Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Sneak Peek: The Love Deception
For Lee. Your friendship and support mean the world to me!
Chapter One
‘Don’t you understand?’ Sarah Walker looked around the imposing boardroom in the vain hope that someone other than the young woman from public relations would appear. Someone more influential.
‘If you don’t renew the Trust, the Sanctuary will be forced to close.’ Sarah gripped the edge of the highly polished table as her future slipped away. ‘Without help . . .’ She snatched up one of the photos scattered across the table, and brandished it as though the slim photographic evidence could change the mind of this corporate stooge. ‘. . . This species will be extinct within our lifetime.’
The PR woman closed her notebook. No trace of concern touched her face. She didn’t even bother to hide her bored indifference. She probably gave more thought to which colour Italian shoes she should sashay in to work than the plight of orangutans.
‘As I said before, the board’s decision was unanimous.’ She sported a victory smile, as if somehow she’d helped make the decision to terminate thirty years of wildlife preservation. ‘I’m sorry you’ve come such a long way and wasted your time.’ Her vacuous tone made it clear she didn’t give a damn what Sarah might have wasted to make the trip to London from the other side of the globe.
The woman stood in her ridiculous heels. Clearly, the meeting was over.
‘The Sanctuary also supports twenty local workers.’ Why didn’t this woman get it? ‘Our organisation is the biggest employer in the area. The local village depends on us.’ Sarah stood. ‘We’re the only thing that brings visitors to the region. Without us, many small businesses will die.’
‘That’s not our concern. Our decision was made clear to you over the telephone and in writing.’
Sarah dropped into her chair, folded her arms, crossed her legs and affected her best concrete-block imitation. ‘I’d like to speak to someone more senior.’ If they wanted her out, they’d have to drag her across their fancy corporate carpet. ‘The finance director or at least your boss.’ The money she needed was a pittance to this British corporate giant. She wouldn’t leave without it. She couldn’t. So many people were depending on her. She couldn’t fail.
‘Will I do?’
A hot guy in casual clothes leaned on the doorjamb. Great, another flunky. Sarah looked away from the distracting eye-candy. But . . . Something about him. Her gaze flicked back to his face. Her heart skipped like a game of hopscotch and it felt as though the pebbles from a hundred games dropped into her belly. Those eyes. That smile. She blinked hard.
Blake!
Her stomach backflipped sickeningly. Her fist flew to her lips. It couldn’t be. How? She blinked hard, trying to stretch her field of vision that now only featured Blake’s gorgeous, deceitful face.
‘What are you . . .?’ She stumbled to her feet and stared at the man who, who . . . The man who’d opened up her world to passion. The man who’d taught her the ecstasy of physical love. The man who’d dumped all that in the rubbish ten years ago and disappeared.
And here he was, standing in front of her with barely a feather stroke of age on his skin. His eyes glinted with that unusual shade of blue. Sharp and searing like a desert sky in midsummer. His body had changed. Broader, harder. His dark hair shorter but still unruly. The tiny touch of grey, a surprise.
‘Sarah?’ Blake’s eyes flashed wide. ‘Good God.’ He strode across the room but stopped halfway and stood rigid. The shock vanished from his face and disdain stained his expression, accompanied with barely suppressed anger. He stared as though he expected something from her. As if somehow the next move was hers.
She looked away from that hard face of betrayal. She’d fallen so willingly into his bed all those years ago. She’d been young, naïve . . . believed in a fantasy. Experience had taught her that life was no fantasy.
‘Thank you, Katie,’ Blake said to the PR woman, who stood gaping, all traces of superior indifference gone. ‘You can go.’
‘Sorry,’ Katie gushed, fluttering to Blake’s side, more attentive than an infatuated teenage groupie with the latest pop sensation. ‘I can handle this.’ Katie hurled Sarah an I-can’t-wait-to-throw-you-out glare. ‘You really don’t —’
‘And shut the door behind you,’ Blake said with the authority of a man who was used to other people doing his bidding.
