THE BRAVO BILLIONAIRE Page 13

  "But we won't be in jeopardy. I am not going to believe that. Nobody is after us. It's been thirty years since your brother was kidnapped, and nobody's tried to hurt you or your family since then. It is not going to happen again."

  "Easy for you to say."

  "Jonas, you can protect us here – as much as we really need protectin', anyway. Please. Just give staying at my house a chance."

  He stepped back, started to turn. "I'm taking Mandy with me. We are leaving now."

  "Oh, wait…" She grabbed his arm.

  He froze, looked down at her hand where it gripped his forearm, then slowly into her eyes.

  She let go of him. "You know what Blythe's will says. You have to live with me, where I say we will live, for one year. If you don't—"

  "Are you threatening me, Emma?"

  "No. I am … remindin' you of our situation. And I am, well, I am willin' to compromise."

  Coward, a voice in her head taunted. Lily-livered ninny. Yellow-bellied fool…

  Should she stand firm? Well, okay. Maybe. But if he took Mandy and returned to the mansion, where would they be but right back where they'd started? Yes, she could sue him, and maybe somehow save Mandy– from what, it was becoming less and less clear to her.

  From her brother's overbearing protectiveness, maybe. From a life locked away at Angel's Crest.

  But even if by some miracle she managed to wrestle custody from him and save Mandy, well, who would save Jonas?

  His eyes had gotten warier – but he hadn't turned away again. "Compromise, how?"

  "We'll go back to Angel's Crest with you now, all of us."

  "And?"

  "And from now on … we share a bedroom, you and me."

  He made a low, disbelieving sound. "I told you—"

  "I know you did. You sleep alone. But that's my offer. What do you say?"

  He said nothing.

  "You know, Jonas. I can't say as I'm flattered at how bad you don't want to sleep with me."

  "Emma…"

  "No. I'm not done yet. I'm gonna go further. Don't sleep with me. But don't come to my room nights, either."

  He made that noise in his throat again, the one of total and complete disbelief. "You're not serious. You don't want that any more than I do."

  "Well, thank you for admittin' it."

  "I haven't made any secret of the fact that I want to be in your bed."

  "Right. You just don't want to stay there for very long."

  "Emma—"

  "Wait. I am not finished. This is my last offer. Mandy and I will go back with you to Angel's Crest. And you will not come to my bed again unless you're plannin' on stayin' in it till dawn."

  He swore.

  She told him, "There's more."

  "Great. I cannot wait to hear it."

  "We will have … time. Together. You and me. And Mandy, too. I know you are a busy man. I'm not gonna ask for the impossible. Say, ten hours, total, a week. And three of those ten hours will include Mandy. We can have dinner together, meet for lunch, take in a movie, go for nice, long walks. Whatever. But there won't be any lovemakin' going on, not until you decide to—"

  He put up a hand. "I get the picture."

  "Well, then. Do you agree?"

  "Yes. I'll stay out of your bed unless I plan on sleeping there – or unless you change your mind."

  She didn't like the look on his face. It was much too self-satisfied. "Wait a minute. I never said anything about changin' my mind."

  "No, Emma, you didn't, I was the one who said that."

  * * *

  Chapter 14

  «^»

  When they got back to Angel's Crest, Jonas asked Emma to have dinner with him. She accepted. After the meal, he walked her up to her room.

  "That's two hours you have spent with me," she said when they got to her door. "Eight more to go by next Thursday." She looked very determined – and utterly adorable.

  He allowed himself a smile. "Keeping score, are you?"

  "Just keeping our agreement."

  "Change your mind anytime."

  "Stay the night."

  Jonas shook his head with a great deal more regret than he wanted to feel. "Sleep well, Emma."

  "Don't you worry. I will."

  * * *

  The next day, Friday, she dropped in on him at Bravo, Incorporated. He found it vaguely irritating, the thrill that shivered through him when his receptionist buzzed him to say that Mrs. Bravo would like to see him.

