by Maya Blake
‘So, in light of what you’ve discovered, what would Jameson PR advise?’
She knew her parents would advise him to go for the usurper’s jugular. Setting a bloodhound on the trail of salacious gossip and secrets to discredit was a favourite tactic her father relished.
‘A charm offensive. And a reminder of everything they have to gain by merging with you.’
‘Not a declaration of war on my competitor?’
Her mouth soured. ‘You can take that route if you want to, I guess.’
‘Which route would you take?’
‘Not that. Blood and gore turn my stomach.’
‘Perhaps you need a stronger disposition,’ he mocked.
Choosing not to take the bait, she sipped her wine, a little surprised when it slipped down smoothly. ‘The looking-into-the-whites-of-their-eyes approach works, Alejandro. Nothing beats a personal touch. How many times have you met the Ishikawa brothers face to face since deciding to pursue this merger?’
He swirled his wine glass. ‘Twice.’
‘After you had your team investigate their viability and profit margins?’
‘Of course.’
‘I’m guessing both times were here in the States where you wined and dined them at the best restaurant in town?’
‘Their every wish was catered to. They left happy.’
‘In your opinion.’
His gaze probed hers. ‘What’s your point?’
‘I’m willing to bet my sizeable manga collection that you didn’t divulge a single personal detail about yourself.’
‘At the risk of repeating myself, I don’t do—’
‘Touchy-feely. Yes, I’m aware. But letting them see you as remotely...human may have prevented this from happening.’
‘That might work for the average Mom and Pop ice-cream-parlour business. If they can’t see their way past those...feelings to a multibillion-dollar merger, then perhaps I’m dealing with the wrong business.’
She sent him a droll look. ‘We both know this isn’t a mistake. The Ishikawa Corporation’s business record is outstanding. So is SNV’s. A successful merger would be the stuff of breaking news headlines and serious accolades. All you’ll need to do is...bend a little.’
‘Is that what you’d do in my shoes? Bare your life to strangers in order to secure a deal?’
She lifted her glass and took a healthy gulp, relishing the warmth that blanketed her insides. ‘We’re not talking about me here.’
‘You’re fond of hypotheticals. So let’s have it. Would you give yourself the same advice, were you in my position?’
‘Maybe.’ She bore his intense scrutiny for a minute before she sighed. ‘Yes, I would.’
‘And what would you tell them about yourself?’
Elise shook her head. ‘That’s too broad a question.’
‘Let’s streamline, then. You attended a university on the west coast when your family is based in a state with excellent universities. Why?’
Nerves began to eat into the warmth. She took another sip, despite the faint warning that this form of Dutch courage hadn’t been her best idea. ‘The need to broaden my horizons?’
‘If you had such a need, why did you return to work with your parents?’
She stiffened at the other raw subject that grated her nerves. ‘Is there a law against that?’
‘Is that the answer you’d give a prospective business partner?’
‘No...’ She paused, aware she had skidded towards a chasm of her own making. ‘I agreed to work at Jameson in return for my parents paying for my university tuition.’
A slow frown gathered on his brow. ‘They expected you to pay for the education they gave you?’
Elise chose to blame the Malbec for loosening the tight leash she normally had on her emotions. ‘They expect a lot of things. Including not giving free rides to anyone, including their daughter.’
The enlightened gleam in his eyes further unnerved her. ‘Things aren’t cordial between you and your parents?’
A harsh laugh escaped before she could stop it. ‘You could say that.’
‘Then why do you work with them?’ he queried.
‘Because jobs don’t automatically fall from the heavens the moment you graduate from college. And if, by some divine grace, you make it to a second or third interview and your prospective boss finds out that you’re the daughter of Marsha and Ralph Jameson, they question why you’d snub the chance to work for the exalted Jamesons. Half of them won’t touch you because they don’t believe you’ll be committed to your job. The other half have certain...preconceived notions about you and won’t even give you a chance. Seven months of polite rejections and my parents demanding repayment of their loan left me little choice.’
