Kitabı oku: «Billionaires: The Tycoon»

CHAPTER ONE

IN THE FLESH she looked more dangerous than beautiful. Conall’s mouth hardened. She was exquisite, yes...but faded. Like a rose which had been plucked fresh for a man’s buttonhole before a wild night of partying, but which now lay wilted and drooping across his chest.

Fast asleep, she lay sprawled on top of a white leather sofa. She was wearing a baggy T-shirt, which curved over her breasts and bottom, ending midway along amazingly tanned legs which seemed to go on for ever. Beside her lay an empty champagne glass—the finger-marked crystal upended and glinting in the spring sunshine. A faint breeze drifted in from the open windows leading onto the balcony, but it wasn’t enough to disperse the faint fug of cigarette smoke, along with the musky scent of incense. Conall made a barely perceptible click of distaste. Cliché after cliché were all here—embodied in the magnificent body of Amber Carter as she lay with her head pillowed on her arm and her black hair spilling like ink over her golden skin.

If she’d been a man he would have shaken her awake with a contemptuous hand, but she was not a man. She was a woman. A spoilt and distractingly beautiful woman who was now his responsibility and for some reason he didn’t want to touch her. He didn’t dare.

Damn Ambrose Carter, he thought viciously, remembering the older man’s plaintive appeal to him. You’ve got to save her from herself, Conall. Someone has to show her she can’t carry on like this. And damn his own stupid conscience, which had made him agree to carry out this crazy deal.

He listened. The apartment was silent—but maybe he should check it was empty. That there were no other bodies sprawled in one of the many bedrooms and able to hear what he was about to say to her.

He prowled from room to room, but, among all the debris of cold pizza lying in greasy boxes and half-empty bottles of vintage champagne, he could find no one. Only once did he pause—when he pushed open a door of a spare bedroom, cluttered with books and clothes and a dusty-looking exercise bike. Half hidden behind a velvet sofa was a stack of paintings and Conall walked over to them, his natural collector’s eye making him flick through them with interest. The canvases were raw and angry—with swirls and splodges of paint, some of which had been highlighted with a sharp edging of black ink. He studied them for several moments, until he was forced to remember that he was here for a purpose and he turned away from the pictures and returned to the sitting room, to find Amber Carter lying exactly where he’d left her.

‘Wake up,’ he growled. And then, when that received no response, he repeated it—more loudly this time. ‘I said, wake up.’

She moved. A golden arm reached up to brush aside the thick sweep of ebony hair which obscured most of her face, offering him a sudden unimpeded view of her profile. Her cute little nose and the natural pout of her rosy lips. Thick lashes fluttered open and as she slowly turned her head to look at him he realised that her eyes were the most startling shade of green he’d ever seen. They made the breath dry in his throat, those eyes. They made him momentarily forget what he was doing there.

‘What’s going on?’ she questioned, in a smoky voice. ‘And who the hell are you?’

She sat up, blinking as she looked around—but not creating the kind of fuss he might have expected. As if she was used to being woken by strange men who had walked into her apartment at midday. He felt another shimmer of distaste. Maybe she was.

‘My name is Conall Devlin,’ he said, looking at her face for some kind of recognition, but seeing only a blank and shuttered boredom on her frozen features.

‘Oh, yeah?’ Those amazing eyes swept over him and then she yawned. ‘And how did you get in, Conall Devlin?’

In many ways Conall was the most old-fashioned of men—an accusation levelled at him many times by disappointed women in the past—and in that precise moment he felt his temper begin to flare because it confirmed everything he’d heard about her. That she was careless. That she didn’t care about anything or anyone, except herself. And anger was safer than desire. Than allowing himself to focus on the way her breasts jiggled as she moved. Or to acknowledge that as she rose to her feet and walked across the room she moved with a natural grace, which made him want to stare at her and keep staring. Which made his groin begin to harden with an unwilling kind of lust.

‘The door was open,’ he said, not bothering to hide his disapproval.

