“But first,” he continued in that silky, supremely dangerous tone, his gaze narrow on hers even as he gestured toward his phone again, “let’s close this deal in Taiwan.”
Dru felt hollowed out and more than a little light-headed with jet lag, not to mention her own much too vivid imagination, when they finally made it to what she assumed was Bora Bora, but which could have been anywhere for all she was able to discern in the thick, heavy dark.
The helicopter they’d taken after their landing in Tahiti set down in a small field lit with tall tiki torches. The night was close and warm, sultry against her skin. She could smell the sea and the deep green of wild, fragrant growing things. The sweetness of flowers hung heavy, like perfume against the dark, and when she tipped her head back to watch the helicopter fly away again, she had to stifle a gasp at the brilliance of the stars that crowded the night sky. The roar of the helicopter faded, leaving only a deep tropical hush behind. It seemed to arrow into her soul.
“Come,” Cayo ordered her impatiently, and strode off.
Porters appeared from the darkness to handle the bags, and Dru followed Cayo over a wooden walkway, lit with more torches and hemmed in on all sides with lush greenery. Even in the dark, Dru could all but taste the burst of jungle all around her. Cayo was ahead of her, his long legs eating up the distance and before she knew it, she was hurrying—matching her stride to his, just as she’d always done.
Just like the dog on a leash he’d threatened to make her, a small voice inside of her pointed out. She shook it off.
Cayo stopped walking before a large Polynesian-style house with high, arched rooftops and wide, open windows that stretched the length and width of the walls, featuring pulled-back sliding shutters and unobstructed views.
And on the other side of the walkway was water. Nothing but dark water, lapping gently against the shore, and off in the distance, a smattering of low lights. Dawn was coming, bluing the inky night. Dru could make out a mountain in front of her, off on its own island across the water, black and high.
“This is the villa,” Cayo said.
He looked down at her as she drew closer to him, his ruthless face softened, somehow, by the soft tropical dark. Or perhaps she was only being fanciful. The torch lights surrounded them in a halo of golden light, and somehow made it seem as if they were standing even closer together than they were. As if there was nothing else in the world but the two of them, adrift in all this lushness.
“I don’t know why you would ever leave a place like this,” she said, trying to shift the focus back to the place. Away from the two of them. She smiled, but suspected it looked as nervous, as unsettled, as she felt. Still, she pushed on. “But perhaps it takes a different kind of imagination to conquer the world from this far-off little corner of it.”
And suddenly he was too close, though she hadn’t seen him move. He loomed above her, his shoulders wider than they should have been and his chest too broad, and he was too close for Dru to breathe, too close for her to do anything but lose herself in the dangerous amber of his gaze.
Her pulse went crazy beneath her skin. Her mouth went dry. And she felt that long, low ache between her legs.
His hard gaze slammed into hers, as if he meant to hold her there with the force of it. And sure enough, Dru found she couldn’t move.
“Don’t speak to me like I’m another one of those investors,” he said fiercely. Almost angrily. “Don’t expect me to dance to your tune simply because you make a bit of cocktail conversation.”
He was right, she had been doing exactly that—and she hated that he’d seen it so clearly. That he’d seen her. She’d always thought she’d wanted that but the truth of it terrified her. It was her job to read him, not the other way around. Never the other way around!
“My apologies,” she bit out. “I won’t point out your lack of imagination again.”
He didn’t speak. He only reached over and dragged his thumb across her lips, testing their shape, and it wasn’t a soft touch, a lover’s caress. It was starkly, undeniably sexual. If she hadn’t known better, if it hadn’t been impossible and unthinkable, Dru would have said he was staking his claim. Imprinting her with his touch, as he might brand cattle or stamp a logo onto a product. Leaving his mark.
She should have slapped his hand away. Instead, she burned. Long and slow and deep.
The way she always had. The way she always would.
“Believe me,” he said, and his voice was so soft and still so demanding. So consuming. A thread of sound in the sultry night, surrounded by flickering golden light and the wild, incapacitating staccato of her own heartbeat. “My imagination grows more vivid by the hour.”
Dru’s lips felt as if they were on fire, and she could feel his touch all through her body, coursing through her veins, even after he dropped his hand and eased away. Her heart didn’t stop its frantic beating. Her mouth was still so dry, her stomach in a knot. She felt him everywhere. And for a long moment, he only looked at her, his dark eyes hot and shrewd and that cruel mouth impassive.
And even that felt like a touch, and with the same result.
Cayo turned then to greet the smiling man who approached them, from inside the villa Dru realized she’d forgot about entirely. When he looked back at her, his gaze was too dark to read.
I didn’t want you to leave, he’d said on the terrace in Milan, half a world away now. And still it rang in her, through her, like a bell. I still don’t.
She wanted that to mean something. She wanted. And she could still feel his touch moving through her, making her his as surely as if he’d tattooed his name on her skin in the blackest ink.
You’re tired and overwrought, she told herself, fighting back another surge of heat behind her eyes. Nothing will feel like this in the morning. It can’t.
