The practised snick of the safety catch on a revolver made him rethink. Fast. It was a sound that resonated through his brain and threw him back thirteen years. Even his back stiffened, as if he were waiting for the echo of a bullet to penetrate his spine. Rob him of the dreams of his youth. End life as he knew it.

‘Stay right where you are. I did not give you permission to move.’

A shiver glanced over his flesh at the cool, dominant tone, as if he’d been physically frisked not just verbally spanked.

‘As you wish,’ he said, taking his voice down an octave or three and coating it in sin. ‘Though I’d much rather conduct this meeting face to face. More so if you are as beautiful as your voice.’

Maybe it was her barely audible huff or maybe it was the impatient tap of a stiletto heel on wood but Nic would swear she’d just rolled her eyes.

‘Who are you and how did you get into my suite?’

Suddenly the ridiculousness of the situation hit him. Was he actually being controlled by a woman?

Shifting on his feet, he made to swivel. ‘I’m turning around so we can have this conversation like two adul—’

A sharp sound like a whip cracking rent the air and Nic’s jaw dropped as he married the sound of a silenced bullet with the precise hole in the oil painting of a wolf about three feet from his head.

How ironic. Lobisomem. Portuguese for werewolf. His Q Virtus moniker.

Omen? He damned well hoped not.

The smell of the gunpowder residue curled through his sinuses and the past seemed to collide with the present, making his stomach clench on a nauseating pang. Sweat trickled down his spine and he had to surreptitiously clear the thickness from his throat just to speak.

‘Crack shot, querida.’ Question was, why wouldn’t she let him turn, look at her?

‘The best, I assure you. Now, tell me I have your undivided attention and that you will behave.’

Nic had the distinct feeling he wasn’t going to win this argument. And that voice... Dios, she could read him passages from the most profoundly boring literature in the world and he’d still get sweaty and hard at the sound of her licking those consonants and vowels past her lips.

‘I will be on my best behaviour. Scout’s honour.’

Not that he’d ever been one. At the suggestion his mother had arched one perfectly plucked, disgusted brow, told him the idea was simply not to be endured and that she’d rather take him to the country club to play poker.

How he’d loved that woman.

Ignoring the misery dragging at his heart, he strived for joviality. ‘Though if it’s co-operation you’re looking for, I’ll be far more amenable without a gun trained on my head by an expert marksman.’

‘Trouble must follow you if you’re familiar with the sounds of a loaded gun. Why does that not surprise me?’

‘Guess I’m just that kind of guy.’

‘A thief? A criminal? Insane?’

Dios! Why was everyone calling him insane today?

‘Misjudged was more the word I was thinking of. Or maybe I’m simply enigmatic, like your lover. Or is he your boss?’

‘My...boss?’ she replied, with a haughty edge that said no man would ever lord it over her.

He almost rolled his eyes then. ‘Okay, then, your lover.’

That earned him a disgruntled snicker.

‘Think again. And while you’re at it who are you talking about? Who is my boss supposed to be? Who are you looking for?’

‘Zeus, of course—who else?’

The room hushed into a cacophony of silence; the lack of sound so loud his ears rang. No doubt a pin dropping would have detonated in an explosion of sound.

Nic pounced on the lull—he’d always liked creating a big bang. ‘I have a meeting with him here. Tonight. So if you’d like to run along and get him I’d be greatly appreciative.’

A stunned pause gave way to a burst of incredulous laughter. The kind that was infectious. It was rusty—as if she didn’t get much practice—but it was out there, all smoky and sultry, and it filled him with a scorching hot kind of pleasure.

Who the devil was she?

‘A meeting, you say? I think not. And I believe you are toying with the wrong woman, stranger. So forgive me if I just run along and leave you with some friends of mine.’

From nowhere three hulks had three guns trained on various parts of his anatomy and he fought the violent urge to cup his crotch. Because 1) despite evidence to the contrary he was of high intellect, and 2) despite their tailored Savile Row attire their eyes were dull from a hard life and the inevitable slide into madness.

Splendid.

For pity’s sake, why guns? Why not knives? He hated guns!

‘Ah, come now, querida, this is hardly fair. Three against one?’

