Viktor’s kiss took Maddie by surprise. It shouldn’t have. Wasn’t it natural to kiss to seal an engagement?

But the kiss did surprise her. And then it overwhelmed her, his lips coaxing a response that radiated throughout her body. They took possession of hers, insisting on the two things she’d said only that morning she wasn’t capable of.

Submission and trust.

But then, like with so many other things in her life, the rules did not apply to Viktor Beck.

She found herself melting into him, no thoughts for self-preservation or holding anything back.

And he accepted her surrender with a forceful masculine desire that belied any claim for a lack of passion between them.

He devoured her mouth, his arms coming around her, his hands pressing her body flush with his.

Maddie’s knees would have given out, but Vik’s hold on her was too tight.

The kiss was Viktor Beck staking claim to the woman who promised to marry him and give him his dreams.

Lucy Monroe’s

RUTHLESS RUSSIANS

Passion is in their blood

As boys, they came from Russia to America to make their fortunes. Now formidable opponents in the boardroom, Viktor Beck and Maxwell Black are about to make the biggest acquisitions of their lives by marrying two of San Francisco’s most notorious heiresses! Beneath their suave American exteriors beat the passionate hearts of fearsome Cossack warriors—and their intended brides are about to give them the battle of their lives!

In AN HEIRESS FOR HIS EMPIRE October 2014

A tabloid sex scandal means Viktor Beck can put his plan in motion and marry heiress Madison Archer—the key to taking over her father’s business and building his empire. But even this ruthless Russian is not prepared for his wild bride to be a virgin!

In A VIRGIN FOR HIS PRIZE November 2014

Formidable CEO Maxwell Black is about to make his ultimate acquisition— socialite Romi Grayson! She has something he wants, and his need for control—in all areas—means he won’t rest until his ring is on her finger and the innocent Romi is warm and willing in his bed!

An Heiress for His Empire

Lucy Monroe

www.millsandboon.co.uk

LUCY MONROE started reading at the age of four. After going through the children’s books at home, she was caught by her mother reading adult novels pilfered from the higher shelves on the bookcase … Alas, it was nine years before she got her hands on a Mills & Boon® Romance her older sister had brought home. She loves to create the strong alpha males and independent women who people Mills & Boon® books. When she’s not immersed in a romance novel (whether reading or writing it), she enjoys travel with her family, having tea with the neighbours, gardening, and visits from her numerous nieces and nephews.

Lucy loves to hear from her readers:

email LucyMonroe@LucyMonroe.com or visit www.LucyMonroe.com

For Judy Flohr, a very special reader who I have long considered an honest friend. It’s sort of amazing to me that you’ve been reading and sharing your love of my books since the very first one, THE GREEK TYCOON’S ULTIMATUM, back in 2003. When I’m doubting myself, or the story, I know I can re-read your emails or online reader reviews and remember why I write and that maybe I’m not so bad at this after all.

THANK YOU!!!

Hugs and blessings, Lucy

Contents

Cover

Excerpt

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

EPILOGUE

Extract

Copyright

CHAPTER ONE

MADISON ARCHER SET HER morning coffee down, hot liquid spilling over the rim, as she read her Google alerts with growing horror.

Madcap Madison Looking for New Master?

Archer Heiress into Heavy Kink

San Francisco Bad Boy Dumps Very Bad Girl

The articles made lurid claims about a lifestyle and relationship between Maddie and Perry Timwater. A completely nonexistent relationship.

The fact that Perry was the source caused the coffee to sour in Maddie’s stomach.

His supposed exposé of their fictitious relationship claimed she was a submissive with a serious pain fetish and need for multiple partners. She gritted her teeth on the urge to swear as she read it was her inability to remain faithful that forced Perry to end things between them.

Maddie wouldn’t mind ending Perry right that minute. Betrayal choked her.

How could he have done this?

He was her friend.

They’d met their freshman year at university. He’d made her laugh when she’d thought nothing could. Not after her epic fail trying to get Viktor Beck’s attention. She’d started university with a broken heart and Perry had helped her paste over the cracks with friendship.

She’d helped him pass his accountancy courses. He’d played platonic escort for her and she’d provided him entrée to Jeremy Archer’s world—an echelon above his own.

But never, not once, had their friendship ever taken a turn toward something heavier.

Pounding sounded on her front door. “Maddie! It’s me, don’t freak.” Then barely a second later, the double snick of locks sliding back was followed by the door swinging wide.

Holding a bag from their favorite bakery aloft, her black bob swirling around her pixie face, Romi Grayson kicked the door shut behind her. “I come bearing the panacea for all ills.”

“I’m not sure even chocolate and flaky pastry can make this situation better.” Maddie slumped against the back of her chair.

Eyes the same vibrant blue as Maddie’s glittered with anger. “So, Perry’s lost his mind, right?”

“You saw the articles?”

“Only after reporters woke me from a dead sleep demanding my opinion of my best friend’s darker sexual proclivities.” Romi’s mouth twisted wryly. “Proclivities I’m pretty sure you wouldn’t have even if you weren’t still a virgin.”

“You’ve got that right. I’ve never been able to trust one man enough to have sex, much less multiple partners.”

As ridiculous as that might seem at twenty-four, it wasn’t going to change anytime soon, either.

“If you ask me, it’s got less to do with trust and more to do with the fact you imprinted on Viktor Beck like a baby bird when you were a teenager and you’ve never gotten over him.”

“Romi!” Maddie was in no mood to hash out her unrequited feelings for her father’s dark-haired, dark-eyed, to-die-for-bodied golden boy.

“I’m just saying...”

“Nothing you haven’t said before.” Maddie’s stomach grew queasier by the second.

Along with the rest of the world, Vik would see the articles, but she couldn’t afford to think about that right now, or she really was going to lose it. “Father is going to kill me.”

This new scandal was bound to crack even the San Francisco tycoon’s icy demeanor. And not in the way Maddie had always craved.

He’d sent her away to boarding school months after her mother’s death and Maddie had courted media attention in the hopes of gaining his. It had worked for her mother, Helene Archer, née Madison, the original Madcap Madison, but Maddie had come to realize the strategy had backfired pretty spectacularly for her.

In the nine years since Helene’s death, Jeremy had developed a habit of thinking the worst of his daughter. When he wasn’t ignoring her existence all together.

“If he doesn’t die of a stress-related heart attack first.” Romi put a chocolate-filled croissant in front of Maddie.

“Don’t say that.”

The other woman grimaced. “Sorry. Stuff just comes out. You know what I’m like. Your dad is wound pretty tight, though.”

Maddie couldn’t argue that.

“I think this time, Perry’s diarrhea of the mouth has me beat anyway.” Romi chewed her pastry militantly. “What was he thinking?”

Morose, Maddie stared at her friend. “That he wanted the money the tabloid paid him for the story?”

She’d had no idea that turning down his latest request for a loan would result in her utter humiliation. How could she? Friends didn’t do that to each other.

“Jerk.”

Maddie usually played peacemaker between her two closest friends, but she wasn’t about to stand up for Perry this time. “What am I going to do?”

“You could threaten to sue and demand a retraction.”

“Based on my word against his?”

Romi made a sound very close to a growl. “You two have never even kissed with tongue.”

“But we have kissed, for the cameras.” Perry had always made a joke of it.

He had been Maddie’s go-to escort for years and more than one article speculating on their relationship had been run, often quoting anonymous sources and always accompanied by the joke kissing pictures.

“Do you think he’s done this before?”

“Sold confidential details of your supposed relationship?” Romi asked.

“Yes.”

“You know what I think.”

