The CEO's Christmas Proposition / His Expectant Ex: The CEO's Christmas Proposition. Merline Lovelace

was still trying to interpret his lazy half smile when he handed her the Baileys and retrieved his snifter of cognac from the marble-topped coffee table. With a ping of crystal on crystal, he tipped his glass to hers.

      “Here’s to Mother Nature. For better or worse, she’s calling the shots.”

      “For the foreseeable future, anyway.”

      Devon lifted the snifter to her lips. Her first sip of the cool, creamy liqueur went down like a chocolate milkshake. The second hit with a little more punch.

      “I called the front desk,” she told Cal as she moved toward the high-backed sofa angled to face the fire. “If necessary, we can hole up here until the storm breaks.”

      His gaze went to the sitting-room windows. The drapes were drawn back to showcase Old City’s illuminated spires and turrets. The sleet blurring the world-famous view gave it an impressionistic, almost surreal, quality.

      “Looks like holing up is becoming more necessary by the moment.”

      Devon had to agree. “I’ll call the people you were supposed to meet with in Berlin and Hamburg first thing in the morning and try to reschedule. Do you have any flexibility in when you need to return to the States?”

      “I would prefer not to spend Christmas Day in Germany. Or in the air,” he added with a wry smile. “As the only non-dad in the family, my sisters usually make me play Santa for my nieces and nephews.”

      “Beard and all?”

      “Beard and all.” He sank into the cushions at the other end of the sofa and stretched his feet toward the fire. “I’d hate to miss Christmas with my family and certainly wouldn’t want to deprive you of being with yours.”

      “Not a problem for me.”

      Evidently Devon’s shrug didn’t come across as careless as she’d intended. Cal eyes held a question as he regarded her from a few feet away.

      “No close family?”

      “No brothers or sisters, and my parents divorced when I was a kid,” she explained. “It wasn’t an amicable parting of the ways.”

      To say the least. Devon hid a grimace behind a swallow of smooth, chocolaty liqueur.

      “They fought over where I’d spend every holiday and vacation. I got so I dreaded school breaks.”

      “The fighting hasn’t let up now that you’re an adult?”

      “If anything, it’s worse. Now they lay the decision on me, along with the guilt. That’s one of the reasons I was more than happy to step in and take this trip when Sabrina got hit with the flu.”

      “What about someone else?” Cal asked casually. “Someone special to catch under the mistletoe?”

      Devon squirmed, remembering Blake’s proposal under that damned sprig of green. No way she intended to relate the fiasco that had followed. Or her ridiculous, starry-eyed belief she’d finally broken the Christmas curse.

      “No one special.”

      “Good.”

      “Excuse me?”

      “I’ve been wondering about that since you picked me up at the airport this morning.”

      Calmly, he set his brandy snifter on the coffee table, reached across the cushions and removed hers from her hand. Devon went from surprised to instantly wary as he laid his arm across the back of the sofa.

      “I’ve also been wondering if that kiss hit you with the same wallop it did me.”

      Oh, boy! Where had that come from? Hastily, Devon scrambled to get things back on a less personal basis.

      “How it hit either of us is completely irrelevant, Mr. Logan.”

      “Cal.”

      “This is a business trip, Mr. Logan. For me as well as you.”

      “We took care of business this afternoon. Even hard-charging professionals are entitled to some downtime.”

      “You took care of business this afternoon. I’m still on duty.”

      His mouth curving, he rendered a snappy salute that reminded her that this sophisticated multibil-lionaire had once been a lowly private or lieutenant or whatever.

      “Now hear this,” he intoned. “This is your captain speaking. All hands are officially at liberty.”

      “It doesn’t work like that,” she said stubbornly.

      “Sure it does. So answer the question, McShay. Did you feel the same kick I did?”

      Every shred of common sense Devon possessed shrieked at her to lie like hell. Despite his blithe assurances to the contrary, her gut told her she should not mix business and pleasure. Especially with someone like Cal Logan. He was too powerful, too charismatic. Too damned sexy.

      On the other hand…

      Stop right there! There was no other hand. She’d been burned once by a handsome, charismatic charmer. She’d be a fool to stick her hand in the fire again.

      “I repeat, Mr. Logan, how it hit either of us is completely irrelevant. I don’t intend to—”

      She broke off, blinking as the cityscape that had filled the windows behind Cal suddenly went black. Dresden’s beautiful spires and turrets disappeared before her eyes. In almost the next second, the luxurious King’s Suite plunged into darkness broken only by the flames leaping in the marble fireplace.

      Four

      “A major substation went down.”

      Cal hung up the house phone and confirmed what he and Devon already suspected.

      “Power is gone to half the city, with more outages being reported as we speak.”

      The flickering flames from the fireplace painted his face in shades of bronze as he crossed the room. His shadow loomed large against the pale walls.

      “The desk clerk says the hotel has a backup generator, but…”

      Devon’s heart sank. She had a feeling the “but” was a lead-in to something she didn’t want to hear. Sure enough, Cal delivered the grim news.

      “It provides only enough power for emergency-exit lighting.”

      Leaving the rest of the hotel in the dark.

      “How long do they think the power will be out?”

      “They have no idea. They’re hoping it’ll just be a few hours.”

      Terrific! What better way to end a day characterized by more screwups and miscues than she wanted to count? Suddenly weary beyond words, Devon ached to sink into her featherbed and sleep right through this latest disaster.

      “I think we should pack it in,” she suggested. “There’s nothing more we can do tonight.”

      Cal accompanied her to the door but leaned an elbow against the ornate molding. “Actually, there is. You could answer my question. Did you feel the same punch I did?”

      As if she was going to admit he’d rocked her back on her heels at the airport this morning!

      “I don’t intend to answer it,” she said primly.

      “Coward.”

      The soft taunt held as much amusement as speculation. Devon responded to both with a lift of her chin.

      “The kiss was a mistake. Or more correctly, a case of mistaken identity. Your friend asked you deliver it to someone he no doubt described as a good-time girl.”

      Which Sabrina Russo most definitely had been. Only Devon and Caroline knew how hard their friend had to work now to maintain her