The Saint's Devilish Deal (2 page)

“You still do not listen, pequeña. Constance has asked you to give her three months to recuperate, do you not see that? Three months and then you’ll understand what she wants. Maybe we both will.” The last words were barely a whisper, but before Esme could wonder what he meant, Santiago stepped forward, crowding her against the adobe wall. Making her five-foot-seven frame feel absolutely dainty next to his six-foot-three of toned, taut muscle. “You have not been here as I have.” The words lashed at her heart but Esme refused to let Santiago see that he had the power to hurt her.

“No, I haven’t been here, watching her condition deteriorate without doing anything as you have,” she said acidly. His face paled and Esme closed her eyes against the pain in his gaze. She could not let herself feel empathy toward him, not now. Not after what he had done to her in Napa. She fell for his lies once and it cost her a job. She would not be fooled twice, not when it was her home and property in danger. Esme refocuse, fisting her hands at her side to keep from reaching out. Showing him any weakness. “How would you react if your father pulled a vanishing act, leaving me to run Cruz Resorts while you sat on your thumbs in the corner?”

“Leave the worrying to Tobias.” He shrugged. “My brother was always more interested in Eduardo’s dealings than I.”

“Truth, Saint, not more posturing.”

“I am no saint and you know it.”

“If the nickname fits...” She waited a beat. “The truth. I think I deserve that much.”

“If I were still involved with Cruz Resorts, I would welcome the additional time to enjoy the finer things in life.”

She scoffed. “Like you did in Napa?”

“I did enjoy you, pequeña. As for my not wanting to be here, not working for Cruz Resorts doesn’t mean I’m uninterested in your. . .property.” His eyes ran a languid race from her sleek chignon to the tips of her fire-engine red toenails.

Esme bit down on her tongue to stop the heat tingling over her body and just managed not to shift under his intent gaze. Did he think he could charm her into bed and out of Casa Constance with a simple look? Knowing Santiago, he thought just that. “How did you do it, Saint? How did you trick Constance into giving you the villa?”

“If you had listened you would understand she’s done nothing of the sort. She’s given you three months to prove you’re able to run Casa. If you’re not, she already knows I am.” His expression softened as he gazed into her eyes. “She was sick long before she allowed us to take her to el hospital. Can you not now give her what she needs to recover in exchange for management of the villa? Is it too much of her to ask her only family for that?”

His words struck her like body blows, reminding her that she hadn’t paid enough attention to Constance. Maybe if she had been more available she would have seen the signs of fatigue and illness. Maybe Santiago would not have insinuated himself so securely into the only home she had ever known.

“You’re just like them,” Esme said, the words barely a whisper. She straightened her spine and looked him in those luscious brown eyes. “I realize you see Con and I as little more than chamber maids, but Con’s business is just as viable as yours. Is that why you want to take what is rightfully ours?” A flicker of something surfaced in his gaze but was gone too quickly for her to decipher. “How long do I have before Tobias or your father is on my doorstep with bulldozers?”

“I have my own reasons for wanting Casa. My family does not run my life or my business any longer.”

“So you do want it.” Esme raised her hand to her temple and pressed.

Santiago took a step back, an emotion she couldn't read flickering over his sharp features.

“I suppose I should be grateful Aunt Constance won’t be here to watch you throw the Cruz weight around and take what is rightfully hers.”

“I do not work for Cruz Resorts.” He clenched his jaw. “I came back to Vallarta to heal from an injury and Constance was kind to me. I can’t change the past any more than you can change Con’s instructions. But, to show that I’m not in some kind of league with my father and brother, why don’t you take the first three months?” He made a grand flourish with his hands, bowing from the waist as if he were Spanish royalty. She supposed he was, more or less. Puerto Vallartan royalty at the very least.

She straightened her shoulders and pushed away from the cool adobe wall. Straight into Santiago’s personal space. His pupils darkened. She fought not to lick her lips as fire lit deep in the black depths of his eyes. She would not fall under his oh-so-charming spell. She was no longer an impressionable student star-struck that the local hero paid her a little attention. She had no illusions about men in general.

“Thank you for your kind offer, but I prefer to take the second three-month stint.” She maneuvered around him, took three steps, and turned back. “That way. I can watch you fall flat on your face.”

