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She pulled in a breath, conscious of the Russian’s gaze on her face. And said the only thing her conscience would allow. “He’s a good man. I wouldn’t work for him if I didn’t think so.”
He watched her. Evaluated her. It was like being inspected by a customs official, the intensity of it. Then he nodded, an expression she couldn’t read passing through those cat’s eyes of his.
“Harasho. Let’s go inside, then.”
* * *
Harrison watched Francesca and Leonid walk back into the room together. Her face was white and pinched, tension stitching her delicate features together. It made the tiny hairs on the back of his neck stand up straight.
Leonid, on the other hand, looked focused and alert. He sat down at the table and signaled for another round of vodka. Harrison’s heart pounded in his chest, drowning out everything but what was about to happen. Seven years of waiting and planning could not end in anything but success.
He sat there in agony while Kaminski engaged in small talk with Francesca as they waited for the vodka. The server came back laden with a tray of four glasses. He passed them out. Leonid lifted his glass. “Right, then,” he said, looking at Harrison. “We have a deal.”
Relief slackened every muscle in Harrison’s body. His heart slowed its frantic pace. It was done. The last piece was in place. The crystal tumbler felt heavy in his hand as he raised it, eyes on Leonid. “We have a deal.”
The vodka slid down his throat and warmed his insides. He had expected a surge of victory. For everything to feel right for the first time since he’d started this quest. Instead he felt nothing. Nothing at all except a numbness, an absence of feeling that was almost frightening in its intensity.
He distracted himself by glancing at Francesca. Her long lashes swept down over her cheeks as she took a sip of the vodka then pushed the glass away. Whatever had gone on outside had rattled her. Even in his distracted state, the glitter in her gray eyes burrowed itself beneath his skin. What had gone on between her and Leonid?
They finished the vodka. Leonid requested a fully executable contract be sent to his lawyer the following morning. If he got the green light that Harrison was sure he would because the lawyers had already scoured the document, he would sign.
He kept waiting for the euphoria to hit him. While he smiled at Leonid’s joke about missing their personal chess matches each day. As they said goodbye to the two men and climbed into the car, Francesca stopping to speak to Viktor. While he stared out at a now dark New York. It never came. Why wasn’t he on top of the world? Why didn’t the victory feel sweet instead of bittersweet? He could close in on Anton Markovic now and bring it all full circle. Make him understand his pain. Wasn’t that what he’d always wanted?
It made no sense.
He glanced at Francesca. The pinched look hadn’t left her face. If anything it was worse. “Did you let him down easy?”
She turned a conflicted gaze on him. “I told him I was hung up on someone else. It seemed nicer to do it that way.”
He wondered if she meant him. He could not deny he was more than a little hung up on her. And fighting it bitterly.
Her gaze fell away from his. He rested his head against the back of the seat. “What did Leonid say to you outside?”
Her mouth pressed into a straight line. “He asked me if he should sign the deal. If you were the honorable man he thought you were.”
His head came off the seat. Her gaze moved back to his, stark and most definitely under siege. Aristov had asked her that?
“What did you say?”
“I said you were a good man. That I wouldn’t be working for you if you weren’t.”
It had cost her integrity a great deal to say that knowing the scenario he’d painted. He closed his hand over the fist she had curled on the seat. “Thank you.”
Her gaze dropped to his hand. “It’s the truth. You are a good man.”
With a cross to bear she didn’t agree with... His hand remained closed over her fist. He fought the desire to bring it to his mouth, to press his lips to her skin until she released the tension and he could taste the salt on her skin. He wanted her. He wanted her so badly he could taste her already under his mouth. But she was unavailable to him.
He released her hand before he did it. His skin pulsed with the need for more because that touch, her touch, was the only thing making him feel alive right now.
He brought his back teeth together. Fought it. Recited to himself all the reasons he couldn’t have her. Good reasons.
Derrick slid the partition open and asked, “Where first?”
He gave him Francesca’s address.
She shook her head. “We’re closer to you. I need the papers for the Detroit project to work on while you’re out in the morning. I’ll come up, get them, then Derrick can drive me home.”
It made sense. It would also get him out of this car sooner. “Fine. That works.”
Derrick stopped in the circular driveway at the side of the building. They rode the elevator to the penthouse in silence, neither of them about to address the tension and push things over the edge.
He found the papers she needed on the desk in his study and carried them out to the living room. “Text me if you need any clarification.” The delicate fingers he’d just held closed around them. Her gaze fastened on his, probing, seeking. “I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon then.”
“Yes.” He willed her out of the apartment with a curt, dismissive look. He needed to be alone or he needed to drown himself in her, but he couldn’t do anything in between.
She was halfway to the door when she stopped and turned around. “Harrison, are you okay?”
“I’m fine. Thank you for your help today.”
