She had it. Thank God. The perfect challenge. It wouldn’t be easy. In fact, it would most likely be immensely difficult, otherwise he’d already have achieved it. But making the impossible possible was her job. She had her methods. She had her sources. She frequently had to get creative and think flexibly. She’d find a way. She always did.
‘How about a bottle of Chateau Lafite 1869?’
If Duarte had a fully functioning brain or any sense of self-preservation, he’d be sticking with his plan to shut this place back up and get the hell out of here so he could regroup and reset the status quo that had been shattered when he’d been informed that there was activity up at the house.
He’d only been back on the estate half an hour before the news had reached him. He hadn’t waited to hear the details. His intention to spend the evening among the vines, which calmed his thoughts and grounded him in a way that nothing else could these days, had evaporated. A dark, swirling mist had descended, wiping his head of reason and accelerating his pulse, and he’d driven straight here, leaving in his wake a cloud of clay-filled dust.
He’d assumed whoever it was had broken in. He’d been fuelled by fury and braced for a fight. Then he’d found her, a golden-haired stranger in his bed, and the mist had thickened. Women had been known to go to great lengths to attract his attention. His wife, who’d gone to the greatest lengths of all by deliberately falling pregnant and effectively trapping him into marriage, had been one of them. So what did this one want?
The discovery of Orla’s identity had cleared some of the mist, but it had made no difference whatsoever to his intention to eject her from his existence. He never deviated from a plan once made, whether it be a seduction, a marriage proposal or perpetuating a lie in order to assuage his guilt. Yet now, unhinged and battered, and with the name of the wine he’d been after for years and the whisper of promise hovering in the ether, he came to an abrupt halt and whipped round.
‘What are you talking about?’
For a moment Orla just stared at him as if she hadn’t a clue either, breathless and flushed, but a second later she folded her arms and squared her shoulders.
‘You think I’m incompetent,’ she said, her chin up and her eyes lit with a fire that turned them to a dazzling burnished gold and momentarily robbed him of his wits. ‘Let me prove to you I’m not. I read in an article a while back that the only material thing you want but don’t have is an 1869 bottle of Chateau Lafite. I will get it for you. Give me twenty-four hours.’
Incredulity obliterated the dazzle and the return of his reason slammed him back to earth. Seriously? She thought it was that easy? She had no idea. He’d been trying to get his hands on this wine, without success, for years. He’d tried everything. Persuasion, negotiation...he’d even toyed with the idea of bribery. What could she achieve in twenty-four hours? A couple of phone calls. That would be it.
‘It’s an exceptionally rare vintage,’ he said scathingly, unable to keep the disbelief from his voice.
‘I wouldn’t expect it to be anything less.’
‘Only three bottles exist.’
She stared at him for the longest of seconds, blanching faintly. ‘Three?’
‘Three,’ he confirmed with a nod. ‘And none of the owners is interested in selling.’
‘Well,’ she said, straightening her spine in an obvious attempt to recover. ‘Not to you, maybe.’
But they would to her? What planet was she on? Delusion? ‘You must be mad.’
‘I’ve never felt saner.’
No. The colour had returned to her cheeks and her gaze now was filled with cool determination. She looked very sure of herself. Whereas he’d never felt less on solid ground. Spinning round like that had put him too close to her. Every cell of his body quivered with awareness. He could make out a ring of brown at the outer edges of her golden irises. Her scent—something light and floral, gardenia, perhaps, subtly layered with notes of rose and possibly sea salt—was intoxicating. The blood pumping through his veins was thick and sluggish. The need to touch her burned so strongly inside him that he had to shove his hands through his hair and take a quick step back before his already weakened control snapped and he acted on it.
‘What makes you so sure you’ll succeed where I didn’t?’ he said, crushing the inappropriate and unwelcome lunacy, and focusing.
‘Experience,’ she said. ‘Tenacity. Plus, I never fail.’
Orla’s tone was light but he detected a note of steel in her voice, which suggested a story that would have piqued his curiosity had he been remotely interested in finding out what it might be. But he wasn’t. All he wanted was to forget that this afternoon had ever happened and get back to burying the guilt and the regret beneath a Mount Everest of a workload and getting through the days.