*

Esmerelda Quinn would be the death of him.

Santiago jumped back onto the cobbled curb just as a taxi roared past, horn honking madly. So much for laid back Puerto Vallartans, he mused. In the height of summer restaurants were packed, the resorts filled to capacity, and taxis careened madly around the city with impatient tourists.

What he wouldn’t give for an empty beach and a few open waves to assuage his guilt over the Napa fiasco. Not just Napa, he admitted. He should have called Esme when it was clear Constance wouldn’t. That decision didn’t sit well. Yes, he wanted the villa. He deserved it. Casa Constance was once Casa Magdalena, named for and belonging to his mother. She solid it Constance for a few pesos so that his father, Eduardo, wouldn’t develop the pristine coastal area to within an inch of its life. Soon after Magdalena had collapsed from a nervous breakdown. Magdalena lost her soul the day she sold the villa. So, yeah, he wanted it back. Not for his father. For himself.

For his mother, Magdalena.

  But not giving Esme the chance to say goodbye to her only family wasn’t in his plan. Now he was well and truly stuck here because if they didn’t make this work Eduardo would buy it. He would win, after all these years. Santiago couldn’t let that happen. Not while his mother was still trapped by the man.

He was getting soft. He shouldn’t care about any of this. Not about the mother who chose an abusive man over her children. Not Esme and the Napa fiasco. Certainly not the kindness Constance had shown him since that rogue wave nearly drowned him in Tahiti. He should never have come here to recover, but he had and now he was drowning in guilt just as he’d nearly drowned in the Pacific last year.

He pushed his left shoulder down and toward his ribs, feeling the awkward pull that the doctors assured him would one day simply disappear. Santiago wasn’t so sure of that. Esme was right. He didn’t want to be in Vallarta, didn’t want to be smothered in the pain of the past—but because he’d made one mistake he couldn’t leave.

Santiago reached his baby, a midnight blue Porsche, put the car in gear and roared out of the garage into Puerto Vallarta’s crazy summer traffic. In minutes he was at the marina, his gaze settled on Isla Magdalena. Eduardo’s private estate on the Yelapan peninsula. He could just make out the red tile roof of his mother’s prison.

He left the car to lean against the sturdy wood of the pier, watching the house he’d escaped so often as a child. Was she inside, staring aimlessly outside as she had done then? Or in bed with a migraine, thanks to some careless word from his father? Not that it mattered. Whatever she was doing, Magdalena was a psychological prisoner of Eduardo Cruz. Living in his home, playing the perfect wife. Unable to leave because after years of mental torture she was more afraid of the outside world than the husband who belittled and abused her.

Now, when Santiago was ready to put Puerto Vallarta in his rear view mirror, Esme was here in a buttoned up suit, with her deep brown hair scraped back in a severe twist. With her innocent eyes pleading with him to leave and stay at the same moment. If he left, Eduardo would win. If he stayed he would hurt Esme all over again.

Either way, Santiago lost.

He smiled as he remembered the anger in Esme’s green eyes when she refused to share the villa with him. Dios, but he had missed her fire over the past four years. Eduardo would chew her innocent heart up and serve up a processed Casa Constance as an after dinner aperitif.

He should be angry with her, not just for disbelieving him. Anger wouldn't come. Instead a flicker of excitement licked through his blood. He could shout from Yelapa the truth about his break from the family business and Esme wouldn't believe him, but he could show her. If he played his cards right, maybe he could make up for the sins of his past.

Santiago returned to the Porsche, and turned toward the villa. He could hear Eduardo’s voice in his head, pounding in the lesson that more was always better and never enough. He knew his plans would work. He would win Constance’s little contest.

Maybe that would free Magdalena.

Maybe it would save Esmerelda.

*

Esme topped the slight rise leading up to Casa Constance and stopped short. A gleaming Porsche sat across the paved walk leading to the front door, and her temper flared. The vehicle was a new model of Santiago’s first car. The car he had in Napa. The car that, had there been a backseat, she would have lost her virginity in. But since there was no backseat, she’d instead lost it beneath an arbor filled with grapevines. Her twenty-first birthday. Less than two months later she was out of a job, Santiago had disappeared, and his family had taken over the Napa vineyard.

