Trade Me (Cyclone #1)(14)

It’s freaking brilliant.

He rescues a dark blue Cal sweatshirt from the pile of crap and pulls it on. The shirt is overlarge; it completely swallows his wrists.

He kicks off his dark dress shoes, pulls out a case, and removes his contacts. Then he puts on the running shoes, dons thick-rimmed glasses, and as a finishing touch, rubs a pump of hair gel between his palms and rumples his hair. Like this, his khaki dress slacks could pass for cargo pants.

He turns to me. “What do you think?”

I think a lot of things.

I’m not sure what game he’s playing, but I’m already berating myself for coming along. I can’t afford to go to lunch with him. I can’t afford the meal. And—I do have my pride—I won’t let him pay. I definitely can’t afford to remember his biceps.

But despite my better judgment, that part of me that is swayed by classical standards of masculine appeal thinks he’s pretty freaking hot. I think I looked more than I should have when he took off his shirt, and I think he knows that.

I give him a critical once-over. “Good disguise,” I tell him. “But it needs a fake mustache.”

He cracks up.

“True story,” he says. “The only time I ever wore dress shirts before I started here was for events—interviews or products launches. Shit like that. Now I wear them all the time. People see the outfit and they think it’s me.” He shrugs. “This way, I get a little privacy.”

It would be so easy to let myself pretend I’m friends with Blake. He’s funny, and more down to earth than I expected. But it’s bad enough being attracted to him because of basic social programming. I can only imagine how much worse this would be if I legitimately liked him as an individual.

“That is awesome,” I say. “I can sell that story to some enterprising reporter for at least a hundred bucks.”

He gives me a patient smile. “Yes, but you won’t.”

“Because I’m going to be so blown away by your amazing charisma that I forget how much I need the money?” I wrinkle my nose to signify how likely this is.

“No. Because by the time lunch is over, you and I are going to be on the same page. Business-wise.”

“Oh, yes.” I frown at him. “That. What is this all about?”

He smiles enigmatically, but doesn’t say anything more until we’re settled into the half-empty top floor of a Vietnamese restaurant. We place our order and the waiter leaves us in peace.

Blake takes a paper napkin from the holder and unfolds it into a wisp of translucent whiteness, before rolling it up and setting it on the table between us. When he looks up, though, his eyes seem like flint—hard and impossible.

“So,” he says. “Are you going to trade me?”

I look over into his clear, blue eyes. I think he may actually be serious. There’s not a hint of a smile on his face. He picks up the napkin again and starts methodically ripping it to shreds.

“You’re going to have to be a lot more specific,” I tell him. “Because that could mean anything.”

“You were right the other day,” he says smoothly. “I’m clueless. I don’t know what it’s like to be you, or anyone like you, and I want to fix that. I offer a trade. I work your hours. I pay your rent. I live in your apartment.”

“It’s so cute that you think I live in an apartment,” I interject.

“You get my house, my car, my allowance. You take over my duties at Cyclone, too—to the extent that’s possible. We’ll have to talk about that. There are details to work out. But that’s the gist of it.”

He shrugs, like what he has set forth is no big deal, and I’m left to boggle at him. There are so many things wrong with this that I don’t even know where to start.

I pick apart the one thing that’s simple. “An allowance? Please don’t tell me you’re getting an allowance from your dad on top of everything else.”

“Ha. No.” He has amassed an arsenal of napkin shreds in front of him. “I thought about offering you my salary instead, but…that’s a dollar a year, so probably that wouldn’t work for you. I asked my accountant to figure out how much I usually spend instead.” He shoots me a look. “I’ll give you that and we’ll call it an allowance. It’s probably not as much as you think.”

I shake my head. “Is that how rich people think? ‘I will impress everyone by taking an extremely tiny salary to show how meaningless money is.’”

“It’s more like, ‘Wow, who wants to pay taxes on ordinary income? Let’s shift my compensation to capital gains tax at every possible opportunity.’”

Oh, thank God he said that. I had just been thinking we might have something in common. I wave my hand with more airiness than I feel. “Ah, tax evasion. As one does.”

He gives me a self-deprecating shrug. “Legal tax evasion. It’s the best kind.”

“You asked me to trade,” I say. “I’m just trying to understand your perspective. After all, you can’t be blowing all your billions on something as gauche as a functioning government.”

The tips of his ears turn slightly pink. “Billion.” He coughs. “Really. It’s just one billion. Not multiple billions.”

I choke. I’d been trying for over-the-top hyperbole. What comes out, though is, “And here I thought you were actually wealthy.”