‘What I need is for my usual PR manager to discuss the launch of a seven-billion-dollar operation in Mexico and Brazil. Do you feel you can discuss the nuances of that, Miss...?’
‘Jones,’ Beatrice supplied and, despite the tension humming between them, she was glad he hadn’t heard of her. Glad for some of that Greek anonymity to be here in this room.
‘Well, Miss Jones—’
‘Please, call me Bea,’ she suggested, aware that she needed to break down his barriers—and quickly—if she was going to have any hope of defusing this situation.
Bea. The name was short and brief, jarring and unpleasant. He dismissed it, wondering why she had chosen to use this moniker instead of her actual name. In the back of his mind, Ares knew he was being a first-rate bastard. He could see the pretty young woman was close to snapping point and it was an excellent indication of the kind of day—scratch that, month—he’d been having that he didn’t care.
But ‘Bea’ had raised an excellent point. He’d come to Clare Roberts about three months after she’d opened the firm a couple of years ago, and he’d never once wavered in his choice to support her fledgling PR company. He’d witnessed her go from strength to strength and had always admired the work she’d done for him. Surely she’d earned a little leeway from him?
Yes, she had, undoubtedly, but at the moment all of Ares’s leeway was in use.
His phone began to buzz in his top pocket.
‘Now, just give me a moment, and I’ll see if Clare’s made any—’
He held up a hand to silence her, reaching for his phone and swiping it to answer. He understood the look of displeasure that crossed Bea’s face at his obviously rude gesture.
Another tick in the ‘bastard’ column for him.
‘Lykaios,’ he barked into the receiver.
‘It’s Cassandra.’
He closed his eyes, his stomach immediately sinking. The fact that the nanny he’d hired for his infant niece was calling yet again was definitely not a good sign. The last time it had been to beg off the assignment, telling him she wasn’t equipped to ‘cope’ with the child. Danica was only five months old! How hard could it be?
‘Go ahead.’
‘I gave it another shot, I did, but honestly, she’s impossible.’
He tossed his head back, staring up at the ceiling as he rubbed his fingers across his neck. ‘Isn’t that what you’re supposed to be trained to deal with?’
‘I’m a nanny, not a magician.’
He could have laughed if he wasn’t already at breaking point. ‘Your résumé and references are excellent,’ he reminded Cassandra.
‘Yes, I know. But I don’t generally work with infants, and definitely not infants like Danica. She needs—’
‘Whatever she needs, she can have. But right now, I need you.’ He compressed his lips, the sense of flailing out of control horrifying him, so he stood taller, straighter, staring directly ahead at the wall across the room. ‘Double the agreed salary, Cassandra. Just do your damned job.’ He hung up before she could answer, confident the exorbitant pay he was offering would be too tempting to turn down.
It wasn’t Bea’s fault, but when he turned back to her, his mood had dipped into oblivion.
‘You are telling me Clare thinks so little of my business she has disappeared into thin air and left only you to help?’
The insult hit its mark. He almost regretted the words. It was beneath him to treat anyone like this. But the look of fire that stoked in the depths of her eyes was fascinating and somehow compelling. He moved closer, bracing his palms on the back of the leather chair she kept trying to wave him into.
‘I’m not sure what your implication is,’ she murmured, her cultured English accent irking him far more than it should.
‘Aren’t you?’ he drawled, a mocking smile curving his lips. He wasn’t amused though. He was frustrated and angry, just as he’d been since his younger brother had checked himself into rehab—thank God—after too many benders to ignore, stranding the infant Danica with Ares, a man completely unsuited to being responsible for anyone, let alone a baby. All his life he’d been taking care of others, and failing them at the same time. His mother. His brother. And now his niece. Why wouldn’t they see that Ares was a loner—not meant to be depended on by anyone?
He dug his fingers into the back of the chair until the flesh beneath his nails turned white.
‘Look, Mr Lykaios, I appreciate how you must be feeling. This is so unlike the London Connection. You mentioned you’d flown into London for the meeting. Will you still be here tomorrow?’
‘I wasn’t planning to be.’
Her delicate jaw moved as she bit back whatever it was she’d been about to say. Goading her was giving him the most pleasure he’d felt in weeks. Irrational and stupid, he knew he shouldn’t bother, yet sparking off this woman offered a kind of tension release.