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She shrugged. “I looked up fatal alligator attacks on humans on the internet yesterday afternoon. I’ll be fine right here. I promise.”
The captain chewed a toothpick in the side of his mouth. “Reckon you’ll be safer on land. No gator’s gonna go after six adults together. But one might take a notion to climb into an empty airboat.”
Maria scrambled onto shore without another word, enduring the laughter that followed her. The men set up a folding table and some deck chairs. Their guide started opening the coolers and pulling out packets of boiled shrimp and French bread.
The meal had a surreal feel to it. Though Alex still avoided her, she found a quiet pleasure in the day. This trip to the States might be her last chance to travel for many years. Her position paid well as such jobs went, but if she planned to help her mother retire early, there would be little extra money, certainly not for worldwide jaunts.
The negatives facing her had piled up; the negotiations in particular were not going well. Alex was giving her the cold shoulder. She had a bruise the size of a small country around her eye, with a headache to match. But even so, she couldn’t be sorry about today. The Montoros were fun and interesting people. She was seeing an ecosystem that was both fragile and starkly beautiful.
When the meal was finished, the Montoro siblings squabbled about how to pack up the leftovers. The guide headed back to the boat. For a moment, Maria and Alex were isolated in a bubble of silence a few yards away from the others. She summoned her courage and spoke her mind. “Are you angry with me, Alex?”
She saw a muscle in his throat work. “No. Of course not.”
“You’ve barely looked at me all day. I can’t help thinking the change in you is about last night.”
Beneath his tan he was pale. He glanced around, perhaps hoping for rescue, but the Montoros were oblivious. “I don’t know what you mean,” he said.
Her temper flared. “Oh, please, Alex. Don’t lie to me. Surely I deserve better than that.”
He clenched his jaw, perspiration beading on his forehead from the thick, heavy air. “It isn’t the time or place to talk about this.”
“This what?” she asked, her gaze curious, though she knew exactly what he meant.
“We made a mistake,” he said through clenched teeth. His voice was low, barely audible. “We’re here in Miami to do a job. We have to finish writing the proposal and we have to convince them to sign it. We don’t have the luxury of…” He trailed off, but his meaning was clear.
“I see.” Hurt made her breathless. Emotion stung the backs of her eyes, but she wouldn’t cry. Her injury and her restless night had left her defenses at low ebb. “I won’t mention it again. It was nothing anyway.”
Alex watched her walk away from him and wanted to curse long and loud. The very thing he’d hoped to avoid had happened. He had hurt Maria, and all because he hadn’t been able to resist touching her.
She joined the Montoro siblings, pitching in to clean up the last of the picnic debris. When Gabriel suggested a short walk, Maria nodded. That told Alex more than anything about the state of her mind. She would rather venture into a cypress swamp rife with alligators than remain in his presence one second longer.
He let them go, unable to stomach the sight of Maria’s arm tucked in Gabriel’s. As the foursome wandered off, Rafael and Bella joked about “lions and tigers and bears, oh my.” Gabriel merely kept Maria close to his side, promising to defend her to the death. His dramatic vow made Maria laugh. Alex kicked a root at the happy sound, his thoughts grim.
It was becoming clearer every day that Gabriel Montoro liked Maria. A lot. In a romantic way? Who knew…? But Alex needed to back off or risk damaging the relationships that were integral to the success of his mission for Alma.
As he sat on the airboat and listened to the old captain tell stories of the Florida that existed before Disney and the interstate highway system, only half of Alex’s attention was engaged. He was debating his options. He could send Maria back to Alma on some pretext. That would put an end to his temptation, and she would also be out of Gabriel’s reach.
But the idea lasted only a nanosecond. Maria was a gifted, hardworking member of the delegation, and she deserved this chance to shine. Alex had no right to kick her off the team; nor did he have the moral imperative to step in between her and Gabriel.
His conclusions were sound. But he didn’t have to like them.
In another twenty minutes, the explorers returned to the boat, all in one piece as Gabriel pointed out, poking Maria in the ribs with a sly smile.