Maddie sighed. “That he’s a leech.”

“Always has been.”

“He was a good friend.” Maddie couldn’t make herself claim he still was.

Romi just gave Maddie a disbelieving look, no words necessary.

Ignoring it, Maddie said, “I probably can’t prove we never had a relationship, but I can sue them for libel in the details.”

“His word against yours.”

“But he’s lying.”

“This is something new for the tabloids?”

Feeling hopeless, Maddie pushed her croissant away.

“You could always sic your dad’s dogs on Perry. That media fixer of his could be cast in Shark Week on the Discovery Channel.”

“I should.” Even supposing her dad cared enough to assign his media fixer’s precious time to helping Maddie.

Romi’s expression turned knowing. “But you won’t. Perry was your friend.”

Maddie opened her mouth, but Romi put her hand up, forestalling words. “Don’t you dare say he still is.”

“No.” Maddie swallowed back emotion. “No, it’s pretty clear he’s not my friend and maybe he never was.”

“Oh, sweetie.” Romi came around the table to hug her.

Maddie fought down stress-induced nausea. “I thought he was real.”

“Instead, he turned out to be just another one of the plastic people.” Romi’s tone reflected her own experience with that. “All looks and no substance.”

Maddie choked out a morbid laugh. “Yeah.”

A bugler’s reveille sounded from her smartphone.

With a snicker, Romi moved back to her seat. “Daddy’s PA?”

“I thought it was appropriate.” Maddie clicked into her text messages, unsurprised to see that there were dozens.

While she checked her phone periodically throughout the day, Maddie only had sound alerts set for certain people: Romi, Perry—who was going off the list today—Maddie’s father, his personal assistant. Viktor Beck.

Not that her father’s business heir apparent contacted Maddie these days. But still, if he did...she’d get an audible alert.

Ignoring the numerous messages from friends, acquaintances and the media jackals, Maddie clicked into the one from her father’s PA.

Mtg w Mr. Archer @ 10:45—conf rm 2.

Mr. Archer. Not Mr. A, even though the PA had used text speak for the rest of the message. Not your father. That might have been too personal.

“He wants to meet this morning.” Maddie bit her lip, considering what she’d have to change to make that happen.

Romi nodded. “Are you going to go?”

Maddie considered putting off her morning plans for the meeting with her father.

“No.” It wasn’t as if her showing up when he called was going to make Jeremy any less angry.

She shot a quick text back to the PA offering to come anytime after noon-thirty.

Fifteen minutes later, Romi was gone after a final pep talk when the strains of Michael Bublé’s “Call Me Irresponsible” sounded from Maddie’s smartphone.

Her father was calling her. Personally. Not texting.

Any other time, she would be thrilled. But right now? The crooner’s smooth voice was as ominous as the sepulchre tones of a Halloween horror flick’s sound track.

Maddie put the phone to her ear. “Hello, Father.”

“Ten forty-five, Madison. You will not be late.”

“You know I have a standing morning appointment.” Not that he knew what it was.

Maddie had tried to tell him once, but Jeremy had mocked the very idea of his flighty daughter doing anything worthwhile. Worse, he’d made it clear how useless he thought it was to spend time volunteering at an underfunded public school predominantly populated by the children of poverty-level families.

Since then, Maddie had kept her two lives completely separate. Maddie Grace, nondescript twentysomething who loved children and volunteered a good chunk of her time, had nothing in common—not even hair and eye color—with Madison Archer, notorious socialite and heiress.

“Cancel.” No give. No explanation. Just demand.

Typical.

“It’s important.”

“No. It is not.” His tone was so cold it sent shivers along her extremities.

“It is to me.” She wished she could be as unaffected by his displeasure as he was by hers. “Please.”

“Ten-forty-five, Madison.” Then he hung up.

She knew because the call dropped.

* * *

Wearing the armor of her socialite Madison Archer persona, Maddie got off the elevator at the twenty-ninth floor of her father’s building in San Francisco’s financial district.

None of the nerves wreaking havoc with her insides showed on her smooth face.

Makeup applied to highlight, not compete with, the blue of her eyes and gentle bow of her lips, she’d styled her chin-length red hair in perfectly placed curls around her oval face so like her mother’s. No highlights had ever been necessary for the natural copper tones.

Her three-quarter-length-sleeved Valentino black-and-white suit wasn’t this year’s collection, but it was one of her favorites and fit the image she intended to convey. The wide black banded hem of the straight skirt brushed a proper two inches above her knees and the Jackie-O-style jacket with a statement bow was a galaxy away from slutty.

She’d opted for classic closed-toe black Jimmy Choo pumps that added a mere two inches to her five-foot-six-inch height. Maddie carried a simple leather Chanel bag, her accessories limited to her mother’s favorite Cartier watch and diamond stud earrings.

Maddie didn’t look anything like the woman described by Perry in his “breakup interview” with the press.

She walked into Conference Room Two without knocking, stopping for a strategic pause in the doorway to allow the other occupants a moment to look their fill.

She wasn’t going to scurry in like a mouse trying to avoid the cat’s attention.

The brief moment had the added benefit of allowing her to take her own lay of the land.

Seven people sat around the eight-person conference table. As to be expected, her father occupied one end. Maddie was equal parts relieved and worried to see his media fixer at the other end, but not happy at all to see the man seated to the right of her father.

Romi was right that Maddie had had a crush on the gorgeous Viktor Beck since he started working for Jeremy Archer ten years ago. The unrequited feelings had evolved from schoolgirl infatuation to something more, something that made it impossible for other men to measure up.

That first year, Maddie had still had her mother and Helene would tease Maddie for her blushes in the tycoon-in-the-making’s presence.

Maddie had learned to control her blushes, but not the feelings the handsome third-generation Russian engendered in her.

Having him here to witness her humiliation tightened the knot of tension inside her until she wasn’t sure it would ever come undone.

Less understandable, but not nearly as upsetting, was the presence of two of her father’s other high-level managers in the remaining chairs on that side of the table. Her father’s PA sat to his left, with an empty chair beside her.

The final man at the table had a powerful presence and a familiar face, but in her current state of highly guarded stress, Maddie couldn’t place him.

Everyone had a stack of papers in front of them. It took only the briefest glance to see what they were: printed-out copies of the news stories Maddie had seen earlier on her smartphone. Underneath them was an individual copy for each person in the room of the actual tabloid the original story had run in.

Vik’s pile was different. It had what looked like a contract on top. Looking around the table, Maddie realized everyone else had a copy of that as well, but on the bottom of their pile—the stapled corner was the only thing visible in the other piles.

She looked at her father and gave him the sardonic expression she’d been using for years to mask her vulnerability. “I don’t suppose it occurred to you to discuss this with me privately before bringing in a think tank.”

“Sit down, Madison.” He didn’t even bother to respond to her comment.

Which should neither surprise, nor hurt. So why did it do both?

She waited a count of three before obeying his brusque order, deliberately ignoring the stack of papers in front of her. “I assume we’ve already drafted a letter demanding a retraction?”

When her father didn’t answer, she stared pointedly at his media fixer.

“Is it likely your ex-lover will recant his commentary?” the fixer asked in a flat tone.

“First, he was never my lover. Second, he doesn’t have to recant his lies for us to sue the tabloid for libel.” Though her chances of winning the suit weren’t high without Perry’s honesty.

“I am not in the habit of wasting time or resources on a hopeless endeavor,” her father said.

“The story is out there and that can’t be changed,” she agreed. “But that doesn’t mean we leave Perry’s lies unchallenged.”