Katie’s lips pinched tight, her pretty face suddenly ugly. ‘Of course.’ She retreated from the office and closed the door.
Blake’s eyes, now icier than the Arctic in the dead of winter, swung to Sarah’s.
‘Ten years without a word and you turn up in my boardroom.’ His gaze could’ve frozen water, but his tone would’ve shattered it. His powerful presence enveloped her, holding her mind captive and her body confused. The boyish cheekiness of those long-gone days had vanished. Instead, he emanated sophistication and wealth despite his casual attire of jeans, jacket and simple white T-shirt. She clenched her fingers. The unwelcome sensation of being out of her depth smothered her senses. ‘Why now? Why here?’ he demanded. ‘Why after all this time?’
‘I’m not here to see you.’ She wanted to scream the words, but they tiptoed out in a shocked whisper. He’d disappeared and she was the one under interrogation? He’d taken her virginity and vanished. Her hands quivered. She collected her notebook and shoved it into her bag.
‘Leave that.’ He stepped in close, his arm brushing her shoulder. Fire scorched every cell in her body. He took her bag, tossing it down on the table beyond her reach.
‘How dare you?’ She pushed past him, snatched up her bag and headed for the door.
‘Sarah, wait.’ He grabbed her arm.
She stared slowly down at his hand on her skin and then back into his blue, blue eyes. ‘Any right you had to touch me evaporated when you left.’ The words tasted sharp, bitter and rewarding.
He didn’t loosen his grip. ‘You can’t just leave.’
Breathing hard, she met his gaze. Of course she couldn’t. It wasn’t just about her any more. She couldn’t storm off like an enraged adolescent. She needed to . . . had to . . . But how did she say . . .
‘Blake, there’s something I need to . . .’ And then it hit her. That case. Fear sharper than any blade cut straight to the centre of her heart. It was in all the papers. She’d seen it on the news on the flight over. Something versus Taylor. Oh, God. She gripped a chair hard to steady her trembling body. The court case. The consequences. The pain. A family torn apart. She looked back into Blake’s demanding face. What if Blake did the same thing? He was so angry. What would he do when he discovered they were connected in more ways than just a holiday fling? Would he exact some sort of retribution? Fight her just to spite her?
‘What is it?’ Blake’s voice lost a fraction of its harsh tone. ‘Are you all right?’
She needed to leave. She needed advice. She needed . . . Well, she didn’t know what she needed. One false step and Blake could take her life and rip it apart. Again.
Blake Huntington-Fiennes watched his first love walk to the door and wrench it open. His pulse took off at a cracking pace. The Australian beauty glowed as she’d done during those heady days in the tropical heat
of Brunei.
He’d been mesmerised from the first moment he’d seen the Amazonian goddess walk across the pool deck of his hotel. She’d walked past him in a simple black one-piece and his heart had stopped. All lush honey-blonde hair and bronzed legs. Her body so toned, so hot. He’d assumed she was one of the Olympic athletes rumoured to be staying at his hotel. When he’d spoken to her, his gaze had flittered between those sumptuous lips and those alluring gold-brown eyes.
Her hair was now hidden in a tight ponytail, but her killer curves were on display in her simple knee-length khaki shorts and white T-shirt. Delicious heat settled low and deep. Her body still showed the athletic quality of all those years ago. But her eyes . . . they’d lost that dancing, carefree sparkle.
‘Stop,’ he said. She wasn’t walking out of his life again.
She turned and silently walked back into the room to collect the series of photos she’d left in her hurry to be gone. Blake glanced at the pictures. Shot after shot of monkeys. He picked up a photo of Sarah, standing in front of a building with a small group of people in work overalls. Dense jungle dominated the background.
The Hope Orangutan Sanctuary. He rubbed the skin above his eyebrows. The board had agreed to cease the funding of that organisation a few months ago. It was a legacy project from the days when the company’s main area of concentration was business software. The sanctuary had nothing to do with the current corporate direction of Hunt-F Technology.
