Cenobia didn’t sleep well.
But she enthusiastically stayed in bed. The time she spent twisting and arching and fantasizing in her high-thread-count sheets was...very refreshing.
If the gorgeous príncipe had wanted Cenobia to sleep, he shouldn’t have come so close in the shadows of her doorway, his broad shoulders blocking out all the light, leaving her blind to everything but his fiery green eyes staring into hers and his sulky lips gleaming like they were carved out of pink marble. He shouldn’t have worn that fitted supermodel suit that showed her the faint lines of the chest harness he wore to hide his gun holster; he shouldn’t have smelled like expensive cologne and gun oil.
He shouldn’t have challenged her like she was a child, then shared with her his own challenges as if he trusted her. As if she was one of the few people he could trust with his own struggles.
He shouldn’t have looked at her at her like he was considering which inch of her he wanted to devour first.
The next morning, she was almost grateful for the dawn call about a crisis at the plant outside of Guanajuato where her hybrid car would be manufactured. That emergency kept her occupied and unable to exchange more than the briefest words with Roman as he escorted her to work and then back home to change for the Pemex-hosted cocktail event. She would have skipped the party entirely if her father wasn’t the guest of honor. The oil and gas company wanted to present an award in acknowledgement of her father’s supposed retirement.
If her father decided Cenobia was not fit to lead and took the company back, would he return the plaque?
When Roman stepped out of her car, Cenobia swallowed her gasp. He’d dressed the part of a fairy-tale prince—a slim-fit black tuxedo, black bow tie, white-silk pocket square—and every dark hair on his head was perfectly styled. But no one would mistake him for a fairy tale; the breadth of his shoulders, the scars on his useful hands, those life-filled lines around his intense eyes all spoke of a man too real, too warrior, to be a child’s fantasy.
As they drove through the tunnels into old-town Guanajuato, shutter-like bars of light showcased him glamorously then turned him into a creature fiercely guarding her in the dark.
He gave her his arm and led her into the grand neoclassical hotel built for silver barons and Porfirio Díaz’s acolytes. They’d already discussed the fact that he’d be immediately recognized in this room full of the Mexican and international elite.
For tonight, the reluctant warrior prince Roman Sheppard was her date.
When she heard the sharp intake of Roman’s breath behind her as he helped remove her shimmering white-silk rebozo to hand to the coat clerk, it was the first time in twenty-four hours that the ground felt firmer beneath her feet.
Her evening gown was a black lace over sleek black satin that covered her from its high neck to the tip of her heels in front. Tight cuffs gathered the full sleeves at her wrists and fastened with black pearl buttons, and she’d echoed those pearls in the black seed pearl chandelier earrings that dangled almost to her shoulders. She’d darkly lined her eyes, slicked her lips a fiery red, and parted her hair down the middle and into a tight bun at her nape.
While the dress covered her completely in front, her entire back was naked down to where the dress scooped to cover her just above her culo.
She’d stared down boardrooms full of men, taken on disbelieving foremen in their cigarillo-choked factory offices, and convinced skeptical international trade groups to give her a chance. But she had no bravery when it came to this dance between one man and one woman. Not usually.
Tonight, however, she hoped Roman Sheppard lost a bit of sleep as well.
He was the sensation she knew he would be in the vast room with its spectacularly decorated high ceiling of stained glass, its giant chandeliers gleaming off marble floors, and large, gold framed mirrors that made the room boundary-less. National and international representatives of the auto, oil, and gas industries, many who were wealthy enough to buy small nations, weren’t immune to the presence of royalty, no matter how reluctant the royalty was.
Roman shook the hands and said the words, but quickly demurred to Señorita Trujillo. His silence, his sharpshooter stare, and his pleasant but resolute nonsmile was effective at shutting down even the most gregarious, clueless, or entitled. They were able to make their way quickly to her father to give their greetings and congratulations.
Daniel welcomed her with a huge, pearly white smile and a big, bear hug. He ruined his greeting when he said, “I heard you had a problem at the plant.”
Cenobia swallowed her surprise and Roman bought her time by grabbing champagne flutes and shoving one into her hand. She took the tiniest sip. Of course her father had people reporting to him.
“It was a mix up,” she said. “I’m handling it.”
Her father, with his thick wavy hair brushed back and tamed with a bit of pomade, looked at her steadily. In her heels, he was only a couple of inches taller than her. But he was every bit as imposing as one would expect from a wealthy industrialist.
“You’ve made many promises about the quality of La Primera, the skill of the Mexican worker, and the excellence of Trujillo Industries. If that plant isn’t running smoothly by the time of the launch, you will immediately break them.”
