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www.millsandboon.co.uk
MARIE FERRARELLA, a USA TODAY bestselling and RITA® Award-winning author, has written more than one hundred and fifty books for Mills & Boon, some under the name Marie Nicole. Her romances are beloved by fans worldwide. Visit her website at www.marieferrarella.com.
To
Shana Smith.
Welcome
aboard.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Prologue
The burst of joy that bathed over her like warm summer rain when Natalie Rothchild opened her eyes began to recede as the reality of the situation slowly penetrated her consciousness.
The spot beside her on the bed was empty.
Empty and cool to the touch when she ran her fingers over it.
“Matt?” She called out his name, but only the echo of her voice answered her. There was no sound of running water from the bathroom, no indication that there was anyone else in the hotel room but her.
Her heart began hammering hard, so hard that it physically hurt her. It felt as if someone had shot arrows through it.
He couldn’t have gone.
But if he was here, where were his clothes? The ones that he’d torn off so carelessly last night, throwing them on the floor along with hers? The first time they’d made love last night, she’d all but caught on fire.
The ache within her chest grew.
“Matt?” she called out again. Fear and bewilderment filled her voice as she sat up. A chill ran down her spine. Something was wrong.
Last night, he’d told her that he loved her, told her that they’d be together forever. He’d said he wanted to marry her. She knew he’d meant it. Knew it wasn’t just something expedient to say because he wanted to make love to her. He’d said it after, not before. After was when it carried weight.
So where was he?
And why did she have this awful, sick feeling in the pit of her stomach, this uneasy sensation that something was very, very wrong?
As Natalie shifted to swing her legs out of bed, she saw it. Just beneath his pillow—his pillow—there was a bit of paper peeking out.
Natalie froze.
She wanted to leave it there. To ignore it. Because the moment she acknowledged it was the moment she had to read it. And the moment she read it, she knew that the euphoric state she’d allowed herself to slip into would burst apart like a soap bubble that had floated on the breeze a second too long, done in by the very thing that had made it float.
But she was Natalie Rothchild. Natalie, the sensible one. The one who faced her problems and life in general head on and fearlessly. Natalie, the rebel who refused to allow her family’s vast fortune to keep her from living a life of purpose.
Matt told her that was one of the things he loved about her.
He loved her.
Didn’t he?
Pressing her lips together, steeling herself, Natalie pulled the note out from beneath the pillow. She held it in her trembling hands and forced herself to read it.
Her eyes clouded with tears, nearly blinding her before she finished.
Balling up the paper, she threw it across the room and then buried her face against her raised knees. Her heart broken, Natalie did what she rarely did. She surrendered to despair.
Quiet sobs filled the silence within the room.
She was really alone.
Chapter 1
Excitement vibrated through Candace Rothchild’s veins.
She could literally feel her adrenaline accelerating. Creating a rush. It was always this way when she stepped out in front of the cameras. Being the center of attention—even anticipating being the center of attention created a high that few drugs, legal or otherwise, could equal. Ever since she could remember, Candace thrived on the limelight, ate it up as if it was a source of energy for her.
Unlike her twin sister, Natalie, whom she considered a dull, placid being with little imagination or flair, Candace positively bloomed when attention was thrown her way. The bigger, the better had always been her motto.
To this end, she always made sure that she was picture perfect. She wore the latest fashions, had the kind of figure women would kill for and men remembered long after she had passed out of their lives. If, at times, that necessitated starving herself and spending outrageous amounts of money, well, so be it. It was all worth it. She wasn’t cut out for the tranquil, humdrum life. Which meant the role of doting mother, to sons she hardly knew and had less time for, wasn’t for her. The only plus from that end was that the tabloids were forever attempting to guess who had fathered them and if, indeed, it had been the same man in both cases.
Beyond that, the children—Mick and David, named after her favorite singers—held no interest for her. Far more important was that there was always another premiere, another function, another occasion to be photographed and fawned over. At times, she would imagine average, desperate women hungrily devouring the tidbits of her life, fantasizing about the men she’d bedded, all in an effort to leave, however briefly, their own drab lives behind.
She was doing a public service living this way, Candace told herself, a smirk twisting her ripe, collagen-full lips. She gave those poor, hopeless women something to dream about.
Why, she was positively noble, if you gave it any thought, Candace silently congratulated herself as she gracefully slid out of the backseat of the limousine and onto the red carpet that was unfurled before The Janus. This opulent casino, where tonight’s charity gala was being held, was Luke Montgomery’s most extravagant enterprise to date. Never mind that Luke and her father were rivals the way only the nouveau riche could be in Las Vegas, where the stakes that ran highest were not always found on a blackjack table.
