Island Conquest

by Brooke Hastings

  Michi opened up several of the guest suites and rooms on the floor below. Neither the two room suites nor the individual rooms were as large as Lani had expected, although she admitted to herself that the earth-tone color scheme was charming. Each room had a private balcony overlooking either the ocean or the golf course.

  They rode back downstairs and left the building through the rear of the lobby. To her right, Lani noticed the parking garage; Daniel explained that most of the structure had been built underground, so as not to obstruct the view. They walked under a covered walkway past a pond where brightly colored tropical fish swam languidly. The hotel's other restaurant, the Bay Terrace, was housed on the second floor of a separate building adjacent to the fish pond.

  After a brief inspection of the conference facilities on the first floor, they returned to the restaurant. Because of the slope of the hill on which the hotel sat, the dining room was level with the main lobby. In spite of the pristine white linen, silver-plated flatwear and china vases filled with scarlet anthurium flowers, the atmosphere here was less formal than in the Koolau Room on the fifteenth floor. Many of the diners were attired only in cover-ups and sandals.

  The hotel's oval-shaped pool was located to the other side of the Bay Terrace, surrounded by a concrete patio. Recumbent sun worshippers occupied every available lounge chair; a nearby stand offered snacks, sandwiches, and soft drinks, while the poolside bar did a brisk business in cocktails and exotic drinks. Beyond the patio were a wide strip of lawn and a narrower expanse of sand, markers on each side indicating a coral-free area for swimming.

  In back of the pool there was a row of tall trees screening out a delightful garden of profusely blooming tropical plants. Although any guest could enjoy a stroll-along the paths that twisted through the shrubbery, the garden functioned as an exotic front yard for the two-story extension Lani had noticed from the highway.

  "These are the hotel's most expensive suites," Daniel remarked, and glanced at Michi. "Can we get into one?"

  "At the far end, Daniel." She opened the door with a pass key, revealing a miniature apartment complete with sitting room, bath and dining area downstairs, and two bedrooms and two bathrooms upstairs. Lani surveyed the luxurious fittings, including a fully stocked bar, bowls of fresh flowers and fruit, plush carpeting, and expensive furnishings. "How much do you charge for this?" she gasped.

  Daniel named a nightly figure higher than what some people earned in a month. "But most of our suites are less expensive. We have a total of twenty-six, most of them with only two rooms."

  Their final stop was the ground floor, which housed additional conference and housekeeping facilities.

  "Would you like to have lunch, Michi?" Daniel asked as they rode the elevator back up to the lobby.

  "I can't." The petite brunette glanced at her watch. "I've scheduled a meeting with the convention manager in ten minutes. May I take a raincheck, Daniel?"

  "Don't even mention that word!" he admonished, sliding his arm around Michi's shoulder as his mouth briefly covered hers. "They come for the sunshine, remember?"

  Michi and Daniel began to discuss the upcoming meeting, and Lani, feeling uncomfortably ignorant about the topic, slipped away from them toward the hotel stores. She spent several minutes browsing in the art gallery, then looked through the season's newest swimsuits. She was examining a provocative wisp of black nylon when two hands came down squarely on her shoulders, causing her to start and swing around.

  "Why don't you try it on?" Daniel asked teasingly.

  Lani quickly moved away. "You startled me," she said breathlessly.

  "You're lucky that's all I did, Miss Douglas. Why did you disappear like that? I've been looking for you for the last ten minutes."

  "You and Michi were talking business, and I felt… in the way," Lani admitted. "I don't know anything about running a hotel."

  "Which is why I'm taking you to lunch." He took her arm to lead her toward the lobby.

  Lani refused to budge. It was the perfect time to introduce Daniel to the custom of issuing invitations instead of orders, and she took full advantage of it. "First Tommy, now lunch. Don't you ever get bored with bossing me around?" She slanted him a beguiling look from under her lashes.

  "What about Tommy?" he asked innocently.

  As if he didn't know! "You ordered him to pick me up this morning. You should have asked me whether I wanted to go with him."

  "Why wouldn't you want to? Did he try to seduce you in the bucket seat of his Porsche yesterday?" A smile was pulling at the corners of his mouth.