‘I wish you the best of luck. If you survive we will meet again.’

He’d always been a lover, not a fighter. Still, living on the streets had taught him more than how to break a lock—which was just as well because he was nowhere near done with this night or this woman.

CHAPTER TWO

SHE SHOULDN’T HAVE LEFT. Walked out. Left them to rid her of the criminal in their midst. Here she’d been expecting news of his disposal to the authorities, or his being shoved onto a plane to Timbuktu, and instead she was standing in the security room faced with three decidedly sheepish guards and a fifty-two-inch plasma screen filled with the image of a prominent, high-profile billionaire tied up in her cellar!

‘I don’t believe this,’ Pia breathed.

Exquisitely tall.

Beautifully dark.

Devastatingly handsome.

And infamous for satisfying his limitless wants and desires. Not—as far as she was aware, and she generally knew more than most—renowned for being a felon.

‘Nicandro Carvalho. I almost shot Nicandro Carvalho!’

Pia’s insides shook like a shaken soda can ready to spray. He’d been in her bedroom. Maybe watched her sleep. She’d been half naked when he’d swaggered into her rooms and for a split second she’d thought her past was catching up with her.

But what really ratcheted up her ‘creeped-out’ meter was the fact she’d shot her favourite painting. Of a werewolf. Lobisomem. How freaky was that? Considering she’d code-named him herself.

‘It would have been his own fault! What was he doing, snooping around in there?’

All three testosterone-dripping men in the room flinched at Jovan’s holler but Pia was used to his bark—especially where she was concerned. Protectiveness didn’t come close to the way he went on. Ridiculous. You would think she was eight, not twenty-eight.

‘More to the point, how did he even get in here?’ she said, glaring at her supposed security staff, who flushed beneath her scrutiny. ‘Find the breach and deal with it. Someone betrayed me today and I want them found.’

Skin visibly paled at her tone. ‘Yes, madame.’

Purposefully avoiding the image on screen—because every time she looked at Carvalho the lamb she’d eaten for dinner threatened to reappear—she speared Jovan with her displeasure. ‘Did you realise who he was before you roughed him up? Tell me you went easy on him.’

‘Easy?’ Jovan said, with a hefty amount of incredulity, and she only had to glance across the room to see why.

One of his men sported a black eye and a broken nose, the other winced with every turn and the third had a pronounced limp.

‘The guy should be a cage fighter! I recognised that pretty-boy face within minutes and I still wanted to pulverise him, regardless. He could have hurt you, Pia! So what if the man has money? Only last year they discovered that billionaire who had buried thirty-two bodies in his back yard!’

Heaven help her.

‘All right—calm down.’ If he worked himself up any more he’d either have a seizure or charge back in there to finish Carvalho off. Which would now be a manageable feat, considering he’d tied the stunner to a chair so tightly the ropes were likely cutting off his circulation. ‘Like every member, he’s been checked out thoroughly.’

Born in Brazil to a lower class family, he’d sailed to New York to make his fortune. The fact he’d come from nothing, was a self-made man, had gained her deepest respect from the start. Pia had first-hand experience of being hungry, feeling worthless, powerless, and she never wanted to revisit that hellhole ever again. The amount of determination it would have taken Carvalho to rise from the ashes with no help had fascinated and charmed her in equal measure.

‘If there was something amiss about him I would know.’ Yet suddenly she wasn’t so sure. Her instincts screamed that this man was far more than he’d initially appeared.

‘People don’t tend to put “serial killer” and “rapist” on their résumé, Pia.’

Valid point.

She tapped at the pounding spot between her brows, feeling as if she’d been given a complex puzzle with half the pieces left out.

‘I’m missing something vital. I must be. First he breaks in, then he has a snoop at the files on my desk. Eros longer than most—I’d know that red file anywhere—and then...’ She ran her tongue over her top front teeth. ‘Now, isn’t that a coincidence? That Eros International should catch his eye.’

The company had taken a suspiciously abrupt beating on the stockmarket of late. Though in all honesty Eros’s share decline had been the least of her concerns. Ugly rumours were abounding, hitting her where it hurt. Her reputation.

Could he be the thorn in her side? The man who’d been making discreet enquiries about Zeus, about the club, about her businesses—the very man who’d been spreading filth and lies?

