The Billionaire From Philly Page 6

  Victor reached for the phone on his desk and pressed the button to connect with the matching phone in Danielle’s office. “Yeah?”

  “How do you feel about Italian for lunch?” Victor smiled to himself. It was a little early for them to be heading out—but then, the specific hours that either of them worked didn’t matter as much as the results. They’d spent two hours at lunch more than once in the two weeks since Danielle had started working for him, and they’d both been the better for the break.

  “Sounds really good, actually,” Danielle said. “When are we going?”

  “Give me thirty minutes to finish some things up, send some emails, and then we’ll head out,” Victor told her. He could feel the heat lighting up his nervous system, the anticipation of sex that they would—he hoped—end up having after their good meal. Victor pulled up the website for Davio’s, and browsed the menu, thinking of what he might want to eat; nothing too heavy, even if they didn’t end up having sex after lunch, he thought—he would need to be able to focus for the rest of the day’s work.

  Victor made up his mind and called Alan to pick him and Danielle up in the next twenty minutes. All he had left to do was send a few emails, reschedule a few things—including opening up the hour after his lunch break, just in case he and Danielle came back in an amorous mood—and he was ready to go. Victor smiled to himself, thinking that one of the better uses of his fortune so far had been hiring the woman he had brought on to spend his money: it was definitely already proving rewarding, even if Nikolai doubted Danielle’s intentions.

  Chapter9

  Danielle had heard of Davio’s, but never been inside the imposing, upscale restaurant before. The dining room was full of light, with elegant, white-clothed tables and comfortable-looking old-fashioned upholstered chairs. It looked huge, much bigger in some respect than the exterior had led her to think, and for a few moments Danielle felt decidedly out of place—but then she felt the power of the expensive clothes that Victor had convinced her to buy, the power of arriving there in his company and seeing the hostess nod to him, saying that his usual table was definitely available. Once again, she was stricken by how money—having it, and other people knowing you had it, and showing it—was power.

  “We have plenty of time,” Victor told her as they sat down with the lunch menu and the bar menu, tucked away slightly from the other people who had come in for an early meal. “You can even order a drink if you want.” Danielle smiled.

  “Only one,” she told him. “I do have to go back to work eventually.” Victor chuckled.

  “You can handle two,” he countered. “I’ve seen you drink more than that and still function.” Danielle snickered.

  “Function yes, but I want to be sharp—I’m still in my first 90 days working for you,” she pointed out. “I have to lull you into thinking I’m the best employee you’ve got, then I can slack off.” Victor’s eyes warmed as he met her gaze.

  “I think you probably are one of, if not the best employee I’ve got right now,” he said. “Not just because of your skills at organization, either.” Danielle rolled her eyes.

  “If you think me having sex with you on the clock makes me a great employee, you have very low expectations,” she said, turning her attention back onto the menu. But the idea—now in the air between them—that the lunch would be a prelude to a tryst in Victor’s office excited her. Danielle had actively avoided having sex with any of her coworkers—much less her bosses—in the jobs she’d had before. It wasn’t worth the complications in her career.

  Danielle carefully didn’t look at prices for anything as she read through the menu, knowing that it would only psych her out. Instead she tried to taste the different items in her mind, even with her somewhat limited knowledge of the components. “I have to say, I can’t quite believe that a high-end Italian restaurant is serving chicken livers,” Danielle remarked to Victor. He snickered.

  “Of course, the poor people’s food always ends up on high people’s tables—after ages of it being delicious,” he pointed out. They spent a few more minutes discussing whether they would share an antipasto, what cocktails they might like, and by the time the waitress arrived to take their order Danielle was ready.

  They agreed to share the tuna tartare, and Danielle got the arugula salad, along with the scallops, and—at Victor’s prompting—a side of asparagus, and the raspberry mule to drink. Victor got a Negroni to drink and ordered the warm spinach salad and the tagliatelle Bolognese.

  “I thought I saw Nikolai Sokolov earlier,” Danielle said hesitantly. Her meeting with Sam, for lunch less than a week before had been tense; she had managed to keep him from finding out about her new job, but he had gone pushy about wanting her to act as cover for him, even when she’d insisted that she wasn’t interested in doing that at all anymore—that she was making more money now and didn’t need his help.

  “He wanted to know if I would be interested in the legitimate business opportunity he and I were talking about the night I met you,” Victor said. “It seems pretty solid—and completely out of his usual wheelhouse.” Danielle smiled slightly. There had been a rumor going around—she’d heard it from Sam, at least—that a few of the Sokolov family were interested in going “clean,” over the course of several years.

  Sam didn’t lend it much credence, but Danielle could definitely see the allure. If they already had money and connections, why wouldn’t they go about removing some of the elements of risk from their lives?

  “Sounds promising—and like more work for me in the future, finding people to take some of that money off of your hands,” Danielle remarked. Victor laughed.

  “He was a bit worried—he did recognize you from being Sam’s sister,” Victor admitted. Danielle felt her stomach sink; but before she had a chance to react to the news, the waitress came to the table with their drinks and the first course: the tuna tartare. Danielle sipped her drink, giving herself some time to think about what to say to that. She didn’t want to be too defensive; she didn’t want to make it seem like she had anything to hide.

