Part 7 (2/2)
He just looked at her.
She figured it out. ”Oh. Right. It's all in my file, isn't it?”
”Emma. We have to get going.”
”All right. I know. I'll just ... set the burglar alarm.” She rarely set it, but since she wasn't sure when she'd be back, she decided it might be a good idea this time. The control pad was right by the door. She stepped back inside and punched the combination to arm the thing. Then she locked the door and turned to Jonas, who was waiting, looking a little impatient, several steps down the walk.
”I'm coming, I'm coming...”
He strode off and she hurried to keep up.
The driver was standing by the side of the limo. He opened the door for them. Jonas handed over Emma's suitcase and garment bag, and stepped aside so that she could get in first.
Emma flashed the driver a grin. ”Thank you.”
The driver tipped his hat. Emma slid across the soft leather seat to the far side. Jonas got in, too. The driver closed the door and then detoured around the back of the big car to stow Emma's luggage in the trunk.
The driver had climbed in behind the wheel way up in front beyond the gla.s.s part.i.tion and started up the engine before it occurred to Emma that something very important was missing.
She turned to Jonas. ”Where's Mandy?”
He gave her a puzzled sort of frown. ”At home where she belongs.””We're stopping at the mansion then? To pick her up?”He looked at her as if she'd just suggested he blow up a bank. ”No.””She's not coming with us?””Of course she's not.””Why not?”He let out a long, put-upon breath of air. ”Emma, I have no intention of dragging my two-year-old sister to Vegas and back. It's an insane suggestion. We'll be home tonight. She won't even know we were gone.”
”That's not the point.”
”Of course it is.”
”Will you kindly stop saying 'of course,' like something is right just because it's what you think? We are doing this for her sake. And by golly, she is going to be there.”
”She is two years old.”
”Yes. She is. And she's comin' with us.”
”No, Emma. She's not.”
They glared at each other. The big car rolled away from the curb.
Emma said, ”Stop the car.”
Either the part.i.tion that separated the front seat from the back was soundproof, or the driver had ignored her. The car rolled on, down to the end of her cul de sac, around and back the other way.
Emma spoke directly to Jonas. ”Stop the car. Now.” His eyes s.h.i.+fted away, then back. The nerves-of-steel Bravo Billionaire had gotten the message. Emma Lynn Hewitt meant business.
”d.a.m.n it, Emma,” he said in a voice right next door to a whisper. ”I've made no arrangements in terms of security. It's not safe.”
Suddenly, she hurt for him, for what she knew he had suffered as such a young child for what he'd lost and what he couldn't seem to help fearing he just might lose again.
She spoke gently. ”It is safe. She'll be with us. We'll never let her out of our sight.”
Jonas turned away.
The car had left Emma's street behind. They were headed for the freeway. Emma said, ”Tell the driver to pull over, Jonas. Tell him to do it now.”
He looked at her again, a look as cold as a dead rattlesnake. He did not tell the driver to stop.
She hated to do it to him, to say the forbidden word. But at that point she didn't see that she had much of a choice. ”I would think, Jonas Bravo, that you of all people would never stoop to ... kidnapping.”
Jonas said nothing. He kept on looking at her, his face expressionless.
Emma said it again. ”Stop the car.”
He pushed a b.u.t.ton built into the armrest on his right. ”Larry. Pull over.”
The car slid in near the curb and stopped.
Emma asked, ”Has she been out of that mansion once since Blythe died?”
He took his sweet time replying. Finally, he said, ”At this point in her life, everything my sister could possibly need is right there, at Angel's Crest.”
”So. She hasn't left the mansion since Blythe pa.s.sed away.”
He granted her the tiniest, most disinterested of shrugs.
She told him, ”That little girl is not going to spend her whole life on a hill in Bel Air.
Starting today, she's gettin' out now and then.”
He muttered, very softly, ”d.a.m.n you, Emma Hewitt.”
And she laid it right out for him. ”I'm sorry, but I am not going to budge on this one. We are driving back to Angel's Crest now, and we are picking up that little girl. Because as far as I'm concerned, Jonas Bravo, if we don't, we are lookin' at a deal-breaker here.”
His eyebrows rose and he gave her another absolutely icy look. ”Oh, are we?”
”That's right. No Mandy, no marriage.”
Chapter 8.
M andy babbled all the way to the airport and then conked out during the flight. The private jet, which was done up like somebody's living room a living room with all the furniture bolted to the floor was pretty quiet after that.
The two bodyguards Jonas had insisted must go with them didn't have a lot to say. And Mandy's nanny, Claudia, was very sweet and very shy. She sat over in a corner, thumbing through a magazine, looking up and muttering something prayerful in Spanish every time the jet hit a little turbulence.
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