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

“I’ll take your word for that.”

She glanced at her watch and swallowed another gulp. “Do you have any other items you want to discuss with me?”

“Not right now.”

“Then I’d better skip breakfast and get to work on these changes.”

“Go.”

After dropping off a USB drive with the revised agenda in the business office, Caro met with the resort’s conference planner in her den. She, in turn, called in the executive chef.

Andreas was not happy about scratching the second day’s elaborate breakfast of fire-grilled Andalucian ham and house specialty torrijas. Frowning, he substituted a simpler sausage-and-egg scramble served with flaky rolls and the region’s signature apricot jam. He was even less thrilled about changing the elegant seafood lunch buffet planned for outside on the terrace to sit-down service in the ballroom.

Caro left him grumbling over the changes and rushed back to the business office. To her relief, the efficient staff had the revised agendas rolling off the high-speed printer and promised to place them on the tables for the kickoff session.

Those two tasks well in hand, Caro tried to reach Captain Medina. As she’d discovered in her previous dealings with the police captain, he tended to set his own schedule. Luckily, she caught him this time and extracted his promise to review the forms she’d faxed over.

“I need your reply as soon as possible,” she begged in the Spanish she’d studied in high school and college. She was almost as fluent in it as in the German she’d mastered during her year in Salzburg with Devon and Sabrina. “Por favor, capitán.”

“Sí, sí, le llamaré.”

Forced to be content with his promise to call, she headed for the ballroom to make sure everything was set for the general session. To her relief, the audiovisual technicians had their equipment up and running. She also confirmed there was plenty of coffee, tea, water and soft drinks available for the attendees who were starting to trickle in. Snatches of conversation caught her ear as she made a last check of the seating arrangements.

“Ramieriz, you old bastard!”

A brawny redhead in a safari shirt with at least a dozen pockets punched the arm of a bearded Latino.

“Heard you got snakebit on that job down in Panama.”

They were joined by a slender Asian in a dragon-red dress slit on one side. A head shorter than the two men, she got their instant respect and an eager demand for the details on the Yang Su kidnapping.

Caro ducked out of the ballroom and into the ladies’ room to check her hair and lip gloss. Then she drew in a deep breath, pasted on a smile and reentered the ballroom.

It had filled considerably in her brief absence. Those present were predominantly male, although she picked out several of the dozen or so women slated to attend. Rory was easily identifiable as he moved among the crowd. He’d dressed for the kickoff session in loafers, black slacks and a pale yellow oxford shirt open at the collar. Caro watched from the corner of one eye while he shook hands and thumped backs in that age-old male ritual.

At least one of Rory’s crew got a kiss instead of a back thump. Or more correctly, she kissed him. On the cheek, although it was obvious to Caro that the tall, striking blonde would have preferred a fullfrontal lip-lock.

For reasons she didn’t have time to analyze, Caro formed an instant dislike for the woman. That lasted only until Rory caught sight of his conference coordinator and brought the blonde over for an introduction.

“I want you to meet Sondra Jennings. She’s head of GSI’s European division, based in Copenhagen. Sondra, this is Caroline Walters, with European Business Services.”

The blonde returned Caro’s handshake with a friendly smile. “So you’re the one who pulled this confab together. Harry Martin was talking about you when we had coffee together a little while ago.” Her blue eyes twinkled. “Knowing Harry, I’m sure he’s kept you hopping.”

“Pretty much,” Caro admitted.

“I’ve worked with several clients who might be interested in the type of services EBS provides. I’ll contact them when I get back to Denmark and spread the word.”

“That’s very generous of you.”

“We girls gotta stick together.” Her gaze snagged on the man just entering the ballroom. “There’s Abdul-Hamid! I haven’t seen him since we tracked the source of those death threats against the author of Inside the Mujahideen. ’Scuse me, you two.”

She hurried to the door and enveloped the newcomer in a monster hug. He returned it with such obvious delight that Caro was forced to revise her initial impression.

“She’s very gregarious.”

“When she wants to be,” Rory drawled. “Ready to get this show under way?”

She swept a final glance over the tables and now-milling crowd. “I am if you are.”

“Let’s do it.”

“I’ll be at the back of the room. Just signal if you need anything.”

“That won’t work.” Shaking his head, he caught her elbow and steered her toward a round table near the podium. “I want you up front, with me.”

“But…”

“It’ll be easier for us to communicate this way.”

After seating her beside Harry Martin, he pinned the mobile mike to his shirt. His voice boomed through the speakers.

“All right, team. Time to get to work.”

He waited for the general shuffle of chairs to die down before asking Caroline to stand.

“For those of you who haven’t met her yet, this is Caroline Walters. She and Harry are running this show. Any complaints, tell him. Any and all kudos go to her.”

Rory held the stage for the next hour. Caroline listened in mounting amazement as he discussed worldwide trends in violence against VIPs, quoting specific facts and figures without once referring to the prepared script. It was obvious even to an outsider like her that he had every facet of his dangerous profession down cold.

His message was grim, and the slides that flashed up on the screen were appalling. They depicted, in graphic detail, a blindfolded French ambassador with a gun barrel to his head. The bullet-riddled body of a candidate for prime minister in Indonesia. The terrified wife of a police captain in Colombia, explosives strapped to her chest, just seconds before drug runners blew her apart as a message to everyone who cooperated with law enforcement officials.

Caroline was ready for a break by the time Rory finished. More than ready. She didn’t view the world through rose-colored glasses by any means, but Rory’s grim assessment had brought home just how dangerous it could be.

Particularly for the kind of high-powered executives her company catered to. Neither she nor Devon nor Sabrina had fully considered that aspect of their business. The realization sobered Caro and made her anxious to impart some of this information to her partners.

“We’ll take a short break so they can set up for lunch,” Rory told his people. “Harry will go over the latest State Department alerts while we eat.”

With palpable relief, Caro signaled the servers to bring in the paella extravaganza she’d arranged for the kickoff luncheon. Most of the ingredients had been precooked in the resort’s kitchen, but four chefs in tall white hats provided the finishing touch. Positioned before waist-high stands supporting huge black frying pans, they sizzled the rice, chopped vegetables and cooked seafood morsels over open flames.

The tantalizing aromas soon drew the attendees back into the ballroom. Caro didn’t relax until everyone had filled their plates with heaping servings. At Rory’s insistence, she brought her plate back to his table.

“You need to listen to Harry’s update on State Department alerts,” GSI’s chief executive advised. “They could play into your business.”

“I was thinking that same thing during your briefing. That was pretty scary information you put out.”

“It’s a scary world.”

Nodding, she speared a morsel of calamari and tuned in to Harry Martin’s succinct recap.