The only reason her father was taking this pretend health sabbatical was so she could hang herself with her own rope. He didn’t want to drive her away. Instead, he believed he was allowing her to make a half-a-billion-dollar mistake so she that would finally realize she was better suited to be the pretty, pampered heiress—with perhaps a quiet VP role in the company as a consolation prize—that he always wanted her to be.
Now, with so many powerful people in tuxedos and gowns watching, and with Roman Sheppard standing by her side, she gave her father her most confident smile. “I’ll be visiting the plant tomorrow,” she said. “We’ll be ready for the onslaught of orders after the car is revealed at the auto show. Don’t you worry, mi padre.”
She leaned forward to kiss his cheek, but her father tightly gripped her hand as she did so. “Be sure you want this, mi hija.” The worry in his voice was sincere. That was the hardest part. He sincerely loved her and sincerely wanted to protect her. “Be sure it’s worth it. There’s still time to slow it all down.”
She squeezed his hand back with a reassurance that she wished her father could offer her. Roman escorted her away.
“You know what the problem with you two is?” he murmured as he moved them toward the hors d’oeuvres table. His bicep felt tantalizingly firm under her hand. “You’re too much alike. Watching y’all argue is like watching someone yell at a mirror.”
Cenobia sniffed as he handed her his glass, filled a small plate for both of them, then led her toward the edge of the room, away from the bright chandeliers and loud conversations. He wasn’t wrong. She and Daniel could match point for point on stubbornness.
“My father wouldn’t be disgruntled if the reflection he saw didn’t have chichis,” Cenobia grumbled as Roman raised a shrimp to her mouth. She took it and chewed.
“It’s more than you simply being a woman.” He took a shrimp for himself then wiped a dollop of yogurt from the corner of his mouth. “It’s bigger than that.”
Her father’s protectiveness, devotion, and worry. The obsessive eyes he’d kept on her in the weeks after Roman had returned her to him. She knew her father’s issues were more than just about sexism or a Mexican traditionalist’s point of view.
“I know,” she said. Roman held out a tiny empanada, which she bit into, then he popped the rest into his mouth. It tasted of sweet corn and crabmeat. “But you do understand that half of the issue is simply my gender, verdad? I’m allowed to be angry about the disadvantage assigned to me because I have breasts.”
He cleared his throat. “You are,” he said. “It’s not fair and it’s something that I as a white male born in the U.S. won’t ever fully get.” The little toast of mollete he fed her was topped with pâté and bright salsa. “I also know it would be helpful while I’m in this tight tux if you’d stop talking about your chichis.”
The shock of his words, his acknowledgement of his awareness of her, a simple joke between friends but they didn’t joke this way, they weren’t...had never been...this way, had her startling to realize that he’d been feeding her. With his thick, capable fingers, this warrior prince had been feeding her. Right now, he was holding up a small taco and she’d been about to take a bite.
“What are you doing?” she asked, rearing back.
His green eyes looked darker in the shadows here at the edge of the gilded room. “Have you eaten today?”
She realized she’d skipped lunch. “No.”
“Then you need to eat, Cenobia.” His voice was like black silk over sand. “I said I’d take care of you.”
To any curious eyes, they simply looked like two longtime friends juggling a plate and two champagne glasses.
Heart pounding, she slowly tilted her head and opened her mouth. He kept his eyes on hers as she fit her lips around the corn tortilla and bit into it. She’d never been more aware of the simple mechanics of eating. He lifted the rest of the taco to his mouth and finished it in one bite. He’d been sharing food with her as if their mouths had already shared other intimacies.
He wiped at a sheen on his plush bottom lip with a knuckle. “How’d that taste?” he asked, low, and how had he learned to make benign words sound like that?
The taco had been filled with crispy carnitas, fresh onion, a heavy squeeze of lime. “Good,” she answered. Not at all breathlessly.
He gave her that smile that was more in his eyes than on his mouth. “I thought you were allergic to tasty food.”
“Food is fuel. It’s a waste of time. If I could just take a pill...”
He closed his eyes in what looked like agony and those tempting lines around them shot out like sunrays. “Oh, sweetheart, I have so much to teach you.”
In a crowded room full of her peers, in front of the man she’d had an increasingly embarrassing crush on since she was eighteen years old, Cenobia suffered through the single most erotic moment of her life. If he breathed on her, she would go up in flames.
In an instant, his demeanor changed. He seemed to grow taller and broader as he received information from the almost-invisible device in his ear and looked over her shoulder, into a mirror that showed him a reflection of the whole room. “We’ve got incoming,” he said as he put down the plate, took his champagne glass from her, then turned to step just behind her.
