Sophie Weston - The Latin Affair

He gave her a sweet, poisonous smile.

‘Oh, I do. I can only conclude that it is not chance.’

Nicky was so bewildered by that, she did not even take offence at his tone.

‘No one else has had a problem. Martin uses only the very best suppliers,’ she said, thinking aloud. ‘And even if one supplier has suddenly lost the plot on quality control we didn’t get everything in your kitchen from just one company. There were too many machines.’ She looked up. ‘You’re sure every one of them was bad?’

Esteban Tremain looked down his nose. It was a thin, aquiline nose and it made her think of a particularly dictatorial Roman Emperor.

‘I have not test-driven every waste-disposal unit and coffee-grinder, if that’s what you mean.’

Nicky began to feel a little better.

‘Well, which have you test-driven?’ she demanded. That did not come out quite as she intended either. It sounded downright truculent

His eyebrows, she noted irrelevantly, were very dark and fine. Just at the moment they were locked together across the bridge of his nose in a mighty frown. A Roman Emperor in a mood to condemn a gladiator.

‘I am informed,’ he said with precision, ‘that neither the dishwasher nor the fridge/freezer are in working order. As a result my companion did not have the opportunity to test the oven to its fullest However, her observation and my own lead us both to the conclusion that the oven is not working either.’

Nicky was not going to admit it but she was impressed. She also noted that Esteban Tremain delegated investigations of the fridge and the dishwasher to a female companion. She suspected that he shared Ben’s ideas about the relationship between women, laundry and sex. Though Mr Tremain would undoubtedly present it in a more sophisticated manner. She did her best not to glower at him.

‘Well, that is of course very serious.’ She riffled through Martin’s desk drawer for a notepad. ‘Let me make a note—’

Esteban Tremain strolled forward.

‘No more notes.’

He sounded quite pleasant But, looking up, Nicky realised that he was a lot closer than she wanted him to be. And that he was in a cold rage. It must have been that rage which made her heart lurch, then start pounding so hard she was sure he must hear it.

He said gently, ‘I didn’t take the time out to come here so you could take more notes. This kitchen has taken four months longer than de Vries estimated. Hasn’t it?’

The question somehow demanded an answer. Nicky could not help but nod. She knew from her reading of the file that he was right.

She could feel sweat breaking out along her spine. It was not fear. It was not, God help her, attraction. But it had some of the symptoms of both. She breathed carefully, praying that he would not notice.

‘So what do you want?’ she asked.

Esteban Tremain smiled dangerously and Nicky hung on to her pleasant expression, but it was an effort.

‘I want action,’ he said softly.

There was a sharp silence which Nicky did not entirely understand.

Struggling for normality, she said in a placating tone, ‘So do we all. But there has to be some planning—’

True to form, Esteban Tremain did not waste time listening to her.

‘I don’t just mean as a general principle, some time in the future,’ he explained, still in that chillingly friendly tone. ‘I mean here and now. Today.’

He sounded cool and amused and as if he did not care one way or the other. Which was odd, considering the trouble he had caused. And her own instinctive feeling that he was so angry he could barely contain himself.

It took real courage to say drily, ‘I don’t do magic.’

For a moment his eyes flickered. Then he gave her a charming smile. It really was chilling.

‘Then I won’t ask for magic,’ he said softly. ‘Just my kitchen working like it’s supposed to. Now, I suggest you personally get into your car and go—and—put—it—right.’

She was not deceived by the gentle tone.

‘I can’t do that at a moment’s notice,’ she protested. Esteban Tremain looked her up and down. Slowly. It was a deliberate put-down and they both knew it. Nicky felt the shamed heat rise in her cheeks. She hated him.

Her chin came up and she glared back at him, right into those dark, dark eyes. It amused him. One eyebrow rose enquiringly.

‘Do you mend machinery by remote control, then?’ he asked pleasantly.

Horribly conscious of her blazing cheeks, Nicky said curtly, ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘Then I suggest you do as I ask. And sooner rather than later. My secretary will sort out the arrangements.’

He paused, waiting. But Nicky was speechless. With a faint triumphant smile, Esteban Tremain walked out of the office.

On a surge of fury she had never felt before, Nicky picked up the Waterford ornament and threw it. Hard. It did not break but it brought in the watchers hot foot.

‘What did he say?’ demanded Sally, half shocked, half thrilled.

‘What are you going to do?’ asked the more practical Caroline, returning the small glass sculpture to Martin’s desk.

‘Is it damaged?’ asked Nicky. Restored to herself, she was a little conscience-stricken.

‘It bounced,’ Caroline reassured her cheerfully. ‘Tremain really got you wound up, didn’t he? Tea, that’s what you need.’

And while Sally went to get it Caroline produced a photocopied sheet from behind her back.

‘Read this,’ she said with relish.

It was a copy of a gossip column piece, dated nearly a year earlier. Headed ‘Heart Throb Wins Again’, it described a yacht race in the Mediterranean. Nicky read it aloud.

‘Brilliant bachelor barrister Esteban Tremain’s winning streak continues. After recent notable victories in court, he and his crew on Glen Tandy have won the Sapphire Cup. Famously elusive, these days the Latin Lover, as the Law Courts call him, is spending time with very good friend Francesca, the popular daughter of Lord Moran. Friends say that Esteban does not tolerate criticism but he will have to smarten up his client list if he is going to tie the knot with a judge’s daughter.’

Nicky looked up. ‘What does that mean?’

‘It means he’s made mincemeat of better adversaries than you. Let Martin deal with him.’

‘Do you know him, then?’ said Nicky suspiciously.

Caroline had been brought in by Martin when the business had begun to expand and she was older than the others by several years. As a result, she had become the office guru. She did not disappoint now.

‘Friends in common,’ she said airily. ‘He is some sort of Latin American by birth but he was quite young when his mother remarried so he was brought up in England and took his stepfather’s name. He’s as tough as they come. Always has to be in control.’

Nicky thought of those unfathomable eyes, so dark, so guarded. She shivered.

‘I can believe it.’

‘Don’t try and handle this one yourself,’ Caroline advised shrewdly. ‘It’s Martin’s baby. Make him come back and deal with it.’

Nicky tried. It got her nowhere. Oh, Martin came back from the exhibition hall, all right. But by the time Nicky got in to see him he had already returned Esteban’s calls and his expression was sober.

‘Do what the man wants, Nick,’ Martin said, before she had managed more than a couple of sentences.

Nicky stared.

‘Have you listened to a word I’ve said?’ she demanded.

‘All of them.’ Martin had had a hard day and it showed. He pushed a weary hand through untidy grey hair. ‘You don’t like Tremain and you think I should run him off the territory. Well, tough. For one thing, I haven’t got the time. For another—we agreed when I took you on that that was your job. You do the trouble-shooting.’