A Proposal Worth Millions

by Sophie Pembroke

  She didn’t know I was coming. Oh, he was going to kill Neal. Painfully, and probably slowly.

  Reflex carried him through the moment, the old defences leaping back into place as she smiled and held out her hand. Her hand. Like they really were new business acquaintances, instead of old friends.

  ‘Dylan! How wonderful to see you again,’ she said, still smiling through the obvious lie. And Dylan wished that, for once, he’d ignored the opportunity and headed back to the airport like his gut had told him to.

  But it was too late now.

  Ignoring the sting of her lie, Dylan took her cool fingers between his own, tugging her closer until he could wrap his other arm around her slim waist, his fingers sliding up from hers to circle her wrist and keep her close. Just the touch of her sent his senses into overdrive, and he swallowed hard before speaking.

  ‘It’s so good to see you, Sadie.’ And that, at least, was the truth. Dylan could feel his world move back into balance at the sight of her and the feel of her in his arms...well, it just told him what he’d known for years. That the feelings for his best friend’s girl he’d tried so hard to bury had never been hidden all that deep at all.

  He really was going to kill Neal for this.

  Sadie pulled back, still smiling, apparently unaware of how his world had just shifted alignment again, the same way it had thirteen years ago when Adem had said, ‘Dyl, this is Sadie. She’s...special,’ and Sadie’s cheeks had turned pink as she’d smiled.

  A real smile, that had been. Not at all like the one she gave him now.

  ‘Let’s get you checked in,’ Sadie said, and Dylan nodded.

  Even though he knew the most sensible thing to do would be to run, as far and as fast as he could, away from the Azure Hotel.

  Maybe his dad had had the right idea after all.

  * * *

  Sadie’s hands shook as she climbed the stairs to her tiny office—the one that used to be Adem’s—and reached for the door handle. Instinctively, she checked back over her shoulder to make sure Dylan hadn’t followed her. But, no, the stairs were clear and she was alone at last, and able to process what had already been a difficult day.

  Hopefully by now Dylan would be happily ensconced in the best suite the Azure had to offer—which was probably still nowhere near the standard he was used to. He hadn’t let her escape without making her promise to meet him for dinner, though. Of course, she’d said yes—she was hardly in a position to say no, now, was she? She just hoped he had no idea how much she’d wanted to.

  Stepping into her office, she slumped into her desk chair and reached for the phone, her fingers still trembling. Dialling the familiar number, she let it ring, waiting for Neal to pick up. He’d be there, she was sure, waiting by the phone. After all, he had to know she’d be calling.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Neal said, the moment he answered.

  ‘So you bloody well should be. What were you thinking? Why didn’t you tell me? Never mind, I think I know.’ Which didn’t make her any happier about the subterfuge. Not one bit.

  ‘You’d have said no,’ Neal explained anyway. ‘But, Sadie, he really wants to help. And you need him.’

  ‘I don’t need a pity save.’ Sadie could feel the heat of her anger rising again and let it come. Neal deserved it. ‘I’m not some bank that’s too big to fail. I don’t need Dylan Jacobs to sweep in and—’

  ‘Yes,’ Neal said, calm but firm. ‘You do. And you know it.’

  Yes, she did. But she wished that wasn’t true.

  ‘Why did it have to be him, though?’ she whined.

  ‘Who else do we know with millions of pounds, a tendency to jump at random opportunities and a soft spot for your family?’ Neal teased lightly.

  ‘True.’ Didn’t mean she had to like it, though. Although Neal was right about the jumping-at-opportunities thing. Dylan was the ultimate opportunist—and once he’d jumped it was never long before he was ready to move on to the next big thing. This wasn’t a long-term project for him, Sadie realised. This was Dylan swooping in just long enough to give her a hand, then he’d be moving on. She needed to remember that.

  ‘Is this really a problem?’ Neal asked. ‘I mean, I knew your pride would be a bit bent out of shape, but you told me you wanted to save the Azure, come hell or high water.’

  She had said that. ‘Which is this, exactly?’

