Ruthless billionaire Ash Evans finds the sexiest way to collect on a debt in the first installment in The Billionaire’s Club quartet!

Notoriously ruthless property developer Ash Evans never forgives a debt. And I have two days to convince the former street fighter not to pull his investment in my father’s company. Taking a job as his chauffeur in Paris is the only way to get close enough to ask the bad-tempered billionaire for a favor.

With his sexy tattoo, scars and magnificently cut body, he’s as powerful, sleek and difficult to manage as the sports cars my family designs. And after meeting his electric-blue eyes in the rearview mirror all night, I’m more than happy to rev his engine and take the boss for a ride!

But now Ash thinks I’m just using him to get what I want. And he’ll give me what I need, but there is a price—posing as his girlfriend to help him exact vengeance on his half brother. Pretending to love Ash is the easiest job I’ve ever had...and soon my heart is racing into danger. Will a man so full of anger ever be capable of loving me back?

Harlequin DARE publishes sexy romances featuring powerful alpha heroes and bold, fearless heroines exploring their deepest fantasies.

Four new Harlequin DARE titles are available each month, wherever ebooks are sold!

JACKIE ASHENDEN dark, emotional stories with alpha heroes who’ve just got the world to their liking only to have it blown wide apart by their kick-ass heroines. She lives in Auckland, New Zealand, with her husband, the inimitable Dr Jax, two kids and two rats. When she’s not torturing alpha males and their gutsy heroines she can be found drinking chocolate martinis, reading anything she can lay her hands on, wasting time on social media or being forced to go mountain biking with her husband. To keep up to date with Jackie’s new releases and other news sign up to her newsletter at jackieashenden.com.

The Debt is the first instalment of The Billionaires Club series, which continues with

The Risk by Caitlin Crews

The Proposition by JC Harroway

The Deal by Clare Connelly

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globe’s sexiest billionaires!

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The Debt

Jackie Ashenden

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-08709-4

THE DEBT

© 2019 Jackie Ashenden

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

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Version: 2020-03-02

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To Fra.

I wrote this book sitting in your bedroom.

Just thought you should know.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

EPILOGUE

About the Publisher

CHAPTER ONE
Ellie

I WIPED MY palms surreptitiously down my black trousers and adjusted my black suit jacket, briefly touching my head to make sure the chauffeur’s cap was in place. Mentally, I went over the address the chauffeur company had given me: The Gustave Eiffel Suite of the Shangri-La, Paris.

Yep. I was in the right place.

I took a deep breath.

Okay, here went nothing.

It had taken me a month of careful planning to get to this point—including relocating from Australia to England—but now I was here I wasn’t going to let the opportunity slip through my fingers.

I had two days to convince one of the UK’s most difficult billionaires to give my father more time before withdrawing the venture capital his firm had invested in our family’s company. It was capital we desperately needed in order to stay solvent. And it was not going to be easy.

Ash Evans, billionaire property developer, investor and slave driver, was as famous for his ruthlessness as he was for his temper, not to mention his unapologetic pride in the fact that he came from a poor background.

He was also notorious for never forgiving a debt.

Still, I liked a challenge and, apart from anything else, this was for Dad’s sake and for Australis, our super car company, and that was more important than any qualms I had about confronting some self-important rich guy.

Not that I had qualms. I was a Little, and Littles were tough. We could get through anything. The key was to put your head down, not make a fuss, and keep going.

Keeping my fuss-making to a minimum, I gave my jacket another tweak then raised my hand and knocked sharply on the suite door.

There was no response.

There was also no one around, which was unusual.

I’d been driving for the rich and famous for a couple of years now—a second job to supplement my position as a designer at Australis because I liked driving—and I knew they tended to be always surrounded by people. Assistants, bodyguards and all kinds of hangers-on.

Apparently not Mr Evans.

But then, given what I knew about him from the research I’d done, that wasn’t completely unexpected.

He was a self-made man who’d grown up in one of London’s most notorious council estates and who’d risen to the top through a combination of ruthlessness, hard-headed business sense and a fight-to-the-death attitude that people whispered had come from his days as a street fighter.

A scary dude by all accounts.

Took a lot to scare me, though—I had four brothers after all—and I was prepared to do what I had to do in order to keep the company solvent. Dad was counting on me since he didn’t want my brothers to know the true state of the company finances, and I was very conscious of the fact that I didn’t want to let him down.

Mine was a ropey plan, but it was the best I could come up with: sign myself on with the chauffeur company that Mr Evans used and hope that I would be assigned to him. It had taken a month for that to happen, but a combination of luck and the fact that he was enough of a prick that no one wanted to drive for him had worked in my favour and I’d been given the assignment of driving him in Paris for two days.

It was a sneaky move, but I’d run out of options, not to mention patience. I’d tried all the usual ways to get a meeting with him to talk about the investment face-to-face, but apparently that was impossible and all I’d managed to score were a couple of interviews with some minor flunkey who hadn’t given a shit about either me or my dad.

Driving for him was the only way I could think of to meet with him in person, to convince him somehow to give us more time before withdrawing his money, because, with the current state of Australis’s finances, we would go under the moment he withdrew.

Yeah, and you know whose fault that is.

I ignored that thought and glared at the shut door instead, raising my hand to knock again.

It was suddenly jerked open.

A man stood on the threshold, the height and breadth of him filling the entire doorway.

I blinked, getting a confused impression of an expanse of bare skin and hard-cut muscle. Then a pair of fierce blue eyes met mine and all the air in my lungs mysteriously vanished.

He stared at me suspiciously for a second and it occurred to me that every single aspect of me had just been observed, catalogued and filed away for future reference.

