Lessons from a Latin Lover Read online

  “No!” She took a quick breath, then said more moderately, “No. I don’t. As surprising as it may seem, I want a husband. I want a family. I always have.” She said the words with almost as much bluntness as he was accustomed to hearing from her. And yet they weren’t disinterested. There was an emotional edge underlying them. She sounded vulnerable.

  Molly McGillivray? Vulnerable?

  “Your sister wears army boots?” he’d said incredulously to Lachlan the first time he’d met her.

  And Lachlan had agreed with a wince as he’d rubbed his shin. “And she knows how to use them.”

  That was the Molly McGillivray he knew. Not this one.

  Now he rubbed the back of his neck and tried to think. The very notion of him helping some girl with marriage on her mind boggled his. Marriage wasn’t even a word in his active vocabulary, despite his mother’s recent not-so-subtle hints.

  When it came to staying power, his romances—if indeed anyone beyond tabloid journalists dared call them that—rarely lasted longer than the half life of a loaf of bread. Which was the way he liked it.

  In the past three weeks, he’d flirted with dozens of women and been delighted to have them flirt with him. Someday he would doubtless marry and do his duty by the family name.

  But he was in no hurry. None at all.

  Besides, what did seduction have to do with marriage? Unless Molly was planning to seduce some man, then kidnap him and haul him to the altar. He gave her a narrow assessing look.

  “You want me to teach you how to nab some unsuspecting tourist?”

  “Of course not!”

  “Well, then—”

  “He’s not an unsuspecting tourist!”

  “You’ve got someone in mind?”

  “Of course.”

  “You do?” He couldn’t keep the astonishment out of his voice. His mind darted to all the eligible men on the island. “Um…anyone I know?”

  “I don’t think you’ve met him. We grew up together. He lives in Savannah now—and elsewhere. His name is Carson Sawyer.”

  No, Joaquin hadn’t met him. But he’d heard the name. Carson Sawyer was the “local boy who made good.”

  “You think we’re driven to succeed?” Lachlan had once said to him when they were working their butts off. “You should meet Carson.”

  Carson Sawyer, last Joaquin had heard, was worth about as much as a small Mediterranean country.

  And this was the man Molly had set her sights on?

  Talk about aiming for the moon!

  “I don’t think—”

  “We’re engaged.”

  “You and Carson Sawyer?” Joaquin couldn’t have disguised his shock if his life had depended on it. Tomboy Molly with all her rough edges and a hotshot, fast-track business tycoon like Carson Sawyer?

  But Molly was nodding seriously. “Since I was fourteen and he was fifteen. Since he went to sea.”

  “That’s—” Joaquin did the math in his head “—seventeen years ago!”

  Molly shrugged. “We weren’t in any hurry. It was right. We knew it. And we both had other things to do.”

  “But—”

  “We were both happy,” she insisted. “It worked. For both of us. We both did what we wanted to do. But now—” she lifted her shoulders “—now it’s time.”

  “To seduce him?” His mind still wasn’t that flexible.

  “Haven’t you been listening to anything I said?” she demanded.

  “Yes, of course. It just seems a little, um…bloodless? Cut-and-dried?” Joaquin was bilingual, but he would have had trouble with this in any language at all.

  “Exactly,” Molly agreed, surprising him. Then she went on. “That’s the point. It shouldn’t be ‘bloodless.’ It should be wonderful, moving, passionate.” Molly’s voice became animated, the color rose in her cheeks again. She looked eager and alive and hopeful. And then, as quickly as it had come, her eagerness vanished and her shoulders slumped. “Only it isn’t happening.”

  “It?”

  “The passion. The…sex stuff.”

  She didn’t want him to teach her about sex, did she? God almighty!

  “He treats me like his pal. Which I am, of course,” Molly said hastily. “But he needs to see me in a new light. So I—thought maybe you could help me.”

  He opened his mouth. Stood there. Stunned. Then closed it again.

  “You are good at it,” Molly said firmly. “I’ve seen you. Lots of times.”