  There was a pause on the other end of the line, and Sadie began to regret the joke. The last thing she needed on top of Dylan Jacobs in her hotel was Neal showing up to find out what was going on.

  ‘Why does he bother you so much?’ He sounded honestly curious, like he was trying to riddle out the mystery of Sadie and Dylan. The same way Neal always approached everything—like a puzzle to be solved. It was one of the things Sadie liked most about him. He’d taken the problem of her failing hotel and had started looking for answers, rather than pointing out things she’d done wrong. ‘It can’t be that he reminds you of Adem too much or you’d have kicked me to the kerb after the funeral, too. So what is it?’

  Sadie sighed. There was just no way to explain this that Neal would ever understand. His riddle would have to go unsolved. ‘I don’t know. We just...we never really managed to see eye to eye. On anything.’

  Except for that one night, when they’d seen each other far too clearly. When she’d finally realised the threat that Dylan Jacobs had posed to her carefully ordered and settled life.

  The threat of possibility.

  ‘He’s a good man,’ Neal told her. ‘He really does want to help.’

  ‘I know.’ That was the worst part. Dylan wasn’t here to cause trouble, or make her life difficult, or unhappy. She knew him well enough to be sure of that. He was there to help, probably out of some misguided sense of obligation to a man who was already two years dead, and the friendship they’d shared. She could respect that. ‘And I need him. I should have called him myself.’ She thought of the sympathy card sitting with a few others in a drawer in her bedroom. The one with a single lily on the front and stark, slashing black handwriting inside.

  I’m so sorry, Sadie. Whatever you need, call me. Any time.

  D x.

  She hadn’t, obviously.

  ‘So we’re okay?’ Neal asked.

  ‘Yeah, Neal. We’re fine.’ It was only her own sanity she was worried about. ‘I’ll call you later in the week, let you know how things go.’

  ‘Okay.’ Neal still sounded uncertain, but he hung up anyway when she said goodbye.

  Sadie leant back in her chair, tipping her head to stare at the ceiling. All she needed to do was find a way to work with Dylan until he moved on to the next big thing—and from past experience that wouldn’t take long. Jobs, businesses, women—none of them had ever outlasted his short boredom threshold. Why would the Azure be any different? The only thing Sadie had ever known to be constant in Dylan’s life was his friendship with Adem and Neal. That was all this was about—a feeling of obligation to his friend, and the wife and child he’d left behind. She didn’t need him, she needed his money and his business.

  A niggle of guilt wriggled in her middle at the realisation that she was basically using her husband’s best friend for his money, milking his own sense of loss at Adem’s death. But if it was the only way to save the Azure...

  She’d convince him that the Azure was worth saving, and he’d stump up the money out of obligation.

  Then they could both move on.

  CHAPTER TWO

  DYLAN WAITED A while before calling Neal to yell at him. After all, he figured he owed Sadie a fair crack at their mutual friend first.

  In the meantime, the wait gave him the opportunity to settle into his suite, his frequent flyer business traveller mind assessing the space the way he always did in a new hotel room. Bed: king-size—always a good
start. The linens were crisp and white, and part of his weary brain and body wanted to curl up in them right away and sleep until dinner. But he was there to do a job, and that job required him to be awake, so he pushed on.

  The room itself was a good size, but Dylan figured this was probably the biggest the hotel had, so he’d have to explore some of the smaller, ordinary rooms before making a judgement on room size. Wandering through to the bathroom, he clocked fluffy towels, good tiling and lighting, and a shower he very much looked forward to trying out later. If that shower head was as effective as it looked, and the water pressure as good as Dylan hoped, his aching muscles would appreciate the pummelling before bed.

  Back in the main room, Dylan ran his fingers across the small table and chairs by the window in the bedroom then strolled into the lounge area through the open arch of a doorway. Again, the size was good, the sofas looked comfy enough, and the coffee table was stacked with magazines and brochures detailing things to do in the area. He flicked through them quickly before deciding the mini-bar and desk were far more interesting.

