“Fair enough,” she conceded, then rushed to add, “but only when we’re in public.”
“That’s logical. Know, too, though, that we will have to spend time alone with each other. This evening, for example, we need to get our stories straight before we face the world on a larger scale.”
So much for her assumption of darker motives for his refusal to call a cab. What he said made sense. “Know that I’m staying under duress.”
“Duly noted. Just keep remembering that black-tie dinner in D.C. with politicians and ambassadors.”
“You’re wicked bad with the temptation.”
He steamed her with another smoky once-over. “You’re one to lecture on that subject.”
“I thought we were going to talk.”
“We will. Soon.” He stepped away and she exhaled. Hard. “I have a quick errand to take care of, but I’ll have dinner sent up to your room while you wait. I hear tonight’s special is tenderloin and stuffed lobster.”
“And cake,” she demanded, even knowing it wouldn’t come close to satisfying the hunger gnawing as her insides tonight. “I really need a slice of that groom’s cake.”
Duarte watched his head of security shovel a bite of chocolate cake in his mouth in between reviewing surveillance footage and internet headlines on the multiple screens. A workaholic, Javier Cortez frequently ate on the job, rather than take off so much as a half hour for a meal. He even kept an extra suit in his office for days he didn’t make it home.
Wheeling out a chair from the monitor station, Duarte took a seat. “What were you able to pull together on security for Jennifer Harper?”
Javier swiped a napkin across his mouth before draping the white linen over his knee again. “Two members of our team are currently en route to her assisted-living facility outside Boston. They’re already in phone contact with security there and will be reporting back to me within the hour.”
“Excellent work, as always.” He didn’t dispense praise lightly, but Javier deserved it.
The head of security had also endured a crappy month every bit as bad as Duarte’s. Javier’s cousin, Alys, had betrayed the Medina family by confirming the Global Intruder’s suspicions about Duarte’s identity. She had served as the inside source for other leaks as well, even offering up Enrique Medina’s “love child” he’d fathered shortly after arriving in the U.S.
Javier had weathered intense scrutiny after Alys’s betrayal had been discovered. He’d turned in his resignation the second his cousin had been confronted, vowing he bore no ill will against the Medinas and was shamed by his cousin’s behavior.
Duarte had torn up the resignation. He trusted his instincts on this one.
How odd that he found it easier to trust Javier than his own father. That could have something to do with Enrique Medina’s “love child” the whole world now knew about. Their grief-stricken widower father hadn’t taken long to hook up with another woman. The affair had only lasted long enough to produce Eloisa. Duarte made a point of not blaming his half sister. He tried not to judge his father, but that part was tougher.
Making peace with the old man was more pressing than ever with Enrique’s failing health.
Javier set aside his plate with a clink of the fork. “No disrespect, my friend, but are you sure you know what you’re doing?”
Most wouldn’t risk asking him such a personal question, but Javier’s past wasn’t that different from Duarte’s. Javier’s family had escaped San Rinaldo along with the king. Enrique had set up a compound in Argentina as a red herring. The press had believed the deposed king and his family had settled there.
However, the highly secured estate in South America had housed the close circle who’d been forced out of San Rinaldo with the Medinas—including the Reyes de la Cortez family. Javier understood fully the importance of security as well as the burning need to break free of smothering seclusion.
Duarte tapped a screen displaying an image of Kate at the antique dinner cart, plucking the long-stem red rose from the bud vase. “I know exactly what I was doing. I was introducing my fiancée to the world.”
“Oh, really?” Javier leaned closer, pulling his tie from over his shoulder, where he must have draped it when he started his dinner. “Less than two hours ago she was scaling the side of the building to get a photo of you.”
His eyes cruised back to the screen. Kate stroked the rose under her nose as she settled in the chair. Her brown hair tousled, her feet bare, she had the look of a woman who’d been thoroughly kissed and seduced.
