Secrets of the Tycoon's Bride / The Executive's Surprise Baby

Two

Getting out of the building for an hour on Friday appealed to Lauryn about as much as winning the lottery.

With the club operating from 11:00 p.m. to 5:00 a.m., Adam didn’t usually make appearances in the Estate offices until late afternoon. While he slept, a hive of office staff, custodians and food and beverage restockers did their jobs to prepare for the night ahead. Nevertheless, Lauryn had jumped at every sound this morning and looked forward to taking the bus to her favorite Dolphin Mall deli and spending a relaxing hour not worrying about Adam Garrison’s bizarre proposition.

The clock ticked noon. Time to escape. Tension drained from her knotted shoulders. She pulled her purse from her desk and took her usual circuit through the club. With the lights turned low, the antebellum structure that had begun life as a French-owned casino looked as if it, too, were sleeping. Later this afternoon the building would awaken as the technicians tested every speaker and bulb and set up whatever stage requirements tonight’s entertainers demanded.

The club was designed around a “night out at home” theme, and each room in the vast building had been set up with trendy leather sofas and chairs arranged in conversational nooks. There were multiple bars and dance floors on both levels, each having its own color scheme. State-of-the-art lighting and sound systems and top-notch live entertainment kept the place packed to its twenty-five-hundred-person capacity with an A-list crowd every night. Or so she’d heard. She hadn’t been a customer yet and probably never would be since she’d given up late-night partying years ago and she didn’t fit the guest profile.

She paused to caress the carved newel post of the grand staircase sweeping up to the second floor. This was her favorite part of Estate. She’d always thought it resembled a stage from a Hollywood movie set.

Thinking of Hollywood reminded her of California and home.

Home. And the mother she’d inadvertently hurt when Susan Lowes had revealed Lauryn’s true parentage.

Way to go, Lauryn. Shoot the messenger.

Lauryn hadn’t meant to imply Susan had been anything less than a perfect mother. But Lauryn had questions about her heritage. Questions Susan couldn’t answer. And then there was the anger. Anger toward her father and Susan for withholding the truth. Anger toward Lauryn’s birthmother for rejecting her without even giving her a chance to fit into her world.

Shaking off her unproductive emotions, Lauryn circled back toward the employee exit, shoved open the side door and stepped into the Miami sunshine and balmy November day.

The first thing she saw once her eyes adjusted to the brightness was Adam Garrison leaning against a silver BMW convertible parked by the curb.

Her stomach dropped like a cruise ship anchor and her nerves knotted like a snarled line. So much for avoiding him after yesterday’s fiasco. She hoped he wasn’t waiting for her.

Reluctantly, she made her way down the sidewalk. She had to walk past him to get to the bus stop a block away. Lauryn had quickly learned that driving in South Beach was a disaster, not due to the traffic but because of the parking. Specifically, the lack thereof. So she relied on the bus system to get to and from work most of the time.

“Good afternoon, Lauryn.” Adam straightened as she neared.

At several inches over six feet, he looked lean and athletic in sharply creased chocolate slacks that accentuated his height and a cream silk T-shirt that emphasized the breadth of his shoulders. A breeze ruffled his dark hair, which always looked in need of a trim. She’d bet he paid a fortune for that casually unkempt look. Thankfully, his designer sunglasses covered his gorgeous make-Jell-O-of-her-kneecaps blue eyes.

She was ashamed to admit that in the beginning she’d had a bit of a crush on her boss, but then stories of his swinging bachelor lifestyle and short attention span with women had eroded those feelings. She’d been there, done that and didn’t ever want to live that kind of superficial, self-absorbed life again.

Adam was gorgeous, but good-looking men were a dime a dozen in South Beach. Not that she was shopping for one. You couldn’t walk down the sidewalk without passing a bare-chested guy showing off his tan and pecs—either of which may or may not be real here in a city where artificial beauty was as common as a cold.

But most of those guys didn’t make her pulse blip unevenly.

