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‘Anders hardly represents the kind of traditional values Reynaud holds in high regard,’ Ramon said. ‘The guy’s in his midforties and already has two ex-wives. His last mistress looked as if she was barely out of college.’ Ramon smirked. ‘And didn’t a story surface during his second marriage of a ménage à trois with the maid?’
Xav shook his head. He had no interest in the sordid details of Anders’s personal life. Xav took pains to avoid the tabloids—both reading them and being in them.
How did Reynaud view him? He kept his nose clean, but the fact remained he was thirty-five and unmarried. Most people assumed that wealthy bachelors led a lifestyle of indulgence and excess whether they actually did or not.
He did not.
And the redhead upstairs...?
Xav ignored the snide inner voice. Jordan was not an indulgence. She was a sudden distracting itch he needed to scratch so he could move on and re-establish some normality.
He checked the time on his phone and stood. ‘I have another meeting. Are you staying here this afternoon?’
Ramon drained his coffee. ‘For a couple more hours. Lucia has set me up in the spare office down the hall. I’ll come in for a few hours each day this week.’
‘Fine.’ Xav gathered up his papers. ‘You’re staying at Mamá and Papá’s?’
‘Of course. They insisted. Emily’s barely been able to prise Katie from Mamá’s arms.’
Ramon got up and collected his own things.
‘Don’t forget the family lunch on Saturday. Mamá will be upset if you don’t show.’
Xav cursed under his breath. Five days from now... Would he and Jordan have had their fill of each other by then?
‘The apartment’s undergoing some renovation work,’ he said, the lie sliding off his tongue with almost disturbing ease. ‘Stay clear of it.’
The last thing he needed was Ramon stumbling across Jordan. How would that conversation go?
Brother—meet my late birth mother’s stepdaughter. Yes, I’m sleeping with her.
Or at least he would be soon.
It was a thought that tested his concentration as he sat down with the heads of his commercial and legal teams.
That meeting went on for an hour. The next one forty-five minutes—thirty of which he spent in his head, replaying the little speech Jordan had delivered upstairs.
How many people did he know who were as straightforward and honest? Willing to speak their minds even when it discomfited them to do so?
She’d berated him for his behaviour, interpreted his actions with unsettling accuracy, and then baldly stated that she wanted him—all while blushing like an ingénue.
He’d never been so turned on listening to a woman talk.
And he’d never wanted a woman as desperately as he wanted Jordan Walsh.
CHAPTER EIGHT
HE’D TOLD HER he’d be back no later than six.
When he stepped into the elevator it was almost seven. He punched in the security code and felt his heart pound as if he’d taken the stairs instead—all the way from the basement.
Anticipation, he told himself.
Yet he’d be lying if he didn’t acknowledge that his pumping blood also fed a small vein of disquietude.
When Lucia had put a call through from one of the directors right on six o’clock he’d sent a brief text to Jordan advising her that he’d been waylaid.
He’d received no response.
