Page 45 of The Tycoon’s Affair: Tempted By Desire

CHAPTER SIX

A FEW HOURS later Serena was back in her own clothes, now clean, and sitting cross-legged beside Luca in the hut of the tribal elders.

She was still smarting from the intensity of his regard that morning at breakfast. As if he’d been accusing her of something.

Her suspicions had been reinforced when he’d said, with a definitely accusatory tone, on their journey to the mines, ‘You were good with that little girl earlier.’

Serena had swallowed back the tart urge to apologise and explained, ‘I have a nephew just a little bit older. We’re very close.’

She hadn’t liked being reminded of that vulnerability—that from the moment she’d held Siena’s son, Spiro, he and Serena had forged an indelible bond and her biological clock had started ticking loudly.

For someone who had never seen the remotest possibility of such a domestic idyll in her life, she was still surprised at how much she craved it.

And she hated it that she’d barely slept a wink in the hut because she’d missed knowing Luca’s solid bulk was just inches away. She dragged her attention back to what she was meant to be focusing on: writing notes as fast as Luca translated what he wanted taken down.

They’d spent the morning at the mines and she’d seen how diplomatic he had to be, trying to assuage the fears of the miners about losing their jobs, while attempting to drag the mine and its administration into the twenty-first century and minimise further damage to the land. It was a very fine balancing act.

When he was being diplomatic and charming he was truly devastating. It gave Serena a very strong sense of just how seductive he could be if...if he actually liked her. The thought of that made her belly swoop alarmingly.

He turned to her now. ‘Did you get that?’

She looked at the notes quickly. ‘About coming up with ideas to actively promote and nurture growth in the local economy?’

He nodded. But before he turned back to the tribal leader Serena followed an impulse and touched his arm. He frowned at her, and she smiled hesitantly at the man Luca was talking to before saying, ‘Could I make a suggestion?’

He drew back a few inches and looked at her. His entire stance was saying, You?

Serena fought off the urge to hit him and gritted her teeth.

‘Those smock dresses that the women make—I haven’t seen them anywhere else.

Also, the little carvings that the children have been doing.

.. I know that this village is twinned with another one, and they have monthly fair days when they barter goods and crops and utilise their skills and learn from each other.

..but what about opening it up a bit—say, having a space in Rio, or Manaus, a charity shop that sells the things they make here.

And in the other village. A niche market, with the money coming back directly to the people. ’

‘That’s hardly a novel idea,’ Luca said coolly.

Serena refused to be intimidated or feel silly.

‘Well, if it’s not a new concept why hasn’t one of these shops been mentioned anywhere in your literature about the charity?

I’m not talking about some rustic charity shop.

I’m talking about a high-end finish that’ll draw in discerning tourists and buyers.

Something that’ll inspire them to help conserve the rainforest.’

Luca said nothing for a long moment, and then he turned back to the chief and spoke to him rapidly. The man’s old, lined face lit up and he smiled broadly, nodding effusively.

Luca looked back to Serena, a conciliatory gleam in his eyes. ‘I’ll look into it back in Rio.’

The breath she hadn’t even been aware of holding left her chest and she had to concentrate when the conversation started again.

Finally, when Luca and the chief had spoken for an hour or so, they got up to leave.

The old man darted forward with surprising agility to take Serena’s hand in his and pump it up and down vigorously. She smiled at his effervescence.

Following Luca out into the slightly less intense late-afternoon heat, she could see a Jeep approach in the distance.

Luca looked at his watch. ‘That’ll be our lift to the airfield. We need to pack our stuff up.’

He looked at her and must have seen something that Serena had failed to disguise in time.

His eyes glinted with something indefinable. ‘I thought you’d welcome the prospect of civilisation again?’

‘I do,’ Serena said quickly, avoiding his look. But the truth was that she didn’t...exactly. Their couple of days in the rainforest...the otherworldly pace of life in the village...it had soothed something inside her. And she realised that she would miss it.

Afraid Luca might see that, she folded her arms and said, ‘Are you going to give me a chance?’ And then quickly, before he could interject, ‘I think I deserve it. I don’t want to go home yet.’

