Enticed (2 page)

But
if nothing else it was a paid vacation. It was a break I desperately needed right when I needed it, like it had landed on my lap on purpose. And maybe, just maybe, this would be the slap in the face Nancy needed to back off of trying to set me up with anyone.

Been there. Done that. Wasn’t going back again.

After weighing the pros and the cons, accepting Drew’s invitation was a decision that involved minimal risk, with a potential for enormous gain on all fronts.

Though
I had no reason whatsoever to trust good fortune, I decided to give Fate the benefit of the doubt.

I could only hope the bitch wouldn’t screw me over again.

From the time I agreed to the interview, everything started happening at a breakneck pace. It probably never occurred to him that I might refuse his offer, so no doubt these plans were all in place by the time he sent the email, all merely waiting for my confirmation to set into motion. By the time he received my response, Drew had a complete itinerary prepared before I even had a chance to pack.

A hired car d
ropped me off at a private air strip that following afternoon, where a luxury charter jet was ready to transport me, and only me, apparently, to the golden coasts of California, courtesy of my prospective employer. A uniformed flight attendant tended my needs as I settled down into the plush, cream-colored seat.

“Champagne?” she asked with a
gleaming 100-watt smile.

“No, thank you,” I declined politely. “But I’ll take a ginger ale if you have one.”

“Of course,” she said as she disappeared behind the wood paneled partition. I glanced out onto the vast tarmac, where I watched my luggage load gently under belly of the plane. It was hard to wrap my mind around the idea that an entire staff of professionals was being paid to take care of little ol’ me. From the moment the driver arrived at my apartment that morning, I hadn’t had to lift a finger. They took care of my luggage and my ticketing. I basically walked from my apartment to the car, and from the car onto the plane. I felt a bit like a celebrity, which made me grin in spite of myself. This was a far cry from the reading/cleaning marathon I had originally planned for my Spring Break.

The
inside of the jet was sumptuous. It had a number of swivel reclining chairs, a bench sofa against one row of windows, and a table toward the back where I could eat my meal in spacious comfort. Colorful throw pillows broke up the monotony of the neutral beige, and there were flowers scattered throughout the cabin, beautiful cream-colored roses and white Gerber daises. Available magazines included highly respected business journals that, by no surprise, featured Drew Fullerton on the cover.

I picked up the magazine and studied this man whose image stared back at me. His hair was jet black but his eyes were ice blue, a striking contrast given the fullness of his lashes. His j
aw was firm, and his fuller lips thinned into a serious line for the photograph. Though his cheekbones were elegant, seemingly etched right out of polished stone, he looked powerful and imposing, even in this two dimensional image.

Sleep the night before had been impossible, so I ended up doing extensive
research until dawn. I had always been warned to beware Greek gods bearing gifts, and this was one hell of a gift to get. There had to be a catch. Things like this just didn’t happen to people like me, women like me especially.

I was a little
concerned I might be walking blind into the lion’s den.

Mr. Fullerton’s ruthless business nature had been well documented. He had been groomed to run Fullerton Enterprises International from the crib, and his father, Malcolm Fullerton, had had a reputation even more formidable than his son. They were known to absorb smaller companies into their conglomerate, even those businesses that were
already failing. Whether they thrived or failed didn’t seem to matter. Fullerton Enterprises always managed to make enormous profit either way, even if the acquired businesses quickly shuttered.

One of the most notorious of those was a steel company acquisition that merged an Indiana company with one in Kansas. Labor disputes resulted in one of the factories closing entirely. Within five years, both had declared bankruptcy and
laid off more than five thousand workers, sending the towns that thrived on these steel plants before right to the brink of disaster.

His shameless corporate record was the main reason I considered canceling the whole shebang
. If the catch was that he was a heartless asshole, then I might as well save myself the trip. I had met my quota of heartless assholes, thank you very much, and wasn’t in the market for any more.