Then, just as suddenly as he’d opened the door, the man turned and strolled back into the suite, talking to someone on his phone as he went, his voice a deep, gritty rumble. He appeared to be wearing only a pair of worn blue jeans that sat low on his lean hips, leaving his massively muscled shoulders and back bare. A Chinese dragon had been inked into the smooth olive skin, the colours all brilliant blues, reds and greens.

I blinked again, staring, oddly shaken though I had no idea why. Because it wasn’t as if I hadn’t seen a shirtless man before. I’d also seen a fair number of tattoos in my time—my brothers all had them, plus I was involved in the car industry where it was practically de rigueur. Still, I hadn’t seen anything quite as beautiful as that one.

I swallowed, for a second unsure whether to follow him or wait. But since I wasn’t the waiting type I stepped into the suite, shutting the door behind me as I followed him into the lounge area.

He stood with his back to me, still talking on his phone and so I took a moment to study him.

Okay, so this was the scary Ash Evans.

I’d seen pictures of him—who hadn’t? He was built like a heavyweight boxer with the height of a basketball player, his face scarred all to hell from an encounter with the wrong end of a knife back when he’d been a teenager. He was an absolute beast of a man—at least according to one gushing female journalist who’d been granted the rare privilege of an interview and had obviously been bowled over by him.

I’d scoffed at all the over-the-top language in the article—honestly, the way some women got when it came to men, I couldn’t understand it. But being in his presence now, I could see what she was talking about.

Even though he had his back to me, he stood in the middle of the lavishly appointed room as if he owned it. No, more as if he owned all of Paris. A fierce kind of energy radiated from him, kinetic and masculine and utterly compelling.

I knew what it was. Two of my brothers were race car drivers and they both had it in spades: pure male confidence.

Luckily, I’d had plenty of practice in dealing with it and my solution was simply to be as confident and in-your-face as they were.

I waited patiently for Mr Evans to wrap up his conversation, staring at his beautiful Chinese tattoo until finally he’d finished and turned to face me.

Intense blue eyes met mine and my breath caught for the second time that day.

The pictures of him were one thing, but the reality was a whole different ball game. His features were blunt, but roughly handsome and somehow made even more compelling by the famous scars that bisected them. One scar narrowly missed his right eye, while another caught one end of his mouth and twisted it, making it look as if he was sneering. A third highlighted his hard, square-cut jaw. But it was those eyes that really dominated his rough-hewn face. They were so blue, electric almost, reminding me weirdly of lightning in a thunderstorm.

Hot.

The thought came out of nowhere, hitting me like a gut punch. Because he was, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d even noticed a guy in that way.

Since the Mark incident I’d put my love life on hold because I simply couldn’t be bothered dealing with all the drama involved, and, so far, I hadn’t met anyone who’d made me want to change my stance.

Not that Ash Evans was even in my league.

I didn’t actually have a league.

Conscious that I’d been standing there, staring at him like an idiot, I shoved my momentary fluster away and I stuck out my hand. ‘G’day, Mr Evans,’ I said, going full Aussie. ‘I’m Ellie Little. I’m—’

‘What do you want?’ His voice was as rough and gritty as sandpaper, and his stare skewered me like a pin through a butterfly. ‘I told the hotel I wasn’t to be disturbed.’

Obviously I was getting a taste of Mr Evans’s famous rudeness. So far, so billionaire. And to be honest, nothing I hadn’t come across before either driving or in the Australis workshop.

‘I’m not from the hotel,’ I said cheerfully. ‘I’m your chauffeur.’

‘Chauffeur?’ He ignored the hand I was still holding out. ‘I usually have Bill.’

‘He wasn’t able to make it to Paris. One of your assistants okayed a replacement.’ I lowered my hand since it didn’t look as if he were going to shake it. ‘Don’t worry, sir. I’ve been given a full rundown of your—’

‘Don’t call me sir. I’m Mr Evans to you.’ He shoved his phone into the back pocket of his jeans. ‘And my assistant never mentioned this.’

With some dudes if you gave them an inch, they took a mile, and clearly Evans was in this camp. I’d found the best way to deal with it was to be as laid-back as possible, all the while making it clear that you were not there to be walked over.

‘I’m sorry you weren’t contacted, Mr Evans,’ I said easily, giving him a wide smile. ‘But that’s not really my problem. I’m just here to do my job.’ And to fix Dad’s little investment issue. But I couldn’t ask him about that now; I needed to build up a little rapport with him first.

There was a silence.

Clearly he did not like my answer, because his gaze became arctic, the electricity in his eyes taking on a bright, cold glint. A sense of threat gathered around him and I could suddenly see why people might be scared of him because that, combined with his height and scarred face, made him pretty damn intimidating.

I wasn’t intimidated, though. I’d dealt with plenty of difficult men in my time and not making things into a drama was the way to handle it.

So I simply stared back and kept my smile easy-going. Letting him know that I wasn’t a threat so he didn’t need to bristle at me the way he was doing now.

His eyes narrowed and I had the oddest feeling that his focus had shifted, zeroing in on me like a laser sight on a high-powered rifle.

It was unnerving since I didn’t much like being stared at, but I didn’t let my unease show. Keep it fuss-free, that was the Little way.

‘Do you speak to all your employers like that?’ he demanded.

‘Yes,’ I said, with absolute truth. ‘And they’ve all appreciated my laid-back attitude.’ I grinned wider. ‘That’s a direct quote by the way.’

A deep blue spark glinted in his eyes for a second and for some reason I felt an unfamiliar heat rise into my cheeks.

Weird. Why was I blushing? I kept my smile pasted firmly on and hoped the blush would go away.

