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She felt a silly smile tremble across her mouth. “You’re interrupting me again.”
“Sorry. Did I tell you I’m impatient?”
“You did. Yes.”
“You won’t regret this, Cleo. That’s a promise.”
It all seemed so simple by then. From all wrong to exactly right in the space of a few hours. Was that crazy? Maybe.
Then again, no. Not crazy at all. It was a fabulous opportunity and she’d be crazy to pass it up.
“Come on,” said Fletcher. “Say yes.” He held out his hand.
She took it. “Yes,” she said, those forbidden, hot little flares of awareness racing through her at his touch.
“Excellent.” He gave her hand a firm shake and then released it. “I’ll call you tomorrow. We’ll set up a meeting ASAP with the lawyers, get all the paperwork handled. Then you can get started looking for the people you’ll need.” He reached around behind her, grabbed the door latch and pulled it open for her.
Feeling suddenly dazed, she swung up into the seat. She stared at him wide-eyed. “Did I just say yes?”
He grinned. “You did. No going back now.” He pushed the door shut and stepped back.
For a moment, still bemused at the choice she had just made, she only sat there and stared at him through the side window. He lifted an eyebrow, clearly wondering if for some reason she’d changed her mind about leaving.
Feeling foolish, she shook herself and stabbed her key into the ignition. The engine turned over and caught. She backed out of the space, so rattled by what she had just agreed to that she came within an inch of hitting a car in the row behind her.
She slammed on the brakes and looked over at Fletcher, who still stood where she’d left him.
He mouthed the word, “Careful.”
She put it in drive and got the heck out of there. Every nerve in her body was humming. Very strange. Definitely scary.
And no, she didn’t let herself look in her rearview mirror to see if he was still standing there watching as she drove away.
Chapter Four
That night in bed, before she turned out the light, Cleo called Danny and told him that she would open a KinderWay at Impresario after all.
“Good for you,” Danny said.
She relaxed into her pillows, realizing she’d been vaguely worried he wouldn’t like the idea, that he might be a little jealous, might remember that blue box on the entry hall table last Tuesday night and suspect that Fletcher Bravo would be putting the moves on her. But no. Not Danny. He didn’t have a jealous bone in his body.
“Oh, Danny. You think so? You really think it’s the right way to go?”
“You bet. I think it’s a smart move. And I’m glad you decided not to let what happened when you were a kid keep you from accepting a great offer right now.”
She caught a curl of her hair and wrapped it around her index finger as she teased into the phone, “Who says I was doing anything as neurotic as that?”
“Hey. I didn’t say it was neurotic.”
“Close enough.”
“Aw, come on. It’s natural for a person to stay away from the things that scare them, the things that have messed them over in the past. It only gets to be a problem if you let what scares you keep you from doing what’s going to be good for you now.”
Sometimes Danny’s insights did amaze her. “You know, I think you missed your calling. You should have been a shrink.”
“Uh-uh. You need a college education for that. I’ll pass. I had enough trouble makin’it through high school.”
“If you say so. It’s the mental-health profession’s loss.”
“Yeah, right.”
“And Danny?”
“Huh?”
“I wasn’t scared. Did I say I was scared?”
“You didn’t have to say it. There was no reason for you to turn down such a great offer—except that you’d have to be around the business that you always say wrecked your mom’s life.”
There’s another reason, a knowing voice in the back of her mind whispered.
That other reason was Fletcher Bravo himself. A man way too much like the men Lolita Bliss could never resist. A man with power. With juice, as they say. A man who liked a challenge, liked the chase, liked going after a woman he thought he couldn’t have …
And just a second here. How the heck did she know if Fletcher Bravo was that kind of man? Yes, he had power and influence. But that didn’t necessarily make him a dog. He wasn’t married. He was an eligible bachelor. Of course he would date. He could go out with a different woman every night if he wanted to and no one had a right to judge him for it.
And why was she obsessing over Fletcher anyway?
Really, she had to stop thinking about him.
If Fletcher Bravo gave her a thrill, so what? She was going nowhere with it. She was sticking with Danny, who was exactly the man she’d been looking for all her life.
“Cleo? You still with me.”
“Yes. I am.”
He laughed his goofy laugh. “I like the way you say that.”
They talked some more. He told her about a beautiful old Mustang he was restoring. She described the fabulous facility Fletcher had had built in the blink of an eye.
Danny was so sweet and supportive. “Sounds good, Cleo. Really good …”
Before they said good-night, they set a date for dinner Wednesday.
The next morning at ten, Fletcher called her at KinderWay. “Can you make it at two to go over the contract?”
“I’ll need to have my lawyer look it over first.”
“You think you need a lawyer, do you?”
“I wouldn’t sign a contract without consulting one.”
“Good answer.”
“How about this … I’ll come in and pick up the papers. I’ll take them to my lawyer. If I don’t have any questions, I’ll sign them and bring them back.”
“Fair enough. Come at one. We’ll have lunch.”
“You don’t miss a beat, do you?”
He made a low sound. It might have been a chuckle. “Rarely.”
