Nicole turned toward me and lifted a knowing brow. “They haven’t seen the social media backlash yet. Maybe it will be brief and die out quickly, but there is going to be plenty of criticism. I’m sure you know that people have called to boycott companies on social media for less. The guy isn’t just a womanizer, or a serial dater of lots of women. Nobody really cares much about that. But showing up naked on the front page of a well-read newspaper with a bunch of nude women can smack of general disrespect and disdain for the female gender. People will assume he bought those women, and that he was able to use them because they needed to support themselves, and he has endless funds.”

  I gritted my teeth, knowing there wasn’t a damn thing I could say in my brother’s defense. More than likely, he had rewarded those women handsomely, even though they’d been with him willingly.

  She was right, of course. A lot could be made of a salacious picture and a sensational, lewd story. “Then tell me what you’d do to prevent all that from happening,” I requested grimly.

  She snorted. “I’d kidnap the CEO and ship him to someplace in Siberia for a decade or two so nothing else happens.”

  Agreed! I would have been happy to buy Dylan a one-way ticket, but knowing my brother, he’d find a way back to England.

  She hesitated before she continued. “Honestly, I’d try to get in front of the whole thing. Find the man-whore a girlfriend who doesn’t have any skeletons in her closet, and book some positive publicity to let the public know that it was a one-time drunken incident. When I was researching, I did see something about Mr. Lancaster being single. I guess I just assumed that he was a widower. But if the old guy is healthy enough to get it up for an orgy, he can certainly get himself a nice girlfriend. He’d have to take responsibility for doing some skanky things, and then show the public that he’s changed.”

  I raised my eyebrows. Was she under the impression that I was an…old man? “How old do you think he is?”

  I couldn’t help myself. I had to ask. Obviously, she’d never managed to dig up a picture or she wouldn’t be talking to me right now.

  It hadn’t been cheap to get experts to remove all that info from the net, but it had been worth it. Perhaps if she’d dug a little deeper into the family, she might have found a photo of me, but there wasn’t a whole lot there to find.

  Nicole shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen pictures or articles about him. Initially, my presentation had nothing to do with the family. It was about improving Lancaster’s image overall as a company, and handling anything that came up in the future that might make them seem negligent to the general population. I didn’t know any of the family was even prone to bad publicity until I heard about this recent orgy thing. Doing damage control on a sleezy billionaire wasn’t even on my radar.”

  “He’s actually not that old.” I hated the defensiveness I heard in my voice. “I’ve seen his pictures. Thirties, maybe.” I had to keep my comments vague. I was treading into dangerous territory. But I was British, so it had to make sense to her that I knew more about British billionaires than she did.

  “That young?” She sounded completely caught off-guard. “Then they really need a fixer. They definitely can’t blow off the incident as some kind of dementia. Look, the guy is single, and I really don’t care what he does, but some people will care. Overall, Lancaster has always had a great reputation. I just wanted to be the PR company that was able to keep it that way. I wasn’t ready for the big sex scandal.”

  “It was a stupid thing to do,” I grumbled, knowing I had to abandon the discussion about my family before I got myself in trouble.

  She nodded her head slowly. “It was, but I’ve learned not to judge. I don’t know the circumstances. It could have been some kind of trap, and the guy does have a right to his kinks. But maybe he should have checked the lock on the door. When you’re at the helm of one of the most powerful companies in the world, private things need to stay private.”

  Of course, what she just said made me wonder if the woman had her own kinks, and exactly what those might be.

  I’m a red-blooded male who hasn’t gotten any for a while, so don’t judge me about my sexual curiosity.

  I decided it was probably best not to ask her about her sexual fantasies at the moment. “There was no way you could have known what would happen while you were there. And I highly doubt that you really bombed that presentation. I’d say that you were presenting the wrong thing at the wrong time—through no real fault of your own.”

  I knew that much was true. The entire corporate office had been bombarded by the media even before I’d left to get to Surrey.

  My employees had been trying to put out fires, and Nicole had been unprepared to be a firefighter.

  “That’s possible, I suppose.” Her tone didn’t sound like she was quite convinced.

  “Feel better now?” I asked.

  She put her feet up in the recliner and leaned her head back. “Not really. But thanks for trying.”

  I ignored her denial. She sounded better, and that worked for me.

  “Should we talk about your other little problem?”

  She closed her eyes. “What problem?”

  “Is it really true that you’ve never had an orgasm?”

  Her eyes popped back open. “I think I need a drink.”

  I grinned as I pushed the call button to get us some cocktails.

  CHAPTER 4

  Nicole

  IT TOOK FOUR rounds of alcohol and a belly full of airplane food before I’d even entertained the idea of answering Damian’s questions about my sex life.

  However, by the time I emptied cocktail glass number four, I had absolutely no inhibitions about telling him anything.

  I handed my empty glass to the flight attendant and leaned back in my comfortable seat, thinking about everything Damian had shared with me over the last few hours.

  Unlike most gorgeous men, Damian didn’t seem to want to talk about himself. At all.

  I felt like he’d pried every detail of my life from me, but he never said a whole lot about himself. His answers to my questions about him were brief, and he hadn’t volunteered anything more than what I’d asked.