She nodded and left. When the door closed behind her and he heard the sound of the elevator whishing its way toward ground level, he poured himself a drink he knew he didn’t need and took it out onto the terrace. The moon was a perfect, giant orb in a sheet of black. Luminous; full of promise. It should have been another signpost of where he was headed. Vengeance. Yet he continued to feel nothing. The fear he dreaded always found a way in, insidious as it was, worming its way into his consciousness.
He lifted his palms to his temples. Willed it away. It was nights like this, nights when he scaled Mount Everest and won, when any other human being would have been basking in the glory, that he wondered if the darkness would claim him, too.
There had never been any sign he had picked up his father’s genetic markers for mania, but the depression beckoned, whispering along the edges of his mind. He raised his eyes to the Grant tower, a shining beacon of what made America great. Had his father known how close to the flame he was flying? Or had he been blinded by the heights he ached to achieve?
Would it be too much for him? His head pounded with the weight of too many decisions. Too many paths that were no longer clear. Too much, too much.
A jet banked over the Hudson, the lights on its wings flashing in the darkness. He stared at it, hypnotized by the pulsing flares. Is destiny the fate of every man?Is your path irreversible no matter how you pursue it? Or is there a way to rise above it? A way to blaze a path that is yours and yours alone?
The throbbing in his head intensified. He needed to escape, but he didn’t know how.
CHAPTER NINE (#u0e140246-1a69-5adc-862e-4bafba8f68a9)
FRANKIE COULDN’T GET into the car. The haunted, hunted look on Harrison’s face when she’d left, the way he’d been ever since Leonid had agreed to sign the deal, was gnawing at her. She’d expected him to be victorious and superior. Instead she’d found him dark and introspective.
Working nearly 24/7 with someone meant you were in tune with their moods, and the Harrison she’d witnessed tonight was one she hadn’t seen before. One that scared her. Leonid might have passed it off as exhaustion, distraction, but she knew it was much more.
Derrick gave her a quelling look. He wanted to get home to his family. He thought she was nuts standing here on the sidewalk, utterly caught in limbo.
She got into the car. They pulled smoothly away from the sidewalk, weaving into traffic. Her stomach churned in big, conflicted circles. She had led Leonid to believe he could depend on Harrison when in reality he would likely be bitterly disappointed. Whether Leonid had read between the lines or taken her words at face value was something she would never know.
A soft curse left her lips. She didn’t want anyone’s future revolving around her. Then to make her choice only to have Harrison turn into a stone wall when he had been handed everything he’d wanted? What is going on?
She clenched her hand into a fist and pressed it against the seat. Was he feeling guilty for what he was about to do to Leonid even though he’d laid his cards on the table? Or had he finally realized, with the final piece in place to destroy Anton Markovic, that vengeance was a poor substitute for a broken heart? That it would never bring his father back?
Or was it something else entirely? That call from Tom Dennison today? The twisting in her gut intensified. She couldn’t do it.
She tapped on the screen. Derrick opened it. ‘Yes, ma’am?”
“Can you take me back? I’ve forgotten something.”
He gave her a supremely patient look. “Of course. Let me just find somewhere to turn around.”
When he deposited her on the sidewalk outside Harrison’s building once more, she thanked him and told him to go home. “I may be a while.”
Derrick nodded. “Call me if you change your mind.”
She was out of her mind. Setting her jaw, she entered the building through the side entrance. The door required a thumb scan to get in but Harrison had taken care of that for her last week when she’d had to come collect some documents for him. She rode the whisper-quiet elevator to the penthouse, heart pounding in her ears.
The doors of the elevator swished open. The apartment was eerily silent as she moved through the entrance way and into the living room. The precious artwork glowed silently on its perfect cream backdrop. No Harrison.
His study was in darkness. A glow from the terrace suggested he was there. She walked through the living room and stepped outside. Harrison was standing at the railing, looking out at the skyline. Her heels clicked on the concrete as she walked toward him. He turned around, frowning. “Did I forget to give you something?”
“No.” Her knees betrayed just the slightest wobble as she took the last few steps toward him. “I just—” Her voice trailed off. Just what? What the heck was she doing here?
She came to a stop in front of him. Her gaze rose to his. He was as tall and commanding as ever, as stomach-clenchingly beautiful, but the tormented look dominated now. It emanated from every pore of him, blanketing her in his desperation. She pulled in a breath.
“I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
The shadows in his face darkened. “I told you I was fine. Go home, Francesca.”
“But you aren’t.” The words spilled from her mouth. “Ever since Leonid agreed to the deal, you’ve been off.”
“I’m fine.”
She frowned. “It’s what we’ve been working toward. I thought you would be happy.”
“I am happy.” The emotion vibrating in his voice sent a shiver down her spine. He turned to look at the skyline again. “It’s none of your concern, Francesca. Go home. I’ll see you in the afternoon.”
She stood her ground, legs shaking now. For a man who claimed to feel little emotion it was written in every taut muscle of his body. In the rigid column of his back, his neck. In the barely leashed confusion that surrounded him. It reached out and wrapped itself around her, pulling her toward him.
