A Vow of Obligation

For a split second Navarre scanned her pleading eyes, marvelling at their rare colour, and then he swept up the phone and, while she held her breath in fear and watched, he stabbed the button for Reception and requested her friend by name.

Colour slowly returning to her drawn cheeks, Tawny drew in a tremulous breath. ‘I’m not lying to you, I swear I’m not … I didn’t even get the chance to open your laptop—’

‘Naturally you will say that,’ Navarre derided. ‘You could well have been in the act of returning it to the room when I surprised you—’

‘But I wasn’t!’ Tawny exclaimed in horror when she registered the depth of his suspicion. ‘I had only just lifted it when you returned. I’m telling you the truth!’

‘That I had some kinky one-night stand with a camera and a receptionist?’ Navarre queried with stinging scorn. ‘Do I strike you as that desperate for entertainment in London?’

Suffering her very first moment of doubt as to his guilt in that quarter, Tawny shrugged a slight shoulder in an awkward gesture while her heart sank at the possibility that she could be wrong. ‘How would I know? You’re a guest here. I know nothing about you aside of what my friend told me.’

‘Your friend lied to you,’ Navarre declared.

After a tense two minutes of complete silence a soft knock sounded on the door and Julie entered, looking unusually meek. ‘How can I help you, Mr Cazier?’

‘Julie …’ Tawny interposed, leaping straight into speech. ‘I want you to explain about you asking me to take the laptop so that we can get this all sorted out—’

‘What about the laptop? Take whose laptop?’ Julie enquired sharply, widening her brown eyes in apparent confusion and annoyance. ‘What the hell are you trying to accuse me of doing?’

In receipt of that aggressive comeback, Tawny was bewildered. She could feel the blood draining from her cheeks in shock and the sick churning in the pit of her stomach started up afresh. ‘Julie, please explain … look, what’s going on here? You and Mr Cazier know each other—’

Julie’s brow pleated. ‘If you mean by that that Mr Cazier is a regular and much respected guest here—’

‘You told me that he took photos of you—’

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about. Photos? I’m sorry about this, Mr Cazier. Possibly this member of staff has been drinking or something because she’s talking nonsense. I should call the penthouse manager to deal with this situation.’

‘Thank you, Miss Chivers, but that won’t be necessary. You may leave,’ Navarre cut in with clear impatience. ‘I’ve heard quite enough.’

Navarre motioned his security chief back to his side with the movement of one finger and addressed the older man in an undertone.

In disbelief, Tawny watched her erstwhile friend leave the suite with her head held high. Julie had lied. Julie had actually pretended not to know her on a personal basis. Her friend had lied, turned her back on Tawny and let her take the fall for attempted theft. Tawny was not only stunned by that betrayal, but also no longer convinced that Julie had ever spent the night with Navarre Cazier. But if that suspicion was true, why had Julie told her that convoluted story about the nude photography session? Why else would Julie have wanted access to the billionaire’s laptop? What had she wanted to find out from it and why?

As Tawny turned white and swayed Navarre thought she might be about to faint. Instead, demonstrating a surprising amount of inner strength for so young a woman, she leant back against the wall for support and breathed in slow and deep to steady herself. Even so, he recognised an attack of gut-deep fear when he saw one but he had not the slightest pity for her. Navarre always hit back hard against those who tried to injure him. At the same time, however, he also reasoned at the speed of light, an ability that had dug him out of some very tight corners while growing up.

If he called the police, what recompense would he receive for the possible crime committed against him? There would be no guarantee that the maid would be punished and even if this was not a first offence she would be released, possibly even to take advantage of selling a copy of his hard drive to either his business competitors or the paparazzi, who had long sought proof of the precise nature of his relationship with Tia. Either prospect promised far reaching repercussions, not just to his extensive business empire, but even more importantly to Tia, her marriage and her reputation. He owed Tia his protection, he reflected grimly. But it might already be too late to prevent revealing private correspondence entering the public domain.

On the other hand, if he were to prevent the maid from contacting anyone to pass on confidential information for at least the next seven days, he could considerably minimise the risks to all concerned. Granted a week’s grace the business deal with the Coulter Centax Corporation, CCC, could be tied up and, should his fear with regard to the emails prove correct, Tia’s world-class PR advisors would have the chance to practise damage limitation on her behalf. In the event of the worst-case scenario isolating the maid was the most effective action he could currently take.

And, even more to the point, if he was forced to keep the maid around he might well be able to make use of her presence, Navarre decided thoughtfully. She was young and beautiful. And, crucially, he already knew that her loyalty could be bought. Why should he not pay her to fill the role that presently stood empty? With a movement of his hand he dismissed Jacques and his companion. The older man left the suite with clear reluctance.

Tawny gazed back at Navarre, her triangular face taut with strain. ‘I really wasn’t trying to steal from you—’

‘The camera recording in here won’t lie,’ Navarre murmured without any expression at all, lush black lashes low over intent green eyes.

‘There’s a camera operating in here?’ Tawny exclaimed in horror, immediately recognising that if there was he would have unquestionable proof of her entering the suite and taking his laptop.