The gala Luke was hosting centered around an international jewelry convention. On display was a breathtaking collection of gems that had been donated by various members of the rich and famous, all in the name of charity. The price of admission was high but only in terms of what the average person could afford.
The sum meant nothing to Candace. Money had never been a problem for her. Sustaining her high had been—because she needed to stay in the spotlight in order to survive. Without it, the insecurities that lingered in the background began to encroach, darkening her world and threatening to sink her into a nether region fraught with madness.
So she did what she could to ensure that she would never descend to those levels. She surrounded herself with glamorous people and basked in the glow of the limelight the way no one else could.
Charity or not, Candace had no gems she was willing to part with. She never met an expensive bauble she didn’t immediately love. And tonight, she was sporting the best of the best, a legendary diamond that, according to a rumor she’d heard, had been in her family for several decades. The Tears of the Quetzal. Only gems of quality had names, she thought with a smug grin.
Her father, Harold Rothchild, thought the ring was safely under lock and key. But then, he had no idea how determined she could be. Or how clever. Like everyone else, he had underestimated her. His problem, she thought carelessly.
Besides, what good was jewelry if you couldn’t wear it? Couldn’t flaunt it and make others look at it enviously? None, that’s what. Jewelry had to be seen to be appreciated.
And its owner envied.
Candace looked down now at the ring on her hand. The incredible multifaceted diamond captured all the light in the immediate vicinity and flashed it back onto her in bursts of green and purple. It was as if she had a star on her ring finger. Rumor had it that there was a curse attached to it.
All nonsense, she was certain. The so-called curse was started by her father, or maybe Grandpa Joe before him to keep people from making off with the gem. But she wasn’t ignorant like the rest of her pathetic family.
She had no concerns about a curse, only about the attention wearing the priceless gem could garner her. She stood for a moment as the limousine pulled away, letting those in the immediate vicinity drink in the sight of her. She gave the appearance of being taller than she was, helped, in part, by stiletto heels. The long, clinging scarlet gown she wore would have been eye-catching under any circumstances. On her it was doubly so, and she knew it. Cascading platinum hair completed the picture. She was a knockout.
She was alone tonight. Deliberately so. She wanted to be unencumbered as she scanned the sea of men this gala had lured. She wanted to be free to scan them and to bring the one that pleased her most back to her condo. Her sons had been packed off with the nanny for an overnight visit with the nanny’s sister and nephews—which left the terrain open for her. There would be no disapproving nanny, no annoying children popping up at inopportune times to ask even more annoying questions.
She was in the mood for something new tonight. Something different. Exotic, perhaps.
Exotic, yes.
A smile slipped over her lips as she slowly made her way along the carpet, her pace timed to the flashes that were going off, marking her passage. Photographers called out her name and vied for better positions in order to snare the “perfect” photograph.
In a pinch, Candace mused, she might not mind reverting back to the tried and true. Like Luke Montgomery. In his time, he’d been very hot in bed. Hot enough to leave an impression on her in his wake, even now. Not an easy feat considering the number of lovers she’d had over the years. Her collection had begun at the precocious age of fourteen when she’d surrendered her virginity, already rather compromised, to the family chauffeur. Paolo, as she recalled, had been poor, but beautiful.
And very, very skilled in the ways of lovemaking.
She wondered where Paolo was these days. Her father had gotten rid of the driver the moment he’d found out about the affair. Harold Rothchild had indignantly threatened the man with prison, but even she’d known that the threat was empty. Ever conscious of their reputation, her father wanted nothing more than to avoid any sort of public scandal that reflected poorly on the family.
She’d given him quite a run for his money, she thought, turning her face up so that the lighting caught her just so.
“Poor Dad, you should have raised prize-winning roses, not daughters,” she mused under her breath.
Recognizing them, she paused to pose for several national magazine photographers. One hand on her hip, the other—the one with the ring—delicately placed just beneath her collarbone and above the deeply plunging neckline that left only the tiniest speck to the imagination. Of the two of them, she wondered which was more of a disappointment to her father, she with her penchant of attracting every photographer within a fifty-mile radius, or Natalie, who worked as a police detective, for God sakes. How mundane and common can you get?
“This way, Candace. Look this way!” a deep male voice called out urgently.
The voice, she noted, sounded vaguely familiar to her, although she doubted she could place it as she turned in the direction it had come from.
And then she smiled more brilliantly. She was right. She had recognized the voice. Recognized the man as well, although she couldn’t remember his name.
Something beginning with a P, she thought, although she couldn’t be sure. Or maybe it began with a B. But then, it didn’t matter if she remembered them, only that they remembered her, and by the look on this one’s face, he most certainly did remember her.
