The Ultimate Seduction

by Dani Collins

  She couldn’t help a small smile.

  “For such a sophisticated, educated man, you’re incredibly uncivilized. You know that, right?” She rubbed the goose bumps off her arms, trying to hide how primitive she was at her core, responding to his caveman talk like some kind of kinky submissive.

  “Your parents have every right to be suspicious of me,” he allowed drily. “But it’s important to me that you know my intentions toward you are not dishonorable.”

  That’s exactly what she had feared after overhearing her mother. It had gutted her. Meeting his gaze was really hard with that specter still haunting her.

  “I don’t expect you to love me, Ryzard.” The words fractured her soul. “But I have to insist on honesty. If you’re really just with me because of my father, please say so and I’ll—”

  “I can’t believe I’m going to say this,” he cut in impatiently, “but sometimes I wish to hell you’d had other lovers so you would appreciate what we have. I do.”

  “Oh, well, let me just accommodate that right now.”

  He grabbed her before she’d taken two steps toward the door.

  “Gorilla! Brute! You’re hurting me,” she accused as she found herself bouncing over his shoulder toward the bedroom.

  “Honesty, Tiffany,” he reminded in a scolding tone. “You just demanded it, and so do I. Lie to me and so help me, I’ll spank you. That is not a bluff.” He flopped her onto the bed and retreated to slam the bedroom door.

  “You scare me,” she cried, sitting up. “Not like scared you’ll hurt me,” she protested with an outstretched hand, trying to forestall the outrage climbing in his expression. “The way you make me feel. I’m terrified you’ll stop wanting me. You saw what I was like before you came along. I don’t want to be that person again. I don’t know how to handle how important you are to me, or how horrible I’ll feel when this ends.”

  The tense line of his shoulders eased. “I can’t imagine that happening.”

  “But I don’t know how honorable my intentions are. I told you how I feel about living in the public eye. If it’s just an affair...”

  She trailed off, distracted as he joined her, his big body crowding and overwhelming, sending her onto her back under him with the force of his personality, barely even touching her. She melted in supplication, slave to his authority and the tenderness in his eyes.

  “This is more than an affair,” he insisted.

  That didn’t allay any of her misgivings, but she wasn’t sure what she wanted him to say. She rather wished she had more experience with relationships herself, but from everything she’d observed, she doubted anyone was truly confident with whatever sorts of relationships they had. It came down to trust, and as much as she wanted to believe in Ryzard, she didn’t have much faith in herself.

  She touched the pad of her fingertip to his lips, tracing the masculine shape that so entranced her.

  “Where do we go from here?” she asked, meaning emotionally, but he took her literally.

  “I have quite a few appearances. I would like you to accompany me. Will you?”

  Her heart stalled, but refusing meant bringing The End forward to now, and she could already see it would be horribly painful. She wasn’t ready for that, so she said the only thing she could.

  “Of course.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  DESPITE TIFFANY’S AGREEMENT, despite the unflagging passion between them, she grew less like the cheeky woman he’d come to know and more like the chilly mother he’d met in Zurich.

  Of course he was pressing her inexorably into her mother’s role. He couldn’t help it. The opportunity was too ripe, the timing at hand, and she was damned good at it. She stepped forward with a gracious remark when needed and backed off the rest of the time. No matter what came up or when, she accepted the pull of his attention with equanimity. If she didn’t like it, no one could tell, not even him. When he asked, she assured him everything was “Fine.”

  A sure sign that it wasn’t.

  But neither of their schedules had room for the type of downtime that had brought them together in the first place. She’d been up for several hours two nights in a row trying to resolve a problem with her firm. Now he’d dragged her to Budapest for an Eastern European conference. A black-tie reception opened the event, and her best makeup couldn’t hide the exhaustion around her eyes.

  Still she smiled, always ignoring startled reactions to her scars or simply moving past an awkward moment with a calm “Car crash.” Then she would distract with a compliment or question, her warm manner disguising the fact she maintained a discreet bubble of distance.

  So why was she currently clasping two hands over a stranger’s? Her expression was uncharacteristically revealing, not the cool mask she usually wore at these events. The man was older than Ryzard, somewhere in his fifties, but not someone he recognized. Tiffany was sharing deep eye contact with him, and her profile was somber.

  He excused himself and crossed over to them, possessive male hackles rising to attention, especially when they both stiffened at his approach and lowered their gazes.

  “Ryzard, this is Stanley Griffin, minister of international trade in Canada and my late husband’s cousin. Well, cousin to my mother-in-law, Maude.”

  Despite the legitimate reason for familiarity, he used the introduction to extricate Stanley’s hand from Tiffany’s grasp.

  They briefly chatted about his country’s mission to, “Do what we did with the EU here in Eastern Europe.” Ryzard expressed his desire to participate, but first he needed recognition so if that message could be conveyed to Canada’s prime minister...?

  Stanley left with a promise to do so, but made a point to ask Tiffany, “Please stay in touch.” Once again, Tiffany had proved her worth to him politically, but her coziness with the man rankled Ryzard for the rest of the evening.

  “You seemed very familiar with that Canadian,” he said later when they were undressing in the hotel suite. He was tired of being away and wished they were home.

