The Executive's Valentine Seduction / Valente Must Marry: The Executive's Valentine Seduction

“I knew there had to be some reason behind your insistence that her company handle this conference. I did a little digging. Didn’t take long to figure out you were the one who knocked her up.”

Wincing at the blunt assessment, Rory yanked on the zipper of his carryall. “Does it make any difference that I didn’t know I’d knocked her up?”

“Not to me. Or to her, I suspect. What’s your game?”

“It’s no game, Harry. I intend to atone for past sins.”

“How?”

He couldn’t lie to the man who’d become his conscience. “My first plan was a cash settlement. I know money wouldn’t make up for what she went through, but it could ease the future for her. If she wouldn’t accept it outright, I planned to disguise it by steering business her way. Now…”

Now all he could think of was how Caroline had looked in the moonlight. How she’d tasted, so warm and salty. How much he wanted to taste her again.

“I’m thinking maybe a more permanent arrangement.”

“Like marriage?”

“Maybe.”

“Little late for that, isn’t it?”

“Better late than never. Besides, we both know I would have made a rotten husband back then. I was too young and too much of a wiseass.”

“You won’t get any argument from me on that. I’m curious, though. Why do you think you’ll make a better husband now? You haven’t spent more than a few weeks in that empty barn you call home in the past year. Then there’s the little matter of your line of work.”

With a jerk of his chin, Harry indicated the scars webbing the back of Rory’s hand.

“Think you can bust in car windows and haul clients out of burning vehicles indefinitely?”

“Yeah, well, that’s part of my rationale.”

Rory glanced down and made a fist. He hadn’t been able to perform that simple act for months after the job in Seattle went sour.

“We both know the odds, Harry. The higher the profile of our clients, the greater the chances we’ll take a hit along with them. Conversely, the greater the risk, the greater the reward. I’ve got more money in the bank than I can spend in two lifetimes.”

“And no one to leave it to,” his longtime friend and mentor guessed shrewdly, “except the half dozen charities that hit you up on a regular basis. So you’re going to make Caroline a rich widow.”

“Not anytime soon, hopefully. But one way or another, she’ll be set for life.”

“Just out of curiosity,” Harry said, “what makes you so sure Caroline will have you?”

“I’m not sure at all. But there’s something between us that just won’t die. A spark. A flame. Whatever. It’s been smoldering all these years.”

“Yeah, I noticed you out there on the beach the other night, fanning the fire.” He palmed his salt-and-pepper buzz cut and eyed Rory thoughtfully. “Have you told her about your plans for her future?”

“Not yet.”

“When are you planning to spring them on her?”

“I’m not sure. Tonight, maybe, in Barcelona.”

Harry nodded once, slowly. “I repeat, kid. Hurt that girl again and you’ll answer to me.”

“Understood. Now give me a quick recap of what you dug up on this guy Casteel.”

Caroline decided the meeting with Rory’s high-powered prospective client required more professional attire than the semicasual outfits she’d worn at the conference. She changed into black pumps, her slim black skirt with its matching jacket worn over an aqua silk tank.

She was glad she’d made the switch when Rory met her in the lobby. He, too, had changed and was once again the consummate executive in a hand-tailored charcoal-gray suit and silk tie. He looked almost like a stranger again until his amber eyes met hers and a frisson of unsettling sensation rippled down her spine.

“Ready?”

At her nod, he took her overnight bag and carried it with his to the silver BMW waiting at the front entrance. The smiling valet opened the door for her. It closed with a well-mannered thud, shutting her and Rory in a cage of cloud-soft leather and high-performance engineering.

Caroline said little during the drive into the city. As they sped along the A7 Autopista, snippets from her early-morning colloquy with Devon and Sabrina kept replaying inside her head.

Time’s running out.

Do I go with my instincts or play it smart and safe this time?

Her fingers tightened on the directions Señor Casteel had provided to his downtown office. She slanted a glance at the man beside her and found only traces of the teenager she’d hungered for in his rugged profile.

This Rory Burke was so different and so dangerously compelling. The square chin, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes, the nose with the flattened bridge—each of the parts added up to a whole that made Caroline’s adolescent desire pale by comparison to the hunger he roused in her now.

It hit her again, a hot rush of desire that made her belly clench and anticipation whip through her like wildfire. They had tonight, she thought. Alone. In a city made for lovers.

Go with your instincts.

See where they take you.

He turned then and met her gaze. Those wolf’s eyes seemed to burn right through her. “Is this it?”

“Wh-What?”

“C-33.” He tipped his head toward the green highway sign flashing by. “Isn’t this where we cut off?”

“Oh. Right. C-33.”

Jerked back to her self-appointed navigator duties, Caroline consulted the handwritten directions. Barcelona’s sprawling suburbs soon engulfed them, with accompanying traffic and noise.

“C-33 turns into Avenue Meridiana about a mile ahead. We stay on that until we hit Avenue Diagonal.” A brown sign snagged her attention. “The Diagonal takes us right past the Sagrada Familia.”

“The what?”

“The Sagrada Familia, Barcelona’s famous unfinished cathedral. It’s one of Antoni Gaudí’s masterpieces, along with La Pedrera and Casa Batlló.”

She clicked her tongue at his blank look.

“You said you’ve visited Barcelona twice before. Didn’t you see any of Gaudí’s work?”