  “What did you say to that?” Danielle set her drink down and reached to serve herself some of the raw, dressed tuna.

  “I told him that you had already separated yourself from the Bey family before you ever even met me, and that you were legit—just like I am,” Victor replied. Danielle felt relief flood through her, more intensely than she would have expected.

  “I actually had lunch with Sam a few days ago,” she said, keeping her voice light. “He wanted me to cover for him—I told him I didn’t need the extra cash anymore, and that I wasn’t interested in even doing that much.” Victor smiled.

  “I’m glad to hear it,” Victor said.

  “I didn’t tell him about my new job, though,” Danielle admitted. “I just...I don’t think I’m ready to tell him I’m working for someone connected—even just on paper—to the Sokolovs.” She dared to meet Victor’s gaze.

  “I can get that,” Victor said. “These old rivalries between the families run deep. If you’re not ready to tell him about it, I think that’s fair.” Danielle smiled, feeling an even deeper relief. She hadn’t known how Victor would take her hiding the fact that she was working for him—just as she still didn’t know how Sam would react to the news of her new job. She suspected, knowing Sam much better than she knew Victor, that her brother would not take the information particularly well; but she didn’t know in what direction his bad reaction would go. Better to wait until she could control the situation, the conditions under which he found out—if at all possible.

  The drink, the tuna tartare, were delicious, and Danielle found herself relaxing as Victor started to discuss the prospect—generally—of how the charity spending would go, and expand over time. The salads came, and Victor transitioned out of work life and into something a little more personal.

  “I was thinking, when you’ve worked for me a full month, it might be fun to celebrate that,” Victor said.

  “What
were you thinking to celebrate?” Victor shrugged.

  “I have Tiffany working on a few ideas,” he admitted. “I was thinking a night out—of course, not at any properties owned by the Sokolovs, or any of the families.” He smiled slightly.

  “That would probably be a good idea,” Danielle said dryly. Victor chuckled and set aside his salad plate, sipping his drink. The waitress had brought them water, too—and Danielle made a mental note to slow down on her cocktail so she would have her full wits about her for the afternoon’s work.

  “But I was thinking maybe dinner, a show, some drinks—something like that,” Victor continued. Danielle put down her fork, thinking about it.

  “That sounds an awful lot like a date,” she pointed out. Victor shrugged.

  “Technically going out to lunch like this is an awful lot like a date,” he countered. Danielle smiled in spite of herself.

  “Fair enough,” she said. “I just...I guess I don’t want things to be any more complicated than they already are between us.”

  “They aren’t that complicated; not really,” Victor said. “We work together well—even if it’s only been a couple of weeks—and that’s both in and out of bed.” Danielle felt herself smiling more deeply at that. She couldn’t say that he was wrong.

  It was easy—too easy—to remember all the trysts between them over the past two weeks, starting with their first night together; the way that Victor seemed to read her as easily as a picture book, the way he fit just perfectly inside of her. The fact that he loved to hold himself back until she’d come at least once and preferably twice, before finishing.

  She hadn’t been a virgin when they’d met—certainly not—but none of the men she’d been with before Victor had seemed to care as much about whether or not she finished; none of them seemed to have an instinctive grasp of how to turn her on, how to get her soaking wet, the way Victor had already shown.

  In fact, in the depths of her mind Danielle had to admit that it was that very thing that made her worry; there was really nothing official between them, when you really got down to it. They were employer and employee, with an agreement that they would have sex on the clock when they both wanted it.

  He could, she knew, decide that he was tired of her within a month and kick her to the curb. He could decide that he must have been insane to hire someone specifically for the sake of spending ridiculous amounts of money on charity and projects. He could change his mind in a day, and there was nothing that she would be able to really do about it.

  But Danielle had also gotten where she had managed to before meeting Victor, from having a good sense of people: being able to read them, being able to figure out who they were and what they were about quickly. She would have—she knew—been a great asset to the Bey family on that score if she hadn’t decided not to go that route. That was, she thought, part of why Sam kept wanting to pull her back in, even in small ways: she had what their mother had called sense, with that special emphasis that meant that she wasn’t talking about run-of-the-mill common sense, but a kind of people sense.

  And her sense of Victor was that he was genuine. And now he wanted to take her out on a date. If things become serious between us, that’s just going to mean that one day I’m going to have to introduce him and Sam officially. That’s going to mean that I have to tell Sam about him. And that’s going to be a whole big can of worms that I won’t be able to close up again. At the same time, though—why shouldn’t she go out with whoever she wanted to? Even if he was her boss?

  “I’ll think about it,” Danielle said finally, just before their main courses arrived at the table. Victor nodded his acceptance of that condition.

  “You’ve got plenty of time to consider it,” Victor told her. He raised his glass as the waitress left them alone once more, and Danielle clinked her mug against it carefully. “For now, let’s just enjoy this delicious food and not get too drunk before we have to go back to the office.” There was warmth in his bright blue eyes, and Danielle knew that his thoughts had turned, just like hers had, to the hour they’d have after the official lunch break.