‘Oh. Right. Someone must have left it open on their way out.’ She looked at him and smiled the pretty kind of smile which probably had most men eating out of her hand. ‘I had a party last night.’

He didn’t smile back. ‘Doesn’t it worry you that someone could have walked right in and burgled you—or worse?’

She shrugged. ‘Not really. Security on the main door is usually very tight. Though come to think of it—you seem to have got past them without too much difficulty. How did you manage that?’

‘Because I have a key,’ he said, holding it up between his thumb and forefinger so that it glinted in the bright spring sunshine.

She was walking across the room—the baggy T-shirt moving across her bottom to draw his unwilling attention to the pert swell of her buttocks. But his words made her jerk her head back in surprise and a faint frown appeared on her brow as she extracted a pack of cigarettes from a small beaded handbag which was lying on a coffee table.

‘What are you talking about, you have a key?’ she questioned, pulling out a filter tip and jamming it in between her lips.

‘I’d rather you didn’t light that,’ said Conall tightly.

Her eyes narrowed. ‘Oh, really?’

‘Yes. Really,’ he gritted back sarcastically. ‘Discounting the obvious dangers of passive smoking, I happen to hate the smell.’

‘Then leave. Nobody’s stopping you.’ She flicked the lighter with a manicured thumbnail so that a blue-gold flash of flame flared briefly into life, but she only got as far as inhaling the first drag when Conall crossed the room and removed the cigarette from her mouth, ignoring her look of shock.

‘What the hell do you think you’re playing at?’ she spluttered indignantly. ‘You can’t do that!’

‘No?’ he questioned silkily. ‘Watch me, baby.’ He walked out to the balcony and crushed the glowing red tip between thumb and forefinger, before dropping it into another empty champagne glass, which was standing next to a large pot plant.

When he returned he could see a look of defiance on her face as she took out a second cigarette.

‘There are plenty more where that came from,’ she taunted.

‘And you’ll only be wasting your time,’ he said flatly. ‘Because every cigarette you light I’m going to take from you and extinguish, until eventually you have none left.’

‘And if I call the police and have you arrested for trespass and harassment,’ she challenged. ‘What then?’

Conall shook his head. ‘Sorry to disappoint you, but neither of those charges will stand up—since I think the law might find that you are the one who is actually guilty of trespass. Remember what I just told you? That I have a key.’ He paused.

He saw her defiance briefly waver. He saw a shadow cross over her beautiful green eyes and he felt a wave of something which felt almost like empathy and he wasn’t quite sure why. Until he reminded himself what kind of woman she was. The spoilt, manipulative kind who stood for everything he most despised.

‘Yes I know but I’m asking why—and it had better be a good explanation,’ she said in a tone of voice which nobody had dared use with him for years. ‘Who are you, and why have you come barging in here, trying to take control?’

‘I’m happy to tell you anything you want to know,’ he said evenly. ‘But first I think you need to put on some clothes.’

‘Why?’ A smile played at the corners of her lips as she put a hand on one angled hip and struck a catwalk pose. ‘Does my appearance bother you, Mr Devlin?’

‘Actually, no—at least, not in the way I think you’re suggesting. I’m not turned on by women who smoke and flaunt their bodies to strangers,’ he said, although the latter part of this statement wasn’t quite true, as the continued aching in his body testified. He swallowed against the sudden unwanted dryness in his throat. ‘And since I don’t have all day to waste—why don’t you do as I ask and then we can get down to business?’

For a moment Amber hesitated, tempted to tell him to go to hell. To carry through her threat and march over to the phone and call the police, despite the fact that she was enjoying the unexpected drama of the situation. Because wasn’t it good to feel something—even if it was only anger, when for so long now all she had felt had been a terrifying kind of numbness? As if she were no longer made of flesh and blood, but was colourless and invisible—like water.

She narrowed her eyes as her mind flicked back through the previous evening. Had Conall Devlin been one of the many gatecrashers at the impromptu party she’d ended up hosting? No. Definitely not. She frowned. She would have remembered him. Definitely. Because he was the kind of man you would never forget, no matter how objectionable you found him.

