by Addison Fox
He watched her mull over the question—saw it spark briefly as something she should consider—before that crystal-blue gaze swung right back to him.
“It seems too odd. Besides, my mother hasn’t been a part of Grant Shipping. She may have been hiding in the shadows, but there’s no way my father would have ever let her get close to the business. Hell, get close to us, period.”
“Things were bad after she left?”
Instantly intrigued by her no-nonsense professional tone as she laid it out for him, Quinn watched her face for any hint the story she told was a front. “It’s hard for me to say what before was like, since she left when I was three months old. But from the snatches I’ve heard here and there, he loved her. When she left, something in him died.”
And then he saw it. The tiniest crumble in her armor. The spark of blue fire that had flared in her eyes when she’d questioned him earlier dulled. The harsh reality of her parents’ marriage dragging the very life out of her expression. “That must have been hard for you.”
As if catching herself, she glanced up from her coffee, any hint of sadness evaporating from her face. “There are worse fates in life.”
Quinn leaned forward, his gaze riveted on hers. “You don’t believe that. I know you don’t. So why don’t you give me the real version of the story instead of that little sanitized story you gave me last night?”
Those delicately arched eyebrows shot up even as the corners of her mouth turned down, and when she spoke her voice was particularly frosty. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me. Enough bullshit. I want the truth.”
“Thanks for the Jack Nicholson impression, Mr. Tanner, but I really don’t have anything to tell you.”
“I maintain my first answer.” Quinn crossed his arms. “Bullshit. And the name’s Quinn.”
“What the hell do you want from me? Quinn.”
“I want your take on what’s going on. Whether it’s related to what’s happening to you or not, the breakup of your parents’ marriage has done a number on you. What do you know that you’re not saying?”
On a harsh breath, Montana’s face lost all color, the normal, healthy pink of her cheeks fading away. Whatever anger she’d mustered against him faded as well in the face of her words.
“It’s me. She left because of me.”
Montana thought her mother abandoned them because of her? An innocent infant, based on the time line of the story. Whatever Quinn expected her to say, that wasn’t it.
“But you were a baby. A welcomed one, at that, if the headlines at the time of your birth are any indication.”
“She didn’t want me and she left rather than stay and raise me. I’d hardly call that an overwhelming motherly instinct.”
Quinn shook his head, searching for the words that might help her understand. “The logic just doesn’t work for me.”
He saw the questions that filled her gaze, layered over the pain of abandonment that clearly lived under her skin. “What?”
“Your father was one of the wealthiest men in the world. And was at the time of your birth as well.”
“Yes?”
“So what would have kept your mother from simply allowing you to be raised by the help?”
The grief that had settled around her like a shawl receded slightly. He could see it in the shape of her body as she leaned forward. The set of her shoulders as she sat staring at him expectantly. “What do you mean?”
An image of her from the previous evening swamped his senses and the urge to reach forward and recapture a loose lock of hair had him lifting his hand from where he gripped the chair. Quinn stopped the impulse just in time, instead laying a hand on the edge of her desk as he leaned forward.
“Think about it. You weren’t exactly born into a family that has to suffer with things they don’t like. If—and I think it’s a seriously big if, based on her recent behavior—your mother didn’t want to be a mother, what reason would she have to leave? All she needed to do was hire a nanny, pat you on the head from time to time and go on with her life. But she didn’t do that. She ran.”
Montana nodded, those lush red curls he couldn’t keep his eyes off resettling around her shoulders. “Yes.”
“And now your father’s dead and she’s back.”
“You really think they’re tied together?”
“I think it’s an awfully large coincidence that deserves some additional investigation. In the meantime, I need you to start thinking more objectively.”
“About what?”
“Your mother. Stop thinking like her child and start thinking like a woman who’s been targeted.”
“It’s not that easy, Quinn.”
“At least acknowledge there might be something else going on. Something related to her.”
At her nod, he kept on going before the emotional land mine he’d just uncovered could slow them down. “Now tell me about that large board meeting you have in a week?”
“My board of directors meeting?”
“It’s a big deal. You’re taking the company public. Looking at all this through a new lens, maybe someone doesn’t want to see that happen?”
Whatever lingering emotion had cloaked her vanished at the potential for problems his words implied. And with that implication, the wounded child became the competent CEO. “A public offering stands to make many people very wealthy. Inside and outside the company. It’s good for business.”
“Not if some of your internal people have a few side businesses of their own.” Quinn decided to go for broke. It was the only way to divert her. The only way to keep her off the subject she kept returning to with unerring precision.
Before she could reply, he pressed on. “Much of the business community thinks Grant Shipping is running some dirty business on the side. You go public and the people doing that are going to have a much harder time hiding it.”
Quinn saw the moment his words penetrated, shifting her thoughts firmly away from Themis. “You think I’m dirty? Is that why you’ve taken a sudden interest in me?”
“You have to admit, the timing is awfully strange.”
