Page 105 of Dangerous Temptation
She looked at the notebooks and then to her laptop on the table in front of them. Was there a connection? ‘My research?’
He laid his hand over hers and threaded their fingers together. ‘I had everything mapped out. I knew how the software would function. I even designed the user interface, but I kept banging into the same brick wall. I’m not an economist. I couldn’t come up with the way to detect when conditions are questionable. That dizzying equation you had on slide eighteen of your presentation? That, baby, is the golden bullet.’
He tossed the notebooks onto the table, and they landed on top of her computer bag. Two combining.
Her weary brain finally started firing. ‘My algorithm. You needed that to make your software work.’
‘And I nearly fell off my chair when you handed it to me today on a silver platter.’
She twisted on the sofa, tucking her leg up underneath her. ‘So all the time when I was in the lake house working on this …’
‘I was up in the manor coding my fingers off.’
The possibilities were making her pulse rush. ‘So we … we can help people.’
‘The financial industry has been looking for something like this for a long time. People need to know if and when their money isn’t safe so they can move it. With the combination of our innovations, we can put control back into investors’ hands.’ He shrugged. ‘The SEC will probably be interested in it, too, but I think we’ll have to charge them more. Alotmore.’
After what the regulators had done to him, the way they’d gone through his life with a fine-toothed comb, she could understand why. ‘People will actually buy this?’
‘In droves.’
‘But …’ Her thoughts were now flying by at light speed. No wonder he’d been so aggressive back in Dr Walters’s office. ‘Shouldn’t we give it away? Seeing how …’
His jaw tightened, his stubborn streak showing. ‘I didn’t get where I am today by giving things away. People will pay, and we will profit.’
She couldn’t help it, she cringed. Her stomach actually flipped at the thought. The press would go rabid if they were to produce software that benefited again from their families’ crimes. Hundreds of millions of dollars were still missing.
Seeing the look on her face, he caught her chin. ‘What I would like to do is donate a portion of the proceeds back to those who were robbed – starting with your mother.’
Pay people back.
The light bulb dawned inside her head with the brilliance of a beacon. He’d said that before. He’d talked about it as being the only way to get people off their backs. She knew how they hounded him. They went after him like rats in a sewer.
But … ‘Is this to improve your image?Ourimages?’
Sighing, he leaned his forehead against hers. ‘It’s to make us feel like we’ve done all we can. You and me. You were right. We can’t make up for our families’ mistakes. We need to live our own lives, no matter what people think.’
He looked at her almost cautiously. ‘I’d like to collaborate with you on this.’
She cupped his bristled chin. It felt prickly and sexy. She’d thought of him once as being calloused and detached, but those were just protective mechanisms he’d built. His feelings went deep.
‘I want to work with you, at the very least. I need more, but if that’s all you can do, I’ll take it.’ He closed his eyes. ‘I’m sorry I chased you away.’
‘You were just trying to protect me.’
‘Because I love you.’ He opened those brilliant grey eyes, and they touched her at her core. ‘I love you more than anything.’
‘Alex,’ she said, her voice breaking.
‘Come back.’ His breath brushed against her lips. ‘I need you with me. I’ll fix what needs fixing. I’ll do whatever you say.’
‘No, that’s the problem.’ She speared her fingers into his hair. ‘We can’t control one another. This has to be an equal partnership. We can be each other’s protectors, but we can’t close ourselves off from the world – no matter how much we’d both like that.’
‘But we still have a chance?’
‘Oh, Alex. Of course we do.’ She rose up from the cushions onto her haunches. ‘I told you I loved you. I meant that with every fibre of my being.’
Their mouths came together in a hungry, desperate lock.