  "Very funny! And that's another thing, Mr. Reid. Since when do you tell me who I can date? If I want to go out with Tommy…"

  "I told him, not you. And you should thank me for it. I wouldn't trust my cousin with any female over the age of sixteen." By now Daniel was grinning openly. "Just looking out for your virtue, princess."

  "You're impossible!" Lani threw up her hands in exasperation and started to walk away, but succeeded in taking only two steps before Daniel's hands wrapped themselves around her waist and pulled her back against him.

  The contact made her heart beat doubletime, and when he bent his head to whisper in her ear, the warm breath on her cheek seemed to flame through her whole body. "Flirting with me, princess?" he asked softly.

  Of course she had been, but she would never admit to it. "Let me go!" she hissed.

  "Promise not to run away?"

  At that moment Lani would have agreed to anything in order to end the dizzying sensations his hard body was causing in hers. She should have known better than to play such games with Daniel. He must feel the way she was trembling, held so close against him. "I won't run away," she quickly agreed.

  He released her, turning her in his arms and kissing her gently on the forehead. "Sorry about this morning, princess. I planned to pick you up myself, and when I got tied up I called Tommy, who obviously couldn't resist the opportunity to get in a few digs. Next time," he added easily, "I'll call you first. Now how about lunch?"

  "Yes… sure," Lani murmured, rather stunned by his kiss and subsequent apology. He wouldn't act so gentle unless he really cared about her, would he? Secretly pleased by the thought, she allowed herself to be led over to the Bay Terrace.

  "Good afternoon, Mr. Reid. It's nice to see you here again. Where would you like to sit?" It was obvious to Lani that the hostess's admiring look owed as much to Daniel's masculine appeal as to his position as a top executive with Prescott & Thomas.

  "I think perhaps the lady would like to decide. Lani? Would you like to watch the ocean or the fish pond?"

  "The fish pond," Lani said, smiling up at Daniel as a reward for consulting her.

  He glanced at the menu, then suggested that they order the mahi-mahi, a local fish which the chef prepared in a white wine sauce. Lani readily agreed. A moment later, he asked briskly, "What do you think of the hotel?"

  Lani was surprised by the shuttered wariness on his face, almost like a suitor anticipating a rejection from his beloved. But of course she was being fanciful. Her opinion was of no importance to Daniel except in a business sense. He wanted her services as a guide.

  Even so, Lani thought the hotel was a showplace. But since she and Daniel had been getting along so well, she thought it safe to tease him slightly. "I preferred the unspoiled beach, but I suppose if you're going to destroy the natural beauty of Hawaii, a hotel like this is better than some slipshod tourist trap. Of course," she added airily, "you have to be a millionaire to stay here."

  "One of your typical exaggerations," he answered in a crushing tone. "You're appalled by the quality of some of the construction over in Waikiki, but you want a hotel to be beautiful and exclusive and offer moderately priced accommodations. You can't have it both ways. A place like the Maunalua Bay costs a fortune to build and maintain. Prescott & Thomas expects to make a profit from its ventures, and we charge accordingly. Even so, you can rent a double room here for only twenty or thirty dollars more t
han in a comparable Waikiki hotel. So we come back to my original question. Given that I've desecrated eight hundred feet of pristine beachfront property, do you approve of the hotel?"

  Lani felt as though Daniel had just tossed her into his office paper shredder. She stared across at him, a totally stricken look on her face.

  "Oh, no, you were kidding me, weren't you?" The words were contrite, and Daniel didn't wait for an answer. "I'm so used to the way you've always gibed at me… I'm sorry, honey."

  "Your hotel is beautiful, Daniel," Lani answered softly. "Everything is perfect—the architecture, the landscaping, the decoration. Even a dyed-in-the-wool environmentalist couldn't object." Then taking in the self-satisfied expression on his face, she risked adding, "The only thing you're missing is the dolphins."

  "The Kahala Hilton beat us to it," he grinned. "One doesn't want to be too imitative."

