EMMA WAS ROUSED from her sleep as the limousine pulled up to The Excelsus hotel in Buenos Aires and she wished she had managed to stay awake. The view from the plane as it had descended into Argentina had promised a stunning and wonderful place that she’d only ever had an internet connection to. Having booked Antonio’s travel itinerary there a number of times, Emma had been eager to see it for herself.
She’d been captivated by the tall, gleaming structures that reached into the sky, surrounded by a harbour of sand and sea, with twinkling with promise and excitement in the morning light, and she was sad that she had slept through the journey the waiting limousine had taken once they had made their way through the sleek airport hallways.
As she got out of the car, surprising both the driver and Antonio—clearly she had been expected to wait for the door to be opened for her—she was hit by an almost cold wind, the kind that she had come to expect from an English autumn. Remembering that Argentina’s coldest winter months took place during June and August, the slight chill in the air made Emma nostalgic for home.
When Antonio failed to emerge from the car, she turned back to catch his gaze through the open door.
‘I’m going on to the stables. You can go on in and rest up in our rooms if you like.’
But Emma didn’t want to go to the hotel. She wanted to see Buenos Aires—wanted to see the grand entrance to the race course and the small lakes she had only seen in internet pictures.
‘I’d like to see the stables,’ she said, but the slight delay in the careless shrug of his response made her realise that she was imposing. That he might want this time to himself.
‘By all means,’ he said, gesturing her to return to the car.
She got back into the warm interior, thankful for the heat that softened the surprising chill still stinging her arms. The fresh air had wiped away the jetlag she hadn’t so far been aware of. Having stayed awake during most of the flight, she had effectively worked through the night and arrived in Argentina late morning, with only two hours’ time difference.
She settled back into the plush leather seat, desperately trying to ignore the proximity to her boss that shouldn’t be affecting her the way it did.
Antonio’s fierce gaze was locked on the scene outside the window, as if he was actively trying to ignore her presence. But he had agreed that she could accompany him to the stables, and Antonio was not a man who would have agreed had he really not wanted her there, she assured herself.
The car took a sweeping loop away from The Excelsus, and Emma was slightly disappointed to find that it pulled up again only a short while later. The stables were housed directly beside the hotel, and she vaguely remembered that being the reason Antonio preferred to stay there.
This time she waited for the driver to open her door, and a half relieved, half satisfied look crossed the man’s features. She thanked him and then stood up to take in the incredible view as he went to open Antonio’s door.
The grounds of the racetrack were long and rectangular, flat and surrounded by thin fencing. Off to the left the impressive stretch of the hotel building loomed over the edges of the race course, with thin lines of aqua-blue hinting at the infinity pools that were boasted by the hotel. In her mind she filled in the hundreds and thousands of people who would cover the stands and the balconies on race day, and the incredible noise they must make.
She heard the slam of the car door behind her, and turned to see Antonio stalking off towards a group of large white buildings with terracotta-coloured roofs that reminded her oddly of the American stables she had seen amongst the Winners’ Circle holdings. She followed him through the fenced-off area, where there were more signs of life, people and horses emerging from corners and shadows as if they had previously been hidden from view.
She was two steps behind Antonio as he went deeper and deeper into the large central building.
To call it a barn would be wrong. The sheer size of it could have enveloped the whole apartment block she lived in back in Brooklyn. This structure had sleek lines, all glistening steel and chrome, and the expansive concrete floor was spotless and wet from where a young teenager further down was cleaning it. The smell of horse sweat and manure was barely discernible, and the only sound she could make out aside from Antonio’s leather-soled footsteps was a hushed conversation coming from one of the stalls.
*
Antonio was so conscious of Emma’s presence he almost missed the broad sound of John’s northern English accent coming from the stalls where Veranchetti was currently housed. At sixteen and a half hands, the horse was glorious. Its black coat gleamed in the shafts of sunlight filtering through the window at the back of the stall.
As he neared, the voices became more distinct, and the feminine lilt of an Australian accent came to a halt.
‘Antonio?’ John’s voice called out from inside. ‘That you? Reckoned you’d have swung by before now.’
Only John could make the reproach sound like a greeting. Antonio caught Mason’s eye as she made her way out of the stall. A brief nod was all she threw at him before heading off out of the building.
‘How are you?’ John asked, coming out from the stable.
‘Good, John. I’m good.’
‘I’ll say,’ John observed, watching as Emma stayed just behind Antonio. ‘I take it this is the lass, then?’
