LITMIR.BIZ

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look. Don’t hurt my daughter was the gist of the volumes it spoke. His answering look said I would never hurt her. He hoped the but I’ll hurt you...bad part went unsaid.

      The moment her father disappeared, Eliana dragged Rafael by his tie and planted a hot kiss on his lips.

      Starving for her already, he moved to deepen it, and she pulled away, chuckling, eyes heavy with hunger. “I shouldn’t be kissing you after I just binged on that feijoada. Rinsing my mouth can’t begin to counteract its garlicky goodness.”

      Brazil’s national dish was indeed an antisocial stew. This restaurant that proclaimed itself the meal’s house was lauded by Cariocas, Rio’s residents, as serving the best feijoada in Rio. Even after he’d ordered their best meal, he hadn’t expected the giant pot of meats swimming in saucy black beans they’d gotten. The tureen had been piled high with smoked and peppery sausages, carne seca ham and an assortment of other pork cuts. He was glad he remembered to tell them not to serve the pig’s ears, tail and tongue.

      He pulled her back against him, claiming her lips. “Having binged on the same pungent bomb, all I taste is your sweetness.” Another savoring kiss. “And the tartness of acai and maracuja and dragon fruit from that Amazonian fruit smoothie.”

      She suddenly yelped, pulling back once again. “You always scorch me, but now you literally do. Those deadly malagueta peppers you gobbled are still lacing your lips and tongue.” Licking the burning away, she smiled. “Thank you.”

      He pressed his lips as if to secure her kisses there. “What for?”

      “For being so nice to my father.”

      “He’s a nice man.”

      He didn’t even have to lie. Apart from the sadness he glimpsed in Ferreira’s eyes—which Eliana said had been there since her mother’s death—and his wariness of how the power Rafael wielded would affect his daughter’s well-being, Ferreira was apparently the kind and agreeable man he remembered. The evil he’d committed against him had carved no visible telltale signs on his visage.

      Eliana sighed. “I actually think you didn’t like him much, but you were still extremely nice to him. So thank you.”

      Deus. Those instincts of hers continued to prove sharper than he’d even thought. He’d thought he’d been seamless.

      Before he could say something to alleviate her suspicion, she added, “But it’s expected on a first meeting with my wary father hen. He spent lunch watching your every move. And you’re a man who suffers no monitoring or judgment.”

      Relieved she’d found a benign reason for the hostility she’d felt from him, he exhaled. “It’s only natural he’d be worried about how fast things developed between us. I think I ended up allaying his anxiety.”

      “I know.” She smiled up at the waitress, who put the bill before him. “Why do you think I went to the ladies’ room?”

      “And there I thought you didn’t have a wily bone in your body.” He grinned as he got out his credit card.

      She chuckled. “No wiliness involved, I assure you. I was instructed to do so. On the way, Daddy begged me to give him any chance to be alone with you. He claimed there was no way he could ‘read’ you as long as I was around. He also begged me not to be my shockingly candid self while he’s around.” She shot him a devilish look. “I did manage not to say things like, ‘Don’t worry about Rafael seducing me, Daddy. I spent a whole night slithering all over him and begging him to have sex with me, and he was the one who held back and reprimanded me about my language, too!’”

      Rafael threw his head back on a guffaw. “It’s a good thing you exercised some self-control. You would have given him a heart attack.”

      Her laugh tinkled like crystal. “I did give him a minor one with that kiss when we first came in. The poor man always bragged he was the only man he knew whose daughter never gave him any nightmares about boyfriends, since I never had any. Then I go and get all mixed up with someone who’s as much trouble as ten thousand men put together.”

      “So I’m all his postponed nightmares come all at once.”

      And she didn’t know how literally true that was.

      “Exactly.” She laughed, her gemlike eyes radiating mischief and joy in Rio’s midday sun. Entranced as he gazed into them, he threw some bills down, and she giggled harder. “That tip could make you a partner in this restaurant.”

      “The food and service were impeccable. They earned it.”

      “It was lovely. But then it didn’t have to be. Just being with you would make anything wonderful.”

      He knew she meant every word. She was the first woman, the first person, who’d ever told him everything she felt, no games. And it was intoxicating.

      “I also want to thank you for not talking business.”

      “I want to discuss a few things with you before I bring up anything with him. I have reports, but I want what only an insider would know.”

      “Let it go altogether, okay? Even my father didn’t bring up business. Now that he saw us together, I believe he won’t.”

      “I know he has big problems, Eliana.”

      Dismay flooded her eyes. “I guess it was too much to hope that you of all people wouldn’t find out. But we’re working on a resolution, and I’m hopeful we’ll soon have it.”

      “I know a partnership with me would help resurrect his business. Even if I don’t give it to him, I still want to help.” He did intend to save her father’s business, for her, to preserve her legacy. He’d seen Ferreira’s will, and she was his only beneficiary. No matter what he felt about her father, he wouldn’t let her inherit an ailing enterprise. He buried his lips in her palm. “Let me help.”

      She caressed his cheek, hand trembling as it was singed by his passion, her gaze softening with gratitude. “It doesn’t matter if you can help, it’s enough you want to.”

      “I can do anything, remember?”

      “Oh, yes, you can.” Her smile was tenderness itself. Then suddenly she pushed her chair back and stood up.

      He rose at once. “Where are you going?”

      “Back to work. Then to the orphanage.” She grinned as she reached for her coat. “As you already know.”

      He helped her on with the coat that matched the deep royal-blue dress he’d spent much of the lunch hour fantasizing about ripping off her.

      She hooked her purse across her body. “See you at my place later? Or would you rather I come to yours?”

      “I’ll come to you. And I don’t want you driving on that road alone again, so whenever you want to come to my place, I’ll pick you up. Eight o’clock?”

      “Make it nine.” Her smile lit up the whole world as she walked into his arms and met him halfway in a kiss that had the whole restaurant watching.

      After she left, some men gave him the thumbs-up. One was giving him two.

      Mock bowing to them, he walked out into the hubbub of Rio’s midday congestion. Cariocas filled the streets as they did every hour of the day. Anyone coming to Rio came for its laid-back beach culture as much as its breathtaking landscapes and abundant tourist attractions. And everyone got the impression the Cariocas were on perpetual vacation.

      He breathed deep of the ocean breeze and the unique scents of this city he’d spent his formative years in. It was strange how alien he felt here. His kidnapping had truly cut all the ties he had with his past, with the being he’d been.

      But Rio was still the place he’d been taken from, and it was where he’d returned to enact the vengeance he’d waited for almost a quarter of a century. Three quarters

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