  Home. Did she regard his country the way he did? She wasn’t happy here in Hungary, despite her expressed desire to see the country and her interest in this city’s history. He couldn’t be sure she’d been happy in any of the places they’d been recently.

  “He was at my wedding. I didn’t remember him, to be honest, but he certainly remembered me. He started to tell me how much he loved it when Paulie had spent summers with their family, when the boys were young, and I thought we were both going to—” She clamped her lips together, then pressed a knuckle to her mouth, turning away.

  Stricken by her edging toward breakdown, he moved to grasp her shoulders in bracing hands. “Shh. Don’t talk about him.”

  She reacted with a violent twist away from his grip and glared up at him with eyes full of tears and betrayal. “Oh, that’s rich. Why can’t I talk about my husband? Luiza is right there every time we’re naked.” She poked two fingers into his chest.

  Her hostility took him aback, as did the underlying challenge. He bristled, but managed to keep himself from pointing out her scars were an equally indelible reminder that she had had a life before he entered it.

  “I didn’t say you couldn’t talk about him, but it’s obviously upsetting you so you should stop,” he managed, barely hanging on to a civil tone.

  Her jagged laugh abraded his nerves, plucking his aggression responses to even higher alert. “Yeah, well, if that’s the criteria, there’s a lot of things I should stop doing.”

  Don’t ask, he told himself, but the elephant in the room had grown large enough to put pressure on both of them. A few weeks ago she hadn’t had the courage to go to the grocery store in her hometown. Today she was being shoved into a supporting role on the world stage. If she didn’t want to do it, she ought to have said so by now, but apparently that was u
p to him.

  “You’re not happy in the spotlight. I understand that.” He removed his belt and flung it away, angry with himself for turning a blind eye to what was obviously damaging their relationship, but he couldn’t undo who he was any more than he was willing to have Luiza’s name erased from his chest.

  “Stanley said Paulie’s mother was always jealous of my mom because she looked like she had it all, but at least Maude had privacy. All I could think is, What am I doing? Why am I here?” She lifted helpless hands.

  “Tiffany, you’re good at this,” he began.

  “I’m good at sex. Should I do that with every man who asks?” she snarled back.

  He recoiled, shocked by her vehemence and scored by a remark that made it sound as if she only tolerated sleeping with him. “As I said—” The words ground from between his clenched teeth. “You shouldn’t do anything that fails to give you some level of enjoyment.”

  Her fierce expression flickered toward remorse, before she collapsed in a chair, elbows on her knees, head in hands, shoulders heavy with defeat. “I’m sorry. I know better than to have this fight. It accomplishes nothing because at the end of the day, you still need me beside you.”

  “I want you beside me, Tiffany. I don’t need you. If you’re feeling used then you know my feelings on that. I’ll achieve my two-thirds votes with or without you.”

  She lifted her head out of her hands to stare at him, face like a mask, half of it tortoiseshell reds, the other side white. Slowly her flat gaze moved to the floor while her hands twisted together. She forced herself to sit upright, but her shoulders remained bowed.

  “That certainly tells me where I stand.”

  The ice maiden was back, causing cold fire to lick behind his heart, leaving streaks of dead, black tissue.

  “I’m saying you don’t have to participate if you don’t want to. We can still be together. It doesn’t have to change anything,” he said rather desperately, sensing things slipping away without any chance to control it.

  “It changes everything, Ryzard! What am I going to do? Sit in your presidential castle waiting for you to come home? There’s a departure from turning into my mother,” she said with a caustic laugh. “What else could I do? Follow you around but never be seen? That would be living as a recluse again. If you—” She bent her head to stare at her pale knuckles, but he saw the pull in her brow of deep struggle. “If we loved each other, it would be different.”

  He couldn’t help his stark inhale of aversion. Marriage he might rationalize. Pulling his heart from the grave where he’d buried it next to Luiza was impossible. There, at least, it was safe from another blow of great loss.

  Silence coated the room in a thick fog for a long minute. Tiffany was the first to move, swiping at her cheek before speaking haltingly.

  “I thought my life was over, that I’d never be able to have a husband and family. I even reconciled myself to it and figured out how to fill my life with other things. I could live unmarried and childless with you, Ryzard. But you’re the one who made me believe I shouldn’t sell myself short. If someone could love me, if I have a soul mate out there, I shouldn’t settle for anything less than finding him.”

  He clenched his hands into fists, trying to withstand a pain so great it threatened to rend him apart. She did deserve to be loved. He couldn’t keep her here to serve his passion while he withheld parts of himself. It would wear on her self-esteem. If he wasn’t capable of giving her all of himself, he had to let her go.

  But the agony was so great he wanted to scream.

  The weariness and misery in her eyes when she lifted them to meet his gaze was more than he could bear though.

  “It’s time for me to go home,” she said gently.

  He nodded once, jerkily, incapable of any other response. His throat was blocked by a thick knot of anguish, the rest of him caved in on itself so his skin felt like a thin shell, ready to crack and turn to powder.

  “I’ll go make the arrangements,” her voice thinned over the last word as she stood and rushed from the room.

