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Tempted to the Billionaire’s Bed
One
THIS WAS NOT THE FIRST time Portia had let herself into the wayward Marco Santoro’s penthouse apartment, but experience didn’t make it any easier. In fact, it was ten thousand times worse, because each of the three times she’d had to do this had been confronting in a new and different way.
First was the time she’d walked in to find him standing in the kitchen wearing only a pair of boxer shorts that left very, very little to the imagination. Then there was the time she’d arrived while he was in the middle of a poker game with friends and the testosterone in the room had almost made her vomit. But by far the worst was a month ago when her boss Dante Santoro had asked her to go to his debauched younger brother’s apartment to get the password for some protected documents and she’d found Marco in the spa with a woman Portia was pretty sure she recognized from a Leicester Square billboard that her running route took her past most mornings. They’d both been naked, she presumed, though she didn’t get close enough to ascertain that for a fact.
So it was with a degree of trepidation that she knocked, waited, hoping against hope that this would be the day he actually answered the door, dressed in something more than boxer shorts, signed the bloody documents he’d been supposed to look at earlier in the week, and she could be on her way.
Except…nothing.
She knocked again, harder, louder, muttered under her breath, “Oh, come on, you lazy son of a bitch,” ground her teeth, then reluctantly reached into her bag and removed the key her boss had given her the first time he’d sent her here, as he offered a sheepish apology.
Dante Santoro, CEO of Santoro Enterprises, ruthless billionaire, was rarely sheepish. In fact, he was rarely anything other than arrogantly brilliant, except when he had to ask Portia to have anything to do with Marco Santoro.
She’d met all the Santoro siblings, and the parents, and cousins. In a family-run business like this, it was impossible to avoid, and she’d been Dante’s executive assistant for eighteen months now, which gave her plenty of time to have been exposed to all manner of Santoro family members. They were all alike, with their dark hair, dark eyes, swarthy skin, strong bodies, confident, charming personalities.
All except Marco, who routinely arrived late to board meetings, if he even bothered to come at all. And instead of the bespoke suits the rest of the family wore as a matter of course, Marco, she was pretty sure, didn’t own anything even remotely as restrictive as a tailored garment. He was more of a ripped jeans and t-shirt kind of guy. A perennial five-o’clock shadow the perfect foil to his often slightly too long hair.
She let out an impatient sigh as she unlocked the door, stepped just inside and called out, “Hello?”
No answer.
Great.
He was probably off sunning himself with whichever supermodel had caught his eye recently in Ibiza. Just the thought made Portia’s spine straighten.
Men sucked.
All men, without exception.
She figured she was still very much within the window of a bad break up to be allowed to surrender herself to such jaded and cynical thoughts. It had only been six months. She’d gone from engaged and planning her wedding to realizing her fiancé hadn’t understood that fidelity was an expected part of their relationship. He’d also had a penchant for women whose legs were far too long and breasts too big and eyes too wide set, and skin too flawless.
With distaste, Portia moved past the glorious, open-plan kitchen with expansive views of Canary Wharf, ignoring the benches that were littered with beer bottles and pizza boxes, into the lounge room that looked like it should have been on the cover of architectural digest with its Scandinavian mid-century furniture and impressive renaissance art.
“Marco?” She called as she stopped walking, so that the clacking of her high heels against the tiled floor wouldn’t get in the way of hearing his response.
“It’s Portia,” she called, more hopefully. “Dante sent me.”
Was it possible he wasn’t home?
A muffled sound.
Coming from the direction of, if she wasn’t mistaken, his bedroom.
Great. Just great.
She crossed her fingers without realizing it, sending a little prayer into the heavens that shenotfind him in bed with someone. It would be far too reminiscent of having walked into her home after succumbing to a tummy bug and needing to leave work early, only to discover Jack had also come home early—and not alone.
Pushing that awful imagery from her mind—it had been six months, when would she stop being tortured by that?—she kept walking, a strange twisty feeling in her stomach as she moved deeper into Marco’s stunning home.
It smelled lovely down here, she realized, suppressing a groan at the unwanted thought. It was fresh, like a forest, and citrussy, and as she approached his bedroom she realized the bathroom was foggy, like it had only been recently used to shower in, and his body wash was the culprit for the fragrance.
Maybe he was awake, not alone? Maybe he’d showered with someone?
Her phone buzzed and she pulled it from her bag, quickly checking the message from Dante:any luck?
If she wasn’t one of the best paid executive assistants in London, she thought with a grimace, she’d have been tempted to quit then and there.