Unwillingly, her gaze drifted over him. His rugged features would have been perfect were it not for the fact that his nose had obviously once been broken. His hair was dark—though not quite as dark as hers—and his eyes were the colour of midnight. His jaw was dark and shadowed—as if he hadn’t bothered shaving that morning, as if he had more than his fair share of testosterone raging around his body. And what a body. Amber swallowed. He looked as if he would be perfectly at ease smashing a pickaxe into a tough piece of concrete—even though she could tell that his immaculate charcoal suit must have cost a fortune.

And meanwhile the inside of her mouth felt as if it had been turned into sandpaper and she was certain her breath must smell awful because she’d fallen asleep without brushing her teeth. Her fingers crept up surreptitiously to her face. Yesterday’s make-up was still clogging her eyes and beneath the baggy T-shirt her skin felt warm and sticky. It wasn’t how you wanted to look when you were presented with a man as spectacular as him.

‘Okay,’ she said carelessly. ‘I’ll go and get dressed.’

She enjoyed his brief look of surprise—as if he hadn’t been expecting her sudden capitulation—and that pleased her because she liked surprising people. She could feel his gaze on her as she padded out of the room towards her bedroom, which had a breathtaking view over some of London’s most famous landmarks.

She stared at the perfect circle of the London Eye as she tried to gather her thoughts together. Some women might have been freaked out at having been woken in such a way by a total stranger, but all Amber could think was that it made an interesting start to the day, when lately her days all seemed to bleed into one meaningless blur. She wondered if Conall Devlin was used to getting everything he wanted. Probably. He had that unmistakable air of arrogance about him. Did he think she would be intimidated by his macho stance and bossy air? Well, he would soon realise that nothing intimidated her.

Nothing.

She didn’t rush to get ready—although she took the precaution of locking the bathroom door first. A power shower woke her into life and after she’d dressed, she carefully applied her make-up. A quick blast of the hairdryer and she was done. Twenty minutes later she emerged in a pair of skinny jeans and a clingy white T-shirt to find him still there. Just not where she’d left him—dominating the large reception room with that faintly hostile glint in his midnight-blue eyes. Instead, he was sitting on one of the sofas, busy tapping something into a laptop, as if he had every right to make himself at home. He glanced up as she walked in and she saw a look in his eyes which made her feel faintly uncomfortable, before he closed the laptop and surveyed her coolly.

‘Sit down,’ he said.

‘This is my home, not yours and therefore you don’t start telling me what to do. I don’t want to sit down.’

‘I think it’s better you do.’

‘I don’t care what you think.’

His eyes narrowed. ‘You don’t care about very much at all, do you, Amber?’

Amber stiffened. He said her name as if he had every right to. As if it were something he’d been rehearsing. And now she could make out the faint Irish burr in his deep voice. Her heart lurched because suddenly this had stopped feeling like a whacky alternative to a normal Sunday morning—whatever normal was—and had begun to feel rather...disturbing.

But she sat down on the sofa opposite his, because standing in front of him was making her feel like a naughty schoolgirl who had been summoned in front of the headmaster. And something about the way he was looking at her was making her knees wobble in a way which had nothing to do with anger.

She stared at him. ‘Just who are you?’

‘I told you. Conall Devlin.’ He smiled. ‘Name still not ringing any bells?’

She shrugged, as something drifted faintly into the distant recesses of her mind and then drifted out again. ‘Maybe.’

‘I know your brother, Rafe—’

‘Half-brother,’ she corrected with cold emphasis. ‘I haven’t seen Rafe in years. He lives in Australia.’ She gave a brittle smile. ‘We’re a very fragmented family.’

‘So I believe. I also used to work for your father.’

‘My father?’ She frowned. ‘Oh, dear. Poor you.’