Thinking of the way she’d made her entrance on the balcony earlier… He couldn’t help but smile at her audacity. “Quite an entrance she makes.”
“Now you’ve invited her into your inner sanctum?” Javier shook his head. “Why not simply hand over a journal with your life story?”
“What better way to watch your enemy than keeping her close?” In his room. Where she waited for him now, savoring the beef tenderloin with the gusto of a woman who appreciated pleasures of the senses. “She will only see what I want her to see. The world will only know what I want it to know.”
“And if she goes to the press later with the whole fake engagement?” Javier’s eyes followed his to the screen, to Kate.
Duarte clicked off the image and the monitor went blank. “By then, people will label anything she says as the ramblings of a scorned woman. And if a handful of people believe her, what does that matter to me?”
“You really don’t care.” Javier tapped the now-dark screen, a skeptical look on his face.
“She will have served her purpose.”
“You’re a cold one.”
“And you are not very deferential to the man who signs your extremely generous paychecks,” he retorted, not at all irritated since he knew his friend was right. And a man needed people like that in his inner circle, individuals unafraid to declare when the emperor wore no clothes. “I assume you want to continue working for me?”
“You keep me on because I don’t kowtow to you.” Javier picked up his cake plate again. “You’ve never thought much of brownnosers. Perhaps that’s why she intrigues you.”
“I told you already—”
“Yeah, yeah, inner sanctum, blah-blah-blah.” He shoveled a bite of the chocolate rum cake, smearing basket-weave frosting into the fork tines.
“Perhaps I am not as cold as you say. Revenge is sweet.” So why wasn’t he seeking this sort of “revenge” with Javier’s cousin? Alys was attractive. They’d even dated briefly in the past.
“If you wanted revenge you could have gotten Kate Harper fired or arrested. She’s snagged your interest.”
Javier was too astute, part of what made him excel at his job as head of security. But then what was wrong with sleeping with Kate? In fact, an affair made perfect sense, lending credibility to their engagement.
“Kate is…entertaining. I’ll grant her that.” And his life was so damn boring of late.
Work did not provide a challenge. How many millions did a man need to make? He was a warrior without an army.
If he’d grown up in San Rinaldo, he would have served in her military. But with his history, he’d never had the option of signing on for service in his new home.
How ironic to be a thirty-five-year-old billionaire suffering from a career crisis? “She’s also helping take heat off me with my father. The old man is in a frenzy to ensure the next generation of Medinas before he dies.”
“Whatever you say, my friend.” Javier tipped back a bottled water.
Ah, hell. He couldn’t hide the truth from himself any more than from his friend. Duarte was off balance, tied up in knots over his father because he’d promised his mother he would watch Enrique’s back. But how did a person defend someone against a failing liver?
He sometimes wondered why Beatriz had asked him when Carlos had been older, when Carlos had been the one to come through for her. She’d reminded him then he had always been the family’s little soldier. He’d done his best to protect his family, a drive he saw equaled in Kate’s eyes when she spoke of her sister. How ironic that their similar goals of protecting family put them so at odds.
Standing, Duarte returned the rolling chair under the console of monitors and tapped the blank screen that had held an image of Kate relishing her dinner. “Make sure you leave that one off. I’ll take care of security in Kate’s suite.”
Four
Thank goodness no one was looking, because she’d tossed out table manners halfway through the lobster tail. Kate washed down the bite of chocolate rum cake with sparkling water. She was hungrier than she’d realized, having skipped supper due to nerves over crashing the Medina party.
Sipping from her crystal goblet, she opted for the Fuiggi water rather than the red wine. She needed to keep her mind clear around Duarte, especially after that kiss.
A promise of temporary pleasures that could lead to a host of regrets.
Footsteps sounded in the hall, a near-silent tread she was beginning to recognize as his. Would he go to his suite or stop by her room? He’d said he wanted to talk through details about their supposed dating past before they faced the world.