Harlequin Presents--June 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Dani Collins

  A Deal to Carry the Italian’s Heir

  Visit the Author Profile page at Harlequin.com for more titles.

  Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  EPILOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  HIDING OUT FROM thugs who’d kidnap her in a heartbeat and cart her off to marry some beer-bellied, gold-toothed creepy old man who gave out loans in exchange for desirable assets wasn’t how Clare Roberts had imagined her life playing out.

  Not even as a girl with the extraordinary imagination that had been needed for transforming her feckless father, who’d dumped her at her unwilling aunt’s doorstep when she’d been five, into an emotionally available superhero for years.

  But just when she thought she’d hit rock-bottom, life decided to show her the green icky stuff beneath the nasty pond scum.

  Desirable asset...the very phrase made her want to throw up.

  To escape Goon Number One, who had made it clear he’d collect her instead of the money she owed his Mob boss—because when her dad had borrowed money from them he’d used her as collateral and then died before he could pay it back—the only option left to her was hiding out on board the superyacht of the man she’d slept with not a month ago. While the night had been everything she’d hoped for and more, the morning after had been entirely too awkward. Her one-night stand had neatly deleted her from his life as easily as spam email.

  Served her right for taking an imprudent dive into the roller-coaster world of sex and romance with CEO and unapologetic bachelor playboy Dev Kohli. A former gold-medal-winning swimmer who had gone on to create the world’s most contemporary sports brand Athleta. A billionaire before he’d turned thirty and a self-made man, the latter quality being something Clare had admired enormously for a long time after she’d first met him at a PR event she’d organized for one of his friends. As well as his wide shoulders and rock-hard abs, that was.

  She should’ve known her own PR company, The London Connection, might do business with him in the future. After all, he was a man who was reputed to be more loyal to his clients than his lovers.

  While Clare completely agreed with the sentiment for a business-only relationship, it pricked a little when, as an ex-lover, one fell into the former category. Not that she was still moping after him.

  But the heart wanted what it wanted...or in her case, it was her lady bits that had done all the wanting, after being firmly denied until the ripe old age of twenty-eight.

  A hysterical giggle—fueled by the two glasses of champagne she’d guzzled in panic—escaped her mouth. Her two best friends and business partners Amy and Bea would’ve teased her no end if she’d said “lady bits” within their hearing. Well, Amy definitely would. Bea would’ve simply fallen into giggles. But they were both on the other side of the world at that moment, trying to keep their business afloat. Apart from the odd text, they’d hardly heard from one another recently.

  God, she missed them like an ache in her champagne-sloshed belly. Desperately wanted to hear at least one of their voices. Tell them what her dad had done to her and then have a cry while they cursed him to hell and back. He’d known he was dying and had sent her money to start The London Connection, which had gone from strength to strength in the last two years. He’d only lived for days afterward, and she hadn’t even fully processed what it meant to discover now that, far from thinking her father had finally done something good for her, he’d actually betrayed her in the worst possible way, just to salve his own conscience for having ignored her for her whole life.

  But contacting them while she was on the run from a mobster who was intent on kidnapping her and dragging her off to his cave was definitely not a good idea. What if he threatened Amy or Bea because he couldn’t locate Clare? After all, anyone who’d done even a bit of digging into her life would know Amy and Bea were her true family. The only people who cared about her in the whole wide world.

  No, she couldn’t take the risk of endangering their lives too. So she’d decided it was better for them if neither of knew where she was—or who she was with. Her friends knew how determined she could be when she was on the scent of a new client, so she figured that when they didn’t hear from her for a while, that’s what they’d assume she was doing.

  What her friends also didn’t know, and Clare wasn’t about to tell them, was that their new client was the same man she’d had a one-night stand with recently. She’d never shared his identity with them, feeling a strange sense of protectiveness about that night. Also, because if she talked to them, then she’d have to own up that she’d mostly failed at abiding by the most important rule of one-night stands—keeping it strictly casual. Especially as Dev had clearly had no such problem doing that himself.

  Athleta was far too big a fish for Clare to walk away from just because its CEO hadn’t proclaimed that he’d love her forever. And tonight had been her one chance to impress on him that her small PR firm could clean up his recently tarnished image.

  Only the mobster’s goons had trailed her all the way from London to a conference in New York and then to São Paulo, and it was terrifying. Today the mobster’s intentions had been made crystal clear. He intended to simply...take her in lieu of the money he insisted she owed him.

  For two weeks, she’d lived in terror of being snatched from wherever she was.

  She’d been meaning to hightail it back to her hotel room when she’d spotted Goon Number One with a drink in hand on the main deck of the superyacht this evening. The short, blond, chubby-faced man had smiled angelically—clearly his cheerful appearance was a useful tool in nabbing unsuspecting women. It was the same man she’d seen leaning near the newspaper stand on the street where The London Connection’s offices were located, looking up at the sole window. The very same posh and supposedly secure street that they paid astronomical rent for.

