Brazilian's Nine Months' Notice (5 page)

Standing up, she flashed a smile at the lady behind the counter as she put down enough money to cover their meal, including a generous tip. ‘See you soon,’ she called out brightly as she headed for the door. Luc’s proposition might have brought memories flooding back, but no way was she selling out to the highest bidder.

Not even the father of her baby could derail her from her career goal. She would make a future for herself and for her child—and she’d do that without sleeping with Luc. She waited for the lights to turn green and then started to stalk across the road—

She’d barely taken a step when she hit a patch of ice and her legs flew from under her. It was only thanks to two strong arms catching hold of her just in time that she was saved from possible serious harm. She flashed a glance up, but she already knew who had saved her. She would know that grip, those hands, that strength, that control anywhere. ‘Thank you,’ she managed, as she caught her breath.

Steadying her on her feet, Luc brushed the hair from her eyes and straightened her scarf, and then he stood back. Briefly, she saw a look in his eyes that said,
Know that I will not allow you to get away from me a second time
, but just as quickly it was gone. And then he laughed. Of course he laughed. This was all just a game to Luc.

‘You are impossible,’ she flashed angrily. ‘I hope you realise that.’

‘Oh, I do,’ he agreed. His powerful shoulders eased in an unconcerned shrug. ‘You don’t have to give me your answer right away.’

‘Oh, please,’ she insisted. ‘Let me give it to you now.’ She drew a breath and then fired at him, ‘No.’

Easing onto one hip, he assured her, ‘You’ll change your mind. I’ll give you twenty-four hours to think about it.’

‘I don’t need time to think about it. What do I have to say to convince you?’ She raked her hair with frustration. ‘You might not think I’ve got much here, but I’ve got my pride, and I’ve got a life here. I won’t be scrubbing floors for ever. I have plans.’

‘And so do I,’ Luc interrupted. ‘I have plans for you.’

‘I think I know what they are.’

‘And I think you’re wrong. Why don’t you give me a chance to explain?’

‘Because your plans belong in the Dark Ages when men thought women were glad to hear they would never have to work another day in their life, while I happen to live in the real world, where women are quite capable of getting along without men.’

‘Without men?’ He smiled. ‘Not you, Emma. But, as it happens, making your own way in the world is exactly what I’m talking about—but if you don’t want to hear my suggestion...’ Shoving his hands in his pockets, Luc strolled alongside her as she hurried back to the hotel. ‘I’m not going to talk about it now, because I want you with a clear head when I do. So you’re going to take a rest now, and then we’ll have lunch and talk this through again without emotion.’

She stopped dead. ‘Have you listened to a word I’ve said?’

‘I’ve listened to everything you’ve said,’ Luc assured her, ‘and I’m entitled to my opinion. You have to take better care of yourself, Emma. You look wrecked. You’re too pale. You’re overworked, and you’re getting nowhere fast.’

‘I’ve heard enough,’ she said as she brushed past him.

‘You’re wasting time, Emma. I will wear you down.’

‘Oh...’ She laughed. ‘You and the housekeeper here are both determined to wear me out, or down, it seems to me.’ She stopped outside the hotel gates. ‘Get this through your head, Luc. Whatever it is you’ve got planned, it isn’t going to happen so don’t waste your time. It might be customary in the world you inhabit to buy any woman who takes your fancy, but in my world women don’t sell themselves to a man.’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you earn your keep.’

He said this softly, but there was a dangerous glint in his eyes. Shaking her head with incredulity, as if that could blank out the sight of the attractive crease that appeared in Luc’s ridiculously handsome face, she gave a thought to the bigger picture. She had to tell him. She couldn’t risk alienating him completely. Maybe lunch would work. If they had an unemotional meeting over food, it could be the right moment to tell him. ‘We do have to talk,’ she admitted, ‘just to set you straight once and for all, but only if you promise not to bring up the subject of my becoming your mistress again.’

His smile flashed heat from the top of her head to the tips of her toes. ‘As I’ve already explained, I don’t plan anything so permanent.’

‘But you want me under your power in Brazil.’