“You look exhausted,” Cayo said, his gaze moving over her face, making her imagine he could read her every thought that easily. He nodded, as if coming to some kind of decision, and the way his mouth curved then looked self-mocking. “Frederic will show you to your rooms.”
And then he walked away, disappearing into the thick night.
Leaving her to make sense of what was happening to her—to them—on her own.
Fighting off emotions she couldn’t understand, much less process, Dru obediently followed Frederic through the villa. There were tall, vaulted ceilings and the same rich, dark wood she’d seen outside. Airy, spacious rooms without proper windows, simply cut-out spaces in the walls to let in paradise on all sides. Bright-colored wall hangings, low and inviting sofas in magentas and creams. Polynesian artifacts on built-in shelves in the walls, and glorious flowers scattered across ornamental tables. She followed Frederic down a level and then outside again. They walked along another, far shorter path that delivered her to a private bungalow splayed out over its own private pier. Here, too, the walls were open to the night, letting the softest of breezes into the expansive suite. Dru couldn’t seem to breathe deeply enough to take it all in.
And again—still—all she wanted to do was dissolve into the tears she knew were waiting for her and cry herself dry. Cry until she couldn’t feel this anymore, whatever this was: Cayo and the dark and that touch, imprinted on her skin. Claiming her.
With a smile, Frederic showed her the glass floor hidden away beneath a rug in the sitting area.
“In the day,” he promised, “you will see many fish. Even turtles.”
“Thank you,” she whispered, summoning her smile from somewhere.
“Sleep now,” the man said kindly. “It will be better when you sleep.”
And she wanted to believe him. She did.
Everything felt too huge, too unwieldy, she thought when he left. Her own head. This place. Cayo, of course. Cayo most of all. It all felt impossible, and painful. It hurt from the inside out. She moved over to the
opening across from the four-poster bed draped in filmy mosquito netting from high above, and looked out at the water and the smudge of orange light behind the mountain in the distance. Daybreak was coming. And she was in paradise with the devil, and she burned for him as if she’d already fallen. Perhaps she had. Perhaps that was why this had hurt so much from the start.
There was no reason at all she should cry now. She wiped away the tear that tracked its way down her cheek. And then all the ones that followed. She felt her face crumple in on itself, and had to pull on reserves she hadn’t known she had to breathe through it—to fight back the sobs that she knew lurked just there and would be the end of her.
She must not give in. She must not start. It was only two weeks, and less than that now. She needed to be strong only a little while longer.
Oh, Dominic, she thought as she crawled on to the bed, not even bothering to change out of the clothes she’d been wearing across several continents and more time zones than she could count. I wish you could see this place. It’s even better than you dreamed.
Her last thought as she drifted off into blessed unconsciousness was of Cayo. That mesmerizing curve of his hard, impossible mouth. The touch of his hand in the cold, wet dark, so hot against her chilled skin. That unquenchable fire that burned ever hotter, ever brighter by the day, no matter how she tried to deny it. No matter how hard she fought. He would destroy her. She knew it. She’d always known it—it was one of the foremost reasons she had to leave him.
So there was no reason at all that she should be smiling against the soft white pillows as she drifted off into oblivion.
CHAPTER SIX
DRU WOKE TO sunshine on all sides. It streamed in the open windows of her room, bathing her in light and the sweet, fragrant breeze. It felt like some kind of blessing, chasing away what shadows remained from the long night before. She stretched luxuriously on the soft mattress and told herself she was fine now. Fully restored. Cayo’s touch, his talk of debauchery, that fire that only seemed to build between them—it was all part of a darkness dispelled. She was sure of it.
She rose from her bed and dressed slowly, in deference to the sultry weather. She pulled on a loose and flowing pair of linen trousers and paired them with a strappy black vest. Then she swept all of her hair up into as sleek a ponytail as was possible in this climate. The result, she thought, frowning at herself in the mirror, was as close to tropical and yet professional as she was likely to get. She slipped on a pair of thonged sandals and stepped outside, where it appeared to be well into a perfect afternoon.
Dru blinked in the brightness and took in her surroundings. There was another pier down from her bungalow with a selection of small watercraft drawn up to it and on the shore nearby. She could see water in all directions, a darker blue on the far side of the island and that stunning turquoise beneath her bungalow in what must be the famous Bora Bora Lagoon.
She walked back into the villa and was struck anew by the beauty she’d only partially registered last night. The dark wood, the high ceilings to draw up the day’s heat, all of it exposed to the tropical paradise and thus a part of it, too. The jungle pressed in on all sides, with the sea just beyond. It felt as wild as it did welcoming, and made something in her seem to ease as she stood there.
When she finished eating a simple meal of toast and tea out on one of the many terraces overlooking the water, she felt restless. Cayo typically did not expect her to rush to work after a long-haul flight unless he had explicitly stated otherwise, so she didn’t feel she had to seek him out at once. She assured herself any employee would feel the same—that it had nothing to do with all the churning emotion he’d stirred in her the night before. Nothing at all. Instead, she wandered down to the wooden path and followed it. It ran down to the pier, then on, making its lazy way down to the farthest point of the island and then looping back around.
