THE BRAVO BILLIONAIRE Page 4

  "Real soon?"

  "That's right."

  Jonas flexed his fingers around the handle of his briefcase. "Pixie."

  "Uh. Yeah?"

  "I want you to move away from that door."

  Pixie's plump chin quivered and the rhinestone in her nose seemed to be blinking at him. "No, I can't do that."

  "Yes, you can. And I think you should." He took the three steps that were necessary to bring him right up close to her.

  She looked at him and he looked at her.

  "I'm not a very nice man, Pixie. Do you understand?"

  Slowly, she nodded.

  "Get out of my way."

  Pixie maintained the stare-down for another ten seconds. That was all she could take. Then, with a small moan, she sidled to the right.

  "Thank you." Jonas opened the door.

  Beyond it, the walls were cobalt blue with white trim and the floor was black-and-white linoleum, a classic checkerboard pattern. A pink-smocked Emma Lynn Hewitt stood by a metal-topped table with some sort of adjustable pole attached to it, a noose at the end of the pole. On the table, below the dangling noose, sat a dog. A very small dog – perhaps seven inches tall and six pounds, max. The dog had long, soft-looking caramel-colored fur and bright, slightly bulging eyes.

  Jonas registered these details in the first second or two after he entered the room, right before the dog attacked him.

  * * *

  Chapter 4

  «^»

  The dog leapt at him, yapping.

  Emma Lynn Hewitt came after it, emitting firm and totally ineffective commands. "Hitchcock, stay! Hitchcock, sit!"

  Jonas lifted his briefcase, positioning it as a makeshift shield. The little dog slammed against it and dropped to the floor, where it lay stunned for perhaps a count of three.

  And then it was up again, grabbing onto the end of Jonas's left trouser leg with its sharp, white teeth.

  "Oh, please don't kick him," begged Emma. The dog growled and wriggled and ripped at his pant leg. Jonas stood absolutely still. "Then I'd suggest you get him away from me. Now."

  "Hitch. Here, Hitch…"

  The dog paused, blinked, and then picked up where it had left off, nails clicking fiercely on the linoleum as it yanked backwards, making a rag of the fine lightweight wool.

  Emma knelt. "Hitchcock. Front."

  The dog froze. Growled.

  "Front, Hitch. Front."

  The dog gave another growl, then let go.

  She scooped the animal into her arms, stood, and backed up. "Good boy. Such a very, very good boy." The dog whined and licked her chin. She glanced at Jonas. So did the dog, which immediately started growling again. "Wait outside in the hall. I'll be right there."

  Jonas advised, "Don't disappoint me, Emma."

  "I won't. I promise. I'll be right out."

  He turned for the door.

  "Send Pixie in," she said, as he opened the door.

  Since Pixie was standing on the other side wearing the guilty expression of someone caught eavesdropping, there was no need to relay the message. Pixie went in as soon as he got out.

  For once, the dog groomer didn't make him wait.

  In under a minute, she came out of the blue room, closing the door and then slumping against it, pale head bowed. She was wearing leopard-skin patterned pants beneath the pink smock, the kind that fit like a second skin and came to just below her knees. There were black platform thongs on her feet. Her toenails were metallic gold. Right then, she reminded him of a very young, very vulnerable Marilyn Monroe.

  "I am sorry," she said, still looking down. "Hitch hates the noose, so I don't use it. After a little conversation and a lot of praise, he's usually real good for me. But you surprised him, bursting in the room like that. Pomeranians don't like surprises."

  "No kidding."

  One of the pink-smocked women – this one skinny as a rail with short, spiky red hair – came out of a door at the opposite end of the hall, leading a fine-looking collie on a leash. The woman paused. "Em? You okay?"

  Emma looked over, forced a smile. "I'm fine, Deirdre."

  Deirdre took the collie through the door to the waiting room.

  Emma turned her gaze on him then, her expression wistful. "Don't tell me. Let me guess. Armani, right?"

  He realized she was referring to his tattered trousers. "Vincent Nicolosi."

  "Who?"

  "Never mind."

