The truth was, if he didn’t win Michaela, his heart would be the loser.
But now he had a mission. To make Michaela fall for him.
Or, at the very least, to accept a real date.
Fernsby wanted to rub his hands together with glee like the Wicked Witch of the West when she sent her flying monkeys after Dorothy.
It had been obvious last night that the boy was smitten. Even better, today Troy had admitted it.
Fernsby smiled inwardly, where none of the others could see. It wouldn’t do for them to notice his glee.
His work here was done. And he hadn’t needed to do a thing.
He looked hard at Gabrielle. She didn’t meet his eye, her gaze alighting on every one of her siblings, yet skipping over him.
Have no fear, my little pretty, you’re next on my list.
Michaela called Troy just after nine on Monday morning. He’d been expecting her call since Friday, when he’d told her to set him up on another date. She’d probably been going through her list of amazing women and making calls.
Yesterday, he’d gone for a long hike in the hills behind his house. The Santa Cruz Mountains were notorious for bad cellphone reception, so if she’d tried to call him, there was no evidence of it. She hadn’t even left a message.
The hike had been his time for reflection on how to woo her or romance her or whatever else Ava had said. And yet, during that entire ten-mile hike, he hadn’t come up with the perfect romantic gesture that would make Michaela fall for him, or, at the very least, blow her socks off. Despite his being both a billionaire and her client.
Her voice on the phone sounded chipper—too chipper. “I’ve found a lovely woman for you.”
He had to cut her off before she got him to agree to another date. “I’ve changed my mind.”
She sputtered a moment and then said, “You can’t do that.”
He turned his face to the morning sun. “Of course I can.”
“But you agreed that if I set Gabby up on a date, you have to go out too. You have to let me matchmake for you both.”
Oh yeah, he fully intended to let her matchmake for him. She just had no idea there was only one woman she could match him with. But she’d find out soon. “Look, I’m right near your office. I’ll come up, and we can discuss this like rational human beings.”
Though he had to admit he wasn’t quite rational. Not where she was concerned.
First, he had to figure out why she didn’t date billionaires and change her mind about that. Then he had to get her to agree to date him. And finally, he had to come up with the perfect romantic montage.
The moment he stepped into her office, she pointed a finger at him. “You agreed. You have to go on this date.”
He had a strategy. He just didn’t have any tactics with which to implement it. He said the only thing he could. “I’m not going out with any other women you fix me up with.”
She jammed her hands on her shapely hips. God help him, he wished they were his hands on her. She said indignantly, “Why not?”
He told her the unvarnished truth. “Because the only woman I want to date is you.”
Chapter Ten
The only woman I want to date is you.
Had Troy really just said that?
Yes, he had, and it freaked her out. The man seemed to take up so much space, filling her office, stealing her breath. He felt so close, though he stood several feet away. He exuded animal magnetism. And her feet wanted to float right into that force field.
The worst? Michaela wanted to go on a date with him in the worst possible way. Make that the best possible way.
But, dear God, he was a billionaire. She’d never fit into his world. She needed to be with a man like herself, someone who’d had to scrabble all his life. Yes, Troy and his siblings had to work their way back from nothing after their parents’ deaths. But was that the same as never having had anything to begin with? Was it the same as watching her mother struggle to put food in the fridge? Because that’s where all her matchmaking skills had come from. As soon as she’d been old enough, she’d struggled just as hard to help her mother.
