The Billionaire's Elusive Lover (2 page)

“Yes,” she replied, pulling her heavy camera bag closer defensively. His anger she could deal with. This new challenge was different, and oh so much more intimidating. She didn’t understand why her heart was beating frantically and her breath seemed to be caught in her throat. She leaned back, wishing she could stand up tall and face the challenge he was silently issuing but, for some reason, she was terrified of the new threat. “I do freelance photography.” She swallowed hard and licked her dry lips.

He watched the movement of her tongue, noted the increased pulse at the base of her long, sexy neck and smiled lethally. “So you owe me, as far as I can see.”

Helen blinked in confusion. “I owe you?” she gasped. “How so?”

He moved in closer, his eyes noting the small shiver that ran down her slender form and the slight color that was pinkening her lovely, high cheekbones. “You are here in my building, using my office to take pictures which you’re then going to turn around and sell to someone else, probably a magazine or some sort of collection, correct?” he stated.

His questions suddenly made sense and for a moment, she was suddenly extremely disappointed that this conversation had turned to profit. She shrugged as if she did this kind of negotiation all the time. . “You want a portion of the sale, is that it?” she asked, her heart falling to her stomach because she wouldn’t get much for the pictures and every penny counted when one was a photographer.

His eyes didn’t reveal any hint of his next words so they took Helen by surprise. “No. You owe me dinner,” he stated firmly. He took her bag from her shoulder and started walking away.

Helen gasped, completely off kilter with his demand, and thrown completely for a loop by his action. “What are you doing with my cameras?” she almost yelled, chasing after him as he started to leave his office. “Give them back!”

“I’m not taking them from you,” he said, turning so suddenly that she plowed into him. His arm immediately went around her waist to hold her steady, her small frame trapped against his taller one and he immediately liked the feeling. He saw her mouth open and his mind had to work hard to control his body. He wanted this woman. And if his body had anything to say about it, it would have to be soon. “I’m simply carrying them for you until we reach my car. This bag is heavy.”

Helen tried to form a thought but she couldn’t. Her mind was spinning and her fingers itched to touch him, to further investigate the hard muscles that her body was currently feeling. Her hands touched his arms to steady herself and her eyes followed, fascinated by the muscles underneath the smooth Egyptian cotton of his shirt. He was amazingly strong, she thought absently.

Her mind clicked back, refocusing on the issue at hand and dismissing her fascination with his body. “I can’t go to dinner with you.” She quickly dropped her hands down to her side and prayed she wouldn’t fall down.

“Why not?” he asked, enjoying her breasts that were pressed against his chest. They felt full and soft and extraordinarily good.

“Um….because….” she couldn’t think when he was this close. She needed to put space between them but her arms and legs weren’t following the direction from her brain. “Because,” she said once again but this time, it came out only as a whisper.

“Not a good enough excuse,” he said softly, his voice husky as he watched her attraction for him on her face and in her beautiful, expressive soft green eyes. He stood up quickly and released her, knowing that remaining in that position would only scare her. He’d only met the woman fifteen minutes ago and all he could think about was getting her into his bed. From the wariness he was seeing, he would have to take things a bit slower than he’d like.

He turned and walked out of his office. “Edith, call The Westin and get a table for two in…,” he glanced at his watch, “twenty minutes,” he said to the still nervous Edith as he passed by her desk.

Helen raced along behind him, her mouth dropping open at the mention of the very exclusive restaurant located in the heart of the financial district of London. Now that she had some breathing room, her anger was able to diffuse the more mystifying feelings she’d been experiencing. She liked anger much more. It was cleansing and helped her regain her focus. “She can’t get a table on this short a notice at The Westin,” she snapped, instantly defending the woman who had helped her earlier. “That’s impossible.”

In response, Alec turned back to look down at the brunette, his dark eyes holding her green ones hostage. He didn’t say a word but simply waited, listening for Edith’s voice. He smiled wolfishly as his secretary calmly informed the maitre’d of the restaurant that Alec and a guest would be arriving shortly. “Thank you very much, Jeffrey,” she said. Placing the receiver down, she smiled at Helen. “The table will be waiting for you when you arrive,” she stated efficiently.

Helen shook her head in amazement. “How is that possible? You need reservations so far in advance it isn’t even worth trying. And yet you call up only a few minutes before you want to eat and you get a table?”

“Of course,” Alec replied. “This way.”

He walked to a private elevator which opened immediately for him. He waited for Helen to enter but held back his chuckle at her obvious irritation as she followed at a slower pace, every movement of her slender figure showing him her irritation.

They rode down the elevator in silence and stepped out into a parking garage where his chauffer was already waiting with the back door open. Two other men stepped into an SUV parked behind the limousine while a third stepped into the passenger seat next to the chauffer.

“Who are they?” she asked, slightly nervous of the angry looking men with black suits and suspicious bulges at their sides.

“My security detail,” he replied curtly before putting a hand to her back and urging her into the car.

Helen watched nervously until they were all in the vehicle. As soon as the door closed, the car sped away.

She sat in the back of the limousine, her arms crossed over her chest and wondered when she had agreed to have dinner with him. This was crazy! She should demand that he pull over the vehicle and let her out.

Just as her head turned towards him and her mouth opened up, he stopped her with a simple denial. “No,” he said, obviously reading her mind.

Helen decided to play dumb, give herself time to formulate a response. “No, what?” she asked, knowing he couldn’t really be reading her mind.

“No, I’m not letting you out of the car. So sit back and enjoy the ride. We’ll be at the restaurant in a moment.”

Helen tried not to show her increased irritation at the accuracy of his mind reading but she couldn’t help the small breath that he heard. “How did you…?” she started to say.

