A Night, A Consequence, A Vow

How could he? How could he?

No wonder he’d been incommunicado this last week. He was hiding, the coward. Leaving Emily to clean up the mess, like he always did.

Bitterness welled up inside her.

Why shouldn’t he? She was his fixer, after all. The person who made things go away. Who kept his image, and by extension the image of The Royce, as pristine and stain-free as possible. Oh, yes. Her father might be a selfish, irresponsible man but he wasn’t stupid.

He’d finally discovered a use for the daughter he’d ignored for most of her life.

Emily dropped into her chair.

It wasn’t unusual for Maxwell to disappear. As a child she’d grown to accept his fleeting, infrequent appearances in her life, sensing from a young age that she made him uncomfortable even though she hadn’t understood why. As an adult she’d hoped maturity and a shared interest in The Royce’s future would give them common ground—a foundation upon which to forge a relationship—but within the first year after her grandfather’s death it’d become clear her hopes were misguided. The loss of his father had not changed Maxwell one bit. If anything he’d become more remote. More unpredictable. More absent.

It was Emily who had run the club during his absences, assuming more and more of the management responsibilities in recent years. Oh, Maxwell would breeze in when the mood took him, but he rarely stayed at his desk for more than a few token minutes. Why stare at spreadsheets and have tedious discussions about staffing issues and running costs when he could be circulating in the restaurant or the Great Salon, pressing the flesh of their members and employing his innate silver-tongued charm?

Emily didn’t care that her job title didn’t reflect the true extent of her responsibilities. Didn’t care that for seven years her part-ownership of the club had remained, by mutual agreement with her father, a well-guarded secret. She knew The Royce’s membership wasn’t ready for such a revelation. The club was steeped in tradition and history, mired in values that were steadfastly old-fashioned. Its members didn’t object to female employees, but the idea of accepting women as equals within their hallowed halls remained anathema to most.

Emily had a vision for the club’s future, one that was far more evolved and liberal, but changes had to be implemented gradually. Anything fundamental, such as opening their doors to women... Well, those kinds of changes would happen only when the time was right.

Or they wouldn’t happen at all.

Not if Carl Skinner got his grubby hands on her father’s share of The Royce. There’d be no controlling Skinner, no keeping the outcome under wraps. It would be an unmitigated scandal, ruinous to the club’s image. There’d be a mass exodus of members to rival establishments. In short, there would be no club. Not one she’d want to be associated with, at any rate. Skinner would turn it into a cheap, distasteful imitation.

Oh, Lord.

This was exactly why her grandfather had bequeathed half of the club to Emily. To keep his son from destroying the family legacy.

And now it was happening.

Under her watch.

She reached for the phone again, imagining Gordon Royce’s coffin rocking violently in the ground now.

Her first call, to the bank, told her what she already knew—they were at the limit of their debt facility. Raising cash via a bank loan wasn’t an option. Her second call, to The Royce’s corporate lawyer, left her feeling even worse.

‘I’m sorry, Emily. The contract with Mr Skinner is valid,’ Ray Carter told her after she’d emailed a scanned copy to him. ‘You could contest it, but unless we can prove that Maxwell was of unsound mind when he executed the agreement there’s no legally justifiable reason to nullify the contract.’

‘Is there nothing we can do?’

‘Pay Mr Skinner what he’s owed,’ he said bluntly.

‘We don’t have the money.’

‘Then find an investor.’

Emily’s heart stopped. ‘Dilute the club’s equity?’

‘Or convince your father to sell his shares and retain your fifty per cent. One or the other. But whatever you do, do it fast.’

Emily hung up the phone and sat for a long moment, too shell-shocked to move. Too speechless to utter more than a weak, distracted word of thanks when Marsha came in, placed a cup of tea in front of her and said she’d be right outside the office if Emily needed to talk.

Alone again, she absentmindedly fingered the smooth surface of the pearl that hung from a silver chain around her neck.

An investor.

Slowly the idea turned over in her mind. There had to be members of The Royce who would be interested in owning a piece of their beloved club. She could put some feelers out, make a few discreet enquiries... But the delicacy required for such approaches and any ensuing negotiations would take time—and time was something she didn’t have.

Whatever you do, do it fast.

Ray’s warning pounded through her head.

Abruptly, she swivelled her chair, dragged open the middle drawer of her desk and rummaged through an assortment of notepads and stationery until her fingers touched on the item she was seeking. She held her breath for a moment, then shoved the drawer closed and slapped the business card on her desk.

She glared at the name emblazoned in big, black letters across the card’s white background, as bold as the man himself.

Ramon de la Vega.

A bloom of inexplicable heat crept beneath the collar of her blouse. She’d intended to throw the card away as soon as she returned to her office after her brief encounter with the man, but at the last second she’d changed her mind and tossed the card into a drawer.

He had unsettled her.

She didn’t like to admit it, but he had.

Oh, she knew his type well enough. He was a charmer, endowed with good looks and a smooth tongue just like her father, except she had to concede that ‘good looks’ was a rather feeble description of Ramon de la Vega’s God-given assets.

The man was gorgeous. Tall and dark. Golden-skinned. And he oozed confidence and vitality, the kind that shimmered around some people like a magnetic force field and pulled others in.

She had almost been sucked in herself. Had felt the irresistible pull of his bold, male charisma the instant he’d stepped into her zone—that minimum three feet of space she liked to maintain between others and herself. She’d taken a hasty step backwards, not because he had repelled her, but rather because she had, in spite of her anger, found herself disconcertingly drawn to him. Drawn by the palpable energy he gave off and, more shockingly, by the hint of recklessness she had sensed was lurking beneath.

They were qualities that didn’t attract her, she’d reminded herself sharply. Not in the slightest. And not in a man whose audacity had already set her fuming.

She leaned back in her chair, her breathing shallow, her pulse feeling a little erratic. Was she mad even to consider this?

Or would she be mad not to consider it?

Forced to choose between Carl Skinner and Ramon de la Vega, she couldn’t deny which man was the lesser of two evils. De la Vega had a pedigree, not to mention an impressive business acumen. She knew because she’d done an Internet search and, once she’d got past the dozens of tabloid articles and photos of him with beautiful women, the long list of accolades lauding his accomplishments as both an architect and a smart, driven businessman had made for interesting reading.

Before she could change her mind, she snatched up her phone and dialled the mobile number on his card.

Two seconds later, she almost hung up.

Maybe this needed more thought. Maybe she should rehearse what she was going to say...

‘Sí?’

The breath she’d unconsciously bottled in her lungs escaped on a little whoosh of surprise. For a second time that day, her vocal cords felt paralysed.

‘Yes?’ he said into the silence, his tone sharper. ‘Who is this?’