“Strange? For what? You sit there, blithely insulting me to the very core and you have the nerve to chalk it up to fucking timing?”
A lovely pink glow suffused her from her cheeks to the generous swell of her neckline. Quinn willfully tamped on the urge to look at the beautiful arch of her breasts, instead focusing on what he had to do: find a way to figure out if she really was as dirty as her old man.
Was it really possible? This woman was light and innocence personified and what he mentally accused her of was the worldwide equivalent of kicking puppies for a living.
Fuck. He needed to get his traitorous dick out of this and focus on the facts.
She helmed the largest shipping company in the world.
Said shipping company was up to its eyeballs in corrupt dealings.
And she was clearly messed up with some nasty—and powerful—people since she’d been targeted for several attempts on her life by supernatural beings.
“Isn’t everything in life about timing?”
She shook her head, confusion now warring with anger. “Now we’re having a philosophical discussion? Well, let me give you a bit of philosophy to chew on. I’m not, nor have I ever been, interested in raping the world of its gifts. I run a legitimate business with legitimate interests and I make legitimate profits. Anything else you’ve heard is bullshit.”
Quinn saw the sincerity in the cold blue of her gaze and in the firm set of her shoulders. Felt it in the bite of conviction that laced her words.
So why did every bit of intelligence he’d managed to source suggest otherwise?
“Come now, Ms. Grant. You can’t honestly tell me you believe that.”
Arturo Veron stepped out of the shower and admired his wet physique in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror in his hotel suite. Long, lean ropes of muscle corded his arms and legs, while eight thick, perfectly formed
barrels rode his midsection, from just beneath his rock-hard pecs to the lower portion of his stomach.
But, as always, it was the power that rested just beneath that caught his attention. With deft fingers, he reached below the swath of hair to the long, hard length of his penis, his arousal claiming him instantly at the touch of his hand. He closed his eyes for the briefest of moments, imagining the two women he’d shared the previous evening, their moans like a remembered symphony in his head.
And then the image changed. Morphed into the one face he’d never seen writhe in pleasure, save for the rare evenings when he dreamed.
Long, lush red hair that cascaded around her shoulders in waves. Tight, high breasts, their nipples proudly pointed forward. Endlessly long legs that he imagined wrapped around his waist as he plunged himself into her.
The strength of his arousal diminished as he reached for a towel. He no longer took pleasure imagining her. Refused to accept—would never accept—that she’d not chosen him. Instead, he returned to his second-most-favorite fantasy—world domination.
With the towel slung low on his waist, he padded to the sink and rummaged through the items he traveled with. His BlackBerry message light winked red and he scrolled through the fifteen messages that had come in during his brief shower.
With another glance at the mirrors that surrounded him, replicating his form from all angles, repeating into infinity, he laid the device back on the counter and smiled. He took great pleasure in the idea that most of the businessmen who stayed in this suite were paunchy, their bodies going to shit as they sought to take over their little corner of the world.
Day after day they subsisted on high-fat diets rich in butter, churned out in the world’s great restaurants over business lunches. Night after night, they drank their livers into oblivion with too many martinis.
He, on the other hand, was taking over the world and looking damn fine while doing it. Butter had no effect on his body and the liquor offered a pleasant diversion, especially when drunk in proper moderation while doing business.
His BlackBerry buzzed again and he glanced at the readout, answering when he saw his personal assistant’s name backlit on the screen. “Veron.”
“I moved your meetings as you requested. Your schedule is fully clear to deal with Grant Shipping for the next week.”
“Good. Good. And the arrangements I requested in Florida?”
“All taken care of, Mr. Veron.”
“Excellent.” Even better would be the mind wipe he’d do on her in the morning, so the details of said trip were nowhere to be found in the vast wasteland of her memories.
“I’ll see you later today, then, Lina.”
“Of course, Mr. Veron.”
As he laid the BlackBerry back onto the counter, Arturo caught sight of the towel where it tented in front of him. His arousal was back, harder than before. Although he’d always loved violence, he had never known—never realized—just how sweet vengeance could be.
How gloriously fan-fucking-tastic it felt. Better than the two women who’d warmed his bed until the wee hours of the morning, truth be told.
His plans spun out before him like the mental equivalent of a chess board. He’d already made his first move, with the next scheduled for tonight.
As Arturo threw the towel on the far corner of the bathroom floor, he couldn’t resist one last look at himself in the mirror as he strode toward the bedroom. His gaze caught on an image of his back, where the bull that rode high on his shoulder flicked its tail as its front paw made a stamping motion on the ground.
The beast was as excited as he was.
Thick, syrupy waves of panic lurched through Montana’s stomach, an odd counterpoint to the heavy, throbbing base drum of her pulse as it thudded in her ears.
Her head spun from the rapid-fire questions and the wildly veering speculation Quinn Tanner had thrown at her. From her mother to her business to her own personal integrity, the man hadn’t left a single stone unturned.