  He’d even bumped into her late one evening when she’d been rushing to catch the Tube after work. Apologized profusely. When she’d then seen him lounging in the foyer of her New York hotel, she’d wondered if she was hallucinating.

  Now, he was here, aboard Dev’s yacht. Looking just as posh as the rest of the designer-suited men. Wearing an affable smile, chitchatting away. He’d almost touched her. Tried to talk to her as if they were long-lost friends. She didn’t have time to wonder how he’d got on board. She needed to hide. Now.

  She ran her hand over her hips, contemplating the rounds the uniformed security guard was making. The emerald green silk skirt she was wearing had been a gift from Bea, and it gave her some much-needed courage. Without looking back, she stepped gingerly down the spiral staircase—who knew yachts could have staircases like this one?—and tried to not trip in her four-inch heels.

  The champagne sloshed around in her belly again as she passed door after door. Peeked into one expansive lounge after another. Even in her panic, Clare couldn’t help marveling at the airy, contemporary spaces, the chic stylish interiors. The click-click of her stilettos on the gleaming floors sounded like a sinister countdown.

  Heart pounding, she walked into the biggest cabin. For a second, she was thrown at the sheer size of it. A large bed with a navy-blue duvet looked so welcoming that she took an involuntary step toward it longingly.

  It was the feel of the luxuriously soft cotton underneath her fingertips that made her realize she was pawing it. Her eyelids felt heavy, her entire body swooning with exhaustion. She’d been traveling nonstop for a week. Hadn’t slept a wink ever since that ghastly man had started following her. But she couldn’t sl
eep now. Not if she wanted to remain undetected until after the party wound down.

  After one last wistful glance at the bed, she shook off the lethargic fog that threatened to engulf her. She was crashing from the shock of seeing that mobster’s henchman again. Moving like an automaton, she walked into a massive closet.

  It was about the size of her bedroom at her tiny flat. A faint scent of sandalwood and something else reached her nostrils. Her belly swooped, with a more pleasurable sensation this time. The memory of Dev’s hard body driving into hers, the feel of the taut, sweat-slicked skin of his back under her greedy fingers... Clare couldn’t help but cling to the memory of the utter feeling of ecstasy he’d brought her to. That moment of sheer intimacy when he’d looked into her eyes and simply...seen her. All of her vulnerability displayed on her face. And he’d just held her tenderly and kissed her temple.

  The sense of well-being that arose from that memory suddenly calmed the fear brewing in her belly.

  She sat down in the vast window seat and looked at the ocean. The expanse of blue was a symbol of how far away she was from her home, her friends and the business she’d built up with her own blood, sweat and tears.

  But also on the other side of it was the man who claimed he owned her as if she were cattle.

  Clare kicked off her heeled sandals and pulled her knees up to her chest. Leaning back against the plush upholstery, she closed her eyes and waited for her heart to slow its pounding beat.

  For the party to be over.

  For the yacht to start moving.

  Every inch of her rebelled at the idea of traveling to a destination unknown with a man who’d walked away from her without a backward glance after the best night of her life. Who’d told her in no uncertain terms that while it had been pleasurable, their...association was over.

  But the billionaire playboy meant safety for now. Even if that meant she’d be clinging to him like an unwanted piece of flotsam.

  * * *

  “Promise me you’ll make it to the wedding, Dev. Please.”

  Dev Kohli pressed a long finger to his throbbing temple, his mild headache becoming aggravated by his twin sister’s shrill pleading.

  But since Dev didn’t lie to himself—it was the only way he’d been able to survive in the military school environment his father had placed him in—he acknowledged that it was guilt that was turning one of the worst months of his life into something much...worse.

  “You haven’t even met Richard. I mean, Rich and I’ve been engaged for eight months and my twin brother hasn’t met him yet. That’s a bit much, even for you, Dev. Don’t you want to make sure...”

  Diya went on, without needing any more response from him than his grunts peppered throughout the conversation.

  The fact that his sister—younger than him by a whole two and a half minutes—was piling on the guilt didn’t mean that it was unwarranted.

  He hadn’t been back to his family’s home in California since military school. He hadn’t seen Diya in eighteen months. But, even throughout the nearly two-decades-long rift he and Papa had sustained, he’d always made it a priority to see his siblings. Even if all his attorney general older brother and renowned pediatric neurosurgeon older sister did was try to talk him into coming home.

  It was Diya who had always been the one to check on him. Even when he’d turned his back on all the rest of them, Diya had been his only connection to his roots. His estranged family. To the one person he’d loved and lost—their mama.

  “When’s the wedding?” Dev asked, just to interrupt the barrage of English and Hindi building up momentum, spewing at him from across the Atlantic. He’d stared at the date for long enough in the last few weeks.

  “You know exactly when it is,” Diya snapped.

  “This isn’t the right time for me to visit California, Diya,” he explained softly. “You know what I’ve been facing in the media. This sexual harassment scandal that’s threatening my company’s name is not a trivial matter.

  “I’ve got people working around the clock to make sure something like that never happens again. And if I show my face at the wedding right in the middle of this...messy scandal, you know what he will say.”