  He was alone in his office, with no appointments or meetings for the next hour. Good timing on her part, he supposed – not that it wouldn't have been a simple matter to let her cool her heels a little, to tell the receptionist he didn't want to be disturbed.

  He said nothing of the kind. He didn't even stall. He was too damn anxious for the sight of her. "Send her in."

  She strolled into his office in her spiky-heeled shoes and dropped into one of the two leather wing chairs opposite his desk. She crossed those long legs and folded her hands loosely in her lap.

  "I have come to ask if we can take Mandy to the zoo on Saturday," she announced. "I know I should have asked you last night. But I didn't think of it until this morning. And then, well, I thought maybe I'd be more likely to convince you if I came in person. So here I am." He watched that beauty mark by her mouth. "Or Sunday," she added, eyes round with apprehension. "We can go Sunday if that would be better for you…"

  What would be better for him? Easy: for her to give up this foolishness and let him back into her bed.

  "Jonas, please can't we do this? I think Mandy will love it, seein' the animals, gettin' out for a while…"

  She must have noticed he was staring at her legs. She coughed and recrossed them. "Jonas?"

  He looked into her sweet, flushed face.

  And he couldn't help thinking that a one-time excursion wouldn't be all that risky. Criminals, after all, studied – and made use of – the routines of their victims. Being at the same public place at the same time of day on a regular basis, or living in a house that could not be secured – those were two of the most effective ways to court trouble. Anyone out to do harm could learn with relative ease where to find his victim and when. But a one-shot deal? He and Emma and Mandy would have their day at the zoo and be back at Angel's Crest before anyone was the wiser. They might end up dogged by a reporter or two, but he could handle that.

  "All right," he said. "Tomorrow."

  That tiny mole disappeared into the shadow of her cheek as she beamed him a thousand-watt smile. "That is just great. I thought we could maybe leave around ten, if that's all right, grab a chili dog or something while we're at the zoo."

  "Sounds good to me."

  "Oh, I am so glad." She stood.

  He realized he shouldn't have agreed so swiftly. Now she would leave. "Wait…"

  She blinked those eyes, which he swore right then were the color of emeralds. And after she blinked, she just stood there, between the leather wing chair and the extensive mahogany expanse of his desk, giving him a chance to tell her why he had asked her to wait.

  The invitation seemed to come out of his mouth all by itself. "Tonight, I'm having a friend in for dinner." It was the independent film producer he'd had to put off the night before. "I'd like you to join us."

  The dark lashes swept down again, then up. He saw pure pleasure in her eyes. "Well, that would be real nice. Thank you, Jonas."

  "We'll have drinks in the front room. Around eight."

  "I will be there." She started to turn.

  He decided he ought to give her more information. "His name's Ledger DelVecchio and—"

  She spun back to him. "The movie director?"

  She had succeeded in surprising him again. "Director and producer. You've heard of him?"

  "Sure. Blythe said once that she thought he was very talented."

  Jonas had met Ledger through Blythe. Years ago, the moviemaker had been one of her strays, a very skinny kid from San Pedro with big d
reams and a battered Super 8 movie camera constantly running in front of his face.

  Emma said, "After all the great things Blythe said about him, I went out and rented one of his movies – the one about the dog that saved New York."

  "Sparky."

  "That's right. Oh, and the one about the aliens – both the space kind and the illegal kind, and the border patrol and the mutated bananas. I saw that, too. Fruit of Venus, wasn't that it?"

  "I believe so."

  "I like a movie where everything doesn't get wrapped up all nice and neat at the end."

  "Ledger's movies certainly qualify on that score."

  She chuckled. So did he. But then the laughter faded and they were left looking at each other across the too-wide desk.

  "Well," she said finally. "I guess I ought to let you get back to work."

  He was sick of the damn desk between them. He stood and went around it. "There's no rush. Want some coffee?"

  "I would love some – I mean, if you are sure that I am not interrupting anything." She sat back down again.

