She opened her mouth to argue, but then wondered if he was laying a trap for her. Getting her to go down memory lane and rehash their failed relationship, rather than stay on track and discuss her reason for being here.
‘I’ve got all the financials for you,’ she said, pulling a USB from her handbag and pressing it across the table. ‘It’s password-coded with your birthday.’ Her voice hitched a little as she admitted the detail, but she’d wanted to protect the documents in case anything happened to the USB, and hadn’t wanted to use her own birthday, in case he didn’t remember it, and had to admit that to her.
‘Fascinating, but I told you, I do not buy partial stakes. That’s not how I do business.’
‘I’m aware of that. Did you think I’d come here tonight without doing my research?’
‘Then you’ve wasted your time.’
‘If you look at the details, you’ll see it’s still a good deal for you. What we can do in the market—’
‘My date is here,’ he said, moving from the booth, his jacket in one hand, his legs brushing hers beneath the table, so sparks flooded her bloodstream. He stood, unfolding to his full six anda half feet, his lap at her eye height, so she had to quickly wrench her gaze to his face. ‘Excuse me, Annie. I’d say it was nice seeing you again, but we both know that would be a lie.’
He began to move away, to greet a woman who’d just walked in, wearing a denim mini skirt so short it almost showed her bottom, and a camisole top with lace trim. Her hair was blond and glossy, and hung halfway down her back.
Annie watched as Theo’s demeanour changed, his smile easy as he drew the woman into his arms and then kissed her on the lips. It was only brief, just a few seconds, but Annie acknowledged she could have lived her whole life quite happily without ever having to see that. It was bad enough that she’d seen photos of him with women clinging to his side like limpets, but those had been still photographs—a world of difference between that, and this.
Still, she’d come this far. She reached for the USB and curled it into her palm, crossing the bar and almost knocking a waitress off her feet in her haste to reach Theo and his date. They had already stepped outside by the time she caught up to them, and Annie, on autopilot, extended a hand to curve around his arm, to get his attention.
Theo glanced back at her, frowning, looking at her like he barely knew her now.
Hurt spread through Annie, but she refused to feel it. Later, when she was back in the hotel room, she’d wallow in the shame and degradation of this whole experience, but for now, she needed to make some headway.
‘Just look at the financials,’ was all she felt capable of saying, given the other woman was now staring at Annie, too. ‘My phone number is in the document. I’m in Sydney for another two days. Take a look, and then call me.’ She cleared her throat. ‘Please, Theo.’
For a moment, his eyes narrowed, and then, without nodding, or uttering a word of reassurance, he took the USB from her and slid it into his pocket.
‘Goodbye, Annie.’
She watched him walk away with no idea if she’d ever hear from him again.
Chapter Two
THEO COULD HAVEgone a very long time without ever hearing the name Langley again. Annie had been one of the biggest miscalculations of his existence—and Theo didn’t generally make mistakes, particularly not with people, and certainly not with trust.
Yet, hehadtrusted her. She’d worked her way through his carefully maintained defenses, wearing him down with persistence, and her insistence that she wasn’t what he thought. So he’d let her in, bit by bit.
When Annie had turned eighteen, she’d drunk too much champagne with her snobby friends and begged him to kiss her. It had been a dare, he’d later found out, from the redhead she was always with—Bianca someone or other. They’d thought it was funny, how much Annie moped about after him with her oversized crush—given that he was just a street kid who’d moved into a mansion next door and never really belonged. He was certainly not someone anyone in that clique thought good enough for Annie Langley.
He’d refused to touch her.
She was barely more than a kid, and he hadn’t been interested in providing entertainment for her entitled social circle.
But at twenty-one, it had been different. She was older, more experienced, completely sober, and as far as he knew, begging him to kiss her was all her own idea. Her friends were nowhere to be seen. And by then, he was the heir apparent to the Georgiades’s fortune—his foster parents, having no children oftheir own, and having been blown away by Theo’s business aptitude, had signed everything over to him. He was his own man, making his way in the world.
So, he’d kissed her.
That should have been the end of it. Except, even then, there’d been something addictive about Annie Langley. Something dangerous, too, because she seemed like the kind of person who could make him want what he’d never wanted before: to be needed. Loved. To want to stick around.
Theo had more than an average amount of experience with women; only Annie hadn’t been anything like the women he usually slept with. She was so innocent and artless in her reactions, so responsive and hungry for him. It was a miracle they hadn’t slept together that night—even more so that they hadn’t slept together at all. Waiting had seemed right, with Annie.
At first, he’d done everything in his power to control their relationship. He’d wanted to keep Annie boxed into a single partition of his life. He enjoyed spending time with her, but he wouldn’t let her shift his focus. Already, he’d made sweeping changes to his foster parents’ business model, revolutionising their core values, increasing their wealth. He owed it to the child he’d once been to continue working towards his business success.
Yet night by night, in ways he still didn’t understand, she pushed at the walls of the partition he tried to keep her contained in, so that while it still existed, it morphed into something so much larger than he’d ever intended. She became the first thing he thought of when he woke up, the person he went to call when he had a success.
And then, she’d ended it, because her parents had told her he wasn’t good enough for Annie. The worst part of it was that he knew her parents thought that, because her father had toldhim. Had tried to buy him off to end the relationship; had told Theo that he was the kind of man Annie needed to steer clear of. Didn’t Theo understand that Annie was aristocracy? She was destined for greatness, and Theo was certainly not that.
He could never forget that conversation. As a street kid, he’d been called a lot of things, but somehow, hearing them from Elliot Langley had cut him to the quick. Because deep down, he’d wanted the other man’s acceptance. The more he came to care for Annie, the more he knew it would be essential to earn her parents’ approval to keep her in his life.