else in her life who would do so. The wealth she had grown up with and no doubt taken for granted was no longer there as a buffer either.
So, yes, Gregorio might have put in a word with Michael Harrington regarding employing Lia at the hotel, but his only reason for doing so had been an effort to give her back some of what she had lost.
For Lia to have reached the conclusion she had, that he was blackmailing her into a relationship with him as a result of his actions, was unacceptable. An insult of a kind Gregorio had never faced before.
The nerve in his jaw throbbed. ‘We are having dinner together.’
‘Did you not hear what I just said?’
‘Of course I heard you,’ Gregorio snapped. ‘How could I do otherwise? But, as I said, I will not answer any of your accusations on a public street.’
His bodyguards had parked their SUV behind his sports car and the two men were now standing on the pavement a short distance away, watchful and alert to any and all danger.
‘I have no intention of being alone with you. Anywhere,’ Lia added with finality.
Gregorio stilled to regard her through narrowed lids. That last remark had been made so vehemently...
Lia’s eyes were glittering brightly, her cheeks flushed and her lips full and pink. The evening was warm, and she had removed the jacket of her business suit as soon as she’d left the hotel. The cream blouse beneath was so sheer Gregorio could see the outline of her light-coloured bra. Her breasts were quickly rising and falling as she breathed deeply, the plumpness of her engorged nipples showed as a darker pink through the lace of her bra.
Gregorio slowly moved his gaze back up to her face. ‘You want me too,’ he stated.
‘That’s a lie!’ Lia recoiled as if Gregorio had struck her, pulling her arm from his grasp as she did so. ‘How could I possibly want you?’ Her breathing became even more erratic. ‘When you’re the callous man who helped hound my father to his death?’
Lia heard herself say the words, saw Gregorio’s reaction to them—his expression hardened and his eyes were once again those fathomless black pits—and all the time knew Gregorio was right. That she’d spoken so vehemently because she did want him. And she shouldn’t. For all the reasons she had just stated.
Except her traitorous body was refusing to listen to her. Her breasts felt fuller and more sensitive and she felt the ache of arousal between her thighs.
‘You are lying to yourself, Lia,’ Gregorio dismissed scornfully. ‘We both know that.’
‘Your arrogance is only exceeded by your conceit!’
He gave a hard smile. ‘When you are ready to hear the truth about your father I suggest you give me a call. Until then...’ He turned to nod at the two bodyguards, indicating his intention of leaving.
‘The truth about my father?’ This time Lia was the one to place a restraining hand on Gregorio’s arm, able to feel his tension through the soft material of his jacket. ‘What are you talking about?’
He looked at her between narrowed lids. ‘As I said, call me when you are ready to listen.’
‘And my job...?’
He drew himself up to his full height, a couple of inches over six feet. ‘Your continued employment is not conditional upon you agreeing to see me or listen to me. Or anything else.’ His mouth was a thin line.
Lia’s hand slowly dropped back to her side. ‘I don’t understand you...’
‘Perhaps that is because—as you admitted the other evening—having now spoken with me, you find I do not fit with the preconceived prejudice you felt towards me?’ he taunted.
There was some truth in that. No, there was a lot of truth in that, Lia conceded heavily. Gregorio was arrogant, and used to having—taking—whatever he wanted. But equally there had been no doubting his anger when Lia had made her accusations about his manipulating and trying to force her into a relationship with him.
He had also been considerate and unthreatening at her apartment on Saturday evening. If he really was as ruthless as Lia had thought him to be, then surely he would have forced the issue of wanting her then? He wouldn’t have taken no for an answer when there had been a convenient bedroom just down the hallway.
After all, she might not have been aware of it at the time, but Gregorio had already known he held all the power.
And now he had implied that he knew something about her father that she didn’t.
Lia gave a slight nod as she came to a decision. ‘I’ll have dinner with you in exchange for you telling me what it is you think you know about my father that I don’t.’
She held her breath as she waited for Gregorio’s response.
‘I THOUGHT WE would be having dinner in a restaurant.’ Lia looked dazedly around the interior of the luxurious de la Cruz jet she and Gregorio were now seated on, being flown off to goodness knew where after boarding the jet at a private airfield fifteen minutes ago. ‘I don’t have my passport with me.’
‘We are not going to land anywhere,’ Gregorio assured her. ‘And we do not need to go to a restaurant when I have persuaded Mancini to join us on board for the evening.’
If Lia had needed any convincing that Gregorio was super-rich—up there in the stratosphere wealthy—then the private jet and exclusive services of the chef were proof enough.
Except she hadn’t needed any further proof of this man’s wealth and power.
‘We’re just going to fly around while we eat our meal?’
‘Why not?’ He shrugged. ‘It ensures our privacy.’
Privacy was the last thing Lia wanted with this particular man. A man she knew was starting to get to her, in spite of herself.
Gregorio knew the information he had about Lia’s father was her only reason for allowing him to take her to dinner. Unfortunately his self-control was currently balanced on a very fine edge where Lia was concerned.
She hurled her insults at him as barbs meant to wound. They had succeeded in doing that, but her open defiance of him had also deepened the desire Gregorio felt to make love with her. To be consumed by the fire that burned between them whenever they were alone together. He wanted to strip every item of clothing from her body and gorge himself on her succulent flesh before burning in those flames.
‘Now will you tell me what you think you know about my father that I don’t?’
His gaze became guarded. ‘Our agreement was that we would have dinner first.’
She gave a frustrated sigh. ‘In that case we might as well eat.’
‘So gracious,’ Gregorio drawled as he stood up to remove his jacket.
A delicate
