Ewan had often enjoyed these galas. Excellent food and outstanding drink, the company of people he could convince to fund his projects . . . at the very least, the scenery was generally enjoyable. He’d usually gone home with someone who was as disinterested in seeing him the next morning as he was them. Women like Ginger Tanaka, who’d finally given up her pursuit when he made it clear that tonight he only had eyes for one woman.

Nina.

“I was wrong,” he said to her now, leaning close so that nobody else at the table would be able to hear him. Not that he cared if they did. He’d have shouted his feelings from every rooftop, if it would have made a difference. “About the dress.”

Nina had been sipping from a glass of red wine and looked at him now with the liquid teasing her lips. She put the glass down and ran her tongue along the crimson droplets, a perfect match to her dress. Her brow furrowed. “It doesn’t look good?”

Ewan shook his head.

She frowned, glancing at herself. “Nothing I can do about it now.”

“The dress is just a dress. It’s you who makes it beautiful, not the other way around.”

Nina burst into raucous laughter loud enough to make everyone sitting with them turn toward her. She acknowledged their curious glances with a wave of her hand, but kept laughing. Ewan grinned, not caring what anyone else thought. At least he’d made her laugh, really laugh, for the first time since she’d come back to him. To work for him, he reminded himself with a pang. She’d come back for a job. Not him.

Nina jabbed a finger at him as she made an obvious effort to swallow her guffaws. “You’re a cheeseball.”

Her eyes gleamed as she lifted her wineglass again, this time with a small shake of her head and a soft, genuine smile, the first he could recall seeing from her since she’d returned. It lifted his heart. Maybe there was hope. He leaned toward her, wanting to kiss her right there in front of everyone, but Ewan hadn’t managed to get where he was in this world by being totally stupid. He caught himself before he could make an utter fool of himself and sat back to lift his own glass.

“To making you laugh,” he said.

Nina clinked her goblet to his. “It’s better than making me cry.”

An apology rose to his lips, but she’d already turned away from him to focus on the plate of pasta that had been delivered by the server. After that, dinner took precedence. He caught her glancing at him now and then, not smiling, but with an appraising look that he hoped meant she might be on her way to forgiving him for being such a colossal sphincter.

“So. Nina. Tell us how you met our dear Ewan,” Katrinka Dev, seated on Ewan’s opposite side, leaned around him to ask.

Nina put down her wineglass and blotted her lips carefully. Her tone was light, but Ewan heard the wariness in it. “He hired me.”

“Oh, do you work in one of his labs?” Katrinka smiled, revealing teeth blinding-white against the crimson of her lips. She nodded, sending a few tendrils of ebony hair spiraling over her shoulders. “My son Jordie works in one of the labs, too, although he’s only an apprentice.”

Before Ewan could reply, Nina shook her head. “I’m not a code monkey. Mr. Donahue hired me to provide him with a particular set of talents.”

“She’s my bodyguard,” Ewan cut in before Nina could say more. He caught sight of her smug grin and knew she’d deliberately made the innuendo. Shaking his head at Katrinka’s amused and slightly confused expression, he said, “Katrinka’s been a longtime supporter of many of my campaigns.”

“Including the Enhancement Repeal Act.” Nina’s tone was bland. “We haven’t officially met, Ms. Dev, but of course I know who you are.”

Katrinka’s expression smoothed as she put the pieces together. She nodded, her eyes narrowed, although her smile was open and friendly. “Yes, of course. You’re Nina Bronson. I don’t know why I didn’t put that together before now. Obviously, I know who you are as well.”

“He hasn’t been introducing me to anyone,” Nina explained with a glance at Ewan. “I think it’s because he thinks if people know who I am, they’ll be rude.”

“I should imagine the guests here would be better behaved than that, and if they weren’t, you’d be able to handle it,” Katrinka told her, also with a glance at Ewan. “But on the other hand, there’s certainly no need to put yourself into an awkward position unnecessarily.”

“Certainly not. It makes dinner conversation so uncomfortable,” Nina said. “I can’t imagine that’s very conducive to encouraging people to donate to the event.”

Katrinka looked thoughtful. “No. But perhaps Ewan simply didn’t want you to be made to feel as though you had to be on the defensive—at least not unless someone tries to hurt him.”

Both of the women looked at Ewan as though for confirmation. He shrugged. “You’re both right.”

He was called up to the podium to give his after-dinner speech before either of them could dig into him any deeper, and relieved, he made his excuses and an escape. Ewan had prepared the speech months ago, when they’d first asked him to attend the fundraiser. He hadn’t practiced it much. It was the same old words, maybe strung along in a slightly different pattern, but nothing much changed in what he was saying. Donate. Support. Blah blah blah.

When he looked out into the audience his eyes automatically sought Nina’s face, but she was gone from her place at the table. Her disappearance was enough to make him pause. Ewan had enough public speaking experience to cover up his hesitation and continue without making it obvious he’d faltered, but he couldn’t settle until he found her. Again, he swept the room with his gaze and found her by the set of tables holding all the items for the silent auction bid. She didn’t appear to be looking at any of them. Nina was deep in conversation with a slight young man dressed in a slim-fitting tuxedo. His shock of almost white hair stood out in the shadows at the back of the room. He leaned too close to Nina for Ewan’s comfort.

Ewan frowned, but kept on with his speech. “These projects have been some of the most gratifying and fulfilling experiences I’ve ever had. Creating clean water in places that before had to rely on the generosity of others to provide them with it. The reintroduction of three species of insects that had been declared almost instinct, so that our farmers can have pollinators in their fields, therefore being able to grow healthier food. I’ve never been more proud to attach my name to a foundation than this one.”

