Two
Grace pressed close to the window as the Gulfstream G500 dropped toward Lima. Far to the west, the setting sun streaked the clouds with rose and flame. Below the plane, breathtakingly close, the craggy peaks of the Andes jutted into the thin air like ice-tipped daggers.
“Unbelievable,” she murmured.
“Isn’t it? I never get tired of flying home.” Emilio emerged from the cockpit where he’d been consulting with his private pilot. Grace was still getting used to his way of making things happen. Within a few hours of their first meeting, he’d pulled strings to secure the couriered delivery of visas from the Peruvian consulate for her and Zac. Grace had been given just one day to pack and recruit a friend to house-sit. The next morning she and Zac had been picked up and driven to the airport in a chauffeured limousine. Bypassing the hassle of ticket and security lines, they’d been whisked along a side road to Emilio’s private plane. Almost before she’d realized it, she was having hot coffee and flaky cheese croissants in the air, served by a slim young man who fussed over Zac and smiled at her efforts to make herself understood in her high school Spanish.
To paraphrase Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, she wasn’t in Arizona anymore. She and Zac had been swept up by this cyclone of a man and transported to another world—a world that, for Grace, was still shrouded in unreality.
“How is the boy doing?” Emilio slid into the leather seat across the aisle. He’d spent much of the flight in the office section of the plane, leaving Grace to tend Zac in the main cabin. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to impose his presence on her; or, more likely, he simply hadn’t had much interest in her company. As his nephew’s caretaker, her status wasn’t far above a servant’s.
Grace glanced toward Zac, who lay strapped in his car seat, sound asleep. “The little pill spent most of the day wearing himself out,” she said. “I’m hoping he’s down for the count. I know I am.”
Emilio’s gaze lingered on the sleeping baby, as if examining each feature for traces of his brother. “He’s a beautiful child, isn’t he?”
“He had a beautiful mother.” Grace squelched the urge to remind him what Cassidy had gone through to carry and deliver her baby, refusing needed medicines to treat her cancer that might have caused him harm. All that Arturo had given up was a minuscule blob of DNA—and that while thoroughly enjoying himself. Emilio had contributed nothing at all. The idea that this man was entitled to storm into her life and snatch away the child she loved was unthinkable. But that was her new reality.
“You look tired, Grace.” Emilio’s gaze took in her drooping hair and tired face. Even after the long day, he looked maddeningly fresh and unrumpled in khakis and a simple polo shirt that matched the black armband he wore as a sign of mourning. Even the faint stubble on his jaw looked as if it was meant to be there.
“In my house you’ll have all the help you need,” he said. “You’ll be able to see the countryside, pursue your art, anything you like—an advantage I suspect you didn’t enjoy at home.”
Grace hummed noncommittally. Admittedly, the thought of having some help sounded nice. So far, Zac had been a full-time job. But was there more behind Emilio’s offer? If Emilio were to marry—as he almost certainly would—his wife would most likely push her aside, forcing her to leave the boy. Was Emilio preparing for that possibility by increasing Zac’s dependence on the household servants instead of her?
Emilio glanced out the window. “We’re coming into Lima, Grace. Come over here. You’ll see more from this side of the plane.”
He rose, giving her room to slip into the space next to the window. She felt the hot tingle of awareness as her body brushed his. He was warm and solid through his clothes, his skin smelling lightly of sage-scented soap.
Pulling past him she took her seat. Did he know that her pulse had surged as they touched? But why even speculate? Emilio Santana was well aware of his effect on women—even on this woman who had every reason to dislike him. For such a man, seduction would come as naturally as breathing.
But Grace had no intention of falling under his spell. Simple wariness of his wealth and influence had been enough to get her to uproot her life and halt proceedings on the adoption she wanted more than anything. If she actually gave in to his charm, who knew what he could convince her to do?
“Down there.” His hands framed her shoulders, turning her toward the view. The mountains had fallen away to a pale ribbon of coastline, surprisingly bleak.
“The mountains keep the rain from reaching the coast.” Emilio’s hands remained on her shoulders, the contact triggering subtle whorls of heat. “In Lima, the precious little water we get comes mostly from fog and wells. Look, you can see the city lights from here.”
The twilight mist was rolling in from the sea, softening the vast river of light that was the capital city of Peru. As the plane glided in on approach, the city unfolded below—a panorama of ancient churches, towering skyscrapers, open plazas and streams of evening traffic. On the outskirts of the city ramshackle slums clung to the barren hillsides.
“Will we be staying in Lima tonight?” Grace asked.
“We’ll just be touching down to refuel, check you and the boy through immigration, and load some supplies. Then we’ll be flying on to Cusco. My driver will be waiting there with the car. It’s a spectacular flight. You won’t be seeing much tonight, but there’ll be plenty of other chances.
“So we’ll have to deplane for immigration?” Grace glanced over at the sleeping Zac, a sigh escaping her lips as she imagined standing in a long line with a cranky baby in her arms.
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll just show your papers to the right people. They know me. If there’s any question, they can board the plane and meet you in person.”
So easy. No doubt some cash would be changing hands. Grace had heard it was the accepted way of getting things done in this part of the world. She had never approved of what she viewed as bribery. But tonight she was too tired to stand on principle.
Minutes later the landing gear dropped and the wheels touched down. The tanker truck was waiting on the tarmac. By the time the refueling was finished, Emilio had taken care of the paperwork and returned to the plane. “All done.” He handed Grace her stamped passport. “I told you there would be no problem.”
“I must say I’m impressed,” she countered. “But whatever you did to speed things along, I don’t want to know about it.”
“You Norteamericanos! So proper!” He chuckled, his grin a white flash in the darkness of the cabin. “Look at it this way, Grace. You are happy because you didn’t have to wake the baby and wait in line for your papers. My friend in Migración is happy because he can now pay his rent. Our pilot is happy because he’ll be home in time for dinner. And I am happy because everyone else is happy. What do you see here that is not good?”
Grace’s only answer was a weary sigh as she buckled her seat belt for the takeoff. “How long will we be in the car once we land?” she asked, changing the subject.
“Not long. It’s an hour’s drive from Cusco to Urubamba. You can sleep on the way if you get tired. There’ll be blankets and pillows in the backseat, and some fresh baby formula in case the boy wakes up hungry.”
“His name is Zac.”
There was a beat of awkward silence. “But of course,” Emilio said.
As the plane rose skyward again, Grace studied his profile against the window. For a powerful, confident man, he seemed ill at ease with his newly discovered nephew. She suspected he’d never spent time with children before. If the jet-setting, thrill-seeking lifestyle she’d seen highlighted in the tabloids was accurate then she doubted he’d ever taken responsibility for another person in his life.
If that was true, she already had her work cut out for her. It wouldn’t be easy, helping a man change the habits from