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‘It’s not nonsense.’ Glory felt compelled to point out, since it also wasn’t fair he didn’t believe her when she was telling the truth. ‘That’s what all the gossip magazines say. That you choose a woman to spend the night with and then you give her money or gifts or jewellery or whatever.’
He remained expressionless, his amber gaze never leaving her face. ‘The gossip magazines. I see.’ Unexpectedly, he let go of her hand. ‘Your name, please.’
A small, rebellious part of her, the part that wanted to stand up to him, also didn’t want to tell him, which made no sense, because it wasn’t like her name was a state secret.
‘Glory Albright,’ Glory said with some dignity.
He nodded, then reached into his pocket and brought out a sleek-looking phone. Glancing down, he touched the screen, then turned, raising the phone to his ear as he took a few steps away from her.
Glory looked at the door, then back at the man standing not too far away from her, talking into his phone in a low voice. If she was quick, she could get to the door and get out of this room before he had a chance to move.
Except that won’t help Annabel. Or get you what you want either.
It wouldn’t, it was true. Then again, this whole virginity thing had clearly been a stupid idea from the start, and given his surprise when she’d offered it to him, either the rumours were wrong and he didn’t choose lovers at his parties, or he didn’t want her. Whichever it was, the outcome was still the same: Annabel would not be getting her IVF treatment and she’d remain a virgin.
An odd pain shifted inside her and she swallowed, glancing back at him. He wasn’t speaking English, but some other language she didn’t recognise, low and musical.
Greek maybe? That’s where he was from, wasn’t it? Or at least, that’s where the magazines had said. Maybe they were wrong though.
You should have known better than to believe them.
Of course she should have. She prided herself on being practical and keeping her head down, doing what she had to do.
That’s what she’d done when Annabel had got sick, the small college fund that she’d put aside for Glory having to be used to pay for the cancer treatment. Not that it covered even a minuscule proportion of it.
Glory had had to drop out of school and get a job so the two of them had money to live on, since Annabel had been too sick from the chemo to work. Not that Glory minded. She hadn’t wanted to go to college anyway, and besides, her sister was more important.
It was very good luck that the Jessups’ little grocery store wasn’t far from where she and Annabel lived, so she could walk to work, and they hadn’t minded that Glory had no qualifications. She was polite, quiet and a hard worker, and that’s what mattered most.
Gatecrashing a billionaire playboy’s party and offering him your virginity is hardly polite and quiet.
No, that was true, it wasn’t. Nor was arguing with him. She didn’t like making people angry or upsetting them, and clearly she’d done both, which meant she needed to apologise for that and for ruining his party.
Glory drew herself up, steeled her spine and turned to him.
Only to find he’d finished on the phone and was standing there with his arms folded, watching her with that intent, almost predatory gaze.
It was unnerving.
She opened her mouth to apologise.
‘Your name is Glory Albright,’ he said before she could get a word out. ‘You’re twenty-three years old. You live at number 2A in the Bella Vista apartments. You dropped out of school to work at Jessups’ grocery store, where you’ve been for the past few years. You have an older sister called Annabel who is currently in remission from breast cancer; you have a large amount of medical debt and no insurance. Correct?’
Glory stared at him, dumbfounded.
His gaze glittered in the light and she had the oddest feeling that he hadn’t really looked at her before and that he was looking at her now.Reallylooking at her.
Her in her cheap red dress and cheap red stilettos, and the stupid cloak she’d found in a sale bin in the thrift store. Her with her untidy, unmanageable curly hair that never did what it was told and was probably already coming down from the bun she’d tried to put it in.
Her in the cheap make-up she’d had to borrow from Annabel, that she didn’t know how to apply very well because she never wore it herself.
Glory Albright, the checkout girl who thought she had what it took to seduce a man as powerful as Castor Xenakis.
It was exposing having him know who she was. Know every little thing about her. It made her feel vulnerable and small, and vaguely ashamed of herself, though she had no idea why.
She wasn’t ashamed of who she was or the life she and Annabel had managed to build after their parents’ deaths. They had a roof over their heads and food on the table, and she had a job that while it didn’t pay much, it was at least steady and the Jessups were nice people. And Annabel was in remission. That was far more than some people had.
Glory stared back. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘That’s me. And for the record, if you’d wanted to know all of that, I would have told you. You only had to ask.’
