The Saint's Devilish Deal (7 page)

Angry or frustrated? Both? The tick at her temple was more pronounced than ever. Definitely both. “Oh, Esmerelda, just so you know, a suit is not the proper attire for dinner in Puerto Vallarta.”

Esmerelda clenched her jaw and flexed her fists but before she could reply he stepped out of the office and hurried to his room on the second floor, grinning as he went.

 *

There was nothing here. Esme stacked the last customer letter with the others and sighed. No useable quotes. Nothing spectacular. She wanted to smack her head against Constance’s desk, but that would only result in worsening the ache hammering at her temples. She didn’t have time for a headache.

The whine of a sander and movers reached her through the closed door and the noise of her radio. More of Santiago’s handiwork. He’d no sooner left the villa for parts unknown, AKA the four foot swells down the beach, than the workmen had arrived. Complete with a list of “renovations” and letter of approval signed by Santiago.

Only, darn it, this was her home they were messing with. Her dusky red walls, her mahogany floorboards, her comfortable furniture. Constance wasn’t here to assuage her fears. Santiago wasn’t here to fight with. She couldn’t even settle into her favorite chair and have a good wallow the way she needed because her favorite chair—along with the sofas, end tables, and shelving units—were gone. A sharp odor reached her nostrils and Esme flinched. Turpentine?

In a flash she was away from the desk and hurtling through the office. She skidded to a stop at the front desk and her eyes bugged. He was actually doing it. Changing her lovely villa into a polished, one-size-fits-all Cruz resort. One man worked a sander over the gleaming floorboards while several others rolled a deep grey paint over the walls. No. He’d taken her furniture, he couldn’t take her walls, too.

Esme grabbed the key to Constance’s office and pocketed it. Then she hurried around the front desk to grab every loose paintbrush she could find. No one noticed her; it was as if she didn’t exist. She’d show them she did exist in about five minutes. Tossing the unused brushes into the office, she then stormed upstairs to her old bedroom, pulled off her pencil skirt and shell, and grabbed one of Santiago’s dress shirts from the closet. It hung nearly to her knees and the sleeves dragged so she rolled them up, then cinched the shirt with one of his ties.

She caught sight of herself in the mirror and stopped cold. She looked like a seven-year-old raiding her father’s closet. Stop it, Esmerelda. Get out of his clothes and keep things businesslike and you’ll be fine. Esme tossed the shirt and tie on his bed, put her own clothes back on, and then pulled his shirt over them for protection from the paint and chemicals downstairs.

Businesslike. Businesslike. Like he was keeping things businesslike by demanding she spend hours away from work each day.

Returning downstairs, Esme grabbed first one paintbrush from a worker she didn’t recognize, then another. Amid cries of “Que?!” and “Para!” she grabbed the rest of the brushes, rolled them up in another of Santiago’s shirts, and locked them in her office.

“No more painting, no more hauling until I get back,” she said, back to the door, pointing to first one worker and then another.

“We are only doing our jobs,” a spindly man with a mullet said.

  “Feel free to take a break until I return, then.” She hurried out the terrace door.

Hot summer sun beat down on the white sand beach, causing a war of feelings inside. On the one hand, she wanted to tear off down the beach and scream at Santiago until he agreed to leave her home alone. On the other hand, the hand holding her favorite silver Jimmy Choos—and she wasn’t sure when or why she’d picked them back up—she wanted to get off the beach and back to the relative safety of the office. The place she felt most in control.

Except there were workmen even now waiting to restart the destruction of everything she held dear. So here she was, tracking down Santiago, the man Constance swore would help her save the villa. She twisted her lips. So far all he’d done was set her libido into overdrive.

Esme shaded her eyes against the glare, saw a lone figure in the surf, and started walking. Finding Santiago on her beach should be much harder. There should be people everywhere, but the sand was empty, no umbrellas opened to shade vacationers. Only a lone beach towel and the man sitting on a surfboard a few yards from shore met her eyes.

