Page 4 of Perfect Persuasion (Love’s Second Chance #2)

He threw down his fork and it rattled against his white plate. “Goddamn it, will you stop doing things with your mouth?”

Her eyes widened. “What?”

“Never mind,” he grumbled, feeling like an ass for exploding for no reason.

Claire didn’t know what she was doing to him. Or did she? His eyes narrowed. She returned her attention to her pasta, a little moan of pleasure sounding in her throat as she chewed another bite. She had to be doing it on purpose.

“You don’t have to act like you’re screwing the fettuccine alfredo.”

“If this is your idea of best behavior, then I’d hate to see your worst,” Claire said, her eyes snapping with anger.

He gave her a slow grin. “You’d love my worst behavior.”

“What happened to business only?”

“You’re the one who was moaning and sucking on your pasta like it was—”

“Logan.” She cast a worried glance toward the other restaurant patrons within hearing distance.

“I was going to say ‘really good’,” he lied, doing his best to sound innocent.

She gave him a look that clearly said she didn’t buy it and then raised her water glass to her lips. When he’d offered to order wine, she’d refused, something that he found odd, since he’d seen her toss back the martinis in New York.

“Why didn’t you want any wine?” he asked suddenly, curiosity getting the better of him.

He swore she seemed nervous. She set the water glass down so hard that a bit of it sloshed over the side and onto the white tablecloth.

“I don’t like alcohol,” she said, tucking a stray tendril of hair behind her ear.

“You forget I saw you going to town on martinis in New York,” he reminded her, now more curious than ever. She was lying to him. But why?

“I’ve decided to swear off alcohol, okay?” She frowned at him. “Look at where it got me the last time, in New York.”

Now that was a low blow and Logan felt it despite himself. He sent her a cool smile. “Point well taken, but as I recall, there wasn’t any alcohol involved the second time.”

But as Logan turned his attention to his mutilated lasagna once more, his mind began to drift.

Claire had sworn off alcohol, and he swore her breasts were larger, and when she’d given him her profile as she waited to get into his car, he thought he’d seen the slightest hint of a rounded tummy.

He had dismissed it as an optical illusion, or the fading sunlight, but now he began to wonder.

She’d been ill too, several weeks ago, and she’d worked from home, claiming to have a virus.

Was it possible that Claire was…pregnant?

She didn’t look pregnant. Her hands were still dainty, her arms still slim, her face still softly defined.

Then again, the pregnancy could be early on, which would mean that she wouldn’t really be showing much.

And it would also mean that there was a chance that Logan was the father. The condom had broken.

Holy shit.

For the second time during their dinner, his fork clattered to his plate. Claire looked up at him, her eyes questioning.

“Claire,” he said, “when you and I were together in New York, you were on some form of birth control, weren’t you?”

He held his breath as he awaited her answer.

“Of course I was.” She frowned at him again. “I’d rather not discuss that weekend anymore, if you don’t mind.”

Logan couldn’t drop the subject yet. He wasn’t quite convinced. He reached across the table and covered her left hand with his. “If you were pregnant, you’d tell me, wouldn’t you?”

She pulled her hand from beneath his, her frown growing until a small vee furrowed her smooth forehead. “You know I would. Don’t you think you’re overreacting? I mean, all this just because I didn’t want wine?”

She was right, of course. Logan pulled his hand away and relaxed in his seat. He cracked an apologetic smile. “Sorry. I guess you’re right. It’s just if there’s any chance…”

“No chance at all,” Claire assured him, looking at him, but not quite meeting his eyes.

A sense of unease unfurled in his gut. God, he didn’t want to relive the hell he’d been through all those years ago.

He hated to even think of it now, because it was all still there, festering inside him, a wound that had never healed.

He remembered the way the clinic had smelled, like antiseptic and something indefinably horrible, and how Abigail had looked at him, tears on her cheeks, telling him those three words that had nearly killed him.

You’re too late.

Christ no, he couldn’t go through that again.

But he told himself that it was just the old memories swimming to the surface that made him so suspicious.

He was being overly cautious about the situation, and all because of things that had nothing to do with Claire.

He knew Claire. She wouldn’t lie to him. Not about something so significant.

So he tamped down the unease and forced himself to continue eating.