  If he thought he could just give me a yes-or-no answer, that’s exactly what I’d gotten, but one-word answers hadn’t worked every single time.

  I did find out that he’d grown up in Surrey, and had taken over an already successful family business after his dad’s death five years ago.

  His mother was originally from Spain, but she’d been in England since she’d married Damian’s father decades ago, who’d been an Englishman. She still lived in their family home in Surrey.

  He’d attended Cambridge for college.

  He was well traveled, a fact I’d picked up myself after I’d asked him where he’d been in the world. His answer to that particular inquiry was probably the longest answer I’d gotten.

  He definitely got around.

  I’d gotten little tidbits of his life during our conversation, but I still didn’t feel like I knew that much about him.

  Me? Well, I’d pretty much spilled my guts right after my second cocktail. If he asked a question, I’d answered it with a lot more information than I really needed to tell a virtual stranger.

  That’s what I get for having more than one drink.

  I got pretty damn chatty after a couple of cocktails.

  After four of them? I was pretty much in an ask-me-anything-and-I’ll-tell-you mood. Anything at all.

  “Would you like another one?” the smiling brunette who had taken my cocktail glass queried politely.

  I shook my head, smiling back at her before she retreated. If I didn’t stop, Damian would probably know my whole life story from birth to the present.

  I’d noticed that he had downed a single beer before he’d switched to some kind of tea.

  I’d probably never understand the obsession that British people had with their tea.

  I turned my head to look at him, and he raised his brows as he lowered his teacup. “So let’s get back to the subject I originally asked you about,” he suggested.

  “What subject would that be?” I tried to act like I had no idea what he was asking.

  “Is it true that you’ve never had an orgasm?” His question was firm, but low enough that not everyone in business class could hear him.

  Really, I wasn’t sure how many of our fellow passengers were still awake. The lights had been dimmed after dinner, and it looked like most people had lowered their seats flat to sleep.

  He was so persistent when he wanted to know something, and in my… ummm…alcohol-induced relaxed state, I wondered if it was really that big of a deal to tell him what he wanted to know.

  Like he said, I’d never see him again.

  I took a deep breath. “It’s true. I haven’t. End of discussion.”

  Okay, so maybe I wasn’t all that comfortable admitting that my sex life sucked to a guy like Damian. I doubted he’d be able to empathize. Something told me that Mr. Orgasm had never left a woman unsatisfied.

  “Wait a minute. You can’t just leave it like that. You have to tell me why,” he insisted.

  I let out a long sigh. “I’m not a virgin, if that’s what you’re asking. I’ve had two serious, long-term relationships, and it just didn’t happen for me. Maybe some women just aren’t…orgasmic.”

  “Or maybe the men you were seeing were absolute morons,” he grumbled.

  Damian sounded so indignant that my lips curved up in a smile. “So what if I’ve never had an orgasm with a guy? Is it really that big of a deal?”

  His voice got louder and a little more annoyed. “Hell, yes, it’s a big deal. If you’d ever had an orgasm during fantastic sex, you’d know how big of a deal it really is. Why even bother to have sex if your partner can’t get to the finish line?”

  I wanted to tell him that my male partners had never had an issue getting to their finish line, but we were sitting on a plane full of passengers, and I didn’t really want them to hear us discussing my sex life.

  I might be pretty tipsy, but obviously not to the point where embarrassment wasn’t a possibility.

  “It’s not that important to me, Damian. Keep your voice down.”

  “Sorry,” he rumbled apologetically. “But I think you should insist on more.”

  I rolled my eyes at him. “Great. Now I’m sitting next to Dr. Phil.” I was starting to get a little offended, but Damian was probably right. I hadn’t ever demanded much from either of my previous long-term love interests.

  I’d met my first boyfriend in college, and we’d both put more effort into our studies than our relationship, not to mention the fact that we’d both been pretty young and inexperienced.

  The second one had come along just when I’d been starting my previous job in corporate law. We’d worked in the same company. He’d been climbing the ladder to get to an executive position, and I’d been career-focused, too, so neither of us had really given our relationship our best efforts.

  We’d finally broken it off when I moved to California to take over ACM. We’d probably both known that there was really nothing there anymore, but we’d gotten comfortable after several years together, kind of like roommates who were friends with benefits.

  When we were both home…

  And not too exhausted…

  Okay. Yeah. Well. Maybe we hadn’t reaped the benefits all that often.

  Still, we’d seen no reason to break it off until I’d decided I was moving to the other side of the country.

  “Hey. I didn’t mean to upset you, Nicole.” Damian sounded almost contrite. “You’re absolutely right. It’s not my place to give you advice. I just think you should demand something…better.”

  I did a major eyeroll. Sheesh! He’d done so well with his first few sentences. And then…he’d just had to go there with his personal opinion during the last one. Again.

  I lifted a brow as I asked him, “Why do I think you have a very hard time not giving your opinion?” I wasn’t really angry with Damian. In fact, it was kind of sweet that he was trying to be my champion.

