Christmas With The Billionaire (4 page)

Kate frowned as Yappy’s excitement reached fever pitch. Opening the door a crack, she peered out in time to see Jason Kent hurrying down the stairs with his dog at his heels. “So that’s it,” she murmured, pulling back.
 

“That’s what?” Jason Kent demanded. Having seen her, he’d stopped. “Do you have a problem?”

Yes. And it was standing right in front of her. “No,” she said coolly. They were far too close. Jason Kent had no idea of personal space and was fresh from the shower. She could smell soap on him. He hadn’t bothered to shave, and his hair was still damp. “Good morning, Mr. Kent.”
 

“Good morning, Ms. Black.” Pressing back against the wall, he made smoldering look easy. But then his hand slipped a little higher, blocking her way. “I take it you slept well last night?”

About as well as he had, judging by those black circles beneath his eyes.
 

“Perfectly, thank you.” Not counting the erotic dreams.
 

She dodged beneath the arm of the lead actor from those dreams, now sadly clothed, and ushered Yappy inside.
 

Kate swore beneath her breath as she hit the sidewalk running. Jason Kent had become such an overwhelming presence in her life in so short a time, and she couldn’t get him out of her head. The one man she would love to come to the party—to make it exciting, to make it worthwhile dressing up as a freaking Christmas elf, was the one man she wished she hadn’t mentioned it to. He might be hot as hell, but Jason Kent didn’t need a boost to his ego from her begging him to come around for a drink on Christmas Eve, as she practically had.
 

She stopped to grab a drink at the water fountain, knowing she wouldn’t have the strength to resist him if he really turned it on. She carried on running, and completed her circuit of the lake in double quick time, determined to run him out of her head. She arrived back at Royal Building in time to see him leave. Dressed in an immaculate dark suit that was just asking to be stripped off him, Jason Kent scorched a trail to her core.
 

His dark stare swept over her. “Good evening, Ms. Black. I trust I find you well?”
 

“Have a good one, Mr. Kent,”
Dear God!
By all the pie and peas in Yorkshire, he was hot.
 

“And your question earlier? Drinks at your place?”

She looked at him blankly, too shocked to speak.
 

“Yes?” she said at last in response to him frowning. Was Jason Kent going to accept her invitation to the sedate drinks for a few— the tale she’d told him—otherwise known as her wild-as-hell, if she had anything to do with it, party?

“Keep the noise down, Ms. Black.”

His voice was cold. His expression was stern. She repaid him with a look her mother would say could strip paint at fifty paces.
 

He had not gotten any further with Ms. Black, but he was a happy man. He’d signed the contract for another deal, and the deed to this building was in his vault. He walked out onto the main balcony to survey the London skyline. It felt good to have real estate of this quality under his belt. Coming from the gutter made it even sweeter.

He surveyed the neighboring balconies, all of them havens of calm. Discreet styling and impeccable taste predominated. He huffed a cynical laugh to think what money could buy. The brawling kid was now viewed as an arbiter of good taste by the chattering classes who saw no further than his ever-increasing bank balance—which had precisely the reverse effect on Ms. Black. He doubted she had ever read the financial pages, so she wouldn’t even know what he did. He suspected she wouldn’t care. So why was a woman like that permanently lodged in his head?
 

He reviewed her major attributes—aside from her breasts. She refused to be impressed and gave an honest opinion—whether he wanted it or not. He paid people to agree with him, but suspected there wasn’t enough money in the world to bribe Ms. Black, who would remain staunchly attached to her values, and to her particular brand of spiky charm, whatever the temptation to sell out.
 

Planting his hands on the balustrade, he stared down at her balcony. He’d made some enquiries. Kate Black: chambermaid, country girl, aspiring hospitality guru; interested in people, dogs, and food. Now there was no sign of her below him. The balcony was deserted. The lights were out. Maybe she was out with friends—

Why should he care where she was?

Even a cold shower and a hot coffee wouldn’t calm her down. Jason Kent was such a distraction. Desperate to escape the building, she headed for Covent Garden, not exactly sure what she was looking for, but determined to find some form of entertainment for the party. As well as high-end stores and quirky boutiques, there were always street entertainers and buskers in Covent Garden, and she had this vague idea to invite some of them to the party in return for as much food and drink as the group could down in one night.
 

Her last-minute outing was a huge success. Where money failed, because she didn’t have any, her straight talk hit the spot. She had more entertainers coming to the party than filled the West End theatres on a Saturday night. Mission accomplished, she returned home with more bags of cut-price food and a fistful of promises. Now, all she had to do was put the finishing touches on the apartment and hope someone turned up.

By half past eight, with the grand dining table groaning with food, and the apartment bristling with lights and glitter, she was feeling like a klutz. She’d put her small pot of savings into this—not that she begrudged the money, but her bank manager might. It wasn’t in her to do things by half, Kate reflected as Yappy looked up at her with concern.

She jumped to her feet and almost passed out with pleasure when the doorbell rang. Running to the door, she swung it wide.

“I hope we’re not too early...”

“Not at all,” she told Lily with relief. “You look amazing!” Lily put Kate’s lurid green Christmas elf outfit to shame, wearing a midnight blue gown, decorated with bugle beads and complimented by sparkly heels and a glorious Ostrich feather fan. They kissed and hugged warmly, and Lily didn’t even raise a brow at the sight of Kate’s abbreviated outfit.
 

Neville and Keith were next to arrive, and after them came a mob, including several more residents. Jack the doorman, Bill the concierge, practically all the cleaners and their families, as well as a girl Kate had heard singing beautifully with a guitar at the underground station. Behind her came the steel band that had been playing in the interior of the former vegetable market at Covent Garden.
 

