Not Just the Boss's Plaything(40)

She hated that most of all. Her damnable weakness.

The air seemed to sizzle, making the vast expanse of his office, all    cold contemporary lines and sweeping glass that seemed to invite the    English weather inside, seem small and tight around her.

"I beg your pardon?"

She could hear the lilt of Spanish flavor behind his words, hinting at    his past and betraying the volatile temper he usually kept under tight    control. Dru restrained a small ripple of sensation, very near a  shiver,   that snaked along her spine. They called him the Spanish Satan  for a   reason. She would like to call him far worse.

"You heard me." The bravado felt good. Almost cleansing.                       
       
           



       

He shook his head, dismissing her. "I don't have time for this," he    said. "Whatever this is. Send me an email outlining your concerns and-"

"You do," she interrupted him. They both paused; perhaps both noting the    fact that she had never dared interrupt him before. She smiled coolly    at him as if she were unaware of his amazement at her temerity. "You  do   have time," she assured him. "I cleared this quarter-hour on your    schedule especially."

A very tense moment passed much too slowly between them then, and he did    not appear to so much as blink. And she felt the force of that    attention, as if his gaze were a gas fire, burning hot and wild and    charring her where she stood.

"Is this your version of a negotiation, Miss Bennett?" His tone was as    cool as hers, his midnight amber gaze far hotter. "Have I neglected  your   performance review this year? Have you taken it upon yourself to   demand  more money? Better benefits?"

His voice was curt, clipped. That edge of sardonic displeasure with    something darker, smokier, beneath. Behind her professional armor, Dru    felt something catch. As if he could sense it, he smiled.

"This is not a negotiation and I do not want a raise or anything else,"    she said, matter-of-factly, wishing that after all this time, and what    she now knew he'd done, she was immune to him and the wild pounding  of   her heart that particular smile elicited. "I don't even want a    reference. This conversation is merely a courtesy."

"If you imagine that you will be taking my secrets to any one of my    competitors," he said in a casual, conversational tone that Dru knew him    far too well to believe, "you should understand that if you try, I   will  dedicate my life to destroying you. In and out of the courts.   Believe  this, if nothing else."

"I love nothing more than a good threat," she replied in the same tone,    though she doubted very much that it made his stomach knot in  reaction.   "But it's quite unnecessary. I have no interest in the  corporate  world."

His mouth moved into something too cynical to be another smile.

"Name your price, Miss Bennett," he suggested, his voice like smoke and    sin, and it was no wonder at all that so many hapless rivals went over    all wide-eyed and entranced and gave him whatever it was he wanted    almost the very moment he demanded it. He was like some kind of    corporate snake charmer.

But she wasn't one of his snakes, and she refused to dance to his tune,    no matter how seductive. She'd been dancing for far too long, and this    was where it ended. It had to. It would.

"I have no price," she said with perfect honesty. Once-yesterday-he    could have smiled at her and she'd have found a way to storm heaven for    him. But that was yesterday. Today she could only marvel, if that was    the word, at how naive and gullible she'd been. At how well he'd  played   her.

"Everyone has a price." And in his world, she knew, this was always true. Always. One more reason she wanted to escape it. Him.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Vila," she said. She even shrugged. "I don't."

Not anymore. Dominic was gone. She was no longer his sole support. And    the invisible chains of emotion and longing that had ruled her for so    long could no longer keep her here. Not now she'd discovered, entirely    by accident, what Cayo truly thought of her.

He only watched her now, those dark amber eyes moving over her like the    touch of his hands, all fire and demand. She knew what he saw. She had    crafted her corporate image specifically to appeal to his particular    tastes, to acquiesce, as ever, to his preferences. She stood tall  before   his scrutiny, resisting the urge to fuss with her pencil skirt  or the   silk blouse she wore, both in the muted colors he preferred.  She knew   the deceptively simple twist that held her dark brown hair up  was   elegant, perfect. There was no bold jewelry that he might find    "distracting." Her cosmetics were carefully applied, as always, to keep    her looking fresh and neat and as if she hardly needed any at all, as   if  she simply possessed a perfect skin tone, attractively shaded lips   and  bright eyes without effort. She had become so good at playing this   role,  at being precisely what he wanted. She'd done it for so long.  She  could  do it in her sleep. She had.                       
       
           



       

Dru could see the precise moment he realized that she was serious, that    this wasn't merely a bargaining tactic she was trotting out as some   kind  of strategic attempt to get something from him. That she meant   what she  was saying, however impossible he found it to fathom. The   impatience  faded from his clever gaze and turned to something far more    calculating-almost brooding. He lounged back against his massive,    deliberately intimidating chair, propped his jaw on his hand, and    treated her to the full force of that brilliant, impossible focus of his    that made him such a devastating opponent. No was never a final   answer,  not to Cayo Vila. It was where he began. Where he came alive.

And where she got off, this time. For good. She couldn't help the little    flare of satisfaction she got from knowing that she would be the one    thing he couldn't mogul his way into winning. Not anymore. Not ever    again.

"What is this?" he asked quietly, sounding perfectly reasonable, having    obviously concluded that he could manipulate her better with a show of    interest in what she might be feeling than the sort of offensive    strategy he might otherwise employ. "Are you unhappy?"

What a preposterous question. Dru let out a short laugh that clearly hit    him the wrong way. In truth, she'd known it would. His eyes narrowed,    seeming almost to glow with the temper that would show only there,  she   was well aware. He so rarely unleashed the full force of it. It   normally  only lurked, beneath everything, like a dark promise no one   wanted him  to keep.

"Of course I'm unhappy," she replied, keeping herself from rolling her    eyes by the barest remaining shred of her once iron control. "I have no    personal life. I have no life at all, in point of fact, and haven't  for   five years. I manage yours instead."

"For which you are extraordinarily well paid," he pointed out. With bite.

"I know you won't believe me," she said, almost pityingly, which made    his eyes narrow even further, "and you will certainly never discover    this on your own, God knows, but there is more to life than money."

Again, that shrewd amber stare.

"Is this about a man?" he asked in a voice she might have called    something like disgruntled had it belonged to someone else. She laughed    again, and told herself she couldn't hear the edge in it, that he   should  hit so close to a bitter truth she had no intention of   acknowledging.

"When do you imagine I would have the time to meet men?" she asked. "In    between assignments and business trips? While busy sending farewell    gifts to all of your ex-lovers?"

"Ah," he said, in a tone that put her back right up, so condescending    was it. "I understand now." His smile then was both patronizing and    razor-sharp. Dru felt it drag across her, clawing deep. "I suggest you    take a week's holiday, Miss Bennett. Perhaps two. Find a beach and some    warm bodies. Drink something potent and scratch the itch. As many  times   as necessary. You are of no use to me at all in this state."