  "Someone so exclusive, I've never heard of him, huh?"

  He shrugged.

  "You just send me the bill, all right?"

  As far as Jonas was concerned, they'd talked enough about his trousers. "I have something important to discuss with you."

  "Jonas, I really don't have time right now to—"

  He was already striding back down the hall. He stopped at the door that led to the office room. "In here."

  "Jonas, I can't—"

  "In here. Now."

  Amazingly, she did what he'd told her to do, platform thongs clipping smartly as she came toward him. She opened the door. "After you."

  He went in.

  She followed, gestured at the two pink Naugahyde chairs opposite the desk. "Have a seat."

  He didn't sit. He laid his briefcase on her desk, opened it, and took out the prospectus. "Here." He held it out to her.

  "What's that?"

  "A plan I've put together."

  She folded her arms below those ripe-looking breasts. "What kind of a plan?"

  "A damn good one." Since she wouldn't take it, he dropped the prospectus on the desk. "We're going to expand this business of yours. You'll open five new PetRitz locations – in Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Dallas, Philadelphia and New York City. One a year, starting next year. I will take all the risks, and put up all the money. The majority of the profit from this venture will be yours."

  "It will?"

  "Yes."

  "And what exactly do I have to do to get so lucky?"

  "You'll contribute your time. Lots of it. And also your … expertise."

  "I heard that." Her eyes were moss green, or maybe hazel. They kept changing color. And they seemed to be twinkling with humor right then. That little mole above her lip tucked itself into the shadow of her cheek as she grinned.

  "Heard what?" he demanded.

  "The way you hesitated before you said 'expertise,' like you didn't really mean it."

  "I assure you. I did mean it."

  She tipped her head to the side. "Sure you did. And a Texas summer never gets all that hot."

  "Emma, I am very well aware that you've done a fine job here. PetRitz, by any standard, is a success. And my mother realized an excellent profit on her investment."

  "You bet she did."

  "So now, I'm going to help you expand."

  She kept her arms wrapped around her. "In exchange for what?"

  "In exchange for—"

  She put up a hand. "No. Don't tell me. Let me guess." She fluttered her eyelashes, which were curly and dark around those almost-green eyes. "I know. You want me to agree to give up any claim to Mandy."

  He sought the most diplomatic way to say yes.

  Before he found it, she prompted, "Am I right?"

  "Emma—"

  "Just answer the question."

  "All right. Yes. You'll give up all claim to custody of Mandy."

  "No."

  He glared at her. "Just read the damn thing, will you?"

  "I'm not going to give up my claim to custody of your sister. Or at least, if I do, it's not gonna be because you have paid me off. Oh, Jonas." She raked both hands back through that white-gold hair and she groaned at the ceiling. "Haven't we been through this already, more than once?"

  "No. This is all new. This is a great opportunity for you to build on what you've got here."

  "Well, fine. It's a great opportunity and I'm passin' it up – considering that to take it would mean I'd have to turn my back on the dyin' wish of the second most wonderful woman I h
ave ever known."

  He must have frowned.

  Because she explained, "The first most wonderful bein' my aunt Cass. You know all about my aunt Cass, now, don't you? Blythe told me how you sicced your detectives on all of her friends. How you keep files on folks, how you never, ever trust anyone."

  "Excuse me. There are people whom I trust."

  "Oh, sure. Maybe. After you've had your detectives on them, keepin' track of their every move for ten or twenty years."

  He felt that urge again, to wrap his hands around her pretty neck and squeeze. He spoke more quietly than ever. You have no idea the kind of precautions a man in my position has to take."

  "You don't have to take precautions, Jonas. You just do. I mean, all those guards you have out there at that mansion of yours…"

  He did not have guards. Not exactly. He employed a skilled and discreet security force to patrol the grounds at Angel's Crest.

  The woman was smirking. "Bel Air is a gated community, with security guards checking out anybody who tries to get in. And then you've got that big stone fence around your property. And did I mention that other locked gate smack in the middle of that high stone fence, that gate with the camera that zooms in on anyone who rings to be let in? And is that all? Oh, no. There is more. Because you've also got those guys straight out of Men in Black sneakin' around in the jacaranda trees, talkin' to each other on their walkie-talkies. I mean, pardon me, Jonas, but you are kind of paranoid."