  The waiter appeared to take their orders for lunch, and while they waited for their meals, Daniel outlined the staffing requirements of the three-hundred-fourteen-room hotel, which employed well over a hundred people in a dozen different departments. As General Manager, Michi Hansen oversaw every aspect of the hotel's operation. Lani felt like an incompetent child in comparison to the sophisticated, highly capable widow.

  During lunch, Daniel continued with a description of some of the problems and challenges Prescott & Thomas had encountered in designing and building the Maunalua Bay. By the time Lani attacked her dessert, a sinfully fattening concoction of tropical fruit wrapped in crepes and garnished with chocolate curls and whipped cream, she was almost spellbound with admiration for Daniel. If his other resorts were as lovely as this hotel, she looked forward to seeing them.

  "By the way," Daniel said casually as Lani giggled over an amusing anecdote, "Michi was telling me that my cousin Richard called her this morning. He's in Japan, with his wife and daughter."

  "I know," Lani said. "Tommy told me about it."

  "His daughter's Japanese family gave a farewell reception for the Prescotts, and Richard struck up a conversation with a fellow named Isamu Mayakawa. Does the name ring a bell?"

  "Mayakawa? You mean Mayakawa Electronics?" Lani asked with interest.

  "Very good. He's bringing his wife and daughter to Hawaii for a vacation next week. Richard talked him into cancelling his Waikiki reservations and staying with us; he seemed to think Mayakawa could be persuaded to schedule his next worldwide sales conference with us."

  Lani set her fork on the dessert plate, feeling a familiar pressure build up along her jaw and neck. How could she have been so stupid as to think that Daniel had expended so much time and charm on her for any reason other than business? He had set her up, taken advantage of her no doubt transparent susceptibility, confident that he could easily persuade her to start work earlier than the date they had agreed upon.

  "Cousin Richard is certainly on the ball," she said sweetly. "Lucky for you that Michi will be able to show them around."

  "Michi is too busy, Lani. You'll have to do it."

  Lani glared at him defiantly. "Oh, no! We had an agreement, Daniel Reid. I'll start work when Brian starts camp, and not one day sooner."

  "You'll start work a week from Tuesday. The Mayakawas arrive from Maui next Monday afternoon. The following week you're entertaining an Australian businessman with a wallet the size of the outback. It isn't open to argument."

  "You're darn right it isn't!" Lani exploded. "We made a deal. You can't…"

  "That was before I knew we had a pair of heavyweights on the agenda," Daniel cut in firmly. "Be reasonable, Lani."

  "And what am I supposed to do with Brian? Throw him out, like yesterday's newspaper? Maybe you don't care about him, but I happen to…"

  "That's enough, Lani!" Lani's whole body jerked in alarm as Daniel's fist came smashing down on the table. Never had she seen him so close to losing control of himself, and when he spoke again, his voice was low with fury. "The issue isn't Brian. Linda starts work a week from Monday, but if there's any problem, Michi's daughter Sarah will look after him. Brian will be fine. The issue is you and your response to me. I was hoping that you'd finally gotten past that knee-jerk reaction of yours—that everything I do is wrong, that my motives are always the worst. But obviously you haven't."

  "Nobody likes being made a fool of," Lani replied stiffly. "The only reason you took me to lunch was to turn on the Prescott charm because you wanted something from me. Next time, why don't you try asking? It might save a lot of your time."

  "We'd better get out of here before I do something both of us will regret," Daniel growled. He pulled Lani up by the wrist and didn't release her until they had reached the garage. "In!" he ordered, holding the passenger door of the Mercedes open for her.

  Although smarting from his rough treatment, Lani held her tongue. She was afraid that if she challenged Daniel again he would either shake her senseless or turn her over his knee and wallop her into submissive-ness. Neither prospect held much appeal.

  Her nervousness increased when he passed by his house and took the cut-off leading up to Diamond Head Crater, parking the car in the visitors' lot inside the gently bowl-shaped extinct volcano. A smattering of tourists were hiking across its grassy slopes toward the distant rim.

  "Would you like to take a walk?" Lani searched Daniel's face warily, looking for some sign of mockery or anger. Finding none, she nodded her agreement, relieved that his anger had cooled.