‘You have something to do with this?’ He held up the photo.
‘More than something.’ She reached for the picture. He held it back, waiting for a better answer.
The look she lobbed him had a don’t-mess-with-me quality. ‘I run it.’
He frowned at the photo. ‘But you’re a journalist.’
Her laugh sounded hollow and weary.
‘No, I run the Sanctuary for which this company just signed the death warrant.’ She took the photograph, slid it into her bag and stepped towards the door.
There she was trying to leave again. Damn, he wanted her. Nothing had ever come close to that night of passion they’d shared. Perhaps another night with her and he’d rid himself of that lingering obsession. She’d be out of his system. Done.
‘What if I could do something about that?’ he said.
Cute creases marred her forehead. ‘What on earth could you do?’
Interesting. So she didn’t know who he was.
‘Have dinner with me tonight and find out.’
‘Don’t you have to get home to your wife and ten children?’ she asked, her tone bitter.
‘No wife,’ he said. ‘And who’d have time for children? So, dinner.’
‘Ah . . . I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
‘I’ll sign a cheque right now for ten thousand pounds if you’ll have dinner with me tonight.’ He’d have to postpone a meeting, but it’d be worth it.
Her eyes widened. ‘You could give the Sanctuary ten thousand pounds?’
He picked up the phone on the table and dialled.
‘Linda, could you come to the boardroom, please, and bring my personal chequebook.’ He dropped the phone back into its cradle. ‘My PA will be just a minute.’ He pulled out a chair. ‘Have a seat.’
‘What do you do here?’ she asked, confusion clouding her eyes. She looked about, as if the answer might hang somewhere on the walls.
‘This and that,’ he said, taking a seat and leaning back casually as though he was at a bar on a Friday night.
A knock announced Linda’s arrival. His efficient, middle-aged secretary moved quickly and placed the chequebook in front of him.
‘Anything else?’ Linda enquired.
‘Yes,’ he said, flipping open the chequebook. ‘Book a table for two at The Dorchester for seven tonight.’
‘Table Lumière?’
Blake nodded. Linda left, softly closing the door behind her.
He wrote a cheque for ten thousand pounds in the name of the Hope Orangutan Sanctuary and tore it from the book.
‘Ten thousand pounds.’ He held out the cheque and waved it with sweet seduction. ‘It’s yours if you have dinner with me.’ Dinner and a whole lot more, if he had his way. Sarah was his sweetest memory. A memory that was in serious need of reinvigorating. Then he could snap shut that chapter of his life, permanently.
Blake waved the small life-saving piece of paper a few feet from Sarah’s hand. How could he authorise such an amount?
‘What do you do here?’ she repeated.
‘You really don’t know, do you?’ He looked even sexier with his half-smile. ‘You’ve been receiving money from me for nearly ten years.’
What?
‘But . . . We’ve . . .’ This didn’t make any sense. She pressed her lips together and regrouped. ‘We receive funding from the HF Environmental Trust.’
He looked at her as if her screws weren’t just loose, they were all seriously defective.
‘HF. Huntington-Fiennes.’ He said the name as if she was supposed to react, as though he’d given her the winning numbers for the next national lottery.
‘Okay, I get it. Hunt-F Technology manage the Trust. And?’
‘Are you telling me you don’t even remember my name?’
‘Of course I remember your name.’
‘My last name?’
She didn’t know. She’d never known. If he’d ever told her, she couldn’t remember. Passion had been the only thing on her mind back then.
‘So . . . you . . .’ She dropped into a chair. The connection chugged into place like an ancient steam engine.
How could she not have known Blake was connected with the Trust? She stared unseeingly across the room. Easily, that’s how. Her mother had been involved with the establishment of the Trust. After she’d died, the money had kept coming. Sarah had never questioned it. Her days were frantic just keeping the Sanctuary operational.
