His is the right company for me to go into business with. He can give me everything I need to break out on my own. I wouldn’t be beholden to him or my family. As far as business goes it would be all me. That part has nothing to do with sex, or love. It’s about doing the right thing for the product, showing I can really do this.
We talk not only to his managers, but to his workers too. They show me the clean, comfortable housing the company provides, and they tell me about the subsidised bills and all the amenities, which include a park area for children, a sports centre, a nursery. They tell me how Waring Holdings puts other big corporations that function in the vicinity to shame, and how people come flocking to work here. They tell me how his company has effectively saved them—saved them.
It’s crazy to believe it, but I’ve seen reports from other companies around the globe—the undercover news articles, the suicides. It’s exactly what I was worried about when I flagged the human rights issues at him.
But now he’s more than assured me of his ethics—he’s made me fall in love with him all the more. He’s not only given these people jobs, he’s given them homes, good lives to live and enjoy. In return for their fantastically skilled work he’s given them the respect of a fantastic working environment.
It’s so perfect. So Lucas.
I think of his easy relationship with Maylene, of the mutual respect so evident between them, and the report he’s given me on what his company can achieve. He’s the right choice. I trust his company. I trust him.
By the time we arrive back at his home that night I am sold. And he knows it. I can see it in his grin as he pulls open the cupboard for wine glasses.
‘Red? White? Or am I permitted champagne now?’
I shake my head with a laugh. ‘I haven’t agreed to anything.’
‘Your face tells me all I need to know... Come on—admit it. You were impressed!’
My smile is fit to burst. ‘Perhaps.’
‘Champagne it is.’ He takes out two glasses and hunts out a bottle. ‘Let’s take it to the roof—the view is amazing this time of night.’
The view is amazing right now...
He’s so handsome in his charcoal-grey suit, with his white shirt now open at the collar, his tie undone. I could hook my fingers through the ends and pull him in...forget the champagne...
‘Come on,’ he says.
Spoilsport.
I let him lead the way up to the roof and then I get it. The view by night is spectacular and he wants me to see it—he’s still trying to impress me.
He places the bottle and glasses on a low table beside one of the draped cabanas and strips off his jacket and tie, tossing them on the foot of the double bed beneath before sitting down at its edge.
‘You going to stay there all night or are you going to join me?’
‘In a bit...’ I say it teasingly, but if I get on that bed there’s no way I’m looking at the view.
Instead I walk around to the other side of the cabana and hook my arm around the pole at the end, my eyes on the glittering lights of Marina Bay, the Gardens and their futuristic bubbles. It really is a sight to behold.
And then music starts flooding the bay and lights dance.
‘What is that?’
He gives me a grin as he lifts the bottle and starts to unwrap the foil. ‘You’ll see.’
I look back out to the bay and see laser strobes hit the sky, coming from the ship-like rooftop of the structure across the water. They dance with the music, and the spectacular pods of what I know to be a shopping plaza below light up in tune, bouncing off the water. It’s incredible, and I’m so transfixed I don’t realise he’s moved until he’s alongside me, holding out a glass.
I take it blindly, not wanting to miss a second. ‘Thank you.’
‘A free light show...’ He bends to my ear as he says it and a heated shiver travels up my spine. ‘What more can you possibly want?’
‘Free?’ I laugh softly. ‘You really are spoiling me.’
His return laugh is husky, low, and I bite into my lip.
‘There’ll be another one later,’ he says. ‘They’re on every night. The tourists go crazy for it. I’ve had a place here for a year and I still try to catch it at least once when I visit.’