  "No." He spoke with extreme patience. "I am not paranoid. I am careful."

  "You are too careful. And I keep thinkin' that, no matter how much you love Mandy – and I do know that you love her, Jonas – but no matter how much you care for her, she can't help but be affected by the way you are, by the way you keep people away from you, the way you are so afraid to trust anybody."

  "I am not afraid." He spoke more forcefully than he meant to.

  She actually had the temerity to roll those just-about-green eyes.

  Clearly, they were getting nowhere. He said, very quietly, "I want you to take a good, long look at that offer." He turned to leave.

  She spoke to his back. "Jonas, this is pointless. I am not goin' to—"

  "I'll call you tonight." He shut the door on her before she could finish whatever it was she had started to say.

  * * *

  He called her at midnight. She answered the phone on the first ring. "What?"

  "Did you read it?"

  "I did. All the way through to the part about how I give up all claim to custody of Mandy. And then I stopped reading."

  "Why?"

  "Because I'm not takin' this offer – which I already told you this afternoon. If you'd only bothered to listen, you could have saved yourself a phone call tonight."

  At that moment, Jonas realized he was truly and completely fed up with this woman. So fed up that he said exactly what he was thinking. "I could ruin you, Emma Lynn Hewitt."

  She gasped. He found the small, shocked sound inordinately satisfying. "I guess that was a threat, huh?"

  "Let's call it a warning."

  "Call it what you want. It won't work." There was steel beneath the twang. "A person's got to stand for somethin' or she'll fall for anything. My aunt Cass used to say that."

  Terrific. Now she was going to beat him over the head with clever little sayings from country-western songs. "I could care less what your aunt Cass used to say."

  "Well, all right. Then listen to this. This is what I say. You are not bullyin' me into doing things your way."

  The problem, Jonas realized then, was that she meant exactly what she said. Damn her.

  This couldn't be happening to him. But it was.

  Everyone had a price – except, apparently, Emma Lynn Hewitt. For Emma Lynn Hewitt, no amount would be high enough.

  He could break her, financially, and she knew it. Yet even the threat of losing everything she'd worked for wouldn't make her give in and see things his way. The woman had values. And she was determined to stick by them. She would come to her own decision, in her own time. And whatever that decision was, he was going to have to live with it.

  "Oh, Jonas." Her tone, all at once, had become insultingly gentle. "I do understand why you are how you are. Blythe told me all about it. And it's no secret anyway. I know it was all over the newspapers back then. Such an awful, terrible thing. I am so sorry, that ugly things like that can happen, that sometimes evil never gets made right. And Blythe, well, you probably know that she blamed herself. She said that her breakdown took her away from you just when you needed her most."

  Jonas put the phone below his chin and sat back in his chair. He looked up at the intricately carved crown moldings overhead.

  Emma Hewitt blathered on. "When she was better, she tried to reach out to you. But she said, by then, you'd spent so much time feelin' all alone that you were used to it. You wouldn't open up to her. You wouldn't open up to anyone, you wouldn't—"

  Jonas had heard enough. Very quietly, while she was still talking, he hung up the phone.

  * * *

  After that, Jonas waited. He had finally understood that he had no other choice. He did not call Emma Hewitt or try in any way to contact her again.

  Three more days went by. During that time, he found he was coming to grips with the fact that there would be a long court battle.

  So be it. Possession was nine-tenths of the law. Mandy lived with him and she would continue to live with him. He could have his lawyers stall and negotiate for years. By the time Emma Hewitt won custody – if, in the end, she did win – Mandy would be all grown-up and running her own life, anyway.

  By Monday, one week before the deadline set out in Blythe's will, Jonas had become certain that he would not hear from the Hewitt woman until the deadline had passed and her lawyer got in touch with his lawyer to begin the custody suit.

  That night, she came to him at Angel's Crest.