They’d slept together, hadn’t they? she thought. He looked like her type. Tall, muscular, with an olive complexion, thick black hair and high cheekbones that gave him almost an aristocratic look. She might have mistaken him for one of the invited guests—if not for the camera he was clutching.
But he was exotic looking and she really was in the mood for someone exotic.
“What have you got for us, Candace?” he called out, elbowing his way forward ahead of the gaggle of photographers. Grumbling and curses marked his forward progress.
“A lot of sugar,” she answered in a breathless voice that made her sound as if she were channeling the spirit of the late Marilyn Monroe at her zenith. “And, of course, this.”
“This” was the ring that she now held up like a courtesan in the court of King Henry VIII waiting to have her hand kissed. A satisfied smirk graced her lips again. A flurry of cameras went off, capturing the image and the moment.
But her attention was only focused on the photographer with the aura of danger about him. Winking, she bent forward, giving him, she knew, ample view of her endowment.
“Didn’t we…?” Candace deliberately let her voice trail off even as her eyes held him prisoner in their blue gaze.
His smile, she caught herself thinking, was incredibly sexy as he answered in a low voice, “Yes, we did. I’m flattered that you remembered.”
It was the perfect thing to say to her and he knew it, even as he maintained his innocent expression.
Candace did her best to recall the details of their coupling—and failed. “I’m afraid your name…” She shrugged playfully, a laugh escaping her carefully made up lips. “I was never good with names.”
“Patrick,” he supplied politely, snapping another photograph. She preened. “My name’s Patrick Moore.”
“I knew it was something that started with the letter P,” she declared triumphantly.
It took effort for the photographer to keep his true feelings from showing on his face. It took even more effort to keep from telling this two-bit slut what he thought of her and her whole degenerate family. But then, that would have been counterproductive to his plan. He hoped that by supplying her with the name he was going by these days, it would keep her from thinking too much. From remembering.
But then, he comforted himself, her brain usually oscillated between being fried or being pickled. Neither state was conducive to remembering pertinent details, like the ones that would blow his cover.
“Is the ring yours now?” someone else, obviously at least mildly familiar with the ring’s chain of ownership, called out to Candace.
She didn’t bother trying to hide the condescending glance she sent toward the photographer. Her laughter echoed with victory.
“It’s always been mine,” she announced.
Out of the corner of her eye she caught a glimpse of Luke just within the entrance. Six foot two, lean and muscular, with dark hair she remembered running her fingers through, he looked incredible. A touch of nostalgia surfaced. He always did look good in a tux.
Looked damn good out of one, too, she thought with a lascivious smile.
“If you gentlemen’ll excuse me,” she murmured to the reporters. And then, because she hated the prospect of facing the night in an empty bed, she glanced back at the exotic reporter. It never hurt to have an ace in the hole. “Maybe we can get together later. I’ll fill you in on what I’ve been doing lately. For your tabloid,” she added with a wink as she patted his face, her ring sparkling and throwing off beams of light with every movement.
“I’d like that,” he told her.
She expected nothing less. “Yes, I’m sure you would. I’m staying at—”
“I know where you’re staying,” Patrick Moore cut her short.
She smiled, inclining her head. “Clever boy,” she murmured.
With that, she sashayed off to the casino, every step a calculated movement guaranteed to make men’s mouths water.
Once inside, Candace began to move just a tad faster. If she’d retained her present pace, the object of her pursuit, Luke Montgomery, would have put too much distance between them. She very much wanted to hook up with the gala host. Men of power were like an aphrodisiac for her, and Luke Montgomery, despite his humble beginnings, was now regarded as one of Vegas’s movers and shakers. Nothing she liked more than being on the winning team.
She had, she liked to think, a lot to bring to the table.
“Luke,” she called out to him. When he didn’t appear to hear her, Candace raised her voice, temporarily abandoning Marilyn Monroe’s sexy, throaty whisper for pragmatic reasons. There was still no response.
The third time she called out his name, Luke stopped walking. He could feel his shoulders tensing. He’d heard her the first time and had hoped that she would just give up.
He should have known better.
Damn that shrew anyway. He wanted the focus of this gala to be on him, his newest casino and the charity he was sponsoring, in that order. Nowhere in that hierarchy did he want to include a vapid, superficial bleach-blonde.
But if he didn’t acknowledge her, he knew she was going to cause a scene, and that was the last thing he wanted tonight.
So Luke turned around, a perfunctory smile of civility on his lips worn for the benefit of anyone who might be passing by.
“Hello, Candace,” he said as soon as he crossed back to her. Towering over the woman, he all but quietly growled, “I don’t seem to remember sending you an invitation.”