“No thanks to you,” she said, settling into her original seat and sparing no glance for Alex.
The captain started up the boat, and the rest of the afternoon passed without incident. To Alex’s critical eye, Maria seemed to flag by the end of the day, but he had abdicated any right to check on her well-being. When the Montoros dropped off Alex and Maria at the guesthouse, Maria disappeared into her bedroom without so much as a word.
Though they later rode in a golf cart together up to the main house, the journey was silent.
Dinner that night was both pleasant and awkward if such a thing was possible. Isabella was in attendance, her wheelchair pulled to the edge of the table at Rafael III’s right hand. Her nephew encouraged her to tell stories of the old times, and the elderly woman did so with enthusiasm.
She’d had one of her rare good spells today. Though her body trembled and her voice was weak, it was clear to everyone present that her spirit was unquenched. Isabella had been a very young child when the royal family was overthrown. In all likelihood, she didn’t actually remember any of the details. But the tales of the traumatic events had been repeated often as she grew up, and to her, the end of the Montoro reign was still vivid.
Alex knew—as did her family, he supposed—that Isabella would not be happy until another Montoro ascended the throne that was rightfully theirs. She was in a fragile state. The span of her life was uncertain. What would happen if she died before a decision had been reached? Would the Montoro family choose to stay in Miami?
Alex had plenty of questions and not enough answers.
Gabriel asked Maria to stay for coffee after dinner adjourned. He glanced at Alex. “I’ll bring her home before curfew, I promise.”
Alex managed a smile, but his gut churned. Walking out of that house and leaving Maria with Gabriel was one of the hardest things he had ever had to do. The hollow feeling in his chest told him he was in deep trouble. He had been lying to himself about the intensity of his feelings for Maria.
With that knowledge came stinging regret. Had he crushed something new and beautiful beneath the heel of his duty and ambition?
He should have been proud of his dedication and resolve.
But it wasn’t pride that kept him awake until three in the morning, when he heard the front door of the villa open and shut…
By Monday morning, Maria was able to conceal most of the vestiges of her contact with Gabriel’s spiked volleyball. The swelling around her eye had gone down, and, with artful concealer, her appearance was close to normal.
She had never been more thankful for the presence of the lawyer, Jean Claude. Having a buffer meant that she and Alex were able to work side by side on the draft of the official proposition without acknowledging the events of the weekend. By noon, they were so deeply involved in the knotty questions of language and ceremony that personal situations were pushed aside.
The document was shaping up nicely. Alex and Maria were composing the actual words. Jean Claude was guiding them with the necessary legal language. The collaborative effort flowed well, though as Maria worked feverishly at her laptop, transcribing the conversations, she couldn’t help but wonder if all of this would be in vain.
That night she ordered room service for dinner and fell into bed soon after, too tired from the intensity of the day’s efforts to do more than dream of Alex. The same pattern repeated itself for the following three days. On Friday morning, the rough draft of the document was complete. Though satisfying, it was only the first step. It would have to be faxed to the prime minister back in Alma. In addition, the entire delegation was to meet the following week to pick it apart and look for weaknesses.
Unfortunately, Jean Claude received a phone call midday summoning him back to Alma for a family funeral. Harried and sad, he offered Alex a bulging folder. “You and Maria can handle editing and polishing over the weekend. Here are all my notes. I’ll check in with you before Monday to see if you have any questions.”
When he was gone, the silence in the room became oppressive. Maria swallowed hard. She and Alex had shared barely half a dozen personal words since the day of the airboat ride. She hated the rift between them. For years they had worked together in harmony.
Even when she was promoted to a new position and no longer reported directly to Alex, they still had frequent contact in the Department of Commerce. And of course, here in Miami, he was her boss. She had been thrilled to be picked for the delegation, especially knowing it would be a chance to work with Alex again.
