The Billionaire's Christmas Bride

by Lara Hunter

  I walked out to the railing to get some air and enjoy the view. The sun was just beginning to set, the sky painted in pink and amber hues. We were in the middle of Guanabara Bay, and I took in the view of Sugarloaf Mountain from my spot on deck. There was something breathtaking about it, viewed from the water.

  “Impressive, no?”

  I turned with a start to find none other than Diego De Rocha standing beside me, leaning on the railing with a glass of amber liquor in his hand.

  “I never get tired of it, and I’ve lived here all my life.”

  “It’s really one of the most impressive sights I’ve ever seen,” I said, meaning it sincerely. There were no mountains in Florida, unless one counted Space Mountain. I hadn’t grown up with such majesty right in my backyard.

  He looked me up and down—it was a practiced move, and anybody less skilled than me at reading a man’s body language might have missed it. But I picked up on it right away. So, he was interested. I wondered if I could use that to my advantage.

  “What do you think about your new job so far?” he asked.

  I laughed. “I haven’t had enough time to think much of anything. No time to think.”

  “So my brother is putting you through your paces,” he murmured.

  “I wouldn’t expect anything less, working for a company such as yours. Lazy people don’t become as successful as you two have.”

  He smiled, looking almost a little embarrassed. In another life, I would have liked him. He seemed sweet, maybe even a little baffled by his wealth and success. A hard worker, no doubt, but not good at enjoying the fruits of his labor. He didn’t have the personality to be the face of the business.

  “Have you met a lot of people yet?” he asked. “I could introduce you around.”

  “Oh, jeez.” I put my hands to my head. “I think my brain might explode if I meet many more people just yet. I can’t take it.”

  He laughed, tipping his head back. “All right. I’ll take pity on you.”

  “Thank you,” I said, swiping the back of my hand over my forehead like I was wiping away sweat.

  Diego chuckled, then frowned. “You don’t have a drink!”

  “Oh, no. I’m not a big drinker.”

  “Oh, you have to have a little something. Even a club soda. Come on in, we’ll get you something.”

  I followed him inside to the bar, watching as he nodded and exchanged pleasantries with the staff. Everybody liked him, that much was clear.

  I ordered a club soda as per his suggestion, interested in the way he didn’t insist I have alcohol. He wasn’t trying to get me drunk, in other words. Damn, I cursed inwardly. I’d been hoping if I couldn’t get dirt on Lucas right away, I might be able to get something on Diego and use it as leverage. No go.

  I flashed a bright smile when he turned to hand me my drink. “To the one employee of De Rocha not taking full advantage of an open bar,” he grinned, raising his glass in a toast. I had to laugh as we touched glasses.

  Then, the happy mood shifted. Out of nowhere, Lucas appeared at Diego’s side. My eyes were drawn to him. He was like the sun, lighting up any room he entered. Only he wasn’t smiling.

  “May I have a word with you?” Lucas’ jaw was tight. Anybody could tell he wasn’t in a good mood. Had I done something wrong? No, it wasn’t me. It was his brother.

  Diego’s eyes went even darker than normal. “Sure.” He glanced at me. “Excuse us.”

  I nodded in understanding, stepping back. The last thing I wanted to do was make it look like I was half as curious as I was. Nobody else seemed to notice the way they walked off together, ducking into the alcove underneath the stairs. That was a good sign—if nobody noticed them, they wouldn’t notice me hovering on the stairs, trying to listen in.

  “What’s wrong with you?” It was Diego’s voice, just slightly higher in pitch than his brother’s.

  “What’s wrong with me? I wanted to keep you from getting into trouble with our newest employee. You’re welcome.”

  Diego’s laugh was short, bitter sounding. “That’s hilarious, coming from you.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I could hear from Lucas’ clipped tone that he was just barely holding onto his temper. What a change, I thought, from the way they appeared when they were in front of people. To the untrained eye, they were the closest brothers in the world. The public saw them as a true story of sacrifice and success. It was becoming clear to me that something lingered beneath that perfect surface. Something nasty.

  “It means that whenever you see me getting along with a girl, you don’t waste any time in jumping in and ruining things.”

  “Oh, that’s not true, and you know it.”

  “Do I?” Diego asked. “Then what happened with Gabriela, huh?”

  “Are you really bringing her up again? Right here and now?”

  “Yes, right here and now, since you can’t stand seeing me getting along with a woman. God forbid I have something for myself, Lucas.”

  “Take your sob story to somebody who cares, big brother. It’s bad enough we have to socialize with each other at these corporate things, but I don’t need you bringing this old B.S. up every time we’re forced to be in the same room.”

  Forced? So they didn’t spend time together aside from when it was mandatory? I was stunned. They were both excellent actors.

  “You’re the one who swooped in on me—again.”