And in any case, she wouldn’t be around long enough to ask even if he was. While he had to admire her confidence—however misguided—she would fail at this challenge and when the twenty-four hours were up she would leave. Which would mean having to find someone else to prepare the winery for the conference, but rare was the problem in business that couldn’t be solved with money.
If it came to it, he would pay whatever it took. The conference was too important to screw up. Each year, in the belief that a rising tide lifted all boats, representatives from the world’s top five family-owned wine businesses got together to analyse global trends, to solve any viticulture issues that might have arisen and generally to discuss all things oenological. This year it was his turn to host, the first since he’d taken his place as CEO three and a half years ago when the news that he was going to be a father had ignited an unexpected sense of responsibility inside him, which his own father had taken advantage of to retire.
There were those who couldn’t see beyond the tabloid headlines and expected him to run the company into the ground by selling off all the assets and blowing the lot on having a good time, despite the twenty per cent increase in profit that had been generated since he’d been in charge. He didn’t give a toss about them. He did, however, care about the business that had been going for nearly three hundred years. Its continued success depended on what people thought of his wines, and he was part of that package. He wasn’t about to give anyone a reason to trash either his reputation or that of his company.
‘So do we have a deal?’ she said, jolting him out of his murky thoughts and recapturing his attention. ‘Do you agree that if I succeed in acquiring this bottle of wine for you by this time tomorrow, you will recognise how good I am at my job and un-fire me?’
No, was the answer to that particular question. Orla had had her chance and she’d blown it. Duarte had a plan and he intended to stick to it. No allowances. No compromises. He’d been there, done that during his relationship with Calysta, regularly excusing her sometimes outrageous behaviour and ultimately sacrificing his freedom for what he’d believed to be the right thing, and he’d sworn he would never put himself in that position again.
Yet what if she did somehow succeed? he couldn’t help wondering somewhere in the depths of his brain where recklessness still lurked. He’d be in possession of a bottle of the wine he’d been after for years. The headache of having to find someone else to finish the job she’d started would vanish. And then there was the sizzling attraction that was heating his blood and firing parts of his body he’d thought long numb and clamoured to be addressed.
Despite the reputation he’d earned in his twenties—which had been wholly deserved, he wasn’t ashamed to admit—Duarte had no interest in romance these days. Love was a minefield into which he had no intention of venturing. It was messy and chaotic and could cause untold pain and resentment. In the wrong hands, it could be dangerous and damaging. Unrequited, it could be desperate and destructive.
Not that he’d ever experienced it himself. He’d married Calysta because she was pregnant. A strange sense of duty he’d been totally unaware of previously had compelled him to stand by her and give their child his name. He’d never forget the moment he learned her pregnancy wasn’t accidental, as he’d been led to believe. They’d been arguing about their lifestyle. He’d been determined to knuckle down and live up to his new responsibilities, she’d wanted to continue raising hell. In the heat of the moment, she’d yelled that she wished she’d stayed on the pill, and Duarte’s world had stopped. He’d demanded an explanation, which she’d given, and at that moment any respect he’d had for her as the mother of his child had been blown to smithereens. He’d been taken for a fool, betrayed, his ability to trust pulverised, and the scars ran deep.
But it had been over three years since he’d slept with anyone, which was a long time for a man whose bedroom had once had a metaphorical revolving door. So perhaps that was why he was so aware of the flush on Orla’s cheeks, the fire in her eyes and the way her chest still heaved with the effort of having raced to catch up with him. Maybe that was why he could so easily envisage her in his bed again, only this time with her wavy golden hair spread across his pillow as she gazed up at him, desire shining in her stunning topaz eyes and an encouragingly sultry smile curving her lovely mouth, focusing wholly on him instead of dreaming about someone else. If she was around, he’d have the opportunity to investigate this further and perhaps put an end to the sexual drought he’d been experiencing.
So, all things considered, he thought as the strands of these arguments wove together to form a conclusion, the pros of agreeing to her audacious proposal outweighed the cons. Changing the plan would be strategic, not weak. There’d be no need for compromises or allowances. The power, the control, would all be his.
‘We have a deal.’