Boardrooms of Power. Heidi Betts

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ to settle down, he would doubtless want that same docility from a woman who would be content to serve him, have his children and patiently stand by while he worked all the hours God made. Behind the passion and seduction of his work, he would require a soothing, calming domestic life.

      ‘Is that why you’re looking at me with such disapproval?’ Gabriel asked and Rose caught herself with a little start. While she grappled with the dilemma of working out how to lead the conversation back into safe waters, Gabriel seized the moment to press her for an answer.

      ‘Was I?’

      ‘Oh, yes. Your little mouth was pursed tightly with disapproval!’

      Rose glared at him and he grinned back at her, knowing very well that his description would have got under her skin. It wasn’t like him to tease. Up until now she had rebuffed every effort he had ever made to move their relationship on to a more cordial basis and he had obligingly backed off, but something had changed and, although he couldn’t put his finger on it, he knew that he was rather enjoying the change.

      He smiled down into the glass of wine he was cradling in his hand. She had stuck to water but, with a driver waiting patiently for him outside, he had decided to have a couple of drinks.

      ‘What you do in your private life is entirely up to you.’ Rose heard the primness in her voice with mounting irritation. ‘If you choose to go out with women whose IQs are in single figures, then that’s your business!’

      ‘Ah. I never took you for an intellectual snob,’ Gabriel murmured in an infuriatingly meek voice.

      ‘I am not an intellectual snob!’ Rose defended hotly.

      ‘And how,’ Gabriel continued with pseudo-thoughtfulness, ‘can you condemn women who like having money lavished upon them unless you’ve been in that position before?’ He paused. ‘Have you?’

      ‘No, but…’

      ‘I mean, how do you know that you wouldn’t enjoy being taken to the finest restaurants? Having pearls and diamonds bought for you? Being flown to Paris or Venice for the weekend?’

      ‘I don’t recall booking too many flights to Paris or Venice for weekend jaunts,’ Rose said tartly. Gabriel had no problem in spending vast sums of money on gifts for the women who came and went in his life but setting aside time for them was an entirely different thing. He rarely had time off and when he did he invariably went back to Italy to visit family. She should know. She didn’t think he had ever booked a flight himself.

      ‘You know what I mean,’ Gabriel said irritably.

      Torn between abandoning the conversation and standing up for herself, Rose took the plunge and for once set aside her determination to keep her thoughts to herself. ‘I don’t have to have expensive things bought for me to know that it wouldn’t be what I wanted. My parents both instilled in us a healthy awareness that money doesn’t buy happiness.’

      ‘Oh, I know that money can’t buy happiness,’ Gabriel agreed readily. ‘At least not happiness of the lasting kind, but it can buy fun…’

      ‘Depends if you think fun is having a six-month fling, dusting yourself down and moving on,’ Rose muttered.

      ‘I take it you don’t think it is…’

      ‘This is a ridiculous conversation. Weren’t we supposed to be talking about work? Apparently, I need to be brought up to speed just in case I get left behind.’

      Gabriel knew damn well that his comment had been totally unjustified, but hell, he had invited the woman out to dinner only to find that she had no desire to go so apologising wasn’t on his list of priorities. Nor was discussing work. He couldn’t think of anything duller than discussing acquisitions, profit and losses, breakdowns in supply and demand with one of his hotels, not when the alternative was so much more interesting.

      ‘There’s no chance that you’ll get left behind, Rose,’ he said placatingly. He nodded to the waiter to clear their plates and when another glass of wine was offered he looked enquiringly at her dubious expression.

      ‘Please don’t tell me that that nasty concept called fun also includes the occasional bit of alcohol…’ That, he was pretty sure, would really get her bristling, and it did.

      ‘Of course I have a drink now and again! I do have a life outside work, Gabriel.’

      ‘Tell me about it.’ He was in there like a shot, having dispatched the waiter to bring them a glass of wine each. Large. ‘No boyfriends with lavish spending habits—that would be unhealthy and bad for the soul…’

      Rose opened her mouth to respond and then shut it. Instead she gave him a wry look. ‘The devil finds work for idle hands, Gabriel. I feel very sorry for those poor girls if you were like this with them.’

      ‘Like what?’ Gabriel asked piously.

      ‘Barbing them.’

      ‘None of them would have been equipped to handle it.’

      ‘Or maybe you respected them more…’ Rose insinuated quietly.

      ‘Don’t be bloody ridiculous. Is that what you really think? That I don’t respect you? Or are you just fishing?’ When she didn’t answer, he raked his fingers through his hair and gave her a brooding, frustrated look. ‘They were bloody useless, the lot of them. I meant it when I said that I needed you, Rose. I do.’ His magnificent blue eyes flicked over her and he added, wickedly, ‘Need you and want you…’ He watched slow colour infuse her cheeks.

      Rose, accustomed to his brilliance, his impatience and his temper, which was seldom directed at her, was thrown off balance by his flirtatious charm, something which she had always assumed was abundant but reserved for the women he dated. She didn’t like it. It made her feel vulnerable and uneasy and she stoically hung on to her composure and managed to say, without any inflection whatsoever in her voice, ‘You think you do, Gabriel, but no one is indispensable, least of all a secretary.’ She sipped her wine and eyed him over the rim of her glass.

      ‘Don’t underestimate yourself.’

      ‘I’m not. But I’m not about to think that your working life will grind to a halt if I’m not around.’

      ‘Maybe not grind to a halt,’ Gabriel admitted. ‘But run considerably less smoothly. I’ve spent the past three months finding that out.’ He was amused to realise that she had never voiced her opinions to him about the women in his life. He also realised that, without using so many words, she had managed to imply distaste with how he conducted his private life. Belatedly it occurred to him that she had widely overstepped the mark with her smugness and she had got away with it. How did that follow when he prided himself on being a man who knew exactly where to draw his verbal boundaries? Healthy criticism on the work front was fine. In fact, to be encouraged! His personal life was, however, his own business and not up for discussion. He chose to disregard the little voice in his head telling him that he had solicited her opinion. It was not really fair now if he castigated her for having one because he didn’t like it.

      She had moved on, though. Was defining the role of secretary and why it was a position relatively easy to fulfil. Sounding like a member of the Personnel department giving advice to a prospective interviewee.

      Gabriel grunted non-commitally.

      ‘Basically,’ СКАЧАТЬ