Maybe. After all, in her world anything was possible. But why?

Stuff it. She had no intention of waiting around while some property magnate ruined her life. If he was to blame.

‘Turn off the screens. I’m going in there.’

She wanted answers and there was only one way to get them. She just hoped she was wrong and there was some perfectly good explanation for his breaking and entering. Yeah, right. Call her foolish, but she didn’t want Nicandro Carvalho to be at the centre of her current storm.

‘What?’

‘You heard me.’

While Jovan dismissed his men with a quiet word her gaze sought out Nicandro Carvalho once again. Obscenely grateful that her dinner stayed put and she remained apathetic and unflappable. As if the sight of a six-foot-plus Brazilian hunk with a bloodied lip was an everyday occurrence. She was good at that. Projecting absolute calm composure while her stomach revolted at the sight of her Lobisomem in a snare.

She rubbed her own upper arms, sore with the faint echoes of pain. She wanted to scream and rail at Jovan for trussing him so tightly. Perhaps she’d tie him up until control was lost, handed to another. See how he liked it.

‘Did you have to cut off his blood supply?’ she asked, cringeing inwardly at her snippy tone. Not for Jovan’s sake. He was more like the bothersome older brother she’d never had, so she didn’t bother to pull her punches with him. But the last thing she needed was to come over unhinged to her staff. ‘Women are emotional liabilities,’ her father would say. Not her. Not since he’d made her into a living, breathing machine.

‘Who cares if I did?’ Jovan asked.

Pia cared—for some bizarre reason. But she wasn’t about to tell him that. Just as she wasn’t about to admit that at times she’d secretly watched Nicandro Carvalho over the past year. There was something darkly arresting about him. One look at his brooding beauty, at that dark skin that looked as if exotic blood ran through his veins, and she felt giddy with it all.

Pia was tall for a woman, and yet his towering height, wide shoulders and the thick biceps bulging from where his arms strained made her feel like a porcelain doll. Though he was snared, anyone could see his bearing was straight, confident, almost regal—like titan warriors and powerful gods. Not an image she would expect from a boy born in the Rio slums. The fact that he took pride in that fact, felt no shame for his poor origins and preferred to acknowledge the truth and stand tall with dignity, had lent him a kind of reverence in her eyes. She’d never been able to shake the stigma of it all.

Hung loosely about his face, his hair was the deepest shade of brown. She suspected it would curl when wet, drying into untamed flicks that twisted to his shoulders and fell wantonly about his face. Sharp brooding eyes almost black in their depths were framed lavishly with thick dark lashes: luscious, evocative and dominating.

And there was that word again—regal—rolling through her mind as she frantically tried to piece together the how and why he had broken into her suite and was now trussed to a chair. None of it made sense.

Jovan’s hard voice ripped her attention from the seriously ripped Carvalho and she spun to see him leaning his six-foot-five frame against a bank of security screens.

‘He did this to himself, Pia. Let me deal with him—please?’ His chiselled features twisted, playing out a complex series of emotional shifts.

‘No. He wants something.’ Right then she flashed back to their brief conversation. ‘And I suspect it is something only Zeus can give—otherwise why lie about having a meeting prearranged? So before he destroys my club with his ugly rumours, or costs me another twenty-five million on the stockmarket, I want to know why.’

Jovan grumbled in the way Pia had learned to ignore. ‘So what do you intend to do with him?’

Stress and worry lined his brow, reminding her of the day they’d met. When he’d swept her into his arms as she’d lain knocking on death’s door outside her father’s palatial entryway. Sixteen years old and before then she hadn’t even known her father existed. Without Jovan, Pia doubted she would have survived in her father’s frigid Siberian world.

‘I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I have no idea.’

Commodities? A cinch. Juggling multi-million-dollar investments every day? A breeze. Dealing with people? Excruciating torture.

‘I’ll just have to play it by ear. Question him. Find out what he wants and why.’

Jovan snorted. ‘Good luck with that one. He is arrogant. Overly cocky and dangerously determined.’

‘Then we are equally matched. I don’t believe in coincidences, Jovan. My gut tells me he’s responsible for the rumours and the mayhem at Eros, and if so he wants something and won’t disappear until he gets it. It would be foolish of me to take my eyes off him for one second.’

