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A teenage celebrity had that morning vacated the presidential suite and it had already been prepared for the next guest. However, that it was Demyan Zukov arriving ensured that as he swept through the foyer, twenty-four floors up, a multitude of staff were frantically doing their best to ensure that every detail was perfect for Demyan’s sudden arrival.
The door was opened and Demyan stepped in and barely gave his surroundings a glance.
Hotels, however luxurious, were all pretty much the same.
‘Can I get you anything?’ the butler asked. ‘A drink perhaps...’
‘My privacy.’
‘Would you like—?’
‘I would like to be left alone. I will call if I need anything.’
As the door closed, for the first time since the news had hit, Demyan was properly alone.
For the first time since Nadia had revealed her foul news, he gave himself a moment to take it all in. He’d been denying there was even a possibility that Roman wasn’t his son, of course. Roman had to be his. Demyan had held him the moment he’d been born, had looked into his son’s eyes and felt love seep into his closed heart for the very first time and had never doubted that Roman was his child.
Demyan had attempted to suppress the news Nadia had imparted in a haze of alcohol and women.
It had almost worked.
It just wasn’t working now.
Despite the hotel staff’s best efforts, as Demyan sought distraction and flicked through the selection of newspapers, there was one detail they had missed— Demyan exhaled as he saw a magazine with both himself and Vladimir on the cover and the quirky question—Who would you choose?
They missed the point entirely, Demyan thought bitterly—Nadia had no choice, even if she occasionally embraced the fantasy that they would one day be a family again, he would never take her back.
Still, the tabloids loved to play their imaginary games. Demyan thumbed through the pages till he reached the article. There was Vladimir, early fifties, extremely wealthy with a stable reputation; the one thing missing in his life—a son.
Then there was Demyan.
Thirty-three, his vast wealth made even Vladimir look poor and his relative youth, combined with dark, brooding looks, meant that in the handsome, rich stakes, Demyan undeniably won hands down.
The negatives?
He didn’t have to flick a page to find out what they were, but he did so anyway. Yes, he was a playboy, yes, he ricocheted across the globe, crashing in hotels, preferably with a casino attached. Yes, he disappeared at times to his luxury yacht and a selection of blondes.
Demyan worked hard and partied harder.
He was single—so why not?
As Demyan read on he saw that for once the press had almost played fair.
Yes, he had a scandalous reputation but that was tempered by his huge success and the fact no one could question that he was a good father and adored his son, and that his debauchery generally remained overseas rather than joining him when he returned to Australia.
Sydney was his base, his home, the rest of the globe his oyster.
But why wasn’t he fighting Nadia? The article demanded.
Why was he letting Nadia take his son to Russia without putting up a fight? Whatever Demyan Zukov put his mind to he seemingly achieved, so why didn’t he demand in the courts that his Australian-born son remain here?
Demyan read on, his gut churning at the questions and suppositions, especially knowing that Roman would surely be reading the same things.
The article was unrelenting. Perhaps Demyan didn’t really care, maybe the father-and-son images had been all for the cameras? Was there a new Mrs Zukov waiting in the wings perhaps?
God help her if there was, the article said.
Was Demyan perhaps weary of the frequent trips to Sydney and now only too happy to let Nadia fully take over the parenting of their son?
Demyan poured a drink and took a gulp and then walked to the window—not to take advantage of the view, more to torture himself with it.
From here he could see his penthouse—he was at eye level with it, in fact. Three stories of luxury yet it was the rooftop terrace that held his gaze now. So many evenings he had spent there with his son and his friends, listening to their God-awful band playing. It was there that Demyan had taught Roman to swim.
Demyan hurled the glass across the room in anger as he tore his eyes from his home.
He could not stand to set foot inside. He wanted it sold, he wanted it gone. There was also the farm in the Blue Mountains, his first home in Australia, that needed to be dealt with too. If Roman went to Russia then there was no reason for Demyan to be here. No reason to ever come back.
Demyan thought about calling his PA to join him here and deal with everything, but decided against it—though he liked her ordered, professionalism, in the bedroom she was getting far too clingy of late. Anyway, this wasn’t business, this was personal. If this was to be his last trip to Sydney then a lot of things needed to be taken care of and, Demyan conceded to himself, it was going to hurt.
Demyan picked up the phone. ‘I need an assistant for a couple of weeks, perhaps a month. Someone who is discreet and used to dealing with real estate.’
‘Of course. When would you like—?’
Demyan interrupted the question; he rarely made small talk.
‘Tomorrow morning at eight.’
Tomorrow he would deal with things.
Tomorrow he would start dismantling his life here and then leave it behind for ever.
There was nothing to hold him here any more.
Demyan headed for the decanter and filled a fresh glass.
What to do with himself this Wednesday night? He would hit another casino, Demyan decided. Tonight he would get blind drunk and, for once, his reputation would join him in Sydney.
Blonde, Demyan thought, inhaling the liquor.
No, brunette, or perhaps a redhead?
Why not all three?
Tonight he would party like tomorrow did not exist.
He took a drink and glanced once again towards the window, to a view that had once soothed him.
Just not today.
CHAPTER ONE
WHY HAD SHE LIED?
Alina Ritchie let out a long nervous breath as her taxi neared an incredibly sumptuous hotel.
Pulling her mirror out of her bag for perhaps the fifth time since the taxi had collected her from the apartment she shared with Cathy, she checked her appearance and wished again that, if she had one, her deeply buried sophisticated gene might today make itself known.
