Reckless Night in Rio

“We’re just here for one night, Robby,” she told her baby, kissing his forehead as she unbuckled his seat. “Just a quick night here and we’ll go straight back home.”

“Did he sleep well?” Gabriel said sardonically behind her.

She gave him a pleasant answering smile. “Did you?”

As they stepped out of the jet, Rio’s sultry heat hit her at once. She went down the steps, blinking in the blinding sunlight and breathing in the scents of tropical flowers, exotic spice and tangy salt from the sea. Lush, white-hot Brazil was the other side of the world from the frigid February weather she’d left behind her.

Looking across the tarmac, Laura saw a waiting white limousine and snorted. The other side of the world? This was a different world entirely!

“Bom dia, Miss Parker,” the driver said, tipping his hat as he opened the door. “I am glad to see you again. And what’s this?” He tickled beneath Robby’s chin. “We have a new passenger!”

“Obrigada, Carlos,” Laura said, smiling. “This is my son, Robby.”

“Is the penthouse ready?” Gabriel growled behind them.

The driver nodded. “Sim, senhor. Maria, she has organized everything.”

“Good.”

Laura climbed into the backseat and tucked Robby into the waiting baby seat, ignoring Gabriel climbing in beside him. Carlos started the engine and pulled the limo off the tarmac, going south.

As they traveled through the city, now crowded with tourists for the celebration of Carnaval, Laura stared out bleakly at the festive decorations. Gabriel didn’t speak and neither did she. The silence seemed like agony as the car inched through the traffic. As they finally approached the back of Gabriel’s building, Laura heard loud thumping music, drums, people singing and cheering.

“This is as close as I can get, senhor,” Carlos said apologetically. “The avenida is closed to cars today.”

“Está bom.” Setting his jaw, Gabriel opened the door himself and got out of the limo.

Laura looked out her window in awe. Ahead of them, she saw the street blocked and people gathering on Ipanema Beach for one of the largest, wildest street festivals in Rio. She looked up at Gabriel’s tall building above them. He had bought it two years ago, as a foothold in Rio while he wrestled his father’s company back from Felipe Oliveira. The ground floors held restaurants and retail space. The middle floors held the South American offices of Santos Enterprises, still officially headquartered in New York. The top two floors of the building were apartments for his bodyguards, household staff and Maria. The penthouse was, of course, for Gabriel—and, the last time she’d been here, for Laura. She swallowed. She’d never thought she’d be back here.

Especially not with a secret. A baby.

The car door wrenched open. She looked up, expecting Carlos, but it was Gabriel. To her shock, the expression on his handsome face was suddenly tender and adoring. His eyes shone with passion and desire.

“At last you are home, querida,” Gabriel murmured. He held out his hand. “Home where you belong. It nearly killed me when you left. I never stopped loving you, Laura.”

She gasped.

Suddenly she could no longer feel the hot sun blazing overhead or the fresh breeze off the sea. Loud music, horns and drumming and singing from Ipanema Beach all faded into the background. Her heart thrummed wildly in her throat.

Gabriel’s black eyes sizzled as he looked down at her, catching up her soul, collecting her like a butterfly in a net.

Then he dropped his hand with a sardonic laugh. “Just practicing.”

Setting her jaw, she glared at him. “A million dollars is almost not enough to deal with this,” she muttered.

His lip twisted. “Too late to renegotiate.”

“Go to hell.”

“Is that any way to speak in front of your baby?”

Turning back into the car, Laura unbuckled Robby. Her son cooed happily, reaching up his chubby arms for her embrace, and she was happy she had one person in Brazil who actually loved her. Leaving the baby carrier in the limo, she scooped him out of his seat. He giggled, clinging to her wrinkled satin bridesmaid’s dress.

Laura felt tired, grungy, dirty. After her poor night’s sleep on the jet, after traveling halfway around the world, and most of all, after the constant friction of having Gabriel near her, Laura’s emotions were too close to the surface. The flash of his dark eyes, the slightest touch of his hand

, the merest word of kindness from his sensual lips, still made her tremble and melt.

He was poison for her, she thought grimly. Poison wrapped in honeyed words and hot desire.