‘So we put him on watch. Twenty-four-seven.’

‘Or I go in there. Deal with him. Quickly. Quietly.’

‘Pia, please. It is too risky.’

‘Since when have I been afraid of a little risk?’ Never. Fear would never touch her heart again. ‘He’s sure to tell me far more than he would ever tell you, and I’ll hazard a guess he’ll remain obstinate until he meets the man behind Q Virtus anyway.’

‘He’ll be waiting a long time.’

‘Quite. So I’ll put him off. Persuade him to deal with me and figure out what he’s looking for. Why he’d chance his membership, his reputation, his business and fortune, by toying with the club. With me personally. He must know Zeus could bring him down.’

‘But you’ll place yourself in jeopardy. Under the spotlight. What if he realises you and Zeus are one and the same person? That your father is dead?’

Without thought Pia let her fingers creep up to her throat, where her pulse beat against her palm in a wild tattoo. Such an outcome wasn’t even worth contemplating.

‘He won’t. He’s a man. He’s predictable and he won’t look beyond my breasts. Women are designed for whoring or childbearing in his world—the truth wouldn’t occur to him in a million years. Granted, very few people know Antonio Merisi had a daughter, but my existence is no secret. If he looked in the right places he’d know I exist. When I tell him he’ll think I am merely ornamental—a pampered child—so I doubt he’ll crow to his friends that he was wrestled to the ground by a mere female.’

The man had a superb business mind and a vast IQ, but he was arrogant and conceited and as dominant as they came. Any battle between them would likely stay behind doors.

‘This is my life we’re talking about and the future of a club I swore would stand the test of time.’ Damn the old rules. ‘Damn the dinosaurs that litter the ranks of my club.’

They’d never accept leadership from someone with a sullied past such as hers. Not only that, but the gentlemen’s club was bound by rules—archaic, chauvinistic rules created by troglodytes—that declared only a Merisi man could lead. Only a man could own and control the largest business interests in the world.

Yet here she was. Groomed. Her path decided the moment her father had seen her, semi-conscious in Jovan’s arms. She’d become the son Antonio Merisi had never had. His heir. His corporate assassin. The girl he’d called worthless, tainted, illiterate trash at first glance, making her feel dirtier than the clothes on her back. The same girl who’d then taken his fortune and quadrupled it within the first two years of living under his excessively opulent roof.

She was master of the most exclusive club in the world. Perpetually in hiding. Habitually alone. And that was the way it must stay.

‘If my instincts are right he’s declared war and I’m fighting blind—ignorant of the cause. If I’m to have any chance of surviving I need the right weapon to wield. Turn off the screens, Jovan.’ Her tone brooked no argument. ‘I’m going in.’

The monitors flickered to black and a moment later a faint tap on the door preceded Clarissa Knight, one of the petite q’s, shifting on her feet as she was nudged through the space, a telling flush driving high on her cheekbones.

The pennies dropped more quickly than a Las Vegas slot machine flashing ‘Winner’ in neon lights.

Oh, wonderful. A lovesick puppy.

Pia checked a disgusted growl. ‘Oh, Clarissa, tell me he promised you the world—or at least a permanent position in his bed?’

Simultaneously Clarissa’s eyes fell to the floor and Jovan raised a small, flat high-tech sensor pad in the air, his expression warning her not to underestimate their intrepid foe.

Fingerprint recognition.

Her anger dissipated as fast as it came. She wasn’t going to ask Clarissa how it felt to be used. She remembered humiliation and worthlessness all too well.

* * *

Somewhere in that dark abyss between unconsciousness and lucidity a razor-sharp rapping registered and Nic tried for a gentle head-shake. His temples loathed that idea, twisting his stomach into a tight knot, pleading with him not to even attempt it a second time.

Prising his bruised eye open wasn’t much of a picnic either, but his heuristic brain—not to mention his sense of self-preservation—was keen to know exactly how much trouble he was in.

And he was in trouble. The ropes cutting into the skin of his wrists was a dead giveaway.

