by Leslie North
Madison gestured toward the empty chair across from her desk, and Vlad sat down with leonine ease. Beneath the warm light of her office, she could see that his haircut was expensive, and that the blond was natural; he wore it straight and slicked back from his chiseled face. When he removed his sunglasses, his eyes were a startling blue. His unfettered gaze trained on her was like a punch to the stomach. She dropped down into her office chair with a winded exhale that had nothing to do with taking a load off from her troubles. Something told her they were only the beginning.
"Can I offer you a cup of coffee, Mr. Karev?" The gesture came automatically. She watched as he set his paper cup down on the desk and tried not to wince openly at her blunder.
"Vladimir is fine, Miss O’Connor," he said. "And something tells me you don't serve it the way I like."
"Something tells me you're right." Madison pursed her lips, remembering how the vodka had set a slow-burning fire to her unsuspecting taste buds. It hadn't been unpleasant, just… surprising. "You introduced yourself as Vlad before. Is it all right if I call you that?"
"Please," he invited. She didn't offer him similar permission to use her first name, and he didn't appear to expect it in return.
"Great. Now that we are acquainted, do you mind telling me why you're here?" she asked. "Unless it was to deliver the news about your father, which I'm sorry to hear, by the way."
She wasn't, and she had a feeling Vlad knew as much. She couldn't afford to be tenderhearted where the Russian Mafia was concerned, and she didn't think this man would hold it against her. There was nothing outwardly tender about him.
"I like to keep an eye on the family business," he answered her simply.
"My family's business, you mean," she said. In the next moment, she cursed herself for her impulsive correction. She wasn't going to make the sort of headway she needed if she kept letting any territorial feelings get the better of her.
Vlad arched a brow above his hooded eyes in bland amusement. "As you say," he replied. "But we are partners, and I'm afraid a personal visit from me was long overdue."
From the outside, there had never been any question about what Vlad was—not to Madison. Despite this, she detected no trace of a Russian accent, which only further aroused her interest in the enigmatic man sitting across from her. Was he from overseas originally, and did it serve him to hide the fact? His English was crisp, even elegant, but it was his sophisticated arrangement of words when he spoke that made her curious of his origins. He seemed a walking contradiction like he had only recently strolled out of a time when men bashed women over the head with a club, but then gone on to receive an Ivy League education.
She watched as he drummed his fingers on her desk meditatively. He wore a light jacket over the V-neck, the sleeves of which ended below his wrists, but even this wasn't enough to conceal the presence of what she assumed were mob-related tattoos. They snaked toward his knuckles like the tendrils of some dangerous vine. The ink was faded, and she deduced that he must have had them for a long time but he couldn't have been more than what? Thirty? Why was she thinking about this? Why was she also thinking about how far the tattoos might extend on his body and wondering how many women knew the answer?
Don't be ridiculous, Maddie. Who even had thoughts like that? Certainly not the man sitting across from her. Hell, she hadn't even wanted to let him through the door when she first met him and now she was letting herself imagine him naked?
She absolutely would not blush in his presence. She refused to. With his watchful eyes trained on her, there was no way he would mistake or misinterpret exactly what she was thinking.
But maybe she hadn't lost all reason after all. Maybe there was an opportunity here, and her thoughts were leading her in the right direction.
It was worth a shot.
"If you'd like to take a look at the ledger, its stowed here," Madison offered as she rose. She turned away from her guest and bent over at the waist, pretending to preoccupy herself with the combination on the safe. She understood all too well the view she was providing him. "I keep two of them. One sits on my desk, and the other collects dust inside here. Let's just say there are discrepancies between the two."
She peered around the side of her right hip as she said this. Vlad's eyes were fixed raptly on her rear end, to the point that she wasn't even sure he heard her. It sent an electric thrill racing through her. She had never tried anything like this before. She wasn't used to putting herself on display; she hadn't even been certain it would work. Now, it appeared to be working too well. The intensity of his gaze was doing things to her physically that she was completely unprepared to handle.
"I mean the figures, Mr. Karev." She half-heartedly tried to call his attention back to their conversation.
"Vlad." His voice sounded tight as he corrected her. "And I am familiar with… figures, Miss O’Connor."
Madison hid a smile as she turned back to the safe. If she appealed to Vlad as a woman, rather than as a reluctant business partner, maybe she stood a chance of getting close to the man. The Russian Mafia was notoriously insular, but surely they had to date outside the "family" pool? And who said anything about date, anyway?
Her brain worked quickly. If she could get someone at the head of the Karev family to open up to her about things he shouldn't—maybe even unwittingly provide her with some hard evidence concerning what they were really doing—then she could use that as leverage to sever all ties between her family and the mob.
While the idea of blackmailing anyone filled her with a sick dread, she also knew that she was willing to do anything to save her parents from their own mistakes. Her father had been tricked into taking the investment from Sergey before he knew where the money was really coming from, and now Carson O’Connor desperately wanted out. Her mother hadn’t taken his decision well and the years under the Mafia’s thumb had taken its toll on her—she’d been in and out of the hospital recently. Madison felt certain that the only way to get the Mafia to back off out of their business was to start speaking in a language these criminals understood. Maybe then, her mother would slowly return to her old self.