“What about the enhancement tech?” The shout came from the back of the room, close to where Nina was talking with the young man. “What about that, Donahue? What about the rumors that you’re going to start that all up again?”

A low murmur ran around the room, but Ewan couldn’t tell if people were muttering in his defense or that of the heckler. He gave the unknown shouter a dispassionate smile. “All of the funds raised from tonight’s event go to support the projects I just mentioned, as well as many others in the Katie Donahue Foundation. You can learn more about them on the net site, or sign up for our mailing list.”

“But what about that other stuff? Address the rumors! We deserve to know if you’re planning to—” The voice cut off abruptly as the bro in the tux that Nina had been talking to stepped forward and frog-marched the heckler out a back door.

He was security, then. Not a guest. Somehow, that didn’t make Ewan feel any better.

Ewan had dealt with hecklers often enough to respond smoothly and quickly, with barely a blink, and he continued his speech as though nobody had interrupted him. As he left the podium, Nina looked at him from her place on the other side of the room. This far away, she wouldn’t be able to sense the rising rate of his pulse and what surely must be an elevation in his temperature or blood pressure. She didn’t move forward, probably because the potential threat, minimal as it was, had been handled.

She was still near the back, this time perusing a selection of scarves woven from spider silk. She held up a translucent length and draped it over one shoulder. “What do you think? Is it me?”

“It’s strong. It’s beautiful. It’s unusual. So, yes, absolutely.”

She eyed him and pressed her lips together. She put the scarf back on the small glass cube used to display it. “What about the spiders used to make it? Do you think they’re happy, spinning all day long without so much as a single catch? Starving for their art?”

“They’re fed,” he said. “They’re kept in the best conditions a spider could ask for.”

“They’re slaves,” she told him with a glance over one shoulder.

Ewan frowned. “Nina.”

She let her fingertips tease along the edge of the scarf, and for a moment, her shoulders hunched. She drew in a ragged breath, but when she looked at him, she was smiling. That gleam was back in her eyes, though, and to Ewan’s disconcertion, he saw them as tears.

“Are you going to bid on any of this stuff?” Nina’s voice was rough, gravelly.

“No. Unless you want something?” Ewan waved a hand in the general direction of the auction items. From over her shoulder, he saw the re-entrance of the bro in the tux who’d dragged off the heckler. “Lots of good stuff there.”

“No, thank you, I don’t need anything.” She leaned to look into a jar filled with holographic beads. It lit when touched to cast a shimmering glow that changed colors in slow patterns. “This is interesting. But no, I don’t want it. I don’t have a place to put something like that. Why don’t they just donate money?”

He’d been busy trying to get a look at the man who’d so caught her attention earlier and so had missed a part of what she’d asked. “Huh?”

“Why don’t they just donate credits?” She poked his arm until he looked at her. “Wouldn’t that make more sense?”

“People like to get something for their money,” he said in a low voice, aware a number of gala guests could overhear them.

“Aside from the satisfaction of knowing how much they’re helping the world recover from devastation?” She chuckled under her breath and shook her head. She caught his gaze and twisted. “What are you staring at?”

“Who were you talking to, earlier?”

Nina’s brows knitted. “When?”

“Right before that person in the audience started shouting at me. The bro in the tux dragged him out. Is he security?”

“Oh. That’s Al.” She tilted her head and gave Ewan a small, curious tip of her lips. “Yeah, Al’s working security tonight. We haven’t seen each other in a while.”

A searing flash of jealousy swept over him. Nina’s chin lifted. If she hadn’t been able to sense a shift in his body’s response to his emotions earlier, she certainly could now. Her eyes narrowed again, and she looked around the room as though seeking the sight of something, or someone, specific before her gaze settled back on Ewan’s.

“Al and I have been friends for years.”

“Is that all it was?”

Nina’s lip curled. The gleam vanished, replaced by a harder light. “Why do you want to know?”

“I think I have the right to ask.” Ewan bristled, his own mouth becoming a tight, grim line.

“Do you? Why is that?”

There was no answer he could give her that wouldn’t make him sound like a colossal sphincter. Ewan frowned. “You know why.”

“This is where you and I agree to disagree, as the saying goes,” Nina told him, “because I don’t actually owe you an explanation about anything I’m doing, have ever done, or am thinking about doing.”

Ewan’s jaw gritted. “Is he something you’re thinking of doing?”

“You’re ridiculous,” Nina told him with a hiss under her breath.

With alarm, Ewan caught another flash of tears in her eyes. The only times Ewan could recall seeing Nina cry, he’d been the cause and certainly was this time, too. He knew she wouldn’t want to lose her composure in front of him, much less a crowd. The fact a single silver tear had already escaped to slip over her cheek was enough to make him attempt to take her hand.

“Nina—”

“I’m leaving,” she said.

Ewan shook his head. “I’m scheduled to be here until the end of the event. I can’t go just yet.”

He could see the war in her eyes. She couldn’t storm out of here, leaving him behind. Not according to the confines of her contract, which stupidly, both of them still seemed intent on honoring.

Her chin lifted again, her jaw set. “Say your good-byes to all the people who are here to salivate over you and shake the hands of your sycophants. Get started now, because it’s going to take a long time, and I’m ready to go. If something happens to you, I’ll be back to save your life. Otherwise, I’ll meet you at the transpo.”

He didn’t move at first. Neither did she. Every line of her body told him she was serious.

Ewan made his rounds, shaking hands and clapping shoulders, kissing cheeks. Making and taking promises that may or may not be kept; he didn’t care. He was done here tonight, and he wanted to get home.

Even if it meant facing an angry-with-him Nina, Ewan wanted to be with her more than anything. He wanted to make things right between them. He could only hope she’d give him the chance.