Well, he’d been in worse situations. Look on the bright side, Nic. You’re in. Zeus is here. Somewhere. They haven’t thrown you out. Yet.

Neck aching from being slumped forward, he cautiously raised his head to take in his surroundings.

His mind registered the darkness, the shadows prancing around the bare room, before he focused on a single stream of moonlight shining through the only small window, illuminating one stiletto-heeled foot tap-tap-tapping on the floor.

Ah. He suspected that was the culprit responsible for the lethargic woodpecker hammering at his head. Yet, oddly enough, all was forgotten as his appreciative eyes glissaded upwards.

Vintage towering black patent heels with an inch-thick sole. Sculpted ankles and toned calves. Sheer stockings draping long, long luscious legs and disappearing beneath a short, black figure-hugging pencil skirt.

His mind took another detour, wondering when he’d last had sex. Full-on, hedonistic, mind-blowing, erotic carnality usually kept his body taut, but now he thought about it he hadn’t felt the need in months. Little wonder he was famished.

‘Good evening, Mr Carvalho.’

A rush of heat shimmered over his skin like a phantom fire. ‘Well, well, well—if it isn’t my little gunslinger.’

‘We meet again. How are you feeling?’

Mouth as dry and hot as the desert sands, he licked his lips. His voice still came out gravelly with repressed need. ‘Much better for seeing you, querida. Or at least the half that I can see. I do wish you’d come a little closer. You can trust me.’

‘Said the wolf to the lamb,’ she quipped. ‘Was it that charming reprobate tongue you used to gain access to my private suite, Mr Carvalho?’

‘Call me Nicandro, please. I’d like to think my submissive aspect puts us on first-name terms at least. Right now you could do anything you desired to me.’

Straddling his lap would his first choice. Pressing her breasts into his chest and licking into his mouth and down the column of his throat would be the second. The agony of feeling her all over his body but being unable to touch... Exquisite torture.

‘Very well...Nicandro.’

His name rolled deliciously from her mouth with a hint of European inflection. Italian, or maybe Greek. He didn’t miss the fact that she still hadn’t given him her name, but he was too busy imagining thick, dark curling locks and hazel eyes to match that smoky, sultry voice.

‘Let us discuss the misdemeanour of breaking and entering. It stands to reason—our being on first-name terms, after all—that you should tell me exactly what you were doing in my private rooms this evening.’

‘Tell me your name and I will.’

That she didn’t want to was clear. But two could play this game, and he hadn’t needed to hear the safety click of her revolver or the commands she’d issued to the staff to tell him this woman held power. Exactly how much he had yet to figure out.

‘My name is Olympia Merisi.’

Now, that was unexpected. He barely managed to swallow the sharp hitch in his breath.

‘Ah. The little wife, then?’ A healthy dose of disappointment made him frown. What did he care who she was chained to?

‘Little? Now, there is something I’ve never been called. As for me being a wife—angels will dance in hell before I submit to any man.’

Nic could soon change that. In fact he was tempted to make it his mission. Which was incongruous, considering he hadn’t even seen her face yet.

‘A more accurate description for me would be...daughter.’

Everything stopped, as if someone had pressed ‘pause’ on the drama that was his life.

Zeus had a daughter. Well, now, every cloud had a silver lining and it seemed the fates were looking down on him tonight.

How utterly opportune. How devilishly delicious.

This new information gave him extra verve to break loose and he regained his attempts at loosening the knots binding his wrists as he found his tongue.

‘In that case I do hope I didn’t cause too much damage to your father’s security staff. I was hoping to meet the man himself to apologise.’ If he were Pinocchio his nose would have poked her eye out by now.

‘That is very decent of you,’ she said, skating the lines of sarcasm.

‘I thought so too. I’m a very decent man.’

‘That remains to be seen. You see, I have the very old-fashioned view that seducing a member of my staff and breaking into private quarters does not decent make.’

He flashed her a mock-aggrieved look. ‘Now you are just nitpicking, querida. I was curious, that is all.’

A small flat black box spun through the air and landed at his feet with a clatter.

Ah. Busted.

‘I would expect to find such high-tech equipment in the hands of a CIA operative, not a man who is merely curious to meet another. I very much doubt you’d find such a thing in the electronics section at the local store.’

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