‘You’d certainly be under me.’

Exasperated, she shook her head. ‘Breakfast didn’t work. Why should lunch be any better? We can’t even hold a civil conversation over a boiled egg.’

‘Try it,’ Luc suggested. ‘I know you want to.’

Yes, but not for the reasons he thought. ‘If you have a serious job offer for me to consider, I might be interested in visiting Brazil. Otherwise? Not a chance. And any job you offer me would have to come without strings attached. I would need a proper contract,’ she stressed, struggling to blank the memories of endless pleasure at his hands as Luc studied her.

‘So—lunch?’ he said, jolting her back to reality. ‘I still owe you for breakfast, remember?’

‘I paid because I don’t want to feel I owe you anything. You don’t have to pay me back,’ she said when Luc began to speak. ‘I don’t need your money, Luc. And I don’t need you.’

‘But you want me,’ he said, confident as ever.

She hated him for being right, but knew that everything could change in the blink of an eye. Luc was being so reasonable now—so good-humoured and easygoing. But tell him about the baby and everything would change.

Face the problem now. Don’t leave it to fester and grow bigger.

‘Late lunch?’ she suggested briskly, working out how long it would take her to rest and recover.

Luc’s lips pressed down with satisfaction at her apparent climb-down. ‘Are you sure you can spare the time?’

‘I usually take a break for a couple of hours in the afternoon before I start work again.’

‘Then it’s a date,’ he confirmed, all humour gone from his face, as if that were another deal signed, sealed and delivered, and there was no longer any need to work the charm.

* * *

So much for his foolproof plan, Luc concluded as he strode back to the café to pick up his car. He should have known Emma would need a different approach from other women. She wasn’t on the lookout for a wealthy sponsor. She never had been. He had always taken it for granted that with his busy schedule it was more straightforward to be the provider of good things with no strings attached, but trying that approach with Emma had just nosedived spectacularly. Her refreshingly blunt responses made him laugh out loud as he mentally replayed them as he walked back along the ice-bound streets. His libido would have to wait until he came up with a better offer, like a serious job she really would be a fool to refuse. Patience, he told himself sensibly. He had business to finish in town, and not too long to wait until he saw Emma again and could hit her with a revised proposition.

When his work was done, he drove back at a leisurely pace to the hotel. The first thing he did when he reached his room was to call the front desk to ask to speak to Emma.

So much for her afternoon rest!

Cursing viciously, he replaced the receiver. What now? Was she trying to kill herself? They’d informed him that, yes, Ms Fane was in the hotel, but as she was working she couldn’t come to the phone. Why, when she had said she was going to take a rest, was Emma back at work? What was she trying to prove? Surely she couldn’t need money so badly?

Pacing the room, he examined the facts. When her parents’ criminal activities had come to light, the courts had confiscated everything they’d owned, so Emma had inherited nothing, but she was a capable woman who didn’t strike him as being dependent on anyone, let alone the parents who, by all accounts, had never shown much interest in her.

He stared out of the window at the grey scene below. Traffic was barely moving, and what few people were brave enough to venture out on foot were bundled up in what appeared to be every heavy winter garment they possessed. His thoughts turned to Emma with the sultry sun of Brazil on her face.

She would love Brazil.

CHAPTER FIVE

‘H
E
DID
WHAT
?’
Emma demanded, her voice tight with shock. She was facing the housekeeper over the gleaming stainless-steel counters in the kitchen, which Emma had just cleaned.

‘Mr Marcelos has asked for you to be released from your duties this afternoon, and I’ve said yes,’ the housekeeper informed Emma. ‘He asked for you most particularly—he said no one else would do.’

The housekeeper was avid for gossip, Emma concluded as the older woman’s gaze sharpened on her face. ‘It was good of you to offer to stand in at the last minute, Emma. I know we can always depend on you, but if this man wants to offer you a better job, I can’t stop you leaving. In fact, I don’t want to stop you,’ the housekeeper admitted in a surprising moment of empathy. ‘Maybe you’ll have the chance to go places that I never had. You should at least find out what he’s got in mind. You shouldn’t let yourself be trapped in a small place like this. A young woman like you should spread your wings.’