He was following her because he thought her business was dirty? Thought she was responsible for any number of horrors in the race for the almighty dollar?
An image of them last night filled her senses, the warm, safe feel of his body as he held her along with the steady thump of his heartbeat where her ear lay pressed against his chest. All that time, while she felt safe, secure and protected, he thought she was a criminal out for personal gain.
Could those moments have meant nothing to him? She reached up and brushed a lock of hair—that lock he’d touched with such gentle fingers—and swept it behind her ear.
And how, in what freaking universe, had his opinion come to mean so much to her?
“Do you believe it?”
His dark brown gaze gave away nothing, nor did the harsh set of those broad shoulders. “I’m simply repeating what I’ve heard, Montana.”
The heavy thud of her pulse intensified further at his lack of denial. “That’s not what I asked you.”
“Can you give me one good reason not to believe it?”
And there was her answer. The night before meant nothing to him beyond a job to be done.
Pain twisted through her as she placed a hand over her stomach. Literal, physical pain at the idea this man thought she was…dirty.
Unclean.
Tainted with the blood of innocents.
For reasons she couldn’t quite name, Quinn’s negative opinion of her hurt deeply. Of course, why did what he thought matter at all?
It shouldn’t. She’d known him less than twenty-four hours. But it did matter.
“I have nothing to change your opinion with, other than the truth. I don’t run a bad business.”
The air crackled between them as storm clouds descended into that dark brown gaze. “Come on, Montana. Don’t play the innocent. Your father ran one of the world’s most profitable businesses for forty years. Do you really mean to tell me you think it’s all been aboveboard? You’re sitting on profits that make the Queen of England and the Pope look like paupers.”
She didn’t want to listen to this. Didn’t want to listen to him voice the very same questions she’d been fighting for the past six months.
She couldn’t accept the possibility she’d spent her entire life living a lie. Living with wealth and privilege while others suffered at her father’s hands.
The thought she hadn’t wanted to give voice to—the thought that tore her apart in ribbons from the inside out—rose up and swamped her.
Was that the real reason her mother left?
Had she found out the truth?
And had she abandoned her daughter to be raised in that filth?
“I would have known. Sensed—” She broke off, the words simply evaporating from her lips.
“Not to mention, your company’s had wild success in the regions of the world where nothing gets done aboveboard or without a hell of a lot of arm twisting.”
His words echoed her own concerns from earlier. “But that’s different. That much is written into our operating policies as an organization, for heaven’s sake. There are regions of the world where you just have to get things done. It doesn’t mean we’re a corrupt business because we know how to grease a few local palms to get our shipments in and out of port. It’s standard practice and you know it.”
Quinn leaped forward at that, his hands placed flat on the desk as he leaned toward her. Despite the oversized nature of the cherry desk, Quinn’s large body took up all the space between them when he leaned forward, his face inches from hers.
Montana desperately yearned for the familiar press of leather at her back, but wouldn’t back down. Would not lean back in her chair, no matter how hard this man tried to dominate the conversation with his physical strength.
“Grease a few palms? Come on now, heiress. Here’s what I know. It wouldn’t take much to look at those situations and decide you wanted a cut for yourself.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“Serious as a hear
t attack. Here’s how I see it playing out. There are all these evil men you have to bargain with to get things done. Even the most basic things like setting up a legitimate business that brings more than enough commerce into the region takes almost more effort than it’s worth because after you’re done paying them, there’s nothing left. So what do you do?”
“It’s not like that. At all!”
Quinn shrugged those big shoulders, but his gaze never wavered. “Sure it is. Here you are, running a legitimate business and you have all these soulless predators who take the riches off the land—oil, diamonds and whatever else they can get their hands on. So what’s any good businesswoman to do? You decide to get in on the action yourself.”
A dizzying rush replaced the thudding pulse in her head as the paperwork she’d reviewed the night before registered again. South African operation.
Minimal participation in the company as they flew under the radar. Modest profits that satisfied, yet didn’t raise any scrutiny. Maximum lifestyle.
“Oh God. Diamonds?” As in smuggling.
Quinn nodded his head, the heavy tenor of his voice pounding the truth home like a judge’s gavel. “You’ve got shipping manifests running through every port in the world. How hard would it be to stash a bit of cargo in your hold? You do that, you can run whatever you want.”
“But I’m not running anything.”
“Somebody is.”
Realization struck with the speed of an oncoming freight train and then she did lean back in her chair, allowing the soft, buttery leather to cushion her body. “That’s the reason for the attacks.”
“Maybe yes, maybe no. Who’d you piss off?”
As his words registered—and the evidence he didn’t believe her—she leaped up, the movement dislodging her chair so it went flying behind her. “I told you, I’m not involved in this.”
“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you are involved in this, Montana. To the very red bottoms of those designer shoes you’re wearing.”
His gaze never wavered from her as his words filled the space up between them. The urge to lean over and press her lips to his roared up, a living, breathing need pulsing with desperate heat.