‘I do,’ she flung at his back.
Ari gritted his teeth and tried to remain calm as she continued.
‘Now you’ve said something—’
‘Actually, you said something. Had you come to me instead of seeking verification from your colleagues, they would’ve been none the wiser.’
‘So you’re saying this is my fault?’ Outrage filled her voice. ‘And can you turn around when I’m talking to you, please?’ she snapped.
With another sigh, he started to turn. ‘I think you’re blowing things out of proportion—’ He stopped dead when he caught his first glimpse of her.
Her hair was a long, dark, wet ribbon curling over her naked shoulder. And she wore a black bikini with the thinnest strings that looked as if they were about to succumb to the laws of gravity. Heat punched into his gut so viciously, he had to lock his knees to keep from stumbling backward against the floor-to-ceiling window behind him. Around her waist, a carelessly knotted black sarong rested on her hipbones.
‘I’m not blowing things out of proportion. The fact is you’ve severely undermined me in the eyes of my colleagues.’
‘Did it occur to you that singling you out for attention could be for a beneficial reason rather than a detrimental one?’
He couldn’t breathe. And he couldn’t move. Even though words emerged from his mouth, his tongue felt thick and all his blood was rushing painfully south. In exactly one minute, she’d know the effect she had on him.
The intensely crazy, intensely electrifying effect he’d thought he had under control.
Her mouth dropped open and her eyes widened. ‘I...no, I didn’t.’
His smile felt a little tight around the edges. ‘Perhaps you should’ve given it a little further thought then. As for David and Cynthia, don’t rule them out completely. They may be receiving phone calls as well. You may simply have been lucky number one, this time.’ His gaze slid over her once more and he wondered how many other people had seen her in that bikini, her exquisite body on full show? He forced himself not to think about it.
She frowned. ‘I find it hard to believe that you check on every single employee...’ She stopped and took a breath. ‘Ari, why did you really do it?’
The sound of his name on her lips sent hot lust-filled darts to his groin. ‘Why does it upset you so much?’ he murmured.
Her eyebrows shot up. ‘Are you serious? I have to work with these people!’
He shrugged. ‘Then I’ll leave it in your capable hands to smooth things over, assure your colleagues that my HR director was conducting a simple employee assessment and you jumped to a conclusion. Because that’s what really happened.’
‘God, you really expect me to believe that, do you?’
‘I do.’
‘You must think I’m really gullible.’
‘If I did, you wouldn’t be working for me. And you shouldn’t take too much stock in what others think of you. Unless that’s the problem here? Are you saying you don’t trust your own judgement, Perla?’
She froze. Before his eyes, her face leached all colour. Her fingers twisted around each other in a clearly distressed way that made him curse inwardly. ‘Yes,’ she whispered raggedly. ‘That’s exactly what I’m saying. I’m...I’m not a very good judge of character.’
The visible distress made something catch in his chest. Before he could think better of it, he closed the distance between them and took her chin in his hand. This close, the scent of her warm body mingled with the chlorine from her swim hit him in the throat. His blood pounded harder, but Ari consoled himself with the fact that with her gaze on his, she wasn’t witnessing what her proximity was doing to him below the waist.
‘What makes you think that?’
‘I got it spectacularly wrong with you, didn’t I?’ she asked.
His mouth firmed. ‘But I wasn’t who you were thinking of just now.’ He knew it as certainly as he knew his name.
‘What, you read minds now?’
‘No. But, unlike you, I can read people. Who was it, Perla?’ he asked, although he had a fair idea.
‘Does it take a genius to figure out that I misjudged the man I married?’ she said, confirming his theory. ‘I thought he was someone I could depend on. Instead, he...he...’ She closed her eyes and shook her head. The pain in her face and her words struck a dark chord within him. A chord he absolutely did not want struck.