She barely glanced at the ring. She just wanted to get this over with and get out of there. She hastily nodded her head. “Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you.” And then I’m going to kill you.
His grin said he was reading her mind again. It also said he’d won this round. He took the marquise solitaire out of the box and slipped it onto her finger.
Then, as the crowd roared its approval, he leaned down.
He wasn’t…
He wouldn’t…
He would!
She tried to step back, but his arms slid around her.
Under his breath, he commanded, “Kiss me.” And she realized she had no choice.
Several hundred people were watching, and this was the crux of a multimillion dollar deal. She tipped her head and saw him smile.
She promised herself she’d make it quick. She’d pucker up, get it done and get the heck away from this sham. But then his lips touched hers, igniting twenty-four hours’ worth of pent-up passion.
His mouth was warm and firm, and way too mobile for a perfunctory photo op. Fine smoky scotch had flavored his lips, the residual alcohol tingling her sensitive skin.
She told herself to end it, but his arms pulled her tight, and fireworks went off inside her head, counterpoint to the flashes of cameras in her peripheral vision. A primal hormone kicked in, and her eyes fluttered closed. Her body went limp, and she opened to him, giving him access, returning his parry, her body alight in raw desire.
Ever so slowly, his arms loosened. Then he drew back, finishing with a brief, tender peck on her ravaged lips. Then the cheers of the crowd penetrated her consciousness, as every photographer in the place finished a montage of their kiss.
A cold wash of reality hit Emma. Keeping a professional distance was going to be a lot more difficult than she’d imagined.
Alex couldn’t believe how easy that had been. Maxim had been more than eager to participate in the Mercedes scam. Sure, it meant Teddybear got a sizable donation, but Alex had a feeling the man was more excited about the flamboyant engagement. Whatever.
Alex shrugged as his limo pulled away from the portcullis in front of the McKinley Fifth Avenue. He’d seen Emma to the penthouse elevator and now picked up the phone to dial Ryan’s number. He guessed a lot of people had a romantic streak.
“Yo,” said Ryan in a sleepy voice.
“The ring’s on her finger,” said Alex as the limo turned into traffic.
“It went well?”
“She said yes.” That was the salient point. The kiss had seemed salient there for a few minutes, too. Surprisingly salient. But the kiss was fleeting, even if it was unexpectedly arousing. That diamond ring was money in the bank. “Boy Scout Garrison is now Romantic Fool Boy Scout Garrison.” Gunter would be thrilled with the publicity, but Alex sure wasn’t wild about the inherent celibacy.
“Better you than me, buddy,” Ryan chuckled, knowing full well the engagement had clipped Alex’s dating wings.
A soft murmur sounded in the background, cuing Alex’s radar.
“You alone?” he asked.
“You kidding?”
Alex swore.
Ryan chuckled again. “Grit your teeth and think of the profit.”
“I am thinking about the profit.” But Alex was also thinking about Emma’s kiss. For someone who prided herself on her solemn strength, her lips sure packed a punch. And she’d looked fantastic in that sparkling dress that showed off miles of creamy smooth skin.
He’d run his fingertips over it as often as he’d dared. Which turned out to be a mistake, since it was hard to think about the money when all he wanted was more of her body and more of her lips. And that wasn’t about to happen in any meaningful way. Not now, not ever.
The woman with Ryan giggled, and Alex heaved a frustrated sigh.
“Buck up,” Ryan advised.
“Right.” Alex stabbed the end button and tossed the phone on the bench seat beside him. It was going to be a very long marriage.
Emma had had a very long Monday morning.
The following morning, she wiped away the sweat that had gathered near her hairline, tuning out the chatter of two women in a whirlpool tub near the spa’s fern garden.
She should have known better than to get mixed up with Alex. When a deal was too good to be true, it meant it was too good to be true. Yeah, the man was bailing them out financially, but the personal price was much too high.
She hated the spotlight. And if this morning’s flurry of activity was anything to go by, the spotlight was exactly where she’d be stuck for the next few months. Out of desperation, she’d left her office, skulked down the back staircase and dragged a lounger behind the curve of the marble wall here in the hotel spa in a bid for peace and privacy.
“Emma?” came Katie’s voice from around a spreading palm.
“Back here,” Emma reluctantly confirmed.
Katie appeared in high heels, a straight white skirt and a matching blazer. “What are you doing?”
Emma paused for a significant second. “What do you think I’m doing?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, I’m hiding.”
“From what?”
“Not from what, from who.”
Katie stripped off her blazer. “Then who?”
“Philippe.”
“Why? And aren’t you going to ruin your laptop?”
“Because he’s a caterer. And because he’s an insane stalker. And yes, probably.”
The two women in a nearby whirlpool laughed, and Katie took a couple of steps closer, lowering her voice. “You’re being stalked by an insane caterer? Is there such thing as an insane caterer?”
“I think they’re all insane,” said Emma. “I’m being stalked by at least a dozen. Philippe is just the most persistent of the crowd.”
“Can’t security take care of them?”
Emma pressed the save button on her laptop and turned her complete attention to Katie. “Oh, sure. Then all the reporters can have a field day on McKinley security staff roughing up skinny men in berets.”
Katie glanced behind her. “We have reporters, too?”
Emma sighed and pushed back her damp hair. “Yes. We have reporters. In the lobby, out front, on the mezzanine floor.”
“Nobody bothered me.”
“That’s because Alex Garrison didn’t make a spectacle of you last night.”
Katie took a seat on the far end of the lounger, curling one leg beneath her as her face lit up with the memory. “You have to admit, if that had been real, it would have been incredibly romantic.”
Emma didn’t have to admit any such thing. It was grandiose and tacky. She’d never, not in a million years, marry a man who thought proposing in public was romantic.
She snapped the laptop closed. “It wasn’t real.”
Katie sighed. “I know that.”
“So quit getting all starry-eyed on me. Alex was acting.” A small difference, maybe. But a rather important one.
Katie toyed with a lock of her hair. “He’s a good actor.”
“He probably had his marketing staff coach him.”
Katie laughed at that.
“Mademoiselle McKinley?” came a nasal male voice.
A sudden shift in Emma’s blood pressure left her feeling light-headed. She stared at Katie. “You were followed?”
“I’m not exactly double-o-seven,” Katie protested.
“Aarrgghh.”
“Mademoiselle McKinley?” Philippe Gagnon repeated. Then he appeared around the corner of the marble wall. “Ah, there you are.”
Katie nearly choked on a laugh as the brisk, wiry sixty-something man stepped in front of them and clasped his palms together over his chest.
“There is so much we must do,” he began.
He sure had that right. And on the top of Emma’s list was a clandestine trip to the Bahamas. She’d find a small secluded beachfront hut with no phone, no radio, and no caterers.