“Sounds like that’s something you haven’t tried before.”

“Not unless you count Buzzfeed’s 9 tips to spice up your sex life.”

“Do I even want to know?”

“One of them was having sex in public, as if that wouldn’t get people arrested. Or worse, filmed or photographed for the world to see. And if it’s in nature, you have to start thinking about insects, allergies, rashes from poisonous plants…” The smirk on his lips widened as my list grew. “You’ve had sex in public before, haven’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“A bathroom, a changing room, a plane, a beach, a jacuzzi…” He thought for a moment. “And I once got a blow job in the American Wing at the Met. Not a lot of foot traffic at the colonial furniture collection.”

“You can write a whole listicle for Buzzfeed about that. Wow.” I grabbed my shirt from the back of the sofa and threw it back over my shoulders, Beck watching me with a grin. “Any places you haven’t done it yet?”

“A car, actually.”I raised a brow at him, because that seemed like the easiest and safest place to have public sex in. I had a friend in high school who lost her virginity in a car. That’s how normal it was. “I’m saving that one for you.”

“Oh, that is so not happening,” I laughed.

“No poisonous plants, no allergies, the interior can be sanitized, tinted windows for privacy.”

“The windshield isn’t tinted.”

“I was thinking about the back of a limo.”

“And have the driver hear everything? Hell no.”

“We’ll see.” He smirked. “Monday morning, my place.”

“I’m not having sex in your car, and definitely not on a Monday morning.”

He reached up and pushed my hair behind my ears. “You have a date with my books. Non-fiction. I have a couple that might help you.”

“Can I use highlighter in them?” I asked.

“Sure.”

“Write in the margins? With pencil, of course.”

“You can do whatever you want as long as you don’t dog-ear them.”

“Beck,” I gasped, “I would never!”

SIXTEEN

I tappedthe screen and flipped through to the next page, where I crossed out another useless passage. My lawyers had drawn up a first draft for a prenup, but it was littered with useless paragraphs about international private properties, cars and taking potential future children to live abroad. It was lacking the corporate solutions we needed in place.

They’d clearly not done enough research on Cordelia Montgomery if they thought my ski chalet in Switzerland would be of any interest to her. She may feel pressured to put on appearances at a few events right now, but everyone knew that she wasn’t doing it because she wanted to.

I typed out a quick email to let the legal team know they’d fucked up and told them to hire a marital law specialist. We’d need one to push the merger through anyway. Might as well keep one on the team instead of hiring an outside attorney.

“So? The girl?” Julian asked, snapping his laptop shut and shooting a glance out the window. Our private jet was slowly descending, clouds and blue skies replaced by fields and winding roads.

I’d looked at the files on the flash drive. The proceedings behind the scenes were moving faster than we’d expected. Mostly thanks to Gregory Montgomery being incredibly by-the-book. Not a single cent out of place in his company. Not a noteworthy extramarital affair, not even after his wife’s death, which meant no illegitimate offspring to challenge Cordelia’s claim on the company. The only reason things had stalled in the first place was a claim raised by three senior members of the company, trying to declare Cordelia mentally unfit to accept her inheritance. Except now Blondie was out there flaunting that dazzling smile. And mysteriously all three of those Montgomery employees had left their positions over the last few weeks. Officially, they were citing personal matters and health concerns. Unofficially, not hard to guess why they no longer had a future at that company.

“We can discuss that on Monday,” I replied, “it’s a business matter.”

“The Montgomery merger is huge. If you pull this off, it would be the biggest milestone of our lives. We should-”