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“Want to talk about it?”

Emilia sipped her drink, to buy for time. Weirdly, she almost sort ofdidwant to talk about it, but with Salvatore? Given they’d been at loggerheads over who’d get the project? It would be dangerous to let him know how off track they were in their first set of deliverables. Or would it? After all, they had a contract with the Moricosian government, and they weren’t quite at the point of breaching it. Nothing short of a breach would allow the government to cancel their deal, and even then, it would be a bad look.

She shook her head, though. “Just a few fires I had to put out.”

“And did you succeed?”

Even without having confided the details to him, there was something in the deep huskiness of his voice that was somehow soothing.

“It will take some time,” she prevaricated.

“Fires often do.”

“Oh, yeah? Something you have to deal with often?”

“You can’t be in business without having things go pear shaped from time to time.”

“I know,” she said, with a nod. “That doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

His smile made her stomach twist. “No?”

She shook her head. “I like predictability. I like people to do what they say they’re going to do. I like things to go according to plan.”

His lips quirked in an expression of amusement.

“Don’t you?” she pushed.

He shrugged. “Of course.”

“Why am I not convinced?”

“Because there is something to be said for the fun of a challenge. The adrenaline rush of needing to think outside the box, to find a solution.”

She pulled a face. “I’ll take your word for it.”

His laugh was deep and throaty. “You must be used to this sort of thing?”

She expelled a breath. “Sure. I’m used to something going wrong, but noteverythinggoing wrong, all at once.” She sucked in a breath, aware she’d come dangerously close to saying too much.

“What difference does it make if it’s one thing or ten?”

She rolled her eyes. “Spoken like a man who never has to clean up his own mess.”

“Ouch. And presumptuous.”

“Am I wrong?”

“I tend not to make mess,” he said, winking at her, so her stomach did another unpredictable little roll.

“Sure you don’t.”

“But I’m responsible for fixing other people’s mistakes.”

“Like what?”

He shrugged nonchalantly. “We don’t need to go into specifics. And specifics don’t matter. At the end of the day, you just have to roll up your sleeves and dive right in.”

She sipped her drink. “And you enjoy that?”