So far it hadn’t.
Alina had put her toes through her one pair of stockings but thankfully they hadn’t laddered and she had simply tucked the hole under her feet. Her carefully applied make-up had all but disappeared and even the short walk to the taxi had seen her pinned, long, dark hair start to coil and frizz in the humid, late-summer air. Alina set to work, taking the shine off her face with a brush and hopefully smoothing her hair with her embarrassingly damp palms.
Today had to go well, Alina told herself.
Even if she had only got this opportunity by default, it was the break that she had been waiting so long for.
Determined to forge a safe career and with her mother’s somewhat bitter but terribly sage advice burning in her ears, Alina had put aside her interest in art and opted instead to study for a business degree. ‘Ask yourself how many struggling artists there are, Alina,’ her mother had said when, at the final hurdle of her application, Alina had wavered. All she had wanted to do was paint but her repertoire, as her mother had all too often pointed out, wasn’t particularly vast.
Alina painted flowers.
Lots of them!
On canvas, silk, paper, and in their absence she painted them in her mind.
‘You need a decent job,’ Amanda Ritchie had warned. ‘Every woman should have her own wage. I can’t support you, Alina, and I hope I’ve brought you up to never rely on a man.’
Her mother’s disenchantment, the fact Amanda was losing her small working flower farm had sealed Alina’s fate—she’d opted for the corporate world but there were more than a few struggling PAs as well, and Alina was one of them. Work had been very thin on the ground and Alina’s rather introverted, at times dreamy nature didn’t fit in too well in the busy corporate world.
Alina’s main source of income came from a restaurant where she waited tables four, sometimes five nights a week. Just before leaving for work last night she had taken a frantic call from a very exclusive agency that Alina had signed on with a few months ago. They rarely called her—Alina, with her rather round shape, didn’t quite fit into their rigid square holes...
Until they were desperate!
Alina had blinked in surprise when she’d heard what they had in mind for her. A city hotel had called with an urgent request that a temporary PA position be filled for a very esteemed guest. None of the agency’s preferred staff were available at such short notice, especially as the time frame was vague—a couple of weeks perhaps, possibly a month. Not wanting to pass such a plum opportunity to another agency, they had called Alina.
‘Your résumé says that you have had some dealings in real estate?’ Elizabeth, who had first interviewed Alina, had checked.
‘I do.’
Alina hadn’t exactly lied.
Rather, she just hadn’t specified on her résumé that the sum total of her real estate experience had comprised of helping her mother sell the farm before the bank had foreclosed on it.
Then Elizabeth had told her that the client she would be working for was none other than Demyan Zukov.
‘I take it that you do know who he is.’
You couldn’t not know who Demyan Zukov was! He actually dined at times at the very elite restaurant where Alina worked, though their paths had never crossed. The last time he had been there she had been home, sick with tonsillitis, and on her return had had to suffer all the staff talking about the very glamorous guest.
Alina had been very tempted to confess there and then that this role was completely out of her league but the thought of having Demyan listed on the credentials part of her résumé had simply been too irresistible to pass up.
The agency had ensured the contracts and signatures were rushed through—Elizabeth had even turned up at the restaurant where Alina had been working that night to ensure that the deal was signed off.
‘All our clients are important, Alina, but I hope I don’t have to tell you just how important this one is.’
‘Of course not,’ Alina had said, but Elizabeth had been too worried to be subtle.
‘Are you sure that you’re up to this, Alina?’
‘Absolutely.’
It hadn’t helped that when she’d delivered her assured answer Alina could see the doubt evident in Elizabeth’s eyes.
You are up to this, she told herself as she stepped out of the taxi and stood for a moment at the entrance to the hotel, trying to will herself calm, watching as elegant men and slim-suited beauties walked by confidently.
Yes, today had to go well because if it didn’t...
Alina blew out a breath as she made a promise to herself.
If this didn’t work out then she was going to quit even trying to survive the corporate world and just hands up admit that it wasn’t for her.
If only she’d kept to her diet, Alina thought, feeling the bite of her waistband.
That was the problem with working at the very top-end restaurant at The Rocks—the owner was nice and ensured that all of the staff got a meal from the sumptuous menu on their break.
Who could say no to that?
Not Alina.
She was a country girl at heart and had an appetite to match, yet today she had to play the part of a slick city PA who allowed nothing to faze her.
Not even the formidable Demyan Zukov.
Alina could feel sweat on her top lip as she made herself known to Reception and was asked to show her ID.
‘One moment, please.’
Oh, God, Alina thought, she wasn’t even going to get past the receptionist! But a few moments later she returned and handed Alina a card for the elevator that would take her up to the presidential suite.
Alina actually felt sick as the elevator hurtled her towards the twenty-fourth floor. Worse, though, was when the elevator door opened at its destination and a very beautiful raven-haired, mascara-streaked woman stepped in as Alina stepped out.
That must have been his date for the night, Alina decided.
Alina had read more than her fair share of glossy magazines and so she was pretty well versed as to Demyan’s rather decadent lifestyle.
Or she’d thought she was!
As Alina walked down the corridor a teary, pale blonde beauty teetered on high heels towards her. Alina could see, though she very quickly diverted her eyes, that the woman’s left breast was exposed.
Nothing fazes you! Alina reminded herself for the hundredth time, though she was terribly tempted to simply turn tail and run.