Her father’s eyes were chips of blue ice. “If you wish to challenge your ex-lover’s lies, you may do so, but that is not my concern.”

“You don’t believe the stories?” she asked with a pained incredulity she couldn’t quite hide.

“What I believe is not the issue at hand.”

“It is for me.” There were only two people in that room whose opinion Maddie cared about.

Her father’s and Viktor Beck’s, no matter how much she might wish that wasn’t the case.

Her gaze shifted to Vik, but nothing from the stern set of his square jaw to the obscure depths of his espresso-brown eyes revealed his thoughts.

There had been a time when he might have tried to encourage her with a half smile or even a wink, but those days were gone. There’d been no softening in his demeanor toward her since her first trip home after going away to university.

And while that might be her own fault, she didn’t have to like it.

Her father cleared his throat. “Those tawdry stories may have precipitated this meeting, but they are not the reason for it.”

Maddie’s attention snapped back to her only remaining family. “What do you mean?”

“The issue we are here to address is your unacceptable notoriety, Madison. I will not sit by while you attempt to rival other heiresses for worldwide infamy.”

“I don’t.” Even when Maddie had tried to court her father’s attention by gaining that of the media, she hadn’t gone that far.

Okay, so she and Romi were known for their participation in political rallies of the liberal variety, which included a well-publicized sit-in protesting cuts in local school funding. That Maddie had gone further, bungee jumping from the Golden Gate Bridge with five others and unfurling a giant banner that read Go Green or Go Home, was beside the point.

There were videos online of her bungee jumping in less politically motivated and slightly more risky circumstances. The snowboarding had been a total failure, but she’d always loved downhill skiing and learning to jump had been fantastic. Of course, only her tumbles made it into the media.

But she hadn’t done a thing to get herself in the papers in over six months. Not since hitting the headlines with a nighttime adventure in skydiving that had resulted in her hospitalization with a hairline fracture to her pelvis.

Her father had not only ignored her exploit, but he’d also ignored Maddie’s injury. And not only had he refused to take her phone calls from the hospital, but he’d also made it clear, through his PA, that Maddie was not welcome at the family mansion for her recovery.

She’d been forced to hire a nurse to help during the weeks of her limited mobility. Romi had offered to stay with her, but Maddie refused to take advantage.

“Am I to understand you didn’t read Madison in on the contents of this contract?” Vik asked, unexpected disapproval edging his deep tone. “Do you actually expect her to agree?”

“She’ll agree.” Her father gave her a stern glare. “Or I will cut her out of my life completely.”

The words were painful enough to hear, but the absolute conviction in her father’s voice stabbed straight through Maddie’s carefully cultivated facade to the genuine and all-too-vulnerable emotions underneath.

“Over this?” she demanded, waving her hand toward the printed articles. “It’s not true!”

“You will not continue to drag my name and that of my company through the mud, Madison.”

“I don’t do that.” While she’d managed a certain level of media notoriety, it had never before been because of anything even remotely like the lies Perry had spewed to the tabloids.

Her father began reading the headlines out loud and weak tears burned the back of her eyes. Maddie refused to give in to them, wishing she could be as genuinely emotionless as the steel-gray-haired man flaying her with other people’s words.

“I told you, he lied.”

“Why would he?” the media fixer asked, sounding interested in an almost clinical way.

“For money. For revenge.” Because she’d turned him down one too many times and compounded that by refusing his latest request for a loan. “I don’t know, but he lied.”

How many times did she have to say it?

“It is time for definitive measures to be taken,” Jeremy said, as if she hadn’t spoken.

“On that at least, we can agree, beginning with the demand for a retraction. I can do my own interview.” Even though she hated that kind of direct contact with the media.

She considered offering the ultimate sacrifice of integrating her Maddie Grace life with that of socialite Madison Archer in order to combat the negative image that clearly concerned her father.

Jeremy dismissed her offer with a slicing gesture. “I believe I’ve made it clear that the current scandal is not my primary concern.”

“What is your concern?” she asked, confused.

“The capricious lifestyle that has resulted in your unacceptable and notorious reputation.”

“You want me to come work for AIH?” she asked with zero enthusiasm and even less belief.

The last time the issue of Archer International Holdings had come up, her father had made it clear he no longer harbored dreams of her one day taking over.

His harsh bark of laughter was all the answer she needed. “Absolutely not.”

“You want me to get a job somewhere else?” She could do that.

She preferred using her education as a volunteer teacher’s aide, but if it would help her relationship with her father, she would get a paying job—which hopefully wouldn’t conflict with her volunteering schedule.

More derisive laughter fell from her father’s lips. “Do you really think any reputable charity or business would hire you right now?”

Heat climbed up her neck, ending in a very rare blush. She’d become adept at hiding her emotions, even suppressing her blushes of embarrassment a long time ago.

But suddenly, she realized that if it did become known that Madison Archer was Maddie Grace, the school might be forced to disallow Maddie’s volunteering. All because a man she’d thought was a friend had turned out to be a lying, manipulative, opportunistic user.

“He wants you to get married,” Vik informed her, no indication in his tone or demeanor that he was joking.

Her father did not jump in with a denial, either.

For the first time, she looked around the room to see how the other occupants were reacting. Her father’s media fixer and PA were both busy on their tablets, ignoring the conversation now, or giving a pretty good pretense of doing so.

One of his managers was looking at her with the type of speculation that left Madison feeling dirty, but the fact he had the articles about her spread out in front of him could have something to do with that, too.

The other manager was reading through the paperwork and the man who Maddie did not know was looking at her father, his expression assessing.

Vik’s expression was enigmatic as always.

She met her father’s gaze again, finding nothing there but implacable resolve. “You want me to get married.”

“Yes.”

“Who?” she asked, unhappily certain she already had an inkling.

“One of these four men.” Her father indicated Vik, the two other managers and the man she did not know. “You know Viktor, of course, and I am sure you remember Steven Whitley.” Jeremy nodded toward a manager she was fairly certain had been divorced once already and was nearly twice her age.

Maddie found herself acknowledging both men with a tip of her own head in some bizarre ritual of polite behavior. Or maybe it was just the situation that was so bizarre.

He indicated the manager whose look had given her the willies. “Brian Jones.”

His expression was benign now, almost pitying.

“I thought you were engaged,” she said, her voice almost as tight as her throat. But that couldn’t be helped.

Hadn’t Maddie met his fiancée at the last Christmas party?

“Are you?” her father asked, annoyance clear in his tone. “Miss Priest?”

His PA looked up from her tablet with a frown. “Yes, sir?”

“Jones is engaged.”

“Is he?” Miss Priest didn’t sound concerned. “He is not married.”

“But I will be.” Brian stood. “I don’t believe I’ll be needed for the rest of this meeting, if you’ll excuse me, sir?”

“Did you read the contract?” her father demanded.

“I did.”

“And you are still leaving?”

“Yes, sir.”

A measure of respect shone in her father’s eyes even as he frowned. “Then go.” He nodded toward the stranger on the other side of Maddie as if the introductions had not been interrupted by the defection of one of his candidates. “Maxwell Black, CEO of BIT.”

Maxwell smiled at her, magnetism that might actually rival Vik’s exuding from him. “Hello, Madison. It’s good to see you again.”

He wasn’t overtly sexual, but there was a vibe to him that made Maddie wrap her arms protectively around herself. This man carried power around him the same way Vik did, but with a predatory edge she hadn’t experienced from her father’s heir apparent.

Then, she’d never been his business rival.

“I don’t believe we’ve met?” She forced her arms to fall to her sides.

“I saw you at the Red Ball last February.”

