came off and there seemed to be a collective sigh of female appreciation as Benjamin Carter was revealed in all his dark masculine beauty. All his dark, masculine, smug beauty.
Lia felt as if she’d been punched in the belly. The fact that it had been him all along was something she couldn’t quite assimilate yet. Or didn’t want to. It was too huge. And now she was being ushered off the dais so that they could get to the next item on the auction list.
The charity’s CEO approached Lia with suspiciously bright eyes, pumping her hand, telling her she had no idea what this would mean for them, and all Lia could think was, I’m going to kill him.
However embarrassed she’d been, standing up in front of that crowd, she writhed with mortification inside to think of the ridiculous flight of fancy she’d taken for a moment, that some enigmatic stranger wanted her enough to bid a million dollars for her company.
Just then a large, warm, callused hand curled around her elbow and she went rigid as sensation shot through her—and the galling confirmation that it was his touch alone that seemed to affect her, and not some general awakening of latent desires.
She tried to tug her arm free but his grip tightened and another shiver went through her—not entirely unpleasant. She refused to look at him, though, even as the CEO of the charity was gushing all over him.
He said smoothly, ‘I was inspired by Miss Ford’s dedication—offering herself up for the good of the charity—and as you know this cause is close to my heart.’
Lia just bet it was. Not. She wanted nothing more than to round on Benjamin Carter and tell him exactly what she thought of his outrageous stunt, but she couldn’t. Not after such a public display of largesse.
Finally he was moving away from the CEO and taking Lia with him, walking out of the function room. People looked and whispered. Lia caught more than a few envious glances and felt like saying, You’re welcome to him! But she gritted her jaw and kept moving.
As soon as they were outside the room, Benjamin Carter walked her over to a secluded corner of the lobby, where tall plants shielded them from general view. Lia finally managed to pull free and turned on him, steeling herself not to react to his sheer magnetism.
For a second she couldn’t get a word out, she was so incensed. She plucked at the ribbons of her mask behind her head and pulled it off. She felt very bare without its protection, but ignored it.
Benjamin Carter’s gaze had lowered to where her chest was heaving with indignation and shock. She folded her arms pointedly. ‘What the hell do you think you’re doing?’
He raised his gaze and put his hands in his pockets, supremely at ease. He drawled, ‘Apart from displaying immense generosity, I would have thought the rest was fairly obvious.’
‘That,’ Lia spat out, ‘was the most ostentatious, crass demonstration of wealth I’ve ever seen in my life.’
Something tightened in his expression, but Julianna didn’t feel regret.
‘You didn’t look especially enthralled at the thought of kissing Saul Goldstein.’
She fought not to shudder at the image in her head of the other man’s fleshy mouth. She tipped up her chin. ‘I would choose to be kissed by him any day of the week rather than spend a minute in your company.’
He made a mocking sound. ‘Such strong feelings, Lia...’
She cursed her out-of-control emotions, feeling heat climb into her cheeks at the thought that she was behaving far beneath her usual levels of decorum. Even so, she said, ‘Only friends and family call me Lia—and you’re neither.’
He put a hand to his chest. ‘I’m wounded...’
Lia all but snorted. She couldn’t imagine anything wounding this man. He was like a force of nature. Immune to any kind of threat. And certainly immune to her sustained animosity, which she was very afraid stemmed from a place that had nothing to do with the threat to her father’s business and everything to do with a far more personal threat.
‘You didn’t have to accept the bid,’ he pointed out. Annoyingly.
Lia unfolded her arms to put her hands on her hips. ‘You didn’t reveal your identity until after I’d accepted the bid. How could I then turn down a million dollars for the charity?’ She shook her head, desperate not to let him guess for a second what deeper desires had led her to accept the bid. ‘You painted me into a corner, Mr Carter. I had no choice.’
His eyes gleamed bright blue against the olive tones of his skin. ‘We always have a choice, Lia.’
His insistence on goading her seemed to get lost for a second in the way he said her name, making her think of how intimate it had felt to talk to him out on that terrace. She decided that his calling her Lia was a lesser battle and not to be fought right now.
She started to pace, feeling edgy. So much for believing earlier that her antipathy would have somehow magically signalled to her who she was dealing with. She stopped and looked at him accusingly. ‘You completely tricked me from the moment you came up to me, hiding behind your mask. Why didn’t you tell me who you were?’
‘Why didn’t you?’ he riposted.
Lia made a sound of frustration and her hands became fists at her sides. ‘You had an unfair advantage with your mask. Obviously you don’t experience many women walking out on dates with you, but if this is just because your pride is dented then—’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
The steel underlying his deep voice stopped Lia.
‘You really think I’d be so petty that I’d pay an extortionate amount of money just to buy a weekend with a woman who walked out on a date?’
The man in front of her bristled with lots of things...none of which was pettiness. Lia was suddenly aware that she wasn’t sure if she wanted to know exactly why Carter had paid all that money for her.
‘There’s not going to be a weekend,’ she said tightly. ‘It’s ridiculous to think that I would go off with a complete stranger. Everyone will appreciate that it was just a stunt.’
He shook his head and came closer to Lia. She fought to stand her ground and not back away. He was so close now that the disparity in their sizes was apparent again. It brought back the memory of standing on the patio and looking up...aching to feel his mouth on hers...reaching up to take his mask off and having his hand close around her wrist... It was as if she’d blocked it out at the time, but she realised now that she had felt the rough skin of his palms on her skin. But she’d ignored it.
The fact that less than an hour ago she’d been reaching up to kiss him made her feel exposed all over again. She couldn’t even contemplate the suspicion that on some level she’d known who he was all along.
Lia was aware that her reactions to this man were completely out of her control, but she couldn’t seem to rein herself in. This close to him, she couldn’t focus. All she could feel was the threat to her equilibrium and the desire to get away from him. Far away.
‘Look,’ she said, purposely making her voice as chilly as possible, ‘I don’t know how things work here in America, but in England we don’t really go in for such crass displays of wealth.