  * * *

  Chapter 5

  «^»

  It was eleven-thirty at night and it was raining when Palmer got the call from the gatehouse. The butler found Jonas at his desk in the study.

  "Ms. Emma Lynn Hewitt at the main gate, sir."

  Jonas shut the lid on his laptop, aware suddenly of the feel of his own blood, the hot surge of it through his veins. "Tell them I'm expecting her and let security know she's on the way up."

  "Of course."

  "Show her in here when she gets to the house."

  "I'll do just that, sir."

  Palmer left him.

  Jonas got up and went to the bank of windows nearest the desk. He stared out at the night, at the lacy shadows of the jacarandas moving in the wind and the waving branches of the palms. The hard warm August rain pinged against the leaded-glass panes, glittering as it slithered down.

  The study was at the front of the house. After a time, he saw her headlights cut the night. The lights slid past the window where he stood and stopped not far from the front portico. They went dark.

  Jonas didn't move. He waited, standing absolutely still.

  Soon enough, he heard the door behind him open. "Ms. Hewitt," Palmer announced.

  Jonas turned.

  She stood in the doorway, Palmer close behind her. She wore an ordinary gray raincoat thrown over a curve-hugging shirt of some sort of elasticized lace. The shirt didn't quite meet the waist of her clinging white bell-bottomed pants. His glance moved down. She wore rain-wet platform sandals on her feet. There was purple polish – polish the same color as the tight lace shirt – on her toes.

  "Hello, Jonas."

  He met her gaze. Her eyes were very green right then. And troubled. Raindrops glittered in her pale hair.

  "Thank you, Palmer," Jonas said.

  The butler left them.

  "I want to see Mandy," Emma Lynn said.

  "She's asleep."

  "I'm not going to wake her up. I just … I have to see her."

  "Why?"

  "I meant what I told you, J
onas. I have been making up my mind."

  "Fine. Why is it necessary for you to see my sister?"

  She seemed at a loss for a reason, only looked at him, an urgent kind of look, through those troubled green eyes.

  He left the window and approached her. Her eyes widened as he got close, as if she feared his nearness. But she didn't step back.

  He went past her. "This way."

  * * *

  Emma followed Jonas out to the entry hall, with its ebony-inlaid walnut floor and its coffered and arched cathedral ceiling rising three stories high. The grand foyer, Blythe had always called it.

  Jonas began to climb the curving staircase. Emma fell in step behind him.

  Mandy's rooms were on the second floor. Jonas went past the dark playroom and entered the bedroom. Lightning flashed once, bright and hard, outside. For a split second, the yellow and blue walls stenciled with dragonflies and dancing frogs were cast into sharp relief.

  Then the room plunged into shadow again. The rain drummed away outside, a low sort of sighing sound.

  Mandy had graduated from her crib to a big white four-poster several months ago. She lay in the center of the roomy bed, on her side, the quilted yellow and green comforter covering her to her waist, both hands tucked beneath her plump chin. Her thick, silky curls looked very dark against the yellow pillow.

  Emma tiptoed to the bed and stood looking down, painfully aware of Jonas, so silent and watchful, in the shadows behind her.

  Mandy yawned, then let out a small, contented sigh. She rolled to her back, flopping her arms up and out, so that her hands lay palms-up on the pillow at either side of her head. Her little fists tightened, then went lax again.

  As Emma stared at those small, perfect hands, it almost seemed she could hear Blythe's voice in her mind…

  "Am I crazy, Em? Am I totally irresponsible, to want a baby so much at this time in my life?"

  "No, you are not crazy. Not crazy at all."

  It had been a Saturday. The Saturday after Thanksgiving. They'd been Christmas shopping. And they'd stopped in at a Mexican restaurant on Melrose for lunch.

  Blythe had leaned toward Emma across their table, her face earnest, her voice low. "I want … I guess I want a chance to do right by a child, to help someone grow up and to do a good job of it. I wasn't there, when it mattered, for Jonas." She sat back, her eyes suddenly far away and dark with pain. "And with my other baby, I never even had a chance."