She remembered going to the charity event that raised money for research into heart disease, but she didn’t remember seeing him.

“I would have remembered.”

“I’m glad to hear you say so.” His teeth flashed in a blinding white smile. “But I meant what I said. I saw you there. We were not introduced.”

“Oh.”

Her father cleared his throat in that disapproving way he had, but if he expected Maddie to say it was a pleasure to meet the man—under these circumstances—he didn’t know her very well.

But then that had been her problem most of her life, hadn’t it?

CHAPTER TWO

THE MORNING HAD GONE according to Viktor’s plans so far, but the spark of temper in Madison’s brilliant blue eyes threatened to derail it.

If Jeremy had evinced even one iota of the concern Viktor knew the older man felt for his daughter’s current predicament, she would be reacting very differently. But then if father and daughter got along perfectly, or even very well, Viktor’s own plans would by necessity be very different.

“You know, I never even entertained the fantasy that you called me to help me, to take my side for once, to protect me because I mattered to you.” The beautiful redhead offered the emotionally laden words in a flat tone Viktor almost envied.

She would be one hell of a poker player.

She was lying, though. Madison wouldn’t have shown up if she didn’t think her father would help her.

“You never were a child taken with fairy tales,” Jeremy said.

Viktor could have reined in the older man’s prideful idiocy, but that wouldn’t further his own agenda. However, he felt an unexpected pang of guilt at Madison’s barely there flinch and flash of pain in the azure depths of her eyes.

She recovered quickly, her expression smooth—almost bored. “No, that was always Mom’s department. She lived under the fallacy that you cared about us. I know better.”

It was Jeremy’s turn to flinch and he wasn’t as fast at hiding his reaction as his daughter, but then he had to be in shock. Madison didn’t go for the jugular like that. In fact, in all the arguments between the tycoon and his daughter Viktor had been privy to, he’d never heard Madison use her mother’s memory against her father before.

No triumph at the emotional bloodletting showed on Madison’s porcelain features.

Instead, she looked like she wanted nothing more than to get up and walk away. The fact she stayed in her seat was proof the heiress might be criminally flagrant in her personal life, but she wasn’t stupid.

She knew her father well enough to be aware that Jeremy’s arsenal of threats wasn’t empty.

“You have five minutes.” Madison’s words verified she did indeed realize her father had more encouragement to lay on the table, but also that she had little patience in waiting to find out what it was.

Color washed over Jeremy’s face. “Excuse me?”

“She wants the other two prongs to the pitchfork,” Viktor informed his boss.

Jeremy’s scowl said he knew that’s what she’d meant, but he didn’t like the time limit or implied ultimatum that Madison would get up and leave if it wasn’t met.

“Pitchfork?” Black asked.

Viktor could have answered, but he didn’t. Giving Maxwell Black any kind of information wasn’t on his agenda for the day. Viktor had ignored the presence of the other candidates at the table as superfluous, and planned to continue to do so.

Madison wasn’t so reticent. “Jeremy never enters a fight he isn’t sure he can win. To that end, he stacks the deck. He’ll have three scenarios in the offing, none of which will I want to eventuate.”

“You call your father by his first name?” Black asked.

Madison flicked a meaning-laden glance in the tycoon’s direction. “As he pointed out, I’m the not the one in the family to wallow in sentimental fantasy.”

What she didn’t say was that until that morning, Madison had called Jeremy Archer Father and sometimes even Dad. That she would no longer do so could be taken from her words as a given.

No question that the company president had seriously messed up in his approach to his daughter.

Viktor might have suggested the current course to protect AIH’s interests and future, but he would not have blindsided Madison with it during a meeting with strangers.

He’d been angry when he realized Jeremy hadn’t even bothered to brief his daughter about the meeting’s agenda before her arrival. She might be flighty and prone to inauspicious, risky behavior, but she deserved more respect than that.

Viktor had no doubts that Jeremy would ultimately get what he wanted, not least of which because Viktor would make it happen.

However he had a nascent suspicion that the personal cost for that success might be higher for Jeremy than the president of Archer International Holdings anticipated.

Madison flicked a glance at the Cartier watch on her wrist. “Your time starts now, Jeremy.”

“Golden Chances Charter School.”

“What about it?” Madison asked with caution, the barest crack in her calm facade finally showing.

“Over the last three years, you have donated tens of thousands of dollars from your Madison Trust income to school improvements and projects.”

“I am aware.”

But Viktor hadn’t been. He began to wonder what else he didn’t know about Madison.

Jeremy’s eyes, the only feature truly like his daughter’s, reflected subtle triumph. “The school’s zoning is under scrutiny.”

“It wasn’t as of yesterday.”

“Things change.”

“I see.” Madison glanced pointedly down at her watch.

“Are you pretending that does not matter to you?”

“No. You have two more minutes.”

Viktor was impressed. Madison would have done a better job negotiating a recent deal with a Japanese conglomerate than the project manager they’d sent to Asia.

Jeremy frowned. “Ramona Grayson.”

“What about her?”

Viktor would be crossing his legs protectively if that tone and look had been directed at him.

“Her father is a drunk,” Jeremy pointed out with well-known derision toward a man Madison had made no bones about considering a second father.

“And mine is a conscienceless bastard. I guess we both lost in the masculine parent lottery, though given a choice I’d pick Harry Grayson. His emotions might be pickled with alcohol, but at least he has them.”

Viktor had seen Madison angry. He’d seen her hurt, embarrassed and even seriously disappointed. He had never seen her this coldly furious.

The Madison that Viktor had known for ten years was in no way reflected in the harshly dismissive woman in front of them.

Despite the implication of her words, she loved her father. In the past, she hadn’t been able to hide her need for his attention and approval. Her mistake had always been how she went about getting it.

She’d followed in her mother’s footsteps, not realizing Jeremy Archer had been too traumatized by the loss of his wife to want to see her audacious nature reflected in their only child.

“Do you think Ramona sees it that way?” Jeremy asked. “Or perhaps she would prefer a father not lost in a bottle.”

Madison shrugged. “It’s not something we discuss.”

“Nevertheless, the destruction of her father’s business, followed by him losing everything to bankruptcy, would hurt her a great deal. Don’t you think?”

Madison pulled her phone from her purse with an almost negligent move belied by the blue fire in her gaze. “You have exactly fifteen seconds to take that tactic for coercion off the table.”

“Or what?”

“Ten.”

And for the first time in Viktor’s memory, infallible businessman Jeremy Archer made a mistake in negotiating. He silently called his daughter’s bluff.

He believed that because she had no interest in business, Madison was not capable of the same level of ruthlessness as he was.

Viktor knew from personal experience that just because a parent and child lived very different lives, it did not mean that they shared no common personality traits.

Madison pressed her phone to her ear.

“Don’t,” Viktor said.

Madison just shook her head. “I’m sorry, Viktor.”

There would be only one reason for her to apologize to him. Whatever she had planned would have a detrimental effect on AIH and, by default, Viktor’s job and livelihood.

The possible implications were still firming in his brain as she made contact with the lawyer in charge of the Madison Trust. “Hello, Mr. Bellingham. I need you to draw some papers up for me. I’m texting you the instructions now.”

Seconds later the lawyer’s agitated tones came through her phone.

Madison listened for a moment in silence and then replied. “Yes, he knows. He’s sitting right here. In fact, he’s the one who put this in motion.”

The fact the unflappable Bellingham was still speaking loudly enough for Viktor to almost make out his words said something about the nature of Madison’s instructions.