‘My protection team set up a camera as a standard safeguard wherever I’m staying,’ Navarre stated smooth as glass. ‘It means that I will have pictorial evidence of your attempt to steal from me.’

Her narrow shoulders slumped and her face fell. Shame gutted her for, whatever her motivation had been, theft was theft and neither the police nor a judge would distinguish between what she had believed she was doing and a crime. She marvelled that she had foolishly got herself into such a predicament. Caught red-handed as she had been, it no longer seemed a good idea to continue to insist that she had not been stealing. ‘Yes …’

‘Having you sacked and arrested, however, will be of no advantage to me,’ Navarre Cazier asserted and she glanced up in surprise. ‘But if you were to accept my terms in the proposition I am about to make you, I will not contact the police and in addition I will pay you for your time.’

Genuinely stunned by the content of that speech, Tawny lifted her head and speared him with an ice-blue look of scorn. ‘Pay me for my time? I’m not that kind of girl—’

Navarre laughed out loud, grim amusement lightening the gravity on his face as her eyes flashed and her chin came up in challenge. ‘My proposition doesn’t entail taking your clothes off or, indeed, doing anything of an illegal or sexual nature,’ he extended very drily. ‘Make your mind up—this is very much your decision. Do I call the police or are you going to be sensible and reach for the lifebelt I’m offering?’

CHAPTER TWO

TAWNY straightened her shoulders. Her mind was in a fog torn between panic and irrational hope while she tried to work out if the exclusion of either illegal or sexual acts would offer her sufficient protection. ‘You’ll have to tell me first what grabbing the lifebelt would entail.’

‘Rien à faire … nothing doing. I can’t trust you with that information until I know that I have your agreement,’ Navarre Cazier fielded without hesitation.

‘I can’t agree to something when I don’t know what it is … you can’t expect that.’

His stunning eyes narrowed to biting chips of emerald. ‘Merde alors … I’m the party in the position of power here. I can ask whatever I like. After all, you have the right of refusal.’

‘I don’t want to be accused of theft. I don’t want a police record,’ Tawny admitted through gritted teeth of resentment. ‘I am not a thief, Mr Cazier—’

Navarre Cazier expelled his breath in a weary sigh that suggested he was not convinced of that claim. Tawny went red and her slender hands closed into fists. She was in a daze of desperation, trapped and fighting a dangerous urge to lose her temper. ‘This proposition—would I be able to accept it and keep my job on here?’ she pressed.

‘Not unless the hotel was prepared to allow you a leave of absence of at least two weeks.’

‘I don’t have that kind of flexibility,’ Tawny said heavily.

‘But I did say that I’d pay you for your time,’ Navarre reminded her drily.

That salient reminder, when Tawny was worrying about how the loss of her job would impact on her ability to pay her grandmother’s mortgage, was timely. ‘What’s the proposition?’

‘Are you agreeing?’

Her even white teeth snapped together. ‘Like I have a choice?’ she flashed back at him. ‘Yes. Assuming there’s nothing illegal, sexual or offensive about what you’re asking me to do.’

‘How would I know what you find offensive? Give me a final answer. Right now you’re wasting my valuable time.’

Rigid with resentment, Tawny looked at him, scanning the pure hard lines of his bronzed face. His eyes piercing with the weight of his intelligence, he wore an impenetrable mask of impassivity. He was incredibly handsome and incredibly unemotional. What could the proposition be? She was a lowly chambermaid whom he believed to be a thief. In what possible way could she be of use to such a wealthy, powerful man? Even more to the point, how could she put herself in such a man’s power? Logic reminded her that as long as that unseen camera of his held an image of her apparently stealing she was in his power whether she liked it or not.

‘How much would you pay me?’ Tawny prompted dry-mouthed, her face burning as she tried to weigh up her single option.

Realising that they were finally dealing in business terms, Navarre’s emerald-green gaze glittered with renewed energy. He estimated what she most probably earned in a year and doubled it in the sum he came back to her with. Although it went against the grain with him to reward criminal behaviour, he was aware that if she was to lose her job in meeting his demands he had to make it worth her financial while. She went pale, her eyes widening in shock, and in the same moment he knew he had her exactly where he wanted her. Everyone had their price and he had, it seemed, accurately assessed hers.

That amount of money would cover any future period of unemployment she might suffer as well as her grand mother’s mortgage for the rest of the year and more, Tawny registered in wonderment. But the truth that he had her pinned between a rock and a hard place was still a bitter pill to swallow. She would accept the money, but then any alternative was better than being arrested and charged with theft. She jerked her chin in affirmation. ‘I’ll do whatever it is as long as you promise to wipe that camera once it’s done.’

‘And I will accept that arrangement as long as you sign a confidentiality agreement, guaranteeing not to discuss anything you see or hear while you’re in my company.’

‘No problem. I’m not a chatterbox,’ Tawny traded flatly. ‘May I return to work now?’

Navarre dealt her an impatient look. ‘I’m afraid not. You can’t leave this hotel room without an escort. I want to be sure that any intel you may have gleaned from my laptop stays within these four walls.’