The look which greeted this remark showed that she’d irritated him and for some reason this pleased her. Amber reminded herself that he had no right to storm in and sit on one of her sofas, uninvited. Or to sit there barking out questions. The trouble was that he was exuding a disturbing air of confidence and certainty—like a magician who was saving his show-stopping trick right for the end of his act...

‘Anyway,’ she said, with an entirely unnecessary glance at the diamond watch which was glittering furiously at her wrist. ‘I really don’t have time for all this. I’ll admit it was a novel way to be woken up but I’m getting bored now and I’m meeting friends for lunch. So cut to the chase and tell me why you’re here, Mr Conall. Is my dear daddy having one of his occasional bouts of remorse and wondering how his children are getting on? Are you one of his heavies who he’s sent to find out how I am? In which case, you can tell him I’m doing just fine.’ She raised her eyebrows at him. ‘Or has he grown bored with wife number...let me see, which number is he on now? Is it six? Or has he reached double figures? It’s so-o-o difficult to keep up with his hectic love life.’

Conall listened as she spat out her spiky observations, telling himself that of course she was likely to be mixed up and angry and combative. That anyone with her troubled background was never going to end up taking the conventional path in life. Except he knew that adversity didn’t necessarily have to make you spoilt and petulant. He thought about what his own mother had been forced to endure—the kind of hardship which would probably be beyond Amber Carter’s wilful understanding.

His mouth tightened. He wouldn’t be doing her any favours by patting her on her pretty, glossy head and telling her it was all going to be okay. Hadn’t people been doing that all her life—with predictable results? Quite frankly, he was itching to lay her across his lap and spank a little sense into her. He felt an unwanted jerk of lust. Though maybe that wasn’t such a good idea.

‘I have just concluded a business deal with your father,’ he said.

‘Bully for you,’ she said flippantly. ‘No doubt he drove a hard bargain.’

‘Indeed he did,’ he agreed steadily, wondering if she had any idea of the irony of her words—and how much he secretly agreed with them. Because if anyone else had attempted to negotiate the kind of terms Ambrose Carter had demanded, then Conall would have given an emphatic no and walked away from the deal without looking back. But the acquisition of this imposing tower block in this part of London wasn’t just something he’d set his heart on—a lifetime dream he’d never thought he’d achieve just shy of his thirty-fifth birthday. It was more than that. He owed the old man. He owed him big time. Because despite Ambrose’s own car crash of an emotional life, he had shown Conall kindness at a time when his life had been short of kindness. He had given him the break he’d needed. Had believed in him when nobody else had.

‘You owe me, Conall,’ he’d said as he had outlined his outrageous demand. ‘Do this one thing for me and we’re quits.’

And even though Conall had inwardly objected to the blatant emotional blackmail, how could he possibly have refused? If it weren’t for Ambrose he could have ended up serving time in prison. His life could have been very different. Surely it wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility that he could teach his mixed-up daughter a few fundamental lessons in manners and survival.

He stared into her emerald eyes and tried to ignore the sensual curve of her mouth, which was sending subliminal messages to his body and making a pulse at his temple begin to hammer. ‘Yesterday, I made a significant purchase from your father.’

She wasn’t really paying attention. She was too busy casting longing looks in the direction of her cigarettes. ‘And your point is?’

‘My point is that I now own this apartment block,’ he said.

He had her attention now. All of it. Her green eyes were shocked—she looked like a cat which had had a bucket of icy water thrown over it. But it didn’t take longer than a couple of seconds for her natural arrogance to assert itself. For her to narrow those amazing eyes and look down her haughty little nose at him.

‘You? But...but it’s been in his property portfolio for years. It’s one of his key investments. Why would he sell it without telling me?’ She wrinkled her brow in confusion. ‘And to you?’

Conall gave a short laugh. The inference was as clear as the blue spring sky outside the penthouse windows. He wondered if she would have found the news less shocking if the purchase had been made by some rich aristocrat—someone who presumably she would have less trouble twisting around her little finger.

‘Presumably because he likes doing business with me,’ he said. ‘And he wants to free up some of his money and commitments in order to enjoy his retirement.’