  She didn’t return.

  When he couldn’t stand it any longer, he went looking for her and came up against a locked door. He could hear her sobbing inside the bedroom, but he didn’t knock. He silently railed at her for shutting him out, but the truth was, he was close to tears himself. Drowning himself in a bottle of vodka looked like a really good idea.

  Taking one to his room, he sat on the bed then left it untouched on the nightstand as he stayed awake through the long, dark night, willing Tiffany to come to him.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  BARBARA HOLBROOK WANTED to know exactly what had happened.

  “Mom,” Tiffany protested, feeling cornered in her room, jet-lagged and wondering how she still had a doll propped on the pillows of her made bed. It was an antique, granted, but seriously. “I’m about ten years too late for having my heart broken by my first crush. That’s all it was.”

  That’s what she kept telling herself anyway. She sure as heck didn’t want to deconstruct everything that had happened with Ryzard. It was too painful.

  But she missed him. Sleeping alone sucked and stalking him on the web only made her heart ache. Or laugh aloud.

  Mrs. Davis and I remain on excellent terms. Print something negative about her at your own peril, she read over breakfast one Saturday morning and got herself goggled at by her entire family for her outburst.

  “What,” she hedged, amusement fading. “It’s funny,” she insisted after reading it to them. She wanted to kiss his austere image, feeling as though he was flirting with her from far, far away. He’d been so contained that last night, so willing to let her go without a fight. That had made her feel insignificant, but reading that they remained “on excellent terms” bolstered her.

  “You’ll be seeing him again, then?” her father asked, sipping his coffee.

  “Why? Does sleeping with him help your approval rating?”

  “Tiffany,” her mother gasped.

  Christian sent her a hard look. “Come on, Tiff.”

  Setting her cup into its saucer like a gavel announcing a judge’s decision, Tiffany said, “That was out of line. I apologize. But I’m tired of being a bug under a microscope. It’s time I went into the office.”

  “You’ve been in there every day since you came home,” her mother said with confusion.

  “Not my office here, Mom. The real office. In the city.”

  “What? When?” Chris asked swiftly. “I can’t drive you for a week at least. I told you I’m working from here until I get that design done, so I’m not interrupted.”

  “And I have to be in Washington,” her father said with apology.

  “I have an appointment in New York at the end of the month, darling,” her mother offered. “You can come in for the day with me, but are you sure you’re ready?”

  She wished she’d had her tablet set to record. Ryzard would shake his head at this display and probably claim this coddling was the reason she was such a spoiled brat. She suspected he’d also remind her how lucky she was to be so loved.

  Misty emotion washed over her in a flood of gratitude for the family she had and an ache of longing for the man she didn’t.

  “You guys are awesome. I love you,” she said, meeting each pair of eyes in turn to let her sincerity sink in. She silently thanked Ryzard as she did it, finally able to see herself as a whole, independent adult because he had treated her as one. “But it’s time for me to be a grown-up. I’ll drive myself to New York and stay in the company flat until I find my own place.”

  Her mother’s gasp and near-Victorian collapse didn’t sway her. On Monday she walked through the glass doors of Davis and Holbrook, palms clammy and half her face hidden behind giant sunglasses. By Thursday the worst of the buzzing and staring
was behind her. Friday morning she was interrupted by a delivery of flowers.

  “Wow,” she couldn’t help saying, stunned by the bouquet arranged to look like a culmination of fireworks. Her heart began to gallop in her chest. “Who is that from?”

  “I couldn’t say, ma’am.” The uniformed man tapped the subtle Q Virtus crest on his shirt pocket. “I work for their concierge service. All I get is a pickup and delivery address.”

  “Oh, um, would it be from Q Virtus itself, then?” That was disappointing. And made the significance of portraying fireworks a little creepy.

  “There’s usually a ‘compliments of Zeus’ card if it is. Without one, I’d guess it’s from one of their members, but I really couldn’t say. I’m not privy to much that goes on there. You could be a member for all I know,” he added with a shrug.

  “I imagine there are members who don’t know they belong,” she murmured ironically, thanking him with a generous tip, then burying her face in the perfume of the bouquet. She wanted to gather the fragrant leaves and butter-soft petals into herself, trying to feel closer to Ryzard.

  How could he be this sweet, this pleased by her stepping out of her comfort zone and taking control of her life, and not love her a little?

  Luiza, she thought with a pang. She could never compete with a woman who had shown such a level of bravery.

  Taking a page from Ryzard’s book, she had Q Virtus arrange a nice lunch when her mother came to visit at the end of the month. Being scrupulously efficient, they located it in a penthouse that fit exactly what Tiffany was looking for as a new home. The decor was a bit too colorless for her taste. It needed a stained glass umbrella to jazz it up, but the floor plan and views were astonishing.

  Her mother pronounced it excellent for entertaining, which only made Tiffany think of holding court with Ryzard and miss him all over again.

  She sat across from her mother in tall wingbacks at a circle of white marble facing a floor-to-ceiling view of Central Park, sipping from crystal water goblets with brushed gold trim, thinking she’d rather be staring at that heart-wrenching statue if it put her back in his proximity.