sat back and watched her with interest. She gave a very confident performance, running through her assessment of the company’s position within the holiday market, running through her proposals for increasing their slice of that market. She’d obviously done a lot of research before starting work here today. No wonder she had been so shocked to see him. He’d managed to keep his ownership of the company out of the financial news so far, mainly because he’d wanted to be one step ahead of his competitors, but it was an added bonus that he’d managed to snare Katie back into working for him in the process. He’d wanted her for this job all along—he’d known she would be perfect for it.
For a moment his eyes slipped down over her body.
OK, that wasn’t all he wanted; he acknowledged the truth as he felt the sudden fierce pull of attraction for her. She had a fantastic figure, and he remembered all too well how much he had enjoyed exploring those sensational curves. Beneath that strait-laced exterior he had found her to be hot and passionate, and he had wanted her from the first moment she had looked at him with those innocently come-hither, violet-blue eyes.
And he still wanted her now.
That fact was eating him away. It was crazy—there were other beautiful women he could replace her with, women who were only too eager for him. Why did Katie haunt his thoughts? Why, from the first moment when she’d told him it was over, had he wanted her back? It wasn’t like him. Since his divorce eight years ago he hadn’t got emotionally tied up with anyone. Nor did he plan to—he would never get serious about a woman again.
Yet he hadn’t wanted to let Katie go. He’d had to force himself to walk away and continue as normal. And despite the fact that he’d been gaining control of two new companies, and had been up to his neck in work, she’d been on his mind morning, noon and night…especially night.
The answer had come to him today when he’d looked at her again. She’d haunted him because she’d dented his ego; it was as simple as that. Usually he was the one who ended relationships; he was used to calling the shots. As soon as things started to get complicated or he’d had his fill of someone he moved on. But Katie had ended things before he was ready. They had unfinished business. It was called lust.
It was a relief to finally know why she had unsettled him so much. And there was an easy remedy for lust. All he had to do was get her back into his bed again and take his fill of her.
She looked over at him at that moment, and he smiled. Then he watched the blaze of fire in her eyes, noted the way her skin heated up as she moved her attention away.
She wasn’t as coldly indifferent to him as she acted. It shouldn’t be too difficult to have her back on his terms, he told himself confidently. Acquisitions had always been his strong point. And this time he would be the one to finish things.
‘So, has anyone got any questions?’ she asked briskly.
As he’d predicted a few members of the board gave her a tough time, started to grill her more intensely, but she more than held her own. After a few more minutes he could see that there was a shifting change of attitude and she was winning them over.
‘Well, I think you have just about covered everything, Katie, thank you,’ he said smoothly.
She nodded and started to close her notes. ‘Then, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll leave you to the rest of your meeting, gentlemen, and I’ll press on.’
‘Certainly.’
Relief coursed through her. She couldn’t wait to get out of here.
‘Just one last thing,’ Alexi added nonchalantly. ‘There is another meeting at the office in New York tomorrow, and I will need you to attend.’
She looked up and he held her eyes.
‘Tomorrow?’ Apprehension clutched at her stomach. ‘That’s rather short notice, isn’t it?’
‘One of those things.’ Alexi shrugged.
‘What time is the meeting?’ She wrenched her gaze away from him, picked up her pen and looked back at her notepad.
‘No need to sort flights; you can come with me on the company jet later.’
Katie’s head jerked up. She felt like she was already on that plane and it had just dropped into free fall from thirty-five-thousand feet. Her whole body was telling her that being alone with him for hours was not a good idea! She wanted to say, no way, but how unprofessional would that look?
‘I think it would be sensible to sort things out in the USA as soon as possible,’ Alexi continued coolly.
A few of the people around the table were starting their own conversations now, and under cover of the sudden babble of noise she wanted to lower her voice and tell him that she didn’t think it was a sensible idea at all. That she didn’t want to be alone with him—that she couldn’t handle this situation, couldn’t act as if nothing had happened between them!
But she didn’t say any of those things—she had her pride. Instead her eyes remained locked with his, and her heart thundered so hard that it felt like it might break out of her chest. ‘I suppose so.’ She said the words tightly.
‘Good. I’ll pick you up at seven this evening.’
Was it her imagination or was there a gleam of triumph in those dark eyes?
She looked away from him and picked up her notes with hands that were not entirely steady.
‘I’ll see you later.’ What else could she say or do? she wondered furiously. This was about work. He had her in an impossible situation.
CHAPTER THREE
IT WAS almost seven in the evening, and Katie was pacing her apartment. Her weekend case was packed, and the professional side of her was ready to go—but emotionally she was reluctant.
In fact when Alexi had rung her at her desk earlier, to confirm flight times and the time for picking her up, she’d tried her best to get out of it.
‘Is this trip really necessary so soon?’ she’d demanded heatedly. ‘Don’t you think it would be better for me to get to grips with the job here and get on top of a lot of this paperwork before sorting out the US side of things?’
‘You can sort some of the paperwork out on the flight. I need to press ahead as fast as possible with this,’ he’d answered without hesitation. ‘So be ready and waiting for me.’
Then the line had just gone dead. He’d hung up on her.
The nerve of the guy! OK, he was her boss—but that didn’t mean he owned her twenty-four-seven. He at least owed her the courtesy of some advance warning!
Her mobile phone zinged with a message now as she tried to pull herself together. She took it out of her pocket and opened it. It was from Alexi. It was strange, seeing his name on the screen after all this time. She’d thought he’d probably deleted her number from his phone weeks ago. She’d certainly meant to delete his, she’d just… Well, she hadn’t got round to it.
Quickly she read the message: I’m outside—don’t be long. Anger twisted inside her. Four weeks of nothing and then a curt summons. Then she