Another frown pleated her perfect brow. ‘I had no idea he was thinking about retirement.’

Conall was tempted to suggest that if she communicated with her father a little more often, then she might know what was going on in his life, but he wasn’t here to judge her. He was here to offer her a solution to her current appalling lifestyle, even if it went against his every instinct.

‘Well, he is. He’s winding down and as of now I am the new owner of this development.’ He drew in a deep breath. ‘Which means, of course, that there are going to be a number of changes. The main one being that you can no longer continue to live here rent-free as you have been doing.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You are currently occupying a luxury apartment in a prime location,’ he continued, ‘which I can rent out for an astronomical monthly sum. At the moment you are paying precisely nothing and I’m afraid that the arrangement is about to come to an end.’

Her haughty expression became even haughtier and she shuddered, as if the very mention of money was in some way vulgar, and Conall felt a flicker of pleasure as he realised he was enjoying himself. Because it was a long time since a woman had shown him anything except an eager green light.

‘I don’t think you understand, Mr...Devlin,’ she continued, spitting his name out as if it were poison, ‘that you will get your money. I’m quite happy to pay the current market value as rent. I just need to speak to my bank,’ she concluded.

He gave a smile. ‘Good luck with that.’

She was getting angry now. He could see it in the sudden glitter of her eyes and the way she curled her scarlet fingernails so that they looked like talons against the faded denim of her skinny jeans. And he felt a corresponding flicker of something he didn’t recognise. Something he tried to push away as he stared into the furious tremble of her lips.

‘You may know my father and my brother,’ she said, ‘but that certainly doesn’t give you the authority to make pronouncements about things which are none of your business. Things about which you know nothing. Like my finances.’

‘Oh, I know more about those than you might realise,’ he said. ‘More than you would probably be comfortable with.’

‘I don’t believe you.’

‘Believe what you like, baby,’ he said softly. ‘Because you’ll soon find out what’s true. But it doesn’t have to get acrimonious. I’m going to be very magnanimous, Amber, because your father and I go back a long way. And I’m going to make you an offer.’

Her magnificent eyes narrowed suspiciously. ‘What kind of offer?’

‘I’m going to offer you a job and the chance to redeem yourself. And if you accept, we’ll see about giving you an apartment more suited to a woman on a working wage, rather than this—’ He gave an expansive wave of his hand. ‘Which you have to admit is more suited to someone on a millionaire’s salary.’

She was staring at him incredulously, as if she couldn’t believe what he’d just said. As if he were suddenly going to smile and tell her that he’d simply been teasing and she could have whatever it was she wanted. Was that how men usually behaved towards her? he wondered. Of course it was. When you looked the way she looked, men would fall over themselves whenever she clicked her beautifully manicured fingers.

‘And if I don’t accept?’

He shrugged. ‘That will make things a little more difficult. I will be forced to give you a month’s notice and after that to change the locks, and I’m afraid you’ll be on your own.’

She jumped to her feet, her eyes spitting green fire—looking as if she’d like to rush across the room and rake those scarlet talons all over him. And wasn’t there a primitive side of him which wished she would go right ahead? Take them right down his chest to his groin. Curve those red nails around his balls and gently scrape them, before replacing them with the lick of her tongue.

But she didn’t. She just stood there sucking in a deep breath and trying to compose herself...while his erotic little fantasies meant that he was having to do exactly the same.

‘I may not know much about the law, Mr Devlin,’ she said, biting out the words like splinters of ice, ‘but even I know that you aren’t allowed to throw a sitting tenant out onto the streets.’

‘But you’re not a tenant, Amber, and you never have been,’ he said, trying not to show the sudden triumph which rushed through him. Because although she might be spoilt and thoroughly objectionable, she was going to learn enough of life’s harsher lessons in the coming weeks, without him rubbing salt into the wound. He picked his next words carefully. ‘Your father has been letting you live here as a favour, nothing more. You didn’t sign any agreements—’