A Cinderella Affair. A.C. Arthur

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      “This is your weekend. For three days it is my job to do whatever I can to make you happy,” Camille remembered saying. It was at that precise moment that he’d walked in.

      The same man she’d bumped into on her way to meet Dana. This was Camille’s first trip to Vegas and her first time in a real live casino. She had no idea that casinos were hotels as well as money pits.

      He’d been extremely attractive and he’d made her nervous. She was happy to get away from him, yet sad that she hadn’t had enough courage to talk to him like a sane adult woman.

      “I want you to sleep with him,” Dana had said as she took another sip from her drink.

      Camille had followed her gaze and immediately began shaking her head negatively.

      “Uh-huh. You are out of your mind.” She had immediately turned her back to the “him” Dana had been referring to, her hands already beginning to sweat.

      “Come on, Camille, he looks positively yummy!” Dana had squealed.

      “Then you do him,” Camille had shot back while reaching for her drink. She’d gripped the glass, brought it to her lips, then decided she needed something much stronger. “Rum and Coke, please,” she’d asked the bartender who thankfully appeared just in time.

      “I’m about to be a married woman, I can’t do him. But you’re single, so you should go for it.”

      Camille had tossed Dana a disgusted look. “I am happily single and couldn’t manage to ‘do him’ if I tried.”

      “What are you thinking about over there?”

      His voice startled her from her memories and Camille jumped in her seat. She’d been so caught up in her thoughts that she’d forgotten she was now sitting across from the man she’d refused to “do” almost six months ago.

      “What? Oh, I’m sorry. What were you saying?” She picked up her napkin and placed it in her lap. She needed something to do with her hands to keep them from shaking. Dating wasn’t something Camille proclaimed to do well. And that was mostly because she was self-conscious about her looks.

      Taking a deep breath, Camille reminded herself that this was not a date. And that while Adam Donovan was her sexy dream guy, she was in no way the subject of his dreams. This was business to him. Business, she reminded herself, was something she could definitely do.

      “I noticed. You were pretty deep in thought. Do you want to share?” he asked.

      He looked at her quizzically, not disapprovingly, she quickly noted. “No. It was nothing.” She cleared her throat. “I’d rather talk about you. I mean, I’d rather talk about your plans for my father’s house and why you approached only one of the owners.”

      Their food arrived so conversation was stalled for a few minutes. Adam had ordered the Porterhouse steak and roasted potatoes with steamed asparagus. Camille’s stomach lurched as the waiter put a huge salad in front of her. She attempted to focus on her salad, sprinkling it with lemon juice instead of salad dressing.

      Adam took a bite and moaned. “Linc has got the best chef in town. I swear I’ve been to just about all of the upscale restaurants in Vegas and have never experienced a steak so tender and seasoned as this one.”

      Camille stifled a moan of her own and stuffed a forkful of lettuce and croutons into her mouth. When Adam looked to her for a response she simply smiled and nodded.

      “Is that all you’re going to eat?” he asked as he cut another piece of steak.

      She nodded. “Yes, I’m not that hungry.” That was a blatant lie and if he could only hear the revolting sounds her stomach was making he’d know that.

      “I never could understand how rabbit food could fill a human stomach. My mother serves a salad with every meal. Made me want to puke when I was growing up.”

      Camille smiled and tilted her head to stare at him. “I’ll bet you were an obedient child,” she said absently.

      “And you’d lose every dime of your money.” He chuckled. “My mother could tell you stories of how mischievous I was. One time when my cousins were at the house I convinced them and my brothers to take the mattress off our beds and slide down the grand staircase in the foyer.” He laughed loudly then. “We had the best time.”

      Camille laughed with him because his smile reached his eyes which held hers captive. She laughed because the deep, sincere sound of his enjoyment touched a spot in her that she was sure she’d lost long ago. “What did your parents do?”

      “Mom blistered my butt something terrible. But that was nothing new. Out of my three brothers I got in the most trouble.”

      Camille stopped eating, placing her elbows on the table. Then as if she were right at the table with them, Camille heard Moreen’s shrill voice chastising her, “Take your elbows off the table.” Abruptly she pulled her arms down and dropped her hands in her lap. She prayed Adam hadn’t noticed but the moment she looked up she knew he had.

      “Ah, are you older than your brothers?” she asked quietly.

      Adam took a sip of his wine. “I am the youngest of the three and I’m twenty-nine.”

      “I don’t have any brothers or sisters.”

      “That must have been pretty lonely for you growing up, huh?”

      “Yes, it was.” She found herself about to tell him how lonely and how painful her childhood had been but then she remembered this was not a social evening. She sat up straighter in the chair and resumed the pretense of enjoying her salad. “So you didn’t tell me why you thought you could buy a property with only one owner’s consent. You and your brother don’t strike me as simple-minded businessmen.”

      He almost choked on his food and Camille quickly lifted his glass of water and handed it to him.

      He nodded and took the glass from her. “Thank you,” he murmured. He took a gulp then set the glass down. “You are correct. My brother and I are not simple-minded. This deal came up kind of sudden. I assumed that Max had taken care of the legwork, which I am sure he did. Details must have gotten misconstrued somehow.”

      “Yes, the tiny detail of my name beside hers on the will. Misconstruing details is right up Moreen’s alley,” she said dryly.

      “You don’t like your stepmother much, do you?”

      “Does it show?”

      Adam chuckled and held his two fingers together. “Just a tiny bit.”

      Camille smiled again. Adam Donovan had a way of making her smile. That was something she wasn’t used to with a man. Actually, she wasn’t sure she’d smiled at all in the past six months.

      “But now that we know there are two owners, we will approach the deal accordingly. Donovan Investments has no desire to cause a family feud or to face any legal hassles.”

      “Good. Then you can tell your brother that there is nothing to approach. I don’t want to sell my father’s house.”

      “So СКАЧАТЬ