Antonio felt himself on unsteady ground as he suddenly realised that he had failed to take into account yet another person he now had to add to his list of deception. John was the only member of his father’s staff he’d stayed in contact with after he, his mother and sister had been forced to return to Italy.
It was a contact that he and the other members of the Winners’ Circle syndicate had very much used to their advantage.
‘Must say, I would’ve thought I’d not have to hear about it on Twitter.’
‘Since when are you on Twitter?’ Antonio asked, a smile playing at the edges of his mouth. ‘John—allow me to introduce you to Emma Guilham, my fiancée.’ The word felt strange on his tongue.
Emma came forward, having hesitated only slightly when he’d said fiancée. ‘Nice to meet you, John,’ she said warmly, reaching out to shake his hand.
‘Oh, no, lass, I’m all mucky,’ he said, wiping straw and mud onto his already dirty jeans.
‘Don’t be silly. I’d hardly be a match for Antonio Arcuri if I was worried about a little dirt.’
John let out a bark of laughter, shook Emma’s hand and turned to Antonio, his eyes approving. ‘I’m going to like her. First one I’ve met of yours—and the last, by all accounts.’
Something like guilt threatened to spark in Antonio’s gut, but Antonio pushed it aside. Dio, he couldn’t let her anywhere near his sister Cici. His sister would be broken-hearted when it all came to nothing.
‘How’s V?’ he asked, swiftly changing the focus of the conversation.
‘Veranchetti,’ replied John, ‘is doing fine. Survived the trip over and has been acclimatising for a good while now.’
‘And McAulty?’ Antonio asked.
From what he’d heard in the last eighteen months she’d been doing everything she’d said she would—living and breathing the horses from the Winners’ Circle stable. John had been giving him, Dimitri and Danyl weekly reports, and had voiced his positive opinion and utter confidence in her on more than one occasion.
‘She’ll do.’
It was about as high a seal of approval as John would ever give. And, from the way he was looking at Emma, it seemed to be covering both of the women who had unexpectedly entered Antonio’s life in very different ways.
Antonio had felt the calm of being inside a stable settle over him from the moment he’d come out of the wintry sun and moved into the shadows. But it was an odd calm. It always had been. The kind of calm that happened before a storm was about to hit and change everything.
He wondered if it was like Pavlov’s dog—if in some way he’d always feel like this in a stable. It was the one place where he’d repeatedly sought refuge when things at home had got too much. When he’d wanted to take the first horse he saw and ride like hell away from his home, his father and all that entailed. It was the kind of calm that anticipated adrenalin...anticipated action and adventure.
It was the kind of calm he hadn’t felt since being forced away from his home, his horses, and his once possible career as an international polo player.
As if John sensed the dark memories taking hold of Antonio, he led them from the quiet peace of the stable back out into the sunlight.
‘Were the overnighters okay?’ Antonio asked. It would have taken them a long time to get from America to Argentina, with several stops along the way.
‘Yep—paperwork was all in place, and everything went well. You might want to check in with the folks from the Hanley Cup. They’ve got some things for you to sign.’ John indicated over his shoulder to where there was a small office hidden amongst the larger buildings.
Antonio nodded his head, willingly taking the proffered escape from the stables and the threatening memories of his past.
*
Emma didn’t know what she’d expected from the stables, but it hadn’t been John. In the eighteen months she’d worked for Antonio she’d never had anything to do with the Winners’ Circle. He’d handled all that himself. Oh, she’d been curious—but never enough to intrude on Antonio’s personal endeavours.
John had watched Antonio walk off towards the office and now turned his attention back to her.
‘I’ve known that one for a long time, Emma.’
‘Is this the bit where you warn me off?’ she said, half joking and half afraid of what he might say.
‘No, lass. Reckon you know what you’re getting yourself into. But that boy...he’s just like a natural-born mustang. Wild and ready to bolt at any moment.’
Emma wanted John to stop. She was struggling enough to maintain the image of Antonio as her boss and now her fiancée. She wasn’t sure she was ready to see him as the boy he’d once been.
‘His da,’ John continued, ‘he were a hard man—no doubt. And he all but broke that boy. You’ve got him this far, Emma. Hold on to him. Even if he tries to bolt. He’s worth it, lass.’
She didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t tell him the truth. That this engagement of—what?—less than twenty-four hours?—was just for show. Just for a business deal. The sincerity ringing from John’s voice was irrefutable.