“I am absolutely certain, and Mr. Bellingham? If your firm wishes to keep the Madison Trust as a client in sixty-five days when it falls under my control, I suggest you have those papers ready for me to sign when I stop by your office later this afternoon.”

Another spate of conversation, this time quieter.

“Thank you, Mr. Bellingham.”

Madison tucked her phone back into her purse and faced her father, her expression daring him to ask what she’d done.

Jeremy remained stubbornly silent, or maybe he was in too much shock to react. He had to realize the likely content of those papers, or maybe he didn’t.

Maybe Jeremy Archer was under the mistaken impression that Archer International Holdings was important enough to his daughter that she would not do what Viktor was almost positive she had done.

“What do the papers say?” Viktor asked, unwilling to make decisions based on assumptions.

“As you know, because of the financial deal Grandfather Madison made with Jeremy upon his marriage to my mother, the Madison Trust holds twenty-five percent of the privately held shares in Archer International Holdings.”

“Those shares are your heritage,” Jeremy said.

“Romi is my friend.”

“So you gave her some of your shares?” Viktor asked with no real hope it could be that simple.

“If Mr. Grayson’s company is under threat from AIH or any company remotely affiliated with it, at one minute past midnight on my twenty-fifth birthday, all of those shares will be signed over to Harry Grayson personally. Not his company.”

“You cannot do that!”

“I can.” Madison looked more like her father in that moment than at any other time Viktor had known her.

“And if his company is not under threat?” Viktor asked, suspecting that Jeremy’s calling his daughter’s threat had precipitated some kind of permanent action on her part.

“Half of my shares will be signed over to Romi.”

Jeremy stood up, his face flushing with color, his eyes narrowed in fury. “You will not sign those papers.”

“I will.” Conversely, Madison relaxed back into her chair. “You had your chance to take my friend’s happiness off the table as a negotiating point, but you refused to take it.”

“That’s insane,” Steven Whitley said, speaking up for the first time since his introduction to Madison. “Even half of your shares are valued at tens of millions.”

“Romi won’t have to worry about her drunk of a father ruining her life, will she?” Madison asked her father, as if he’d been the one to bring up the point of the shares’ value.

Jeremy slammed his hand on the table. “I am not ruining your life, Madison, you’ve done a fair job of that yourself.”

“No, I haven’t, but I don’t expect you to believe me.”

“You are not giving away twelve and a half percent of my company!”

Viktor didn’t know if Jeremy realized he’d just effectively taken the third prong of his threats off the table. No way was he going to allow Harry Grayson Sr. to own twenty-five percent of AIH.

Jeremy and Madison were too much alike. Both would go to extreme measures for what was most important to them. The problem was that while Madison was very important to Jeremy, she did not believe it and Jeremy was willfully blind to what Madison needed from him.

Beyond that Archer International Holdings came first with Jeremy, and the people she cared about came first with Madison. Right now, those two priorities were in direct conflict.

Things were going to go completely pear-shaped if Viktor didn’t take control.

“Sit down, Jeremy,” Viktor instructed the older man in a tone that was respectful, but firm.

With a glare for his daughter, Jeremy returned to his seat.

“This meeting has derailed and I believe it is time to regroup.”

Jeremy nodded.

Viktor stood and straightened his suit jacket before walking around the table and offering his hand to Madison. “Come with me.”

“What are you doing, Viktor?” Jeremy asked, his expression considering.

The man knew that AIH sat near the top of Viktor’s priority list, too. The company was the conduit for his own plans and no chance was he starting over because of the father-daughter issues of its owner.

“Madison and I have some things to discuss.”

Steven frowned at him. “You are not the only candidate, you know. This contract was offered to four of us.”

“I am the only one who matters.”

An infinitesimal quirk of his boss’s mouth said he knew that was true, but he said, “I believe that is up to Madison.”

The lady in question made a sound of disparagement. “Right. If the decision is mine to make, I assume it’s to be from the men you included in this meeting. One of whom was already engaged, another is old enough to be my father with a history of failed marriages and the other a complete stranger. And then there is Viktor.”

“Maxwell Black is a man worth knowing.”

While it might be true, Viktor didn’t appreciate Jeremy pointing it out. Two half-Russian boys, raised to appreciate a culture not fully American, Maxwell and Viktor had grown up together, their families close, their goals similar.

Friends of a sort, but too alike for comfort, both men were determined to make their mark on the world, to be at the top of the food chain.

Because of the different paths they took to dominant positions in the business world, Viktor’s and Maxwell’s interests had not conflicted before today.

Thankfully, Madison didn’t look impressed by her father’s words.

She shifted so she could make eye contact with the CEO of BIT. “Mr. Black, do not be fooled by Jeremy’s mistaken ignorance. Those articles are lies made up by a man I believed was my friend. Perry and I never had any sort of sexual relationship, much less a BDSM one.”

The pain underlying her measured tones prompted Viktor to make some plans in regard Perry Timwater.

“I believe you.” Maxwell’s assurance proved he was every bit as intelligent as Viktor had always known him to be.

Madison relaxed infinitesimally. “Good.”

“Regardless of the reason for our meeting, I would like to get to know you, Miss Archer.” Maxwell, damn his hide, smiled charmingly at Madison. “You seem like an interesting person.”

She inclined her head. “Thank you, but—”

“Don’t dismiss the possibility of our compatibility out of hand,” Maxwell interrupted her with another of his lady-killer smiles. “I bet I could teach you to like some of the things you’ve been accused of needing.”

Madison’s gasp said she was shocked by Maxwell’s words.

Whether the words themselves or where he chose to speak them, Viktor didn’t know and it didn’t matter. He wasn’t surprised. Maxwell played to his strengths and exploited the weakness of others.

Turning the lurid headlines into something forbidden but potentially exciting was a solid tactic for handling the current situation and the humiliation Madison had to be experiencing. Though she’d done nothing to let it show.

Unfortunately for Maxwell, Viktor wasn’t going to let the ploy succeed.

Nothing was standing between Viktor and control of AIH. Not even Madison herself, but particularly not Maxwell Black.

Clearly upset with Maxwell’s words, Jeremy made a sound of protest.

Before the older man could say anything Viktor was in front of Black, blocking his line of sight with Madison. “That is not something you are going to discuss here, or with Madison at all.”

“You think not?” Black challenged back.

“I know not.”

“I don’t need your protection, Viktor,” Madison said quietly from behind him.

He turned to face her, but didn’t move so Black would have to stand and sidestep to see her. “Nevertheless, you have it.”

She shook her head, whether in denial, or frustration, he didn’t know.

“I’m nowhere near taking him up on his offer. I’m pretty sure even the mildest form of that kind of relationship requires trust and I don’t have any. Not for men, particularly men with the same priorities as Jeremy Archer. Businessmen.”

She made the word sound like a slur.

Viktor didn’t believe her regardless. Madison trusted him. She always had; even if she no longer realized it.

And while Maxwell’s words hadn’t surprised him, Madison’s willingness to meet them head-on did. But then maybe it shouldn’t have. She’d already shown her willingness to stand against her father.

Maxwell got up, his pose too damned relaxed for Viktor’s liking. Even less did he like the way the other man moved around him to face Madison. “I see.”

“Good.”

“Nothing in the contract states we must share a bedroom.”

Madison’s eyes flared with...was it interest?

Viktor cursed under his breath. “In order to receive the shares stipulated, Madison and her husband must provide an heir for Archer International Holdings.”

Madison gasped, anger shimmering around her like electric currents.

Before she could say anything, Maxwell shrugged. “There is always artificial insemination.”

“While we live two entirely separate lives?” Madison asked in a tone Viktor recognized, but from the reaction of both Maxwell and her father, they did not.