  “Seen me what?” he demanded, visions of her spying on his bedroom activities making him decidedly uncomfortable.

  “Pick up women. Get picked up by them. Flirt with them. You know,” she said a little desperately. “I’m not good at that stuff. But I can learn,” she added.

  He looked at her doubtfully. “You want me to teach you how to seduce your boyfriend?”

  “Fiancé. Why not? It’s how I learned to repair engines. It’s how I learned to fly. I went to an expert.”

  “I thought Hugh taught you to fly.”

  “I’m not asking Hugh to teach me how to seduce Carson! And I’m not asking Lachlan, either, so don’t even suggest it!” Abruptly Molly headed for the wall to climb over it and leave. “Never mind. Forget it. I shouldn’t have bothered. I should have known you’d think it was stupid.” She turned on him. “If you say one word—”

  “I’m not saying anything.” He caught her arm again and swung her around so that she landed on the chaise and stared up at him. He stood over her, breathing hard, aware of a sudden new energy pumping through him. “Don’t be so damn quick to jump to conclusions. What do you need to know?”

  “If I knew I wouldn’t be asking, would I?” Molly folded her arms across her chest. “I just want to make him look at me differently when he comes for the island homecoming. I want him to see me as a woman. He never has.”

  “Never?”

  “Well, not never. But not for a while. We had things to do. We didn’t want to just get married and have babies. So we got engaged. It took the pressure off.”

  “It did?” Joaquin shook his head, dazed at the logic. “How?”

  “I didn’t have to worry about finding a boyfriend, and he didn’t have to worry about finding a girlfriend. We had each other, but we could go ahead and do our own things. Then someday, when the time was right, we’d get married. But he’s so busy, he doesn’t remember.”

  “So why haven’t you reminded him?”

  “I’m not begging Carson to marry me! He’s got to want to. And he will,” she said stoutly. “I just need to make him sit up and take notice. But I don’t quite know where to start. That’s where you come in. I can pay you.”

  “I don’t want your damn money!”

  “Well, too bad. I’m not a charity case!”

  “No. You’re a nutcase! How much time do you have to turn into a femme fatale?”

  “Ten days.”

  “Ten days? That’s all?”

  Molly’s chin lifted. “If you’re any good, that should be long enough!”

  “Or if you are,” he countered.

  She didn’t flinch. Much.

  They glared at each other. All he could see were her deep-green eyes, her face full of freckles, the smudge of oil on her nose and that grubby bandanna covering her forehead. For the first time in a month, he couldn’t even see the emptiness of the horizon.

  “It’s a deal,” he said. “I’ll do it.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  IT WAS QUITE POSSIBLY the stupidest thing she’d ever done.

  Once she was back home, staring in the bathroom mirror as she stripped off her grimy shorts and T-shirt to take a shower, Molly even said so out loud.

  “Stupid,” she told herself. “Daft. Insane. You are a complete whacko. All of the above.”

  She still couldn’t believe she had actually asked Joaquin Santiago to teach her to seduce a man. Even less could she believe he’d said yes.

  Though if she thought about it, maybe that wasn’t so hard to
believe. It was no skin off his ego, after all, if she was too dim to even grasp the fundamentals. He wasn’t the one who was going to look like an idiot.

  The very thought of it made her shudder. In fact it made her feel more naked than she was, stepping into the shower right now.

  But the truth was, she was desperate. The realization that things were changing had crept up on her slowly, beginning nearly two years ago when Lachlan’s relationship with Fiona had almost ended in disaster.

  Everyone could see how right they were for each other. And yet they almost hadn’t made it happen. Lachlan had very nearly blown it.

  Still, she’d assured herself then, that was Lachlan. Her oldest brother had always been totally focused on the soccer pitch and totally clueless in real life. But then sane, sensible Hugh had nearly screwed things up, too, when he’d let Sydney get away!

  It had taken him months to find her. And he was damned lucky, to Molly’s way of thinking, that Syd loved him as much as she did.

  Both her brothers had been incredibly lucky. They’d come to their senses before it was too late. But some people didn’t.

