myself the biggest, baddest motherfucker out there. I’d have the drug dealers and gangs scared of me.
So that was what I’d done.
And then later, I’d had Seb. He hadn’t yet shown me his true colours and I’d thought he had my back to hell and beyond.
Sadly, hell had come sooner than I’d thought.
You think that excuses you being shitty to her?
My jaw ached. Behind me I could hear Petra and Doug talking, Petra flirting a little in the way that she did when she wanted to get someone on her side.
Fuck, I was shitty to everyone. Why should Ellie be exempt?
Yet all I could see was her face as she’d talked about her family’s company, genuine worry glittering in her eyes. Then she’d mentioned that special project, the one that pulling my investment dollars would put at risk.
It was important to her, wasn’t it?
I was supposed to help people when they needed it, not deny them the way I’d been denied. That was why I’d set up my charitable foundation in the first place. And yet, what had I done?
I’d refused her.
If my company had been small and in its infancy, it might have been a different story, but it wasn’t. Evans Investment was just one of a number of companies in my portfolio and giving someone some time before requiring promised returns would have absolutely no impact on my bottom line.
I shouldn’t have denied her.
On the other hand, business was business and if she wanted a favour...
Something clicked into place in my head like pieces of a perfectly constructed building.
I could give her what she wanted, while at the same time solving my own problem. Not that I couldn’t give her what she wanted without making it dependent on me, but I hadn’t got where I was today by being soft. Everything was a deal. Everything was give and take.
I’d give her something and she could give something to me.
Such as her presence as my serious girlfriend in Dubai, for example.
I wouldn’t have to act as if I was into her the way I would have struggled to with someone else. Our chemistry would take care of that. Certainly it should be convincing enough for Delaney.
Hell, I could even sweeten the deal by giving her access to The Billionaires Club and their contacts. There’d be plenty of people there who’d be interested in her electric car project.
In fact, the more I thought about it, the better an idea I found it.
All I needed to do was put the proposal to her.
I didn’t waste any time, putting through a few calls there and then. Bill was more than happy to take an evening off and the chauffeur company was more than happy to accept my exorbitant offer for one night of Ellie Little’s services. It was very late notice, but they could certainly accommodate me.
That sorted, I shoved my phone back into my pocket and turned to rejoin the meeting, trying to ignore the way the lightning in my veins had become hot, electric.
Nothing to do with the prospect of seeing Ellie again, definitely not. I was simply pleased to have solved the problem of how to get Delaney on my side.
Liar. You still want her.
No, I didn’t. Been there, done that, and I didn’t go back.
This was business. Nothing more.
Ellie
I WASN’T HAPPY when the job came through and I almost refused. I didn’t even want to see Ash Evans again, let alone drive for him.
But I couldn’t say no, not if I wanted to stay on the chauffeur company’s books, and I did want to, because my options for money were few and far between.
I’d spent the week since getting back from Paris trying to figure out what my next move should be. I couldn’t bear the thought of calling Dad to tell him I’d failed—not that I had failed. I just needed to...regroup.
Failure wasn’t an option anyway, not when I was the whole reason the company was having difficulty in the first place.
So I accepted the job and tried to ignore my own personal doubts about seeing him again. Tried not to think about why he’d asked for me, especially given how angry he’d been back in Paris.
Perhaps it was for another encounter in the back seat, though if that was the reason then he was shit out of luck. No way I wanted to have sex with him again, not given how emotional I’d been after the first time. And then there had been him getting so furious with me...
No, definitely not going back for that. I wasn’t a masochist.
Thoughts of what we’d done together that night in the limo wouldn’t leave me alone, though.
The whole week I’d tossed and turned in my uncomfortable single bed in the Shepherd’s Bush flat I shared with a few other Australians, my body aching. Unable to stop thinking about him. His hands on my skin, his cock inside me, pushing deep and hard. The weird sense of freedom as I’d given myself up to him...
And you crying like a fool afterwards.
Yes, there was that. I should have been able to put the experience behind me, and the fact that I couldn’t disturbed me.
So, by the time I reluctantly turned up for my shift as Mr Evans’s driver, I was already feeling restless and out of sorts.
The address for the pick-up point was odd into the bargain and I had to double-check it numerous times to make sure it was right, because it seemed very much not the kind of place from which to pick up a billionaire.
A large, featureless council estate tower block, it had a scraggly green lawn out the front with a couple of spindly-looking trees dotted here and there. A group of teenagers were hanging around outside, shouting and playing loud music, and being generally annoying.
There was a grim feel to the place, a kind of hopelessness that made me sad. I might have had a lonely upbringing after losing my mother, but at least I’d had a decent home and food on the table, and no drug dealers hanging around my front door.
I frowned out of the window. Surely Mr Evans wouldn’t be here?
A young woman pushing a small toddler in a stroller approached the entrance to the building, prompting a swirl of attention from the gathered teenagers.
Tension crawled over me and I reached for the door, ready to spring out and go at them if they started threatening the woman.
Except at that moment a tall, powerful figure came striding out. And instantly
