Though it took her breath.
“I think you have Larissa’s appearance well in hand,” he said after a moment, as if she had not spoken at all. His gaze flicked over her, and she took the absence of criticism to mean approval.
How sad you are, she told herself when she realized she actually felt a little glow go through her at the thought of his approval. As if that was the Holy Grail.
“Is that how you play this game?” she asked quietly, clamping down on her anger—at herself most of all. “You will simply pretend not to hear me as it suits you?”
“If you are planning to throw a childish tantrum,” he said in his dark, commanding way, making her flush too hot and feel that warmth sear the back of her eyes—was she so eager to please him? “Please let me know now, so I do not pointlessly rearrange my schedule.”
“Heaven forfend,” she murmured. She glared at him with all the force she could manage, which, unsurprisingly, had no noticeable effect on him at all. “It’s not as if I’ve given up weeks of my life, and rearranged everything. Why should you be inconvenienced?”
He gazed at her, and this time, even though she knew it was deliberate and that he intended for her to feel foolish and small, she had to bite down on the inside of her cheek to keep from squirming. But she could do nothing about the way she flushed yet again, or the creep of that red heat across her face and down her chest.
And even then, , there was still that part of her that wanted nothing more than to reach out and touch him.
Damn him.
“If you’re finished,” he said, so calmly. So coolly. “I think it’s time for a field experiment.”
Theo studied her in the flattering light that spilled through the floor-to-ceiling windows, bathing the trendy SoHo restaurant in afternoon sunshine. She looked radiant. Beautiful, serene.
And she was driving him slowly insane.
He had lost sleep over this woman, an occurrence so rare that he had not allowed himself to admit it was possible until he found himself standing at his window in the dark of night, drinking whiskey and brooding. And thinking only of the way she’d argued with him—the way she’d looked at him as if she hurt for him.
He could not seem to wrap his head around that. He could not make sense of it.
He no longer knew what he saw when he looked at her. It had all become tangled. Knotted and snarled beyond any possible redemption. He had shared things with her he’d never shared with anyone, and he’d tried to slap her back down when it had all become too much—and none of it had helped. And yet he found himself mesmerized by the way she held the heavy silverware in her delicate hands, the way she sneaked glances around her when she thought he wasn’t looking. And why shouldn’t she? This was the restaurant of the moment. Had Theo cared to, he could no doubt have identified most of the other patrons packing the place, as they all had to be very famous, very wealthy, or both, to get in at all.
What was this childish part of him that wanted her to know that? Wasn’t it enough that he knew it?
He had no idea what was happening to him.
“Tell me about your childhood,” he heard himself ask, breaking the silence between them. He toyed with his glass, and could not seem to breathe when she licked her full lips. Was that an indication of her nerves? Or this same fire that burned in him? He decided he didn’t care. Nothing mattered but this lunch, this woman, this moment. Surely.
“Is that an order?” she asked, that challenging look on her face.
“Merely a request.” But he smiled slightly, because she never quit, this woman.
“I hesitate to make myself more human in your eyes,” she continued crisply, cutting into her steak with a certain deliberate precision that he suspected was the only outward sign of her temper, aside from her tone of voice. “That might make me exist independent of your permission to do so, and then where would we be?”
His smile deepened. “The futility of the fight never seems to faze you,” he murmured, as much to himself as to her. She was his very own Don Quixote, tilting wildly at any windmill that caught her attention, and he could not help but admire her passion. Her foolish courage.
She put down her silverware with a thunk and met his gaze. Hers was that color between brown and green, and it called to him. So serious. So sincere. So unreasonably brave.
“Whereas you try to dominate everything you come into contact with,” she countered. “Whether you need to prove something or not.”
“You make me sound like a stray dog, humping your leg,” he said dryly. Her eyebrows rose, and she did not refute it. He laughed then, throwing his head back and letting it pour from him—because she was right. Something about this woman made him feel reckless and untried. As if he had to prove himself. No wonder he was acting like a fool. When he looked at her again, her bright eyes looked almost dazed.
“I didn’t know you were capable of laughter,” she said, clearing her throat. She looked away, then back at him with her cool mask back in place. “I thought it was all gloom and ghosts with you.”
“You don’t know me very well,” he said. He leaned forward, and idly picked up her hand, sliding his palm against hers, reveling in the contact. “But I assure you, I have better technique than a randy dog.”
She pulled her hand away, but not before he felt her tremble, and saw the heat bloom in her cheeks, in her gaze.
“I’ll have to take your word on it,” she said primly. He sat back in his seat and she watched him warily for a moment. “Why this change of heart?” she asked. “Last night you were in a high temper, and now you want to know about my childhood? Why?”
“There is no reason we can’t be friendly, Rebecca,” he said, his voice low. Insinuating. He hadn’t meant to sound as if he meant to seduce her … had he?
“There is every reason,” she said, her voice husky though he could see how she fought it—it was written across her face. She sat straighter in her chair. “For one thing, the fact that you keep calling me by the wrong name. It’s Becca, not Re-becca.”
“Becca is a nickname for Rebecca,” he replied, shrugging.
“It is,” she agreed, smiling tightly. “If your name happens to be Rebecca. But my mother named me Becca. B-E-C-C-A. No nickname. No longer name. Just Becca.” She tilted her head slightly as she looked at him. “Is that part of how you assert control? Play your little dominance games? You don’t like someone’s name so you change it—and they’re too afraid of you to complain?”
“I hear no fear at all, but a great deal of complaint,” he pointed out, still lounging across from her, almost idly. “This tactic cannot be very successful, can it?”
She pressed her lips together, then dropped her hands into her lap. He imagined he could feel the table move, as if her knee was bouncing in its usual agitation, and then it stopped—as if she’d slapped it down with the hands he couldn’t see.
“What is the point of this?” she asked, finally. “You don’t care about my
