between jobs, in actual fact. Well, no, that’s not strictly true. I’m a freelance artist, but still quite new to the business. I haven’t had time to make many contacts so jobs are pretty thin on the ground at the moment. Things will pick up. I’m pretty sure of that. But it’s difficult breaking through... I make ends meet working at a pub near to where I live. I can only hope that I get some work soon—perhaps a long-term contract, which would be brilliant. Via word of mouth... Of course I’ve been in touch with every pu—’
‘Enough. Really not all that interested in the backstory. Correct me if I’m wrong, but the bottom line is that you’re broke because you can’t find regular work?’
‘It’s a competitive world out there when it comes to graphic art and illustrations...’
‘Indeed.’
‘I did a secretarial course when I left school...I had a few jobs doing secretarial work, but I didn’t enjoy it.’
‘Expensive choice of restaurant for someone who happens to be currently financially challenged.’
But then that wouldn’t be a consideration, bearing in mind she would have known, if she played her cards right that he would pick up the tab—and if not him, then any other lone punter. This wasn’t a place frequented by paupers. She was sex on legs and that worked nine times out of ten.
Susie opened her mouth to tell him that, actually, her parents would be the ones picking up the tab and promptly closed it—because how pathetic was that? She was twenty-five years old and still reliant on handouts from her parents for the occasional treat. Shame washed over her.
‘Sometimes...ah...you just have to splash out now and again...’ she countered feebly.
‘Maybe your online date would have done the gentlemanly thing and treated you to the meal,’ Sergio humoured her, ‘had he only stayed the course...’
‘I doubt that. Anyway, I wouldn’t have allowed him to do that. The last thing I would have wanted would have been to give him any ideas.’
‘Any ideas...?’
‘That if he paid for my meal he got me thrown in as an added extra...’
She reddened as Sergio looked at her with raised eyebrows.
‘And if I pay for your meal do you think that I might see you as dessert?’ he murmured.
All at once her head was full of images of him having her as his dessert...taking her to his bed, making love with her, touching and tasting her everywhere...
And the way he was looking at her...
It sent thrilling little shivers up and down her spine. His navy eyes were cool, speculative... She was a tasty little morsel and he was idly contemplating the pros and cons of sampling her...
That was what it felt like and, yes, it should have had her bristling with indignation but...it didn’t.
She licked her lips nervously—an unconsciously erotic little gesture that made Sergio shift in his chair, easing the pain of an erection that wasn’t going anywhere.
‘The coat,’ he reminded her softly. ‘Take it off.’
Susie obeyed. She got the feeling that people always obeyed what he said. Maybe that was why he was allowed to take up valuable space in a pricey restaurant without actually putting any money in the coffers by eating. She had thought he was being charming and self-deprecating when he had described himself as arrogant. Maybe he was just being truthful.
The coat came off.
Sergio’s breath caught in his throat. What had he been expecting? He didn’t know. He just knew that if she was out to see what she could get from him, then she had been inspired in her choice of dress, because it displayed every inch of her fabulous figure in loving detail. The tiny waist. The generous breasts. Shapely legs. But she wasn’t overly tall, and he liked tall. She wasn’t brunette, and he preferred brunettes. And she certainly wasn’t a career woman—unless you could call not having a steady job a career choice—and career women were the only women who interested him.
But she was doing terrific things to his libido.
He smiled a slow, curling smile as he inspected her lazily from head to toe and back again.
‘That’s rude!’ Hot and bothered, Susie hurriedly sat down and wiped clammy hands on the dress.
‘Come again?’
‘That’s rude...’
‘Don’t tell me you don’t like being looked at? If you didn’t you wouldn’t be wearing a red dress that leaves very little to the imagination.’
‘It was a mistake buy.’
She was mortified to feel dampness seeping through her underwear and the tingle of her nipples, which had reacted to that lingering, unhurried inspection as though they were being played with.
What was going on? she wondered in confusion. She never reacted to guys like this. She was comfortable around them. Always had been. Yes, she had had two boyfriends, but neither of them had had this sort of effect on her.
Mistake buy? Sergio nearly burst out laughing. ‘Mistake buys’ weren’t small, red and sexy. Small, red and sexy were designed to do one thing and one thing only, and that was to attract a man. To attract, in this case, him. It had worked. He was attracted.
And the way she could barely meet his eyes... She was the very picture of flustered, pink-cheeked innocence. It might be great acting, but the flustered pink-cheeked innocence was as sexy as the dress.
Hats off to her for a new and interesting route to getting through to him. Had she just turned up at the bar wearing the sexy red dress he might have looked but he wouldn’t have gone there. But her storyline... She had enticed him with more than the dress and the body...she had enticed him with her personality—and, frankly, he was in the mood to be enticed.
She was a refreshing change. He needed a break from intellectual women who had opinions and could become borderline tedious on the subject of their high-powered careers. What could be more of a break than a frisky little number who didn’t have a job?
‘I’d dispute that,’ he told her, with that same curling smile that made her short of breath. ‘In fact, from where I’m sitting, it looks like anything but a mistake buy.’
He was hardly aware of their glasses being refilled by a waiter, or of menus being placed in front of them. In fact he was hardly aware of ordering food.
‘So, does the bartending and the occasional picture-painting pay the rent? In London?’ he asked.
‘Just about. I can’t say I have much left over at the end of the month...’
Her parents would have loved nothing more than to install her in their grand apartment in Kensington, which was only used when they occasionally decided to descend on the city for the theatre or the opera, but she had always stuck to her guns and refused the offer.
Pride, however,