The sight of him, tanned legs dangling in the water, arms braced against the fiberglass board, stopped her heart for a second. A pair of Oakleys protected his eyes from the glare, longish, black hair flirted with the collar of his tee shirt, and his soaked board shorts outlined the muscles of his legs. A few more steps and she stood at the shoreline, just out of reach of the incoming tide. Waving her arms in the air, Esme called to him, but Santiago either didn’t hear her over the surf or chose to ignore her as his board rocked on the water. She checked her watch. No choice. It was a short drive into town; the workmen could potentially be back to work Santiago’s black magic on the villa any minute.

Esme untied the paint-spattered tie, tossing it in a heap on Santiago’s towel. His shirt, now decorated with white and grey splotches, followed. She placed the shoes on top of the pile. Feeling only a little self-conscious, her bra and panties covered more than most bikinis anyway, she waded into the warm water. All too quickly she was chest-deep, standing beside Santiago’s board.

“You promised.”

“It isn’t time for dinner, pequeña, but you do look delicious,” he drawled, the words rolling off his tongue like the deepest of dark chocolates. Santiago didn’t spare her a glance, just kept staring out to sea.

Esme’s fingers bit into the board as she leaned forward. “You can’t keep doing this, Santiago. Sitting for hours in the ocean won’t change what happened to you in Tahiti. Turning my lovely villa into some weird replica of a Cruz Resort won’t, either.”

“I’m not turning Casa into a replica of my father’s businesses.” He sounded genuinely perplexed. “We agreed on an upgrade, to entice a wealthier clientele.”

“Wrong. You agreed. You didn’t say anything about changing everything in my home.”

“‘Everything must go.’ What part of that did you miss?”

“I didn’t think you were serious. How are we going to completely renovate the villa in less than a week?”

“Money changes things, Esme. It isn’t like you’ve been living there for the past few years. And you know what appeals as well as I. Wealthy vacationers don’t want homey. They don’t want Old Mexico. They want adventure, modern conveniences. And this isn’t your home. It’s your business.”

“So you decided to do an Extreme Makeover without my consent? Without even asking me?”

“You’re the one who said the first three-month stint as manager was mine.”

“You’re the one who, not more than an hour ago, said we were in this together. And then you came out here to sulk because you’d rather be anywhere than here.”

  “You think I am on the water, thinking of surfing?” He slid off the board, the movement sending tiny waves over her that did nothing to cool her body temperature. Esme was surprised the water didn’t sizzle against her skin as his body heated the small space between them. He pulled her against him. “You do not know me nearly as well as you would like to think, Esmerelda.” He leaned in, his lips nearly brushing her cheek as he spoke. Esme’s toes curled into the sand. He smelled exactly like the shirt she stole from his closet not ten minutes before. She closed her eyes, breathing him in.

“I don’t pretend to know anything about you anymore, Saint.” She wanted, badly, to ask what he was thinking of. Why had he been staring out to sea for nearly an hour while she tried to make actual plans to restore the villa?

“You didn’t come down here because of the workmen or Velazquez or this ridiculous situation that Constance set up.”

She took a step toward the beach. “Of course I did.”

Santiago leaned forward, invading her space again and making her wish for the safety of her suit or even his paint splattered clothes. Anything to put a shield between them. What had she been thinking stripping down to her undies? His index finger slid under her bra strap, burning her skin. “You stripped down to your bra and panties for an entirely alternative reason.” He nearly echoed her thoughts, throwing Esme off balance even more.

Business, Esme, stick to business.

She swallowed. “Even if I wanted to debate the point with you, we don’t have time for this.”

He reached out, tracing his finger along her jaw, causing a slow burn to start in her belly. “We have time for whatever we choose, Esmerelda. Nothing Velazquez said changes what Constance laid out in her instructions. Nothing the workmen repair or replace will change what will happen here over the next few months.”

“It could. We have options—” Her breath caught in her throat as his finger played with her ear.

“The only option you have is to work with me, gain the experience you need to move forward.”

He had to be wrong. Saving the villa would save Constance, just as it had saved her when she was a little girl reeling from the deaths of her parents. It would heal Esme, too, once he was gone again. Her gaze caught on the gleaming white walls and salmon roof of the villa. She couldn’t lose everything. Esme reached deep inside for courage and then brushed his hand aside.

