spun around and dragged Elena back to the bed, taking a minute to slip her feet into high-heeled black pumps before crossing her legs and perching beside her.
“All right, spill,” Alandra said, sounding entirely too chipper for the headache that was beginning to throb at Elena’s temples.
“Did you do it?” she asked, lowering her voice a fraction. “Did you talk to Chase Ramsey?”
From the moment she’d first thought of going to the CEO of the Ramsey Corporation for help in saving her father’s business, Elena had confided her plan to her sister. They had been best friends and confidantes since childhood, and shared just about everything with each other. Elena trusted Alandra not only to keep her secrets, but to act as a sounding board to let her know if her ideas were logical or bordering on insane.
And while Alandra had agreed that speaking with Chase Ramsey was a good idea, neither of them had breathed a word of their intentions to Victor Sanchez. Their father was a proud man and wouldn’t appreciate anyone—least of all his daughters—interfering in his business or coming to his rescue.
They would only tell him, they decided, if things worked out to their benefit. Otherwise, he need never know what Elena had done.
Elena nodded, her mind flashing back to every tense, intense minute of her meeting with Chase.
Alandra’s eyes glittered with interest. “And how did it go? Is he going to help us?”
“That depends.”
“On what?”
Elena met her sister’s gaze and murmured in a voice lacking all emotion, “On whether I sleep with him.”
Her sister’s screech of outrage was comforting, but Elena quickly hushed her for fear their conversation would be overheard. She didn’t think Pop was home yet, but Connie, their longtime housekeeper, could often be found in the hallways dusting or doing other chores.
Once Alandra had calmed down, Elena filled her in on the details of her face-to-face with Chase Ramsey, recounting every word and facial expression from the time she entered his office.
“And then he told me that he’d give Pop extra time to try to save SRS if I agreed to be his mistress. He wants me to meet him at the airport for a trip to Vegas if I’m willing to go through with it.”
From her jacket pocket she pulled the slip of paper Chase had given her, and handed it to her sister. Alandra studied the scrawl before refolding the note and giving it back.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” Elena released a pent-up breath and shook her head, still racked with indecision.
“Do you want me to do it?”
Elena gave a bark of laughter, then caught the flat look in her sister’s eyes.
“Are you serious?” she asked. “You’d do that for me?”
Alandra shrugged. “For you, for Pop, for the family business. It wouldn’t be that much of a hardship. You did say he was cute, right?”
She hadn’t, and “cute” wasn’t even close to the word she would use to describe Chase Ramsey’s strong features, fathomless blue eyes and attractive physique.
“It’s not like I have that much going on in the boudoir these days, anyway,” Alandra continued with a small eye roll when Elena didn’t respond. “And if this guy just wants to get laid, then he probably won’t care which sister he’s with.”
Elena laughed again, this time in amusement. She threw her arms around Alandra and hugged her tight. “Oh, Alandra, I love you.”
“I love you, too. And I’m more than willing to take this bullet for you, if you want me to.”
Elena could just imagine that. The only problem was that when she pictured her sister in bed with Chase instead of herself, she felt a stab of inexplicable jealousy.
How could that be? How could she be jealous of her own sister, who was willing to sleep with a complete stranger just to save Elena and the family business? And how could she suddenly feel territorial about a man who had made her such a disrespectful offer? Primarily, she suspected, as an act of revenge for what she’d done to him as a teenager.
“No,” she said, drawing a deep, cleansing breath. “I’m the one who came up with the idea of going to him in the first place. And I’m the one with a past relationship with him.”
“All right,” Alandra acquiesced, “then how do you feel about Ramsey’s offer?”
Her stomach jumped at the question, followed by a peculiar, almost traitorous warmth that spread through her breasts and between her legs.
Lord, could she actually be attracted to Chase? On more than simply the detached level of a woman catching a glimpse of a good-looking man.
Could the attraction go deeper? Could she actually be considering saying yes to his proposition? To becoming his mistress?
A skittering of nerves joined the heat flowing through her bloodstream. She’d never been a man’s mistress before, never been in a relationship based solely on sex. She’d dated a good number of men, and even slept with a few of them, but those relationships had always moved slowly and been based on other things, like friendship, mutual attraction, similar occupational interests.
Chase had no interest in getting to know her, and she doubted they had a single thing in common other than her father’s company. He wanted her for two reasons only—to look good on his arm at business gatherings and to satisfy him in bed.
And darned if that idea wasn’t becoming more appealing by the minute.
Squeezing Alandra’s fingers, she felt tears prickle at the back of her eyes as she met her sister’s gaze. “Is it terrible that I’m thinking of going through with it? And not entirely to help out Pop?”
Alandra gave a soft chuckle, pushing a strand of hair back from Elena’s face and tucking it behind her ear. “Of course not. You’re allowed to think a guy is hot and want to roll around with him for a while, with or without ulterior motives. I’d be more worried if you thought Chase Ramsey was a dog, but were still willing to sacrifice yourself and your body for SRS. The important question, I think, is how you’ll feel about yourself afterward. Can you chalk it up to one of life’s many adventures while remaining emotionally detached, or are you going to feel guilty or ashamed when it’s all over?”
Her sister was right, but Elena knew she wasn’t going to make a decision tonight. She had a couple of days before Chase left for Las Vegas, and she was going to take every one of them to make up her mind.
* * *
Chase wished he could say he was unconcerned and uninterested in whether Elena Sanchez showed up today. But in truth, he’d gotten to the airport an hour earlier than he normally would, just in case.
He’d positioned himself in one of the chairs facing the main area of the airport so he could see everyone who passed by and watch for her.
Just in case.
He’d dug out his laptop and was trying to work, making sure he had a clear view over the top of the monitor.
Just in case.
Part of him hoped she wouldn’t take him up on his offer. It had been a totally spontaneous, reckless suggestion, and he still wasn’t sure why he’d made it.
Maybe because he’d always wanted the chance to knock her down a few pegs. Maybe because it had been obvious that day in his office that she wasn’t quite the high and mighty princess she’d been in high school, with a father wealthy enough to buy and sell Chase’s own modest, hard working family and every acre of land they possessed.
Or maybe because, despite his better judgment and the gut instincts that screamed for him to back away, keep his distance and not get sucked in again