  “Grow up and get over it. It’s been, what, eight months since that happened? You’re a grown man. Move on with your life.”

  “I’d like to see if you could do that,” Diego growled. “I’d like to see how you would react if your own brother—”

  Diego’s words were cut short by the approach of Dani, who told him one of the potential investors had been asking about him. I had nearly been hanging over the railing to listen in, so I jumped back against the wall to avoid Diego looking up and seeing me eavesdropping. He stepped out from the alcove, straightening his tie, then strode behind Dani in the direction of the investor in question. Lucas, meanwhile, hung back. I didn’t see him step out.

  What was their relationship like, and why? It sounded like they’d fallen out over a woman—the oldest story in the book, really. She must have been somebody pretty special if brothers who’d gone through as much together as they had could be torn apart by her.

  SIX

  I walked down the steps, hoping to catch Lucas before he disappeared. He looked perturbed, to say the least, his handsome face lined with worry.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. De Rocha,” I said, scrambling for a reason to catch his attention. “I hope I didn’t overstep my bounds by chatting with your brother. I don’t want to do anything to cause trouble.”

  He glanced at me for a second like he didn’t remember who I was. He was that far away, lost in some past event. I waited for him to come back to the present—when he did, he smiled distractedly. “Not at all,” he assured me. “That had nothing to do with you. I’m sorry if we gave you the wrong impression.”

  “That’s good,” I said with a smile, laughing a little. I could tell from the way the light seemed to leave his eyes that he was already distracted, wanting to get back to the party and whatever business deals he was trying to close. I searched my mind in a hurry, trying to come up with a way to get information on his business there. “So, how are things going? Is there anything I can do for you? Do you need a drink or anything? Something to eat?”

  He seemed to relax a little. “No, thank you. Just enjoy yourself, get to know everybody.” He started to move in the direction of a group of serious-looking older men. I didn’t recognize any of them and guessed they were investors. He wanted to get back to them.

  I nodded, unsatisfied. It was clear I’d have to fall back on a tried-and-true tactic if I wanted to get anywhere. I ducked my head a little, looking up at him from beneath my sooty eyelashes. I bit my lower lip, smiling a little. “I had hoped we could get to know each other a little better, actual
ly. We’ve had no time to do that yet.” I took a chance and stroked his arm, my hand hidden between our bodies and the wall. Discretion was key, always.

  He stiffened a little—but he didn’t pull away. That was a good sign. His chuckle was a little forced, though. “There’s plenty of time for that.”

  “I always say there’s no time like the present,” I insisted, squeezing his arm to strengthen my point.

  “I don’t like to mix business with pleasure,” he murmured. He couldn’t fool me, though—the way his voice deepened told me what I needed to know. He was interested. If he wasn’t, he would have shaken me off and walked away. We were still cozied up together in that little alcove.

  I wondered if Diego wasn’t right, after all. Lucas had pulled him away because he couldn’t stand the sight of Diego chatting and flirting with me. The knowledge made me bold, gave me courage.

  “I’m not asking you to do anything that would send you to confession tomorrow,” I chuckled softly, closing the already negligible distance between us until our bodies touched. “I just wanted to spend a little time getting to know you. Just the two of us. What’s so wrong with that?” It wasn’t hard to turn on the heat, since his very presence was enough to start a fire in my core. Being so close to him was a natural aphrodisiac. The flush on my cheeks was real.

  I almost had him. I was sure of it. My next step would be to ask for a tour of the lower decks.

  Just as he opened his mouth to reply, a strident male voice broke through our intimate moment.

  “Lucas. I had hoped to get a private word with you.”

  Damn it! I turned, forcing myself to smile pleasantly. Lucas visibly shook himself free of the spell I’d put him under. “Of course,” he said, all business again. “Let’s step aside and have a word.”

  He didn’t need to shake me off, my hand dropping from his arm like it was on fire the second I was aware of a third party. Of all the times for some old man to come over and interrupt us. Just when I was close to breaking him down, too.

  Then, I spotted something. A phone sitting on the windowsill, just beside me. I filched it without a second thought, slipping it into my purse. Nobody noticed me. They were all too busy enjoying themselves.

  His phone! I crowed with pride. This was it. The keys to the kingdom. I looked around, desperate for a restroom in which to explore my newfound treasure. If Lucas came back for it, I could always explain that I’d picked it up for safekeeping while he was gone. Just an assistant doing her best to protect the boss’s privacy.

  I found an unoccupied room and locked the door behind me, heaving a sigh of relief at finally being alone. My face hurt from smiling so much, while my head was starting to throb a little from working so hard to corner Lucas. In the end, it hadn’t even been that difficult.

  I pulled the phone from my purse, sitting down on a plush chair to get to work. I touched the screen and wasn’t surprised to find the device locked. What could the code be? A six-digit number. Well, there was always one combination that people seemed to use even when security experts advised against it.

