Bait by Leslie Jones Read Free Book Online

going to be a learning experience for both of you.”
    She dropped her gaze to the floor. “He doesn’t like me.”
    Heather chuckled. “He doesn’t like anybody who works for your parent organization.”
    â€œWhy?”
    Heather propped her head on her hand. “You’d better ask him directly. Anyway, I don’t think that’s going to end up being your problem.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?” She slumped back against the back of the chair.
    Heather’s expression turned from concerned to knowing. “I seem to recall sparks literally flying between the two of you in Azakistan.” Her eyes twinkled.
    Christina shot her a look of horror. “I can’t stand him. He’s arrogant and bossy and . . . and . . .” And really good-­looking. His blond hair was overlong, curling around his face in a way that made her itch to push it back with her fingertips. Last time she saw him, he’d sported a ridiculously sexy two-­day growth. His irises were ringed with dark brown, but the centers were a tawny gold. It was his nose, broken at some point in his life, that kept him from being too beautiful.
    She sighed. “And he doesn’t trust me,” she finished lamely.
    Heather stood. “You’ll learn to trust each other. Hey, I gotta run. Briefing in five minutes.”
    Christina shut the laptop with another sigh. She and Gabe would be together virtually all the time. She groaned, dread twisting in her gut.
    F OR THE NEXT two weeks, Christina applied herself to learning how to stand, walk, eat, and think like a crown princess. She began to wear Ronnie’s clothes, speak in her lilting French dialect, copy her mannerisms. Ronnie’s private secretary, whose duties had much more to do with being a staff liaison and advisor than any kind of note-­taker, began to style her hair and help with her makeup.
    The princess sat as heir to the throne, but Concordia was a constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary democracy. The prime minister held most of the power. She studied the significant members of Parliament, influential entrepreneurs, and foreign heads of state, and pored over the de Savoie family tree, memorizing members of Ronnie’s family and ancestors that went back eight generations.
    â€œJust focus on the important ones,” Ronnie said. “Crazy Queen Bernedetta, who used tea leaves to determine the course Parliament would take. Prince Roland, who was nearly blind and walked right off the cliff at Cap de la Nau in Spain. The Marquis de Plages, who kidnapped his wife from a British household in 1528 and nearly sent the two countries to war.”
    Christina chuckled. “A colorful family history.”
    â€œAnd now, demoiselle, we must dress,” Deni said. “Your bodyguard shall arrive shortly.”
    Ugh. Christina had been trying to forget that fact. “Do I have time for a workout first?”
    Ronnie’s living space mercifully included a room large enough to contain a wide variety of modern workout gear, and a large center floor that Ronnie used for kickboxing. Everything in it was first-­rate. It made up for not stepping outside in two weeks.
    â€œPerhaps after?” Deni suggested.
    â€œAll right.” She followed Ronnie into the master bedroom. They sat side-­by-­side on the four-­poster bed, the forest green bedspread soft beneath them, while Deni disappeared into the walk-­in closet. She came back out and held up a garment bag with something of a flourish.
    â€œCome. We dress, okay?”
    â€œSure.”
    The older woman’s gray eyes glittered with both intelligence and wisdom. Her red hair was swept into a sleek, sophisticated style. A face lined with experience projected an air of calm authority. She opened the garment bag.
    â€œVoila!”
    Bemused, Christina changed into the pantsuit. It was clearly expensive. The silky material clung to her breasts and