Page 7 of The Billionaire in Her Bed

“You know damn well it wasn’t. Fuck, if I had another condom, I’d say let’s do it again.” He glanced down at his semi-hard cock. “In a few minutes, when I’ve had time to recover.”

“If that’s the only thing holding you back, I’ve got good news for you.”

“There’s a box of Trojans in the desk drawer?” he asked hopefully.

“No.” She gave him what she hoped was a saucy smile, filled both hands with his tight butt, and squeezed. “But there’s a condom dispenser in the men’s room.”

…

“You look like crap.” Ginny glanced around the hole-in-the-wall diner, taking in the grease-stained walls and ripped pleather seats. “And why did you want to meet me way out here? What’s wrong with Dean & Deluca? Or the Starbucks on Eighth and 48th?”

Too close to the office, that’s what was wrong. He’d explain as soon as he flagged down a waitress and got what, from the look of the place, was sure to be a crappy cup of coffee.

“Nice to see you, too,” Eli quipped, flapping his arms like a madman and finally getting the attention of one of the servers, a frazzled-looking woman in a pale-pink polyester uniform, who looked like she’d stepped right out of central casting for the role of overworked, underpaid food service employee. He ordered two coffees and took the risk of asking for a couple of menus.

“Here.” Ginny slid his phone across the table to him.

“Thanks.” He slipped it into his pocket. “You’re a lifesaver.”

“I hope the reason for this little excursion is so you can tell me what’s going on.” Frown lines creased her forehead. “You’ve been missing in action for almost two days. I was worried sick.”

Guilt clawed at his gut. What an utter shit he’d been, thinking only of himself. While he was off sucking down scotch and screwing bartenders in Sunset Park, Ginny, the only person he could trust, was tearing her thin hair out and losing sleep over him.

He dropped his chin to his chest. “I’m sorry. Really. I didn’t mean to freak you out.”

“I’m glad you’re all right.” She leaned over the table to study him, her bloodshot eyes narrowed. Had she been crying? Because of him? The guilt tightened its grip on his midsection. “You are all right, aren’t you?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

The waitress chose that moment to show up with their coffees and menus. He waited for her to set them down then went on.

“Can I trust you?” After everything he’d been through the last forty-eight hours he had to ask. For his sanity.

“Of course.” She sat back and crossed her legs, emptying a creamer and a packet of sugar into her coffee. “What do you need?”

“I need to lay low for a while,” he said, dropping his voice for some unknown reason. It wasn’t as if he was likely to run into Simon—or anyone else he knew, for that matter—in Brooklyn at eight a.m. on a Thursday. Or any day. He’d had a hard enough time convincing the usually unquestioning Ginny to make the trek across the East River. “And I want to do it here.”

She waved a hand around the restaurant. “In a run-down diner?”

“No.” He sipped his coffee. Just as he’d suspected. Crap. But bad coffee was better than no coffee. He took another sip and grimaced. So much for that theory. “In Sunset Park.”

Her frown lines deepened. “Why Sunset Park?”

He pushed away his cup and explained the plan that formed the minute a certain sexy barkeep made an offhand comment about the Fairway. It had taken a temporary backseat to getting in her pants—well, skirt, technically—but the next morning, once she’d hustled him out the door before Miguel showed up, it started percolating again as he roamed the streets of the Brooklyn neighborhood.

The supermarket wasn’t the only new development popping up. He’d walked past a frozen yogurt shop, a farm-to-table restaurant, and an upscale coffeehouse. That added up to one thing in Eli’s business brain—dollar signs, provided he could get in on the ground floor before property values went through the roof. He’d even found the perfect project on his sojourn—a former factory someone had chopped up into a handful of loft apartments before going belly up and abandoning the job.

“So, let me get this straight,” Ginny said when he was done. “You want to buy an old candy factory in Sunset Park and turn it into luxury condos.”

“Right.”

“And you want me to help you.”

“Right.”

“Without letting Simon know what you’re doing.”

“Right.”