  I entered Lucas’ birthdate with one finger, crossing the fingers of my other hand as I did. When the phone opened to me, I almost laughed out loud.

  My first and most important stop was his email account. His private messages would be there. My hands almost shook with excitement at the possibility of cracking him wide open. The sounds of laughter filtered through the crack beneath the door as I scrolled through Lucas’ emails. I ignored all of it, totally focused on my task.

  Only it wasn’t much of a task. I became more and more discouraged the longer I scrolled, reading through what would have been pages of correspondence by the time I gave up. There was nothing there. Nothing that would have held up as evidence of corruption. He talked about deals, but there was never a mention of keeping things hush-hush or “just between us.” Nothing I hadn’t already heard about, either. I was aware of all the people sending and receiving email from him, having already seen their names in his primary inbox.

  “Damn it,” I whispered, wishing I could throw the thing across the room. That would only blow my cover, however, so I held back and settled for dropping into my purse again. A dead end.

  What was his deal? If the client was willing to pay me an arm and a leg to find dirt on this guy, there had to be dirt worth finding. Nobody would hire a spy when there wasn’t any suspicion of wrongdoing. Would they? I couldn’t go to them with nothing, either—I needed to produce a status report the following day. There had to be something I could deliver by then.

  But Lucas seemed totally clean. Unless he was a mastermind with an entire network of contacts somewhere other than his phone, I was at a loss. He didn’t strike me as an evil genius, either. I wanted to scream in frustration, but again, no sense in blowing my cover.

  Instead, I checked out my reflection in the mirror—still put together, still looking good. A quick makeup touch-up and I was back out there, getting myself an actual drink for the first time. I needed one. I would probably need more than one. What was I supposed to do?

  I glanced over to where Lucas still stood, chatting up the older man who’d pulled him away from me. He looked so perfectly at ease, so confident and sure of himself. It couldn’t be something he’d learned in his youth, not when he’d grown up as poor as he had. He’d taught himself to be that way, to fit in with people who probably wouldn’t have stopped to give him a second look when he was a little boy. I wondered if he ever thought about that while he rubbed elbows with the elite. Did his smile ever falter at the memory of the poverty he’d grown up in?

  When it seemed like their conversation was dying down, I ducked back into the alcove beneath the stairs, placing his phone on the windowsill where he’d left it. I could only hope he would come back for it—when he did, I’d be waiting.

  Minutes later, Lucas came over and slid the phone into his pocket. “One thing you need to know about me if we’re to work together,” he said smoothly.

  “What’s that?”

  “I would forget my own head if it weren’t attached. Thanks for keeping an eye on this for me.”

  “No problem.”

  I was at a loss. Now that I’d looked through Lucas’ phone, there wasn’t much of a professional reason to continue my seduction. I already knew all there was to know, which was nothing. Anything further would get me nowhere.

  Still, if I went cold out of nowhere, I might arouse suspicion. I couldn’t have him wondering why I’d been all hot and ready to go one minute and an ice queen the next—and I couldn’t blame it on him leaving me alone to attend to business.

  I had to keep going through with it. Better to be safe than sorry, after all. I gave him the same “come hither” look I’d had on my face before we were interrupted, and the sexy smirk he gave me in return told me he was eating it up with a spoon. Well, I could have done a lot worse. He was gorgeous, sexy, powerful. It wasn’t so difficult to act interested when my body responded to him without my meaning to.

  “So, where were we?” he asked, nearly cornering me. What a change from the way things had been before, when I’d thrown all my wiles his way.

  “I think I was just about to ask you to show me around the lower decks. I’ve never been on a yacht this big before, and I don’t know when I’ll ever get the chance again.”

  He grinned, his eyes searching my face. Dark, brooding eyes, full of intelligence—and at that moment, lust. “I think that can be arranged,” he murmured, taking me by the elbow. “Let me show you around. I think you’ll be impressed.”

  I crossed my fingers and went with him, telling myself it was for the best. I had to follow through with what I’d started.

  ***

  When we stepped below deck, I couldn’t help letting out a murmur of surprise. It was luxurious to say the least, with five bedrooms, a full chef’s kitchen, an indoor pool, a game room, and a library.

  “How many people do you typically entertain down here?” I asked,
wondering what he needed such a huge yacht for. And why call it the company yacht? Why not just have a private yacht to use for company purposes every once in a while? It didn’t add up, and still hinted at misappropriation as far as I was concerned. Still, there was no proof, and a single yacht wasn’t enough to raise much of a fuss.

  “Oh, we don’t keep overnight guests that often. Only once in a while.”

  “So why have this, then?” I followed along behind him as he gave me the tour.

  “You’d be surprised at how many wealthy, privileged men expect the companies they do business with to have toys like this. The bigger, the better.”