Page 37 of How to Undo the Proud Billionaire

Brin’s eyes narrowed. “How many beds?”

He couldn’t lie. “One. But it’s a huge bed and the same rules apply there as here. You’ve got to ask…”

“Yeah, that didn’t work out so well this morning.”

“It would’ve worked out fine if we hadn’t been interrupted,” Radd muttered, still feeling resentful. He now had to work ten times harder to get back to that place they had been, and Radd wasn’t sure if they would get there.

The thought depressed him. And the fact that he could feel depressed, depressed him more.

God, he was losing it.

Radd, irritated with himself and with Brin for not making this situation easier, found his patience slipping. “I’m going to The Treehouse. Come if you want to. If you don’t, fine.”

Brin took her time making up her mind and Radd forced himself not to display his impatience. This slip of a girl didn’t need to know how much she rattled him. And how much he hoped she said yes.

“Does this place have a shower?”

“Solar-powered.”

Radd sent Mari aHelp melook, and she rolled her eyes before speaking. “If the lodge is a six-star establishment, then The Treehouse is a notch above. It’s a pretty special place, Brin, and you’ll regret not seeing it. It will be worth putting up with his company, I promise you.”

Thanks, Mari, Radd thought, narrowing his eyes at his old friend.

“Fine,” Brin muttered, stomping inside.

Mari smiled at him. “Prepared to do some groveling, Tempest-Vane?”

The hell he was! He was alpha to his core, groveling wasn’t part of his vocabulary. God, he wasn’t even good at apologizing! Mari’s eyebrows rose higher at his silence and he finally gave in, his shoulders slumping. “I might have to do a little damage control,” he reluctantly admitted.

Mari patted his shoulder. “Try not to hurt yourself trying something new, my friend.”

Ha-ha, Radd thought, glaring at her departing back.

CHAPTER EIGHT

WHATWASSHEdoing in this vehicle? Why hadn’t she stayed in Radd’s villa and given them both some time apart and space to cool down?

Brinley pushed her sunglasses up into her hair and shook her head at her behavior. While she didn’t believe she had been completely in the wrong to defend Mari, she shouldn’t have jumped feet first into Radd’s business. And Mari, smart and independent, didn’t seem the type to need defending. But Naledi just pushed every button Brinley had…

And what had she been thinking, allowing her fight with Radd to reignite after she finally had found the courage to apologize? And what was she doing here? Was she just a glutton for punishment?

But the heart of the matter was that, despite the fact she was still irritated with Radd, she didn’t want to miss out on one moment she could be with him. She would leave his life the day after tomorrow and, annoyingly, wherever he was, was where she wanted to be.

He was arrogant and irritating and implacable and annoying and sexy and…

Brin shook her head and noticed that Radd was finally, after an hour of driving in silence, slowing down. He braked and switched off the ignition.

“We’re here.”

All she could see was rocks. Confused, Brinley exited the vehicle at the base of a massive set of boulders towering above her. Pulling her overnight bag over her shoulder, she followed Radd as he stepped onto a walkway made of anchored wooden planks climbing in a zigzag pattern up the rocks. Radd easily carried a huge picnic basket and his own small rucksack. A two-way radio was tucked into the back pocket of his cargo shorts and he had a rifle slung over his shoulder.

Brin turned the corner and looked across the walkway spanning two boulders, and her mouth dropped open. To the left was a rolling carpet of open savanna, dotted by the occasional tree. To the right were more boulders, some of which had tree roots clinging to their mottled surface. Stopping, she pushed her fist into her sternum and looked at the structure in front of her, sophisticated and simple.

At its core, The Treehouse was a wooden deck, encircled with a wire-and-wood railing, thirty feet off the ground. A reed roof covered half of the area and beneath it was an enormous bed dressed in white linen, piled high with pillows and surrounded by a heavy mosquito net, sumptuous and sexy and sensual.

A small table sat in one corner of the deck overlooking the rolling savanna. In the other corner sat a pile of thick, huge cushions, suitable for a sultan’s tent. Numerous old-fashioned lamps were placed at strategic intervals along the outside of the deck, providing light when night fell.

Man, it was romantic. All that was missing was an icy bottle of champagne in a silver bucket and blood-red rose petals.

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