Fletcher Bravo rose from his sleek leather swivel chair. He braced his lean hands on his black slate desktop and canted toward Cleo Bliss. âI want you,â he said. âName your price.â
A thoroughly unwelcome thrill shivered through Cleo. She had to remind herself not to shift nervously in the glove-soft guest chair.
Calm, she thought. Serene. Under no circumstances can he be allowed to sense weakness. She met those eerily compelling pale gray eyes of his with a level, no-nonsense stare.
I want youâ¦.
It was, Cleo told herself, only a figure of speech. He didnât refer to Cleo specifically but to the top-quality service that Cleo and the people who worked for her could provide. If there was another, very sexual meaning in his words, Cleo chose not to acknowledge itâjust as she chose not to recognize the hot little flares of excitement and attraction that had sizzled beneath her skin since sheâd entered the CEOâs corner office several minutes before.
Cleo already had a man in her life and he was nothing like the one across from her. Driven, powerful, dynamic men in gorgeous hand-tailored suits just werenât her style. Sheâd spent a good portion of her childhood watching what such men could do to the women they wanted.
Lesson learned. In spades.
She shouldnât even be here. She certainly didnât want to be here. But the man across from her had insisted. Heâd started by having his associates approach her. Repeatedly. Each time sheâd turned them down.
Fat lot of good declining had done. Heâd called and said he wanted to meet with her personally. What could she do? In the past couple of years, Fletcher Bravo and his half brother, Aaron, had become major players in the gaming and megaresort world of Las Vegas. No smart businesswoman would offend either of them if she could help it.
So here she was. Meeting with him. Trying to get him to understand the word no.
So far she wasnât having a whole lot of success. She cleared her throat and told him for what seemed like the hundredth time, âIâm sorry, but Iâm just not prepared right now to take on a project of this magnitude.â
Those wolfish eyes narrowed slightly. âGet prepared.â
Cleo let a long beat of silence elapse before carefully suggesting, âMaybe Iâm not making myself clearâ¦.â
âYou are. As glass. But Iâm not listeningâand the day will come when youâll thank me for not listening. Because this is an opportunity you canât afford to pass up. This is growth, pure and simple. Growth that the Bravo Group will bankroll. Your facility here at Impresario will be double the size of what youâve got at your current location. Inside and out, youâll get all the space you require. State-of-the-art equipment. Whatever you need. Say the word and itâs yours.â
âItâs just not that simple.â
âOh, but it is.â
âAt KinderWay,â she said patiently, âweâre much more than a day-care service. We base our work on proven child-development techniques. For the program to be effective, it has to be consistent and ongoing. Weâre not set up for drop-ins.â
âI realize that.â He lowered his head and looked at her from under the dark shelf of his brow. âAnd you wonât be a drop-in service. We plan to keep the regular day care for our guests. Employees with infants or workers who need day care only for after school can continue with our original program. I want KinderWay for the preschool kids only to start. And I want it exclusively for children of Bravo Group employees, both here at Impresario and at High Sierra.â
High Sierra and Impresario were sister resort/casinos. They claimed a big chunk of prime real estate on opposite sides of the Strip and were connected by a glittering glass breezeway that crossed Las Vegas Boulevard five stories up. Both were owned and run by the Bravos. Fletcher was CEO of the newer Moulin Rouge-themed Impresario. Aaron Bravo, Fletcherâs half brother, ran High Sierra.
Though Fletcher had yet to say so, Cleo knew the real reason he had decided he wanted the best preschool in Las Vegas on-site at Impresario. She could Google with the best of them, and in preparation for this meeting sheâd done her homework. The photograph mounted in a brushed-chrome frame on Fletcherâs polished-stone slab of a desk told the real story here and confirmed what Cleo already knew. The little girl in the picture had brown hair and big, solemn dark eyes.