Free Merger By Matrimony by Cathy Williams Page B

even the waiter’s staring.’
    â€˜It was recommended to me by the sales lady,’ Destiny pointed out coolly. ‘ She didn’t appear to think that it was too short.’
    â€˜Well, she should be shot. If you belonged to me, I wouldn’t let you leave the house in that get-up.’
    He sat back as they were handed two oversized menus, giving her a few seconds for her simmer to reach near boiling point.
    â€˜If I belonged to you? If I belonged to you? People aren’t possessions! ’ She stared at him and he gazed back at her, his dark brows meeting in a frown.
    â€˜Any woman that was mine would be my possession, body and soul.’
    â€˜And how would you feel if she felt the same way about you? That she wanted you to dress down because you looked too sexy in what you wear?’
    â€˜Are you trying to tell me that you think I’m sexy?’he asked, turning her well-meaning point on its head and giving her a slow, amused smile.
    She muttered something under her breath and resorted to the relative safety of her menu, behind which she could hide. Why ever had she thought that these huge menus were a bit of a joke when in fact they served a very useful purpose as shield from a nerve-jangling dinner companion?
    â€˜Well, you still haven’t answered my question. Do you?’ He pulled down the menu with one finger and peered at her over the top of it, his amused grin much broader now.
    â€˜You’re an attractive enough man,’ she told him—because an outright lie would have probably turned the amused grin into a guffaw of disbelieving laughter. ‘If you go for your type of look.’
    â€˜ My type of look?’
    He looked neither taken aback nor offended by her postscript. Of course, he would she thought irritably. Hadn’t she discovered that his ego was roughly the size of Panama? If Stephanie ever sought her advice on the subject, she would tell her in no uncertain terms that scooting around him and never answering back was a sure-fire way to add to the problem.
    â€˜I can’t read the menu with you dragging it down.’
    â€˜Have the fresh fish. It’s the best thing on the menu.’
    â€˜There you go again,’ she reminded him, ‘being bossy again,’ and blushed when she realised that he had been winding her up.
    â€˜So what is my type of look?’ he persisted, still grinning and still tugging her menu down so that she couldn’t conveniently hide behind it.
    â€˜Well, if you must know, it’s that obvious tall, dark-haired, good-looking kind of look.’
    â€˜Ah! You mean as opposed to the short, fair-haired, unappealing kind of look…’ He released the menu so that her glare of infuriation was lost on the list of starters, and by the time she had decided on what she was going to eat he had his amused gleaming expression safely under wraps.
    â€˜I’ve got all the paperwork here,’ he said, whisking a two-inch wad of papers from the briefcase at the side of his chair. He pushed them across to her, then sat back to inspect her at his leisure. ‘Naturally you’ll need some information on Felt’s profit and loss over the past, say, three years. Did you bring it along with you?’
    â€˜You know I didn’t.’ She glanced at the top page and found enough technical terms in the first three sentences to reduce her to bewildered dismay.
    â€˜Ah, yes. You were sporting your minimalist look. Not to worry…’ He fished into his briefcase again and this time the wad was three inches thick. ‘I have everything you need right here.’
    â€˜Perhaps you could just sum it all up for me and leave me with this paperwork to read over the next couple of days.’
    â€˜You might not understand all the terms and sub-clauses,’ he said piously. ‘You might find that I have to explain them to you.’
    â€˜I’ll try my best to get to grips with