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Thankfully it never got old since she needed a nice breathtaking view to distract her from Ferro and all of his questions and smiles and that spicy, masculine way he smelled.
Which was hard to ignore in the enclosed space of the limo. A lot of tech guys had a smell a bit like they’d been living in a cave. And some of them even had a permanent hunch from bending over the keyboard. Had she not hired an image consultant, she very well might have ended up that way herself. Because frankly, in her life, she’d become much more concerned with coding than how she looked to the world. When she’d tried on her own, she’d always come out looking ridiculous. Without a consultant, she was hopeless.
But Ferro wasn’t like that. He exuded a kind of easy charm and sex appeal that most people with his level of intelligence, including her, rarely bothered with.
Not that she could achieve sex appeal, even with professional help, even if she did bother, but it was a nice thought.
“I’ll take your silence as affirmation and move on,” he said, his tone dry. “I don’t want Hamlin to get the account, mainly because I want it. I’m sure you feel the same way about both of us.”
“Yes,” she said, still scanning the shoreline, keeping herself distracted. The limo wound up the side of a hill and she whipped around to look at Ferro. “I thought we were going to your office?”
“My home office.”
She frowned. “Why?”
“I’m not advertising any kind of alliance with you until I’ve had time to figure out how I want it to look.”
“For a man proposing a partnership of some kind you used the word I a lot.”
“Problem?” he asked, one dark eyebrow arched.
“There’s no I in team, Ferro, which you may have heard.”
“I hate clichеs.”
“They’re clichе for a reason. Because they’re true.”
“Not necessarily,” he said.
The limo pulled around a corner and up to a security box with a facade in the same white stucco that was on the houses. It was shrouded by palm fronds and large, flowering plants so that it almost faded into the lush background.
Ferro leaned out the window of the limo and placed his thumb on a scanner. His driver did the same. “You, too,” he said.
“It won’t recognize me.”
“I know,” he said, “and you won’t be given clearance to use your print to open the gate. But I keep records.”
“Fingerprint records! Talk about paranoid.”
“Don’t I need to be?” he asked.
She shrugged and nodded in grudging agreement. Especially since she was one reason he should be paranoid. She wasn’t above snooping for secrets. But he did it to her, too, dammit. Fair was fair. Or two unfairs made it fair…or something.
“Now, you. Print,” he said.
She looked across the seat, across him and out the window. “You want me to just…lean over and do it?”
A flicker of amusement sparked in his eyes. “Yeah. Just lean over and do it.”
Her cheeks heated and she did her best not to make eye contact or show him that he’d disturbed her in any way. She was used to men. She worked with a lot of men, and she’d gotten to the point where their innuendos didn’t really bother her. Especially not when she had her armor on. The face she showed the world. The leather clad, boot-wearing, tough chick who took no prisoners in the boardroom.
That’s just who she would be now. Who she would remember she was now. He was trying to unnerve her. And she didn’t back down. Ever. Not for any man.
She took a breath and leaned over, reaching past him. And came up short of the reader. She cleared her throat and edged a little closer, her arm skimming his chest. Her heart tripped and fell, sending a pang of something deeply disturbing through her body. Something that left her feeling a little breathless and shaky.
And there was the way he smelled again. Closer, she could identify the nuances to it. Spice from aftershave. Soap over skin. Clean, musky, masculine skin…
At least, that was her assumption of what the smell was. She wasn’t overly familiar with the scent of men’s skin, but that was not anything she should be thinking about. And she way shouldn’t be thinking about the way Ferro Calvaresi’s skin smelled.
Scan your thumb and run, you’re regressing!
Regressing to that sad, longing teenage girl she’d once been. Failing to fit in until she’d stopped trying. And then her parents had started trying for her and things had gotten really bad. And then she’d found out what could happen when you tried. When you were vulnerable and soft and trusting.
She shook off the memory, leaned in a bit more and tried to ignore it when the edge of her breast touched his biceps. She tried, also, to ignore the fact that her breath was jammed in her throat and she couldn’t inhale or exhale anymore.
She extended her hand and placed her thumb over the scanner, the trapped breath exiting in a gust when it beeped and she could get herself back over to her side of the limo, with a bit of healthy distance between Ferro and herself.
They continued up the driveway and another gate barred the way. The limo stopped and her heart fluttered against her breastbone like a caged bird. “Are you kidding me?”
He shrugged. “This one just uses a code.”
He keyed it in on the screen of his phone, a phone that she noticed wasn’t as sleek or fast as the one her company had just released, and the gate opened.
“Neat,” she said.
“Does your phone link up to home security?”
“No. But it has really cool gaming apps.”
“How is it that your phones are outselling mine?” he asked, dark brows locked together.
“Did you not just hear me say the words really cool and games? That’s how.”
“There is no practical use in that.”
“Right, and practicality is fine, but the vast majority of people do not have security that screams ‘I’m paranoid.’”
“And how is your security?” he asked.
“It screams ‘I’m paranoid.’ But I don’t need to control it from my phone.”
He lifted his phone. “Admit it, though, it’s very…cool.”
“All right, fine. It is.”
“This is all making my case very nicely for me.” The limo pulled up in front of a massive home, more reminiscent of an Italian palazzo than of the other homes that were set into the hill side.
“What case is that?”
Ferro opened his door and got out, then rounded to her side, opening the passenger door for her. He leaned in and she caught the scent of him again. Her heart tripped over itself again. And then he offered her his hand.
“Stuff it, Calvaresi, this is a business meeting.” She got out of the car, avoiding his touch, and leaned past him, closing the door herself. “If you wouldn’t do that for a male business rival, don’t do it for me.”
“I shall make a note of the fact that my touch disturbs you.”
