“That’s great news.” Emily sipped the wine, found it tasteless.

Derian leaned against the counter, drinking wine and looking completely composed, not bothered in the least that she’d soon be leaving. “I don’t think she expected me to understand any of the numbers, but when I made it clear that I did, she pretty much ran out of ammunition. Her slings and arrows bounced off at that point.”

“I owe you a great debt,” Emily said.

Derian shook her head. “No, you don’t. If I’d been in the picture all along, my father probably wouldn’t have tried to take over as soon as Henrietta gave him an opening.”

“Nevertheless, everyone at the agency appreciates everything you’ve done.”

“I’ve enjoyed it. Working with you was a special bonus.” Derian set her glass down. “Henrietta has agreed, at least for now, not to fight her rehab regimen. It’ll be a few weeks before she can even work part-time. I’ll be back—”

“We’ll be fine,” Emily said. “You’ve interrupted your schedule, your life, for all of us, not just Henrietta. You’ve done enough.”

Emily tried to slip by her to hide in the kitchen. Just putting a counter between them would help, but she didn’t make it. Derian pulled her closer until she was almost standing between Derian’s legs. She couldn’t be this close to her and not put her hands on her. She clenched her fists at her sides. Please, she needed a little bit of distance, just so she could think again.

“There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about,” Derian said.

Business, that would be good. If they could just get back to business. “Oh?”

“I think I found a solution to all our problems,” Derian said. “Your visa, keeping Martin away from the agency, and taking care of the long term.”

“It sounds like a miracle cure,” Emily said.

“It might be,” Derian said, laughing. “I think you and I should get married.”

Emily stared, the cold enveloping her completely.

“It’s perfect, really,” Derian said, reaching back for her wineglass. “No one could argue about succession. You’d be a permanent resident, you’d be an insider—family, and you’d be the logical one to take over after Henrietta.”

“And what would you get out of it?” Emily asked, thankfully having recovered her powers of language. Her mind seemed to be working although she’d lost all feeling below her shoulders. She was actually numb. “Besides annoying your father, that is.”

Derian frowned. “My father? What does he have to do with this?”

Emily managed to extract herself and backed up until they were no longer in contact. That helped bring some sensation back into her body, and what followed was anger. No, not anger, fury. “I can’t imagine he’d be very happy to discover that you’d outsmarted him at one of his own games. He’s wanted to dismantle the agency or, at least, take control of it, and since you’d never shown any interest in it, he had the perfect opening. And then you outsmart him by marrying someone who, I imagine, he wouldn’t approve of, and making it impossible for him. You win.”

Derian frowned. “It’s not about winning some game with my father.”

“Isn’t it? Then what is it about? This arrangement you’re suggesting.”

“It’s a sensible solution,” Derian said, caught off guard by Emily’s accusations. She wasn’t trying to get back at her father. “I was trying to help you and Henrietta.”

“Help? By committing yourself to a marriage of convenience.” Emily felt just a little bit crazy. “God, I’ve become a character in one of my manuscripts.”

“Marriage of—no, that’s not what I’m suggesting.”

“Then what are you suggesting, Derian? We’ve had the marriage conversation already, remember? You’re not interested in marriage. It doesn’t fit with your lifestyle. Why would you do this?”

“Because—” Derian stumbled over the swirl of emotions tangled in her head, thrown by Emily’s anger, struggling to sort out feelings she’d never faced before. Trying to see the future she’d never envisioned. “I want you to be able to stay—isn’t that what you want?”

“For Henrietta. For the agency.” Emily nodded, the numbness receding. Only her heart remained frozen. Not for her. Of course, not for her. Derian didn’t love her. She took a deep breath. “I appreciate your offer. It’s very kind of you.”

Derian’s brows drew down. “Kind? It’s not about being kind—”

“Yes, that’s exactly what it is. That, perhaps, and some misplaced guilt about not being here sooner.”

“Guilt.” A muscle in Derian’s jaw tightened. “Because I ran out on my family, you mean. Because I didn’t fulfill the Winfield legacy.”

“Before we say things we might regret,” Emily said very carefully, fighting desperately for solid ground while a tornado of hurt and self-recrimination whirled inside her, “I think we need to reassess exactly what we’re doing.”

“Reassess,” Derian said, her eyes narrowing. “That sounds like a business proposition.”

“Yes, well, we’re talking about business, aren’t we?”

