Page 8 of Dating the Billionaire
He was lucky that she hadn’t reacted as defensively as she normally would have and elbowed him in the ribs before turning to plant her knee in his crotch. If she did that now, she could seriously hurt him. His body had reacted to the closeness of hers.
As if concerned that she might start physically defending herself, he loosened his grasp and stepped back. But with his hand on her waist, he turned her to face him. Before he could say anything, though, she lashed out at him.
“You lied to me,” she said. “You claimed you don’t play games, but that’s obviously what this is.”
“What?” he asked—all innocence.
“You’re using me to make your girlfriend jealous,” she said. “And I want no part of it.”
“Girlfriend?”
“Francesca.”
He chuckled. “Francesca is my sister.”
The last of her anger drained away with a soft sigh of relief. But that relief was short-lived when his sister appeared behind them. She wasn’t alone. Another woman accompanied her—one nearly as beautiful as she was. Both of the women glared at her, making it clear to Blair that neither of them wanted her there.
“I should go,” she said, and not just because she wasn’t welcome, but also because she was much too attracted to a man whose life was too complicated for her.
Teo wasn’t used to a woman trying to ditch him. Usually women fawned all over him instead, especially when they realized how much money he had. Not that Savannah knew.
Until someone exclaimed, “Francesca, introduce me to our benefactor! I cannot believe how generous he was to finance the entire gallery for you!”
He glanced over his shoulder to find his sister standing behind him with another woman. That woman looked at him the way women usually looked at him, the way he’d probably looked at Savannah earlier—hungrily. He turned his attention to his manipulative little sister and shook his head.
“Now is not the time,” he warned her.
Francesca was one of the reasons he hated games and manipulation, but she’d learned from the best—their mother. This was the reason he’d brought along a date, because he’d known his sister didn’t want him to bring one. Because she’d hatched some damn plan that he wanted no part of...
Of course she would excuse her actions as just trying to help him, as if he couldn’t find his own damn date. That was another reason he’d joined the service, to prove to his sister that he could find somebody on his own.
Now if only he could keep her.
He turned back to find Savannah walking away from him again. She’d done that entirely too often since he’d met her just a short time ago.
“Please,” he implored her. And he wasn’t used to having to ask anyone for anything anymore, not since he’d been a kid. And he’d learned then that it had done no good to ask; he’d had to make his own way in the world. “Please, stay.”
She stopped, her long body tense.
“I’m not playing games,” he promised.
She turned her head and looked over her sexy bare shoulder at him, one golden brow arched in skepticism. “Really?”
“Not with you,” he vowed. He glanced over his shoulder now, and he was relieved to find his sister walking away from him, towing the other woman along with her. “And I didn’t want to play her game,” he said. “That’s why I chose not to come here alone.”
Her lips curved into a knowing smile. “You were scared to come here alone.”
He wanted to argue with her but found a chuckle slipping out instead. “Touché.”
She chuckled, too. “I understand.”
He suspected that she did; after all, she knew a matchmaker, too, and a professional one at that.
“Yes, you do,” he said. “If you’ll give me a chance, we can still have a fun evening. I’ll call for the driver and—”
“You need to go back inside the gallery,” she said.
He shook his head. “No.”