Jeremy puffed up with renewed anger while the other Russian-American nodded with smug complacency. “Exactly.”

“We would be married in name only?” she asked, the disgust levels rising enough that the others should have recognized them.

They didn’t.

“No.” Viktor was done with the verbal games.

Madison gave him a look like she was questioning his right to make the pronouncement.

“That sort of relationship would be too uncertain for the health of Archer International Holdings,” Viktor pointed out.

Disappointment dulled the blue of Madison’s azure gaze, but she masked the emotion almost immediately. Viktor cursed silently.

Her father, however, nodded vigorously. “Precisely.”

“I think your daughter has already proven she is more than capable of her own decisions.” Maxwell’s admiration was annoyingly apparent.

“I won’t sign the contract,” Jeremy said in implacable tones.

The BIT CEO didn’t look worried.

Madison’s features had gone smooth with a lack of emotion once again as she stared at her father. “You believe I would agree to that kind of marriage?”

For once Jeremy seemed incapable of speech, perhaps realizing finally how little interest Madison would ever have in such a cold-blooded bargain.

“But then you believed the lies Perry spewed, didn’t you?”

“I never said that.” Jeremy’s voice had an alien quality.

Realization of his colossal error in judgment in the handling of his daughter must be settling in, but being who he was, Viktor’s boss wasn’t going to back down, either.

Madison pulled her copy of the contract from the stack of papers in front of her and stood. “I assume you aren’t going to do anything to mitigate Perry’s lies.”

“I have done it. Do you think this agreement is only about AIH? This is as important for you as it is the reputation of my company.” Jeremy clearly believed what he said, but then Viktor had made sure his company’s president saw things exactly that way. “Once you are married to a powerful man with an impeccable reputation, you can begin to live down your youthful excesses.”

“My life has nothing to do with your company.”

Viktor wasn’t about to let the conversation degenerate further and there was only one direction it was headed if the two kept talking. Down.

“Conrad will put out a press release categorically denying all of Timwater’s allegations,” Viktor inserted before another word could be said.

The media fixer looked up from his tablet. “I will?”

Severely unimpressed with the man’s lack of dedication to the protection of the company president’s daughter, Viktor let Conrad see his displeasure. “You will do a hell of a lot more than that. If you’d been doing your job properly to begin with, this situation would not have happened.”

“Protecting Miss Archer from her own excessive behaviors has never been in my job’s purview,” Conrad claimed in snide tones.

“Did you notice the loss of confidence in AIH articles in the online press this morning?” Viktor asked. “The first of which went live within thirty minutes of that tabloid hitting newsstands. Or did you think that was just a coincidence?”

The media fixer swallowed audibly and shook his head.

Jeremy didn’t look too happy, either. He’d been too focused on using the current situation to bring his daughter into line, and had ignored the bigger picture. Something that was anathema to him.

“Your job is to protect the image of this company and anyone affiliated closely enough with it to impact our reputation in the financial community,” Viktor reminded Conrad in a hard voice.

“Yes, sir.”

“Maybe it’s too much for you. Perhaps you’d prefer to move to a PR position working for a nursing home?” Viktor allowed the implication that was the only type of job Conrad would be able to get to hang in the air between them.

The usually unflappable media fixer paled, showing the man still had some of the intelligence he had originally been hired for. “I’m on it.”

“You should have been on it at four-fifteen this morning after the scandal sheet went on sale.”

Conrad didn’t argue. He’d screwed up.

“I don’t know what you spent this meeting doing on your tablet, but whatever it was, it wasn’t as important as getting ahead of Madison’s situation.”

“I was writing the engagement announcement.”

“I see. Not nursing homes then. Maybe you should be writing puff pieces for online dating sites,” Viktor opined.

Nervous laughter filled the room and Jeremy made a sarcastic sound of approval, but it was Madison’s genuine amusement that Viktor enjoyed the most.

“I’ll need your signature on a civil suit against Perry Timwater,” Conrad told Madison.

“No.”

Viktor wasn’t surprised by Madison’s answer and forestalled any arguments from the media fixer or Jeremy. “The man was her friend. She’s not going to sue him.”

“Some friend.” Conrad snorted.

The tiny wounded sound that Madison made infuriated Viktor. “We have other avenues of influence to bring to bear. I want a retraction from Perry in time for this evening’s news. Play it off as a joke perpetrated by one friend on another.”

Viktor turned to Madison. “For real damage control, you are going to have to do an in-person interview for one of the big celebrity news shows and meet with a journalist with a wider readership than the original article.”

“Whatever I can do,” she said with more conviction and none of the disagreement he expected.

Viktor’s brow wrinkled in thought. Something about this scandal concerned Madison enough that she’d come to her father to ask for help.

While Jeremy might not see Madison showing up for this meeting as that, Viktor was certain of the truth.

Unlike her other escapades, Madison wanted this one cleaned up and her father’s refusal to take it seriously had bothered her. A lot.

Viktor needed to figure out why it meant so much to her.

He put his hand out to her again. “Come with me, we’ll talk your father’s plan through and make some decisions from there.”

She looked ready to argue.

He smiled at her. “Is that really too much to ask? I’ve got Conrad working on fixing this for you.”

“Are you going to tell him to stop if I refuse?”

“No.” Madison needed an act of good will.

It was important she realized that she could trust Viktor to watch out for her. He had to be the only candidate for her fiancé that she seriously considered.

Because her husband was going to take over AIH eventually and Viktor had every intention of that man being him.

Madison tucked her purse under her arm. “Okay.”

“Just a minute,” Jeremy said.

Viktor turned to face him. “I know what you want.”

“But—”

“Have I ever neglected your interests in a negotiation?”

“No.” Jeremy got that implacable look he was known for on his face. “Just remember that Madison’s cooperation isn’t the only thing on the line right now.”

Viktor wasn’t surprised by the threat, or even bothered by it.

He’d spent ten years working for this man and his ultimate goal was finally in reach. Viktor wasn’t about to let it pass him by.

CHAPTER THREE

MADDIE FOLLOWED VIK into Le Mason, not at all surprised when the maître d’ found them a table in a quiet corner in the perpetually busy restaurant, popular with tourists and locals alike.

“Did you eat breakfast?” he asked.

She shook her head, not even pretending to herself that shredding Romi’s offering of chocolate pastries counted as actually ingesting calories.

He ordered the restaurant’s specialty pancakes for her and coffee for himself.

“Did you bring me here to remind me of friendlier days?” she asked, sure she knew the answer.

“I brought you here because you used to crave their banana pancakes and I hoped to tempt you to eat.” His six-foot-four-inch frame should have looked awkward in the medium-sized dining chair, but he didn’t.

With his dark hair brushed back in a businessman’s cut, his square jaw shaved smooth of dark stubble and a body most athletes would be jealous of covered in a tailored Italian suit, nothing about Viktor Beck could be described as awkward.

Doing her best to ignore his sheer masculine perfection, Maddie adjusted her napkin over her lap. “How did you know I hadn’t already?”

“I guessed.”

“I used to stop eating when I was stressed.” She was surprised he remembered.

“Are you saying that’s changed?”

“No.” Too much was the same, but she wasn’t about to tell him that.

She had to remember that Vik’s interests here were aligned squarely with her father’s. Not Maddie’s. He’d made that clear six years ago and nothing had changed since.

Yes, Vik had gotten Conrad focused on curtailing the media frenzy around Perry’s supposed breakup interview, but he’d done it for the sake of the company. Again...not Maddie.