Since coming to Miami, she’d seen him in a new light—in all honesty, as a potential lover. And it had seemed to her as if Alex was experiencing the same shift in dynamics. There was awareness between them. An unspoken bond that had bloomed out in the open in Miami’s atmosphere of hedonism and fun.
Their first kiss had rocked her…had forced her to be honest with herself about the fact that her admiration for Alex had segued into something much deeper and more volatile. She wanted him.
When she was injured and he cared for her with such wildly intimate results, she’d been sure he was feeling the same desperate, crazy passion that she was. But almost in the next instant, he had shut her down. Which said that his emotions were unengaged.
He might have a physical response to her as a woman. But she needed and wanted far more. So much more.
“Shall we continue?” she asked. “With the editing, I mean.”
His face was hard to read. “I think not. We’ve worked incredibly hard this week. Why don’t we take the rest of the day for ourselves? Call a truce. Play tourist.”
Her heart sank. He was offering an olive branch at the worst possible time. “That’s very kind of you, Alex. And very tempting. But I’m meeting Bella and Gabriel and Rafe for an early dinner.”
His dark eyes flashed fire for a brief second before his expression shuttered. “I see.”
She shoved her hands through her hair. “No. I don’t think you do. They’re concerned about the future. And they know I’m not a native of Alma, so they think I can be objective.”
“And can you?”
The derision in his voice hurt. “I’ve given a hundred percent to the work of the delegation. And I’ll do everything in my power to convince them the monarchy is important for everyone.”
“Anything else?”
The sarcasm was overt, but she was angry enough now not to be affected by his scorn. “If you must know, I’m trying to get closer to Gabriel.”
“I’ll bet you are.”
“Oh, grow up,” she said. “Somebody has to ferret out his bad-boy secrets, not to mention defusing anything that might embarrass the Montoros once they return to Alma.”
“And that has to be you?”
“Do you have a better idea? He likes me. I think he trusts me. So I’m going to use that connection to do my job.”
Alex’s glare could have melted a Titanic-sized iceberg. He held up his hands, his cheekbones streaked with color. “Don’t let me stand in your way, Ms. Ferro. Good luck.”
Fury sent her across the room to go toe-to-toe with the irritating man. “I can’t believe I ever thought you were a nice guy. You’re overbearing, hostile, argumentative—”
He shut her up abruptly by the simple expedient of slamming his mouth down on hers. Neither suave nor sophisticated, the move reeked of desperation.
Shock held her immobile for two seconds before she put her hands on his shoulders in a token attempt to shove him away. “I won’t let you kiss me,” she muttered. But her arms curled around his neck and her lips parted to allow his tongue entrance.
She was so damned mad at him, but somehow all that feeling transmuted into hunger that consumed her from the inside out.
He wedged a leg between hers. “I don’t know what to do about you, Maria. God help me, I don’t.”
With some last vestige of self-respect, she jerked out of his embrace. Her knees trembled, and she could barely breathe. But she wouldn’t let him toy with her emotions. Not like this.
She wiped the back of her hand across her mouth, trying to eradicate the taste of him. “You need to make up your mind, Alex,” she whispered raggedly. “Either I’m a valued employee or a prospective lover or a gold digger looking to marry into the royal family. When you figure out the answer, be sure to let me know.”
Walking toward the door, she stopped abruptly and gave him one last withering glance. “I’ll see you here Monday morning at nine o’clock sharp. If you need any edits on the document over the weekend, email them to me. I think it would be better for everyone concerned if you and I stay away from each other.”
Eight
By the time dinner rolled around Maria had run the gamut of emotions. She had burned with anger, cried with regret and at last found a certain measure of peace by reminding herself that she was only a small part of a much larger purpose. Her relationship with Alex, or lack thereof, was secondary to the job she had been engaged to do.
Alma, as a nation, faced a critical juncture. At such points in history, personal agendas often took a backseat to working for the greater good. This wasn’t wartime, but in a sense, she and Alex were living in the midst of a volatile shift in national identity.