  Hugh’s first love, Carin, and her husband, Nathan, for example, had stayed apart for years after their first encounter. And Nathan’s brothers, according to the island telegraph, had had their own relationship problems.

  The path to true love, she knew all too well, was fraught with peril. So it made good sense to make sure the same thing didn’t happen to her and Carson. The thought had been growing ever since Lachlan’s marriage. It had come into sharper focus after Hugh’s wedding. But it hadn’t taken on a real sense of urgency until Duncan appeared.

  Duncan was an absolute dreamboat. He was, without a doubt, the most gorgeous male Molly had ever set eyes on. He had eyes as blue as the sea, a dimple in his left cheek that begged to be touched, and a smile so teasing and engaging that every woman he flashed it at nearly swooned at the sight.

  And he was only four months old.

  The boy would be a lady-killer when he grew up.

  One look at Duncan Dunbar McGillivray, her drop-dead-gorgeous nephew, and Molly had fallen like a ton of bricks. Every maternal instinct she’d ever buried beneath engine grease and motor oil and a baseball cap was suddenly on alert.

  She caught herself chucking him under the chin and tickling his toes and playing peek-a-boo. She hummed long-forgotten lullabies while she cleaned carburetors, and snatches of old nursery rhymes ran through her head while she welded metal frame.

  “Who the hell is the Grand Old Duke of York?” Hugh had demanded last week. “Don’t tell me Grantham got promoted.”

  Lord David Grantham hadn’t—and never would—ascend to a dukedom. “No. Dave’s still Dave, as far as I know,” Molly had mumbled, embarrassed, then clamped her lips together and tried not to think in rhyme the rest of the afternoon.

  But she still volunteered to baby-sit without being asked. She bought stuffed dogs and school-of-fish mobiles and cardboard books by the dozen. She relished every smile Duncan bestowed on her and cherished every bubble he blew and every noise he made.

  That she was such a sap when it came to babies astonished her. She’d always liked kids. She’d been a teacher for several years before she’d decided she’d rather be a mechanic. But this wasn’t just “liking kids”; this was different.

  This was Duncan. With eyes like his father’s and a nose like his grandma’s and a glimmer of his mother’s—or his auntie Molly’s—red in his hair, in Duncan Molly saw hints of the children that someday she might have. And she found herself rocking him and imagining the day when she would rock a child of hers and Carson’s.

  In the region of her heart, she began to feel pangs she’d never ever felt before.

  And that was when she knew she and Carson had waited long enough. Carson had made plenty of millions. She had a job she loved. Their engagement had served its purpose. She wanted more.

  She couldn’t say Carson felt the same.

  The last time he’d come home, eager to show off her nephew, Molly had taken the baby with her to meet him. She was sure he’d take one look at this wonderful new human being and would instantly understand.

  He’d been…surprised…to say the least.

  “Who’s this?” he’d asked. It had been seven months since he’d been home, so Molly supposed he might not have known Fiona was expecting. But surely just looking at Duncan, he would know.

  But before she could reply, he’d gone on, “Are you trying to tell me something, Mol’?” And then he’d shrugged and said a little ruefully, “You could have just told me you’d found somebody else.”

  And then she’d realized Carson had completely misunderstood, that he thought Duncan was hers!

  “Duncan is my nephew! He’s Lachlan and Fiona’s. I would never—I’m engaged to you!”

  A relieved grin had spread over Carson’s hard handsome face. “Well, that’s all right then,” he’d said cheerfully and looped an arm over Molly’s shoulders. “How come you’ve got him?”

  “Fiona’s sculpting this afternoon. I said I’d baby-sit.”

  He’d looked dismayed. “I thought maybe we’d go fishing.”

  His reaction had definitely not been all that she had hoped for. But Molly supposed she shouldn’t have been surprised. Carson hadn’t been expecting to see her with a baby. But if she’d hoped the notion would grow on him, it hadn’t.

  He’d been distracted, preoccupied with business, going back and forth to talk to Tom Wilson at The Lodge on the private island just south of Pelican Cay. They had “irons in the fire,” he told Molly. Something to do with another retreat center for burned-out execs in Savannah like the one Tom had already established at The Lodge. Carson had been helping him with the Savannah operation.

