Page 11 of The Reluctant Billionaire

‘What’swrong with themis that they’re six grand trainers, which is fucking unethical in itself, if you ask me. And the kids coming in tomorrow may be poor as fuck, but believe me, they all have the SNKRS app on their old, crapped-out phones and they pore over that stuff. They know every Air Jordan collab under the sun, just like my twelve-year-old nephew does.

‘So if you’re going to stand there and tell me you think it’s okay to wear six grand trainers to hand out breakfast to kids whose parents are too broke or too high to buy them breakfast cereal, then I’m going to stand here and tell you to read. The. Fucking. Room. Got it?’

There’s anger pulsing through my bloodstream at the mere fact of having to explain this shit to her. My ears are ringing, and it’s heady, and I don’t fucking know why. Yeah, I have an entire fucking wardrobe of Air Jordans at home, mostly purchased under pressure from my sneakerhead nephew, Woody, but there’s no way I’d ever wear them here.

There’s also no way I’d ever spend more than two hundred quid on a pair, no matter how rare they are. Six grand on trainers is justwrong.

We stare at each other for a moment.

She blinks first.

‘You are one hundred percent right, and I apologise,’ she says with a grace and poise I’m not expecting. ‘I wasn’t thinking. Consider it done. What was the second thing?’

Well, that was easier than I expected. But I suspect she won’t let my second point land without a fight.

I clear my throat.

‘You need to wear a better bra tomorrow,’ I say, studiously training my eyes on her face.

Her jaw drops open.‘Excuse me?’

‘You heard me. You need to put those fucking nipples away. They’re distracting to the point of being a hazard.’

She glares as me. ‘You’re actually calling my nipples a hazard. Please tell me you’re not serious.’

I’m already deeply regretting bringing this up, but if it means I don’t have to spend the rest of this project expending every ounce of energy I have on avoiding the peanuts she’s smuggling, then it’ll be worth it.

‘Us looking at them could be a hazard,’ I say with less conviction.

She puts her hands on her hips, which doesn’t helpat all,because the slender curves of this woman’s body are knockout.She’sa knockout, and she knows it.‘How so? Pray, tell me why my nipples are a hazard.’

‘Don’t get fancy with me. They are fucking mesmerising, and I need to make sure I and all the guys here keep our focus on the job at hand and don’t do ourselves an injury because we can’t keep our eyes off your tits.’

Okay. That was definitely a step too far.

‘This is harassment,’ she says. ‘I suspect you don’t come from a corporate background, but you absolutely cannot say this to people in the workplace.’

She’s right. Obviously. I would never, ever dream of speaking to a colleague like this. Not only that, but Totum has a million HR policies in place to make sure a conversation like this could never happen. So what the fuck I’m doing right now, I do not know.

I throw up one hand. ‘This isn’t a workplace. It’s a fucking community project. If you don’t like it, walk. Or put on more fucking clothes. And preferably a padded bra. You’ll be more comfortable. You look like you’re freezing.’

‘I have poor circulation,’ she says through gritted teeth.

‘You need to work on your vascular system,’ I tell her. I know about this stuff. I’ve done a couple of Wim Hof weekends. ‘Ice baths are great. Or cold water swimming. You can start with cold showers.’

The look she’s giving me could fell a lesser man. Or a fucking oak tree, probably. ‘It sounds like the only person who needs a cold shower around here is you,’ she grits out. ‘I suggest you take one. Maybe you can bang one out while you’re in there. It might make you less fixated on the extremities of my circulatory system. Good night,Aide.’

I can’t help but smirk as I admire the spectacular view of her retreating arse.

If I’m ice, that woman is fire.

6

AIDE

‘How’d it go?’ Andy enquiries twenty minutes later as he steers my brand-new Defender through the traffic-logged streets of Notting Hill. My driver and all-round house manager picked me up a couple of streets away from the community centre. Having someone drive me is one of those things that sounds wanky on the face of it but is in fact, like most of my choices, grounded purely in practicality.

I can sit on the M4 like a muppet for the best part of an hour, or I can pay Andy to sit on the M4 like a muppet while I feverishly attempt to play catch-up on my day job. Also, he’s more in love with this car—his new toy—than is healthy, in my view.

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