She smiled, knowing that she couldn’t do anything but keep up the façade and not break an old man’s heart. ‘I’ll do that, John. Or I’ll try,’ she said on a laugh, to lighten the tone.
To change the subject, she nodded back towards the stable.
‘Is Veranchetti the horse Mason’s going to ride in the Hanley Cup? I’m afraid I don’t know much about it,’ she said ruefully.
‘Yup. They’ve got good a chance, I reckon.’
‘It’s an odd name—though I suppose they all have odd names.’
‘Cici—his sister—named him after the hero of one of her favourite romance novels. Antonio didn’t have the heart to say no,’ he said, squinting in the sunlight, looking out at the course.
‘Does Cici ride?’
‘No, she was never that interested in the horses. But you don’t want me raking up old ghosts, Ms Guilham.’
Whether John had purposely shied away from the past, or whether he’d noticed Antonio’s return, she couldn’t tell. Either way, his presence clearly sounded the end of their conversation.
‘John’s been telling me that Veranchetti’s chances are good. I might even have to place my first ever bet!’ she said brightly.
Antonio’s dark glance told her that he didn’t believe her, and as he said his goodbyes and ushered her back towards the limousine Emma felt horribly as if she’d been treading where she shouldn’t have been...
*
The foyer of The Excelsus gleamed in the sunlight through the glass-fronted entrance. She resisted the temptation to shiver, which was more from the incredible luxury surrounding her than the temperature. Her low heels clicked on the marble flooring as they made their way towards the reception desk.
‘Mr Arcuri!’ A perfectly suited manager greeted Antonio and then turned his attention to Emma. ‘And Ms Guilham. Welcome to The Excelsus.’
Momentarily startled that the manager had greeted her by name, Emma was wrong-footed.
The man pressed a sleek black folder and two black-coloured room cards across the desk towards her. ‘Your belongings have been taken up to the suite. Would you like me to show me to your rooms, Mr Arcuri?’
‘No, thank you, I am sure that everything will be in order,’ Antonio responded, pausing only to pick up the folder and key cards before marching towards a discreet lift hidden behind steel panelling in the opposite direction from the more public elevators in the centre of the foyer.
Emma was left trailing behind, feeling once again unsettled in this environment. The excitement she had felt back in New York when she’d stayed at The Langsford was beginning to rise again. This was a glimpse of a lifestyle, experiences, that she couldn’t have imagined putting on her Living List, and she was eager to see her room.
As she came to a halt beside Antonio the question she’d felt niggling at the back of her mind had clearly become apparent.
‘Yes?’ Antonio demanded, with a return of the autocratic boss she knew he could be, who for just a moment had been absent at the stables.
‘How did he...?’
‘Know your name? I would think that, just like John, many people now know your name. After all, to all intents and purposes, you are the future Mrs Arcuri.’
Emma remembered the press articles speculating on who she was, how she had managed to capture the notorious playboy, whether she might be carrying his child. She was thankful that she had managed to get hold of both her parents to let them know what was about to happen, but hated to think of them reading all the gossip and conjecture.
The discreet lift doors opened and Antonio entered, waiting for Emma to do the same—but she couldn’t. He was in there, taking up the whole space, dominating it. Some kind of self-preservation instinct kicked in, preventing her from joining him. Until Antonio reached out a hand, caught her by the wrist and pulled her right into hell with him.
The move had startled her so much she had fallen against him, found herself pressed against the hard planes of his chest, and the physical contact drew an almost instantaneous reaction from Emma, who had been trying desperately to forget the shocking kiss that had announced their engagement to the world.
He was looking down at her, his dark hawk-like eyes watchful, almost waiting...
‘Capable of standing on your own two feet?’
Embarrassment painted her cheeks red as she disengaged her body from his. The lift was ascending with barely a jolt, and she put the flip of her stomach down to the ascent of nearly twenty floors in just seconds.
Coming to a halt, the lift opened onto a hallway with only two doors at opposite ends, and Emma slapped down her active imagination that had been expecting to walk straight out into a penthouse suite.
Not waiting for her, Antonio exited and made his way towards the door to her left. She followed, and as he swiped the key card and pressed his way forward into the suite she hovered by the door.
‘Emma?’
‘Yes? Oh, sorry. Now that you’re safely settled in, I’ll take my key and find my room,’ she said, trying to look anywhere but at where her new fiancé was standing.
His silence drew her gaze like nothing else could have. He stood there, barely a hair out of place despite the flight and the visit to the stables, his head cocked to one side, and looked at her with something in his eyes she didn’t want to name.
