Marriage: For Business or Pleasure?

‘You like?’

He glanced down at his suit, leaving her no option but to do the same, and she gulped at the way his chest filled out the shirt, how the fine material of the suit jacket hugged his shoulders.

‘I’ve never seen you in one.’

His eyes glittered with a satisfaction she didn’t understand as he pinned her with a stare that had her squirming.

‘Times change.’

She gripped her glass so tight she wouldn’t have been at all surprised if it cracked and she forced her hand to relax and place it on the table by her elbow.

‘They do. So let’s get down to business.’

Leaning back, he placed an outstretched arm on the back of his chair, the simple action pulling his shirt taut across the muscular chest she’d seen in all its glory earlier that day and she instantly wished for a drink refill to cool her down.

‘I have to say I’m intrigued. This business must be pretty damn special to drag you back here from the bright lights of London.’

Special? How could she begin to explain to him what this promotion meant? The long hours she’d put in over the years? The overnight jaunts to godforsaken places, going the extra yards to secure information, ensuring her pitches were bigger and better than everyone else’s? The endless drive to prove her independence in every way that counted?

Nick wouldn’t get it.

Papa Mancini had doted on him, not having a mum had bonded them like nothing else. Wish she could’ve said the same for her ‘family’.

‘I’ll give you the short version.’

She leaned forward, clasped her hands in her lap and prepared to give the pitch of her life.

Securing the use of the Mancini plantation was paramount to her plans and would assure her that promotion. The current MD had virtually said so. Then why the nagging doubt convincing Nick wouldn’t be as easy as she’d hoped?

‘I work for Sell, London’s biggest advertising company. We’re doing a worldwide campaign for the sugar industry, driven by the mega-wealthy plantation owners in the States.’

A flicker of interest lit his eyes and she continued. ‘I’ll be honest with you, Nick. There’s a big promotion in this for me, a huge one. If I nail this, I’m the new managing director.’

His eyebrows shot up. ‘That’s some title.’

Picking up the boutique beer the waiter had discreetly placed on the table in front of him, he took a healthy slug.

‘So where do I fit into all this?’

She’d got this far. Taking a deep breath, she went for broke.

‘Your place is the oldest sugar-cane plantation in Australia. If I could have exclusive access to it, shoot footage, use some of the history, I’m pretty sure the promotion is mine. That’s it in a nutshell.’

She didn’t like his silence, his controlled posture. She’d expected some kind of reaction, not this tense quiet that left her on edge and wondering what was going on behind those deep dark eyes.

‘I’ve set out facts and figures in the written proposal. How much the company’s willing to pay to use the farm, how many hours it will involve, that kind of thing.’

Her voice had taken on a fake, bubbly edge, as if she was trying too hard, and she eventually fell silent, waiting for him to say something.

When he didn’t, she blurted, ‘Well, what do you think?’

Something shifted in his eyes, a shrewdness she’d never seen before.

‘All sounds very feasible.’

Elation swept through her, quickly tempered when he leaned forward and shook his head.

‘There’s just one problem. I’m about to sell the farm.’

‘Sell it? But where will you live? Where will you work?’

His condescending grin sent a chill of foreboding through her.

‘You still see me as some hick bumpkin farm boy, don’t you?’

She fought a rising blush and lost. ‘Of course not. I just meant that place has been in your family for generations. I don’t get why you’d sell now.’

He gestured all around him. ‘Because my place is here now.’

Confusion creased her brow as she followed his hand. His designer suit, his patronising smile, his cryptic comments, made her feel as if she was left out of some in-joke and the punchline was on her.

‘You belong here?’

She shook her head, knowing if there was one place a guy like Nick belonged, it wasn’t in this ultra-elegant hotel.

He’d always loved the farm, had been proud of his family’s heritage, so what had changed? The Nick she’d known and loved thrived under the harsh Queensland sun, harvesting billets of sugar cane, getting his hands dirty with the machinery he’d loved tinkering with, riding down the highway on his beat-up Harley with the wind in his hair and the devil at his back.

He frowned, his shoulders rigid as he sat back. ‘You find that so hard to believe?’

‘It’s just not you.’

‘It is now,’ he snapped, his control slipping as anger flashed like fire from those dark eyes she’d lost herself in too many times to count.

‘Just because we had a teenage fling, don’t presume you know me.’

That hurt, more than she could’ve thought possible after all this time.

‘It was more than that and you know it.’

Understanding warred with passion before he blinked, obliterating the slightest sign he acknowledged what she’d said as true.

‘Irrelevant to our business now.’

He glanced at his watch and stood up. ‘Sorry, I have to cut this meeting short. I’ve got an interview scheduled.’

‘You want to work here?’

He shrugged, the corners of his mouth twitching.