Rahm nodded again, face warm with shame. “Yes, father,” he said, sounding very much like the supplicating young man who, only a few short years earlier, had begged his father to let him start his own investment firm, Platinum Dunes, in the west.
“Or have you been indulging too often, and focusing too little?”
“No father,” Rahm lied, avoiding the harsh glare of his father’s beady, coal black eyes peering back at him through the giant flat screen monitor.
An awkward silence followed, during which Rahm knew his father was stewing. When at last it was broken, his father’s voice – and terms – were unwavering. “Find out all you can about Carly Stanton,” he ordered. “Her company, her recent acquisitions and what she’s going to invest in next.”
Rahm peered back at his father’s face in the computer screen, nonplussed. “But how can I do that, father?” he asked.
At last the elder Farzik smiled. “Why, just do what you do best, son – seduce her.”
Rahm felt the cold dread of fear grip his heart. He had seduced many a woman since his time in America, but always for fun – never business. He had been eager to seduce Carly Stanton anyway. She possessed everything he wanted in a sexual conquest: the exotic allure of pale, glowing skin and red hair, endless legs and an hourglass figure, the air of independence he loved to squash and the smart mouth he loved to silence. And yet the thought of getting closer to her for something as boring as “inside information” somehow quieted the raging fires of desire he’d felt for her upon their first meeting.
And yet, duty called. Nodding, bowing, hands pressed together in supplication, he peered back into his father’s eyes. “Yes, father,” he said. “Of course, father.”
“And son,” his father said, voice light with the sudden tone of victory. “Don’t disappoint me again, or I shall shut down your little American adventure sooner than I would a fallow oil field.”
The words chilled Rahm to the bone, making him bow even lower to avoid his father’s cruel, all-seeing eyes. “Yes, father,” he said, reaching out beneath the camera’s view to click his mouse and end the weekly video conference call before his father, the sheik, could impose anymore decrees.
Only when the screen went blank and he knew the signal was terminated did Rahm rise to his full height and reaching into the sleek, stainless steel dorm fridge beneath his desk to grab a beer. Popping the cap, he felt the frustration of the call roll off him in waves.
His office was vast and sprawling, like the rest of his penthouse apartment high atop the Luxe condominium at the southernmost tip of South Beach. Pressing the French doors open, he traded the dark, cold expanse of his home office for the sprawling balcony that wrapped around his exclusive 6,000-square feet penthouse.
The sultry warmth of the tropical climate bathed his swarthy skin in a lush mixture of salt spray and cool, ocean breezes. Beneath him crashed the aqua blue waves of the Atlantic Ocean onto the shores of a white, unlined beach. He watched them while he sipped his beer, the vehemence of his father’s call retreating with every distant crash and pull of another salty blue wave.
In time, the beer was gone and so was his anguish. He had a full week before he was forced to call his father again and, despite his initial reluctance over the chore at hand, Rahm now embraced the opportunity to seduce Carly Stanton in a more official capacity.
In fact, as he returned to his office for another beer, Rahm was downright looking forward to it…
Five
“Rahm?”
Carly stood, turning from the bar, eyes meeting the sultry brownness of her business rival’s amid the swirling throng at the El Tropicale nightclub. It was a retro 80s-slash-Latin bar off the beaten path, little more than a warehouse full of throbbing singles and strobe lights and blaring music from a live band that played an eclectic blend of 80s music and salsa hits.
She was on her third mojito of the night, skin aglow with perspiration and heaven only knew what her hair must have looked like, and yet she couldn’t help feeling a rush of pleasure – or maybe just adrenaline – at finding Rahm leaning against the same bar.
“Carly?” he asked with the same breathless surprise as she had. He looked casual and relaxed, to say nothing of drop dead sexy, in a black dress shirt unbuttoned to reveal his hairless, firm chest and maroon slacks that caresses his long, athletic legs. “What are you doing here?”
Although she had her drink and was leaving the bar, destined to return to her table full of rowdy single coworkers, Carly lingered to drink in the sexy hunk currently peering back at her as if she was the only woman in the room. “I could ask you the same thing,” she purred, feeling the warm glow of sweet Caribbean rum through her veins. “Shouldn’t you be on to your next acquisition by now?”
His grin was spontaneous and broad, lighting up an already flushed face. “I liked the view in South Beach so much,” he said, inching imperceptibly closer along the smooth, polished bar railing toward her. “I thought I might… stick around.”
She chuckled at the obvious come on. Or was it so obvious? Despite her prowess in boardrooms and at negotiating tables, Carly was strictly amateur when it came to dating. She’d had little experience in high school, preferring to graduate early and go on to college and receive her MBA in record time. Even in college she’d dated little, preferring random hookups in off campus bars to satisfy her lustful desires before going back to her 70-hour a week academic grind.
Even after college, she’d yearned for, but had yet to achieve, the stability of a steady boyfriend. While there had been prospects, most had bailed on her after only a few months. Not that she could blame them. In Carly’s world, her work always came first – forcing her to sacrifice nearly everything else in her life, love most of all.
