Make Me Risk It Read Online Free PDF

at math. I suck at it. They say people who are gifted in math often are also good at picking up languages. Plus . . . I’ve never had a ‘few’ Italian lovers,” she added playfully. She blinked when she saw his rigid expression. Had he been offended by her comment about his previous lovers?
    He blinked and set down his fork. “What do you mean, you
forgot
I was good at math?”
    She leaned back at his intensity, bewildered. “I just meant . . . you’re a computer programmer, right? Apparently, a particularly talented one, a savant by most accounts—” She broke off when his stare continued to bore into her. “
Aren’t
you good at math?” she asked weakly.
    He took a draw on his wine.
    “Yes,” he said, picked up his fork again. “Where have you learned things like that? About me, I mean,” he asked, his tone milder now. Still, she sensed his ruffled mood beneath his calm demeanor.
    “Isn’t what I just said public knowledge? I know you like to keep a low profile, but it’s inevitable that some details about your history are going to be known.”
    “That doesn’t really answer my question though, does it?”
    For a few seconds, they just stared at each other from across the table. Finally, she shrugged and gave a bark of laughter, cast at sea by the turn of his mood. “I didn’t know that much about you before I was invited to the cocktail party, although I have heard of Lattice, of course, and I’ve heard your name in passing. Ruth Dannen, our society and entertainment editor, filled me in on some of the details about you.”
    “Like what?” he asked quietly, pushing back his unfinished salad.
    “Like that you were a gifted programmer and that military intelligence recruited you after college to work on anti-hacker software, and you used that knowledge after you left the army to create Lattice.”
    “And?”
    “And
what
?”
    “Did she insinuate that my success was suspect? She mentioned the insider trading scandal, didn’t she?”
    “Yes,” Harper replied honestly.
    “Did she ask you to dig for a story about me?”
    She set down her fork with a clinking sound. “In fact, she did.” His face turned to stone. “Is that really relevant? Did you
see
a story on you at the
Gazette
about anything I’ve learned about you since we’ve been together—which, trust me—
isn’t much
,” she added succinctly with a glare. “Why are you so edgy all of a sudden?”
    “Am I?”
    “You know you are,” she muttered, taking a bite of salad and then pushing back her plate in mounting frustration.
    For a few seconds, he didn’t speak.
    “I’m sorry,” he said after a moment. Her gaze jumped to his face. He still looked tense, but also irritated. At himself, she thought. His apology had been genuine. “It’s not pleasant for me. To consider you hearing speculation and gossip about my past.”
    She exhaled slowly, some of her frustration going with her breath.
    “You are very secretive, Jacob. You’re very closed off. I’m not telling you anything you don’t know already. People are bound to gossip, given all that. Nature abhors a vacuum, isn’t that what they say?” she asked quietly. “That doesn’t equate to being dishonest or a criminal.”
    “You believe that I’m above reproach?”
    “Maybe I just want to believe it,” she replied sincerely. She couldn’t decode what she read in his eyes at that moment. “I
do
believe that the fact that you are so shut off and suspicious of people’s intentions only amplifies the rumors about you. Your aloofness only fans the flames.”
    “Maybe I should hire you for public relations. You could clean up my murky public image,” he said, a mirthless smile tickling his handsome mouth.
    “Would you actually want that?” she asked archly, taking a sip of wine, thankful the tense moment had passed. “Why does it matter if people backbite about you? Why do you care?”
    “I don’t, usually,” he said very quietly. He seemed to