Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of wearing it, Eleanore?
Yes, but she was no femme fatale and maybe Lukas would somehow get a hint of it and be turned on anyway.
An image of how he had looked at her when he’d told her to take her hair down in the department store drifted into her consciousness. His eyes had gone from sapphire blue to almost navy and she’d felt the kick of the chemistry between them as strongly as a short black laced with sugar.
She knew he was attracted to her. He would just never be serious about her. But that was okay. She didn’t plan to marry the man. Heck, she didn’t even plan to sleep with him. She would just entice him to kiss her and win the bet.
On the verge of calling Olivia for some pointers on flirting, Eleanore changed her mind. Her sister would only want to know all the details and she didn’t want word to get back to Isabelle, who would no doubt think her behaviour highly inappropriate. On that note Eleanore pulled up short. If Isabelle ever found out about the bet would she wonder if Lukas hadn’t given her the contract because he was interested in her personally instead of professionally?
Given that Isabelle hadn’t been that enthused about the project until Eleanore had mentioned that Lukas might have gone to the Chatsfields next she didn’t want to give her sister any reason to doubt her competence on the project. Her nose crinkled as she thought about that. Isabelle was a stickler for doing the right thing; it came with being the eldest and running the family company, no doubt, and Eleanore would never do anything to jeopardise the promotion she was desperate to get but...she also couldn’t deny the tiny thrill that zipped through her at the thought of pitting herself against Lukas Kuznetskov and winning. The man was just so full of himself and her sister need never know about how she’d won the right to have Harrington’s name on the door and she was positive Lukas would never admit to losing a bet with a woman. He didn’t seem the type.
No, it would be fine. She would win and have an even bigger coup to offer Isabelle than just finishing his spectacular hotel. A grin split across her face as she pulled the silky top over her head. She could barely wait for it to happen just to see the look on his face when she won.
* * *
‘You don’t play fair, Eleanore,’ Lukas murmured as she took a seat beside him at the conference table.
‘What are you talking about?’ she asked, darting him a nervous look before pulling as far back in her seat as possible without toppling over.
When he’d arrived at the early-morning meeting she’d been talking with Greg Drummond, the site foreman he’d introduced her to the previous afternoon. Lukas hadn’t like the way Drummond had looked at her then and he didn’t like the way he was looking at her now.
His foreman’s attention was just a little too tuned, his laughter just a little too enthusiastic. Still, it didn’t mean that just because a man looked at a woman’s legs with a glint in his eyes that he was planning to sleep with her.
Well...sometimes it did, but dammit, who was to say Eleanore was even Drummond’s type? Yes, she had a great body her tight skirt and fitted suit jacket did little to hide and a pretty face and incredible eyes with dark silky lashes, but that didn’t mean Drummond wanted her.
Lukas frowned. But nor did he need Drummond turning into some sort of lapdog for a month and becoming so distracted it jeopardised the completion of his hotel.
A feeling of jealousy he’d never experienced before swamped him and vied with logic for top billing. He knew what it was. Last night she had told him she hadn’t wanted him and it had tripped his ego again. So okay, maybe he should just call the whole wager thing off as he’d thought of doing during his morning swim.
And maybe he would have if someone Eleanore was talking to hadn’t made some comment about her shoes—pitch-black stilettos with red soles and a thin red strap that manacled her ankle—because she’d twisted sideways and her calf muscle flexed as she glanced at her feet as if to check what she had put on them. As she did, her suit jacket gaped just enough that he’d been able to see what she had on underneath. Or rather didn’t have on.
It was at that point she’d noticed him in the doorway and the warm smile she’d bestowed on his employees had turned into a stunned moue.
The other staff members had noticed him too, and had made moves to take their seats around the table.
Lukas hadn’t shifted his eyes off Eleanore though and she’d stiffened under his insatiable regard like a soldier reporting for duty. Game on, her body language had said to his, and he’d found himself as hard as an untried youth poring over a girlie magazine.