‘Fair enough.’ He gave me a brief up and down glance then reached out to pick up the black T-shirt that had been draped over the back of a luxurious white couch. ‘Though if you speak to me like that again, you won’t last the night.’

I wasn’t listening. I was too busy being oddly mesmerised by the flex and release of the chiseled muscles of his chest and abs.

Which wasn’t like me at all. It was only that he was just so very...powerful. Like one of the Pythons, Dad’s latest model supercar. Super charged and sleek, with a big V8 engine. The most perfect design. Dangerous in the wrong hands, yet an adrenaline junkie’s dream in the right ones...

‘Do you understand?’

I nearly jumped as the edge in his voice caught me, making me realise I’d been standing there gawping at him with my mouth open.

Dude. Zoning out staring at his body? What is wrong with you?

Purely from a design perspective he was an impressive specimen. Built for strength and power, with not an ounce of fat on him. He could probably deliver the maximum amount of force with maximum efficiency too—

You’re not in the workshop now, idiot, and he’s not a bloody car.

Oh, hell. Of course he wasn’t. And now he’d caught me staring.

I struggled to find my normal chill, trying to think of a jokey way to defuse the situation.

‘Uh, yes,’ was all I could come up with.

His gaze narrowed further. ‘You’d better,’ he said, his upper-class British accent completely at odds with the roughness of his voice, his scarred face and worn jeans. ‘I’m not accustomed to repeating myself.’

Concentrate, fool! It’s like you’ve never seen a man before.

Well, to be fair, I hadn’t seen a man like him before.

‘Sorry, Mr Evans.’ I grinned like an idiot, pretending I wasn’t still blushing furiously. ‘I was thinking about something else.’

He stared at me with the same intense focus as when he’d opened the suite door earlier. ‘What did you say your name was?’

‘Ellie. Ellie Little.’

Would my surname mean anything to him? Probably not. Evans Investment, his venture capital firm, invested money in a lot of different projects so there was no reason he’d know about our company in particular.

Sure enough, there was no recognition in his eyes as he unexpectedly put out his hand. ‘Good to meet you, Miss Little.’

Now, he wanted to shake? A small, rebellious part of me was very tempted to refuse, which would have been stupid given the massive favour I had to ask of him at some point.

So I ignored the urge, reaching out to take his hand politely instead. Yet as his big palm and long fingers wrapped around mine, the weirdest thing happened.

A jolt of electricity shot straight up my arm, making me jerk my hand out of his before I could stop myself.

Good one, fool.

‘Sorry,’ I muttered. ‘Damn static.’

An odd expression I couldn’t quite decipher crossed his face, making the unsettled feeling inside me deepen.

My heart was beating fast and my skin was tingling where he’d touched me. It felt sensitive, as if I’d been scorched by his fingers.

It wasn’t static, you idiot.

But I didn’t want to think about what else it might have been so I shoved that thought away and put my hands behind my back instead. ‘Ready when you are, Mr Evans,’ I said, as if nothing had happened.

He gave me another of those intense searching looks, though what he was searching for I had no idea.

‘Go down and wait in the car,’ he said at last. ‘I’ll be down in a minute.’

With one last dismissive glance, he turned away, the colours of the tattoo on his back flashing, leaving me with no other option but to do as I was told.

CHAPTER TWO
Ash

I LOOKED OUT of the window of the limo, watching a string of couture-clad people file through the entrance into the elegant historic brick building, and allowed myself a certain sense of satisfaction.

Finally. Fucking finally.

Here I was, outside the door to the most exclusive private members’ club in the world: The Billionaires Club.

Joining was by invitation only—an invitation that only came once your bank balance reached a certain level. A cool billion, obviously.

Mine had come a week ago in the form of a hand-delivered black envelope with a simple gold seal on the back and my name, Mr Ash Evans, written in cursive on the front.

Inside was a heavy slice of black platinum the size of a credit card, embossed with the club insignia: an M with two bars over the top of it, the Roman numeral for billion.

An exclusive club for the rich and famous.

And here was I, the scum of the streets, with a key.

Dad would be turning in his fucking grave. He’d have hated the thought of his bastard son finally having access to everything he’d denied him over the years.

Correction. Dad wouldn’t hate the thought, because, even if he’d still been alive, he wouldn’t have thought of me at all. Not thinking of me was all he’d done from the moment I was born, the product of an illicit affair with one of his maids.

Still, I wasn’t going to let happy memories of my prick of a father ruin my evening, not tonight. I’d worked too long and too hard to get to this point and I had other, bigger fish to fry.

Fish like my half-brother and chief competitor, Sebastian Dumont. He was one of the reasons I’d decided that my first appearance at the club would be at their burlesque event in Paris. I knew he’d be attending and I wanted to shove my membership in his rich and privileged face. He wouldn’t be expecting it and seeing me, his undeserving, lower-class half-brother, showing up where he didn’t belong, would piss him off in the extreme.

Petty? Yes. Satisfying? Completely.

But that wasn’t the only reason. I was also hoping to sabotage his latest business deal, too, just for the hell of it.

John Delaney, a property investor who was looking to sell a couple of islands in the Caribbean that he owned, was also going to be attending the event tonight, and my plan was to corner him and make him an offer for those islands.

I had a luxury hotel business that I’d just got off the ground and the islands Delaney was selling were perfect sites for it.

They were also the same islands that Dumont just happened to be after for his luxury hotel business.

Oh, Dumont had tried to keep his intentions under wraps, but I had my ways of finding out things. And now my entire plan was to buy those islands out from under him.

Yes, we had a rivalry. And to say it was mild was like saying England and Germany were slightly at odds during World War II.

It had been going on for years and I had no plans to build bridges any time soon. Not after what he’d done to me.