It was like having a warm brick wall at her back.
Her vice president of marketing and publicity was charging toward them as the head of Alphawind Autos followed halfheartedly behind.
The diamond studs in Lance Vasquez’s tux shirt twinkled brighter than the candlelight. “Cen, what good does it do Trujillo Industries when our brightest jewel hides itself in a corner?” he said, curls slicked back and his smile as wide as a shark’s. “We’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
Vasquez had abandoned all efforts at obsequiousness with her. Only family and friends called her Cen; her employees called her Señorita Trujillo.
“And now you’ve found me.” She took the American’s hand in both of hers and shook it warmly. “It’s good to see you, Blake.”
Blake Anderson was the same age as her father and had that long face, square jaw, and blond hair mellowing to silver that was the trademark of television dads from American ’80s sitcoms. As the longtime head of Alphawind Autos, one of Trujillo Industries’ top clients, Blake had watched her grow up, and smiled down at her now with that affection as he patted her hand. “It’s good to see you, too. Belated congratulations on your new role as CEO. It was well deserved.”
“I appreciate the engraved Montblanc,” she said of the luxury pen he’d sent when her position was announced. “It’s helped to sign many of the important documents that have gotten La Primera off the ground.”
She could see Vasquez’s scowl as Blake chuckled. “Then maybe I should have given you a leaky Bic.”
The email had been labeled exploratory when Alphawind Autos had written to inquire about Trujillo Industries putting off their eco-friendly car launch for a year to make way for the Americans’ hybrid car in the Mexican market. Trujillo Industries had replied with a polite and emphatic no.
“I’ve instituted changes that will affect our partnership, but I’m sure we can agree that the Mexican car-buying market is big enough for the both of us,” she said sincerely with a final squeeze before she let go of his hand. “I’m looking forward to our continued working relationship.”
“As am I,” he said. But a troubled frown etched his brow as he continued looking down at her. “I want to apologize for the mix up at the Frankfurt Auto Show.”
Vasquez cut in, “And I was explaining to him that it wasn’t a mix up. We’ll benefit from the strong hand of an American ally supporting us when there are questions about the viability of our car.”
The plant emergency had kept Cenobia too busy to deal with Vasquez. But if he wanted to play this out in front of a client and competitor, so be it.
“The principal voice questioning the viability of our car is yours, Señor Vasquez,” she said. “Which is a concern. As the VP of marketing and publicity, you should be its most vocal champion. Perhaps we should discuss whether you are the best person to be in that role.”
Lance Vasquez’s connections to the top tiers of Mexican government, industry, and society were why her father had recruited him. Those same connections would make him a formidable enemy, which was why Cenobia had put up with his growing insolence. But she was done. When he undermined her, he kicked at the legs of her company, her employees, and all the Mexicans who needed her to chart a new way.
Vasquez stiffened and looked at her with outraged fury. She imagined no one, and especially not a dark-skinned woman, had ever talked to him that way.
He glanced up and just behind her. Then blanched.
She didn’t need Roman Sheppard standing behind her for this conversation. But his reassuring presence was like a hand pressed against her naked back.
“Perdóneme, señorita,” Vasquez said through gritted teeth.
Blake looked like he wished to be anywhere but here.
She put her hand on his tuxedoed arm. “Lo siento, Blake,” she murmured. “I’m sorry that you were given bad information. Please have your people contact my assistant while you’re in Mexico and we’ll have dinner.”
She slipped her hand through Roman’s arm as her cue that she was done. As he led her across the ballroom, she caught glimpses of them in the gold-framed mirrors—her with her black, sleek hair and black fitted gown, him with his dark hair and classic tuxedo—and marveled at how otherworldly beautiful that mirror-couple looked.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t introduce you.”
“I like being the fly on your wall, Cenobia,” he said. He led her to where the guests were taking their seats for the ceremony. “You got more weapons than my people do. You melt ’em with your smile and dagger ’em with your eyes.”
It was the best compliment she’d ever received.
She enjoyed watching her father receive his award—the speeches, the bawdy jokes, the truly astonishing stories about all he’d accomplished—even with all their current difficulties. Her father swiped at the occasional tear in his eye, and when she did the same, Roman handed her a soft white handkerchief. Daniel had grown up wealthy, had money his whole life although not the world-dominating sums that Cenobia had grown up with. And still, her bright-smiled father loved these events, loved the French champagne and gold-edged plates of antojitos and beautiful people and glittery rooms. Her father had never taken his wealth for granted, but instead enjoyed it, valued it, and appreciated that he had a responsibility with it, teaching her through example with his charitable endeavors and efforts to provide fair wages and benefits to his workers.
