The Price of Scandal (Bluewater Billionaires) - Lucy Score Page 0,82

the reins and take to the golf course. I was not one of those people.

Derek had won the brief but entertaining wrestling match for the keys to the Porsche. I hadn’t put up much of a fight. I hated to admit it, but I was still not firing on all cylinders. Still tired, it was the price paid for what I’d earned. The work didn’t do itself.

“Dinner,” he said, picking up my hand and bringing it to his lips.

Salsa, wildly romantic, played from the stereo’s speakers.

This moment, with the sun sinking in the spring sky, with the Miami breeze ruffling my very daring haircut, with the debonair Derek Price driving the convertible I’d earned, was perfection.

“Dinner sounds wonderful.” I sighed.

“It will be. My stepfather is grilling.”

It took a few seconds for the words to sink in.

“No. Absolutely not,” I insisted, sitting up straighter. I chose that moment to realize today was the first time I’d ever ridden in the passenger seat.

“I’ve met your family,” he pointed out.

“That was business. That wasn’t a cozy family dinner!”

“There’s nothing cozy about this. I have a brother and two sisters, my stepsiblings, and somewhere in the neighborhood of thirty nieces and nephews,” he said conversationally.

“Derek, you can’t introduce me to your family.” I was horrified.

“Why not?”

Why not? There were a few dozen reasons why not. I was his client, not his girlfriend. Secondly, to the public, I was the rich bitch who skated on drug charges. And to round out the perfect trifecta of why I shouldn’t be meeting his parents: We. Just. Had. Sex.

Sex. Not conversations about where this was going or what the expected outcomes were. We’d had glorious, glorious sex, and now I was supposed to shake hands with the man’s mother? I probably still smelled vaguely like her naked son.

“I mean, why are you doing this?” I tried to squash the nerves that were suddenly electrifying my intestines. Oh, God, did I have my emergency Imodium stash in this bag?

“I think you’ll find my family more relaxing than some of your regular social situations,” he said. He was too polite to mention the fact that my family was like a reality TV reunion special where someone invariably got punched in the mouth.

“I’m not in ‘meet new people’ form,” I argued.

“This isn’t for a photo op or anything other than a good meal and interesting company,” he promised.

I scrubbed my hands over my face wishing I’d put forth more than the minimum of effort on my makeup this morning. Of course, this morning I’d only been thinking about brunch and the lab. Not meeting Derek Price’s parents.

He was putting me in an impossible position. If things went badly, I didn’t have an easy exit strategy. I didn’t have Jane. Hell, I didn’t even have the keys to my own car.

“Emily,” he said.

“What?”

“Relax and trust me. I like you, and I think you’ll like them. There are no requirements. If you’re not comfortable, give me the signal, and I’ll drive you home. No questions asked.”

The man had gotten into my vagina less than twenty-four hours earlier, and somehow that had granted him an all-access pass to my innermost thoughts?

“Trust me,” he urged. He reached into his pocket and produced a small packet. He held it out to me.

“What’s this?” I asked, taking it. I flipped it over in my hand. It was a single dose of Imodium.

“Just in case,” he said.

“How did you…”

“Do you really want to talk about it?” Derek asked, his eyes on the road.

“God, no!” I was humiliated. Humbled. And something else.

“You can trust me, Emily Stanton, formidable boss, beautiful billionaire, and real live human being.”

It wasn’t flowers or a love note but diarrheal medicine that made my heart do a slow, inevitable flip-flop in my chest.

God help me. God help us both.

I cleared my throat, surprised at the emotion clogging it. “I’ll give it fifteen minutes. What’s our signal?”

“It should be something subtle like, ‘Derek, I need your throbbing cock in my womb right now,’” he said, smoothly shifting gears and accelerating around a graffitied school bus that was riding the rumble strips in the bike lane. “My family will understand.”

I rolled my eyes so hard it was audible. “Your ego knows no bounds.”

“Confidence, love. Not ego,” he corrected.

“How about a work emergency?” I suggested.

“Hmm, slightly less believable, but I suppose I could sell it. At least with the less sophisticated Prices.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“Darling, I’m driving the woman who redefined lovemaking for me in the sexiest car in the