Bound To A Billionaire: Protecting His Defiant Innocent (Bound to a Billionaire) / Claiming His One-Night Baby / Buying His Bride of Convenience

‘I’ll bet.’

A silence formed.

‘It’s late. I should let you go,’ she said, breaking it. But she didn’t want to let him go. She wanted to have that glorious voice speak into her ear all night. A thought occurred to her. ‘Did I wake you?’

‘I’m watching a film in bed.’

‘Is it any good?’

‘It’s bad enough to remind me why I hate television.’

‘You can’t hate television,’ she said, feigning outrage.

He groaned. ‘Don’t tell me you’re one of those television addicts?’

‘I love television,’ she informed him gleefully. ‘If I was put on a desert island and only allowed to take one thing that would be it.’

‘You’re a heathen.’

‘A heathen with a large collection of box sets.’

His laughter rumbled down the line again, warming her from her lobes all the way down to her toes.

To think Felipe was lying in his bed too...

‘Did you go anywhere for dinner?’ she asked.

‘I had room service in my suite.’

‘So did I.’

‘What did you have?’

‘Jambalaya. You?’

‘The same.’

There was no reasonable answer as to why Felipe independently eating the same meal as her should make her glow.

Another silence formed, this time broken by Felipe. ‘We should get some sleep.’

‘I’m not tired.’ A lie. She was exhausted. But speaking to Felipe had recharged her. She wanted more than a conversation down the phone. The easiness of their talk, the subtle undertones racing beneath it propelled her to say, ‘Do you want to come to my suite for a nightcap?’

There was another prolonged pause with time enough to make her heart expand with anticipation.

‘Goodnight, Francesca,’ he eventually said in such a gentle tone her heart flipped over on itself and her unanswered offer didn’t sting as much as it should.

She hugged the receiver to her chest for a long time after he’d hung up.

* * *

When Felipe strode into the hotel lobby the next morning, the first person he saw was Francesca, sitting on a sofa with her legs elegantly crossed, reading a newspaper.

As if she had a sixth sense to his presence, she tilted her head and immediately fixed her gaze on him. Her lips curved into a smile that made his chest compress.

He nodded a greeting in return.

He’d given himself a sharp talking to that morning, reminding himself of all the reasons he needed to keep his distance from this mesmeric woman. He’d put the phone down after their late-night conversation with an ache in his groin that had still been there when he’d woken.

Her call had caught him off guard. Her husky voice had played down the line, into his ear and into his veins before he could put the mental blocks in place to deflect it.

Her apology had taken him off guard too. Francesca was not a woman who found apologies easy.

That he knew such a thing about her disturbed him on many different levels but nowhere near as disturbing as the strength it had taken to refuse her suggestive offer of a nightcap. He hadn’t been able to refuse in words, not when his tongue had been clamouring with the rest of his body to say yes.

He should have ended the call after she’d made her apology, not allowed that husky voice draw him into further, more intimate conversation.

They had five more days left together and in one respect he was glad they would now be able to get through it without a wishing well full of antagonism between them.

He could laugh at his optimism. He’d only known her a short time but knew perfectly well Francesca was not a woman one could expect to have an easy life with, not even for five short days. Everything she did, she did with passion. Everything she felt was with passion.

He’d felt that passion for himself and, Dios, he craved to feel it again.

He’d never met anyone like her. He’d never desired anyone as he did her. He’d never become aroused at a voice before.

He’d had to force himself to say goodnight.

‘Ready to go?’ he said briskly. He would not allow the spell they’d fallen into during their late-night call seep into the job in hand.

It had been one phone call, he told himself irritably. They’d hardly shared a naked sauna together.

But, naturally, his thoughts immediately turned to the image permanently lodged in his retinas of her sunbathing in that tiny yellow bikini.

Thankfully, today she was fully covered in a simple blue knee-length dress, black fitted jacket and black heels, her dark hair plaited and coiled. She looked ready to step into a courtroom. She also looked as sexy as a siren.

Her light brown eyes widened a little at his tone but her poise remained. ‘I’m ready when you are.’

They collected Seb and James at their lodgings and then drove onto the airport, keeping conversation light and professional. If not for the gleam in her eyes every time she looked at him he could believe he’d mistaken the sensual undertone in her nightcap offer. But the gleam shone brightly. She shone brightly even though she was more together and composed than he had ever seen her.

When she met with the official in charge of the island’s medical service, who in turn expected his own bribe, he was impressed with the way she used a combination of facts, charm and intelligence to deflect him and get him to agree to naming a wing of the hospital after him in lieu of a backhander.

‘Weren’t you tempted to use that technique when dealing with the Governor?’ he asked on the drive back to the airport.

She shook her head and pulled her lips together ruefully. ‘I wish that meeting could be scrubbed away so I could pretend it never happened. I was so excited to get his agreement that, frankly, if he’d asked me to serve him the moon on a dish I would have accepted. I didn’t think the ramifications through clearly. I should have been a lot more prepared.’

He admired her ability not to pull punches at her own faults. The more he observed her, the more he found to admire, from her professionalism to that inherent zest for life she carried with her. ‘You didn’t make the same mistake this time.’

She met his eye and her lips curved. ‘I make it a point to learn from my mistakes, not repeat them.’