To do that, she needed to appeal to Vlad, and she needed to start thinking like the vixen her red hair made her out to be. She needed to get back on the subject of figures.
"Really?" she mused aloud. "How familiar with them are you, would you say?"
"I have a Masters in Finance," Vlad replied.
This revelation took Madison by surprise. She rose up in astonishment and wound up banging her head on the underside of one of the taller shelves. Her skull throbbed in the aftermath, and she raised a hand to it with a little moan, clutching the ledger in the other.
"Are you all right?" Vlad asked. If she had been surprised to find the man watching her while she displayed her assets to him, she was even more surprised to find he’d half-risen out of his chair in the aftermath of her clumsy maneuver. Madison waved him off as she rejoined him, blushing crimson and glad that her hair was disheveled enough to hide her cheeks.
"Yeah, happens all the time," she confessed. She slid the ledger across the desk to him and decided that was the end of that. Even if she had been succeeding before in her seduction of Vlad, there was no way the man would be at all aroused by her after her clumsiness. Better to stick with what she knew from now on.
"You seem uncomfortable in your own office," Vlad commented as he flipped the ledger open. She instinctively bristled, but she couldn't deny that what he said was true… and probably obvious. "Then again, maybe it's only my presence making you uncomfortable."
"You don't make me uncomfortable." The protestation escaped her lips before she had time to censor or reflect on it. Madison realized it was the truth. Vlad didn't make her uncomfortable… at least, not in the way she thought he meant. Then again, an amused flash of his steely blue eyes made her second-guess her own assumption. A sexual being like Vlad had to have some idea of what he did to the women in his vicinity.
"Real
ly?" He didn't sound doubtful, but he didn't sound altogether convinced, either. Madison sat back in her desk chair and crossed her arms, pressing her tongue to the inside of her lower lip as she tried to match his unflinching gaze. "Then why don't you have dinner with me?" He flipped the ledger closed without looking and slid it back to her.
"What, like… tonight?" She felt her eyebrows lift in surprise at his offer.
"I find that business pairs well with food don't you?" Vlad asked. She could detect no deception in his blue eyes, but then again, she couldn't see very far past their stark color to the intentions that might lurk below the surface. "And drink, of course."
"We seem to be all out of those this morning," Madison observed, as she detected a smirk on his lips before it disappeared. "So you're proposing a business meeting with me, Vlad? And where might I expect us to conduct our 'business' this evening?"
"Mari Vanna. Seven o'clock," Vlad said as he rose. "I'll send a dress over."
"That… that won't be necessary!" Madison blustered as she stood up also.
"Not necessary, but a pleasure I trust you won't deny me." The Russian's lips flexed in a grin, revealing perfect ivory teeth. "I'm not used to being refused, Miss O’Connor."
"I can see that," she grumbled as she reached down to straighten her pencil holder. A rebellious part of her wished that she had turned his invitation down flat.
"I will send it to the gallery’s address an hour before dinner. Don't be late," Vlad advised as he exited out the office door and out of her life… for now.
Once she had assured herself she was alone, Madison collapsed back into her chair and buried her face in her hands. What was she doing? She should be running for the hills, or at least running to the nearest police station!
But that was the problem. She had no concrete proof that Vlad Ivankov Karev and his family were doing anything illegal by investing in her family's business. She needed to get on the inside track and earn his trust… and trust like that wasn't forged overnight. No, it was forged over a series of nights, by spurious women in crime-financed dresses.
She needed to make a phone call.
"Don't go," Savannah blurted out. "Madison, I'm begging you. You have no idea how in over your head you might be getting with this guy."
"Isn't that the risk you take anytime you go on a date with someone new?" Madison countered as she got into her car. She held her cellphone pinned between her ear and shoulder as she fished for her keys. She tossed the contract paperwork with the gallery's movers into the empty seat beside her.
"I thought this wasn't a date," Savannah mused on the other line. "At least, that’s what you told me three times already."
"Well, I lied." Madison's face burned as she stabbed the key into the ignition. Maybe calling her best friend had been a mistake. Then again, who better equipped to handle the details of what she was about to do than Agent Savannah Casillero of the Federal Bureau of Investigation?
"You hate lying. And you suck at it," Savannah reminded her. "And let me tell you, you're about to find yourself heaped in lies and deception. So if you insist on seeing this guy tonight, you better get used to it."
"I just feel so… sleazy," Madison confessed as she steered her car out onto the block. "Isn't it possible to go through with my plan and still be me? Can't I be a kickass powerful, warrior woman who fights for her family without lying, cheating and stealing her way to victory?"
"I think you're going to have to find that out for yourself and report back to me," Savannah replied. "Because if there's a way to have it all and win without compromising at least some truth, I sure as hell haven't found it."
It wasn't the first time that Madison had wondered what Savannah went through on a day-to-day basis. She never asked out of respect for her friend's career, and Savannah rarely divulged anything. It was a strange friendship from the outside, she supposed, but Madison wouldn't have traded it for anything.