Emma had never heard the housekeeper say so much to her in one outburst before. It made her feel ungrateful that she could turn down an opportunity without even considering it.

‘You used to work for him, didn’t you?’ the housekeeper pressed.

‘Yes. It’s on my CV. I worked for the Marcelos hotel chain in London.’

‘And now fate has brought the owner of that hotel chain back into your life. You can’t ignore a sign like that.’

‘The chance of a job working for Senhor Marcelos’s hotel chain has cropped up,’ Emma emphasised. ‘There’s nothing more to it than that.’

‘I don’t know what you’re waiting for.’ The housekeeper sniffed as if she would have seized the opportunity with both hands, given half a chance.

‘Yes. What are you waiting for, Emma?’

Emma swung round to see Luc standing in the doorway.

‘You should at least allow Mr Marcelos to tell you what he’s got in mind,’ the housekeeper pressed, simpering as she ogled Lucas.

Who did look amazing in a soft black cashmere sweater and jeans, but that wasn’t a good enough reason to massage his ego, Emma thought. She had a pretty good idea what Lucas had in mind. Judging by his expression his latest suggestion would be similar to the first, and it would be far better to deal with him away from prying eyes. Putting her cloths and cleaning products away, she washed her hands and then allowed the housekeeper to chivvy her out of the kitchen.

‘You can’t keep a man like Mr Marcelos waiting,’ the housekeeper insisted, with more smiles and simpering directed at Luc.

Oh, can’t I?
Emma’s gaze clearly stated, when Luc raised an amused brow.

‘Where are you taking me?’ she demanded, as he shooed her up the back stairs to the lobby.

‘To my suite, where you’ll rest and then we’ll talk.’

‘Your suite?’ She held back. ‘I don’t think so,’ she protested as he called the lift. ‘I’m not getting off on your floor,’ she warned as the lift doors slid to, enclosing them inside the restricted space.

It was her lucky day. The elevator was crowded. At least she didn’t have to face an argument with Luc when she was exhausted and at her lowest ebb, though she did feel awkward dressed in her maid’s uniform, red-faced and work-worn, amongst such expensively clad guests. She smelled of carbolic, while everyone else smelled of money. French cologne for the men and expensive blends for the women; even the children emitted a strong smell of soap, but none of them stank like she did. No wonder everyone was carefully avoiding looking at her.

Except for Luc, she noticed, who was leaning back against the wall, studying her with a steady gaze. She turned her head away. She didn’t want to look at him. He was one more polished reminder of the yawning gap between herself and everyone else in the elevator.

When the lift stopped and everyone got out, she told herself that she only had a couple more floors to go. Luc didn’t move as they soared upwards again, but when the doors slid open he did more than stop her, he pinned her to the wall with his arm resting above her head and his body pressed up hard against hers. She wasn’t going anywhere, his smiling eyes told her, and though she should hate him, be angry with him, at least, for trying to control her, his dark, amused stare was hypnotising.

‘Don’t fight me, Emma,’ he growled in a way that reverberated through her. ‘I’ve only got your best interests at heart. You need to rest, and if I let you out of here unescorted, how can I be sure you won’t go straight back to work? To summarise, if I have to lasso you and tie you to a chair in my room, that’s what I’m going to do, because you are going to take a rest before you collapse.’

He allowed the doors to slide to at that point, and when they reached the next floor, his floor, Luc ushered her out onto the corridor. ‘First you take a bath and then you sleep. You missed lunch, so I’m going to order supper to be served in the room when you wake up.’

‘I’d rather just talk and then go up to my own room, if you don’t mind,’ she said stiffly. Yet again she was exhausted, and didn’t want this to be the time when she told him. Her body was screaming for sleep. Her mind wasn’t sharp. Her emotions were in tatters. This was the worst time possible to drop a bombshell like a baby into Luc’s lap.

