Page 15 of How To Tempt The Off-Limits Billionaire

If he bought a farm planted with run-of-the-mill vines, the Clos du Cadieux board, with Susan leading the charge, would come after him with pitchforks and lighted torches. They’d also fire his ass. However, if he discovered a thought-to-be-extinct cultivar and managed to get a small run of wine, he would be considered a wine god and would be pretty much untouchable.

He was taking a hell of a risk, but he was fairly sure that St. Urban still had the C’Artegan cultivar. Tomorrow he’d walk the land, and look for any subtle differences between the vines. If he found vines that looked interesting, he would send samples for analysis...

If they turned out to be the C’Artegan cultivar, he’d pamper and protect them, and in a few years, he’d produce a small vintage of soft, luscious, rare as hell wine. When he released a press release stating that Clos du Cadieux was branching into making C’Artegan wine, their stock would go through the roof.

But if Ro insisted on the sale going through before he had his results back, he would buy the farm himself—he was insanely wealthy and could afford whatever price she demanded—and decide what to do with the property later.

And his position at Clos du Cadieux would be secure...

“Tell me about Franschhoek,” Ro said, adjusting the strap of the nude-colored purse on her bare shoulder.

He pulled himself back to the present.

“Before colonization the San and Khoekhoe peoples inhabited this area, but in 1687 Simon van der Stel and twenty-three pioneers arrived in the valley and established farms along the Berg River. A year later, French Huguenots, looking to escape persecution by the Catholic Church, came to the valley and started farming. The residents are very proud of their connection to France and they hold a massive Gallic festival here every year. They claim it’s the food and wine capital of South Africa and they aren’t wrong,” Muzi replied, stopping next to a small whitewashed house. A discreet plaque on the gate told them they’d arrived at Pasco’s.

Ro glanced around, breathed deeply and smiled. She looked at him, and attraction, hot and wild, sizzled. Muzi knew that if he made a move, covered her mouth with his, she would be his for the taking. She wanted him, that much was obvious, nearly as much as he wanted her.

She wouldn’t object to skipping dinner to return to his house and get naked.

He was so very tempted.

“Are you guys going to spend the rest of the evening standing there or are you coming in?”

Muzi immediately recognized the gravelly voice and turned toward the man standing off the path leading up to the house, a glass of wine in his hand and a cigarette dangling between two fingers. Muzi grinned when Ro’s fingernails dug into his skin on his forearm.

“Uh...that’s Pasco Kildare, the famous chef, one of the youngest in the world to be awarded two Michelin stars. He owns a restaurant in Manhattan, and you need to wait a hundred years to get in,” Ro whispered, sounding a little starstruck.

The last time he was in New York, about two months ago, he called in on Pasco during lunch service and returned that night to work his way through Pasco’s new tasting menu. His food was always stunning, creative and cutting-edge.

Pas, he had to admit, could feed him anytime and anywhere.

Pasco’s, Franschhoek, was more down-to-earth, casual and, because Pasco was Franschhoek born and raised, it was where Pasco could relax. The town still saw him as the younger son of one of the valley’s most respected farmers and remembered him for being one of the biggest pranksters the town had ever seen.

It was hard to be taken too seriously when your biggest claim to fame wasn’t the Michelin stars or your reputation as a superstar chef, but the fact that you plowed your first car through the floor-to-ceiling window of an exclusive art gallery on Main Street.

“Triple M,” Pasco said, in his drawling voice.

“Hey, Pas,” Muzi said, exchanging a one-armed hug with his old friend. He stood back and put a hand on Ro’s back. “Meet Roisin O’Keefe.”

“Call me Ro.”

“Hello, Call Me Ro,” Pasco said, dropping a kiss on her right cheek, then her left. Done with the Gallic kissing, he kept her hand in his and Muzi fought the urge to rip off his arm. Jealously wasn’t his thing, but he’d give Pas ten seconds to drop her hand or else things might turn fractious.

Pasco dropped her hand at nine seconds. “Welcome to my place,” Pasco said, sitting on the thick stone wall of the restaurant’s old-fashioned wraparound veranda.

“Shouldn’t you be in the kitchen?” Muzi asked, not at all happy with the fact that Pasco couldn’t keep his eyes off Ro. Pasco finally met his eyes and Muzi saw the mischief dancing in those green eyes. Damn. Pas knew that he was attracted to Ro and was prepared to give him a hard time about it. Muzi knew that if the shoe was on the other foot, he’d mess with Pasco in the same way.

Irritating each other, winding each other up, was what they’d been doing since they were spotty teenagers.

“My team has everything under control, and I’d much rather sit here and talk to a pretty woman.”

He could find someone else to talk to and stay away from his woman...wait, what the hell? Ro wasn’this, he reminded himself, and he didn’t believe in treating women as property. What the hell was happening to him?

“Stop flirting with her,” Muzi told Pasco, speaking in Xhosa. Having been brought up on a farm, Pasco was nearly fluent in the language and, even if he wasn’t, Muzi’s scowl would tell him to back down. Way down.

“You’re not the type to get jealous but she is lovely,” Pas replied, his Xhosa accent a little rusty.

“It’s business,” Muzi replied, keeping his tone flat. He knew that Pasco wouldn’t believe that whopper, but he had to try.

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