A careless laugh met his statement. “I’m sure it was just an oversight.” Candace possessively threaded her arms through his. Being so close to Luke vividly reminded her of the last time they’d been together. Though she’d never said anything, she’d considered settling down with him. At least for a while. A lady-killer who lived up to his reputation, he was a magnificent lover who always left her wanting more.
Because she sensed that this gala meant a lot to him, she tried to get on his good side by saying, “This certainly has the looks of being quite a successful event.”
He certainly hoped so. Luke had undertaken hosting this event and pulling together all the beautiful people from the four corners of the world not just to benefit the charity he was sponsoring but also because hosting such an event, where all the rich and famous showed up in droves, would garner him an enormous amount of goodwill. Good publicity was crucial since he was on the verge of building yet another casino and hotel—this one on the exact spot where the tenement building he’d lived in as a child had stood.
The Phoenix, as the new establishment would be called, was very near and dear to him, and he wanted nothing to hamper its success. Someone like Candace Rothchild and the kind of attention she attracted could do a lot of harm to all his good intentions.
He wanted her out of here, and he had no time to be polite about it. Moving over to a more private corner of the casino, he asked in a controlled, low voice, “What is it you want, Candace?”
Her eyes raked over his body, blatantly undressing him as she looked up into his eyes. “Why, darling, that should be very evident to someone as smart as you.” Tightening her hold on his arm, Candace raised her face up to his. Her mouth was barely inches away from his lips. “You.”
Gone were the days when he would have been flattered. He knew her for what she was. A woman with no soul on her way out, living in a town that didn’t care. She was swiftly becoming a punch line to a good many insulting jokes.
“Not now, Candace.”
A pout appeared on her moist lips. “Then when?” she wanted to know.
What had he ever seen in her? he couldn’t help wondering. Granted, there’d been a time when he would have gladly taken her up on her offer, but he’d been younger then and far more impressionable. He’d like to think he was too smart now to be tempted to lie down with a black widow.
He shook his arm free and then grasped hers. He began directing her toward the front entrance. “Some other time, Candace,” he said forcefully.
Instantly, her face clouded over. “I don’t like being rejected, Luke. Your little party won’t go so well if I make a scene. That’s what they’ll remember, me,” she emphasized, “not you or this little jewelry store display of yours.”
It was a threat with teeth, and they both knew it.
He didn’t react well to threats. “I think you’ll be happier elsewhere, Candace,” Luke told her coldly. He snapped his fingers over her head at someone across the floor.
She didn’t bother looking to see who Luke was summoning. She wasn’t interested.
“And I think I’ll be happier here,” she insisted. Accustomed to getting her way, it infuriated her to be contradicted.
The next moment, they were joined by a third party. Matt Schaffer, the head of security for Montgomery Enterprises, was at her elbow. But rather than look at her, his attention was completely focused on his employer. Matt waited silently for instructions.
Candace always perked up when in the company of a good-looking man, and this time was no exception as recognition entered her eyes.
“Why, hello handsome,” she purred.
Candace had already had too much to drink, Matt realized. He could smell it on her. But he was careful not to allow his disdain to register on his face. Instead, he raised his eyes to Luke’s face.
“Mr. Montgomery?”
“Schaffer, please escort Ms. Rothchild out of the casino,” Luke requested, his voice flat and devoid of emotion. “She was just leaving.”
Candace became incensed. “No, I wasn’t,” she insisted heatedly. She gave every impression that she was about to dig in her heels, and if Matt intended to remove her, it was going to have to be by force.
But rather than take hold of her arm and drag her from the premises, cursing and screaming, Matt leaned over and whispered into her ear. “There are a bunch of photographers outside asking about you,” he told the Rothchild heiress smoothly. “You wouldn’t want to disappoint your public, would you?”
Her blue eyes flashed, reminding him of another pair of blue eyes. Matt banked down the memory and the feelings it threatened to usher in with it. He’d made his choice, and he had to live with it…had been living with it these last eight years.
“I don’t want to be disappointed,” Candace told him haughtily.
There was another, more logical approach to this. “You’ll save face if you make it look as if leaving is your idea. Ms. Rothchild,” Matt told her quietly. “But make no mistake, one way or another, you are leaving the casino.”
Candace exhaled angrily, then, right before his eyes, she managed to get herself under control. There was a squadron of cameras waiting to capture her beautiful likeness, she thought, and she knew that when she frowned, she looked closer to her own age. Thirty was a horrible number.
As she moved toward the door, Candace thought she could see that reporter—the sexy one—looking in her direction. Patrick Moore.
Something told her that the evening was not going to be a total waste after all.
She flashed a radiant smile. “I’ll have your head,” she promised Matt through lips that looked as if they were barely moving.
They were almost at the entrance, but Matt knew better than to release her. If he did, she might just double back, and he needed her on the other side of the door.