‘I do mind,’ he said. ‘You promised me you’d rest last time, yet I found you back at work. I can’t trust you to stay in your room, Emma, and I won’t be responsible for you collapsing with exhaustion. I can’t pretend I know why you’re punishing yourself, but as a previous employer I can’t stand by and allow it to carry on.’

And when she’d slept and was refreshed, she could speak to him, Emma reasoned as Luc opened the door to his room. Closing it behind them, he stood with his back to it. ‘Where would you go if not here with me?’

She rolled her tired eyes. ‘To my room.’

‘To a cold cell in the attic,’ Luc said with an impatient gesture. ‘Why would you want to do that, when you’ve got everything here that you could possibly need? And you’ll have the place to yourself.’

‘To myself?’ Her head shot up with surprise.

‘I have some business to attend to in town.’

So when would she speak to him?

‘Stop frowning, Emma. You won’t be disturbed. I thought that would please you.’ A genuine smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. ‘And I’m willing to bet my bed is a lot more comfortable than yours.’

She couldn’t deny that. The thought of trying to find a comfortable spot on her old, lumpy mattress held no appeal.

‘There’s a spa bath through there,’ Luc went on, indicating the bathroom as if she hadn’t cleaned it umpteen times.

‘This I know,’ she wryly.

‘It’s a fantastically clean bathroom,’ he stressed, mocking her with his eyes. ‘I’ll have you know I have the best chambermaid in the area.’

He made it hard not to smile. When Luc turned it on, his charm was irresistible.

‘And if you miss supper, you’ll go hungry,’ he pointed out. ‘And, knowing you, you’ll go straight back onto your next shift whether you’ve eaten or not. So what do you have to lose by taking time out here?’

Everything, Emma thought as she glanced at the bed.

* * *

She was still sleeping when he got back. He guessed she still had a lot of catching up to do. He’d never seen anyone look quite so exhausted. Thanking the waiter who’d brought the supper trolley, he took control and wheeled it into the room. He returned to put a ‘Do Not Disturb’ notice on the door and then settled down at the table to work on some papers. He’d ordered lobster salad and champagne with a view to eating whenever Emma woke up.

After about an hour he heard the sheets rustle and turned to look at her. Emma was waking slowly, like a child unsure of her surroundings. She looked so vulnerable she touched him somewhere deep. He blanked the feeling. He hadn’t registered a single emotion for years beyond lust or boredom with a woman, and it was far better for both of them if he kept it that way.

Rubbing her eyes, she stared around, first in confusion and then with embarrassment and shock.

‘Relax. I’ve been sitting here, working,’ he reassured her. ‘No one came near you while you were asleep.’

‘Luc!’ She shot up and then, realising she had fallen into bed naked after her bath, she grabbed the covers and pulled them up to her chin.

‘You’re in my room,’ he confirmed as she stared at him warily. ‘You needed to sleep. Can I get you something? Water? Juice?’

‘I shouldn’t be here.’

‘Why?’ He shrugged, speaking in the same low tone he used with his wild ponies. No sudden movements. No raised voices. It worked every time. Emma’s darting gaze settled and her shoulders relaxed.

‘I’m sorry.’ She frowned. ‘I must have been sleeping for ages. What time is it?’

He glanced at his watch. ‘Nine o’clock.’

‘Nine o’clock!’ Grabbing the top sheet to wrap around her like a toga, she catapulted off the bed. ‘My next shift started half an hour ago!’

‘There isn’t going to be a next shift.’

She paled, staring at him wide-eyed. ‘What do you mean, there isn’t a next shift?’

‘You don’t work here any more.’

She looked shocked and then she was angry. ‘What have you done?’

‘You quit,’ he explained. ‘I handed in your notice.’

‘You did what?’ Furious now, she raked her hair. ‘Do you have any idea what you’ve done? I need this job.’ There was an edge of desperation in her voice.

‘And you’ll have another job,’ he promised evenly. ‘I’ll give you a job where you don’t have to work all the hours under the sun. A proper job with good prospects.’

‘No, Luc! No!’ she fired at him, moving behind a chair as if it were a shield when he came towards her. ‘You said you wanted to talk to me. You said I could use your room to rest, and that it was more comfortable than mine. What you didn’t tell me was that while I was safely out of the way you would make critical decisions on my behalf that weren’t yours to make.’