  His sister didn’t need to ask who “he” was.

  “The last thing I need right now is to hear his negative voice preaching at me,” Dev said, bitter even now. After all these years. Even after he’d proved his despotic father wrong on so many fronts.

  “Dev, you can’t let the past—”

  “I just don’t have the bandwidth to sit through another episode of family drama. If I stay far enough away, we can continue to pretend that we’re the embodiment of the wealthy, successful Indian American family he’s always wanted to be. Do you want to have your wedding upstaged by one of our dirty fights?”

  Diya sighed. “If I have to spend every minute leading up to the ceremony keeping you and Papa apart, then I’ll do it. In fact, I’ll recruit Richard to play referee between you two. Papa adores Richard.”

  That little fact came at him like a bolt he hadn’t even seen coming, lodging painfully in his chest. Dev wanted to bang his cell phone against the glittering glass bar and forget all about the wedding. Of course, his father approved of Diya’s investment banker fiancé.

  And at twenty-nine, here he was, still envious of something a stranger had—his father’s admiration. As if he was that pathetic twelve-year-old boy again, desperate to please his father and utterly failing.

  “I’m so sorry, Dev.”

  Dev sighed. “Not your fault, D.”

  No one understood how deep the scars of his childhood were, not even Diya. Not his obediently perfect older brother or his genius older sister either. It was like they’d had a father different from the one he’d been given.

  Sometimes, he resented them all so much. But mostly for expecting him to just...get over it. To forget that he’d always felt like an outsider among his famous family’s overachieving members. Especially after Mama had died.

  No, he’d been made to feel like that. By Papa. Until he’d been sent away to the military school at twelve—which had turned out to be a blessing in disguise—Dev had been yelled at by his father, bullied into believing that he was nothing. That he was a cuckoo in a crow’s nest.

  And that was something he could neither forgive nor forget.

  “I promise you, Dev,” Diya said, launching into dire warnings now, “if you don’t show up for my wedding, I’ll...forbid you from seeing your future niece or nephew. Cut you out of my life. There will be epic poems written about the estranged uncle.” Dev could hear the calming tones of a man speaking in the background, undoubtedly Richard. He smiled, despite the tightness in his chest.

  He wondered what kind of a man had willingly signed up for a lifetime with his firecracker of a younger sister.

  Damn it, this wasn’t how it should be. Him thousands of miles away from his brother and two sisters and nieces and nephews. Mama would’ve been immensely saddened by this family rift that had left him utterly alone. She’d have wanted so much more for him than this solitary, nomadic lifestyle.

  “Let me sort through the mess my company’s in right now,” Dev said, making up his mind, “and I’ll be there at your wedding.”

  “You know that we all have faith in you, don’t you? Whatever those trashy websites said about you knowing that female executive was being harassed... We know you’d have never tolerated something like that.” He had no idea how she’d known, but Diya had just said the one thing that Dev had so badly needed to hear.

  “Now, clean up the mess, Dev. And show up at my wedding with your billionaire halo all freshly polished.”

  Dev smiled.

  “Also, it would be awesome if you could bring a date to the wedding.”

  The sudden image of silky dark brown hair and intelligent blue eyes boldly holding
his gaze as he moved inside her was so vivid in his mind that for a moment Dev stayed mute.

  Diya whistled. “So you’ve met someone! Who is she? What does she do? I can’t wait to tell Deedi—”

  The excited tone of his twin’s voice sent alarm bells ringing in his head. “No one out of the ordinary,” he muttered, feeling horrible for saying it.

  Clare Roberts had been so far out of the ordinary that he hadn’t quite recovered yet. He’d tried to tell himself during the last few weeks that she’d been just the same as his usual one-night stands, but he hadn’t quite managed to convince himself of that yet.

  “Continuing with the love them and leave them policy then, huh?”

  “Don’t push it,” he warned her.

  Diya giggled. “Fine. It’s on your own head when you show up all single and handsome... Seema Auntie’s been asking about you.”

  Dev groaned. Seema Auntie had been Mama’s oldest, dearest friend and the most notoriously ambitious matchmaker on both sides of the Atlantic. With a horde of daughters, she regularly embarrassed eligible men without discrimination.

  He quickly hung up after promising to update Diya on his plans.

  Talking to his twin always left him feeling restless. As if he was back in his unhappy childhood. As if he hadn’t achieved enough, conquered enough. As if he still didn’t have enough. The feeling had been returning more and more frequently, and now it had been amplified by the man he’d trusted most using and betraying Dev’s name in the worst possible way and endangering the company he’d worked so hard to build.

  With a sigh, Dev looked around at the stunning sight of his yacht leaving the Port of Santos behind. He been visiting the nearby city of São Paulo, but he never stayed anywhere longer than a month. His sports merchandise was manufactured all over the world, and he preferred not basing himself permanently in one place.

  In his heart, he knew he didn’t really want to miss Diya’s wedding.

  Which meant he had no choice but to hasten the mass cleanup he’d already instigated in the company. There was no way he was showing up in front of his father with a harassment scandal weighing him down.