Luca looked at her. She could see the Jeep coming closer, stopping. She held her breath. His gaze narrowed on her and became... hot. Instantly Serena felt something spike. Anticipation.

He came closer, blocking out the Jeep arriving, the village behind him.

‘I’ve no intention of letting you go home.’

Serena’s arms clenched tighter. She didn’t like the way her body reacted to that implacable statement and what it might mean. ‘You’re giving me a trial period?’

Luca smiled, and it made Serena’s brain fuzzy.

‘Something like that. I told you I wanted you, Serena. And I do. In my bed.’

Anger spiked at his arrogant tone, even as her pulse leapt treacherously. ‘I’m not interested in becoming your next mistress, Fonseca. I’m interested in working.’

Luca’s eyes flashed at her use of ‘Fonseca’. ‘I’ll give you a two-week trial. Two weeks of working in the charity by day and two weeks in my bed by night.’

Serena unclenched her arms, her hands in fists by her sides, hating the betraying sizzle in her blood. Had she no self-respect?

‘That’s blackmail.’

Luca shrugged, supremely unconcerned. ‘Call it what you want. That’s the only way you’ll get your trial.’

Serena swallowed a caustic rush of tangled emotions along with the betraying hum of desire. ‘And what about your precious reputation? If people see us together? What then?’

Luca moved closer. Serena’s words struck him somewhere deep inside. What was he doing? he asked himself. All he knew was that the things that had been of supreme importance to him for a long time no longer seemed as important. There was only here and now and this woman. And heat . And need.

Yet he wasn’t losing sight of what had driven him for all these years completely. He was cynical enough to recognise an opportunity when it arose. Having Serena on his arm would mean news, and news would mean focus on the things close to his heart. Like his foundation.

He said now, ‘I have every intention of people seeing us together. You see, I’ve realised that seven years is like seven lifetimes in the media world.

You’re old news. And if anyone does make something of it I’m quite happy for you to be seen by my side as someone intent on making up for her debauched past by doing charity work.

Everyone loves a redemption story, after all.

And in the meantime I get what I want—which is you .

You owe me, Serena. You don’t think I’m going to give you a two-week trial without recompense, do you? ’

Serena just looked at him. She was too stunned to say anything.

What Luca had said was so... cold . And yet all she could feel was hot .

She should be slapping him across the face and taking a bus back to Manaus and the next flight home.

Maybe that was what he was doing? Calling her bluff.

Goading her. She couldn’t imagine that he didn’t have a string of willing mistresses back in Rio.

But that only made something very dark rise up: jealousy.

‘We leave in fifteen minutes.’

With that he turned and strode away, as if he hadn’t just detonated a bomb between them. She watched him incredulously, and then stalked to the small hut.

As she packed up her small backpack a few minutes later she alternated between the longing to to find Luca and deliver that slap to his face which he so deserved and pausing to remember how it had felt when he’d kissed her and touched her the other night.

She’d never really enjoyed sex; it had been another route to oblivion which had invariably ended in disappointment and an excoriating sense of self-disgust.

But Luca... It was as if he was able to see right through to her deepest self, to the part of her that was still innocent, untainted by what she’d seen and experienced as a child...

‘Ms DePiero?’

Serena whirled around to see a young man in the doorway of the hut.

‘Senhor Fonseca is waiting for you at the Jeep.’

Serena muttered something about coming and watched the man walk away.

Something inside her solidified. She could leave and go home, lose any chance of a job with the charity and start all over again.

Concede defeat. Or...if she was going to admit to herself that she wanted Luca too. ..she could be as strategic as him.

But if she was going to stay and submit to his arrogant demands then it would be on her terms, and she would gain from it too.

Luca sent a wary glance to Serena, who was sitting on the other side of the plane.

She was looking out of the window, so he couldn’t see her expression, but he would guess that it was as stony as it had been when she’d got into the Jeep and on the silent journey to the private airfield near the airport.

He wasn’t flying the plane this time. Ostensibly so he could catch up on work, but for possibly the first time in his life he couldn’t focus on it.

All he could focus on was Serena, and the tense lines of her slim body, and wonder what that stony silence meant. He knew he deserved it. He was surprised she hadn’t slapped him back at the village. He’d seen the moment in her expression when she’d wanted to.