Reminding herself of what was at stake helped put her own troubles in perspective. Broken hearts were a dime a dozen. She’d get over hers. Besides, it was probably only bruised. She’d had a crush. That was all…
Meeting Bella, Rafe and Gabriel in the hotel lobby was interesting to say the least. Paparazzi were not as ubiquitous in Miami as they were in some parts of the world. But the Montoros were both famous and flamboyant. The public enjoyed their antics…even more so now that gossip had begun to circulate about a possible tie to Alma.
Though Maria found it disconcerting when a camera flash went off in her face, the Montoro trio seemed to take it in stride. They had planned to walk the block and a half to their favorite seafood place. When it became clear to the guy carrying the camera that nothing too dramatic was afoot, he slunk away without further incident.
The restaurant overlooked the water and was crowded even at this early hour. Reservations required. When the Montoro party was granted a premium table near the window, Maria began to see that this branch of modern royalty was comfortable with the trappings of wealth and privilege. They might have to adapt to a new country and new titles, but theirs was no rags-to-riches story.
Over a meal that was exquisite in every way, her dinner companions grilled her about Alma and its current state.
She grimaced as she dabbed her lips with a linen napkin. “Where do I start? You’ll be happy to know that the government has made technology a priority, both for education and in the private sector. Certain books and movies were banned under the old regime, but now information and entertainment flow freely.”
Bella wanted to know about the palace. “Is it habitable?”
“Oh, yes. Tantaberra, and later his son and grandson, made themselves very comfortable over the years. Even during the revolt, little was damaged. Efforts are already underway to update the furnishings and to clean and remodel. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised when you see it.”
Rafe frowned. “If, not when.”
She felt her face heat. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to get ahead of myself.”
Gabriel appeared far more serious than she had seen him on other occasions. “Are the people really in favor of this move, or is it the brainchild of a favored few?”
“The press has done good job of advancing the idea. In a recent poll, seventy-two percent favored a return of the traditional monarchy.”
Bella grimaced. “And what about the other twenty-eight percent?”
“Some of those are young people who are suspicious of anything that reeks of being told what to do and how to act. They want assurances of freedom and personal choice. Once they see that Alma functions well with the constitutional monarchy, I think the poll numbers will be even higher.”
Rafe was still the quietest of the three. She couldn’t quite tell if it was because of the situation or because his personality was more measured than his younger siblings. He lifted a shoulder, as if to say he was taking a fatalistic view. “In the end, what difference will it make if I say yes or say no?”
Maria started to respond with the official line but then pulled back and spoke from the heart. “I grew up in London. My mother and I had nothing. Every day was a struggle for her. But she adored the royal family. It was as if they represented something special about England that was a part of her, as well, though she was never likely to meet a royal or see one in person. I watched her swell with pride when good things happened to them and shake her head in grief when tragedies happened.”
“Then why did you move away from England?” Gabriel asked.
“I had been working for Alex’s family for several years when things changed in Alma and the Ramons decided to return to their homeland. My job paid well, far more than my mother was making. And in Alma I would have opportunities for advancement. So together, we made the decision to leave England. I can tell you, though, that she will be one to cheer the loudest if the Montoros return. She understands what the monarchy means to the common people.”
The table fell silent. Maria hadn’t spoken with the intent of making anyone feel sorry for her or her mother. But there could no longer be any doubt that the social chasm between the two Ferro women and the Montoros—or the Ramons, for that matter—was vast.
She couldn’t decide if she had done more harm than good when her companions consumed their desserts in silence. Had she been too frank? Did they think she was too pushy? Should she have let more senior members of the team do the persuading?
At last, she pushed her plate aside, her lemon meringue pie only half-eaten. “One more thing, and then we can abandon this topic.”
Gabriel shook his head. “Why stop now? You’re on a roll.”
“Very funny.” She clasped her hands in her lap, feeling the damp palms that signaled her nervousness. More than anything, she wished Alex were here beside her. For more reasons than one. “Your family is very well-known in Florida, probably across the States, too. But the publicity storm that will be unleashed if you agree to reclaim your positions as royal family will be unprecedented. You think Prince William and Kate and baby George have been photographed continually? That will be nothing compared to your return.”