I flicked a glance in the rear-view mirror of the limo and found my chauffeur for the evening, the sexy little Australian, staring back at me.

And for a second, all thoughts of my hated half-brother vanished.

When she’d come to the door of my hotel, I’d been expecting Bill, white-haired and grizzled and pushing sixty-five. Instead, what I’d got was brunette and fresh-faced, and pushing twenty-five, if that.

Not to mention small and curvy, with a pretty, freshly scrubbed face, glossy brown hair in a no-nonsense ponytail, the usual chauffeur uniform of black trousers, white shirt and a black tie doing its best to hide the fact that she was unequivocally female.

Oh, yes, and she had a sunny attitude to match.

She hadn’t appeared to notice my scars or to be in the least bit intimidated by my manner, and she had looked me in the eye, which most people never did.

Then there had been that smile. That pretty smile like a bright burst of sunshine. As if she’d never heard of my reputation and had no idea what a bastard I was.

Those things shouldn’t have made her so immediately fascinating to me, because she was nothing like my normal type. I preferred them beautiful and expensive-looking, all the better to soil with my rough, dirty hands, not with a dusting of freckles, dressed in a chauffeur’s outfit, and telling me with a cheerful smile how my assistant not briefing me on her arrival wasn’t her problem.

Not many of my employees would have dared say that to my face.

Correction, none of my employees would have dared say it.

What made her think she could?

She stared at me in the mirror, hints of gold and emerald glinting from beneath long, silky dark lashes, and there was no deference in her gaze. It was full of curiosity and a certain boldness that I found...exciting.

Been a long time since you had a worthy opponent.

Yes, it was true. A very long time. Not that I was into physical fights these days, at least not outside the gym and never with a woman. But it had been a while since I’d met anyone who could hold their own against me. And every fighter needed a challenge to improve their game.

If you didn’t get better you didn’t win, and if you didn’t win, all you got was your teeth kicked in.

I’d never been a fan of getting my teeth kicked in.

She grinned at me. ‘Are you ready to go, Mr Evans?’ Her tone was ridiculously chirpy, yet her voice had a soft, smoky edge that somehow made it sexy at the same time.

She could be your challenge.

Nice idea, but no.

I’d felt the chemistry between us the moment she’d taken my hand back in the hotel room, and when she’d jerked away, her skin pink, I knew she’d felt it too.

Normally that would be something I’d explore, since I never denied myself something when I wanted it, but fresh-faced, tomboyish little Australians who should know better than to smile at men like me were not worth the trouble of tangling with.

And besides, I had a golden rule: never screw the staff.

She might only be a substitute for Bill for a couple of nights, but she was still a staff member. Which made her out of bounds.

‘I’ll go when I’m good and ready, Miss Little,’ I growled, irritated for no good reason.

‘Of course,’ she replied with the same chirpiness, apparently impervious to my annoyance. ‘You can sit here as long as you like. I only asked so I could be ready to open your door for you.’

My irritation increased. She looked so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and eager to please.

You could think of a few ways she could please you.

Yes, but again, not happening.

I stared hard at her, trying to put a dent in her insufferable cheerfulness, but she kept staring boldly back, apparently impervious to my game. And also, apparently, unaware of the blatant challenge she presented by doing so.

A certain tension began to gather in the car, one she also seemed blithely unaware of. At least until I noticed a hint of red glowing in her freshly scrubbed cheeks.

So. Maybe she wasn’t as unaware as she seemed. Not that I was going to be doing anything about it.

‘Then what are you waiting for?’ I said, unaccountably irritated with the direction of my thoughts. ‘I’m ready now.’

Once again, she didn’t bat an eye at my tone, immediately getting out of the car, coming around to my door, and pulling it open for me with a little flourish.

Normally I didn’t bother with that kind of theatre, but tonight I was making an exception.

I glowered as I got out, unfolding myself to my full height, looming over her like the hulking, scarred beast that I was.

She was very small, her head tilting back as she gave me a searching look. Her forehead creased, her smile turning sympathetic. ‘Don’t worry, Mr Evans. You’ll have a great night, I’m sure of it.’

The comment was so unexpected that for a second I had no idea what she was talking about.

‘Do I look fucking worried?’ I said.

Either she didn’t hear my sarcasm or ignored it, because she gave me another thorough scan, her expression becoming serious. ‘Actually, on second thought, you don’t. You just look really grumpy.’

No one made casual observations about me quite like that. Certainly no one said them out loud. To my face.

I opened my mouth to give her another lesson in driver etiquette, but she charged on, giving me another sunny smile before reaching out to pat my arm. ‘Don’t let the bastards grind you down, eh?’

People didn’t touch me, not these days. In fact, the only people who did were the women I took to bed.

No one ever patted me sympathetically on the arm.

No one would dare.

To make matters worse, the brief touch sent a ghost of the same electricity I’d felt back in the hotel sparking through the leather of my jacket and straight into me.

Christ. That was all I needed.

My temper, already mean, took a feral turn.

I glanced pointedly down at her hand on my arm. ‘I’m not a dog, Miss Little.’

Colour bloomed in her cheeks. ‘Oh. Sorry.’ She dropped her hand, her cheerful smile returning. ‘No worries.’

For some reason that didn’t make me feel any less irritated.

Trying to ignore my inexplicable annoyance, I turned away without another word, starting towards the entrance of the hotel and pushing her out of my mind.

The pretty, rich people in their glittering couture gowns and perfect tuxes were gathered around the doors and they all stared at me as I approached.

I scowled, staring them down in turn.

I didn’t miss their looks of disdain and the whispers, their glances at the limo and then at me in my jeans and black T-shirt, leather jacket thrown over the top. I knew what they were thinking. They were thinking that I couldn’t possibly belong in their rarefied circles. I wasn’t handsome enough, glittering enough, rich enough.

