by Holly Rayner
“Not great, but I can hold onto you and sway.”
“That sounds perfect.”
Chapter 12
Raul
She felt amazing in my arms. I never wanted to let her go. And her lips, Dios mío, they were soft and sweet, and I wanted to devour her from the lips down.
My body tightened in ways it hadn’t in years. My heart thudded against my ribs, and I wondered if she could feel it against her back.
I caught Marco smiling in the rearview mirror and shot him a quelling look. Meddling old man, I thought.
He’d been with me for decades, caring for me, protecting me, making sure my family was safe. He loved my family, especially my daughter, as much as a father would. But in the way that longtime retainers often did, he’d become familiar in ways that were sometimes frustrating. He’d butted in with the women of my past—those who had wanted nothing more than money and perhaps a quick roll in bed with the man once named the most handsome billionaire in the world. The fact that Marco liked and apparently trusted Tanya carried a lot of weight. Marco was an excellent judge of character, and he had only my best interests at heart. I trusted him implicitly.
We pulled up to a club. Music thumped from behind the door, leaping to full-blast volume as the door was pushed open and several young, drunk, men and women spilled into the darkness.
“I’ll park down the block, señor. Text and I will move to the front.”
“Gracias, Marco.”
Raul took my hand and helped me out of the car. He led us to the door, whispered something in the doorman’s ear, and then followed the hostess into the club. The hostess led us to a cordoned off table near the back of the club.
“I hope you’ll be comfortable here, señor Jimenez. I’ll leave Carla with you. She’ll take care of all your needs. Anything you want, you just ask. We’ll make it happen.”
“Gracias. Let’s start with a bottle of Clase Azul Ultra.”
“Oh, no, Raul, not a whole bottle,” I cut in. “I promise, something bad will happen if we drink a whole bottle.”
“We don’t have to drink the whole thing,” he said, winking at the hostess.
“I’ll send Carla back with your bottle, señor.”
I tipped my head to the hostess and took a seat beside Tanya. Her beautiful, clear blue eyes were wide as she swept them over the interior of the club. I wondered at her reaction. Based on where and how she grew up, she should be used to things like this club and the Clase Azul. She was a special woman to have such an awed reaction to things that were commonplace. Her reactions were refreshing.
I realized I was tired of the jaded women with whom I had attempted to be social in the past. The kind for whom nothing was new or interesting. They bored me as much as the world seemed to bore them. Tanya, however, was a burst of fresh air after being confined to the indoors for five years. Everything seemed to make her eyes light up, no matter how many times she must have come in contact with it previously.
“Do you dance?” she asked.
I shook my head. “Not to this kind of music.”
“What kind of music do you dance to, then?”
“I prefer traditional Spanish music. Flamenco in particular.”
“Oh,” Tanya said. Her face fell a little, and I immediately wanted to make things better for her.
She continued, “I don’t know how to dance Flamenco. I’m honestly not particularly good at dancing in general.”
She stuck her feet out in front of her.
“See. Two left feet.”
I grinned and held my hand out to her. She took it, and I raised her up and pulled her toward the DJ booth. Once there, I requested one of my favorite Flamenco songs, then I whisked Tanya to the dance floor despite her objections.
“No, Raul, I wasn’t kidding. I really can’t dance.”
“Let me worry about that. I will lead. You will follow, and we will dance.”
I led her to the center of the floor when it cleared as the thudding modern music faded out to the opening strains of Ojos de Brujo’s “Zambra.”
Tanya turned terrified eyes to me and clung to my hand.
“Relax and let me lead,” I said and took control of our dance.
The rhythms and beats of the music sang to my soul, and I moved us around the dance floor in the ancient moves of my ancestors. My heart raced in time with the music and the movement of our bodies. Tanya clung to me, allowing me to move her body, trusting me to catch her when I flung her away from me and pulled her back at dizzying speed. Her gasps and small cries ignited my blood even more, raising my desire to a nearly painful level.
I wanted this woman in my arms. I crushed her to my body as the music wound toward the end of the song. She stiffened in my arms first before melting into my body. I held her, both of us gasping for breath, in the center of the dance floor as the music faded out.
Around us, the spectators, whom I had forgotten were even there as we danced, applauded. Tanya peeked at me, her face flushed and glowing.
“Are they…applauding us?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because we were beautiful together.”
“No. You were beautiful. I was a stumbling idiot.”
“I think you don’t see yourself very clearly.”
I led the way through the crowd, back to our VIP seating. Carla waited by the velvet rope that circled the booth. She unhooked the rope to allow us entry, followed us in, and then poured our drinks and handed them to us.
“Will there be anything more I can do for you, señor?”
“No, gracias.”
Tanya took the seat beside me on the couch-like booth, tucking her feet up under the wide skirt of her lovely vintage-style gown. The sight of her sitting this way tightened something in my gut. It was an innocent pose that made me want to sit on the floor in front of her and curl my arms around her legs. I sighed and sat back, denying my desires for the sake of proper behavior.
