Page 10 of Emergency Engagement

‘But, if I’m honest, the fact that I know you in a manner of speaking changes the picture.’

‘You knew me yesterday and the picture didn’t seem to be changing then. If I recall, you sent me on my way because there was nothing you were willing to do for me.’

‘Maybe,’ Rafael admitted truthfully. ‘That was an instinctive reaction. I’m not a man who is sentimental when it comes to the past, but in this instance...’ He shrugged, but his eyes were serious and thoughtful. His voice became rough. ‘Let’s just say that I read what you’d written in your proposal and maybe I’m more sentimental than I thought. I also think you have the sort of personality to get the hotel moving in the right direction quickly.’

‘And what sort of personality is that, if I could ask?’

‘Argumentative and determined not to takenofor an answer.’

His voice was matter of fact. There was no criticism intended, but somewhere deep inside Sammy felt a sudden stab of hurt because...were those feminine traits? She was twenty-seven,and yes she had had boyfriends, but had any of them come to anything? No. Her last boyfriend, a guy she’d been dating for seven months, had told her, by way of an excuse for breaking up with her by text, that she was a littledifficult.

She’d taken that to mean that her independence had ended up getting on his nerves, but what was so wrong with being independent? She had learned valuable lessons from her mother whose helplessness had been her undoing until she’d found the strength and courage to realise that going it alone was no bad thing. Worse would be to feel that she had to rely on some guy to make decisions that affected her life.

She looked at the drop-dead gorgeous man who was looking back at her with a shuttered expression and she thought of the women he was routinely pictured with. None of them looked thedifficulttype.

‘I wish you’d just tell me what’s missing from this picture,’ Sammy said sharply, shaking her head clear of those silly, thorny thoughts. This all felt too good to be true—there had to be a catch.

‘We won’t be staying at the hotel,’ Rafael revealed. ‘It isn’t due to formally open until the end of the month, which will give my managers plenty of time to ensure there are no glitches.’

‘Where will we be staying? Where is this cooking going to take place?’

‘At my house there. I hope you don’t have a problem with that...’

CHAPTER THREE

HOPEYOUDON’Thave a problem with that...?

Have a problem with vanishing off to a place she’d never heard of in a part of the world she’d never visited to cook for a man she barely knew and had contrived to forget how much she didn’t like? All in an attempt to prove herself worthy of being given an opportunity to find a foothold in the culinary world, because he’d thoroughly trashed her chances there when he’d gazumped her on the deal she’d made to buy the place adjoining the hotel.

Why on earth would she have a problem with that? That was what she sarcastically asked herself on a loop over the course of the following two weeks as she got herself prepared for the shake-up in her life she’d been cornered into accepting.

Bitter though she was at the olive branch that had been handed to her—because she should never have been put in the position of having to have an olive branch waved in front of her in the first place—she had to admit that he was being generous. His PA emailed her with the contract outlining what was expected of her, the duration of her employment—one week on probation followed by the six-month contract—and of course her remuneration, which was more than generous.

At the end of her stint, she would easily have sufficient capital to find herself a suitable outlet for her business and buy herself somewhere decent enough to put down roots. Those months away would be challenging, of course, because she would know no one at all and would be going it alone, in charge and without a familiar face to guide her. The fact that she could fail to makethe grade after all that cast a long shadow but she had no choice to speak of and would go with the flow.

For such a hard-headed businessman, guilt certainly seemed to have sunk its teeth into Rafael; but she still couldn’t manage to get herself to any place of gratitude because, generous offer or no generous offer, he was still as arrogant as he’d been as a teenager.

She was forced to confess to her mother that the deal with the hotel had fallen through and had plastered a smile on her face as she’d put as good a spin on the situation as she possibly could.

‘But...you’re going to...where—to be a personal chef because you can’t get the place at Clifford’s hotel? I’m just not following you. It all sounds very sketchy...I thought youwantedto have your own place. It’s what you’ve spent years working towards! I just don’t understand what’s going on.’

Sitting across the kitchen table at her mother’s house, Sammy breathed in deeply and tapped into a reservoir of phony optimism she’d never thought she possessed.

‘It’s a thrilling opportunity!’ she trilled through gritted teeth. ‘In fact, I’ll bet not getting that silly place will end up being the best thing that’s ever happened to me!’

‘But all your plans to move upstairs so that you could own your own place as well as the bakery...’

‘Oh, Mr Moreno—orRafaelas I call him, seeing that we know one another—will be paying me sufficiently over the six-month period at his hotel for me to have quite some choice when it comes to another venue!’ She swept that observation aside, making sure not to mention the little technicality of a probationary period. Why muddy the water when her mother was actually buying into the whole change of plan?

Sammy would do anything to spare her mum needless worry and so a little finger-crossing was perfectly acceptable if it made her happy.

Oddly, having tentatively mentioned Rafael’s name to find that her mother had instantly remembered who he was, the fact thathewas the billionaire who was now giving her this so-called chance of a lifetime somehow ended up reassuring her mother that all would be okay. This, despite the fact that the odious man had been responsible for ruining her future in the first place. Sometimes Sammy just didn’t understand her mother, but still, she was at least relieved that she seemed to have stopped worrying.

She got hold of as much information as she could about the Caribbean island where she might just end up spending a few months. It was small—a dot in the middle of the ocean—but with a good infrastructure and a thriving economy based on the export of sugar cane, cocoa and tourism. There were strict controls in place when it came to the number of hotels allowed, and the size of them, and there were draconian hoops to jump through for anyone not of local ancestry to get permission to own land and build on it.

Rafael’s name was mentioned as being one of the lucky ones. From the write up, the journalist in question obviously loved him, and Sammy abandoned reading about all the things he had done for the islanders after the first page. He obviously had a sprawling fan club, but thankfully she had no intention ever of signing up to become a member.

She knew that he would be travelling ahead of her, which was blessed relief. But, at dawn on the day that he had arranged for the chauffeur to collect her, she was suddenly floored by an attack of nerves and almost wished that he was going to meet her at Gatwick after all.

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