  Damian frowned at me. “Honestly, I usually don’t give anyone my personal opinion on anything. I’m the boss at my company. I give orders, not opinions.”

  I turned my head to look at him. I recognized a hint of a hardcore authoritarian in his tone that I hadn’t heard before.

  For some reason, I bought the fact that the Damian I’d been talking with for the last three or four hours wasn’t the face he usually showed to the world.

  Maybe it was intuition…

  Or the seemingly genuine bewilderment I saw in his beautiful green eyes right now.

  Whatever it was, his chagrin was real.

  I reached out a hand, but I couldn’t quite touch him, so I just kept it on the armrest between us. “Hey. Are you okay, Damian? Yeah, maybe I didn’t ask for your opinions, but now I’m kind of glad you made me think. You’re right about the fact that the men in my life never put much effort into a relationship. But then, neither did I. It worked both ways.”

  His eyes grew clearer as he asked gruffly, “Why were you even together?”

  I shrugged. “I guess they were my okay-for-now boyfriends, just like I was their okay-for-now girlfriend. Haven’t you ever had someone like that? Somebody you don’t mind being with, even if they don’t set your body on fire or anything.”

  He quirked an eyebrow, the amusement back in his eyes again. “Yeah. I call them my mates, and I don’t sleep with any of them.”

  I made a face at him. “I meant haven’t you had that kind of relationship with a female.”

  “No,” he answered. “It seems rather pointless. I think I prefer hooking up with a woman I like for amazing sex, and then going home when the evening is over. No strings attached.”

  Really? “So all you want is good sex from a woman?”

  He hesitated before he answered. “I’d prefer incredible sex, if you don’t mind. And it’s just never gone any further than that. Most of the women I’ve dated aren’t looking for anything more intense. So it’s always worked out well for me.”

  I was ready to call bullshit on his statement about nothing ever “going further” for him. That it had just never happened.

  Somehow, I knew that he sought out women who wouldn’t ask for more. It had never gone further because he designed it that way.

  What I didn’t know was why he did it.

  “That sounds…pretty cold,” I observed aloud.

  “Is it really any worse than being an okay-for-now girlfriend?”

  I thought about his question before I replied. “Probably not.”

  “At least I’ve never left a woman unsatisfied.”

  I shot him a dubious look. “How do you know that? Women fake it all the time.”

  He glared back at me. “I assure you that no woman has ever had to fake it with me.”

  Did he not know that every guy in the entire world thought that, too? I was sorely tempted to do the Meg-Ryan-I’m-faking-an-orgasm scene from the movie When Harry Met Sally, but I knew nobody could ever fake it as well as Meg did.

  I certainly couldn’t.

  I never even tried to fake it, and my boyfriends had never really cared.

  Done with the entire conversation, I reached for my carry-on bag and sifted through the contents for a pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt. “I need to change. I want to try to get some sleep.”

  Damian was reclined, so there wasn’t enough space in the pod for me to avoid swinging a leg over his to get to the aisle.

  It shouldn’t have been a difficult task.

  It wasn’t like I had to crawl over him.

  It was just his lower legs, for God’s sake.

  It was just a little…hop!

  Unfortunately, the small leap was a whole lot harder than I anticipated after all of the cocktails I’d swilled down over the last few hours.

  I got dizzy from getting up too fast, and then tried to catch myself by grasping Damian’s seat behind me after I’d jumped over his long, stretched-out legs.

  I failed to catch myself, and I panicked for a moment as I started to fall backward.

  Strong arms wrapped solidly around me, pulling my upper body against a very solid chest as my ass landed very inelegantly in Damian’s lap.

  CHAPTER 5

  Damian

  I KNEW I WAS completely fucked from the second her statuesque body collided with mine, and I smelled a faint, mouthwatering scent of…strawberries.

  Christ! When in the hell had fruit become an aphrodisiac? Yeah, I liked strawberries, but they’d never exactly gotten my dick hard.

  I’d been aware that Nicole was tipsy, but she’d gone into motion so fast that I hadn’t had a chance to move my legs so she could be more careful once she got to her feet.

  Transatlantic Airlines prided themselves on their extra-wide, reclining, lie-flat seats in business class, and I was just figuring out how very convenient they were as I steadied Nicole’s curvy figure in my lap.

  I’d wrapped my arms tightly around her as she’d fallen to keep her upper body from flopping over the armrest between us, which allowed her beautiful ass to plop directly into my lap. Her lower legs dangled naturally over my armrest next to the aisle.

  I closed my eyes and stifled a tormented groan as the feel and the tantalizing scent of Nicole wafted over my senses. I’d wanted to know what she’d feel like in my arms, and now, I knew.

  I guess I’d never known that a guy could feel ecstasy and torture at the same time.

  My cock had responded immediately by pushing eagerly against her shapely ass.

  Jesus!

  She smelled so damn sexy.

  She felt like she was made to be plastered against me just like this.

  Every primal male instinct I had said that this woman was…mine. That she and I should always be just like this…

  Wait a minute! That’s totally ridiculous. I hardly know her.

  I shook my head slightly, knowing my brain wasn’t going to win the battle between my body and my mind.