Whatever his agenda now, it had the welfare of AIH as the end goal, she was sure of it. And if she got swept along with the tide, so be it.

“Give me the bullet points of the contract.” She was morbidly curious about what her father had done to entice a man like Viktor Beck, or Maxwell Black for that matter, to marry her.

Vik’s dark brows rose. “You trust me to tell you everything important?”

Answering honestly wouldn’t just make a lie of her earlier words, but it would make her a fool. “I’ll read it later to make sure.”

“Your father accepts that you will not be his successor.”

“What was his first clue?” She’d refused to get a degree in business and had fended off every request, demand and even plea for her to take a job at the company.

“Do you really need me to enumerate them for you?”

“No.”

“Suffice it to say, Jeremy has finally accepted you are never going to be CEO of Archer International Holdings.” Vik’s deep tones were tinged with more satisfaction than disappointment at that pronouncement.

“It would certainly set a roadblock in your own career path if I were.”

His espresso eyes flared with quickly suppressed surprise.

She smiled, pleased that he hadn’t realized she knew. “You don’t seriously think your desire for that office is a secret?”

“It’s a family-owned company.”

“That you plan to run one day and if Jeremy doesn’t realize it, he’s being willfully blind.”

“That is one of his failings.”

“You think?”

“He does not see you for who you are or what you need from him.”

“You tried to tell him, once.” The year before her clumsy attempt at seduction.

She’d thought Vik standing up for her meant he cared. But looking back, she had to conclude the friendship he’d offered her had been in pursuit of his own goals. Gaining Jeremy Archer’s unmitigated trust.

She could have told Vik befriending her wouldn’t do anything for him. Her father would have had to care about her for that to be the case. And he didn’t.

The only thing that mattered to Jeremy Archer was the company. He’d married her mother to gain the necessary infusion of capital to make AIH a dominant player in the world market. His only interest in Maddie had been as a potential successor.

“He’s given up on me personally because he realizes I’m never going to be his business heir.” As much as it hurt, it also made sense of how unconcerned he’d seemed to be by “Perrygate.”

“The only thing Jeremy has given up is his plan to try to lure you into the business.”

Maddie shook her head, not buying it for a second. “You heard him. He had no intention of having Conrad help me until you stepped in.”

“Your father can get tunnel vision.”

“And all he could see was the endgame.” He hadn’t even noticed that her scandal had adversely impacted AIH’s reputation.

“Yes.”

Maddie waited for the waitress to place her pancakes on the table and walk away. “Which is?”

“You married to a man who can and will be groomed to take over as Jeremy’s successor.”

“If my father can’t get what he wants out of me, he’ll use me to get it, is that right?”

“That’s a very simplified view and not entirely accurate.”

She wasn’t going to argue something she knew to be true, as did Vik, even if he was too loyal to admit it.

“Jeremy wants his successor to be family.” Hence the marriage. “How old-fashioned.”

“It ensures his grandchildren will inherit his legacy intact.”

“And that’s important.”

“To him.”

The smell of pancakes, fresh bananas and syrup had her mouth watering. “What about you?”

“You need to ask?”

“AIH is your life.” As much as it had always been her father’s.

“Say rather AIH is the vehicle for my own dreams.”

“I didn’t know men like you dreamed.”

“Without visionaries at the helm, companies like AIH would atrophy and eventually die.”

“So, you think my father is just a very dedicated dreamer.” Sarcasm hanging thick from her words, she took a bite of her pancakes and hummed with pleasure.

Vik laughed. “That is one way to put it.”

“And your personal dreams include being president of AIH one day.”

“Yes.”

His easy honesty surprised her and charmed her in a way. She’d always thought of men like him as having goals. Solid, steady, unemotional stepping stones that marked their success.

“Wow. I guess the heart of a Russian really does beat under that American-businessman veneer.”

“My grandparents like to think so.”

She offered him a bite of pancake with a slice of banana. “And your parents?”

Vik took the bite just like he used to and memories of a time when they’d been friends, and all her dreams had centered on this man, assailed Maddie.

“My mother has been out of the picture for all of my memory. My dad is like a computer virus. He keeps coming back.”

She smiled. “I should say I’m sorry, but having a father who drives you nuts makes you more human.”

Vik shrugged, but she couldn’t help wondering if he’d told her about his dad on purpose. To build rapport. She thought Vik had outclassed her dad a long time ago in the manipulation department.

After all, Jeremy Archer still thought he ran AIH. However anyone with a brain—not blinkered by willful blindness—and access to the company would realize it was actually Vik’s show and had been for a few years.

“Whose idea was it to offer Steven Whitley and Brian Jones up on the chopping block?”

“It’s hardly a sacrifice to be offered this kind of opportunity.” Vik drank his coffee, his expression sincere if she could believe it.

But then what was to say she couldn’t?

“Marriage to the prodigal daughter for an eventual company presidency?” That might well be worth it to a man like Vik.

“You don’t exactly fit the distinction of prodigal.”

“Don’t I?”

“You haven’t blown through your inheritance. In fact, you are surprisingly fiscally responsible.”

“Thank you, I think.”

“You haven’t abandoned your family to see the world.”

“I moved out of the family home.”

He winked at her. “But stayed in the city.”

“What can I say? I love San Francisco.”

“And your father.”

“I’d rather not talk about that.”

“Understood.” He smiled and her nerve endings went twang. “Your media notoriety isn’t even of the truly scandalous variety.”

“Until Perrygate.”

Vik waved his hand, dismissing the importance of Perry’s lies. “That will be handled.”

“Thank you for that.” The thought of being forced to give up her volunteerism because of an unsavory reputation hurt deeply, compounding her pain at Perry’s betrayal.

He knew how important working with the children was to her.

“But seriously?” she asked, refocusing. “Whitley and Jones?”

Vik shrugged, but his lips firmed in a telling line. “They’re the most likely men within the company to do the job.”

“Marrying me?”

“Becoming the next president.”

“Besides you.”

“Besides me,” he agreed.

“You’re the only real candidate.”

“I would like to think so.”

“And then there is Maxwell Black.”

Vik’s eyes narrowed, the brown depths darkening to almost black. “Your father is never going to approve the kind of marriage Black suggested.”

“And if that is the only kind of marriage I’m willing to agree to?” she taunted.

“Jeremy will hire a surrogate and have his own child in hopes of succeeding with him where he failed with you.”

Wholly unprepared for that answer, several seconds passed before Maddie felt like she could breathe again. “He’s not a young man any longer.”

“He is fifty-seven.”

“He would not be so cruel.” And she did not mean to her.

No child deserved to be born merely as a player on the chessboard. She should know.

She’d taken herself out of play, but she’d had the strength of the memory of her mother’s love to bolster her own courage.

This child would only have Jeremy Archer.

Maddie shivered at the prospect. “I’m not having a child simply for him or her to be put in the same position.”

“You want children.” There was no doubt in Vik’s voice.

“Someday.”

“Whenever you have them, or whoever you have your children with, Jeremy will want the company to ultimately pass on to them.”

“I know.” Her father’s role in her life and that of any children she might have was something she’d already spent several hours talking to her therapist, Dr. MacKenzie, about.

“That is not a bad thing.”

She’d come to realize that. While Maddie’s feelings about AIH were too antagonistic for her to ever want to be a part of it, as she’d always seen it as the entity that kept her father from her, it did not automatically follow that her children would feel the same way.

“You said something about me having a child being necessary for the man I marry to take over AIH.”

“Upon the birth of our first child, my succession to the presidency will be announced. Your father will shift into a less active role as chairman of the board on his sixtieth birthday.”

“And if I haven’t had a child by then?”