With his enormous crystal award in one arm, her father instructed everyone to raise their glass to Cenobia, “the future of Trujillo Industries.”
She wished the future could be as easy as that straightforward toast. With her glass in the air and Roman’s warmth by her side, she fantasized what this moment would feel like if the foundation beneath her was set and she truly was the pillar of Trujillo Industries.
People began to mingle again. Roman leaned close to say something, but stopped. He straightened abruptly then scanned the area around them. His entire bearing transformed, the prince instantly subsumed by the warrior.
She saw the two other guards making their way quickly toward them from the room’s edges.
“We’ve got to get you out of here,” he murmured, taking a firm grip of her arm. “You just got another email. It’s a credible threat. They know the layout of the room and what you’re wearing.”
Cenobia’s heart leapt into her throat. This was happening under the glitter of chandelier light, at an event where her ascendency had just been toasted. “Roman, I need every single person in this room to believe I can maintain control of Mexico’s auto industry.”
If she—a young indígena woman in a backless dress—went scurrying from this room in front of the power brokers she desperately needed on her side, she would be mocked, derided, and undermined, regardless of the reasoning.
His eyes narrowed and the edges of his jaw clenched. He looked a second from slinging her over his shoulder. But he gave a quick nod.
“Maintain a close perimeter,” he ordered the guards as they reached them. “Head straight to the door; the driver is already in the portico. We’re not stopping—” He’d shot that command at Cenobia. “But keep it cool.”
The four of them moved as quickly as they could through the throng of people toward the door fifty feet away. Cenobia kept her eyes constantly shifting, focusing on people just beyond the group they were about to pass, as if there was always someone more valuable than the individual she was about to encounter. She’d been an heiress her entire life; this game was as effortless as walking and talking. The game kept her occupied so that terror didn’t take out her knees.
Fifty feet shrank to forty then thirty then twenty faster than she could have hoped. Roman’s steely presence kept her from whirling to protect her exposed back.
Ten feet from the door, she began to feel the heady relief of escape.
Then she met the eyes of Barbara Benitez, the Pemex representative who’d joined Vasquez in her office. She stood at the door speaking to a man Cenobia had read about but hadn’t met. They both stared at Cenobia.
Her heart rate picked up, but it felt like the rapid heartbeat of a twin standing next to her. She was aware of her constricting breath and clammy palms, but she was safely observing the effects of panic from outside herself. She slowed, then stopped. Low, against her skirts, she held one hand in the other and rubbed her thumb across the silky back.
“Cenobia?” Roman’s warm, vital voice sounded hollow and distant, like he was speaking through a tube. “We need to keep going. What’s wrong?”
Barbara and the man—Hernán Rodriguez—were still talking. Still focused on her. Barbara gave her a simpering smile. Cenobia felt like she was seeing it from a mile away as they all but blocked the doorway.
She rubbed faster, the skin heating up.
Roman took her arm as appropriately as any gentleman but pulled her close against his side. “Cenobia, I got you. Let’s go.”
A guard fell back and another one stood directly in front of her.
“Bueno,” she said. Her voice came from somewhere up in the stars.
He got them out of the ballroom and into her car with no fuss. She realized, as she came back into herself, the car and its caravan moving quickly out of central Guanajuato and Roman communicating with his people, that he’d escorted her out without forcing her to release her grounding press into her hand. She stretched out her fingers now and they ached.
He told the crew to assemble at her home and that he was going mute.
“Who was that man?” he asked quietly as he slipped his phone back into his jacket pocket.
“Hernán Rodriguez,” she said, her voice giving an unexpected shudder.
Roman undid his seat belt, moved close to the leather divider that separated them, and slid his hard palm against hers, enfolding their fingers. His strength could crush her hand and she gripped it tight. “He’s an attorney appointed a year ago to negotiate for the government with the most powerful drug cartels. He was lauded for bringing a new era of calm.” She breathed harder and Roman rubbed his thumb across her hand.
“Now there are rumors that he is the principal bagman for Las Luces Oscuras.”
The inside man for the drug cartel who’d kidnapped her and a representative of the oil and gas monolith desperate to see Cenobia fail were discussing her at a cocktail party.
“I think...” Cenobia felt herself starting to telescope out of her car. “I think I know what they want.”
“Stay with me,” he urged, close to her ear, squeezing her hand. He was the rock holding her down. “We’ll get you home. I’ll keep you safe.”