‘Now you’re properly awake we can talk,’ he said steadily.

‘Talk?’ she demanded. ‘Not before you explain to my employers that I’m not leaving here, and that this is all some terrible mistake.’

‘I won’t stand by and watch you destroy yourself,’ he said quietly, holding her furious stare.

‘What I do is none of your business,’ she fired back at him. Stalking to the bathroom, she returned clad in his robe. ‘You can’t just walk back into my life and take it over.’

‘I’m not trying to do that.’ He maintained the same calm tone. ‘You’re an intelligent woman, Emma. I pulled your report from the hotel in London. Everyone speaks so highly of you, so why are you still hiding away in Scotland? If the chatter about your parents bothers you, I can tell you now that it will never go away unless you stand and face it.’

‘I’m not in hiding. I’ve come home.’

‘The world’s a big place, Emma. Why don’t you take a look at some more of it before you make up your mind that you want to stay here?’

‘The world might be a big place for you, but I don’t have your resources.’

‘Your world can be as big as you want it to be. Don’t put false limits on your imagination.’

She laughed without humour. ‘And how am I supposed to do that? And what if I’m happy here? Has it even occurred to you that not everyone wants what you want, and that some of us are happy in our own back yard? Or is this all about you, Luc? Are you trying to get me to come back to London so I’ll be there at your beck and call?’

To any other woman he might have said, ‘Don’t flatter yourself,’ but this was Emma.

‘And you can stop looking at me like that right now,’ she flashed furiously. ‘I don’t want your pity. And I can’t think why else you would waste your precious time pretending you care about me, unless it’s to pursue that ridiculous idea that I would be prepared to share your bed until you tire of me, and that I wouldn’t even be your full-time mistress—short term, didn’t you call it?’

‘Do you want to be my full-time mistress?’

‘Stop teasing me,’ she yelled. ‘That is not what I want. Anything but that.’

‘I’m not teasing you. Nothing’s changed. I want you to come with me when I leave Scotland. I want you in my bed.’

‘And what about my future?’ she demanded with a scandalised laugh. ‘What type of future will I have if I’m forever trailing around after you? I won’t have a future! And if you think for one minute I’d agree to that, you really are off your head. Is that clear enough for you?’

‘You won’t turn me down,’ he said quietly, and with absolute confidence.

‘Won’t I?’

Emma huffed incredulously, but as she went to storm past him he caught hold of her and dragged her close. Every inch of him was pressed up hard against her. Every inch of her was soft and warm and yielding, as her stiffness and anger gave way to something else.

‘Do you seriously think you only have to snap your fingers and I’ll come running?’ she demanded in a shaking voice.

‘Yes,’ he said as he smiled into her darkening eyes. ‘I think exactly that.’

‘No, Luc.’ She slowly shook her head. ‘You don’t know me. I won’t be controlled, and you are always trying to control me.’

‘But you want me. You’ve tried life without me and you know how empty that is.’

‘I know you’re an arrogant—’

He drove his mouth down on hers, kissing her into silence. She was everything he wanted and more. She was hot. She was aroused. She was angry. They matched each other for passions. She was already moving against him in the hunt for more contact, and he knew exactly how to deal with that.

Infuriated beyond reason by frustration when he pulled away, she launched an attack, her tiny fists flailing as he brought her back and held her tight against the wall of his chest. ‘Don’t,’ he murmured against her silky hair. ‘You’ll only hurt yourself.’

‘I’ll hurt you first,’ she assured him heatedly.

She already had, he realised. Emma Fane had blasted his cold stone heart to hell. ‘I would never hurt you.’

‘So you say.’ She whipped her face away as he brushed her mouth with his.

‘I mean it,’ he insisted quietly, realising he was absolutely sincere.

‘Until the next woman comes along?’ she demanded sceptically, staring at him with furious eyes. ‘I know your track record, Luc. Everyone knows your track record. It’s hardly a secret when you feature in every celebrity magazine under the sun.’