Palm trees rustled over her head and bright flowers bloomed jubilantly on either side of the tidy boardwalk. She could hear birds up above and the waves against the shore. It made perfect sense to her that Dominic would have wanted this to be his final resting place. The sun was warm on her face, the breeze a caress against her skin. She felt serene. At peace.
All you needed was a good night’s sleep, she told herself firmly.
As the villa came into view again, perched up over its own gleaming white beach, she saw there was a whole section of it she’d yet to explore. It was not until she left the path and climbed up for a closer look that she realized that what looked like a separate wing was, in fact, Cayo’s master suite.
The wide-open walls meant she could step inside too easily and so, giving in to an urge she didn’t recognize, she stepped into the first of the rooms, and then sucked in a sharp breath. It was an airy space appointed with deft masculine touches, bold colors and clean lines, but the centerpiece was the massive bed that dominated the room. Cayo slept here last night, a little voice whispered. Or perhaps more recently, as it was still unmade, the snowy white coverlet tossed to one side, the pillows dented.
And suddenly, Dru went hot all over. Then cold. Almost as if she was feverish.
She reached over and traced the indentation in the nearest pillow with a fingertip. She imagined him naked and dark against the crisp sheets, that perfect, impossible body on display, her own body softening and melting at the pictures in her head—
It was clearly time to find the man—her boss, she reminded herself sharply—and concentrate on what remained of her time in this job, not on her incurable madness where he was concerned. Not on the way she burned.
She glanced at the art and small collections of statues and carvings as she made her way down the hall, peering into each room as she passed. There was a library fitted with a wall of books, a seating area within and a covered lanai outside with a plush loveseat and two armchairs—perfect for a read in the shade. There was a private lounge with a flat-screen television on one wall and a fire pit with a dramatic chimney on the other, and what looked like a built-in bar in the corner. And then an office suite, kitted out with computers and other equipment, sleek modern furniture—and Cayo.
Dru stopped in the doorway, watching him as he frowned down at his laptop with his mobile clamped to his ear, as usual. His hair looked unruly, as if he’d spent hours raking it back with his fingers, and he’d neglected to shave. It made him look even more dark and sexy than usual. Unpredictable, somehow. Edgy.
“You misunderstand me,” he was saying in cold, deadly French into his mobile. “It is no matter to me whether we ever open a plant in Singapore. But I suspect it is of great importance to you. Perhaps you’d like to rethink your tactics?”
He looked absurdly beautiful, as if someone had carved him into being from the finest stone and set him among lesser statues. He fairly gleamed in the golden sunlight streaming in behind him. He looked terrible and great the way the old gods might have, dangerous and mighty, and if he’d announced that he could command the weather at his whim, she would have believed it. The storm within her howled into being anew, the fever and the yearning, and he was to blame.
He raised his head then and met her gaze. Her stomach dropped and she stopped kidding herself about serenity and a good night’s sleep. It was as if he was inside her, provoking her, making her ache and burn.
He looked at her as if she were naked and beneath him. And Dru couldn’t help but wish she was, no matter how much she hated herself for her own eternal weakness.
Cayo sat back in his chair, his eyes on her as he finished the call with an abruptness that she knew must have made the man on the other end wince. He tossed his mobile on to the desktop in front of him and then regarded her, his golden eyes narrow and much too shrewd. His olive skin seemed darker against the loose white shirt he wore, making it impossible not to notice his lean, muscled arms and that perfect chest. Her breasts swelled against her vest. Her palms fe
lt damp. And there was that same familiar ache, blooming into life so low in her belly.
Sleep or no sleep, she was doomed.
“Henri is still giving you trouble?” she asked, determined to ignore what was happening to her, what she felt. Desperate to concentrate on business instead.
“He remains unclear on the chain of command,” Cayo replied, though the way he looked at her made her think he was not thinking of Henri or the Singapore project at all. “I think he has already convinced himself that I am not, in fact, the majority shareholder now.”
“You expected that,” Dru reminded him. She reached out a hand and touched the door frame next to her, running her finger over the dark wooden beam. The slightly rough texture made her feel even warmer, somehow, as if she was touching him instead. “You felt his personal connection with the employees and his decades of company loyalty far outweighed any tussles over authority you might have to have.”
“So I did.” He leaned against the arm of his chair and propped up his jaw in his hand, eyeing her in a way that made her keenly aware that he was one of the most powerful men in the world and she was...the only person she knew who had tried to defy him. “How do you find Bora Bora? Is it living up to your expectations?”
Dru couldn’t seem to hold his gaze for more than a second at a time, and had no idea why. She felt...fluttery. It was as if he really had branded her last night with that odd, small touch in the dark, and she didn’t know how to regain her equilibrium. Not when he was in front of her like this. Her lips seemed to tingle all over again, as if remembering. Yearning.
“I don’t understand you,” she said.
“That is hardly a breaking news item,” he said dryly. “What is it you feel you need to understand? I am a simple man, when all is said and done. I like what I like.” His hard mouth curved, his dark eyes gleamed gold. “I want what I want.”
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