"Listen," Savannah said suddenly. "No matter how charming or sexy this guy might be, never forget that he's still dangerous. He's probably killed people."
"I know," Madison mumbled. "Believe me. One look at him and it's obvious."
"Your family, and your ties to the gallery, can't protect you from them," her friend pressed. "This is a seriously delicate situation, Maddie. Just… do me a favor, and be careful."
Madison ended their conversation with permission to go forward with the date, which was better than how she began it. Still, she didn't take Savannah's warnings lightly. The woman was a federal agent with the Blood Diamond Task Force. She had practically written the book on danger herself, or at least contributed to a few of the meatier chapters.
Vlad Ivankov Karev was bad news. He wasn't even late-breaking news and Madison knew better than to get caught up with a man like him.
But she couldn't resist the temptation to sample some danger, even if for one night.
3
Vlad was a regular at the bookstore. It wasn't because he was anything resembling a great reader; in fact, he couldn't recall a time outside of college that he had actually finished a book, but his brother, Dmitry, was the proprietor of the store.
Vlad would be the first to admit he looked out of place among the stacks of moldering tomes. As he pretended to browse, sunglasses fixed firmly in place, he tuned a half-hearted ear to what his brother had to say. He would never admit it out loud, but Dmitry Karev was the closest thing Vlad had to a voice of reason most days.
"You going to buy something today?" His brother tipped his reading glasses in Vlad's direction. He was propped up behind the counter, one long leg crossed over the over. Dmitry shared Vlad's chiseled features and blond hair. The two tended to resemble the Karev side of the family more than their older brother, Maxim, but Vlad privately disproved of Dmitry's adherence to hipster fashion trends. He wore his own hair close-cropped along the sides with a longer strip down the middle, culminating in a small topknot that Vlad could not understand the point of. If the bookseller was trying to attract women with his choices, what he might try first was actually stepping outside his store.
"Sorry. All out of money," Vlad replied.
"Bullshit." Dmitry did not sound at all surprised by his brother's response. "At least you better not be, considering you already agreed to buy that O’Connor girl a dress and take her to the God damn Mari Vanna tonight."
Vlad said nothing; instead, he keyed a PIN into his phone and hit send on his order for the dress delivery. A clinging black number was exactly what he wanted to see adorning his adversary when she came to meet him tonight. He intended to know more about her every tight dip and generous curve before their evening together drew to a close. He may as well lay as much groundwork as he could in advance to give himself the advantage.
"You come here looking for me every other week. You should take my advice for once and listen to me. I'm older than you," Dmitry pointed out.
Vlad snorted. "By a year."
"I was also married for five," Dmitry stated, as if either of them needed reminding of the fact. Lily's sudden death had been the catalyst for Dmitry leaving the family business half a decade ago. Vlad still couldn't understand how their father let him go, but he had never been in the habit of questioning Sergey's decisions—not like his brothers were, anyway.
"So I think I speak from a level of experience when I say you need to take a step back and enjoy the finer things," Dmitry continued. "The lone wolf thing looks good on you, Vlad, but it isn't healthy. You're thirty years old. You might want to start thinking seriously about what the next step is. This woman, Madison O’Connor?" Dmitry leaned back in his chair, rotating a pen between his fingers. "Maybe you should, you know, actually go on a date with her."
"What do you think I'm doing?" Vlad asked as he browsed the shelves inset into the wall beside his brother. "I flirted. I invited her to dinner. She said yes."
"What you described is not a 'date'," Dmitry insisted. "It's a dressed-up interrogation. You're pumping her for informa
tion on Dad's death. And if you can find the time to inject some sex into the proceedings, I suppose you think you can use that to fill up your meaningful human relationships quota."
A crude smile played across Vlad's lips. "You're the one who suggested I pump her."
Dmitry laughed. "I suggested nothing of the sort. And you better clean up your language before you go to meet this girl."
"You want me to let a woman into my life," Vlad reminded him. "So I will do it on my own terms."
"You aren't going to let her in at all," Dmitry snapped. "I don't know why I bother trying to talk to you about anything outside of the family business. Seriously, Vlad, when are you going to figure it out? Even Maxim got out while he still could."
"Don't talk to me about Maxim," Vlad warned, turning away from the shelves. The wound his other brother's defection had left was still fresh. "You want to know why I work so much? Maybe you should ask Max who had to take over his responsibilities when he left."
"You're letting your obligations consume you," Dmitry said. "It's been worse since Dad passed. You should take this time to reassess what your life could be."
"Father didn't pass," Vlad growled. He clenched his fists at his sides. "He was murdered. And if he's anything, he's lucky he isn't alive to see how ungrateful his sons are."
"You're not the only one suffering." Dmitry was standing now, his aggressive posture mirroring Vlad's own. The bell above the front door chimed to indicate the arrival of a customer, but neither brother broke from their standoff. The door rang again as whoever it was quickly exited the establishment.
"Forgive me for not wanting to bury another member of my family," Dmitry stated.
Vlad's smile was nasty. "Is that what you want? I had no idea. From where I'm standing, it looks like all you want to do is sit behind that desk and keep jerking it to Dostoyevsky."
"Like you fucking know who that is."