“Not exactl—”

“And I think it would be best if we keep our relationship on professional terms from now on.” There, she’d done it, what she should have done from the beginning—erected some boundaries in her relationship with Derian, for her own self-preservation.

“And if I don’t agree?” Derian’s eyes were molten.

“I’m afraid you don’t have a choice.”

“You’re wrong about that,” Derian said on her way out the door. “I’m no longer part of the Winfield Agency as of right now, so our professional relationship, if that’s what you’d like to call what we’ve been doing, is officially over.”

Emily slumped against the counter, staring at the closed door and trying to convince herself she’d just made the only decision she could. She believed that, she really did, but doing the smart thing didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. How far would she have to go to silence the craving for the sound of Derian’s voice and the touch of her hands? She had no clue, but she at least knew where to go first.

Chapter Twenty-six

Derian only knew one way to handle confusion and anger and disappointment—she moved on to the next stop on the revolving stage of her life. Head down, cutting her way through the early evening sidewalk strollers with the ease of years of handling casino and racetrack crowds, she pulled up the number on her phone of her favorite travel agent, one of several kept on retainer by the corporation to handle all the upper-level management travel needs, including hers.

“Monica? Derian Winfield.”

“Yes, Ms. Winfield. How can I be of assistance?”

“I need to be in Rio by this time tomorrow.”

“Just a moment.” Monica sounded as if the peremptory request was just another ordinary item in a day’s work, which Derian guessed it was. She imagined Monica must go everywhere with a mobile, because no matter what time of day or night she called her, Monica always took care of her.

“I can get you on a direct flight from DC at six ten a.m. You’ll fly the corporate jet to Reagan National. Shall I send a car for you at four?”

Derian hesitated. She needed to go—she’d been putting off Antonio, her business manager, for weeks. If he said she needed to put in an appearance to woo some nervous investors before the next leg of the circuit, she believed him. She had nothing pressing at the agency—nothing she couldn’t have Vonnie delegate with a quick phone call. After all, Emily could have been doing her job all along, and she’d planned to have Emily step in while she was away. At the moment, talking to Emily and pretending everything was business as usual felt like more than she could handle. She ruthlessly pushed aside the quicksilver flash of pain when she imagined Emily at the office, looking beautiful and sexy as only she could in casual business clothes. Looking beautiful and sexy no matter where she was or what she was doing. “Yes, have me picked up at the Dakota.”

“Very good—shall I arrange a wake-up call when the driver is en route?”

“That would be fine.” She didn’t have much to pack. Once she’d left, the Dakota staff would take care of disposing of the few things in her kitchen, sending any clothes she left behind out to be laundered, and cleaning the place.

“I’ll reserve your usual suite at the Copa?”

Suddenly weary just thinking about the high-octane world she’d be jumping back into the next night, Derian sighed. Maybe the nonstop parties masquerading as business meetings would be just what she needed to quench the seething unrest souring her stomach. “Sure. Thanks.”

“Of course, Ms. Winfield. Have a good flight.”

“Good night.” Derian shoved her phone into her pants pocket and tried not to think about the hash she’d made of the night. Since kicking herself was a physical impossibility, she’d just keep walking until she burned off some of the anger. Nothing had turned out the way she’d expected, and she still couldn’t figure out where things had gone so wrong. She mentally replayed the conversation with Emily—hell, all their conversations—wondering how she’d misread the signals so completely. One minute they’d been closer than she’d ever been with anyone, not just physically, but in every way, and the next she’d felt like she’d been talking to a stranger. Emily had actually suggested Derian’s proposal was meant to manipulate Emily into doing something just so Derian could gain an advantage over Martin. Pain knifed through her chest. That Emily could imagine Derian was like him—a manipulator, someone who used people as weapons against one another—hurt far more than all the insults Martin had ever hurled her way.

Martin was the last person in the world she wanted to be like, and if that was how Emily saw her, a game player on the grandest of scales, then she’d been a fool to think Emily would want…anything…with her. She couldn’t even claim her tarnished reputation, deserved or not, was at fault for Emily’s impression of her. She’d revealed more of herself to Emily than to anyone in her life, even Aud, and that hadn’t been enough to matter. She slowed, let out a deep breath. She should have known she couldn’t change who she was like she changed her clothes, no matter how much she might’ve wanted to. She had been living off her inheritance and her name, she was a player, just as Emily had intimated, and wanting to be someone else didn’t erase that. Wanting Emily to see her as more than that wasn’t enough to make it so.