  After strolling for several minutes he eased himself down onto the grass and smiled up at her. "Care to join me?" he invited affably.

  It looked rather incongruous to see Daniel sprawled out on the lawn in his blue business suit, and Lani couldn't help but return his smile. She sat down beside him, carefully spreading the light cotton fabric of her dress to prevent grass stains.

  "What's so funny?"

  Lani giggled at the irritation in his tone. "You. You're so urban. You look funny, lying on the grass in a suit." She plucked a blade and sniffed at it. "It smells so fresh. It's beautiful up here."

  "Ah, at last something we can agree on. We both like grass. It smells good, and it's great for golf courses, tennis courts, and parks, not to mention picnics. Also for making love on," he added wickedly.

  "Which you would know all about," Lani inserted rather sourly, because she suspected Daniel was amusing himself at her expense.

  "Which I would know all about," he agreed blandly. "It's also not a bad place for explanations and apologies."

  "Oh?" It was all Lani could manage. Was the arrogant Daniel Prescott Reid actually going to apologize to her for the second time in one day?

  "I didn't set you up. I took you to lunch because I wanted to tell you about the hotel. You seemed to be in one of your rare receptive moods so I brought up the Mayakawas' visit. There was nothing sinister or manipulative about it."

  "Did you have to make it an order? Couldn't you just have asked me?" Lani asked plaintively.

  "I intended to. I was trying to explain the situation first, but you jumped on me so fast I never had a chance to ask you anything. I figured you'd refuse, so I decided not to give you that option."

  Lani had picked several more blades of grass and began absent-mindedly to split them lengthwise. She was thinking about several of Daniel's remarks: "I'm so used to the way you've always gibed at me," and "I was hoping you'd finally gotten past that knee-jerk reaction of yours." Was her image of him—aloof, impervious, and manipulative—terribly shallow and unfair? But before she could say anything, the tickling sensation of grass against her arm startled her into looking up. Daniel was studying her with intent gray eyes. He stopped teasing her arm as soon as he had her attention.

  "I could use your help, princess. Please. What about the Mayakawas?"

  Lani didn't really want to refuse, but some streak of mischievousness prompted her to ask, "And if I say no?"

  "Daring me to force you?" he drawled.

  "You couldn't!"

  "Okay, so I couldn'
t," was the temperate reply. But Lani suspected that he probably could.

  "And the Australian with the huge wallet? Where does he come into it?"

  "I threw him in for the sake of negotiations," Daniel admitted with a laugh. "I'll take one for two, if it's all I can get, princess."

  The situation was becoming too intimate for Lani to handle. The soft breeze, Daniel sprawled out only inches away from her, the sensuous sound of his voice… it was increasingly difficult to keep her mind on the conversation. Lani found her thoughts drifting back to his greeting at the airport, and the way his mouth had felt when it brushed her lips. And earlier today, when he had pulled her back against him, he had aroused emotions she had had to struggle to conceal. Daniel was so experienced that touching a woman's body that way probably had little effect on him, and he was so naturally and unconsciously sensual that he could have no idea of the havoc he wreaked every time he so much as spoke to her. He knew she was attracted to him, of course, but would probably have been shocked by the intensity of her physical response.

  All the same, she told herself thoughtfully, he had never taken advantage of her—not since that evening seven years ago, and then only to teach her a lesson. Perhaps she had been absurd to be so frightened of him all these years. It was true that she didn't trust herself to be sensible about him, but then, she probably didn't have to. She could trust him instead. In any event, the defense system which had worked so well in California didn't seem to work at all in Hawaii, and she much preferred this new teasing, friendly relationship to the old wary hostility.

  She stood up and smoothed her dress, shyly extending her hand when Daniel held his out for help in getting up, not that he really needed it. "I'll have to talk to Brian first," she said. "But I'm sure he won't mind."

  A single dark brow arched in inquiry. "Japan and Australia?"

  "Sure."

  Only then did his lips curve slowly upward into a devastating, triumphant smile that made Lani tingle and bristle at the same time. Daniel put his arm around her shoulder as they walked to the car, obviously well-pleased with the afternoon's labors.