And none of them had proposed.

“Good afternoon, Mr.—Adam. Did you need me for something?”

Please say no.

“Lunch.”

Not the answer she wanted. “I…have plans.”

He frowned. “A date?”

She hesitated and debated lying. But she couldn’t. Her presence in Miami was already complicated by too many half-truths. “No. I was going to the mall.”

“I have a better idea. Get in.” He opened the passenger-side door.

Would he fire her if she refused? Not something she wanted to find out. She eased into the leather seat and fastened her safety belt. Adam slid into the driver’s seat, started the engine and merged into the Washington Avenue traffic.

“I only have an hour,” she reminded him.

“Not a problem. Besides, you’re with the boss. Who’s going to report you?” He drove north for a couple of miles and then cut through to North Bay and turned back south. Seconds later he pulled up to the curb in front of an exclusive restaurant overlooking Biscayne Bay—one she’d never been to because A, she couldn’t afford it, and B, she couldn’t get a reservation even if she wanted one.

He climbed from the car and tossed the keys to the valet. Another uniformed employee opened Lauryn’s door, handed her out and escorted her to Adam waiting on the sidewalk as if she were a prized possession. Or a ditz who couldn’t be trusted next to the busy street.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Garrison,” the hostess greeted him the second they stepped through the doors. Her cool gaze assessed and dismissed Lauryn in two seconds flat. “Your table is ready.”

Adam motioned for Lauryn to precede him, but then followed so closely she could feel his heat and his gaze on her back. She hoped her pin-striped navy skirt didn’t make her butt look big. And then she mentally kicked herself.

His opinion of your butt is irrelevant.

Conscious of the curious stares and her department-store clothing so different from the rest of the clientele’s designer wear, Lauryn followed the hostess to a waterfront table on the outside deck, took a seat beneath the umbrella and accepted a menu. A breeze teased strands of her hair from the knot at her nape to tickle her cheeks.

She looked up and directly into Adam’s blue eyes. He’d removed his sunglasses. As always, the intensity and intelligence in his gaze made her breath hitch.

Tension invaded her limbs as she waited for him to bring up the proposal because there was no doubt that’s why he’d brought her here. She hadn’t changed her mind about marrying him, although the idea had monopolized her thoughts and cost her a decent night’s sleep. Lunch at an exclusive restaurant wouldn’t sway her.

What kind of man coolly plotted to buy a wife, sleep with her for two years even though he didn’t love her and then discard her and walk away? But then Adam probably hadn’t loved any of the women who’d creased his sheets.

Having been burned by love, Lauryn could see the advantages of avoiding the unpredictable emotion, but call her a romantic sap; she actually wanted to find her soul mate one day.

She ducked her head and fussed with her napkin. She’d thought her parents had been soul mates, but discovering the letters and the lies had made her question every tender gesture she’d witnessed over the years. What had been real? What had been staged? Had they fallen for each other after the convoluted coverup of Lauryn’s adoption and the premature death of Susan’s baby like Susan claimed? Or was that also a lie?

After the waiter took their orders Adam gave Lauryn his full attention. His gaze roamed her features as if cataloging each one. “You moved here from California. Which part?”

Small talk. She could do small talk. Although it had been so long since she’d been on a date she was probably rusty. Was this a date? She hoped not. “Northern.”

“Why Florida?”

She’d had enough doors slammed in her face to know she certainly couldn’t blurt out the whole truth. Adam belonged to the same upper class who’d closed ranks and shut her out when she’d come here ten months ago to ask questions about one of their own. No one would confirm that Adrianna had given birth to an illegitimate child, and no one would tell Lauryn how her birthmother died. In fact, conversations ended pretty quickly as soon as she mentioned Adrianna Laurence’s name.

Adrianna’s obituary hadn’t listed a cause of death or even an organization to which one could donate in lieu of flowers as a clue. She’d only been thirty-six, ten years older than Lauryn was now. If there was a ticking time bomb in Lauryn’s genes she would like to know.