Elise took another sip of wine to drown the sinking knowledge that she’d divulged far more than she’d intended to.
Silence seething with questions filled the room. Alejandro levelled a gaze at her, speculation swirling in his shrewd eyes. ‘And is that debt paid off?’
She swallowed. ‘No. But I’m almost there.’
He raised his brow. ‘Almost?’
‘Yep. With your help, of course.’
‘My help?’ he enquired thinly.
‘Helping you nail this deal would be great for you, of course, and it’ll boost my résumé, too, but, more importantly, it’ll see me freed from the shackles of Mum and Dad. So really, it’s a trifecta of pure winning.’
Alejandro slowly swirled his glass. ‘I see.’
Shame nibbled at her. As he continued to stare at her, heat that had nothing to do with the great food and wine swarmed up her neck. ‘I’m sorry, you didn’t ask for my life history.’ Setting the nearly empty glass down, she stood. And swayed. Alejandro surged up and grasped her waist. She averted her gaze from eyes that saw way too much. ‘I told you I wasn’t much of a drinker.’
‘Sí, you did, but you’re not drunk. Trust me, I know the difference.’ His voice was faintly self-mocking.
‘All the same, this isn’t going to look good in the morning, is it?’ she muttered.
‘You barely finished your glass. I’m not going to hold it against you.’
Her eyes flicked to his. And stayed, absorbed by the faint gold flecks splaying from his pupils. ‘Thanks,’ she whispered.
‘De nada,’ he murmured.
They remained like that, their breaths close enough to mingle. Elise knew it was unsafe to let those dark-rimmed eyes bore right into her soul. ‘I didn’t mean to carry on. I just...’
His eyebrow lifted. ‘You just...?’
‘I don’t like talking about my parents.’
‘Why?’
‘It...it just hurts too much, you know?’
A curiously bleak smile quirked his lips. ‘No. I don’t know.’
Elise frowned. ‘Of course not. I’m guessing you had a brilliant childhood, filled with nauseatingly blissful memories.’
The hands curled at her waist tightened imperceptibly. ‘Nauseating more often than not, yes. Blissful, no.’
Her brain suddenly locked onto the fact that his hands were on her body. Elise couldn’t think beyond the electric heat seeping into her skin. Or the need to feel it glide elsewhere.
‘Well, I’m sorry.’
‘For what?’
She attempted a shrug. ‘For both of us.’
‘I don’t need your pity.’ His voice was edgy, filled with a thousand barbs.
She shivered. Immediately, his hands slid up her arms, warming her. Elise struggled to focus. ‘I wasn’t offering it. I was just...’
His gaze dropped to her mouth and her thoughts momentarily scattered. Dragging her eyes from his face restored temporary sanity. A question that had been probing the back of her mind surged forward, but his hands on her body wreaked havoc with her thought processes.
‘Alejandro?’
‘Sí?’ he breathed.
Her insides shook at the sultry, exotic word. ‘You can let me go now
. I promise I won’t fall over.’
His hands tightened on her for a heated second, then he freed her. ‘Good to know. Would you like some coffee or shall we put an end to this workday?’
She gripped her arms where his had been a moment ago, absurdly aware she wasn’t ready for the evening to end. ‘You were going to tell me who was behind the stalled merger.’
Several emotions curled through his eyes, most of them forbidding enough to send a chill through her.
‘It’s my brother,’ he finally offered. Contrary to the expression in his eyes, his voice was bled of every emotion.
‘Your brother?’
‘Yes.’
‘But...why?’
He took a step back, then another. Striding to the ever-present coffee cart, he poured a shot of espresso. ‘Because like you, for me, family isn’t a word that conjures hearts and flowers.’
Elise wished she didn’t understand what he meant. All the same... ‘That’s still a little extreme, isn’t it? Your brother wants to hurt you that much?’