Poor bastards. They were in for one hell of a shock.

The thought mollified me and I was cheered still further by how they all rushed to get out of my way like antelopes before a lion as I strode for the door.

The impressive-looking doorman, though, was not an antelope and there was not a whiff of disdain from him. He gave me a nod and pulled open the door as soon as I approached, ushering me into the foyer with a simple, ‘Welcome to The Billionaires Club, Mr Evans.’

I hadn’t been expecting to be treated with respect and it took the wind out of my sails slightly.

The foyer was a huge space with an impressive staircase leading to the upper stories and a massive chandelier that dripped jewelled light into the vaulted space.

Directly in front of me was an ornate and obviously antique table with a huge spray of white orchids in a glass vase on top. The simplicity of the arrangement was in direct contrast to the chandelier and the table it sat on, and the floor of horrifically expensive Italian black marble. A few chaises longues were strategically placed for people to sit on, covered in luxuriously ostentatious gold silk.

The whole place reeked of money, the scent of the elite, the entitled, the privileged. The lucky, lucky few.

Of which I was now one, despite my father’s best efforts to keep me in my place, and my own half-brother’s betrayal.

Fuck you, old man. And fuck you too, Seb.

I smiled savagely at the thought.

There was a woman waiting for me beside the table, tall and slim, with long blonde hair and the kind of perfectly groomed appearance that only the very wealthy could achieve.

She ignored my smile, didn’t blink at my scars, simply held out a hand and said, ‘Mr Evans, welcome to The Billionaires Club. I’m Imogen Carmichael. Pleased to meet you.’ Her accent was American, east coast.

I took her hand, reining in my temper, because I could be pleasant when I wanted to be. ‘Likewise.’

She gave me a cool smile in return. ‘I’m glad you could make it to Paris to join us. Would you like a drink to start with or would you prefer it after the tour?’

‘After. Since I received precisely nothing in the way of information, I want to know how this place works.’

A flicker of genuine amusement crossed her classically lovely face. ‘That’s intentional. Part of the mystique, you understand.’

‘Of course. It’s also pretentious as hell.’

She laughed. ‘You’re direct. I like it. In fact, if I’m not much mistaken, you’ll fit right in.’ Stepping back, she gestured towards a grand set of double doors opposite the main entrance. ‘Right, I’ll show you to the ballroom. We’re in the middle of a burlesque gala event right now, which will give you a taste for the kinds of things we do.’

The club was as exclusive as it got, with a million-dollar membership fee per year. It was an extortionate amount, but I’d already figured out that membership could only benefit me. Evans Construction and Development, my property development firm, was going from strength to strength as it was, but the club would open doors when it came to growing Evans International, my luxury hotel chain. Especially when it came to stealing my half-brother’s business from him the way he’d once stolen mine from me.

As Imogen showed me into the ornate ballroom, with high ceilings and yet more chandeliers, I took a glance around, scanning the glittering crowd for any sign of Dumont or my other quarry, Delaney. Suspended above the crowd by a pair of red, silken ribbons, a woman clad in nothing more than jewelled bikini bottoms and nipple pasties performed a sensual aerial act. Music with a heavy beat played while both men and women in risqué jewelled costumes circulated with trays of drinks.

‘We hold gala events like this one all over the world and throughout the year,’ Imogen murmured. ‘And all the proceeds go to various nominated charities, as does fifty per cent of each member’s buy-in.’

‘Of course,’ I said, listening with only half an ear as I searched the crowd. ‘You must need the tax breaks.’

Imogen clearly heard the cynicism in my voice, because she raised a brow. ‘It’s all completely genuine, Mr Evans, I assure you. And most of our members help out by attending each event, though you can come and go as you wish. Right now, I’m in the middle of arranging the Christmas ball that will take place in New York, the money from which will also go to a very good cause.’

From the expression on her face she believed every word that she said, and maybe it was true. Maybe my cynicism had more to do with me than with her and this club.

Whatever. I wasn’t here to debate charity and privilege, or to hear about parties. I was here to find Delaney and my brother.

As if sensing my impatience, Imogen gestured to another door. ‘Come with me, I’ll show you something else.’

We went through into another area, a series of plush interconnecting rooms full of subtle lighting, clusters of deep, velvet-covered armchairs and low tables. People were sitting either in groups or pairs, talking intently in low voices. It was all brandy balloons and Scotch glasses, expensive cigar smoke in the air, and the scent of money, of big deals being done.

My favourite hunting terrain.

‘Our quiet area,’ Imogen said as we passed through. ‘Where members can relax and talk business or whatever else they might like.’

‘Sounds like my kind of place,’ I murmured, finally spotting Delaney sitting in a corner chatting to a group of people.

Good. He was here. Now to figure out where Dumont was.

We came back out into the entrance hall and Imogen gestured to the magnificent staircase that led up to the upper levels. ‘And up there are our intimate suites, if you want to take a look.’

I raised an eyebrow, curious. ‘Intimate suites?’

Imogen’s smile turned secretive. ‘The club provides for anything our members and their guests might need or want, and that includes some private spaces for blowing off a little steam.’

She didn’t need to elaborate, I got the idea. And I approved.

‘Now,’ Imogen went on. ‘That concludes the tour. You’re free to join the other members in the ballroom or adjourn to the bar, whichever takes your fancy.’

The bar, obviously, since Sebastian was not in the ballroom. Besides, although I was very much into pretty girls dancing while wearing not a lot, I wasn’t keen on the pointless posturing that was happening in the ballroom. Give a person a billion and they thought they were God’s fucking gift. Half those arseholes hadn’t had to work for what they had, not like I’d had to, and I wasn’t going to stand around pretending I was as good as the rest of them.