“My father used to be stationed at Tyndall Air Force Base. I grew up hearing stories about Florida, the Everglades and the beaches. After he died I decided to check them out for myself.”

“And yet you settled on the east coast rather than panhandle.”

“Better job opportunities,” she replied and hoped he’d drop the subject. He’d been the only job opportunity she’d pursued, and she considered it an amazing stroke of luck that his previous accountant had quit to stay at home with her new baby around the same time Lauryn had needed her job.

“California’s loss is my gain.” He accompanied the words with a smile she’d only seen in the South Florida Album section of the newspaper, but those grainy pictures in no way had the same lung-emptying impact as the real deal. No wonder flocks of women fell at his feet. She felt almost dizzy.

She transferred her gaze to the islands across the bay. The Sunset Islands were a tiny cluster of outrageously priced real estate. Could you see Adam’s other home—her birthmother’s family estate—from here? She counted until she found the correct channel to mark the way to the waterfront property. Lauryn had considered renting a boat and trying to get a better view of the house from the bay side, but the only thing she knew about boats was that they made her seasick.

The man in front of her held the answers. “Didn’t I hear someone say you own a house on one of those islands?”

Adam nodded. “Ricco?”

What did the club’s booking agent have to do with the estate? But he wasn’t her source. She’d discovered that tidbit during a search of the county records, but if she told Adam that she’d come across as a stalker. Which she was…sort of. And she didn’t want to get Ricco in trouble. “I don’t remember.”

“I bought the house at auction the same way I bought the building now housing Estate and a few other properties. Bargain prices. Good investments.”

“And yet you don’t live on the island.”

“I use the Sunset estate to house certain VIPs who are performing at the club. The ones who prefer privacy to hotels.”

That explained the maintenance crews. “I didn’t know that.”

He reached across the table and covered her hand with his. A zing shot up her arm—the same kind of tempting tingle she’d experienced yesterday when he’d held her hand. Lauryn was no stranger to sexual attraction, but she’d learned the hard way to ignore it because sex inevitably led to complications. Complications she didn’t need.

She tried to pull away, but Adam’s grip tightened around her wrist. He turned her hand over, used his other hand to pry open her clenched fist and then drew on her palm with his fingertip. The impact hit her libido like a car bomb. Shock-waves plowed through her and shattered defenses she’d thought unbreachable. She gulped and squeezed her knees against the warmth gathering between her thighs.

“I apologize for springing my proposal on you so abruptly yesterday. I realize it’s a pretty radical idea.”

“No kidding,” she croaked and tugged her hand to no avail.

“You don’t know me well enough to know I always give one hundred ten percent to any endeavor. I can and will be a great husband.” He stroked up and down between each of her fingers. Her pulse bounded like popcorn in a popper. No doubt he felt it beneath the thumb he feathered over the inside of her wrist. “We’ll get to know each other better. Date a few times.”

“I—I don’t think that’s a good idea. And it won’t change my answer.”

“You can’t deny there’s chemistry between us.”

His deep, velvety tone immediately made her think of dark nights, tangled sheets, a lack of clothing and his hands on her skin.

Heat flushed her from the inside out. How long had it been since she’d had really good sex? Or sex, period, for that matter.

Did he really feel the attraction, too, or was he just saying what he needed to say to close this deal? God knows she’d fallen victim to plenty of smooth-talking guys who’d made her feel like the most important person on the planet until they had what they wanted. But then she’d been known to use guys, too, to get a rise out of her father.

She scanned Adam’s face, noting the dusky color on his cheekbones and the way he breathed through slightly parted lips.

Adam Garrison attracted to her? Impossible. She’d seen his usual bimbos and she didn’t even come close to the models and starlets he dated, especially the way she dressed these days.

“You’re my boss. Office relationships always turn out badly—usually for the employee.”

“They don’t have to. Besides, you won’t be working for me after the wedding,” he enunciated very clearly and a tad too loud. Before she could figure out why he’d spoken that way a woman jerked to a halt behind him.