She could blame her father for that. Xavier Stanton had instilled in his only child the need for success at all costs. Giving her little in the way of financial benefit but much in the school of hard knocks, Carly’s father had taught her the insatiable need for more – more success, more contacts, more investment, more success. As a result, Carly was a success addict, and rarely took time off from her favorite addiction to indulge herself in a little nightlife.
Tonight was the rare exception, a bachelorette party for one of the girls in Accounting. She’d agreed to the invitation under duress, her personal assistant Avery Hightower reminding her it had been nearly six months since Carly’s last night out with “the girls,” her one and only source for fun outside the office.
Alarmed that it had been so long, Carly reluctantly agreed, only to find herself standing in front of her newest business rival all the same. She smirked, pausing to sip her drink as he studied her every move. Flattered, she tried to hide the blush that quickly crept to her face with a playful toss of her long, red hair. “I’m glad you stuck around to enjoy the… view,” she purred, full lips never too far away from her drink straw. “South Beach can be addictive.”
He nodded, reaching for a rocks glass full of two fingers of a rich looking amber liquid and nothing else. Their eyes met, the moment slowing down and his penetrating gaze making Carly feel like she was the only woman in the room. Hell, as if they were alone in the vast, throbbing, glitzy, sultry nightclub. “That’s not exactly the view I was referring to, Carly.”
His words did not exactly shock her, though she felt a current run up and down her body just the same. The look in his eyes, predatory and hungry, telegraphed his cheesy come-on line from a mile away, and yet it landed in a receptive place. Perhaps Carly was buzzed, her three mojitos well beyond the nightly limit of a glass of wine she allowed herself after getting home from the office at nine most evenings.
Perhaps she was just lonely, her last “indiscretion” occurring over a year earlier with a blind date Gena in Sales had hooked her up with. He’d been handsome, and young, but delightfully inexperienced in bed and a real clinger-on once she’d tried to explain to him that she’d made a “mistake” by indulging in a workplace romance. Luckily
he’d only been an intern, on loan from the local MBA program, so she’d only had to endure the indignity of his puppy love for a few weeks after their single night together.
Since then her bed had been empty, save for the rare occasions when she shared it with one of the half-dozen toys from the “fun drawer” in her nightstand. Still none of those compared to the real, rock hard, solid and sexy man standing a few feet away – and closer all the time.
“Are your lines always this cheesy?” she finally asked over the noise of the six-piece salsa band, currently belting out a horn-tinged version of Madonna’s “Like a Virgin”. How appropriate, Carly thought to herself as she tried to navigate the torturous waters of flirtation.
“Only when I’m tongue tied by beautiful redheads,” Rahm chuckled, lifting the rocks glass to his lips and pausing to read her response. In return he received another blush from Carly’s face, a sight that clearly made him smile before tossing back his drink and signaling the bartender for another.
She watched the way the bartender snapped to attention, as if he’d been hovering and waiting for Rahm to order. It was a subtle thing but, in a swirling nightclub full of hundreds of people, a sure sign that wherever he went, Rahm Farzik got what he wanted.
Am I what he wants tonight? Carly couldn’t help wonder to herself as she sipped her mojito while Rahm waited for his drink. She had no intention of giving him what he wanted tonight – that was Negotiating 101, of course – but she had to admit the thought of giving in to Rahm was temptation enough to make her panties moist beneath her shimmering black cocktail dress.
He turned to her then, catching her in mid-ogle as she admired the slim, athletic physique beneath the fine tailored clothes. “Penny for your thoughts,” he said, voice so warm and sultry and smooth and near she realized he had somehow managed to inch face to face with her between paying for and picking up his drink.
Rather than flinch and step back, as she might have with a handsome stranger, she leaned in closer and winked merrily over her rapidly disappearing drink. “Oh no,” she giggled playfully, wagging a finger in his face. “I’m not letting you into my mind quite that easily.”
Rahm smirked, a devilish curve of those thick, ruby lips that entranced her more than they should have. “Well then,” he said, reaching out a hand to gently caress her arm. “If you won’t let me into your mind, where will you let me in, Carly?”
Six
Carly’s skin was warm and fragrant as they left the nightclub together, if not quite arm in arm then certainly side by side. The sidewalk was quiet after the raucous nightclub, which he’d only endured because his intel on Carly assured him she would be there that night.
Even so, a few shots of Jack Daniels, his new American favorite whiskey, had made the horrible salsa band and the throbbing crowd tolerable. Now that he had successfully talked Carly into letting him walk her home, and she’d navigated the treacherous waters of leaving her work friends behind, the night held untold pleasures as its sultry embrace warmed Rahm’s already flushed skin.
“Do they follow you everywhere?” Carly asked, her eyes peering over her shoulder at the two bodyguards following a block behind.
He nodded. “Unfortunately,” he said, admiring her flushed skin as she admired them. “Why, do they bother you?”
She shrugged, turning back to him with that same, subtle, crafty smile that had held him entranced the entire time they’d stood at the bar. “A little,” she confessed with a slight, curious nod.
“Why?” he asked, ever curious – on and off the job.
