He smiled to himself grimly. The tiredness was worth it. He’d made sure that no one could match his offer … this time O’Brien would be his.
Luc found that the memory of seeing O’Brien was leading him to a much more potent memory: that of Jesse Moriarty in his office a week ago. He frowned with displeasure at finding himself thinking of her again, but her delicate features slid into his mind with annoying persistence and vividness, and his insides tightened against a frisson of awareness.
He assured himself that he was only thinking of her again because he associated her with O’Brien. There was no way she could compete with him now. If O’Brien had a counteroffer Luc would know about it. O’Brien was too desperate not to be greedy and up the stakes by playing two bidders off against each other.
Much to Luc’s chagrin, his mind slid back to Jesse Moriarty like a traitor. He’d tried to get some information on her but she’d proved to be annoyingly elusive. The only details about her background were something sketchy about having been brought up in care. Maybe she was an orphan? Luc didn’t like the way that thought made him remember her inherent fragility, despite her chutzpah in storming into his office the way she had and demanding answers. He had to concede that it had been a long time since anyone had had the guts to do that. And it hadn’t been altogether unpleasant …
He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw that they’d left the city behind and were on the open road. The sooner he was airborne and onto his next meeting the better. It would mean welcome distraction from thinking about a pixie-sized, short-haired enigma. Just then his phone rang, and his mouth curved into a smile when he saw a familiar name.
He answered with affection, ‘Cherie … how are you today?’
What felt like a long time later, Luc became aware of waking up and feeling inordinately groggy. He opened his eyes and blinked at the bright sunlight streaming in the small window beside him. His surroundings were very quiet, but he could hear the sea in the distance and gulls overhead. The plane had obviously landed—the cabin door was open just a few feet away—but there was no sign of the air steward or pilot.
He remembered being on the phone as he’d boarded the plane, and then the flight attendant offering him coffee which he’d drunk with relish to perk up his tired mind. He’d drunk two cups, and after that remembered nothing—which was odd, because he’d intended working.
Slowly tendrils of lucidity came back into his brain, and with them finally came clarity. He looked around him. All his belongings were gone. His laptop that he’d been working on, his phone, his briefcase … He looked outside the window properly now, and the realisation hit him that he wasn’t looking at the mountainous peaks of Switzerland. He was looking at an altogether hotter vista.
Feeling increasingly as if he’d stepped into a twilight zone, Luc undid his seat belt and stood up. Shaking his head free of a residual fogginess, he went to the open door and squinted into the glaring sunlight. It was warm. And it was most certainly not Switzerland. A faint heat haze shimmered in the distance, and the cerulean blue sky showcased the glittering waters of the … Luc blinked disbelievingly. The Mediterranean?
A movement out of the corner of his eye made his head swivel round, and he saw a small Jeep parked near the plane. Someone was standing by its side. It was a slim, petite figure, with short strawberry-blonde hair. Faded jeans, running shoes and a white shirt. Dark glasses hid eyes which he could recall with all too disturbing ease, despite the lingering fog in his head.
Luc slowly descended the steps attached to the plane and as the warm salt-tangy air hit him all his synpases started firing again. This was real—not a dream or the twilight zone—and he took it from the slightly defensive stance of the small woman in the distance that she was entirely responsible for the fact that he wasn’t where he was meant to be.
Storming into his office demanding answers was one thing … This action had taken things to another level. The fact that Luc had underestimated someone for the second time in his life sent acrid anger to his gut. No one underestimated him any more.
He wasn’t aware of the hurried movements behind him when his feet touched the tarmac, but as soon as he walked away from the steps the air steward appeared in the plane’s doorway to haul the steps back up out of sight, and the door was closed. Luc went towards Jesse Moriarty and came to a stop just feet away, head thrown back, nostrils flaring, and he stared down at her from his considerable height advantage.
‘Well, well, Ms Moriarty, fancy meeting you here. Are you going to tell me where I am?’ His voice dripped with ice.
He could see Jesse’s slim throat work as she swallowed. The fact that she wasn’t as cool as she was obviously striving to appear did nothing for his temper levels.
Slowly she supplied, ‘Greece. This is a privately owned Greek island, which I’m renting.’
‘That’s nice. And you felt compelled to bring me along to join you on your holiday?’
Jesse didn’t answer immediately and Luc added caustically, ‘If I’d known how desperate you were for my company we could have come to some arrangement.’
He could see her cheeks flush red and she bit out, ‘It’s not … not like that. That’s not why you’re here.’
Somehow that had a more incendiary effect on Luc than finding himself landed in a different country from the one he’d been flying to. He closed the distance between them and grabbed Jesse’s arms in two hands, shaking her. She was so slight that her sunglasses fell off with the motion, revealing those huge grey eyes, stormy with swirling emotions, staring up at him.
‘Well? Are you going to tell me what the hell I’m doing here?’
‘I …’ She gulped visibly, and then said more forcibly, ‘I’ve kidnapped you.’
LUC Sanchis’s hands were painfully tight on her arms, but Jesse wouldn’t emit so much as a squeak to let him know. She looked up into those flashing dark brown eyes and noticed for the first time that he had the most absurdly long lashes. She blinked. This was crazy! She’d just kidnapped one of the world’s most influential men and she was noticing his eyelashes?
Jerkily, and with a lot of effort, Jesse pulled free of Luc Sanchis’s tight grip; she knew she’d be bruised. He was still staring at her, stunned. Fear pierced Jesse for a second. He looked okay, but what if he’d been allergic to—?
Suddenly his slightly stunned look changed to something much cooler and angry. ‘I presume you had them slip something into my coffee?’
Jesse flushed. She could see the small plane now almost at the other end of the runway out of the corner of her eye. Neither of them had even noticed the low throb of the engine.
‘I asked them to put a herbal sleeping aid into your coffee. I was hoping it would make you too groggy to notice the detour in your flight, and also give them time to take your things. We didn’t know it would knock you out.’
Grimly Luc surmised that that was because they hadn’t known how tired he was. He wasn’t feeling any lingering effects of the herbal remedy now, so he knew it hadn’t been anything stronger.
He heard the throttle of the plane roar behind him as it geared up to make its dash back down the runway. Luc turned around and saw it start its run, gathering speed. As he watched it come closer and closer and faster incredulity kept him immobile. He realised that this was the first time in a long time that things had deviated off the tracks of his well-ordered life, and along with the incredulity was something much more ambiguous.
The small plane sped past him, bringing a small tornado of wind and hot