I was better. And I saw no need to pretend.

The bar was off the main ballroom and was just as gilded and ornate, with quite a few people gathered at the tables and sitting in the gold-velvet-covered booth seats that ran down one wall. Light glittered and dripped from the chandeliers that hung from the ceiling, sparkling on jewelled necklaces and glinting off cufflinks. The low hum of voices filled the room along with the heavy beat from the ballroom.

People stared at me as I made my way to the bar and I let them look, enjoying the attention. Me, with my knife-fight scars, in my jeans and T-shirt amongst all the jewels and tuxes.

I didn’t need to imagine what they were thinking. I knew, since it was written all over their faces. They were thinking I didn’t belong. That I was scum from the streets, their reminder that, though they might be insulated from the hard cold realities of life by their wealth, hard cold reality was now also here amongst them.

It amused me. I also didn’t give a shit. They could think what they liked. I’d earned my place here and too bad if they didn’t like it.

Strolling up to the bar, enjoying the way the crowd rippled to give me space, I took another scan around before ordering a drink.

A pretty blonde in a red dress with diamonds sparkling around her neck sidled up to me smiling, her intent very clear.

She was just my type: rich, sophisticated and beautiful. Definitely the kind of woman who’d never let a guy like me, rough and blunt and scarred all to hell, touch her if I didn’t have a billion dollars in my bank account.

Definitely a potential cure for the burn of thwarted attraction and annoyance my little chauffeur had ignited inside me.

I bought her a drink and she put her hand on my chest, leaning in to whisper something filthy in my ear. And that was when I finally spotted him.

He was standing right down the other end, one elbow propped casually on the bar, his head bent to talk to a brunette in a tiny black dress.

A deep satisfaction pulsed through me.

Sebastian Fucking Dumont.

My half-brother and once my closest friend. We’d ruled the exclusive school my mother had forced my father to shell out for—the only money he’d ever given her for me—and we’d had plans. So many fucking plans.

Until he’d stolen those plans for himself.

They say you’re supposed to forgive and forget, but I wasn’t a forgiving kind of man. I never forgot a betrayal, either—and I hadn’t forgotten his.

His blue eyes—so like mine—widened as they saw me and I gave him a savage smile.

Yeah, you rich fuck. Here I am, despite what you did to me. Here, in your territory.

Shock gave way to anger, and he frowned. As I expected. He’d be wondering what I was doing here and why the club had let riff-raff like me into its elite halls. And then, no doubt, he’d be calling someone to have me thrown out for daring to gatecrash.

The bastard was in for a couple of big surprises. Especially when he eventually found out the islands he’d been angling for were already sold. To me.

I smiled wider and gave him a jaunty one-finger salute. I’m a member of your precious club, motherfucker, and what are you going to do about it?

He stiffened, turning away to say something to the brunette before pushing his way through the crowd towards me.

But I was done.

I’d showed my face. I’d proved my point.

Time to find Delaney and buy those fucking islands.

CHAPTER THREE
Ellie

I CHECKED THE rear-view mirror again to make sure the entrance to the fancy hotel Mr Evans had disappeared into was still clear and, again, it was.

I didn’t expect him to come back out so soon—not that I’d been given details of the event I’d dropped him off at—but I wanted to be ready when he did. Anything to make up for my little mistake earlier, when I’d attempted to defuse his mood by cheering him up.

I’d thought he looked apprehensive when he’d stared at the crowd outside the doors, so I’d given him a pat and a rousing ‘don’t let the bastards grind you down’ talk the way I did with Jason, my oldest brother, when he was racing and feeling nervous.

Not a great plan in hindsight, because Mr Evans was not my brother, nor had he been feeling nervous, apparently, given his grumpy response.

Which meant that now I needed to be on my best behaviour, especially if I was going to be broaching the topic of Australis with him.

I’d hoped I would have made a good enough impression by this point that I could ask him about it tonight, but maybe that was too soon, especially given his temper.

Now that I’d been given a taste of his fearsome reputation, it seemed as if he’d come by it honestly, and the curious part of me wanted to know why. Was he genuinely a grumpy bastard all the time or did he just not like people? Did it have something to do with his scars? Or was there something else going on?

My research hadn’t given me any clues since he never talked about his private life. There were all kinds of rumours about how he’d made his initial start-up money, but the general consensus was that he’d earned it in illegal street fights, which naturally the media ate up with a big spoon.

They had quite a fascination with him and now I’d met him, I could see why.

He was quite...magnetic.

I frowned out of the front windscreen, reflecting again on when and how I needed to approach the question of his Australis investment.

It was important I get this right, since there wouldn’t be another opportunity to get close to him and if I didn’t succeed, the company was more than likely going to tank.

If only Mark hadn’t been drunk at the Christmas party and thought I was fair game. And if only I hadn’t got angry when he’d grabbed me and kneed him in the balls.

But I had. I’d committed the cardinal sin of turning something minor into a big deal, and Mark had complained to Dad about ‘assault’ and talked about lawsuits. Dad had had no choice but to pay him off, thus losing the best designer we’d ever had, not to mention a large portion of the investment capital we’d been given by Evans Investment.

I’d then compounded my error by showing Dad a potential answer to our financial worries—the design for an electric supercar that I’d been working on for the past five years or so.

But he wasn’t interested. He’d already been disapproving of how I’d handled Mark and he liked my electric car suggestion even less. He was an internal combustion engine man all the way and ‘fancy, newfangled’ ideas had no place at Australis.

There’d been no point making a fuss so I’d quietly shelved the supercar project, turning to other ideas to fix our money problems instead.