But the solid earth slipped beneath my feet as the sleek jet climbed higher and higher into the bright blue sky, so there was no turning back now. I convinced myself that it was a calculated risk. If he was an asshole, I’d be back in Texas within a week and life would go on as usual.

It was just as likely that I would actually wake up from the dream I was so clearly having, because things like this just didn’t happen to me. My whole life had been a battle, and this was just a little too easy and too grand to be real. Perhaps I drifted off to sleep after reading a crazy romance novel that helped me vicariously live through the rich and the famous, the beautiful and the blessed, and stepped into a warped version of the scenario in my own dark subconscious. Any minute now, I expected my alarm to go off and yank me back into normality.

I was still pinching myself an
hour after we were in the air. I had everything I could possibly want, including Internet access. The gourmet meal was exceptional, and the flight attendant named Sophie catered to my every need as we soared high above the country.

Dream or no, t
his certainly was traveling in style. As each minute passed, I started to suspect that Mr. Fullerton, though his request was unusual, unexpected and unsolicited, was completely on the up-and-up. And it kind of scared me more.

T
here was only thing more terrifying than his offer being bogus and wasting a week of my life with a paid getaway to the City of Angels… and that was the possibility he was completely sincere. If I decided to take this job, I would be in Los Angeles by summer, nearly to the day of the last day of school where I currently taught.

Then I would work through what would have been my summer vacation, in a teaching setting completely unfamiliar to me, with a child much younger than those I normally
taught. If things worked out and Jonathan responded well to this new arrangement, I could reasonably teach him each and every year until he went away for college.

It was a potential ten year commitment on the other side of the country
where I knew not a soul. My friends and extended family were all in the Lone Star State. But aside from Nancy, Greg and the kids, I barely had contact with anyone else anyway.

What exactly was
I clinging to? Kids would come and go in my classes, gracing my life for a year before that painful moment when they moved on to that next level and I had to restart my head and my heart with a whole new class. I was good ol’ Aunt Rachel to Nancy’s kids, but they, too, would grow up and move on. Unlike Nancy, I didn’t have a husband to cushion that particular blow.

I just had a
tiny, lonely apartment that hadn’t changed much in the three years that I had lived there. There were even boxes I had yet to unpack.

Even if Jonathan didn’t respond well to the new learning environment,
the six-figure salary he had dangled in front of me would be enough to completely transform my life in Texas however I wanted even if I didn’t last beyond the first year.

The potential
of either scenario was equally terrifying and exhilarating.

My hands literally shook as I disem
barked at the Santa Monica airport, where a sleek, stretch limousine was waiting for me. A tall, wiry man with short, cropped gray hair stood in a formal butler’s uniform, complete with a black hat and white gloves. He advanced confidently with an outstretched hand. “Miss Dennehy?” he asked, with a distinguished British accent.

I nodded and smiled. “That’s me.”

“My name is Harrison. I am Mr. Fullerton’s personal valet. He’s asked me to retrieve you as he was called away unexpectedly for business.”

“
Then I’m in your hands, I guess!” I quipped as I reached for one of my suitcases sitting toward the trunk of the long car.

Harrison touched my hand softly. “I will tend to this,
miss. Please,” he said as he opened the back door and gestured inside.

I nodded awkwardly, feeling embarrassed by all the attention. “Help yourself to a drink,” he offered before he shut the door. I opened the tiny fridge and spied
single bottles of champagne. Behind those were some lemon-lime sodas, so I grabbed one of those instead.

I jumped when the trunk of the limo slammed shut. Harrison walked around the large black car and eased into the driver’s seat. “Would you like some music, miss?” he asked through the rearview mirror.

“That would be lovely,” I responded as I settled as best I could into the back seat. He eased the volume of the radio up until the vehicle was filled with its very own symphony. He raised the tinted glass between the front seat and the rest of the car, giving me privacy to relax on our way from the airport to the Fullerton estate in Beverly Hills.