Chapter 13
Tanya
Raul sighed, and I wondered what had changed. Just seconds before, he had looked at me as though he planned to devour me when given the opportunity. Truth be told, I wouldn’t mind being devoured by this surprising man. Each time I thought I might understand or know him, he showed me something completely different.
Who knew a billionaire real estate mogul could dance like that? It had been an unforgettable experience to be spun about the floor. I’d given myself over to him completely, knowing that would be the only way I’d be safe. If I’d doubted him, I’d have ended up on my butt in front of all those people.
Instead I’d barely felt the floor beneath my feet and had flown from one place to the next, the beat of the music pushing my heartbeat faster and faster as we’d danced. I could only imagine what it had looked like from the outside. From inside the dance, it had been gorgeous and amazing.
“Where did you learn to dance like that?” I asked finally when the silence became too much to bear.
Raul turned those green eyes up from their contemplation of the tequila to meet mine. Something twisted in my belly, and the desire to lay in his lap went from a vague thought to an almost unbreakable urge.
“My mother believed a gentleman of means should know how to dance. She bought a dance master to our home every week beginning when I was six until I was in my late teens. I resisted at first, but then I discovered that girls liked a boy who could dance. Instead of lining the walls of the school dances with my mates, I was on the floor, a pretty girl in my arms. I was very popular.”
He winked at me, and I giggled. I slapped my hand over my mouth. I couldn’t believe that sound had come out of my mouth.
“How is it that you don’t dance?” he asked. “I would have thought ballet lessons would have been de rigueur for a girl of your upbringing.”
“Oh, they were, but I was so awful, the ballet master asked my parents to keep me home from the recital. After that, my father agreed with me that there was little to
be gained from my continuing lessons.”
“That was a terrible thing for your ballet master to do. Each little girl should have at least one night when she dons a pretty tutu and prances with her friends on the stage before her parents and their friends. Rey had a recital just last year. She hated it until she saw the photographs.”
“I bet she was beautiful in her costume.”
“She was, but then, she is always beautiful.”
“I’d have to agree. She’s a special young lady.”
Raul nodded, but said nothing more, merely sliding just a fraction closer to me on the bench. The touch of his body to mine burned hot, and I sipped the tequila he’d ordered for us. It really was unlike any tequila I’d ever had before. To me, tequila had always been one of those things you drank to cleanse your soul of some evil humor. This was smooth, oaky, and going down far too easily.
I held the glass aloft to draw Raul’s attention.
“This really is amazing tequila. Is it something I can get in the States?”
“If you have an excellent supplier and seven thousand dollars, you can.”
I choked a little on the sip I’d taken.
“Seven thousand dollars? Please tell me that’s for the bottle and not the glass.”
Raul chuckled.
“Yes, silly one, for the bottle. Even I might balk at seven thousand per glass. Though, I can’t say for sure.”
I looked into the amber liquid, searching for something that would justify such a price, but found nothing. I couldn’t wrap my head around spending the price of a used car on a bottle of liquor.
I sensed a change in Raul’s demeanor and looked up to find his eyes immediately locked with mine.
“What?” I asked.
“Before returning to the city to meet you for dinner, I dropped Rey off at a friend’s house for a sleepover. That means I can stay at my penthouse here in the city, rather than returning to the country for the night. Would you care to join me there?”
“Are you asking me to spend the night with you, señor?”
“I suppose I am, as clumsy as the attempt has been thus far.”
“I…” I stopped, unsure what to say. Guilt flooded me, rushing in with unexpected vehemence. How could I continue to enjoy this man’s company, his kisses, perhaps more, when I still intended to betray him?
Of course, the penthouse was a likely hiding place for the architectural plans I needed. While I continued the internal debate, Raul got tired of waiting for an answer.
The kiss was nothing like the ones we’d shared thus far. This one was primal, his tongue an invading army, unwilling to accept defeat or be kept out. I melted against him, unable and unwilling to fight this onslaught of sensual sensations.
“Will you come to the penthouse with me? I won’t ask again.”
There was only one acceptable answer at that point. For both reasons. I wanted what he offered me now, and I needed to see if the drawings and models were in the penthouse. I spoke a single word into his mouth as he continued to plunder mine.
“Yes.”
Chapter 14
Tanya
“I keep this penthouse for when I want to stay in the city overnight. I don’t often use it because I prefer to have breakfast with Rey. I sometimes work here when the office is too chaotic.”
My heart raced at Raul’s admission. If he worked at the penthouse, maybe the blueprints were there and I could finish this case. My conscience still twanged at the idea of what I thought I was going to do.
I wanted what Raul had offered me. The culmination of our tentative and then not-so-tentative kisses was absolutely on my mind. I wanted to see what the body I sensed hiding under his Armani looked like unclothed. Would he look even more like the panther I pictured when I thought of him? I was betting he would.