Some days I wondered if he would have liked me more if I hadn’t been born the spitting image of my pretty, womanly, passionate mother. If I’d been born a boy instead.

Mum had died of cancer when I was seven and Dad had been destroyed by her loss. He hadn’t even been able to look at me in the days following her funeral, so I’d put away my pretty dresses and swallowed my grief, and tried to act like my brothers instead.

But I couldn’t change the basic shape of my face. And of course, I had her eyes...

Dad had never treated me the same way since.

An old grief caught in my throat, but I forced the emotion down, distracting myself by glancing at the hotel entrance again.

This time I saw the doorman move to pull open the door and finally Mr Evans came striding out, his arm wrapped around a pretty blonde woman in a skintight red dress.

I only just suppressed a groan.

Bloody hell. There went any opportunity for a quiet word about Australis. If he was going to be entertaining women, I’d probably have to wait until tomorrow.

Annoyed and trying to ignore it, I got out of the car and hurried around the side to open the door, pasting on my usual smile.

The woman was tall and lovely, her dress beautiful, her make-up perfect. Just the kind of woman men liked. At least, she was definitely a woman my brothers would have liked.

She didn’t look at me as she got in and I was expecting Mr Evans to ignore me the way she had, but he didn’t. As I stood there holding the door, he glanced at me and those electric-blue eyes pinned me to the spot.

An intense, hot satisfaction glowed there and it was so at odds with the cold lightning that had been in them before that I could only stare, my breath catching.

But it was only a moment. The next second, he’d got into the car leaving me standing there staring into space, my heart beating unreasonably fast.

God, what was wrong with me? He was just a man. A rich man, yes, and powerful, but a man all the same. And I knew all about men. They were either stoic like my dad and my middle brother, Dev. Or they were cheeky and fun like my two older brothers, Jase and Justin. Or quiet like George, my youngest brother.

Or pretending to be nice and ending up a sleaze like Mark.

But Mr Evans didn’t fit into any of those categories. There was something burning inside him that none of the men I knew had, something that sparked and crackled like an arc welder melting metal.

I had no idea why that fascinated me or why I’d ended up standing there staring into space because he’d glanced at me...

It’s not static, remember?

But the thought was an uncomfortable one, so I pushed it away before it could settle, shutting the door and going around to the driver’s side, getting back behind the wheel.

I reached up to adjust the rear-view mirror, catching a glimpse of the pair of them as I did so.

Mr Evans’s dark head was bent and he was whispering in the woman’s ear. She was sitting very close, half turned towards him, her hand spread on the broad expanse of his chest, and she gave a soft giggle.

Ugh. Were they going to carry on like that the whole way? Not that it was any of my business what they did and not that I was at all bothered by it. I’d seen worse over the years I’d been driving.

Ignoring my strangely hot cheeks, I jerked my gaze away from the mirror and stared out of the front windscreen instead.

‘Back to your hotel, Mr Evans?’ I tried to sound cheerful and professional and completely relaxed about what was happening behind me.

‘Yes,’ Mr Evans said.

His voice had gone even deeper and grittier, a thread of heat curling through it, and, despite myself, I glanced into the mirror again, drawn inexplicably by the sound.

He was watching me, a hot blue flame glowing in the depths of his eyes.

My mouth dried and my heart kicked in my chest, which was totally ridiculous, because him looking at me shouldn’t affect me like that. Not after Mark and the way he used to stare at me from behind his computer in the workshop. Making me feel as if I’d had a bath in a tub full of grease.

So there shouldn’t have been any reason why I felt restless and hot. Why the expression in Mr Evans’s eyes connected to something hungry inside me. Something he saw that I hadn’t realised was there.

Something I didn’t understand.

I looked away before I could stop myself and then felt instantly annoyed. As if I’d retreated somehow, which was a mistake when dealing with a guy like him.

Get it together, Little. You shouldn’t be playing games anyway.

I definitely shouldn’t, not that I was a game player anyway. But there was a reason I’d managed to manoeuvre my way into driving for him and it wasn’t because he’d turned out to be hot shit on a stick.

I had a mission and I had to keep that in mind.

Determined not to look again, I started the limo and pulled away from the kerb, concentrating squarely on driving and not on the man behind me.

Except I found the low rumble of his voice distracting. There was a velvety texture to it, a kind of huskiness that made me feel shivery.

The engines of the Pythons sounded like that. A deep purr, like a giant cat. I loved the sound of those engines, loved those cars, sleek and dangerous and powerful.

Taking one of them for a spin around the track was a huge rush, an adrenaline hit I’d craved right from the first moment I’d sat behind the wheel and the engine had turned over, throbbing like a giant heartbeat.

The rush of speed had been the perfect way to deal with all the messy teenage emotions I hadn’t known how to handle, the emotions that Dad hadn’t known how to handle either, and so I’d taken to the track to drive whenever I was feeling upset or needing an emotional release.

Speed was better than crying and there was nothing like hitting the gas hard and throwing a powerful car around a few corners.

Ever since then, the revving purr of a V8 engine had made me feel good. Made me feel reckless and powerful. And listening to Mr Evans talk, his voice thrumming through me like one of those engines, a deep vibrating rumble that I could feel in my chest and lower, in my sex, made me feel that same way.

What would it be like to drive him?

What a stupid thought. He wasn’t a car. He was a man and probably wouldn’t appreciate being driven anywhere.

Yet try as I might to concentrate on the road ahead of me, the thought wouldn’t go away.

He was muscular and powerful, just like one of the Pythons. Would he take me on a wild ride if I put my hand on him? He probably wouldn’t be as easy to drive, but he’d certainly be as hot. And he’d be hard, too, and the rumble of his engine...

