Free The Risk: A Billionaire Romance (Wagered Hearts Series, Book 2) by Calista Kyle

it, but I didn’t realize you’d get blamed for it.”
    “Why would you want to get under my mother’s skin?” I asked.
    He waved his hand in front of him in careless dismissal. “Oh, she just said some things that rubbed me the wrong way and I thought I’d be petty and immature and get her back for it.”
    “What did she say?”
    “It’s nothing important,” he said.
    “Please tell me what she said,” I insisted. I wanted to know what my mother could have possibly said that would get Ryan so riled up. He normally seemed so carefree and unruffled.
    “She just made a suggestion about who I could bring as an acceptable date and I didn’t take too kindly to that,” he said.
    “Ah, now I can understand,” I said.
    “If I knew that she’d go and try to blame you for it, I never would have done it,” he said. He looked at me intently, almost willing me to believe him. And I did. I suddenly felt a little bit of my black mood lift.
    “I know,” I finally said. “Don’t even worry about it anymore. What’s done is done. Let’s move on. So, how are you enjoying the party?”
    He looked like he still wanted to say more on the matter but then thought better of it. “I’m enjoying it a lot more now,” he answered.
    “Don’t try to flirt with me. I’m on duty tonight.”
    “And that means you’re immune to compliments?”
    “I’m not supposed to be enjoying myself. That’s only reserved for the distinguished guests.”
    “Hmm that sounds like a challenge to me,” he mused, shooting me a lopsided grin.
    “Don’t. I don’t want to monopolize all your time. Besides, like I said, I’ve got to work.”
    “You work too hard. You should enjoy yourself. Everything looks amazing by the way. I know you had a large part in that.”
    I blushed at his compliment. “Thanks, you’re probably the only one who’ll say that. But it was mostly Paola’s vision; I just helped bring it to life.”
    Paola was the special events director at Chère, and in charge of overseeing the party. I had been her right hand woman, helping her plan it since I started working there months ago.
    “Don’t sell yourself short. I’m sure you had more input than you give yourself credit for.”
    Before I could reply, I saw my mother approach us out of the corner of my eye. Judging from her frosty demeanor, she had probably just found out that Cara Galanis was here. I shot Ryan a quick warning look before she finally reached us. He turned around to face her head on. That stopped my mother in her tracks for just a moment.
    “Cora,” Ryan said in greeting.
    She gave him a curt nod, but her eyes were glinting. “So good of you to show up,” she said.
    “Yes, thank you. I was just telling Melanie here that everything looks amazing. You’ve really outdone yourselves this time,” he said. His voice was calm and almost perfunctory. He gave no hint that he was agitated or in any way alarmed. He probably wasn’t. My mother would never turn her ire on to him. Even she wouldn’t dare piss off someone in Ryan’s position, at least not to his face.
    “Thank you. You know I always pride myself on throwing the best parties,” she said, giving him a slight smile before turning her gaze to me. “If you’ll excuse us, I need to speak to Melanie for a moment.”
    “By all means go ahead,” he said, but he didn’t move away. Instead he stood right where he was, almost daring my mother to say something. She narrowed her eyes and frowned at him before she took my arm and spun us around, hissing in my ear.
    “Melanie, what are you doing in here? I thought you were supposed to be outside making sure only the people on the guest list were allowed inside.”
    “I was,” I answered. “But I came back in to warm myself up for a little bit.”
    “That’s no excuse. You were given a specific task and you failed. Now we have the likes of Cara Galanis here and I specifically blacklisted her from attending. I give you one simple task and you