I followed Raul into the elevator in the lobby of the building he’d brought me to. When the doors opened, Raul grabbed my hand and tugged me inside the mirrored and gold box. He drew a set of keys out of his pocket and inserted a tiny brass skeleton key into a lock at the top of the panel with the buttons for the floors. The key turned with a tiny click. The doors slid shut and the car climbed.
“Whoa!”
I was in Raul’s arms, pinned to the back wall of the elevator as he plundered my lips. I clung to him, partially to encourage him and partially to keep from falling on my face.
“You are nothing like I thought you would be and I love that,” he growled against my neck.
“I could say the same about you.”
He grinned at me.
“You’re so refreshing. How did I get so lucky to have you come into my life?”
A stab of guilt so strong it made me gasp knifed into my chest. I tightened my fist in Raul’s shirt, and he looked sharply down at me. He might have spoken, asked what was wrong, but the elevator doors slid open at that moment.
I turned and sighed with pleasure. Unlike his office where severe and spare decoration ruled, this room was plush and reminded me of what I’d always pictured a Sultan’s quarters to look like when I read those romance novels as a teenager.
Plush sofas and cushions were scattered around a central, sunken area in the living room. Bright colors and sensuous materials were splashed around the room. I wanted to lay down in this room and roll in all the beauty. I said so to Raul.
“You see, so refreshing. The last woman I brought to this place told me it looked like I should have a harem and dancing girls in the next room.”
“I actually thought something similar, but I like that idea.”
“Ah, a reader, are you? Who was it? Bertrice Small?”
I laughed. “How did you guess?”
“My wife loved those rags. We’d scour used bookstores for them every time we traveled.”
“Why not just buy new ones?”
“I asked her the same thing many times, but she loved diving into a pile of books in an old store in some back alley in whatever city we were currently in. So we went book hunting rather than hitting up Amazon.”
“I think I would have liked your wife,” I said. A moment later, I slapped my right hand over my lips.
“I am so sorry. I have no right… I shouldn’t have said that.”
Raul stepped close to me, leaned down, and kissed me sweetly. He cupped my face between his hands and stared into my eyes.
“I think she would have liked you, too.”
Heat rushed into my cheeks, intensified by the warmth of his hands. He lifted his hands from my face and stared at my flaming cheeks.
“So charming,” he whispered. “Would you like a drink?”
“Some water would be wonderful.”
Raul crossed the room to where a bar was tucked into the wall. He took a bottle of water from a small refrigerator, opened it, and then poured the contents into a tall glass. He poured himself one as well. He held the glass out to me, and I crossed the room to take it.
“Would you like to see something beautiful? Perhaps it will convince you that my price is the right offer.”
“I would love that.”
Raul took my hand and pushed a panel in the wall. It popped open to reveal a small office. In the corner, a model of the proposed building soared up from a detailed diorama of the streets around the plot of land I was supposedly here to sell Raul.
“It’s perfect,” I gushed. The problem was, that was the truth. The lines of the building complemented the neighborhood. It would blend perfectly rather than be the eyesore Arlen had planned.
“Does that mean you’ll accept my offer rather than Arlen’s?”
I turned anguished eyes to him and shook my head.
“I wish I could, Raul, but my father’s lawyers would have kittens if I did that without their approval.”
“I understand, of course. My board of directors would do the same if I were to pay you what you say you want.”
I glanced around the room, making note of the drafting table in the far corner of the room. I couldn�
��t see details from this distance, but I was pretty sure the blueprints Arlen wanted were on that table. All I had to do was get photos of them, send them to Arlen, and then call my mother and tell her to start packing.
I smiled at Raul, took the glass from his hand, and put our water on his desk. I thrust my fingers into his hair and pulled his lips down to meet mine. He growled and pulled me hard against his body. In moments, he had swept me up into his arms and carried me to the sultan’s bedchamber in the living room.
Chapter 15
Tanya
I glanced at my watch when I opened my eyes. It had been at least an hour since I’d closed my eyes after the waves of pleasure Raul had given me had finally subsided.
I looked at him now, noting how much younger he appeared in sleep. Without the pressures of his life, his face relaxed and the hard edges smoothed out. I slipped out of the cocoon of his arms, desperate not to disturb him. I needed a few minutes to finish my job so I could spend the rest of the week mostly guilt-free.
I slid my dress over my head and tip-toed across the room to the panel in the wall that led to the office. We’d left it open when we’d dived into the cushions, so I didn’t have to seek the latch in the wall. I stepped through the doorway and pushed the door almost closed to block the view from the living room.
I stood over the drafting table, holding my phone high enough to get the entire blueprint into the shot. I took the photo and then turned the page to the next level of the drawing. I repeated the process until I’d taken shots of each layer.
I checked the photos, and while the schematics were a mystery to me, they were clear in the photos. I turned and snapped a shot of the model before moving to the next side. When I was finished, I had photos of each of the four sides of the model and all layers of the blueprint.
I let the photos upload before clicking to send them to Arlen. When my phone vibrated to indicate the upload was complete and the photos had been sent, I deleted the message to Arlen and deleted the photos from my phone. Just in case.