Her voice hit top register. Her heart was pounding as she heard his dark-chocolate chuckle against her ear.
She wanted to tell him she didn’t usually sleep naked. It had just been so hot last night and she couldn’t get comfortable, even after a cold shower. But she knew he’d put two and two together and realise it wasn’t the summer heat that had kept her from sleep, but thoughts of him. His ego was big enough already.
‘Why are you ringing, Donato?’
‘It’s not enough that I want to hear your voice?’
That sounded like a parody of her own feelings. She tried to despise this man who was a crony of her father’s, who’d toyed with her last night. Yet she kept the phone pressed to her ear, luxuriating in the soft rumble of his voice. As if she wanted that flurry of desire rippling through her.
Ella shuffled up in the bed, yanking the pillows up behind her so she could sit. Lying naked in bed with Donato’s voice in her ear was wrong on so many levels.
‘Get to the point, Donato. Why did you call?’
‘Do you usually sleep so late?’
Ella peered at the time, stunned to find it was after nine. ‘No.’ Usually she was up at six to fit in Pilates or a swim before work.
‘So you had a disturbed night? Were you dreaming about me?’ That thread of satisfaction in his voice grew stronger.
‘Is there a point to this call?’ She sighed ostentatiously as if she hadn’t indeed spent half the night taunted by dreams of him. ‘Or do I hang up now?’
‘Give me your address so I can collect you. We’re having lunch together.’
Ella scowled. She told herself it was because of his assumption she’d go along with what he wanted. But what unnerved her was the little jiggle of excitement that skipped through her.
‘Ella?’
‘If you’d invited me to lunch I’d be obliged to thank you for the invitation before I declined. But as there was no invitation that’s unnecessary.’
‘Absolutely,’ he said smoothly. ‘Because we will be lunching together.’
Ella shifted against the pillows. She shouldn’t enjoy this fruitless argument. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to end the call. Not when basking in the sound of Donato’s voice was the closest she’d come to enjoying a man’s company in a long, long time.
What did that say about the state of her love life?
Pathetic! That was it.
‘What’s your address, Ella?’
‘I’m surprised a man with your resources doesn’t already have it.’ Her father would have given it to him in an instant, if he’d been able to find it. ‘Don’t tell me your dossier on the Sanderson family doesn’t include something so basic.’
‘I don’t have a dossier on your family.’
‘I thought you’d be a better liar, Donato.’
Instead of taking offence he chuckled again, the sound like warm water lapping through her veins. Ella’s hand on the phone grew clammy and her bare nipples budded. Frowning, she snatched the sheet and dragged it up, anchoring it under her arms. As if that would protect her from whatever this magic was he wove around her.
‘I have a dossier on your father’s business and on his private...interests.’ Ella winced, not liking the sound of that. There were some things she didn’t need to know about her father. ‘And some information on your sister.’
‘You told me you didn’t set your investigators onto her!’
‘I didn’t need to. A quick trawl through the social pages was more than ample.’
Ella hated the way he dismissed Fuzz as if she were nothing. Her sister might be flawed but she wasn’t as bad as all that. She just needed purpose, and freedom from their father’s influence.
‘Really?’ Her voice dripped disapproval.
‘It seemed a sensible precaution since your father suggested I marry her.’
And now Fuzz was out of the picture that left Ella.
Ella glanced around the bedroom with its Monet print on the wall and her pride and joy, the nineteen-twenties tub chair she’d rescued from a garage sale and reconditioned with the help of a night class. The wooden legs glowed with polish and the sage-green upholstery was restful as well as pretty.
The idea of strangers nosing into her world, ordinary as it was, picking through the details of her life, set her teeth on edge.
‘I don’t make it into the social pages. How much have you found out about me?’
‘Not nearly enough.’ The skin at Ella’s nape drew tight at the sultry note in that deep voice.
‘Your investigators only work business hours? You disappoint me, Donato. I’d have thought they’d scurry to do the bidding of a man with your reputation even late last night.’
‘You’ve been doing some digging of your own.’ He didn’t sound fazed.
‘Don’t tell me you’re offended?’
‘On the contrary, I’m pleased. It proves that, despite your rather emphatic goodbye, you anticipated meeting me again.’
Ella scowled. He was right. Why bother finding out about him if she’d cut him from her life? She’d had an insidious certainty it wasn’t so easy to get rid of Donato Salazar.
No, it was more than that. She’d wanted to know everything she could about him. No man had ever made such an impact on her.
‘And as for hiring investigators to work through the night...’
‘Yes?’ She shifted uneasily. Was someone even now interviewing her neighbours or accessing her records?
‘You made it clear you believed that an unforgivable breach of privacy.’
‘So?’
‘So I’m not going to do it to you.’
‘Sorry?’
‘You heard me, Ella. I’m not in the habit of saying things I don’t mean.’
For a moment words eluded her. ‘Just like that? Because I said so?’
‘Just like that.’
Ella’s pulse faltered then tripped to an unfamiliar beat. He was serious. Yet she couldn’t quite believe he’d renege on using the power his money could buy just because it offended her.
Why would he do that?
She shoved her hair back from her face. To her amazement her