She hesitated. And then she felt silly. It was only lunch, which she’d be eating in any case. She agreed to meet him at High Sierra’s Placer Room, where the food was supposed to be almost as good as at Club Rouge.
Again there was champagne.
“To celebrate your decision to bring KinderWay to Impresario,” Fletcher said as the wine steward poured.
Like the day before, Cleo only had one glass. What did she need with alcohol anyway? She was flying high naturally, feeling giddy and excited at the prospect of the big job she’d taken on. It was the right time to expand, she realized now. And she couldn’t wait to get things moving, get that gorgeous new facility staffed and ready for the kids who needed it.
Once they’d ordered and the waiter left them alone, Fletcher wanted to know more about her childhood and about the shows she’d been in while she’d worked her way through college.
She shook her head. “Uh-uh. Your turn.”
He tried to put her off. “I know all about my life. I want to hear about yours.”
But she wasn’t letting him push her around. She repeated, “Your turn.”
He gave in and told her that he’d been born in Dallas. “My mother was working the graveyard shift at the Pancake Palace. Blake Bravo came in for a cheese omelet with sausage and a short stack on the side. For her, it was love at first sight.”
“And for Blake?”
“No way to say. He was gone in the morning and she never saw him again—not until about thirty years later, when she opened her morning newspaper and saw his picture under the headline Notorious Bravo Dies for the Second Time.”
“Your mom raised you on her own?”
“For the first ten years she did. Then she met my stepdad. They married and we moved to Ocean City. My stepdad serviced vending machines, had his own little business—still has it and does all right at it, too. They have two daughters, my half sisters, Cathy and Anna-Marie. Cathy’s at NYU and Anna-Marie is a senior in high school.” His expression had softened.
“You’re crazy about your sisters.” That pleased her.
“Yes, I am.” He said it with real enthusiasm. “Cathy’s studying microbiology. And Anna-Marie says she wants to be a writer—at least right now. She’s at that age where it’s always something new.”
“I wish I had sisters. Or brothers. I’m not picky. Family counts, you know?” Her hand rested on the snowy tablecloth.
He laid his over it. “I know.”
She felt the warmth of his skin against hers and she wanted to …
No. Uh-uh. Not going there.
Carefully she pulled her hand away.
As they were leaving the restaurant, they stopped off at a corner table and Fletcher introduced her to his half-brother Aaron and to Aaron’s wife Celia, who was also Aaron’s personal assistant.
Celia, who had a cute heart-shaped face and red hair, was pregnant. Very pregnant. She looked as if she’d swallowed a watermelon, as if she would have that baby right then and there, over lunch. She confided, “Our oldest, Davey, is just three. He’ll be attending your school.” She put her hand on her huge stomach. “And so will this one, when the time comes.” Her hazel eyes twinkled. “I’m so glad you decided to bring KinderWay here.”
“I’m pretty excited about it myself,” Cleo said.
At her side Fletcher laughed—a low, knowing laugh that played along her nerve endings. “To hear her talk now, you’d never guess how hard I had to work to convince her she needed to do this.”
Aaron held out a hand. “Welcome to the Bravo Group family.”
Cleo took it and they shook. She met Aaron’s blue eyes and wondered what he might be thinking. Like the Bravo standing beside her, it was hard to figure out what could be going through his mind.
Fletcher put a hand—so lightly—at the small of her back. “Okay, we’ll let you two enjoy your lunch in peace.” Cleo went where he guided her, stunningly aware of the press of his palm against the base of her spine.
They took the elevator to the office tower. As they stepped into the car, Cleo eased away from him. She turned and backed against the brass railing that ran along the mirrored elevator walls.
They looked at each other, neither of them speaking. She found herself achingly aware of how small the space was, how with only a step or two she would be in his arms.
Crazy. Ridiculous. She was not, under any circumstances, going to end up in Fletcher Bravo’s arms.
She shifted her gaze and she was looking at her own reflection in the mirrored wall behind him. Did she look as guilty as she felt?
Before she could decide if she did or not, the elevator whooshed to a stop and the doors parted.
Marla had a manila envelope all ready for her. Cleo took it with a smile. “Thanks.”
From behind her Fletcher said, “I’ll see you to your car.”
No way, she thought, as she turned to him. She made a joke of her refusal. “You don’t want to do that. You saw the way I pull out of parking spaces. I might actually run over you this time.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
Danny had said it that night last week: He’s after you.
And he was. He still was: his hand on hers at the table; his palm settling so possessively at the small of her back as they left the restaurant …
Subtle, knowing touches. What a man does to draw a woman in. Nothing obvious. Nothing blatant. Making it so very easy to pretend it isn’t happening …
But it was happening. And she had to stop denying, stop pretending it wasn’t.
Guilt tightened her stomach as she remembered how she’d assured Danny that she wasn’t interested.
Liar, she silently accused herself. She was interested. She just didn’t want to be—no. Wrong, damn it.
She wasn’t going to be. She was stopping this slow and oh-so-clever seduction, stopping it right here and now.
She drew herself up. “No,” she said firmly. “I enjoyed the lunch. Thank you.”