“My becoming company president will not happen until we have had our first child.”

“What if we can’t have children?”

“We can.”

“You sound very certain.”

“I am.”

She remembered the ultrasound her doctor had ordered as part of her last physical, at the company’s request. She’d thought it was odd, but since her medical insurance was through AIH, Maddie hadn’t demurred.

“Jeremy had them run fertility tests on me.”

“Just preliminaries, but enough to know that aside from something well outside the norm, you should have no trouble conceiving.”

“That’s so intrusive!”

Vik didn’t reply and, honestly, Maddie didn’t know what she wanted him to say. She wasn’t entirely sure the test had been all her dad’s idea. If Vik had suggested them, she wasn’t sure knowing would be of any benefit to her.

“What else?”

“The contract gives five percent of the company to me on our five-year anniversary. Another five percent on the birth of each child, not to exceed ten percent.”

“How generous, he’ll allow me to have two children.” She’d always dreamed of having, or adopting, at least four and creating a home filled with love and joy.

“The contract does not limit the number of children you have, only the stock incentive to me for fathering them.”

She ignored the way Vik continued to assume he was her only option. “What else?”

“On your father’s death, if we have been married for ten years, or more, I will get another five percent of the company. The remaining fifty percent of the company will be placed in trust for our children with voting proxy passing only to our children actively involved in the executive level of running the company. I will hold all outstanding family-voting proxies.”

“But the other children will receive the income from the shares.”

“Yes.”

“It sounds complicated.” But then her father wasn’t a simple man, not by any stretch.

Vik took a sip of his coffee. “Jeremy wants a legacy and you’ve made it clear you won’t be part of it.”

“So he wrote me out of the will.”

“Only insofar as his ownership of Archer International Holdings is concerned.”

“I see.” Honestly, she didn’t care.

The Madison Trust provided all the income she needed to live on. That income would decrease once half of her shares in the company transferred to Romi, but Maddie didn’t mind.

The biggest expense she had was keeping up her appearance as Madison Archer, socialite. As far as she was concerned, that part of her life could go hang. If her father wanted her to keep up appearances, he could pay for the designer wardrobe and charity event tickets.

“Is there anything else pertinent to me in the contract?”

“Your father would like us to live in Parean Hall.”

The Madison family mansion, named for the pristine white marble used for flooring in the oversized foyer and the risers on the grand staircase, had stood empty since the death of Maddie’s grandfather from a massive coronary upon hearing of his daughter’s accidental death nine years ago.

“I have plans for the house.” It was part of the trust and would come to her when she turned twenty-five.

“What plans?”

“That is none of your business.”

“Indulge me.”

Maddie didn’t answer, but concentrated on finishing her pancakes. Vik didn’t press.

His patient silence finally convinced her to tell him.

She said, “I want to start a charter school, this one with boarders from the foster-care system.”

“An orphanage.”

“No, a school for gifted children in difficult family circumstances.” A place the children could be safe and thrive.

Vik sipped at his coffee pensively for several moments.

“How will you fund it?”

“A large portion of my trust income will go to it annually, but I also plan to raise funds amidst the heavy coffers of this city. I’ve learned a lot about fund-raising since my first volunteer assignment on the mayoral campaign when I was a teenager.”

“Your father has no idea how full your life is.”

“No, he doesn’t.” And Vik had barely an inkling as well.

She’d stopped telling him about her plans and activities when he’d rejected her so summarily six years ago.

Vik relaxed back in his chair. “The Madison family estate is a large house, even by the elite of San Francisco standards, but hardly the ideal location for a school. Either in building architecture or location.”

“Oh, you don’t think poor children should live among the wealthy?” she challenged.

He didn’t appear offended at her accusation. “I think it will cost more than it’s worth to get zoning approval.”

“That section was zoned for the inclusion of a local school, but none was ever built.”

“And you think that zoning will remain once your neighbors learn of your plans?” he asked in a tone that said he didn’t.

“I don’t intend to advertise them.”

One corner of his lips tilted just the tiniest bit. “A fait accompli?”

“Yes.”

“You have to apply for permits, hire staff...it’s not going to stay a secret long.”

“And then the fight begins, you are saying?”

“Yes.”

“But why should the residents care if there’s a school in their neighborhood? The city planners clearly intended there to be one.”

“And the fact there isn’t should tell you something.”

“But—”

“I can find you a better building.”

She didn’t want to sell her grandparents’ home. Her memories there weren’t the greatest. Her Grandfather Madison had often made Jeremy Archer look warm and cuddly by comparison, but Maddie’s mother’s stories of her own childhood had been filled with delight.

Maddie always wished she’d had a chance to know her grandmother, Grace Madison.

“I’ll have to sell the mansion to finance another purchase.” No matter how much she might not want to do it.

The school was too important to give up and Vik was right, as he so often was—the opposition to a boarding school in that neighborhood for the underprivileged was bound to be stiff.

Vik shook his head decisively. “I’ll buy the other building.”

“In exchange for what?”

“Consider it my wedding gift to you.”

“Presumptuous.”

“I’m the only man I will allow you to consider.” Dark brown eyes fixed on her with unmistakable purpose.

She ignored the way his words sent shivers through her insides. “You’re assuming I’ll agree to marry.”

“Your father doesn’t realize it, but I know he didn’t need anything beyond his first threat to convince you to fall in with his plans.”

“You don’t think so?”

“Are you in another relationship?” Vik asked, the words clipped, something like anger smoldering in the depth of his gaze.

“No.” Maddie saw no reason to hedge.

“Dating anyone?” he pressed.

“No.” She frowned. “Why are you asking about this now?”

“Because if you were in a relationship with someone who mattered to you, no pressure your father brought to bear would sway you into marrying someone else.”

He was right, but it rankled. “You think you know me so well.”

“I know that your dad means more to you than you want him to believe.”

“It’s not a matter of what I want.” Her father didn’t think he mattered to Maddie because she wasn’t all that important to him. Not in a personal way.

“Jeremy isn’t going to back off on this.”

“Why now?”

“You need to ask?”

“Yes.” Her father had been too unconcerned about Perry’s scandal for it to be what tipped him into must-get-my-wayward-daughter-married mode.

“Jeremy has been worried about what will happen when you come into your majority for the Madison Trust for a while.”

“Now he knows.”

“I don’t believe he saw that one coming.”

“No. It wouldn’t have occurred to him that I would purposefully put Archer International Holdings at risk.”

“No.”

“But apparently the idea that I might marry someone who might do that had already occurred to Jeremy.”

“Yes.” Something about the quality of Vik’s stillness said he might have had more to do with that than her own father’s paranoia.

“So, he was already considering how to get me to marry the man of his choice?” Maddie surmised. “He’s using Perrygate as a vehicle for his own agenda.”

She wasn’t surprised by her father’s mercenary motives, but she didn’t have to like them.

“You would have to ask him.” Vik indicated to the waitress to bring their bill. “I think the reality is more that he is afraid you’ll end up with Mr. Timwater. Your father will do anything to prevent that.”

“To protect the reputation and future of the company.” Considering Perry’s poor luck with his own business ventures, she could understand her father not wanting him to get even shallow hooks into any part of AIH.

“Sometimes, I think you are as willfully blind as your father.” Vik shook his head. “He wants to stop you from marrying a man who would go public with the kind of claims Perry made in his interview.”

“And Jeremy believes you’re a huge improvement.”

“You don’t?” Vik asked, his tone more than a little sardonic.

She wasn’t about to answer that. “Perry has never been in the running.”

“Several articles in the media over the past six years would suggest otherwise.”

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