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I looked up at both sides of his face. Neither of them were bluffing.
I speared a bean and bit into it. He drove a fork into a piece of steak and fed it into his mouth. It was the first time I was able to truly study his lips. Only the right corner had been seared. The remaining skin was soft and unblemished. He watched me closely as I ate, the silence strangely comforting. We both cleared our plates and lowered our cutlery.
“This is a beautiful room,” I said, glancing around.
He breathed deeply beside me. “I don’t do small talk, Rose,” he said, sharply. “Either say something meaningful or say nothing at all.”
I glared at him. “Fine. Does asking you a question count as meaningful?”
His good eyebrow curved into a perfect arch. “It depends on the question.”
“Why did you pay so much for me?”
His eyes widened for a beat of a second then resumed their nonchalant normality. “I didn’t want to be outbid. When I see something I want, I do everything in my power to get it.”
His confession knocked the wind from my chest so I reached for the glass of wine I’d sworn I wouldn’t touch and drank half of it.
“In the short time I spent researching the auction site, I didn’t see any bid go above ten thousand. You could have bid twelve thousand and still won.”
He brought his own wine glass to his lips. “Where’s the fun in that? Besides, you don’t know that for sure.”
“Most bids I saw settled at a couple of thousand, and even then, the girls were beautiful – like supermodels.”
He lowered his glass slowly and placed it on the table with highly controlled care, then his head rotated towards me. “Are you saying you’re not worth a hundred thousand pounds?”
I swallowed, unnerved by the sudden depth of his voice. “I don’t really think you can put a price on anyone.
“But you put yourself up for sale.”
“Because I need the money,” I said, folding my arms.
The door opened and more waiters appeared. I felt his gaze scorch my skin as we waited for the plates to be removed and a dessert course to be delivered.
As soon as the door closed, he spoke again. “Why do you need money?”
I took a deep breath. “I want to go to university and unfortunately education doesn’t come cheap.”
“Your parents can’t pay for you?” He lifted a fork and dug into a pot of rosemary chocolate fondant.
I looked away and tried to find something distracting to focus on.
“They could. They just choose not to. Besides, I need to get myself another place to live, after my stepfather hit me…”
The clatter of a fork dropping onto a china plate made me jump, but the look on his face made me fearful. “He…what?”
I spoke slowly. “His best friend’s daughter was a bully. I fought back, Jeff didn’t like it, he hit me.”
His pause lingered until my pulse throbbed in my ears.
“So, you don’t have anywhere to live?”
I shook my head. “No. But it’s fine. I’ll stay with friends until I get a university place.” I picked up my own fork hoping to draw a line under the topic.
“Which friends?”
I almost spat out the fondant but swallowed it instead, feeling a large chocolatey lump ease it’s way too slowly down my throat. I took another few mouthfuls of wine. It really was delicious. “College friends,” I replied, eventually. “Why do you want to know?”
“Are they trustworthy?”
