‘Yes. I’m a man of my word.’ That was the one good thing people could say of me. When I gave my word, I stood by it. ‘Plus, I can introduce you to a few key people at my club. You might find future sources of income for your own project.’
Strangely, colour rose in her skin and she looked away. ‘I need to get Australis back into the black before that happens.’
Her response wasn’t what I’d expected—given the sparkle in her eyes when she’d spoken about it before, I’d thought she’d be excited to talk about it. But again, this wasn’t about her as a person. This was about her as my date.
‘So, do we have a deal?’ I asked, leaving the subject of the car alone. ‘You’ll come to Dubai?’
She glanced back at me, her expression unreadable.
And a word escaped me, a word I never said to anyone. A word that I didn’t need to say to her, not given the power I had over her. Yet it came out all the same.
‘Please.’
Her expression softened. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Okay. We have a deal.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Ellie
THE FIRST THING I realised on accepting Mr Evans’s deal was that I had nothing to wear. Or at least nothing that a ‘serious girlfriend’ would wear to a billionaires event in Dubai.
I didn’t wear dresses or skirts or make-up—I hadn’t since my mother had died—and had never seen any reason to start. But even I knew that I was probably going to have to scrub myself up for this. Sadly, my chauffeur’s uniform—the nicest, most professional clothing I had—was probably not going to work.
Which meant I was going to have to buy something nicer.
However, that required a level of female know-how I did not have.
A couple of my flatmates could have helped, but I was reluctant to tell them what was going on. They knew me as Ellie the chauffeur and the thought of asking them to help me buy dresses made me feel strangely self-conscious.
Luckily, Mr Evans had an assistant called Petra, who soon took charge of Operation Get Ellie Ready for Dubai by taking me out on a shopping spree the Saturday before we were due to leave.
It took me all of two seconds to realise that the shops she was taking me to were so far out of my price range they might as well have been the sun to my poor, poverty-stricken Pluto, and that there was no way I could afford it. I quickly told her the situation but she informed me crisply that this was a business trip and that Mr Evans would cover any and all expenses. Then she ignored my protests, dragging me into yet another designer shop on Bond Street.
She was very good at getting her way. Some of the dresses and skirts she made me try on I protested about, uncomfortable at seeing myself in the mirror looking so...female. But again, she ignored me. She even got me into a gown—a green thing made out of some gossamer-like fabric that wrapped around me like a second skin—and then bought it, not even blinking at the outrageous price tag.
Business expenses. Bloody hell.
Eventually I ga
ve up protesting. If Mr Evans wanted to pay for all that bullshit, who was I to argue? He could probably pass the dresses on to his next girlfriend anyway and, besides, I had bigger things to think about.
I called Dad that night with the good news that Mr Evans wouldn’t be pulling his investment from Australis any time soon, and he seemed pleased, though, as always, it was difficult to tell.
He didn’t thank me—both of us knew that if it hadn’t been for Mark we wouldn’t have been in the position of me having to go to Mr Evans to start with.
Yet, even though I’d expected it, Dad’s response sat in my gut like a small piece of glass, cold and sharp. He didn’t ask how I’d managed to get Mr Evans to listen and I didn’t tell him.
He didn’t need to know that in return for doing what I had for Australis, I had to promise to go as Mr Evans’s date to some billionaire event in Dubai.
I still didn’t know why I’d agreed. I’d demanded at least that Mr Evans tell me his reasons for lying to some guy so he could get a bunch of islands and also get one over on his half-brother.
I hadn’t expected him to tell me, but he had. And it was clear that as much as he was angry with his half-brother for losing the money his mother had invested, he was also angry at himself, too.
The blame game was something I was familiar with myself, and I couldn’t help feeling for him. But that wasn’t why I’d agreed in the end.
It was the way he’d said ‘please.’ As if the word was foreign to him and he didn’t know its power, but had said it anyway.
And because he’d needed something from me and it had been far too long since someone had needed anything from me.