Bella wrinkled her nose. “Surely you’re exaggerating.”
“I don’t think so. We’re talking about a throne that has been empty for seven decades. And a new king who is handsome and charismatic and single. Your whole family will be in the public eye.”
Gabriel slumped back in his chair. “Oh, goody.”
Rafe lapsed into silence. Bella excused herself to go to the ladies’ room. Maria fixed Gabriel with a half-apologetic stare. “Part of my job is going to be media spin and public relations. Since you seem to carry the black sheep reputation, I have to ask…are there are any situations we will need to know about?”
His chuckle was dry. “To the best of my knowledge, I have no secret offspring hidden about the state. And no outstanding warrants. The worst of my sins are more gray than black. Wouldn’t you agree, Rafe?”
His older brother grinned widely, for once looking almost carefree. “Far be it from me to weigh in on your confessional. But I promise, Maria, Gabriel won’t embarrass us. He’s too smooth and charming. If critics pop up, he’ll simply woo them or schmooze them. They’ll never know what hit them.”
Rafe’s assurances removed most of her concerns. Maybe Gabriel wasn’t quite the loose cannon she had expected. Which was a good thing for everyone involved.
When Bella returned to the table, the group rose to leave. Bella and Rafael were headed out to a party. Gabriel offered to walk Maria back to her hotel. Along the way, she was startled when he opened up to her in a very serious voice. “I’m worried about my brother,” he said, his voice flat. “I don’t want him to give up his life.”
“Has he said much to you?”
“Not really. But I found out today that he and my father have known about this monarchy thing for at least a couple of months.”
“And you didn’t?”
“No. Apparently the prime minister of Alma contacted our father and told him what was brewing…along with pointing out that Dad was not going to be king.”
“That must have been an uncomfortable conversation.”
“Indeed. Anyway, Rafael was sworn to secrecy until the delegation arrived. But it explains a lot.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, a few weeks ago, Rafe took off to Key West for an unexpected trip. I offered to go with him…we often fish and snorkel there together. But he told me no…that he needed some time alone to clear his head. At the moment, I had no idea what he was talking about.”
“But now you do.”
Gabriel paused in front of Maria’s hotel. “Yes. Now I do.”
She touched his arm. “You’ll be a big help to him. Whichever way the decision goes. I can tell he thinks a lot of you.”
“I appreciate the pep talk, Maria. It’s no wonder Alex is madly in love with you.”
“Excuse me?” She took a step backward in shock.
“Oh, come on. Surely you’ve noticed. Every time I get close to you, he practically bares his teeth at me.”
Her head pounded and her chest tightened with anxiety. “You’re mistaken. We’re colleagues. That’s all.”
“Trust me on this one. I’m a guy. I know how guys think.”
“He accused me of trying to cozy up to you so I could be a princess.”
Gabriel laughed out loud. “And do you want to be a princess?”
“Not particularly,” she said, truthful but wry.
He gave her an oddly sweet smile. “I think you and I will turn out to be good friends by the time this is all over. And I could use a friend right about now.”
“You have a reputation for being a party lover. I find it hard to believe you don’t have a confidante on every street corner.”
“Plenty of women in my life. I’ll admit to that. But they all want something. You’re an open book, Maria. I like you a lot, even if we aren’t romantically inclined.”
“And Alex?”
He grimaced. “I don’t have the same warm, fuzzy feelings about your boss. My family will tell you that I get a kick out of stirring up trouble. I could help you make him jealous.”
“No, thank you.” Imagining Alex’s glacial expression if he thought Maria was encouraging Gabriel’s interest made her cringe. “Besides, I told him there was nothing between us but friendship.”
“And did he believe you?”
“I don’t know what he believes,” she said, realizing that this was a highly inappropriate conversation to be having with a member of Alma’s prospective royal family. “I should go now,” she said quietly.