As a teenager, he’d fallen in with some dangerous criminals. Learning to read micro expressions had helped him survive. That he’d not picked up on the passionate woman concealed beneath Harper’s professional exterior pointed out just how complacent he’d become.
Time to wake up and start paying attention.
She cleared her throat. “Getting back to Chef Cole...”
“I’ll hire him if you spend an evening with me.” This time he was deliberately hitting on her.
She set her hands on her hips and scowled at him. “Five minutes ago you were ready to pass on him.”
“Five minutes ago I didn’t realize just how starved for adventure you were.”
“I’m very happy right where I am.”
“When the first thing on your bucket list is riding a camel in the desert and sleeping in a tent, forgive me if I don’t believe your life is as satisfying as you’d have people believe.”
“I don’t have a bucket list,” she retorted. “And if I did, that wouldn’t be the first thing on it. It was just something that popped into my head. I remember you doing that in an episode of The Culinary Wanderer.”
“You’re a fan?”
“Before I get into business with someone I do my research.”
Sensible. But he hoped that hadn’t been her only motivation. Swept by the urge to see her let her hair down, literally and figuratively, he decided to ignore her verbal cues and concentrate on what she was saying with her body.
“And your research involved watching my shows? I would have thought you’d be more interested in hard facts such as the financials of my four other restaurants and the uptick in advertising revenue my show brings to the network.”
“All those things paint a very positive picture of you. I also spoke with a number of your employees and several of the crew who worked with you on your shows. As I said, I do my research.”
Obviously she knew much more about him than he knew about her. The imbalance bothered him. “Then you know the sort of businessman I am, and when I say I’m willing to hire a chef you favor, it’s not done lightly.”
With her gaze firmly attached to his left shoulder, she murmured, “In exchange for a night with me.”
“I proposed an evening.” He couldn’t help but laugh at the conclusion she’d jumped to. “You have a naughty mind if you think I’d barter hiring Cole for sex.”
Hot color flared in her cheeks. “That’s not what I was thinking.”
“Oh, I think it was. I told you that hellcat was going to get you into trouble.”
“I misspoke.”
“I don’t think so.” Now that she was off balance, he decided to keep her that way. “I think it was a Freudian slip. You want me. You just can’t admit it.”
“What I want is for you to hire a chef and get him trained to your exacting standards so I don’t have to worry about what happens after you leave.”
She’d taken refuge in exasperation, but it wasn’t fooling him.
“My offer still stands. Give me one evening and I’ll hire Cole.”
“Why would you want to spend an evening with me?” She looked as frazzled as he’d ever seen her.
“I thought you’d be interested in tasting the dishes I’m considering for the restaurant.”
Her eyes narrowed. “And that’s all there is to it?”
“Of course.”
She regarded him in silence for several heartbeats before replying. “Hire Cole. You need someone accomplished to run your kitchen while you’re off playing celebrity.” With that, she pivoted on her conservative black pumps and strode across to his bag. Snagging the handle, she pulled it after her. “I’m taking this as collateral,” she called over her shoulder.
It was a silly gesture—taking his clothes hostage wouldn’t prevent him from getting on a plane—and so unlike Harper, the consummate professional. Ashton’s gaze followed her, appreciating the pronounced sway of her hips. Thinking she’d put one over on him had injected a trace of strut into her stride.
“I will hire him,” Ashton promised her. “And you will spend the evening with me.”
“Sampling your menu.” Her words floated back to him.
He’d been right about the hellcat lurking beneath her skin. It had been asleep far too long and he was the perfect guy to rouse it.
His final shot chased her out of the restaurant. “I’m going to make it a night you’ll never forget.”
Two
Smugness from her encounter with Ashton lasted about a second as she strode out of the restaurant and headed toward her office. What had she been thinking to walk off with his luggage? He must think she’d gone mad.
Well, hadn’t she?
She’d agreed to an evening with him. Harper had no doubt she’d signed on for more than a private tasting of his menu. Which meant she was in big trouble. Already her mouth watered at the prospect of being the beneficiary of his culinary prowess. As long as that was the only prowess he plied her with, she might survive the evening without making a fool of herself. If he decided to test her level of resistance to his manly charms she wasn’t going to maintain her professionalism very long.
Her skin burned as she thought of how he’d called her on her assumption that he wanted sex in exchange for hiring the chef she preferred. Not once had she suspected Ashton was the sort of man to make such a sordid offer. So why had she jumped to that conclusion? Even worse, why had she lobbed the accusation at him? Naturally, he’d presumed her misunderstanding represented her deepest desires.
And he was probably right. For the past nine months she’d been complaining that the real Ashton Croft wasn’t as wonderful as the one on television. But that wasn’t exactly true. His persona on TV was charismatic and amusing. He was the cool guy everyone wanted to hang out with. The flesh and blood Ashton Croft was no less appealing. It was just that the travel series didn’t fully convey the masculine energy of the man. The rawness of his sex appeal.
Most of the time she focused on how frustrating he was. She was terrified of being bamboozled by his dimples and rakish grin. If he had any idea how easily he could knock her socks off, he’d probably go after a few other items of clothing, as well.
Harper shook her head at the thought. She was not going to sleep with Ashton Croft. It would be different if they’d met in some exotic locale; she could see herself being one of his random hook ups. The next morning, she would chalk up the evening as an adventure worth having. Hadn’t she spent tedious hours on the treadmill imagining all sorts of spicy scenarios where she bumped into Ashton at a vineyard in Tuscany or on a walk around Dubrovnik’s ancient city walls? There they would