I had already seen photos of the house, which had been featured many times in architectural digests. The
$28-million-dollar mansion was a sprawling Italian villa painstakingly restored much to its original condition when it was built in the 1920s. The estate sat on nearly one-and-a-quarter acres of land, and the house itself covered more than 13,000 square feet. This included eight bedrooms, nine bathrooms, a formal ballroom and full-sized media room, making it a tad bigger than my one-bedroom, 900-square-foot apartment in Grand Prairie.

We exited the 405
Freeway on Santa Monica Boulevard, curving around Beverly Drive to Sunset. These were all places I had read about or watched in movies and TV, but had never considered, in my wildest of dreams, I might actually get to explore myself one day.

Tall palm trees lined the streets, piercing the crystal clear sky
the color of a robin’s egg. The skyline of downtown Los Angeles had long since disappeared in the distance as we turned down a narrow street, where all the multi-million-dollar mansions were concealed behind tall trees, endless shrubbery and formidable iron gates.

One such ga
te opened and we entered the long driveway towards the house. My breath caught as I watched it come into view. The pictures in the magazines had not done this place justice. The two-story villa sprawled out over the knoll upon which it sat, distinguished and sophisticated, dressed in an Austin stone exterior. The architecture was classic and timeless, and quite literally took my breath away as we rolled to a stop on the Moroccan tile and textured concrete of the patio, which featured a beautiful marble fountain right out front. Tall Italian cypress trees stood guard on either side of the arched doorway with etched glass doors. I was speechless as I stepped out of the car.

“This is
amazing,” I finally breathed as Harrison rounded the car to join me.

“Yes. Master Fullerton is quite proud of his family home. It was built in 1927
with materials imported directly from Italy, and a Fullerton has lived here ever since. Come,” he said as he extended his gloved hand in front of us, leading the way toward the arched doorway.

I was even more blown away by the interior. The foyer opened up to a grand spiral staircase toward
the upper level, and an ornate Swarovski chandelier sent sparkling light across the highly polished parquet wood floor.

Harrison led me to the main living room, which looked as though it belonged in a museum rather than someone’s home, especially anyone with small children.
Several other crystal chandeliers hung from burnished wood on the barrel ceiling. Antique Queen Ann furniture was upholstered in dark hunter green with tiny pink roses as accents. The wall of windows cast bright, natural light into the room, which, despite its name, didn’t look like anyone actually “lived” in it. I thought about all the books and magazines in my living room back home, scattered across my coffee table and end tables, which were in a constant state of chaos with stacks of homework, lesson plans and text books at any given time.

I was afraid to
merely stand next to the furniture in this room.

Posed family portraits
hung on the wall. I recognized Malcolm Fullerton, of course. He had figured greatly in my homework for the new job, and as I stood under his imposing portrait, I almost cowered beneath his steely blue gaze. His wife was a raven-haired beauty whose eyes were equally as blue, with perfect cheekbones and a kind smile. She seemingly passed all but one of those things to her oldest son, who stood rigidly at her side in the portrait. He adopted the same stance and countenance as his father, though he couldn’t have been more than ten at the time it was painted.

I glanced at the
younger boy in the photo, who curled into his mother’s arms like a contented kitten. He wore her same smile, which made me smile despite myself. This was Alex Fullerton, Drew’s younger brother. It was clear that he hadn’t yet been groomed by his father as heir to their massive fortune, a mistake for which they would pay in later years when Alex jumped ship entirely.

The feud between the two brothers was legendary.
Drew stepped into his rightful place as president of Fullerton International Enterprises at the tender age of 21, shortly after his father had suffered his first debilitating stroke. Alex, however, escaped to backpack across Europe to “find himself,” leaving Drew to run the family business a decade before I received my fortuitous email.

Though I prided myself as a non-judgmental person, I felt my lip curl. For the rest of us, who had to work hard just to break even, I couldn’t imagine that kind of devil-may-care attitude. Even if he didn’t have to work for a living, there was so much good he could do with his limitless resources and his family’s influence.
But he had famously walked away from all of it.