  It was Tom, in fact, who had rung up the evening she’d actually tried to steer the conversation around to their engagement and—maybe someday—marriage.

  But she’d barely got into it when Tom had rung. Carson had said, “Can’t talk now,” and had gone off to talk shop.

  “We’ll do it later,” he’d promised Molly.

  But there hadn’t been time.

  Well, at homecoming there would be. Time for talk—and considerably more than that, Molly vowed as she scrubbed vigorously under the shower’s spray. Provided she didn’t die of mortification from Joaquin Santiago’s “seduction lessons” first.

  He had told her he’d “be in touch,” when she’d left his room at the Moonstone.

  “When?” she’d asked. Given a specific time, she figured she could gear herself up for the experience. Or think of a reason to chicken out.

  “I need to think about it,” he’d said.

  “Really?” She’d been surprised actually. “You mean it’s not instinctive.”

  “We’ll see, won’t we?” he’d said with that smooth, seductive voice that could send shivers down a woman’s spine.

  She’d done her best to look indifferent. “I guess. But I’m going to the Grouper tonight if you want to do it there,” she said with what she hoped was more nonchalance than she felt. The minute he’d agreed she’d felt a frisson of panic, of having jumped into the deep end. And the feeling wasn’t going away. On the contrary it was getting worse.

  Maybe she wouldn’t go to the Grouper tonight. Maybe she’d just stay home.

  Or maybe he wouldn’t be there. Maybe, she thought with some degree of hope, he’d change his mind.

  On that heartening note, she shut off the shower. Just as well, as the water was beginning to run cold. She snagged a towel and scrubbed at her hair when she heard a knock on the door.

  “Oh, cripes.” She’d forgotten Fiona had said she might come by with Duncan. “Come on in,” she called through the high open window. “I’ll be right out.”

  She rubbed her hair until it stuck out all over her head, ran her fingers through it to tame it slightly, then wrapped the towel saronglike around her and skittered down the stairs to see her favorite nephew.<
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  “Hey!” she beamed, prepared to sweep Duncan into her arms.

  “Hey yourself.” Joaquin was standing in the living room looking as if he’d never seen a woman in a towel before.

  Molly wanted to drop through the floor. “What are you doing here?” she demanded, hot with embarrassment.

  “Someone…you—” he clarified pointedly “—said ‘Come on in.’ So I did.”

  “I didn’t mean you!”

  “No? But then you must be in the habit of inviting unknown persons into your house while you cavort around in a state of undress,” he said.

  “I thought you were Fiona and Duncan!”

  “I’m not.”

  “I can see that. Go outside.”

  “I don’t think so.” He’d recovered from his astonishment and was eyeing her with considerable interest. It was making her even hotter.

  “It’s rude to stare,” Molly said irritably.

  A sudden grin slashed across his tanned face. “Not necessarily,” he said. “Not if I’m awestruck by your beauty.”

  Molly snorted. “Pull the other leg while you’re at it.”

  “Pull your leg?” He looked intrigued and moved toward her as if he were going to do just that.

  Molly hopped back up on the steps. “Stop that! And don’t pretend you don’t know what it means. You know exactly what it means. You speak English perfectly. You even sound like a Texan sometimes.”

  “My mother’s influence,” he agreed, still eyeing her, still moving closer.

  Molly clutched the banister, refusing to allow herself to edge farther back up the stairs.

  “Tell me,” He cocked his head and regarded her speculatively. “Have you ever greeted Carson in a towel?”

  “Of course not!”

  “Maybe you should. Solve all your problems.” His grin flashed.

  Molly frowned. “Very funny. What are you doing here? I suppose you’ve had second thoughts.”

  “I certainly am now,” he murmured so softly she wasn’t sure she heard him.

  “What did you say?”

  “Nothing.” He cleared his throat and dragged his gaze from the length of her legs past the skimpy towel up to her face. “I came to invite you out for a drink.”