  Crouching down, he yanked open the fridge door and nodded his approval. A decently stocked mini-bar—even if he never used it—was a must in Dylan’s book. Then he dropped into the swivel chair by the desk, tugged his phone from his pocket and checked for the complementary WiFi the girl at the desk had assured him was part of his room package. To his amazement, it worked first time and with minimal fuss over the password.

  He smiled to himself. He shouldn’t be so surprised. After all, this was Adem’s place, for all that Sadie was running it now. And Adem had always been vocal about the individual’s right to easy-access WiFi at all times and in all places. Something else he and Dylan had always agreed on.

  Twirling around in his chair, Dylan split his attention between checking his mail again and surveying the room as a whole—and spotted something he hadn’t noticed before. Getting to his feet, he crossed the room, pulled aside the curtains and stepped out onto the suite’s small balcony.

  Now this was worth travelling all those miles for. Breathing in deeply, Dylan savoured the warm sun on his face and forearms, and stared out. He could see now why Adem had been so evangelical about the place, right from the start, quite apart from his family connection to the hotel.

  The view was magnificent. Down below, the Aegean Sea lapped against the rocks, bright and blue and entrancing, sending up puffs of white spray with every wave. Above the rocks, scrubby bushes and juniper trees twisted up towards the clear azure sky, all the way up the peak where the hotel sat. Overhead, a bird called out as it passed, and Dylan thought for the first time all year, since he spent the holidays with his sister and her family, that he might actually be able to just switch off and enjoy the moment.

  Except he still had to deal with Sadie—and find out how bad things at the Azure really were for Neal to have sent him here when she so obviously didn’t want his help.

  Eventually, he figured enough time had passed that even Sadie would have finished yelling at the hapless accountant and, leaving the sunny warmth of the balcony behind him, Dylan headed back inside to sit at the desk and call Neal.

  After just a couple of rings Neal answered the phone with a sigh.

  ‘You can’t possibly be surprised by this call,’ Dylan pointed out.

  ‘I know, I know.’ Neal sounded stressed, in a way Dylan wasn’t used to hearing from his old friend. That alone put his nerves on high alert. ‘Trust me, I’ve already heard it all from her.’

  Her. Sadie. The memory of her expression, the shock and horror that had flashed across her face at the first sight of him, rankled all over again.

  ‘I bet you have,’ Dylan said. ‘So? Is she going to kick me out on my ear or let me help?’ It wasn’t what he’d expected to ask—he’d expected there to be a lot more yelling first, apart from anything else. But now he had Neal on the phone it seemed like the only thing that really mattered.

  ‘She’ll let you help.’

  ‘Because she’s desperate.’

  ‘Pretty much.’

  ‘Great.’ Dylan put as much sarcasm as he could muster into the word. ‘I just love being a last resort.’

  Neal let out another, world-weary sigh. ‘You know Sadie, Dyl. She’s proud. And she thinks it’s her responsibility to fulfil Adem’s dreams all on her own.’

  ‘She let you help.’ Which, Dylan had to admit, still irked him a bit.

  ‘Yeah, but I’m less smug than you.’

  Smug? ‘I’m not—’

  ‘Yes. Yes, you are. And you need not to be this week, okay?’ Neal wasn’t joking any more, Dylan could tell. And that worried him more than anything else that had happened that day.

  But, to be honest, being too smug and alienating Sadie wasn’t really what Dylan was concerned about. He was far more worried about being obvious than smug. Worried that Sadie still thought she knew more about his feelings than she could reasonably expect to after so many years—and might refuse to let him help because of it.

  ‘Things are that bad here?’ he asked.

  Neal huffed impatiently, a far more familiar sound than his concern. ‘Didn’t you read the info I sent over?’

  ‘Of course I did.’ Well, he’d scanned through it on the plane, which was practically the same thing. It wasn’t that Dylan wasn’t interested in the stats for the Azure Hotel, it was just that he had a lot of other projects on his plate, plus new opportunities coming in. Besides...he hadn’t really been able to imagine any of it until he was actually here.