“Disturbs me? Your touch nothings me. But I won’t have you engaging in subtle power plays here. Tell me what it is you want so I can get back in the limo and make my way back down Fort Ferro and back into civilization. I’m in serious need of some wine at this point in the day.”
“Then come in and have some,” he said. “Because this isn’t going to be a brief meeting.”
“Oh, no, it is, because I can already tell I’m not going to like what you have to say.”
“You won’t like it, but you aren’t stupid. That means you’ll listen.”
“Does it?”
“Yes. My case is this. You have something I need, I have something you need. The only way we’re going to get this deal is by joining forces.”
“I would rather be thrown into the fires of Mount Doom.”
“Noble. But it isn’t going to get you your deal. Working with me will.”
“Wrong. It will get me half a deal.”
“It’s better than no deal. And it’s better than Hamlin getting the deal.”
“And why am I more okay with you getting the deal than Hamlin?” she asked. She knew Scott Hamlin was a big-time jerk, she wasn’t unobservant and the word about him that she heard was never good. She’d hired people who’d come from Hamlin Tech for low level positions and their view of their ex-boss was never flattering. But then, she imagined people who were let go at Anfalas had bad things to say about her and her executives.
She’d scalped a few of Ferro’s employees, too, and the word tyrant came up once or twice. And, if she was asked to sum up Ferro Calvaresi, nice guy wouldn’t be her words of choice.
But, neither of them had ever been accused of sexually harassing employees or female tech bloggers, either. Hamlin was a chauvinist pig with a capital oink, in addition to being generally unscrupulous. And if there was one thing she could not stand it was jackass men who thought they were entitled to a woman’s body just because they were men, or because they paid her wages, or whatever lame excuse they came up with to justify their behavior.
So, yeah, for that? She wanted Hamlin to fry. But she wasn’t going to come off as too eager to Ferro, either.
“The fact that you have to ask proves that you aren’t very familiar with Hamlin.”
“I’m pretty familiar with you and I’m not especially fond of you.” She looked down at her watch. An extravagant, custom-made piece with her patented OnePhone interface built into it, and started the stopwatch. “You have one minute to convince me to go in, Calvaresi, or I walk.”
“Sorry, cara mia, I don’t work that way.”
“So you aren’t even going to try?”
“I only have one thing to say on the subject. Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.”
CHAPTER TWO
“IS THAT SUPPOSED to intrigue me?”
Annoyance coursed through Ferro’s veins and the blame rested squarely with Julia Anderson. But then, it often did. The woman was a menace.
And she was continuing the trend. No one spoke to him like this. No one treated him like this. But then, very few people were so close to being equal with him. Julia’s company had come up from nowhere five years ago and had fast gained worldwide popularity. Anfalas was dedicated to bringing the technology fantasies were made out of into reality.
Needless to say, her vision was a popular one. Creative vision combined with an aptitude for all things tech that came naturally to her in a way he hadn’t witnessed with anyone but…well, anyone but himself. It made her quite formidable.
Though she fancied herself more formidable than she was. She’d proven that without a doubt today. Acting as though she could turn his offer around on him? Assume the power in the situation?
Not likely.
“It was,” he said. “And it did.”
“Did it?” She crossed her arms beneath small, perfectly formed breasts and tilted her head to the side, blond hair cascading over her shoulder in a wave. She was dressed in all black, her signature look. Ridiculous when they lived on the California coast, but he imagined she thought it made her look like a badass.
In his estimation, it made her seem like a pale, spindly, wannabe-goth chick, but she hadn’t asked his opinion.
“There has to be a reason you’re breathing so hard,” he said. “It’s either interest in the project or in…me.” He flashed her his best smile, the one he knew for a fact made women melt in their overpriced shoes. He had the attraction game down to a fine art. He was an expert in enticement. Ironically the women he’d always worked to entice hadn’t truly needed it, but they liked to play like they did. Liked to be seduced. It made them feel desired, and when a man could make a woman feel desired…he ended up with all the power and no need to strong-arm.
“Well, it’s not interest in you, so we can check that off the list,” she said, her lips tight.
He’d honestly thought as much. Julia seemed to have a serious aversion to him. But he could use that against her just as effectively as he could use a feigned seduction. There was always an in with people. Always a vulnerability. A weakness.
Except with him. Not anymore. Eventually a weakness was hit at too many times and it healed over with scar tissue far too thick to penetrate again. Ironic, how a weakness could develop into the hardest point to breach. But it had happened in his life.
“So it must be interest in my plan. In which case, I would ask you to come inside where we might speak privately.”
“You have security that rivals the Pentagon, I’m pretty sure we’re private anywhere on your property.”
“I never take chances.”
“Is paranoia a cultural thing?”
“What?”
“Are all Italians similarly paranoid?”
“Perhaps if they grew up on the streets of Rome. That has a tendency to make you a little paranoid.” A little paranoid. A little lawless. It had a way of searing the conscience so that all the bad decisions just rolled off like water.
Well, not quite all of them. But that was all right, too. Because some lessons needed to be remembered.
“All right. Well. I can see how that might make you a bit more…cautious. More so than me because…the suburbs of Ohio aren’t exactly mean.”
“Now that we’ve gotten the basic information easily found in our bios out in the open, would you like to come in and hear what I have to say?”
She squinted, blue eyes glittering from behind a thick fringe of lashes. “Not especially. But I will.”
“So, I do intrigue you.”
“Don’t let it go to your head.”
“This way.” He put his hand on her lower back and he felt her tense beneath his touch. She was certainly jumpy around him. No melting. No lingering looks. The woman didn’t respond in the way other women did. It would make her more difficult to manipulate. More difficult, but not impossible.
