His Ultimate Demand

The bouncer cleared his throat conspicuously. She turned. ‘Can you tell me who that second guy was who just got into that limo?’ she asked.

He raised one are-you-serious? eyebrow.

Ruby shook her still-dazed head and smiled at the bouncer. ‘Of course you can’t tell me. Bouncer-billionaire confidentiality, right?’

His slow grin gentled his intimidating stature. ‘Got it in one. Now, you coming in or you just jaywalking?’

‘I’m coming in.’ Although the strong suspicion that she’d missed Narciso Valentino grew by the second.

‘Great. Here you go.’ The bouncer placed a Mayan-mask-shaped stamp on her wrist, glanced up at her, then added another stamp. ‘Show it at the bar. It’ll get you your first drink on the house.’ He winked.

She smiled in relief as she entered the smoky interior. If her guess had been wrong and she hadn’t just missed Narciso Valentino, she could nurse an expensive drink while searching him out.

She’d worked in clubs like these all through college and knew how expensive even the cheapest drinks were. Which was why she clutched an almost warm virgin Tiffany Blue an hour later as she accepted that Narciso Valentino was the man she’d seen outside.

Resigned to her fruitless journey, she downed the last of her drink and was looking for a place to set the glass down when the voices caught her attention.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Of course I am. Narciso will be there.’

Ruby froze, then glanced into one of the many roped-off VIP areas. Two women dripping in expensive jewellery and designer dresses that would cost her a full year’s salary sat sipping champagne.

Unease at her shameless eavesdropping almost forced her away but desperation held her in place.

‘How do you know? He didn’t attend the last two events.’ The blonde looked decidedly pouty at that outcome.

‘I told you, I overheard the guy he was with this evening talking about it. They’re both going this time. If I can get a job as a Petit Q hostess, this could be my chance,’ her red-headed friend replied.

‘What? To dress in a clown costume in the hope of catching his eye?’

‘Stranger things have happened.’

‘Well, hell will freeze over before I do that to hook a guy,’ the blonde huffed.

Statuesque Redhead’s lips pursed. ‘Don’t knock it till you try it. It pays extremely well. And if Narciso Valentino falls in my lap, well, let’s just say I won’t let that life-changing opportunity pass me by.’

‘Okay, you have my attention. Give me the name of the website. And where the hell is Macau anyway?’ the blonde asked.

‘Umm...Europe, I think?’

Ruby barely suppressed a snort. Heart thumping, she took her phone from her tiny clutch and keyed in the website address.

An hour and a half later, she sent another Hail Mary and pressed send on the online forms she’d filled out on her return home.

It might come to nothing. She could fail whatever test or interview she had to pass to get this gig. Heck, after discovering that she was applying to hostess for Q Virtus, one of the world’s most exclusive and secretive private clubs, she wondered if she didn’t need her head examined. She could be wasting money and precious time chasing an elusive man. But she had to try. Each day she waited was another day her goal slipped from her fingers.

The alternative—bowing to the pressure from her mother to join the family business—was unthinkable. At best she would once again become the pawn her parents used to antagonise each other. At worst, they would try and drag her down into their celebrity-hungry lifestyle.

They’d made her childhood a living hell. And she only had to pass a billboard in New York City to see they were still making each other’s lives just as miserable but taking pleasure in documenting the whole thing for the world to feast on.

The Ricardo & Paloma Trevelli Show was prime-time viewing. The fly-on-the-wall documentary had been running for as long as Ruby could remember.

When she was growing up, her daily routine had included at least two sets of camera crews documenting her every move along with her parents’.

TV crews had become extended family members. For a very short time when it’d made her the most popular girl at school, she’d told herself she was okay with it.

Until her father’s affairs began. His very public admission of infidelity when she was nine years old had made ratings soar. Her mother publicly admitting her heartbreak had made worldwide news. Almost overnight, the TV show had been syndicated worldwide and brought her parents even more notoriety.

The subsequent reunion and vow renewal had thrilled the world.

After her father’s second admission of infidelity, millions of viewers had been given the opportunity to weigh in on the outcome of Ruby’s life.

Strangers had accosted her on the street, alternatively pitying and shaming her for being a Trevelli.

Escaping to college at the opposite end of the country had been a blessing. But even then she hadn’t been able to avoid her roots.

It’d quickly become apparent that she had no other talent than cooking.

The realisation that the Trevelli gene was truly stamped into her DNA was a deep fear she secretly harboured. It was the reason she’d cut Simon out of her life without a backward glance. It was also the reason she’d vowed never to let her parents influence her life.

Which was why she needed a ten-minute conversation with Narciso Valentino. A tingle of awareness shot through her as she replayed the scene outside Riga.

With a spiky foreboding, she recalled the dark, dangerously sensual waves vibrating off him; those bronzed, sure fingers drifting over the blonde’s bottom, causing unwelcome heat to drag through Ruby’s belly.

God, what was she doing lying in bed thinking of some stranger’s hand on his girlfriend’s ass?

She punched her pillow into shape and flipped off her bedside lamp. She couldn’t control the future but she could control the choice between mooning over elegant hands that looked as if they could bring a woman great pleasure or getting a good night’s sleep.

She was almost asleep when her phone pinged an incoming message.

Exhaling in frustration, she grabbed the phone.

The brightness in the dark room hurt her eyes, but, even half blinded, Ruby could see the words clearly. Her CV had impressed the powers that be.

She’d been granted an interview to become a Petit Q.

CHAPTER TWO (#u4017a3b2-e6af-5f18-a53a-4ede2f98d967)

Macau, China, One Week Later

THE RED FLOOR-LENGTH gown sat a little too snugly against Ruby’s skin, and the off-the-shoulder design exposed more cleavage and general flesh than she was comfortable with. But after two gruelling interviews, one of which she’d almost blown by turning up late due to another delayed train, the last thing she could complain about was the expensive designer outfit that spelt her out as a Petit Q.

She was careful now to avoid it getting snagged on her heels as she walked across the marble floor of her hotel towards the meeting place, from where they’d be chauffeured to their final destination. In her small case were two carefully folded, equally expensive outfits the management had provided.

An examination had shown that they, too, like the dress she wore, would be tight...everywhere. It was clear that someone, somewhere in the management food chain had got her measurements very wrong.

She’d already attracted the attention of an aging rock star in the lift on the way to the ground floor of her Macau hotel. It didn’t matter that he’d seemed half blind when he’d leered at her; attracting any attention at all made her stomach knot with acid anxiety.