THE VALQUEZ SEDUCTION(14)
‘You were legless last night. Just as well I came along when I did. You were about to get down and dirty with the man in Suite 1524.’
Daisy stopped glaring at him. Another fragmented memory filtered through the haze of her brain. The guy from Ealing pressuring her to have a drink. Refusing his offer but finding he had bought her one while she had gone to the restroom. He insisting he keep her company while she drank it. She had suffered his company because she’d become so irritated with seeing Luiz Valquez working the room like Casanova with catnip. Surely a single vodka and orange wouldn’t have caused her to lose all sense of control? ‘How do you know I was going to…erm, become intimate with that guy? I might’ve just been going to his room to—’
‘Look at his etchings?’
She gave him a look. ‘Not all men have one-track minds, you know.’
He moved over every inch of her sheet-wrapped body with the smouldering heat of his gaze. ‘They do when someone looks as gorgeous as you.’
Daisy knew it was a throwaway line but she couldn’t help feeling a little thrill all the same. It wasn’t that she wasn’t used to compliments. She knew she wasn’t model-thin or billboard-beautiful but she was pretty enough in a girl-next-door sort of way. But hearing him say it made her feel all fluttery and feminine. It made her want to flirt with him, which was rather surprising as she never flirted.
She shuffled over to where her clothes were folded in a neat pile on a coffee table next to one of the plush sofas. ‘I have to get moving. The girls will be waiting for me.’ She scooped up her clothes with her free hand, turning back to glance at him. ‘Do you mind if I use your bathroom to get changed?’
His eyes had that laughing glint in them again. ‘Be my guest.’
Daisy sniffed the air in the luxuriously appointed bathroom for any trace of sickness. To her very great relief it smelt of citrus with a hint of lemongrass and ginger. She unwrapped herself from the sheet and quickly donned her clothes, her fingers tracing over the lace of her bra and knickers as she thought of Luiz handling her intimates, even to pass them over to the laundry staff. Had he put her to bed? Had he carried her or had she walked/stumbled/crawled on her own? Had he tucked her in? A shiver passed over her flesh at the thought of his hands on her naked body. Damn it. Why couldn’t she remember the most exciting moment of her life? If he hadn’t acted inappropriately given the way he said she had, then why not? Wasn’t he supposed to be a bad boy or something?
Or did he have some scruples after all?
When Daisy came out of the bathroom he was standing with his back to her, looking down at the Vegas strip in all its crazy madness. ‘Are you decent?’ he asked.
‘Hardy-ha-ha.’
He grinned as he turned around to face her. ‘Don’t you like your men with a sense of humour?’
Her men? What a laugh. If only he knew the only men in her life were her father, her bodyguard and Robert, the elderly gardener at Wyndham Heath.
Daisy was afraid she was starting to like Luiz Valquez a little too much. His uncharacteristic chivalry was potently attractive. If what he had said was true about her having been in danger of being taken advantage of by the Ealing guy, she owed him a huge debt of gratitude, not censure. Anything could have happened to her last night but he had stepped in and made sure she was safe, possibly putting himself at risk in the process. She’d had him pegged as a hard partying bad boy and yet he had acted with honour and propriety.
Had the world got it wrong about him? Or did he cash in on his racy reputation because it fitted the image of the sporting superstar? Who was he behind that mask of sophisticated playboy? If she had offered herself to him so shamelessly and he’d refused, then he must surely have far more to him than met the eye.