She shrugged, bare shoulders lush and luminous beneath a passing streetlight. She wore a shimmering black cocktail dress, tight along her magnificent torso and looser atop her long, gangly legs. Black heels gave her an extra inch or two, making them nearly the same height as they walked toward her condo on Coconut Street.
“I dunno,” she said, voice low and husky and conspiratorial as she leaned closer while waiting to cross the nearest intersection. “They just don’t inspire privacy, you know?”
He nodded, understanding the implication all too well. Turning, he nodded at his full-time bodyguards and drew a long, slender finger across his throat, signaling their duties were done for the night. They nodded, knowing there would be a fat bonus in it for them in the morning, even as he knew they’d continue to linger in the background, just not visible enough for Carly to see.
His nighttime indulgences notwithstanding, Rahm was royalty, after all, and thus his father insisted on constant monitoring at all times. Of course, as a thirty-year old man in the prime of his sexual life, there was “times” in Rahm’s life better left unmonitored.
This, hopefully, being one of them.
“Better?” he asked, offering his arm as they crossed the empty street, the blinking “Walk” sign redundant at this hour of the night. Or, should he say, early morning.
“Much,” she said, clinging to his arm tightly as they crossed the deserted street. Peering at the city now, neon and sultry, both quite and subdued but also with a vibrant, beating heart pounding just beneath the surface, Rahm could hardly believe he’d been eager to leave South Beach once the PrimeTime deal had gone south.
Now, charged with the most pleasant task of seducing his fiercest business rival, Rahm admired South Beach with a new sense of appreciation. He wondered how long it might take to bed a woman like Carly Stanton, and thought for once he wouldn’t mind one of his conquests making him wait.
After all, Rahm would much rather stick around, seduce and “monitor” Carly than chase another boring tech deal in some other city, which was so often his pattern.
“Penny for your thoughts,” she teased, pausing at another intersection as they wove farther away from Ocean Drive and deeper into the heart of downtown South Beach.
He smiled, drinking in the scent of her as they stood in the steamy darkness. “For once I’m not thinking, Carly,” he lied. Well, almost. “I’m doing.”
She chuckled, merrily, using the light post to launch herself into another deserted intersection as her funky, fashionable condo rose from the lackluster skyline in the near distance. “Is that supposed to be some kind of compliment?” she teased, dancing just out of reach as Rahm raced to catch up.
He didn’t race too fast, though, preferring to walk just behind her, the clatter of her heels on the cobblestone pavement, the shimmer of her legs, bare beneath the spray of her funky black dress, the promise of soft, pink panties dancing just out of reach and, beneath those, the luxuriant ginger bush Rahm was so desperate to tempt and tease beneath his trembling fingers and probing tongue.
She paused near a condo sign, her condo sign, turning coy and provocative as she ran her long, pale fingers along the security gate beside it. “Well,” she purred, their eyes meeting in the sultry dark beneath the glow of her building’s sign, which read The Atrium. “I appreciate the walk home.”
He felt the sudden sting of rejection throbbing in his gut, an unusual and certainly uncommon sensation. “I enjoyed it,” he said, inching closer to take her hand. “But I’d enjoy making sure you were safe inside your apartment even more.”
“That’s okay,” she said, and despite the firmness in her stance even Rahm could note the uncertainty, even reluctance, in Carly’s voice. “It’s a pretty secure building and, Rahm, from the hungry look in your eye, I think I’d feel a whole lot safer on the other side of this gate.”
He laughed, openly and honestly, a rare sound in its own right. “Am I so obvious?” he asked even as she opened and, before he could advance, closed the small gate between them.
“Trust me,” she said, inching closer to reach a soft, pale hand between the bars. “I’m a little hungry myself. I suppose this gate is here to protect us both.”
He took her hand, feeling the desire warm and beating just beneath the skin. “From what?” he asked, almost breathlessly, as he struggled between the dual sensations of frustration and desperation.
“From each othe
r, I suppose,” she said, squeezing his hand and releasing it all in the same, quick motion. With that she turned, high heels clicking on the concrete as she approached a brightly lit lobby where a liveried doorman opened the door for her and greeted her warmly.
Seven
“Hold up, hold up, hold UP!”
Avery Hightower waved her cinnamon dusted frappucino cup for emphasis. “You ditched us for some drop dead sexy stud, stiffed us with the check for three mojitos and didn’t even get so much as a kiss goodnight.”
Carly chuckled good-naturedly, reaching in her wallet for a crisp fifty dollar bill. “Will this cover it?” she asked, watching Avery snatch it in her short, stubby fingers.
“It will more than cover the tab,” said the cheeky personal assistant, slipping the bill inside her purse before Carly could change her mind. “And I’m keeping it just to teach you a lesson.”
“Let me guess,” surmised Carly, toying with the handle of her oversized cappuccino mug. “The lesson goes a little something like ‘Hos before Bros,’ am I right?”
Avery wrinkled her nose, as if the quaint saying was already outdated. “More like what a wasted opportunity,” she sighed instead before inhaling another straw full of her frozen caffeine concoction.
ROMANCE: THE SHEIKH'S GAMES: A Sheikh Romance Page 77
