Page 72 of Seduced by Her Billionaire Fake Fiancé

All men, without exception.

She figured she was still very much within the window of a bad break up to be allowed to surrender herself to such jaded and cynical thoughts. It had only been six months. She’d gone from engaged and planning her wedding to realizing her fiancé hadn’t understood that fidelity was an expected part of their relationship. He’d also had a penchant for women whose legs were far too long and breasts too big and eyes too wide set, and skin too flawless.

With distaste, Portia moved past the glorious, open-plan kitchen with expansive views of Canary Wharf, ignoring the benches that were littered with beer bottles and pizza boxes, into the lounge room that looked like it should have been on the cover of architectural digest with its Scandinavian mid-century furniture and impressive renaissance art.

“Marco?” She called as she stopped walking, so that the clacking of her high heels against the tiled floor wouldn’t get in the way of hearing his response.

“It’s Portia,” she called, more hopefully. “Dante sent me.”

Was it possible he wasn’t home?

A muffled sound.

Coming from the direction of, if she wasn’t mistaken, his bedroom.

Great. Just great.

She crossed her fingers without realizing it, sending a little prayer into the heavens that shenotfind him in bed with someone. It would be far too reminiscent of having walked into her home after succumbing to a tummy bug and needing to leave work early, only to discover Jack had also come home early—and not alone.

Pushing that awful imagery from her mind—it had been six months, when would she stop being tortured by that?—she kept walking, a strange twisty feeling in her stomach as she moved deeper into Marco’s stunning home.

It smelled lovely down here, she realized, suppressing a groan at the unwanted thought. It was fresh, like a forest, and citrussy, and as she approached his bedroom she realized the bathroom was foggy, like it had only been recently used to shower in, and his body wash was the culprit for the fragrance.

Maybe he was awake, not alone? Maybe he’d showered with someone?

Her phone buzzed and she pulled it from her bag, quickly checking the message from Dante:any luck?

If she wasn’t one of the best paid executive assistants in London, she thought with a grimace, she’d have been tempted to quit then and there.

Except, she loved her job. She loved working with Marco, who was brilliant, diligent, and respected her intelligence and professional strengths enough to frequently stretch her way beyond a traditional assistant’s workload. He was forever challenging her, offering her opportunities, inviting her to travel with him. This was one of the rare times when he’d asked her to do something more like grunt work. And she knew why he didn’t outsource this sort of thing to one of the pool assistants, shared between the executives.

He needed discretion.

Marco was something of a media darling, his charming, sexy, playboy persona combined with the family’s stratospheric wealth, meant he was frequently in the scandal papers and all over the internet. His dating—or sleeping around—was a matter of great interest, and the prospect of being able to sell a tidbit of gossip about his latest conquest meant Portia was one of the few people Dante could trust to breech Marco’s inner-sanctum. She didn’t bother replying to Dante straight away; that would wait until she was in a cab downstairs, documents signed.

When no answer came to her knock on the bedroom door, she pushed it inwards and peeked around.

The curtains were drawn but enough morning light filtered through to make out the shape of Marco in bed and with relief, she saw he was alone.

A sheet was draped over his lower half, though one darkly tanned, hair-roughened leg was kicked out of the bed, and if she stared long and hard enough and followed the line of that leg upward, it would be to see the outline of his impressively firm bottom silhouetted by the billion thread count sheets.

“Marco.” She stood beside the bed, arms crossed over her chest, willing him to stir. “Dante sent me. Wake up.”

Marco didn’t move.

Great.

Irritated and impatient, she reached down and jabbed a finger into his shoulder. His skin was warm and soft; her finger lingered a moment longer than necessary, then she withdrew it as though she’d been burned.

His features were similar to Dante’s but somehow different. Dante was the oldest sibling, and his face had a harsh angularity to it, a symmetry, that spoke of strength and also of turmoil. Or perhaps the turmoil part came from knowing about his tragic past, and imagining that his loss and grief were imprinted on his harsh features. Or perhaps it was because he rarely smiled, and smiling could change a person’s appearance so completely. Dante appeared to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders, whereas Marco seemed to not even know what it was to carry any weight whatsoever. He was the epitome of carefree. Make that, careless.

He lived as though every day was his last on earth. He partied, flirted, slept around, lived the kind of life one might expect a person born into obscene wealth to enjoy. Except Portia knew he also played a valuable role in the company, purely by virtue of the fact he was a certified genius with a savant-like gift for numbers. He could achieve in twenty minutes of focused effort what many people might take months to fathom, meaning almost anything was tolerated from him.

“Marco.” She raised her voice, jabbed his shoulder again, but this time he moved, reacting fast, one hand reaching out, grabbing her wrist, eyes blinking open—bleary yet somehow focused—and spearing hers, making it feel as though she’d been glued to the spot.

“Portia.” He said her name with the hint of an accent and her stomach rolled uncomfortably. “What a pleasant surprise.”

His fingers were wrapped around her wrist and for reasons beyond her comprehension, Portia didn’t pull back. “Dante sent me,” she said, her voice strangely light.

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