“Don’t close the door yet,” someone yelled out as more people piled in.

The circus performers!
 

“You’d be surprised how many people are alone at Christmas,” Lily told her with a wink. “Now, come on Kate, let me help you. We’ve got a lot of people here to feed.”

He had brought a crystal glass of his favorite single malt onto the balcony, and was sipping it contentedly, breathing deep on success, when a clown’s face swam in front of him. Was he drunk already?
 

Drunk on success was a metaphor, surely?
 

And then, utterly incomprehensible to him, in London on a winter’s night, a steel band started up.
 

“Canapé, sir?”

He
was
going mad. The twelve-foot clown, against every safety regulation in the book, was balanced precariously on a pair of stratospheric stilts planted on the balcony below. There were streamers flying from his top hat and a ridiculously exaggerated happy smile on his face as he offered a plate piled high with party snacks.
 

“No, thank you.” Downing his drink in one, he headed back inside.

As the noise levels rose downstairs it occurred to him that this was like a really disturbing replay of
A Christmas Carol
, with him in the unsavory role of Scrooge. He had to ask himself how he had ever imagined he could avoid Christmas with Ms. Black downstairs. She had sent Christmas to find him.
 

Chapter Five

The noise was deafening outside Lady Vallender’s apartment. Inside it was packed and rowdy. He wasn’t even going to waste his time thinking about the man in a circus strongman’s outfit who let him in. He was royally pissed to see everyone having such a great time. Ms. Black standing in the center of the room, directing proceedings like a ringmaster, whilst dressed like a stripper in a too-tight green suit, didn’t help his mood. Drink and food abounded. Exuberance threatened to erupt onto the street. He put the energy down to an excess of alcohol, which he blamed on Ms. Black and her punch. Those fucking oranges!

Hadn’t he made it clear that parties were expressly forbidden? A steel band. Seriously? People lining up to do the limbo beneath a sweeping-brush pole—

“Come on—join in—don’t be a party pooper,” a city gent in a suit with his tie around his ears implored him.
 

“I clearly told the occupant of this apartment no rowdy parties—” No one was listening.
 

He didn’t have time for this. “Excuse me, please. I’ve got urgent business to attend to,” he told a black-cloaked vampire standing in his way. Muscling past a large lady dressed as Britannia, complete with spear and shield, he homed in on his target.
 

“Jason!” Ms. Black smiled. “How good to see you. I didn’t think you’d turn up.”
 

“Clearly.” His voice was ice. “You didn’t need to send the clown on stilts to alert me. The noise was rocking the paintings off my walls.”

“I didn’t send him.” Eyes wide, she pretended surprise as she recovered fast and took him on. “I think he used his initiative. Fabulous, isn’t he?”

“Fabulous.” He gave her a look that let Ms. Black know exactly what he thought of the clown, as well as the chaos erupting around them.
 

“Please don’t,” she said as he swung around to call for quiet. “Can’t you see how everyone’s enjoying themselves?”

She was standing on tiptoe, looking at him with such a pleading expression on her face that for once in his hard-bitten life, he hesitated. Against his better judgment, he gave way. She did look so cute with that insincere expression of helplessness on her face.
 

Cute? Ms. Black was off the scale in the most erotic Christmas elf outfit he’d ever seen. In lurid green, he might have wondered where she’d gotten it at such short notice if the room hadn’t been full of people in equally bizarre outfits. The full skirt barely covered her well-formed rump, and gave him an excellent view of her shapely legs, which ended bizarrely in pixie boots with bells jingling on the turned-up toes. Ms. Black obviously had no ego to protect, and was prepared to sacrifice everything in the service of entertaining her guests. And he was entertained. Her top half was tightly covered to the neck, which might have disappointed him, had her ample breasts not been struggling to break free—

“Jason...”

“What?” He frowned down at her, noting the swell of her lips, and the way her eyes darkened when they met his stare.
 

“Before you get angry,” she began, “I know you don’t like Christmas—”

“Before I get angry?” he queried incredulously. “Do you know what you’ve done?” His voice was so harsh the whole room went still, and he had to wait until everyone lost interest and the noise rose again. “Do you think these people are ever going to leave with this amount of food and booze on offer?”
 

“You can never have too much food,” she said. “And as for my punch...” She smiled. “I’ve got you to thank for rescuing the oranges.”

“Thank you so much for reminding me.”

“Don’t mention it. Can I get you some punch?”

“No.”

“I am really sorry if we disturbed your quiet time.”

“Disturbed it? You destroyed it.”
 

“So, you hate noise, parties, and Christmas most of all.”

“Which you have chosen to ignore.”
 

They were standing very close, and as she pulled a face of mock-regret, the impulse to drag her into his arms and kiss her into submission was overwhelming. Every other woman would do her utmost to please him, but Ms. Black seemed to delight in doing the opposite.
 

And he loved a challenge.

“Won’t you stay on for just a little while?” she wheedled.
 

“I’m here to stop this,” he reminded her, staring deep into her luminous eyes.

“But now you’re here...” She pulled the wide-eyed look again.
 

He was tempted to stay. She tempted him.
 

And then she pulled a comic face and the more she played him, the more he wanted to be played. She was feisty and funny, and the only Christmas present he could ever imagine wanting was the fragrant Ms. Black in his bed.

“Just five minutes? Ten?” she persisted.

“You’re supposed to come down from five, not up.”
 

She frowned up at him. “Don’t you ever switch off from business?”

She saw something different in his eyes and blushed.