He laughed, enjoying the expressions flitting across her face. She was beautiful yes, but still young and everything she was thinking was transparent on her face. “Your eyes darted to the door handle and then scanned the sidewalk, Helen. I didn’t have to read your mind. Reading your body language and facial expressions is easy enough.”

He chuckled at her disgruntled expression, then let his eyes go lower. Did she realize that her arms were pushing her breasts higher? That he could see her nipples through the thin layer of her shirt? Did she have any idea how desirable she looked right at the moment?

“What do you do, Mr. Dionysius?” she asked, desperately wanting some way to get him to stop looking at her. She was embarrassed that he could read her so easily and wanted to figure him out as well. Any clue she could garner from conversations that might give her the upper hand, if only for a moment, would make her feel much better, more in control.

“Call me Alec, Helen. And what do you think I do?”

Helen shrugged her shoulders. “I can’t imagine. I’m guessing you’re pretty awful.”

“Why would you say that?”

She smiled impishly, loving the fact that she was about to give him a good set-down. “Obviously a lot of people hate you. Otherwise, you wouldn’t need the extra body guards. I’m guessing they’re here to keep the throngs at bay?”

Alec laughed softly. “Yes, at times, they keep the paparazzi out of the way. But they have other purposes.”

“What would those other purposes be?” she asked, wishing she knew who he was. She felt at a disadvantage. He looked like he knew so much, whereas, she barely knew his name.

“I don’t think you want to know,” he said simply and enjoyed the frustration in her beautiful green eyes. He wasn’t just being annoying. He didn’t want to worry her about the potential threats that he received occasionally or the fact that, due to his wealth, there was a constant threat of kidnapping. They might live in the civilized world where these things were more rare. But they weren’t unheard of and unscrupulous people would do a lot for even a fraction of the money in only one of his bank accounts.

Helen eyed him carefully before shrugging and looking down. “I probably don’t although leaving it that way leaves much to the imagination.” She laughed and peeked back at him before saying, “I can imagine a lot of things people might want to do with you.”

Alec threw back his head and laughed before his amused glance settled back on her delicate features. “Yes, and I can imagine several things I would like to do with you,” he countered and was rewarded by seeing her soft skin turn pink once again.

She should never have dared to challenge him, she thought to herself. He could dish it out much better than she could. “More evidence that you need those guards,” she grumbled. “You never mentioned what you do, Alec. I’m guessing you’re in investments or something boring like that.”

“Why are investments boring?” he asked, not confirming or denying her question.

Helen shrugged. “I don’t know. It just seems like a horrible life to be stuck in an office all day, never really getting outside and seeing what’s going on?”

“I guess you get to do a lot of that in your line of work?”

She smiled and nodded eagerly. “Oh, yes. I love watching people and making up stories about them. Sitting in the park or at a coffee shop, I get to see so many people, all of them rushing around, working or just reading something as they relax. Sometimes I catch interesting people through my camera and I can’t wait to get back to my flat and develop the pictures to see if I captured their expressions in the same way I saw them on the street.”

“You make up stories about them?” he asked, stunned at the possibility.

“Of course.” She looked at him with a curious expression. “Don’t you?”

“Never. What kinds of stories to you make up about the various people you see?”

Helen looked out the window of the limousine, a dreamy smile on her face as she thought about some of the people she’d seen today. “Oh, I don’t know. Lots of things. If there’s a couple, I look at their body language. If they’re stiff and smiling politely, I assume they’re on their first date and wonder about the conversations they’re having, what new information they’re finding out about their potential life mate. If they’re angry, then they’re having a fight about which school their kids should attend or maybe about the color of the sofa they want to purchase…” she stopped and looked back at his face, noting the ever present amusement. “Don’t you ever wonder what other people are thinking?” she asked, more curious now than angry.

“No.”

Helen scowled back at him. “Of course you don’t,” she said, obviously miffed. “You don’t like people very much, do you?”

Alec hesitated on his answer, not wanting to disillusion her on the pretty way she viewed others. “Let’s just say that I get to see a different variety of people in my day to day life that don’t lean towards possible romantic outcomes.”

Helen surveyed him and saw the cynicism in his eyes and felt sad for him. Odd, she thought as she looked at his dark, mysterious eyes, ten minutes ago she wouldn’t have guessed that she’d actually feel sorry for a man as obviously strong and wealthy as Alec. “I guess you see the bad in people a lot.”

Alec didn’t answer, but simply shrugged.

“And that’s why you have the security detail?”

Alec was suddenly uncomfortable with the perceptiveness of her comments and the way she was looking at him, as if she could see some sort of hurt inside him that simply didn’t exist. He didn’t really answer her question but said instead, “I protect my privacy.”

Helen grinned. “You mentioned the paparazzi. Are they really that bad? Are you some sort of movie star?”

Alec laughed. “I guess you don’t get to the movies very often, do you?”

She grimaced. “Not really. People on the street or in a playground are much more interesting than a group of actors spewing out the lines someone else wrote for them to speak. Life is too interesting as it happens.” Then she realized she might have insulted him and looked worried. “You’re not really an actor, are you?” she asked, pained to think she might have hurt his feelings.

Alec couldn’t believe what a soft heart she had. He was shocked to watch the mischievous look turn to true concern over the possibility of him being upset at her words. “No, I’m not an actor.”

She instantly relaxed. “Whew!” she said and leaned back against the soft leather seat. “I was worried for a moment.”

“We’re here,” he said and couldn’t believe he was actually disappointed. The truth was, he wanted to stay and talk to her in private. She was fascinating and he was concerned that she would change once they were in a more public setting. Having no alternative, he stepped out of the car, then turned to offer his hand to help her out.