Matched To A Billionaire. Kat Cantrell

his with each small inhalation. “Daniella is too formal and stuck-up, don’t you think? Call me Dannie.”

      He shook his head. The more formality the better for his peace of mind. “There’s nothing wrong with the name Daniella. It’s unusual. Beautiful. It suits you.”

      Her eyes lit up and suddenly, she was the only one breathing because all the organs in his chest stopped functioning. Nothing to the south suffered from the same problem. Everything there hummed on high alert.

      “You think I’m beautiful?”

      Had he said that? His brain was not refreshing fast enough. “Your name. I said your name is beautiful.” Her expression fell and he cursed. If only he could converse with his wife exclusively by email, then maybe he could avoid hurting her feelings. “Of course you are, too. Very lovely.”

      Nice save, he thought sarcastically. Lovely. That described a winter snowscape. From the perspective of an eighty-year-old woman. This was the point where he usually escaped to go do something where he possessed proficiency—work.

      Without looking at her again, he muttered, “Good night.”

      “Leo.” A firm hand on his arm stopped him before he’d taken two steps past her. “I asked you to call me Dannie because that’s what my friends call me. We’re friends, aren’t we?”

      The warmth in her voice washed over him, settling inside with a slow burn. He didn’t turn, didn’t dare face her.

      Something fundamental had changed in her demeanor—the leash she’d kept on her energy had snapped and yeah, he needed to look out. It leached into the air, electrifying it. She certainly wasn’t afraid to speak to him any longer. “I… Yes. Of course.”

      She brushed against his arm as she rounded it, apparently not content to talk to his back. Her shirt gaped slightly, revealing a tantalizing peek at her cleavage. The slow burn blazed faster. They were talking about being friends, not lovers. What was wrong with him?

      Dannie. No, too intimate. Daniella was too intriguing. What was he supposed to call her, hey, you?

      He couldn’t compartmentalize his wife. That was bad.

      “Friends,” he rasped because he had to say something.

      Okay, good. Daniella could go into the friends box. It could work. He’d envisioned having a companion to fill a hole in his life. Now he had one.

      “Friends.” Without breaking eye contact, she reached up and loosened his tie, leaning into it, fingers lingering far too long for the simple task. “Who help each other relax.”

      Relax? Every nerve in his body skated along a razor’s edge, desperately seeking release from the power of his wife’s touch. The faint scent of strawberries wafted from her glossy lips and he wanted to taste it. “What makes you think I need to relax?”

      “I can feel the tension from here, Leo.”

      Was that what they were calling it these days? Felt like a good, old-fashioned hard-on to him.

      As if pulled by imperceptible threads, his body circled closer to hers and the promise of heat turned into a reality as their lower halves brushed once, twice. His hand flew to the small of her back to clamp her tight against him.

      Fingers still tangled in his loosened tie, she tugged slightly. Her face tipped up, lips primed to be taken in another kiss, but this time nothing prevented him from finishing it. From dragging his lips down the length of his wife’s torso, straight to…

      He cursed—they’d agreed to be platonic only a few hours ago and they were in the middle of an innocuous conversation about being friends. Yet he was salivating at the thought of kissing her, of laughing together over a joke, of being so much more than a convenience to each other.

      He took a deliberate step backward and her hand dropped from his tie.

      If she had this strong an effect on him, he was in hotter water than he’d realized. He did not want to be so obsessed with his wife.

      “I’m tense because I have a lot of work to do.” He willed his body and his bothersome loneliness back into submission. Or tried to. Seemed as though it was destined to be a losing battle. Since she was clearly no longer too scared to talk, he’d have to put space between them another way. “We’ll spend time together, but this will not be a conventional relationship. If that’s not going to work for you, we should get an annulment.”

      A hint of hurt crept into her expression. His chest panged. She’d just asked to be friends and loosened his tie. Why was he turning it into a cardinal offense? Wasn’t this part of letting their relationship grow more intimate naturally?

      “What happened to make you so jaded?” she asked quietly, not the slightest bit cowed by his speech. He liked it better when she said nothing more than yes and thank you.

      “I’m not jaded. I don’t have anything against relationships or love in general. Without it, I wouldn’t be here. My parents still make googly eyes at each other across the table. Didn’t you notice?”

      “Of course. They’re a very happy couple. Why don’t you want the same?”

      There was the reason he’d nipped the tie loosening in the bud. They were married and might even become friends, but they were never going to be anything more, and it was a disservice to Daniella to let her have the smallest hope otherwise.

      He was already doing himself a disservice by even contemplating “otherwise.”

      “Oh, they’re happy, all right.” He rolled his eyes. “At the expense of everything else. My parents have no money. No savings.”

      And they refused to accept what they called handouts from Leo. He’d like nothing more than to take care of them, had offered a house, cars, even vacations, to no avail. Apparently, they enjoyed the gangs and graffiti spray-painted on the front sidewalk. Their memories appeared to be short, but Leo could never forget the gun-wielding thief who’d broken into their house when he was six. The terror had fueled his drive to escape and kept him on the straight and narrow.

      “You fault your parents for being happy over making money?”

      “No, I don’t blame my father for working a low-paying job so he could be home with my mom and me. I choose to live my life differently. I’ll never force my child to be grateful for one gift under the Christmas tree. To stay home from school on the days when the rest of the class goes on field trips to the zoo because I can’t afford for my kid to go.”

      “Oh, Leo.”

      The compassion shining in her eyes unearthed something poignant inside. That had to go. This wasn’t about feeling sorry for poor, little Leo Reynolds from the section of east Dallas where even the churches had bars on the windows. It was about making a point.

      “See all this?” He cut a hand through the air to indicate the house at large. “I worked for every dime. I held three jobs in college so I could graduate with no debt and then put my nose to the grindstone for years to get ahead. I’m still not there. If I take my eye off the prize for even a moment, poof. It all vanishes.”

      His wife gazed at him without speaking, lips pursed in a plump bow. Firm breasts strained against her blouse, inviting him to spread the fabric wide and—maybe he needed to internalize which prize he wasn’t supposed to take his eyes off of.

      Other venture capital companies were unearthing the next Google or staking start-ups that sold to competitors for billions of dollars. Reynolds Capital would be there soon if he kept on course. All he had to do was resist temptation. He’d married a woman who would help him avoid the dangers of giving in.

      If she’d just stay in her box, that is.

      He breathed in the scent of strawberries and the sizzling energy of his wife. “I work, Daniella. All the time. I can’t invest in a relationship. It wouldn’t be fair if I let you believe in that possibility.”

      He