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He’d been raised as a gentleman and no gentleman made a move on his best friend’s sister, however tempting she might be. Anna had been supremely tempting. It physically hurt to say “no” to her when she’d kissed him and it wasn’t only because she’d given him a mind-numbing erection. He’d sensed that night that he was turning down more than sex. It was difficult not to harbor regrets.
After room service delivered the wine, Jacob removed his suit coat and tie. He was essentially shedding his armor, but it would make things more informal. If the Langfords were aware that a takeover was in the mix and Adam had sent her to spy on him, this would make him seem less threatening. The War Chest investors had been careful, but some tracks were impossible to cover.
The suite doorbell rang. Jacob had given his personal assistant the night off, so he strode through the marble-floored foyer to answer it. When he opened the door, he couldn’t help himself—he had to drink in the vision of Anna. A stolen glimpse of her in the hotel bar had nothing on her up close. Her sweet smell, her chest rising and falling with each breath, sent reverberations through his body for which he was ill prepared.
“May I come in?” she asked. “Or did you answer just so you could slam the door in my face?” The look in her eyes said that she was only half kidding. He had to give her credit. It couldn’t have been easy to break the silence between himself and the Langfords.
“Only your brother deserves that treatment. Not you.” Jacob stepped aside. He’d forgotten about the sultry nature of her voice, the way it made parts of him rumble and quake.
“I won’t take up your time. I’m sure you’re busy.” She came to a halt in the foyer, folded her hands in front of her, playing the role of steely vixen all too well.
“Anna, it’s eight o’clock at night. Even I don’t schedule my day nonstop. The evening is yours. Whatever you want.” The more time he spent with her, the more sure he could be of her motives.
She straightened her fitted black suit jacket. The long lines of her trousers showed off her lithe frame. “You sure?”
“Please. Come in. Sit.”
Anna made her way into the living area and perched on the edge of the sofa. Palm trees fluttered in the wind outside. Miami moonlight filtered through the tall windows. “I came to talk about Sunny Side.”
Of the things Jacob thought Anna might come to discuss, he hadn’t considered this. “I’m impressed. I thought I’d managed to keep my investment role at Sunny Side quiet. Very quiet. Silent, in fact.” Exactly as he hoped he’d kept his LangTel investments. Was he losing his touch? Or was Anna that good?
“I read about them on a tech blog. It took some digging to figure out where their money was coming from, but I eventually decided it had to be you, although that was just a hunch. Thank you for confirming my suspicions.” She smiled and cocked an eyebrow, showing the same satisfied smirk her brother sometimes brandished.
The times Jacob had wanted to knock that look off Adam’s face was countless, but on Anna? Coming from her, delivered via her smoky brown eyes, it was almost too hot to bear. He was intrigued by this sly side of her, more self-assured than the coltish twenty-year-old he’d first met. “Well done. Would you like a glass of wine? I have a bottle on ice.”
Anna hesitated. “It’s probably best if we keep our conversation strictly business.”
“There’s no business between you and me without the personal creeping in. Your family and I are forever enmeshed.” She could turn this point on him later if she learned of the War Chest’s plans, not that he cared to change a thing about it. The ball was rolling.
Anna nodded in agreement. “How about this? Talk to me about Sunny Side and I’ll stay for a glass of wine.”
Was it really as innocent as that? His skeptical side wanted to think that it wasn’t, but it’d been a long day. At least he could enjoy a glass of good wine and derive deep satisfaction from admiring his nemesis’s little sister. “I’ll open it right now.”
“So, Sunny Side,” Anna said. “They could be an amazing acquisition for LangTel.”
Jacob opened the bottle at the wet bar, filled two glasses and brought them to the lacquered cocktail table. He sat near Anna and clinked his glass with hers. “Cheers.” Taking a long sip, he studied her lovely face, especially her mouth. He’d only had her lips on his for a few moments, but he knew the spark beneath her composed exterior. She could so easily be his undoing. He hadn’t anticipated this beguiling creature resurfacing in his life. Or that she might disrupt the riskiest investment venture of his career.