  ‘She needs more than your money, Dyl. She needs your business brain.’

  And, okay, yes, it was bad timing, but it wasn’t really his fault that his brain’s automatic response to a comment like that was a feeling of smug pride, right? ‘Doesn’t everyone?’

  ‘Okay, that? That’s exactly what I don’t want you to do this week.’

  The puff of pride disintegrated as fast as it had appeared. ‘Fine. So I’m here in a business advisor capacity only?’

  ‘No, she needs your money, too,’ Neal said. ‘She’s insanely committed to Adem’s dream of making the Azure a successful hotel. Doesn’t matter that he’s not there to see it—she’s going to make it happen anyway.’

  Only Sadie. Other people walked out on commitments every day—families, marriages, financial and business obligations—and never looked back. Only Sadie would remain committed to a dead man’s schemes. And only because she had loved Adem so much.

  Dylan sighed. ‘That’s not going to be easy.’ He knew that much from the information Neal had sent him—and the fact Sadie had agreed to let him help at all. If she’d thought she could do it herself, she would have. Sadie was nothing if not bloody-minded and determined.

  ‘Probably not,’ Neal allowed. ‘But it might save Adem’s dream. And Sadie.’

  And so, of course, he would do it, without question. He just hoped no one ever pressed him to say exactly which of those motivations was strongest for him.

  ‘I’m having dinner with her tonight.’ He tugged a sheet of writing paper branded with the Azure logo closer to him and grabbed a pen. ‘Where do I start?’

  ‘She needs this to be business,’ Neal said. ‘Not a pity save, even if that’s what it is.’

  It was more than that, Dylan knew. This wasn’t just pity. He couldn’t bear to see Sadie struggling, so he’d do whatever it took to save her. He suspected that Neal knew that too.

  ‘So how do I convince her it’s not?’

  ‘By letting her pitch the Azure and Kuşadasi to you as a real investment opportunity. As something you’d want to put money into even if she wasn’t involved. Let her present her proposal for the place, then decide if you will invest.’

  Suddenly, a plan began to form, right at the back of Dylan’s brain, where he always got his most inspired ideas.
r />   ‘I can do that,’ he said, and smiled.

  * * *

  Standing in front of her wardrobe, Sadie shifted her weight from one foot to the other, squinted, then sighed and gave up. Nothing she could do right now changed the clothes hanging there for her to choose from. If Neal had told her Dylan was coming, she’d have had time to go shopping. Not that she would have done. The last thing she wanted to do was give Dylan Jacobs the impression that his presence was new-clothes-worthy.

  Either way, her options now were limited.

  She flicked through the hangers again, dismissing each outfit in turn. Black suit? Too conservative for dinner with someone who was, business opportunities aside, an old friend. Navy shift dress? Might have worked, if it didn’t have hummus smeared down the front of it, courtesy of Finn. She tossed it in the laundry hamper. Grey shift dress? She supposed it could work. The neckline was demure, the fit okay... It was just boring and made her look even greyer than she felt.

  Hadn’t she once had more interesting clothes? The sort with colour and pop and stuff? She was sure that once upon a time she’d dressed to fit her happy and in-love mood. Maybe that was the problem. When Adem had died he’d taken all her colour and brightness with him—and it even showed in her wardrobe.

  Trapping her lower lip between her teeth, Sadie reached right to the back of the closet and felt slippery satin slide through her fingers as she tugged one more dress to the front. The dress. The bright red, sexy dress her sister had talked her into buying on their last shopping trip to London before she and Adem had left for Turkey. She’d never yet found the courage to wear it, for all of Rachel’s suggestions that it would be the perfect dress to wear if she wanted to convince Adem they should give Finn a little brother or sister.

  She let it fall from her grasp. Definitely not the right dress for tonight.

  Instead, she pulled out her standard black function dress—the one she’d worn for every single event since she’d arrived in Kuşadasi, and the dress she’d known she’d end up wearing all along, if she was honest with herself. It was well cut, didn’t reveal too much, looked more dressy than a work dress, but still had the aura of business about it.