There was a throb between my legs, a hot, raw feeling that I wasn’t sure how to handle. I’d never felt this before, not for anyone, not even for my one lone high-school boyfriend.

Still think it’s static?

Okay, no. It wasn’t static. It was attraction. But that didn’t make things any easier, because I still didn’t know what to do about it.

Sex is what people usually do about it.

I glared out of the front windscreen as I manoeuvred the giant car through the narrow Parisian streets.

Sex was not happening. I’d had it a couple of times with that one single boyfriend and it had been nice but forgettable. Certainly not worth trying it with Mr Evans, even if he had been interested, which I was sure he wasn’t. Not given the woman he was with now.

Anyway, he was clearly a man who was used to being in charge and, after Mark and his handsy ways, I wasn’t keen on letting any guy take charge of me.

Apart from anything else, I was supposed to be asking him for more time on the Australis investment, not...anything else.

The lights were red at the intersection ahead of me so I stopped, irritatingly conscious of Mr Evans’s voice rumbling again, followed by more feminine laughter and then a soft gasp.

Don’t look. Don’t look.

I wasn’t going to look. I wasn’t curious. I didn’t need to see what was happening behind me.

Of course I looked.

And the way the rear-view mirror was positioned gave me the perfect view of one of his large hands cupping her breast over the fabric of her dress, his thumb moving lazily back and forth over her nipple.

I blinked, a weird flashback hitting me. Of how Mark had grabbed me from behind, squeezing me and pinching me, and how it had hurt. He’d been rough and I’d been taken by surprise, unable to jerk away until it was too late.

Yet the woman didn’t seem to find what Mr Evans was doing to her unpleasant. She was arching into his hand as if wanting more. And...it seemed as if he was holding her carefully, his thumb moving gently, lightly...

Unexpectedly, my own nipples hardened, pressing against the cotton of my bra, and I had to jerk my gaze away, my face flaming.

Bloody hell, what was I thinking? Staring at my clients wasn’t at all professional. And as for getting turned on by it...

No. Just no.

The light changed colour and I put my foot on the accelerator, determined to ignore what I’d just seen.

But Mr Evans made another of those deep, purring sounds and it shivered through me, making my mouth go dry and the throb in my sex even more intense.

Was it the blonde making him sound like that? And why? What was she doing?

Madness. I shouldn’t even want to look again, let alone be battling the sudden and intense desire to do just that.

Another set of lights was up ahead, turning red as soon as I approached.

I wasn’t going to look. I wasn’t.

But I couldn’t help myself. I did.

His hand had moved to her butt, curving around it possessively, while hers had shifted from his chest and down between his powerful thighs, her fingers spread as she cupped him through his jeans, her red nails standing out against the blue denim.

I swallowed, trying vainly to get some moisture into my bone-dry mouth.

Her fingers were lazily stroking up and down, tracing the outline of something very long and very thick, and his thighs were spread wide, giving her room, as if he was enjoying very much what she was doing to him.

A hungry feeling pulsed inside me, my palms sweaty as I gripped the steering wheel.

This time I couldn’t drag my gaze away. I was glued to the view in the mirror, mesmerised and not even sure why.

There was something hypnotic about the way her fingers moved on him, about the shape of his cock beneath the denim, that caught my attention, twisting my curiosity tight and refusing to let go.

What did he feel like? Was he hot? Was he as hard as he looked? Would he make that soft bass rumble for me if I touched him?

Need throbbed between my thighs, my hands itching to touch.

I loved driving, and chauffeuring satisfied that need in me, but I also loved design. There was nothing that gave me as much pleasure as the clean lines and curves of a beautifully designed car, form and function perfectly melded.

I wanted to see Mr Evans’s form. I wanted to see the lines and curves of him, and whether he’d be as beautifully designed for power and strength as he seemed to be. I already knew his torso was a work of art, but what about the rest of him?

My heartbeat accelerated like one of the Pythons, revving hard.

The mirror didn’t show his face and suddenly I wanted to see it. Wanted to know what his scarred features looked like when he was turned on and whether those intense blue eyes were still full of heat and not just lightning.

With a hand that shook only slightly, I reached up to adjust the mirror so I could see. Then froze as his gaze clashed with mine.

Electricity sizzled through me and this time there was no static to blame.

It was all him.

‘The light is green, Miss Little,’ he said in his deep, rough voice.

And it took me at least five seconds to process what he was saying. And then I did.

Oh, crap.

My face burned and I wrenched my gaze away, pressing my foot down hard on the accelerator. Too hard. Much to my shame the car bunny-hopped a couple of times before I managed to bring it under control again. I stuttered an apology, keeping my attention resolutely forward this time.

He didn’t answer, but I was just about combusting with embarrassment, angry with myself for staring when I knew I shouldn’t, and also at my own reaction. At the pulsing, insistent ache between my thighs.

I didn’t understand it. Australis’s continued existence was on the line and here I was, letting some stupid sex stuff distract me. And now he’d caught me watching him...

He’ll probably fire you.

Shit. The thought made my palms even more sweaty.

I tried to dismiss it, plaster my smile in place, get back into a more professional space, but I was still blushing furiously by the time I pulled the car up outside Mr Evans’s hotel.

‘Stay there, Miss Little,’ he growled as I reached to undo my seat belt.

Oh, great.

He said something to the woman that I didn’t catch, but I didn’t dare look this time to see what was going on.

Instead I waited, staring out of the widow, listening to the rear door open and then close with a thunk.

There was a long silence.

Eventually, I had to glance in the mirror, because the suspense was killing me.

The blonde had gone, but Mr Evans hadn’t.

He was still sitting in the back seat.

And he was staring straight at me.

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