  She smiled back at him and sipped her drink, feeling the start of the tingle between her thighs. She was more than happy to commit to an hour of sex after a great meal—but the bigger step of going on an actual date with the man was something she was really going to have to figure out.

  Chapter10

  Victor waited for Danielle from inside his car, trying not to feel impatient. She agreed to go on the date—and you know that the date’s going to go well, he reminded himself. There was no doubt in Victor’s mind whatsoever that he and Danielle would end the night either at his place or hers, in bed together. They’d spent the entire day at work teasing each other; he knew that Danielle had purposely worn a skirt that showed off the delicious curve of her hips and the shape of her full, rounded ass—she wasn’t meeting with anyone that day, only staying in the office.

  They hadn’t gone at each other all day, each of them making excuses: there was paperwork to be done, Victor had meetings, so on and so forth. But he had made sure that Danielle knew that he appreciated her outfit, and he had reminded her—in passing, as innocuously as possible—about previous trysts, referencing whichever charity or project they had been discussing when each one had happened.

  Waiting for her outside of her apartment building, Victor was fairly certain that the night would end with as much spectacular sex as they both could stand. He had tried to strike a balance between making the evening romantic and keeping things light—he didn’t want to make things serious between them, not yet certainly. Admit it to yourself at least: you like her. Beyond being a good employee and a fantastic lay, you like her. It was true, Victor knew; but he wasn’t ready to do anything about that.

  Finally, he saw the door to the building open, and Danielle emerged. She was definitely not wearing anything that she would have bought on the stipend he’d provided for her first month working with him, but Victor thought that she had definitely benefited from her higher pay: she wore a dress that Victor was sure would have been out of her price range before, cut almost exactly to the curves of her body.

  It didn’t show too much skin, but there was definitely an excellent view of her strong legs and lush hips and breasts. As she came towards the car, Victor watched as Danielle pulled a light cardigan over her shoulders, smoothing the sleeves down her arms and adjusting her purse.

  Victor opened the door and climbed out of the back seat of his car, smiling. “You look amazing,” he told Danielle, holding out the small—deliberately small—bouquet of hyacinths he had gotten for her. It had seemed, to him, like the kind of flower that was sweet and evocative—but at the same time didn’t have the loaded imagery that a bunch of roses would have. He leaned in and kissed Danielle on the cheek and caught the scent of her perfume. She smelled as delicious as always, and it was, for a moment, difficult not to reach out and pull her body against his.

  “Thank you,” Danielle said, her cheeks taking on a flush of dusky pink underneath the warm sepia color of her skin. “You really are going all out tonight, aren’t you?”

  “I want to celebrate right,” Victor told her, holding the car door open for Danielle to climb in. She tucked the skirt of her dress around her legs carefully and slid into the back seat with practiced ease. Victor appreciated the view of Danielle’s bare legs as he climbed in behind her, thanking the fact that he’d met her in the summer—although a month later, summer was only another month away from being truly over, and it would start going cool in the evenings.

  But then, fall is the season for staying in...sitting around in the bath...watching movies and curling up in front of the fire and spending the whole night fooling around. It all depended on how their first real date went—and whether or not there would ever be another date.

  “So how is this going to go?” Danielle spotted the vase where Victor had placed the hyacinth bouquet and put the flowers back into the water to keep them in good s
hape while the date went on.

  “We’re going to Tuna Bar first, for some drinks and dinner before the show, and then Punch Line Philly to see Chris Porter, and then afterwards Zee Bar,” Victor explained. Danielle smiled playfully.

  “That’s two bars in one night you’re taking me to,” she pointed out. “And I’m pretty sure Punch Line serves alcohol too.” Victor laughed.

  “You should know by now that I don’t need—or want—to get you drunk to get what I want from you,” he said. “If you want to go home alone at the end of the night, I won’t try and argue you out of it.” That was a rule for him: he never—ever—pressured a woman to come home with him, he never pressured a woman to do anything she seemed the least bit hesitant to do. After a month with Danielle, Victor knew when she was unequivocally in the mood.

  “I know,” Danielle said, her smile warming up a bit more, but the playful gleam still in her eyes. “It sounds like a lovely night,” she said primly. Victor chuckled.

  “I thought it would be a pretty decent mix of date and celebration,” he said. Danielle nodded and they both settled in for the relatively short drive to the restaurant. Just being close to Danielle, seeing her in the dress, not quite being able to feel the heat of her body next to his, was enough to start the heat flowing in Victor’s veins.

  He wanted—almost more than anything—to reach out and pull her into his lap, to nibble along the column of her neck, up to her lips, and let his hands wander over her curvy, lush body. But there was time enough for that later on, he reminded himself.

  Tuna Bar was, as always on a Friday night, busy—even at the slightly early hour. People nursed drinks and sampled from beautiful dishes, and Victor followed the hostess to their reserved table, still feeling a little anxious to get Danielle alone again; but a drink would take the edge off, prepare him for enjoying all the buildup to the great ending. “I should have asked how you feel about raw seafood,” Victor said as they sat down. Danielle laughed.