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‘No, Luc—’ She stopped. The expression on his hard, autocratic face chilled her to the bone. What was she going to do? Say no to him? Did she really want a life for her child where its mother was always looking over her shoulder to see if Luc was coming to claim her baby, or was she going to sort this out now?
‘Anything more you have to say to me can be said in Brazil,’ Luc informed her.
‘I’m not going anywhere until we talk. This isn’t some business deal where you can reasonably request a change of venue. We’ll talk here, and then I’ll decide if I’m going to travel halfway across the world with you.’
‘I can’t force you into anything,’ he confirmed, ‘so if you’re happy to ignore all the things your child is going to benefit from in Brazil, I can’t do much about it.’ He shrugged. ‘But I would have thought that as a mother you would at least want to familiarise yourself with the country where your child is going to live.’
‘My child will live with me,’ she exclaimed, panic-stricken.
‘Which is why I intend to repeat my offer of a job,’ Luc informed her coolly. ‘And this time I suggest you listen carefully to my proposal before you turn it down.’
Her head was reeling. She couldn’t take it in. Just when she thought she had everything sorted out in her head, Luc threw a curveball. ‘You’re offering me a job in Brazil?’
‘I don’t know what else you think I could mean. You proved satisfactory in London, so why wouldn’t you prove satisfactory in Brazil?’
Satisfactory? Was he talking about her satisfaction rating as a chambermaid or in his bed? Luc’s stare didn’t waver. He had no intention of dressing it up. Whatever he was talking about, she was satisfactory, no more, no less.
‘Don’t you think you’d better go and start packing?’ he prompted impatiently.
‘I’ve got no intention—’ She stopped as he turned away to pick up the phone. Luc wasn’t even listening to her. He was arranging a flight to Brazil.
* * *
Bundled up warmly in coat, scarf and woolly hat, Emma waited outside the hotel for Luc with her single battered suitcase. He arrived, frowning like an avenging angel, looking, as always, as if he’d just stepped out of the pages of a magazine. Dark jacket. Blue jeans. Heavy boots.
‘Where were you? I looked for you inside.’ Turning away impatiently before she had a chance to answer, he tipped the man who had brought up his car. ‘Why did you carry your own suitcase?’ he demanded. ‘Why are you standing in the cold? There’s no need to make yourself a martyr, Emma.’
‘I’m not a martyr. I’m self-sufficient,’ she said, biting her tongue on everything else she would like to say. But Luc was right about the cold. It was freezing. The snow was drifting down and there were inches of ice beneath her feet, but she’d had to get out of the suffocating atmosphere of the hotel and breathe some clean, fresh air. She had left with a surprisingly good reference, and had been told she could come back at any time. Once again Luc had smoothed the path for her, whether she’d wanted him to or not. And now he took charge of her suitcase and helped her into the car.
He drove with confidence over the icy roads to the airport where his private jet was waiting. ‘Are you warm enough?’ he asked, as she hugged herself for comfort at the thought of the long trip ahead of her and its unknowable outcome.
‘Yes, thank you.’
Everything was happening so fast she felt as if the little control she still had was slipping away like sand through her fingers.
‘I’m surprised you’re not more enthusiastic,’ he commented as a fresh blanket of snow came tumbling down. ‘Rio,’ he murmured, as if landing in his own country couldn’t come fast enough for him. ‘Sunshine, samba and the best beaches in the world.’
Luc was a true son of heat and passion, Emma reflected, her stomach tightening on the thought, while she was better here in ice and snow, never allowing her passions to be roused. A thought that niggled at her when Luc went on to explain that she would be working at his flagship hotel, which was tempting, though she’d be right under his nose.
‘It’s a job with real prospects, Emma—a managerial position.’
‘What?’ She questioned this, feeling she wasn’t ready for such a responsible position. When she’d left London she had only been halfway through her training course. A job in management was still several years away for her.