‘This is your room, Emma.’
Shock kept her in place, hovering outside the door to the suite. She was pretty sure her jaw had dropped.
‘That’s not going to work, Antonio.’
‘Of course it is. You’re my fiancée—where else would you be staying?’
‘Who’s to say that I’m not the kind of fiancée who believes in...in waiting for the wedding night?’
Words like sex were dangerous at the best of times, but with him...? She cursed internally. She wasn’t going to be able to do this.
‘No one—and I mean no one—would believe that I would allow my fiancée to have her own set of rooms. We’re on this path, Emma, and I will not let anything or anyone question that. This is going to have to be believable, so get used to it.’
He was standing in front of her now, so close, and strangely even more dominating than he had been in the lift.
Before she could take a breath, he continued, ‘You have your company credit card?’
Her mind was spinning enough that she was not able to understand why that would matter, but she nodded.
‘Good—perhaps if you look the part it will help you act the doting fiancée.’
She looked down in dismay at the sensible, albeit rumpled clothes she had worn on the plane. He was right. Not only did she need a whole wardrobe of clothes—those she hadn’t been able to retrieve from her apartment before coming here—but she needed a particular style of clothing.
She scowled at him. ‘No one,’ she said, echoing his earlier words, ‘would believe you would settle for doting.’
*
The concierge at The Excelsus had arranged for a car to take her to the most exclusive mall in Buenos Aires, with the assurance that it had a wide selection of fashion stores from which she would be able to get everything that she needed.
In the years since her breast reconstruction Emma had taken to shopping for clothes online, enjoying the fact that she didn’t need to expose her insecurities to anyone but the four walls of her bedroom. This, however, was daunting. But she knew Antonio was right. The level of sheer extravagance in even the daywear of the women in the hotel had been enough to convince Emma that if she needed to be Antonio’s fiancée, on his arm at evening events and at the racetrack, she would need thick and very expensive armour to succeed.
Besides, millions of women around the world who’d had reconstructive surgery did this every day. So could she.
But now, standing in the fourth store she’d entered, she felt the drive and determination that had brought her there beginning to fade. It wasn’t just a dress or two that she needed—it was an entire wardrobe. She knew that there were women who would kill to be left free in one of Argentina’s hottest fashion districts holding a credit card without a limit, but right now it was all just a little too much.
Some of the shocking and outlandish creations she had seen on display were so far outside her comfort zone, and the sheer sensuality of the Argentinian designs were both tempting and frightening in contrast to the office-style respectability of the clothing she was used to wearing in New York. But this was getting silly. She had spent so long hiding her figure behind loose clothes and dark colours. Perhaps this was a chance to make the most of this opportunity—even if she did feel slightly out of her depth.
She took her courage in both hands and approached a saleswoman who had been eying her suspiciously. Briefly, in a no-nonsense way, Emma explained the situation.
Rather than cloying mawkish sympathy she had prepared herself for, she was surprised and oddly touched when instead the woman beamed, informing her that she would be utterly delighted to help.
*
Antonio had just exited a shop, with a present each for his sister and mother safely in transit to his hotel, when he’d caught a glimpse of Emma slipping into a store. He’d held back a moment, losing her briefly as she moved amongst the mannequins and rows of designer clothes. Then, curious to see how she was getting on, he hadn’t been able to help himself as he followed her in, telling himself that he only meant to make sure that she chose clothing suitable for her new role.
He’d felt the vulnerability coming off her in waves when he’d discussed her need for a wardrobe, and had had an urge to reach out and comfort, to protect. The only other women in his life he’d ever felt like that about were his sister and his mother, and from them he understood only too well how important it was for a woman to feel beautiful in what she wore.
As he neared the back of the shop he was surprised by a high-pitched coo falling from the lips of a shop assistant. He turned just in time to see Emma twisting around to catch a glimpse of herself in the floor-to-ceiling mirror by the changing rooms.
Need and desire consumed him fiercely and unexpectedly the moment his eyes snared her. There she stood, in a strapless dress that hugged her perfect breasts and stomach, leaving her arms and shoulders bare while layers and layers of blood-red silk cascaded from her slim waist, looking almost as shocked as he felt.
He watched as she took in her own appearance, her eyes drawing upwards from where the dress fell at her bare feet all the way to the top, where she met his eyes in the reflection of the mirror.