His mouth twisted. ‘You assume I’m capable of being hurt. At the worst, he’ll make a nuisance of himself. No more.’
The staggering confidence behind the words further chilled her. And yet, she felt an affinity with Alejandro, sensed an underlying emotion that she couldn’t quite pinpoint.
She was twisting the puzzle in her mind when he drained his cup and set it down. ‘I think I’ve used up my reasonable workday quota where you’re concerned. Come.’
He walked out of the dining room. She followed at a slower pace, and entered his office to find him returning from hers with her jacket and briefcase.
He held out her jacket for her, and Elise murmured her thanks. About to bid him goodnight and beat a hasty retreat, she froze as he caught up his own jacket and came towards her. ‘You’re leaving, too?’
‘I’m taking you home.’
She shook her head. ‘There’s no need to do that. The subway will get me home in twenty minutes.’
He took her elbow and steered her towards the door. ‘It’s late. Letting you brave the subway at this time of night is out of the question. If nothing else, I wish to see you return to work tomorrow in one piece.’
‘It’s really not—’
‘You haven’t already forgotten our agreement to dispense with unnecessary arguments, have you?’
She firmed her mouth and followed him into what looked like a private lift. Enclosed in the small space, she couldn’t think of one thing to say to the man whose presence loomed powerful and vibrant beside her. In contrast, she felt small and shamefully inept, so she turned her face away from him. To the mirror that reflected his image in perfect detail.
Even in profile, Alejandro was unforgivingly captivating. In the harsh light, his skin glowed a vibrant olive, his thick dark hair gleaming invitingly. Elise had never felt the urge to touch a man’s face, let alone his hair. Pursuing a double major had been time-consuming enough, and the casual dates she’d occasionally accepted in college ended when she discovered sex was the subtext behind each date.
That reality had followed her into her working life, but she’d become an expert at holding male interest at bay.
But staring at Alejandro, she felt an alien need to do the opposite, to give in to the subtext of sex pulsing through her right to the tips of her fingers.
As if he sensed her unvarnished scrutiny, Alejandro’s head snapped up. Their eyes met in the mirror. His gaze held hers easily, compelling her completely, so she couldn’t look away. The whine of the descending lift the only sound, they stared at each other as silence seethed, thickened into something else. Something that had intense heat dredging low in her belly, and flaring tingles all over her body.
His gaze probed, darkened with each jagged second. It dropped to her lips, and Elise, as if she were under a spell, parted them.
Someone made a sound. A tiny fracture of breath. The beginning of a curse. Or a prayer. She never got the chance to guess.
The lift arrived with a slight bump and the doors glided open.
And the spell was broken.
CHAPTER FIVE
ELISE HAD RIDDEN in her fair share of supercars, her father being a firm believer that a show of power and success bred even more of the same. Each time she’d ridden with her father, she’d prayed for the ride to be over as quickly as possible, silently enduring the ‘life lesson’ speeches that came with those trips, while Ralph Jameson had walked away congratulating himself for showing his daughter what material benefits could be plucked like fruit from the nearest low-hanging tree, should she play her cards right.
Tonight, she was far from uninterested. Her gaze strayed frequently to the man behind the wheel of the Bugatti, a tiny part of her not minding the traffic that slowed their progress through downtown Chicago.
Even the silence, although charged with residual awareness from the lift, was welcome. It gave her a chance to breathe, and evaluate just what it was about Alejandro Aguilar that threatened the careful foundations of the walls she’d built around her emotions and sexuality.
When it came right down to it, he’d done nothing presumptive or offensive to make her believe she had anything to fear from him. His comment about her flirting had stung, of course, but he’d dropped the subject at her challenge. Which was far more than a few of the men she’d interacted with professionally and privately had done in the past.
But that tiny consideration still didn’t account for why she felt this unsettling excitement just by being next to Alejandro Aguilar.
Whatever it was, she needed to get it under control quickly.