“Whatever. Now that you’re off the board, what do you say we go up to the office and come up with an actual game plan.”

This time he didn’t reach for her; he stood, arms crossed over his chest and an inscrutable expression on his face. “We’re going to wind up in bed, Esmerelda Quinn, and it won’t be less explosive than last time.”

She started for the beach, telling herself he was wrong. Falling for Santiago Cruz—again—was definitely not on her agenda. Rehabbing the villa, turning it into a hot destination getaway, that must be her focus.

Chapter Five

Santiago followed the trail of Esme’s footprints through the sand and onto the boardwalk leading to the terrace. He hadn’t lied. Esme might hate him for the rest of her life, but he was doing her a favor. They would turn Casa around, protect it from his father and then he would make sure she moved on. Esme would find other work. She was talented, good at her job. Only. . .

He looked up at the welcoming walls, the shiny windows looking down on the ocean. The best view around. He didn’t really hate this place, he hated what it represented. Obsession. Eduardo had turned his anger on Magdalena so many times before that last night—

Santiago closed off those thoughts. He didn’t need to go back there. Didn’t need to revisit his part in Magdalena’s collapse. He needed to focus on the present.

He took the outside stairs to his room so he wouldn’t drip on the floors. After changing into old jeans and a faded polo he checked his phone. No new messages from Charlie or the guests arriving Wednesday. Nothing to do but talk to Esmerelda—and he didn’t want to do that.

The whining of power tools and good-natured teasing of the work crew reached upstairs. Forget it. He could stay up here, hiding out, or he could push his plans farther along.

As he stepped off the stairs the last worker waved his goodbye. Standing alone in the vast room, no furniture to cozy it up, no artwork on the walls, no pretty flowers to look at, was Esme. Looking triumphant. Anger spiked. She couldn’t send off his crew.

Esme unhooked the power sander and he stalked over.

“I’ll just call them back.”

“No, you won’t. You gave me the magazines to torture me. To see if I’d actually change my home to your liking. I won’t.” Tears hovered in her eyes and Santiago shoved his hands into his pockets to keep from reaching for her.

Dios, this wasn’t what he expected. His heart clenched at the pain on her face. Her feelings weren’t part of his plans.

She pushed past him. “I won’t turn this place into another paint-by-numbers resort. I’ll update it my way. That means original flooring, not whatever the color of the moment is according to magazine editors. I’ll update the art but it will be local and—”

“Esmerelda, I wanted your opinion—”

“No. You wanted me to prove that I’d do anything to win, that I could be as ruthless as you.” She turned to him, hurt flashing in her eyes. “You want to take the good parts of this place and make them ugly and I have no idea why. You escape at every chance, you spend more time in the water than in the office. You obviously don’t want to be here and in six months you won’t be. But this is my home. I have to live with it, so the reno is my vision, not yours.”

“That doesn’t mean you have to sand the floors and paint the walls yourself. Let the workmen do their jobs.”

She sniffed but the tears threatening her lashes didn’t fall. “It means exactly that, Saint. Now, I have work to do. If you’d like to help, grab a paintbrush, otherwise go back to your precious surfboard and brood.”

She picked up a roller, dipped it in a carton of ugly grey paint and started rolling over the rustic walls. Stripes of grey obliterated the red. Without understanding why, Santiago picked up another roller and started on the opposite wall. Dip, roll, make the red disappear. Dip, roll, repeat.

He felt her eyes on him again. He’d seen her watching him closely over the last few days. Felt her gaze land on his mouth and then watched as she wrenched it away. He’d teased her, flirted and tempted, and she’d parried. But for just a second before that parry came, her eyes were hollow. No feeling. Just as they’d been empty a few moments ago. A beautiful green shell that told him something else was going on with her. All of this focus on the rehab wasn’t about getting it in shape for Constance’s return. It wasn’t even about taking on more responsibilities or keeping this place away from his family. She hated him because of Napa, but that wasn’t it, either.

“Why haven’t you gone off to some surfing competition yet?” The soft words were loud in the empty room. “I saw the roll you took in Tahiti, but a year is plenty of time to heal. And on the beach just now I know you were thinking about the waves off Africa this time of year.”