“Most recently, I was the vice president of North American operations. I’m not some naive newbie.”
“Yeah?” he challenged as they started across the lobby. “Then why did you agree to meet Murdoch in his office?”
Emma didn’t get the point of the question. “Because it was Mr. Murdoch I was meeting with.”
Alex pushed open the double glass doors. The temperature went up twenty degrees while car horns and tire screeches replaced the echoing quiet of the lobby. “You should have had him come to you.”
“What difference would that make?”
They dodged other pedestrians as they made their way down the stairs.
“Tactical advantage.” Alex’s lips quirked in a grin. “Newbie mistake. Good thing I was there to rescue you.”
“You didn’t even let him make the offer.”
“The offer sucked, Emma. I brought a car. Just across the street.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No-I’m pretty sure I brought a car. That blue Lexus over there, under the red sign.”
“You don’t know the offer sucked.”
Alex stopped at the bottom of the stairs and turned to face her. “I knew about your meeting. I knew he wanted to buy. I knew how to shut him down. Don’t you think there’s maybe a slim possibility that I know the market value of a hotel?”
“Not half high on yourself, are you?” As soon as the sarcastic words were out, Emma regretted them.
Alex had made a fair point.
She’d been out to prove herself on this deal with Murdoch. She’d even gone so far as to secretly hope that whatever he had in mind would save McKinley Inns, so that she wouldn’t have to give half of the company to Alex, and she could avoid going through with this farce of a wedding.
But Murdoch hadn’t wanted to make a business deal beneficial to McKinley. He’d simply wanted to make a purchase. He’d been looking for a bargain.
Not that she’d ever admit any of it to Alex. He had enough of an advantage over her already.
“Like I said before,” Alex interrupted her thoughts. “There’s somebody I want you to meet.”
“Your lawyer?” Now that the engagement was out of the way, the prenup was next on the list.
“No. Not my lawyer. My housekeeper.”
For a man with a reputation as a cold-blooded hard case, Alex sure had a soft spot for his housekeeper. Oh, he tried to hide it. But it was there in the inflection of his voice as they came down his long driveway in Oyster Bay.
“She can be irritable at times, and she’s as judgmental as anyone I’ve ever met. But she’s been with the family since before I was born, so I try to humor her.”
“Because she scares the life out of you,” Emma guessed.
Alex hesitated just a shade too long. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
They drove beneath spreading oaks and past fine-trimmed lawns. The last time Emma had come to the Garrison estate, she’d been focused on the upcoming conversation with Alex. This time she paid more attention to the landscaping, doing a double take as they passed a magnificent rose garden.
“What did you tell her about me?” Emma asked as she craned her neck to watch the stunning blooms. Wow. The Vanderbilts’ gardener had nothing on the Garrisons’.
“That I was marrying you for your hotels,” he said.
“You did not.”
“Actually, I told her I was helping you out of a financial jam. She guessed the part about the hotels.”
That surprised Emma. “Well, at least I don’t have to lie to her.”
“You don’t have to lie to anyone else either.”
Okay, now that was about the most ridiculous thing Emma had ever heard. “Yeah, I have to lie.”
“We tell them we’re getting married,” he explained. “We tell them we couldn’t be happier-which, when you consider the money, has got to be true. And we tell them we’re co-managing McKinley Inns. All perfectly valid.”
“And what do we do when they ask about our feelings? You planning to pull a Prince Charles?”
He glanced her way, raising an eyebrow. “A Prince Charles?”
“When Prince Charles was asked if he loved Diana, he said ‘whatever love is.’”
Alex chuckled.
“Hey, you pull a Prince Charles on me, and I’ll pull a Mrs. Nash on you.”
“What’s a Mrs. Nash?”
“I don’t know, but she does something that intimidates you, and I’m going to find out what it is.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Like a fox.” Emma glanced back out the windshield to see the three-story white building rising up in front of them. “I swear your house is bigger than some of my hotels.”
“That’s why I bought an apartment in Manhattan.”
“You kept getting lost?”
Alex laughed.
The building grew closer and seemed to get taller. White stone pillars gleamed in the morning sun. Dozens of dormered windows delineated the three, no, four stories, while a fountain dominated the circular drive’s center garden.
“You spin me around three times in there, I swear you’ll never have to see me again.”
“Good tip,” said Alex as he brought the car to a smooth halt in front of the polished staircase.
She pulled a face, but he just laughed at her.
They exited the car and started climbing the wide steps.
“We have to talk about this,” said Emma, trying not to feel outdone by Alex’s status and old money.
“About my house?”
“About everything. How this marriage thing is going to work. How much time we’ll have to spend together. How we’ll coordinate our schedules.”
Alex reached for the handle on the massive front door. “We can coordinate schedules over breakfast.”
She supposed they could schedule a regular morning call. “What time do you get up?”
“Around six.”
Emma nodded. “I usually eat about seven. We could talk on the phone over coffee.”
“The phone?”
“You’d rather e-mail?”
“I’d rather eat at the same table. Dining room, breakfast nook, kitchen, pool deck, I don’t care-”
“What are you talking about?”
He reached for the ornate knob on the huge double doors. “Breakfast. Pay attention, Emma. We’re talking about breakfast.”
“Where?”
“Here, of course.”
Emma stopped dead. “Here?”
“Can you think of a better place?”
“My penthouse.”
He smirked as he pushed open the door. “You want to share your bedroom with me?”
“We don’t have to live together.”
“Sure we do. We’ll be married.”
In name only. And even if they did spend time in the same residence, it couldn’t be here.
Emma walked tentatively into the cavernous rotunda foyer, gazing upward. It definitely couldn’t be here. “Regular people don’t live like this,” she said. “It’s practically a palace.”
“That’s because great-great-great Grandpa Hamilton was British royalty. The second son of an earl.”
Emma gazed at the row of portraits sweeping off down the main hallway. “Why does that not surprise me?”
“The Earl of Kessex,” said Alex. “It’s a small holding just south of Scotland. However, his older brother inherited the property and the title. So Hamilton became an admiral in the British navy. I guess he always wanted the trappings because he bought the original eight hundred acres and built this place.”
Emma made her way slowly down the hallway, peering at the old portraits of nobility.
“This guy,” said Alex, pointing to a distinguished man in a dress navy uniform, gold tassels on his shoulders, medals adorning his chest, with a saber clutched in his left hand. He looked proud, serious, intense. In fact, take away the hat, the moustache and about twenty-five years, and he looked surprisingly like Alex.
Emma stepped back and glanced from one to the other.
“Yeah, yeah,” said Alex. “I know.”
“It explains a lot,” said Emma. “It’s genetics that make you so intent on expanding the family empire.”