He changed lanes as they neared her South Shore apartment. In an effort not to stare at his hands or the taut thighs centimetres from hers, or even breathe in the aftershave-mingled maleness of him, she cleared her throat.
‘So...are you going to go after your brother?’
His jaw clenched as he pulled to a stop at a traffic light. One hand rested on the top of the steering wheel, the other scrubbing restively over his stubble. ‘No. For now, I’m choosing to resist that impulse.’
A breath freed itself from her chest. ‘I’m glad.’
He glanced at her before he eased away at the green light. ‘Do you advocate the “make love, not war” route with all your clients?’
‘My commissions so far have involved damage limitation or using the best PR approach that makes the client look good. I won’t be helping you if I advocate an approach that makes you look bad to investors in the long run.’
He slid another glance at her. ‘What do you care? This is your last commission. What happens after this shouldn’t concern you.’
Elise bit her lip as a mildly hollow sensation washed over her. ‘No, I guess it shouldn’t. Maybe I don’t want my swan song to leave a bad taste in my mouth,’ she replied. She looked out of her window and saw her apartment block slide into view. She indicated the quieter side street. ‘If you pull over here, I’ll jump out.’
He ignored her and the no-parking zone in front of her building and stopped before the double glass doors. Stepping out, he came round and opened her door.
Elise took a gulp of restorative fresh air. ‘Thanks for the ride.’
He took her arm and started towards the double doors. ‘You can thank me by letting me see you to your door. You can also tell me why your building doesn’t have a doorman. Or adequate security.’ He eyed the hippy-looking couple who breezed out, then transferred his scathing gaze to the doors that didn’t quite shut behind them.
To counteract what the thought of being enclosed with him in another lift was doing to her insides, she waved his terse demand away. ‘I have a super. Does that satisfy you?’
‘No, it does not.’
Her mouth twisted. ‘Not everyone can afford a Barrington Hills mansion, Alejandro.’
He pressed the lift button. When it didn’t arrive quickly enough, he pressed it again, several times. ‘I don’t live in Barrington Hills.’
‘My parents do.’
He stared at her. ‘And you choose to live here?’
‘Yes,’ she answered simply.
He didn’t probe further, leaving Elise with the feeling that the subject of family was as unwelcome to him as it was to her. What he did probe was the lift button, uttering a skin-flaying Latin curse when the lift made no move to arrive.
Relief and disappointment spun through her. ‘I’ll take the stairs. I’m only on the third floor.’
He whirled with fluid grace and indicated for her to precede him. Battling to suppress her self-consciousness, she hurried up the stairs, and arrived at her door two minutes later, struggling not to pant. Alejandro, on the other hand, had barely broken a sweat.
She unlocked her door. Almost reluctantly her eyes drifted up only to find his waiting for her. ‘Since conventional working hours are out the window, what time do you need me tomorrow?’
‘To avoid another argument, you can arrive at seven.’
Her eyes widened. ‘As opposed to what? Five a.m.?’
He shrugged. ‘That’s when my work day starts.’
‘Dare I ask when it ends?’
‘When the coffee machine threatens to quit. Which it does on a daily basis.’
She laughed. His lips twitched. Then his gaze dropped to her mouth.
The laughter died. She scrambled backwards, bumping her backside into the door. ‘I’ll see you in the morning?’
Penetrating eyes collided with hers. ‘Sí. You will. Buenas noches.’
He departed with the quiet strength and power of a jungle predator. And even though his footsteps barely echoed down the stairs, she found herself listening for them.
Catching herself, she stepped back and shut her door.
Twenty minutes later she was showered and dressed in her favourite sleeping shirt. Sitting in bed, she tugged her laptop close and powered it on. Her buzz disappeared beneath the volume of emails from her mother earlier in the day, then her father demanding responses to her mother’s emails.
She’d muted her phone for her interview with Alejandro and then neglected to turn it back on. She activated the sound and wasn’t at all surprised when the handset rang almost instantly.