“Sometimes,” she said quietly, laying a hand on his arm, “the things we want the most, the things we think are going to make us feel better, don’t. Can’t because they were never the solution in the first place.”
He spun to face her, dislodging her hand. Antagonism poured off him in waves. “Nailing Anton Markovic to the ground is going to make me feel better, Francesca. Much better. Make no mistake about it.”
Her heart thudded against her rib cage. “Then why? Why are you like this?”
“Because I have too much going on in my head.” He practically yelled the words at her. “This is not another case of you saving the day, Francesca. It’s far more complex than one of your little sermons can fix.”
Her stomach lurched. “I didn’t suggest that.”
His mouth curled. “Go.”
“I won’t leave you like this.”
The deliberate way he looked at her made her pulse buzz in her ears. “You would be very wise to do so,” he suggested in a low, deep voice that made her insides liquefy. He lifted a finger and dragged it across her cheek, watching as she shivered in reaction. “Otherwise I will do what I was aching to do in the car and drown myself in this. And I think we’ve both agreed it’s an unacceptable result.”
His touch felt like fire on her skin. The kiss from London sizzled through her head, beckoning her on to sure destruction. They were like hot and cold fronts converging in a storm it seemed impossible to outrun.
But he was her boss. She loved her job. She really must go.
He slid his thumb down to her lips, his gaze holding hers as he traced the trembling outline of her mouth. “Go, Francesca. You’re the only thing making me feel alive right now. If you don’t, I can’t be responsible for what happens next.”
Run, her sensible side commanded, hurting man or not. But the other side of her, the one pulsing with an awareness of him so strong it made her mouth dry, wanted him to drown himself in her. Wanted to experience that type of passion. Because he made her feel more alive than she’d ever felt in her life. Being the center of his attention was hypnotizing.
The tremor in his hand as he stroked the pad of his thumb over her bottom lip made her heart turn over. She couldn’t go.
His dark gaze glittered. “Out. Now.”
“No.”
The word hung on the air between them, defiant and crystal clear. She watched the control fizzle in his eyes at the same time he reached for her hand and brought it to his mouth. He pressed his lips to her palm in an openmouthed kiss, as if tasting her very essence. Her pulse ran wild.
“You have five seconds to leave,” he murmured. “Or you don’t.”
She closed her eyes as he pressed another kiss to her palm. Counted out the seconds in her head. His soft curse split the night air.
“Francesca.”
She brought his hand to her mouth. Found his palm with her lips. He tasted hot, salty and hedonistically male. She wondered if he’d experienced the same stomach-churning intensity of it. The way he went completely still said he might have.
He let her play for a while, to know him. Then he curled his fingers around her wrist and brought her the two steps forward he needed to let her feel the heat his tall frame emanated.
“You’re sure?”
She nodded. His fiery, conflicted gaze scoured her face. “I won’t take an innocent.”
“I’m not.” She didn’t need to tell him there had only ever been one, awkward and disappointing as the sex had been.
The warm night air heated up around them, like it was catching fire, too. He slid his fingers into her French twist and started pulling pins out. The buzz in her ears was so loud she couldn’t hear them hit the concrete, one by one. She should have been terrified with what little she had to bring to this insanity. Instead she trusted him on a level she didn’t understand.
He pulled out the final pin. Her hair fell loose around her shoulders. He lifted a hand and fingered a silky strand, a curious look on his face.
“What?”
“I can’t figure you out,” he murmured. “Honest, fearless, unsure of yourself at times yet so sure of so many things on a bigger life level.” He wrapped a chunk of her hair around his finger and let it slide through his hand. “It’s why Leonid asked you that question tonight. Because the essence of you is good. It emanates from you.”
Her lips pursed. “It’s the way I was brought up. I don’t know any different.”
“I do.” He bent his head and put his mouth to the hollow between her neck and shoulder. “You don’t seem real to me.”
She wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. But then it didn’t matter as she abandoned herself to the sensations his lips were evoking on her skin, the warm slide of his mouth across her heated flesh sending sparks to every inch of her body. He savored the hollow he’d found, pulled every reaction out of her with his lips and teeth. The arch of her neck, her soft sighs, guided him. More. He set his hand to her jaw, moved it to the other side and did the same masterful job to the matching sweet spot between her left shoulder and neck. It made her weak in the knees. She curled her fingers into his waist and anchored herself to him.
He slid his hand to her nape and took her mouth then. Hot, possessive and never-ending, it wasn’t like his kiss in the car. It promised carnal, exciting things to come and it made her rational brain shut down.
He pushed her jacket off her shoulders and threw it over the railing. Dispensed with the buttons on her blouse so expertly it made her wonder what the heck she was doing, thinking she could play in Harrison’s sandbox. By the time he’d undone the last button and bared her to his gaze, her cheeks were scarlet. The look of pure lust that crossed his face sent that thought flying off into the nether.
“You are so beautiful,” he murmured, absorbing her with his eyes. “I swear to God I thought you were an apparition the night I walked into the office and you were sitting in Tessa’s chair.”
