The Millionaire's Christmas Wife. Susan Crosby

to wrap herself up in it and savor his body heat before hanging it up.

      Why didn’t you call? The question she wanted to ask most was the one she couldn’t ask, even as she felt him checking her out as she moved to sit behind her desk. “How can I help you?” she asked.

      “I need a wife.”

      Disappointment landed on her. Ever since he’d made the appointment, she’d been hoping it was just a ploy to see her again. But it was only business, after all. She hadn’t been on his mind as he’d been on hers.

      “A wife. Okay,” she said, all business now. She pulled her keyboard in front of her and brought up a Request-for-Domestic form. “What kind of skills are you looking for?”

      “Wifely skills.”

      She smiled slightly at that. “Can you be a little more specific? Our domestics do everything from errands to party prep to cleaning to child care.”

      “I don’t need someone with any of those skills, actually. I need someone to be my wife.”

      She took her fingers off the keyboard. “I think you have me confused with a matchmaking service.”

      “You did a good job for my brothers.”

      He really did want a wife? “Not intentionally.”

      He slouched in his chair a little, crossed an ankle over a knee. “David called you uncanny, the way you match up employers and employees. You even found Noah a teacher. Not a typical staffing placement for your company, right?”

      “That was pure luck. Tricia just happened to come along, and she was qualified. She wasn’t even looking for a teaching job.”

      “And now she and Noah are getting married, and David has already tied the knot,” Gideon said easily. “Don’t people call your company Wives for Hire?”

      “That is the unfortunate nickname that some people use, yes, because our employees assume many of the roles that a wife would.”

      “Except they can’t have sex with the employer.”

      Denise’s pulse fluttered. “There’s that, of course, but being a wife certainly entails more than what my company provides, regardless of the sex issue.”

      “But in my case, what I need is a wife.” He paused. “Without the sex.”

      “You mean a pretend wife?”

      “Exactly.”

      “Why?”

      “To help me woo an investor to a project of mine.” His logic intrigued and confused her. “You have to be married to accomplish that?”

      “For purely business reasons, yes.”

      “Well, this is a first. Would you like to hire two-point-five children, too?”

      He grinned. “Not necessary. Although a little pregnancy padding could be helpful.” He straightened, getting down to details. “Look, I need someone who is intelligent, articulate and isn’t intimidated by men who are used to being in charge. Someone who can hold her own, whether it’s business or social. I need a woman who brings presence—and stability—to the table.”

      “I see. And how much are you willing to pay for this paragon?” she asked.

      “How much would you charge?”

      “I don’t have a rate set up for what you need. We’ll have to talk to the employee and decide together.”

      “I don’t think you understand, Denise. You’re the one I want.”

      Her body reacted to the bold statement. It took her a moment to recover. “I’m not for hire.”

      “Why not?”

      “I own this company. I run this company. It’s more than a full-time job already.”

      “I could work around your schedule. Weekends and evenings would be okay.”

      “This is impossible, Gideon.”

      “No, it isn’t. Have dinner with me. We’ll talk about it. I brought the plans to show you.”

      “You think you can butter me up over dinner?”

      His smile was wide. “I can try.”

      “No one would believe we got married,” she said. “We hardly know each other.”

      “Sure they would. We’ll tell them how we met at David’s bachelor party and how the instant attraction caught us off guard. How we avoided each other for the whole week until the wedding, because neither of us had ever felt like that before, and we weren’t sure we could trust it.”

      His eyes went tender and his voice soft as he continued with the mesmerizing words. “Then at the wedding we danced and talked for hours, our eyes meeting, hands touching, bodies brushing, and we knew, we just knew it was right. We were right. That there is such a thing as love at first sight, that we decided we didn’t want to live without each other for one more sunrise. So we drove to Reno and got married, trying to talk each other out of it the whole drive, but only talking ourselves further into it. It’ll be a love story for the ages. Even the most cynical men will believe it, because we’ll say it with passion in our eyes. We’ll be envied by all.”

      It took Denise a few seconds to focus again. She’d gotten totally caught up in his fairy tale. Heck, he’d convinced her, so she supposed others would believe it, too. Really, who would’ve thought he was a romantic? She’d figured him for the kind of hero Hemingway wrote about. A survivor. The man you hope is with you when your plane goes down.

      Still…“I really don’t see how we could pull this off, Gideon. Why would you have kept it a secret from your family for a month?”

      “There’s no reason for them to ever find out. Most people will never know, only the ones I’m trying to convince to invest in my project, and I’ll bet they don’t ask. But just in case, we’ve got a story. At least take a look at what I’m doing. If I can’t convince you of the merits of the project, we’ll skip the whole thing. Have dinner with me,” he repeated.

      She wasn’t going to take the job, but she could have dinner with him, as a courtesy to him as David and Noah’s brother, anyway, and a potential client. She could better match him with someone from her staffing pool that way, too.

      She linked her fingers and set them on the desktop, all business. “You’ll have to wait or come back. I’ve got appointments at four and four-thirty.” She didn’t get to see his reaction, because he stood and grabbed his jacket off the hook, keeping his back to her.

      “I’ll be here at five, if that works for you,” he said. He picked up the tube and passed it to her. “Can I leave this with you for now?”

      “Sure.” She walked him out. “Maybe I should just order Chinese here? We could use my conference room.”

      He put a hand on her elbow, stopping her, then looked into her eyes, into her soul, in that way he had. “Let me take you out, Denise. Please.”

      You couldn’t have asked me out a month ago? “All right.”

      He slid his hand up to her shoulder and squeezed. The simple gesture kick-started her hormones again. Was her face as red as it felt? Could he tell what he was doing to her?

      “See you at five,” he said.

      She nodded, then walked back to her office window and waited until he emerged from the building. Instead of getting on his motorcycle he headed toward the Capitol Mall nearby. He didn’t strike her as much of a shopper, but then it was almost Christmas, and he did have nieces and nephews.

      “Hel-lo?”

      Denise snapped to attention at the sound of her assistant’s voice right next to her. “What, Stacy?”