“Adam?” The lady could have been anywhere from fifty to a well-preserved seventy, but it was impossible to gauge by her tightly stretched skin.

Adam looked up and hesitated just the right amount of time before releasing Lauryn’s hand and standing. “Good afternoon, Mrs. Ainsley. This is Lauryn Lowes. Lauryn, Helene Ainsley. She’s on the board of practically every charitable foundation in Miami.”

Helene Ainsley. The same woman who’d refused to come to the door when Lauryn had knocked and asked the maid who answered for a moment of her mistress’s time. The Ainsley estate was four doors down from the Laurence property, and even though Mrs. Ainsley was older, she or her children had probably known Adrianna Laurence.

“It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Ainsley.” It would have been nicer ten months ago.

The woman looked from Adam to Lauryn through her nipped and tucked eyes. “Do we have news?”

Lauryn tensed and held her breath.

Adam sent a lingering look her way and then smiled tenderly before replying without breaking eye contact, “No news.”

Good grief, the man should be an actor. His tone, expression and body language spoke the opposite more eloquently than words.

“I could have sworn I heard you say ‘wedding.’”

Adam returned his attention to Mrs. Ainsley. “You could have. There have been a few weddings in the Garrison family lately. And of course, my sister Brittany is engaged.”

But Mrs. Ainsley didn’t believe him. Lauryn could see the curiosity in the woman’s overstretched face. How smart of Adam to plant the seed—just in case he convinced Lauryn to say yes. Not that he would.

The woman’s searching gaze focused on Lauryn. “Have we met, dear? You look familiar.”

Lauryn’s heart skipped a beat. Did she take after her mother? The only photos she’d found of Adrianna had been blurry black-and-white newspaper shots that made identifying specific features difficult, but Lauryn had inherited her father’s coloring. Her mother had been a brunette. “No, ma’am.”

“Are you quite sure? I never forget a face.”

She yearned to blurt out the truth, but the consequences of handling this badly were too great. “I’m sure. I haven’t met many people because I haven’t lived in the area very long.”

“Then we should remedy that. We’re having a few friends over on Saturday. Perhaps you and Adam will join us for couples’ tennis?”

The invitation stole Lauryn’s breath.

Doors will open, Adam had said. Lauryn hadn’t considered that those open doors would offer an opportunity to join her birthmother’s social circle.

If she married Adam Garrison she’d be one of the Miami elite and closer to getting her answers than ever before. The idea tempted her more than it should.

“Lauryn?” he asked.

“I, um…I’m sorry. I don’t play tennis.” She’d been too busy being a rebellious teen to learn. Just one more reason to regret her misspent youth.

Helene turned back to Adam. “Then perhaps you’ll bring Lauryn to cocktails on Monday evening. The club is closed then, isn’t it?”

“We’d like that,” Adam accepted without consulting Lauryn. But she didn’t care about his high-handedness. He was going to get her into a house her mother had probably visited and introduce her to people her mother had probably known. While they were on the island maybe she could convince him to show her his place and she could walk her mother’s path.

“Lovely. See you at eight.” Mrs. Ainsley glided off with the grace of the queen.

Adam sat quickly, followed by the arrival of their meal. After the waiter departed Lauryn looked at her companion. “You’re very sneaky.”

A mischievous smile slanted his lips, making him look like a bad boy inviting her to come out and play. The dormant rebel in Lauryn raised its head, but she quickly reined in her naughty urges. She’d given up her penchant for bad boys.

“I know what I want and I’m not ashamed to go after it. Helene is one of the biggest gossips in the Greater Miami area. By the time we announce our engagement it will be old news.”

She gaped at him. “Need I remind you that I turned you down?”

“You’ll change your mind.” He lifted his wineglass in a silent toast. His eyes held a challenge. “Or I’ll change it for you. We’ll be good together, Lauryn. In bed and out.”