‘You . . . You own Hunt-F Technology?’
He cocked his head and smiled. A superior, self-satisfied smile only a man with confidence branded in his DNA could achieve. ‘I’m the CEO.’
Sarah shook her head, trying to sort out what he was telling her. None of this made any sense. Could it really be that Blake had been so close all along? She couldn’t bear to think about it.
‘But you . . .’ The conversations from all those years ago filtered back into her mind. The days by the hotel pool. Strolling through the manicured streets of Brunei, hand in hand. The intimate dinners. Those tentative plans for a future. The night that . . . She swallowed, but the usually simple action felt difficult and constricted. ‘Ah . . . you were some sort of programmer. Software or something like that.’
‘You remember.’
Remember! Those seven days were etched on her mind and body for eternity.
‘Vaguely.’ She wouldn’t let him see the hurt. Things had irrevocably moved on and it was as though that magical time had never existed. An exquisite moment lost in a life of hard work and struggle. A moment that made the rest of her world drab and grey, except of course . . .
‘So. Dinner.’ Blake waved the promise of money in the air.
She should just leave, but the Brunei Wildlife Administration had given the Sanctuary eight weeks to make urgent repairs. Failure to comply and it would issue a closure notice. The precious paper fluttered temptingly close. Ten thousand pounds wasn’t anywhere near the amount she needed, but she could start on critical repairs.
‘Okay,’ she said. Blake had been absent from her life for ten years; a few hours wouldn’t make any difference. Would it? She reached for the money.
‘Tonight.’ He slipped the cheque into the front pocket of his jeans.
Her eyes followed his hand and lingered a little too long. When she met his eyes again, she knew he, too, was reliving hot nights and slick sex. Traitorous heat crept up her neck, but she defiantly held his gaze.
‘I’ll give you the cheque tonight.’ He stood and moved towards her. ‘That way I kn
ow I’ll actually see you again. Where are you staying?’
Her heart tap-danced in her chest. She stood, forced her expression into a blank mask and prayed her alarm didn’t show. He couldn’t go anywhere near the hotel. She couldn’t risk it. Not yet. Not until she knew the implications of this situation.
‘I’ll meet you at the restaurant.’ The words poured out too fast. ‘The Dorchester, right?’ she said, fussing with her handbag.
He stepped in close. Every time he did she lost a little of her mental capacity, and her body’s desires took over the show.
‘How can I trust you’ll turn up?’ he asked.
This man had an interesting way of remembering the past.
‘Two reasons. One.’ She thrust her forefinger into the air in case he missed the point. ‘I’m not the one with the history of disappearing. Two.’ Second finger up. ‘I need the money.’ She slid the rest of the photos into her bag and thrust out her hand. ‘See you tonight.’
Blake took her hand. The way he captured it was nothing like the quick handshake she’d been aiming to deliver. His touch held the promise of a night to remember. ‘I can’t wait,’ he said.
She couldn’t speak. His touch robbed her of the ability to think, to reason. Her eyes burned brighter than a lighthouse beam across a dark ocean. She turned away. Away from temptation; away from the man who’d taken her heart and treated it with such carelessness; away from the man who would steal the most important person in her life. Away. Away. Away.
‘Leave the country as soon as possible,’ the lawyer instructed.
It felt as though the cord of the telephone was wrapped about Sarah’s throat and slowly tightening. Her breath came in short gasps. It had taken her half an hour to find a legal-aid lawyer willing to talk to her. What he’d explained was a thousand times worse than any scenario she’d imagined.
‘But won’t that set us up for an acrimonious legal battle from the start?’ she asked.
‘You’ve read the papers. The Taylor versus Hamilton-Smyth case. Eleanor Taylor lost her house, her business and has had to live in the UK for over a year while this case was being contested. Can you afford to stay in London indefinitely? Because that’s the situation you could face. Leave the country and fight this case from Brunei.’
Billionaire's Pursuit of Love: Destiny Romance Page 1