Claire felt like scum for lying to Logan so directly. She glanced over at him in the dim confines of his car. His handsome face was illuminated by a glow from the dashboard screen and, as if sensing her regard, he looked over at her. She did her best not to flinch and look away.

“Thanks for agreeing to dinner,” he said. “We’re almost at your street. Do you mind if I come in for a few minutes?”

“I don’t know,” she hedged. “It’s late.”

She didn’t want to be forced to talk to him more, not when she felt so terrible.

Claire hadn’t planned on having to lie to Logan.

Ever. He wasn’t supposed to suspect her pregnancy.

He wasn’t supposed to find out. Maybe she hadn’t exactly thought things through since her life had gone into meltdown mode, but her plan had been to leave LM and Logan both and never look back.

Now she was realizing how foolish she’d been to think she could so easily extricate herself from this horribly complicated situation.

“Just for a few minutes?” Logan pressed. “I’d like to discuss that business we never quite got to at dinner.”

“Why bother?” His persistence frustrated her. Whenever they were alone together, bad things tended to happen. She couldn’t afford to allow that to happen now.

He pulled into the driveway at Sophie’s house and slid the car into park. “I’m determined, Claire,” he told her, unhooking his seatbelt. “I’ll get the door for you.”

Claire’s fierce sense of independence wouldn’t allow her to wait in the car for Logan to come and open her door.

So she ignored both him and the look of annoyance he gave her as she passed him and made her way to the front door.

He stood behind her, a large, unsettling presence waiting as she fished through her oversized bag.

As her fingers closed around her keys, she turned back to him. “Thanks for dinner, Logan,” she managed politely. “Good night.”

“Nice try.” He plucked them from her fingers and brushed past her, unlocking the door and gesturing for her to enter first.

“I’m afraid your skills as hostess leave something to be desired,” he drawled as he followed her inside.

“And I’m afraid your skills at taking a hint and leaving stink,” she countered, deciding that maybe if she counteracted his rudeness with some of her own, she could actually win this battle.

He merely raised a brow at her. “Is there some place we can sit down and talk like two rational, levelheaded adults? Bickering with you does have its merits, but…” He shrugged.

“Fine.” She stalked into the living room. Logan Monroe had a patent way of making her feel two inches tall. “In here.”

She seated herself on a loveseat, hoping he would at least take this hint and settle for the sofa opposite her. Claire should have known better. Being deliberately obtuse, he sat next to her, crowding her with his large body.

She scooted over an inch or two until her right thigh pressed into the arm of the loveseat. Logan scooted closer, eating up the space separating them.

Even more annoyed than before, she rose and sank down into the blessedly empty sofa. Logan sent her a knowing look.

“Don’t trust yourself, Claire?”

She snorted. “Wouldn’t you like to think so? Look, Logan, enough of the games. You hate me. You’ve hated me for years, ever since I first started in the Creative Team at LM eight or nine years ago.” Claire crossed her legs, awaiting his answer.

“It was nine years ago,” he corrected, eyeing her with that intense stare she found so unsettling. “And I never hated you.”

“You did give me the creative director’s position,” she acknowledged, still baffled that he had, given his obvious dislike of her.

“But other than that, you’ve always had it out for me.

” She thought of all their workplace battles over the years.

She had loved her job, but there was no denying he was an arrogant control freak at times, and they’d done their fair share of clashing.

“If you’re an asset to the company, that’s all that matters.”

“I’m not staying, Logan,” she said quietly, holding her ground.

“I’d be willing to let you buy into the company,” Logan continued, as though he hadn’t heard her rejection. Maybe he hadn’t. Those ears probably no longer processed the word “no” since he was so accustomed to hearing only “yes.”

“No.”

“A share of the company, a twenty-five percent raise, more vacation time, a redecorated office, a company car.” Logan ticked the items off on his fingers.

They were very, very tempting items, she had to admit. Claire looked at his long, tanned fingers and swallowed. “No,” she managed to all but croak.

“I won’t accept an answer,” he told her, rising from the loveseat. “Not yet. You think about it this week and get back to me. I’m offering you a lot. Far more than you’ll get anywhere else.”

No one knew that better than Claire. And that was just one of many problems on the apparently endless list facing her. What he offered her was very attractive. The ramifications were not.

She rose as well. “My answer is still no. No to everything. Can’t we just leave it at that?”