Tendrils of desire wound through her. And that, Lauryn realized, was the crux of her dilemma. The answers she wanted were right at her fingertips, but only if she broke the promise she’d made to her father and herself before the ink on her annulment had dried.

Next time, she’d vowed, she’d marry for all the right reasons.

And the business alliance Adam proposed didn’t even come close.

He almost had her.

Adam didn’t know why the idea of drinks with the Ainsleys’ stuffy crowd excited Lauryn, but he’d seen the flash of interest in her eyes and the heightened color on her cheeks earlier at lunch.

He rinsed the last of the shaving cream from his face, patted dry and then padded naked into his bedroom to dress for a Friday night at the club. He fed off the pulse of the music, the flash of the lights and the energy of Estate’s guests. Knowing he provided a good time for hundreds of people each night and was financially rewarded for doing so filled him with satisfaction.

Work. He lived for it. Why couldn’t his family—specifically his brothers—see that? But they viewed his life as one big party and treated him like a perpetual frat boy.

He made it halfway across the room before the mental image of Lauryn in his bed stalled his steps. Hell, he couldn’t be attracted to her, could he? Before Brandon’s suggestion, Adam had never had a sexual thought about his accountant. Or any employee, for that matter.

Lauryn had done nothing to light his fire. She was cool and withdrawn. She didn’t flirt. Even though he’d spent an hour with her today, he didn’t know any more about her than he had before lunch except that the smiles he used to make other women melt didn’t affect Lauryn Lowes.

But he had to admit something happened when he touched her to quicken his pulse and heat his blood. Was his interest piqued solely because she’d said no?

Shaking his head to clear the image of her pale skin spread across his black sheets, he headed for his closet. Any anticipation he might feel for seeing her again could be attributed to moving closer toward his goal. The marriage would be strictly business. Not pleasure. Although he was beginning to suspect Lauryn had a good body beneath her shapeless clothing and that he could derive a great deal of pleasure from exploring it.

All right, so he wanted to see her naked, but that was only because he was curious to know what she was hiding and why.

And if she wanted to dip her toes in Miami Beach society, he’d lead her to the water even though he usually avoided such events like he’d avoid swimming through a school of jellyfish. You never knew when you might get stung.

Drinks at the Ainsleys’ could include anywhere from a half-dozen to a hundred guests. Adam hoped like hell his mother wouldn’t be there drinking herself into oblivion. Lauryn would get a dose of Bonita Garrison soon enough.

After the wedding he and Lauryn would have to attend some of the Sunday family dinners, but until then he didn’t dare risk letting his mother’s increasingly bitter barbs scare off Lauryn because he didn’t have the time or inclination to search out another wife candidate. The nominating committee had already begun their search.

Guilt nagged at Adam as he dragged on a silk shirt. Finding out her husband of thirty-eight years had a twenty-seven-year-old illegitimate daughter from a long-term and on-going affair couldn’t have been easy for his mother. But that was no excuse for pickling her liver by living in a bottle of booze. His mother’s drinking had been a problem for as long as Adam could remember, and with it came the lies and excuses to cover the things she’d done or forgotten to do. But the situation had worsened since the reading of the will and the open acknowledgment of Cassie, his father’s illegitimate daughter by his Bahamian lover.

Adam made a note to hire a full-time driver for his mother. He couldn’t risk letting her get behind the wheel of a car. And he needed to talk to his siblings about drying her out before she killed herself.

He stepped into his trousers and pulled them over his bare butt. He hadn’t known about his halfsister, Cassie, but he had known about his father’s affair for years. Should he have told his mother? Or had she already known? Was that why she drank?

Five years ago during a trip to the Bahamas, Adam had stumbled upon his father and Cassie’s mother in an intimate clench. He’d tried to force his father to end the affair and failed. The confrontation had been ugly. Later that same year his father had turned over the running of Garrison, Inc. to Parker and the hotel operations to Stephen. Adam had received nothing. Nada.