AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"They treated you like you were less than because your father's company is not as big."
"I had no voice in that household and I only realized how bad it was after I left, when suddenly I got to make all the choices about my life and how I spent each day." She put her tablet down in her lap and stared out at the ocean again. "My father used me as a bargaining chip to leverage better deals with a company out of his league beforehand."
Was Richard Johnson part of the land development? Rowan was right that her father wasn't a big enough player to be involved in the investment partnership. He would have to have his investigator do some more digging. Knowledge was power.
And Lysander always acted from a position of power.
"Are you ready to return to our suite?" he asked.
Rowan gave him a once over that had his cock hardening. "That depends? Are you done working?"
"I can be."
"Then yes."
~ ~ ~
Their first port of call was Cabo San Lucas.
Rowan had picked an adventure on camelback for their excursion, and she loved it. The guide was voluble and full of anecdotes about the area and its history.
At one point, Lysander made it clear he thought she was paying too much attention to the handsome young man.
Rowan shook her head and laughed at her tycoon. "I'm supposed to hang on his every word. He's telling us about the area."
"And his family. And his own studies at university."
"Which is exactly what makes him so interesting. He's sharing more than what I could read in a guidebook. Thank you so much for finding someone like him to be our guide."
Lysander defrosted enough after that to ask a couple of his own questions.
Afterward, they stopped for lunch at a restaurant in the courtyard of a beautiful building in downtown Cabo San Lucas. Rowan found the outdoor seating charming and spent time people watching while Lysander checked his messages and email on his phone.
Their security detail used a table on either side of them, but there were plenty of other tourists and locals for Rowan to observe. Careful not to get caught staring, she soaked in vignettes of human interaction around her.
But when the fried cheese appetizer arrived, Rowan's attention went to her empty tummy and the delicious food.
"I've never had anything like this," she said.
Lysander hummed an assent, his attention fixed firmly on his phone as he typed away on the screen.
She warned, "If you don't watch out, I'll eat it all."
She'd been expecting something like cheese sticks, but this was cheese flattened and fried, to be eaten like chips with the plethora of salsas in little dishes on the table.
"I'll wait for my lunch," Lysander said without looking up.
At the reminder that more food was coming, Rowan had one last bite of the cheese and then pushed the platter away.
Taking a sip of her fresh coconut water, Rowan noticed a familiar woman walking purposefully between the tables.
Adele Fournier stopped beside their table. "Lysander, darling, if you are that bored with your companion, perhaps you should have answered my latest text."
Lysander's head jerked up. "Adele."
His expression was filled with surprise and in no way welcoming. Rowan was gobsmacked. What was the supermodel doing here? Was she on a shoot? What were the odds?
"You don't mind if I join you?" Adele asked, finally deigning to acknowledge Rowan with a lift of her perfectly shaped eyebrows.