She wasn’t mad at the Porsche—it was a lovely little thing—it was the assumption that the driver was more important than arriving guests. Her villa’s guests.

She looked inside the beautiful machine, saw the keys still in the ignition, and slid behind the wheel. And sighed. The supple leather seats were wonderfully buttery, holding her body like a lover’s caress. She slid the seat forward, cranked the engine, and pulled the car around to the back parking lot. It looked out of place next to her rental.

Well, that’s because it is out of place, Esme told herself, parking it in direct sunlight rather than beneath the shade of the large Parota tree. Porsche driving surfers don’t belong here. Certainly not as management. She clutched the keys, grabbed her bag, and strode into the villa.

She was immediately swamped with nostalgia. The gleaming mahogany floors still smelled slightly of lemon cleaning solution, the walls painted a burnished red and the seating areas still filled with carved wooden benches and comfortable chairs. With the wisdom—or maybe hubris—of a teenager she’d informed Constance that white walls and white furniture made the villa look like a hospital ward. So Constance had redecorated, with Esme’s help, that first year after Esme’s parents died.

“Two o’clock, no later,” came a voice from the office, followed by the sound of a phone hanging up.

Tears rose in her throat, anger at the Porsche—or the Porsche driver, she couldn’t remember—all but forgotten. Constance loved this place. Esme found solace here. She’d turned her back on this beautiful, wonderful place for business experience? She sniffed but refused to let the tears fall. If she started crying now, she might never stop and she had work to do.

A business to save.

Santiago exited Constance’s office and Esme swallowed back the memories. Focused on the envelopes in his hand, he didn’t notice her until she stood before him across the antique front desk, a rescue from an eighteen-hundreds mission.

“Pequeña, I see you made it home.” He grinned and winked. “I wasn’t sure you would remember the way.”

Another stab to the heart. Had he meant that as an insult? From his expression, she assumed it was a joke. More of The Saint’s charm. Didn’t matter, she was over the charm factor.

“I’ll never forget my way home, Santiago. Speaking of, this isn’t your home, not yet anyway. Employees park in the rear.” She dropped the Porsche keys on the desk between them and waited. He said nothing, only looked at the key ring. “The front spaces are reserved for incoming taxis and arriving guests.”

His smile turned grim. “We have no guests, at least not today.” He snagged the keys and dropped them into his pocket. “But I’ll remember your tip about parking. I am too used to being a guest here, I suppose. Speaking of guests, I had Marquez take your things to Con’s suite.”

Esme was off balance. Constance’s suite? Why not her familiar room? “Have him move them back, please, I would prefer my own room.”

“That is going to be interesting.”

Dread shivered down her spine. “Interesting? It’s a room with a bed, Santiago.”

“A bed I’ve been sleeping in since Con took me in.” He leaned his strong, tanned forearms against the desk, his hands so close she could feel his radiant body heat. His rich brown gaze fastened on her and she couldn’t move. Her breath came in little gasps and her throat tightened.  But she held herself upright, refusing to sway further into his orbit. “I’ve been sleeping in your bed, Esmerelda, and here you want to join me after only a few hours. Think of the scandal.” He winked again, and his next words all but kissed her skin. “You’ll probably be more comfortable in Con’s suite, but my rooms are always open.”

Her heart fluttered in her chest. She remembered being in his bed all too well. Four years hadn't dimmed those memories and neither had her fling with Jason the Jerk. Her knees went wobbly as he leaned another inch across the desk, his mouth inches from hers, so close she could feel his breath against her skin.

Where was her bravado when she really needed it? Gone. Evaporated with a single scorching look from Santiago Cruz. She wasn't ready for this. For him. And she had to be. Constance and the villa depended on her keeping her wits about her. Keeping him at a distance. She swallowed hard as she backed up to the stairs. “Nevermind, I’ll stay in the suite.”

Not running, she assured herself.

“You are fighting the inevitable, pequeña.”

“Its called unpacking, Saint.” He raised that irritating eyebrow again, a half-smiled on his luscious lips. Esme fled before he could say more.