She saw him in the next second, and the pleased, anticipatory look she’d had when she came through the doors became immediately shuttered. She’d put on her guard.
It fucking broke him that he was the cause of that. In the times before, all she’d ever had to do was look disappointed in him, and he’d gone to his knees for her. Literally. Once, making Corinne happy had been the only goal Reese ever had.
Tony twisted in his seat to look where Reese was staring. “You know her?”
“It’s the CFO of Stein and Sons.”
Tony’s eyebrows lifted. “She’s—”
“She’s the CFO,” Reese repeated harshly, “of Stein and Sons.”
“Ah. Look, how about I head on back to the hotel and turn in. I’ll see you tomorrow morning?”
“Yeah, I’ll go with—”
Too late. Corinne had crossed the tiny dining room to stand in front of their booth, hands on her hips. Mouth a thin, grim line. “What the hell are you doing, Reese? Stalking me?”
“I’m finishing my dinner,” he told her. “Actually, it was breakfast. Just at dinner time. Breakfast all day.”
Tony looked startled at the blather spouting from Reese’s mouth. Corinne noticed Reese wasn’t sitting alone. She shook her head and frowned, probably against the start of a tirade. She nodded at Tony.
“Hi,” Tony said. “You must be Corinne. Tony Randolph.”
Now she looked embarrassed and held out her hand. “Oh. Tony. You work with Reese. Hi, nice to meet you. I thought we were supposed to meet.”
“I changed it, I told you,” Reese said.
“I’m just on my way out. I’ll see you Monday at the meeting…?” Tony stood.
Reese watched Corinne’s gaze go up, up, up. At the small curve of her smile, no different than the looks Tony eternally garnered from men and women alike, Reese winced from the stab of jealousy. He was an idiot. She could look at whomever she wanted to. Hell, she could drag Tony off into a corner and fuck him into next week, if they were both into it, and although before tonight Reese hadn’t thought Tony might even have considered it… Fuck.
He was getting out of control.
Both Tony and Corinne were staring at him. Keeping his expression bland, Reese leaned back against the diner booth as though he didn’t have a goddamned care in the world. He didn’t seem to have fooled his assistant, who was still smart enough not to say anything about it, but he gave Reese a look that said he’d be asking about it later.
When Tony had gone, Corinne turned as though she meant to leave too. Reese snagged the soft fabric of her jeans at the knee, letting go at once when she looked down at his hand, then at his face. He’d seen that look before. He’d overstepped.
“Sit,” he said. Then, more gently, “Please?”
Corinne slid into the booth across the table from him. “What kind of game is this?”
“This is called coincidence. I had no idea you’d be there tonight. How could I?”
“You want me to believe you come back into town after about a million years, trying to buy the company I work for, and you show up at the diner where we first met, and that’s a coincidence?”
He would always remember the first sight of her behind a coffee pot with a plate of eggs and potatoes in her hand. This might have been the place his father brought him on Saturday mornings, but it was also the place with strong memories of her. Reese frowned.
“I wanted something to eat.” He sounded defensive and cursed himself for giving her any hint that she was affecting him.
Her gaze softened, though her mouth did not. “So you came for breakfast.”
“It always was the best I ever had.”
“I bet it still is.” Her eyes met his, held his gaze. Challenging him the way she’d used to, and it wasn’t about the breakfast.
Reese shrugged, giving Corinne the look his last lover had called “the smug bastard expression.” Amber had hated it. He was sure Corinne wouldn’t like it any better.
Corinne, however, smiled. She tilted her head and looked him up and down, and though it had been a long, long time since she’d studied him that way, he’d never quite forgotten how it had felt to be the center of her attention. Object of her affection. Nobody else had ever come close to making him feel for even one second what Corinne had done with such casual cruelty.
“Maybe you should tell me what’s going on,” she said when he didn’t speak.
“I buy and sell businesses that are faltering, and I grow them and sell them for a profit,” he told her. “I saw Stein and Sons listed in a report I get about small businesses that are considered to be in need of acquisition.”
Impulsive. Mom had said he was impulsive, in response to Dad’s somewhat harsher assessment of “flighty.” Reese had grown to think of it as following his gut.
Corinne’s smile twisted on one side. “And you…what? You saw I worked there and decided to buy it? So you could somehow fuck with my life, Reese? What the hell?”
“Is that what you think of me? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. You never did give me the benefit of the doubt.”