  He buzzed his secretary and asked her to send in a coffee tray. Then he dropped into the other wing chair, the one right next to hers. They talked – about Ledger and his strange movies. About how much Mandy was going to enjoy her first trip to the zoo. About how if they didn't watch it, they'd use up their ten hours long before the week was out.

  "There's no reason we can't spend more than ten hours together, is there?" he heard himself asking.

  And she said, "Well, of course there isn't. No reason at all…"

  * * *

  Ledger DelVecchio was part Mexican, part African-American, part Italian and part Irish – or so he claimed. "I am the real America," he was fond of informing anyone who would listen. "Does that make you nervous?"

  In Jonas's opinion, Ledger was too scrawny to make anyone nervous. He stood six-foot-three and weighed perhaps one hundred and fifty pounds, possibly less. He had skin the warm brown of a walnut shell and black eyes. Once his hair had been black, too. But for over a decade now, he had dyed it an improbable shade of blond and shaved it off even with the tops of his ears, so that it looked like a lemon-yellow bird's nest turned upside down on the crown of his head.

  He and Emma hit it off from the first, which Jonas had somehow suspected they might. Emma told Ledger how much she admired Sparky and Fruit of Venus. Then the two of them spent perhaps a half an hour discussing the lovable personality and amazing scenting ability of the bassett hound – Sparky, the star of the film by that name, had been a bassett hound.

  By the time they sat down to the table, Ledger was off and running on the subject of his latest project, which Jonas had already figured out he would end up paying for, and which Emma appeared to find absolutely fascinating.

  "Oh, no, you are kiddin' me. I do not believe it. And then what happens next?"

  Ledger told her, in detail, in that basso profundo voice of his that sounded impossible coming out of a man so damn skinny.

  After the meal, they retired to the media room. Ledger showed them a few clips he had brought. Ledger always stayed late into the night when he visited. He drank Chivas when he partied and he could put the stuff away, never seeming to get the least bit drunk, simply becoming more relaxed and expansive as the hours went by.

  Emma left them at a little after one.

  Ledger hardly let her get out of the room before he was singing her praises. "She's an original, Jonas. You are one lucky man. Someone real, with a heart to match her bra size. What you needed. Open you up a little, get you to chill some. And that accent, jus' sweet as a li'l ole piece of country pie. Blythe found her, didn't she? Leave it to Blythe…" His black eyes misted over. "Damn it, why is it the good ones are always gone too soon?"

  Jonas said he wished he knew and offered more Chivas. Ledger didn't say no. Jonas poured them each another drink. And then another after that…

  Ledger stayed until well after three, at which time Jonas invited him to make himself comfortable in one of the guest suites.

  Ledger refused, as he always did. "It's one thing to drink your booze, to help myself to your caviar and hearts of palm. But I got to keep my edge. Can't weaken too much, can't start lying myself down in the decadent mansions of the white power establishment."

  Jonas had one of his drivers take Ledger home. Then, alone in the living room off the grand foyer, feeling slightly drowsy and more than a little bit buzzed, he poured himself one more drink. As always, he'd enjoyed seeing Ledger and he didn't even mind parting with the few hundred thousand it was going to cost him to help make Ledger's latest dream a celluloid reality.

  What he did mind was going up to his room without stopping in to visit his wife first.

  Jonas swore, though there was no one else in the room to hear it. He sipped that last drink, which he knew damn well he should not have poured. As he sipped, he reminded himself that it had not even been thirty-six hours since they'd come to the agreement that kept him out of her bed, that she was the one who would change her mind eventually. All he had to do was wait awhile.

  He dropped to a sofa, swirled the ice cubes around in his glass, listened to the cheerful clinking sounds they made. He would finish this drink and go up to bed.

  His bed.

  He drank the last of it, then set the glass on the side table near his elbow. But he didn't get up. He found himself studying an old family photo on the low table in front of him: his grandmother and his grandfather, his father and his uncle Blake, who had been disinherited at the age of twenty – and died in an apartment fire not many years later. Blake's weird pale eyes seemed to glitter at him, full of malice and evil intent.