In a second the shock in her gaze was shuttered. Her eyes narrowed and she spun round, looking at him accusingly. ‘How did you find me?’
Affronted by the way the fire in her voice matched the temperament of the dress, he couldn’t help the retort that fell from his lips. ‘I don’t have a tracker on your phone, if that’s what you’re implying.’
She scowled, and oddly Antonio felt—and resisted—the urge to laugh.
‘I’m here by mere coincidence,’ he concluded.
‘You don’t believe in coincidence.’
‘No,’ he said, feeling exasperation rise within him.
He really didn’t, and in that moment he wondered what kind of game the gods responsible for their lives were playing. Because that was exactly how he felt right now. Played.
As her hands clutched instinctively at the skirts of the dress he remembered just for a moment the feeling of her skin beneath his palms, and he forced himself to turn away before he embarrassed them both. The almost painful shock of arousal had hit him hard, and he knew it had nothing to do with how much time had passed since he’d last been in bed with a woman.
He could almost taste desire as he made his way over to the seat beside the dressing room. He was some kind of masochist to stay, but he didn’t have the will-power to leave.
A glass of champagne was left discreetly on the table beside the chair, and when he took a sip the bubbles scraped against his raw throat.
‘It’s not right,’ Emma said, looking at him, and for a moment he forgot that she was speaking about the dress.
He felt his eyes narrow instinctively, and everything male in him roared that she was wrong.
Before sanity prevailed.
‘Perhaps not. Try something else.’
*
It was a command. Uttered in a harsh tone. One that did not befit the dressing room, and Emma felt it down to her very soul.
Yet she didn’t think that they agreed for the same reason. She had never chosen clothes to accentuate her breasts before. At least not since the surgery. Before that she had been seventeen and happy with her body. Had never suffered from the kinds of insecurities she’d seen in her friends as they judged themselves against each other, against impossible to achieve celebrity figures.
But afterwards? Yes. She had let her insecurities run her wardrobe.
The selection of clothes given to her by the lovely sales assistant here was impeccable. Some of them were rather more extreme than others, but she had begun to view it as a kind of shock therapy. The more extreme made the less outrageous palatable, when once she would have baulked at the whole lot.
Emma had known women—powerful, strong, inspiring women—who had embraced their bodies and their lives with vigour after chemotherapy. She had longed to find that sense of self, and now she was beginning to realise that the courage that had seen her battle fiercely with the chemo was still needed to battle her future.
Stepping back into the changing room, she fought the instinctive urge to run. Run from Antonio’s assessing gaze...run from the desire. She wasn’t foolish enough to try and hide from what it was that had sprung forth between them.
She undid the zip hidden in the side seam of the dress and it pooled around her feet. She stepped out of the delicate red silk and her body felt the lick as if of flames across her body. There was only a thin curtain of material separating her from Antonio. She knew it and so did he.
Her exposed skin feeling overly sensitive, she reached for the last dress the assistant had procured for her.
Having already chosen some incredible day clothes, she only had evening functions to cater for, and she cursed herself for leaving the best for last. It was her favourite dress of the selection, and she’d wanted to have this moment for herself. But outside sat Antonio, glass in hand, as if he were waiting for a show. Except rather than taking her clothes off she was putting them on.
Suddenly she wanted him thrown off balance as much as she was. She wanted him to be feeling just an ounce of what he was doing to her.
Standing in a thong and nothing else, she reached for the dress and stepped into the skirt. The fabric of the dress’s blue silk was covered in a subtle lace flower pattern detail, with a figure-hugging bodice. It rubbed against her sensitive skin at the same time as the cool silk soothed. The sleeves were sheer, with the same lace detail covering her arms but leaving her décolletage bare. It covered even whilst it revealed and she silently thanked the shop assistant’s perfect eye.
Before she stepped out into the dressing area she looked at herself in the mirror, feeling that same sense of shock she had experienced when she’d seen herself in the red dress moments ago.
Was that really her? Whilst her hair and minimal make-up were almost ordinary, the dress had called forth something within her. Something powerful and feminine... Things she’d always wanted to be but had never seemed to achieve. There was a blush to her cheeks, making more of her cheekbones than she was used to, and the glitter in her eyes shone like diamonds.
She pulled aside the curtain that separated her from Antonio and everything else faded away—the assistant, the shop...it all disappeared and only he came into focus.
And her lungs stopped working.
Because Antonio Arcuri, destroyer and saviour of global companies, was looking at her as if she were the only thing in the world and she nearly came undone.