The billionaire’s shoulders started to shake.
She pulled back suspiciously, and the smirk playing on his lips confirmed it.
Oh! He had done it again!
“Horrible man,” she snarled. Utterly horrible, with the way he took advantage of his amazingly hot English vocabulary to get to her. “You are unbelievably cocky,” she accused.
“You wouldn’t like me any other way,” the billionaire answered easily. Ignoring the way she glared at him, he glanced at the paper bag in her hands, asking, “What did you get us?”
Ilse started, her fingers tightening around the paper bag. Earlier, she had thought that it wouldn’t be bad if she bought her usual choice for him. But in hindsight, she began to regret her choice.
He’s a billionaire, Ilse. Do you really expect him to—-
But the billionaire had already taken the paper bag, and ignoring her gasp of protest, he drew out its contents, paper boxes containing a rather plain-looking wheat loaf sandwich for each of them.
Ilse tried not to fret as she watched him open one of the boxes.
“Smells good,” he murmured after taking a whiff.
Accepting her sandwich, she muttered self-consciously, “You don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to.”
He gave her an odd look. “Why wouldn’t I want to?”
“You’re a billionaire. You’re probably unused to this kind of fare—-”
Jaak said very gently, “Ilse.”
She stopped speaking.
“The first two years after I left home, I barely had enough money to eat three meals a day, and I worked eighteen hours a day. All the spare cash I had was invested in stocks. So this sandwich that you bought with your hard-earned money?” He lifted it up for emphasis, saying simply, “I know better than to take it for granted.”
Everything the billionaire said was true, and though it was a story guaranteed to make one wipe away a tear or two, it only had Ilse...grunting.
He laughed. “You don’t have to hide it.” Setting his sandwich aside temporarily, he spread his arms wide open, murmuring wickedly, “Come on, babe.”
Ilse glared at him.
“You know you want to.”
One, two, three seconds passed, but the billionaire waited patiently.
On the tenth second, Ilse succumbed, and she moved towards him.
His arms closed around her.
She hugged him more tightly.
“I know, babe.” And he did.
She squeezed her eyes shut. “I hate you.” And she did. She hated that he seemed to know her so well while she knew him so little. She hated how he surprised her every day, hated the way hemade her wonder what an incredible man like him was doing with someone like her.
When she suddenly shoved him away, the billionaire released her, a grin tugging at his lips at the way she started fussing with the rest of their takeout. She handed him a cup of coffee, mumbling, “It’s flat black.”
“Thank you.”Just the way he wanted it,he thought, but of course Ilse would rather die than say something so nice to him. His amusement deepened as he watched Ilse concentrate on making her coffee like her life depended on it, taking her own sweet time as she added cream and sugar.
As she started stirring, he asked wickedly, “Are you, by any chance...”
Ilse started to raise her cup to her lips.