  Jonas grunted. He looked away from the old photograph, stared into the middle distance, pondering.

  Maybe it was the booze, breaking down his defenses, clouding his judgment, but right now, he found he couldn't help wondering…

  Was it really all that important to sleep alone?

  He blinked, shifted on the sofa. Damn right it was important. He had always slept alone. He had trouble getting to sleep in the first place. And once he managed that, he tossed and turned a lot.

  He might whack Emma in the face with a flung-out arm. He might kick her. He would unquestionably hog the bed and take all the covers. The truth was, when he did finally drop off to sleep, he was usually out of control. He knew this because of the state of his bed when he woke.

  And sometimes, when he had a certain dream – a dream he could never actually remember – things could get very ugly indeed.

  Jonas waved his hand in front of his face and instructed aloud, "Forget the damn dream."

  He hadn't had it in a long time now – except for that once, the night Blythe died, which was pretty understandable. Before that, it had been over a year. And since the night of his mother's death … nothing. The odds were he wouldn't have the dream again for a long time to come. Maybe never.

  Yeah. No reason he couldn't forget the damn dream.

  Jonas smiled to himself.

  They got along pretty well, he and Emma. Tomorrow, by God, they were going to the L.A. zoo with Mandy. Just like a family. And wasn't that something new and completely different?

  Not that it was anything lasting. No, nothing permanent. And that was part of the charm of it.

  What was it Ledger had said tonight? That Emma was real, that she was just what he needed, to "open him up a little," to help him to "chill." That was pretty much, he imagined, what his mother had thought when she'd cooked up this whole crazy plan to marry him off to her for a year.

  And maybe it was working. A little.

  Right now – so late at night it couldn't be called anything but tomorrow, after an evening of good company and a couple more whiskeys than he should have allowed himself – it didn't seem like anything but good news that his eccentric mother's bizarre marriage scheme was working out all right, after all.

  Jonas looked down at his shoes. The hand-woven rug underneath them had a m
edallion pattern. The medallions seemed to be … shifting. Hell. The whole room was shifting.

  But only a little. Like a boat gently rocking on a placid sea.

  He spoke again to the empty room. "Bed. Now."

  Carefully, he raised himself up off the sofa.

  Once on his feet, he sucked in a couple of slow, deep breaths. Yes. It was all right. He was drunk, but not so drunk he couldn't make it where he needed to go.

  He started for the tall doors that led to the grand foyer.

  * * *

  When he reached the top of the staircase, he had a choice: go left, to his own bedroom suite. Or right. He went right.

  When he got to her door, he put his hand on the knob. It turned. She hadn't locked it.

  But then he let go without opening it.

  No. It wouldn't be right, to wander into her bedroom now at – he braced one hand on the doorframe and lifted the wrist of his other hand to squint at his watch – 4:03 a.m.

  Not right. Not a good thing, so late at night it was morning already, reeking of whiskey, weaving when he walked.

  Better to just go on along to his own room, deal with all this – Emma, their agreement, whether or not he wanted to back down on this issue – tomorrow, with a clear head.

  But then, his feet didn't want to start walking again. It seemed a huge, impossible distance, all the way to his own suite of rooms. His feet weighed a thousand pounds each and everything was slowly, lazily spinning around…

  He grunted, turned, braced himself against the wall right next to the door and slowly slid down it, until he was sitting cross-legged on the geometrically patterned runner that ran the length of the hall.

  Well, and now he was down there, he didn't see any reason to remain in a sitting position. Why not relax a little? Whom was it gonna hurt?

  Whom…

  He let out a low laugh, thinking of Emma, yesterday, telling him it wasn't a "what" but a "who."

  He had corrected her. You mean it's a "whom."

  Who, whom, what's the difference? It's me, Jonas. You are hiding from me…

  Jonas shook his head. Hiding, was he?

  The hell he was. He was right out here, at her door, sitting on the floor.