An Enticing Debt to Pay

She shook her head, banishing the absurd thought.

‘Ravenna?’

Her head jerked up. She remembered him calling her by name years before, the only time they’d really talked. In her emotionally charged state then she’d imagined no one but he could ever make her name sound so appealing. For years her unusual name had been the source of countless jibes. She’d been labelled the scrawny raven and far, far worse at school. It was disturbing to discover that even now he turned her name into something special.

‘What?’

‘Are you okay?’ His voice came from closer and she stiffened her spine.

‘As okay as you can expect when you barge in here threatening my mother with gaol.’

For a moment longer Ravenna stared out of the window. The Place des Vosges, elegant and symmetrical with its manicured gardens, looked as unchanged as ever, as if nothing could disturb its self-conscious complacency.

But she’d learned the hard way that real life was never static, never safe.

Reluctantly she turned to find him looming over her, his eyes unreadable.

‘What is she supposed to have done?’

‘There’s no suppose about it. Do you think I’d come here—’ his voice was ripe with contempt as he swept the salon with a wide gesture ‘—if it wasn’t fact?’

Ravenna’s heart dropped. She couldn’t believe her mother had done anything terrible, but at the same time she knew only the most extreme circumstances would bring Jonas Deveson within a kilometre of Silvia Ruggiero. There was hatred in his eyes when he spoke of her.

‘You’re too angry to think straight.’ At her words his lowering dark brows shot up towards his hairline. Clearly this was a man unused to opposition.

She drew another, slower breath. ‘You’ve despised my mother for years and now you think you’ve found a way to make her pay for the sin of falling in love with your father.’

The sizzle of fire in his eyes told her she’d hit the nail on the head. Her hands slipped onto her hips as she let righteous indignation fortify her waning strength.

‘I think you’ve decided that, without Piers here to defend her, she’s easy prey.’ Her breath hitched. ‘But she’s not alone. You’d do well to remember that.’

‘What? She’s moved on already?’ His voice was contemptuous. ‘She’s found another protector to take his place? That must be some sort of record.’

Ravenna wasn’t aware of lunging towards him but suddenly she was so close she saw his pupils dilate as her open hand swung up hard and fast towards his cheek.

The movement came to a juddering halt that reverberated through her as he caught her wrist. He lifted it high so she stretched up on her toes, leaning towards him. Her breasts, belly and thighs tingled as if from an electric charge as the heat of his body, mere centimetres away, burned hers.

His eyebrows lowered, angling down straight and obstinate over eyes so intent they seemed to peer into her very soul.

His scent—clean male skin and a hint of citrus—invaded her nostrils. Abruptly she realised she’d ventured too far into dangerous territory when she found herself inhaling and holding her breath.

A shimmy of reaction jittered through her. A reaction she couldn’t name. It froze the air in her lungs.

Instinct warned he was dangerous in ways that had nothing to do with her mother.

Ravenna tugged hard but he refused to release her hand.

Leaning up towards him like this, almost touching along the length of their bodies, Ravenna became fully aware of the raw, masculine power hidden beneath the designer suit. The clothes were those of an urbane businessman. The burning stare and aura of charged testosterone spoke instead of primitive male power, barely leashed.

She breathed deep, trying to douse rising panic, and registered an unfamiliar spicy musk note in the air. Her nerves stretched tighter.

Never had Ravenna felt so aware of the imbalance of physical power between male and female. Of the fact that, despite her height, she was no match for this man who held her so easily and so off balance.

‘Nobody slaps me.’ His lips barely moved, yet Ravenna felt his warm breath on her face with each terse word.

‘Nobody insults my mother like that.’

Even stretched taut against him, her mind grappling with a multitude of new sensations, she refused to back down. She stared into those glittering, merciless eyes and felt a thrill of fear, realising he was utterly unyielding.

‘Then we’re at an impasse, Ms Ruggiero.’

Did he tug her closer or did she sway towards him? Suddenly keeping her balance was almost impossible as she teetered on the balls of her feet.

‘In which case there’s no need for the macho act. You can let me go.’ She paused, deliberately going limp in his hold. ‘Unless you feel you have something to prove.’

Relief gushed through her as he released her.

Rather than let him see it, Ravenna bent her head as if examining her wrist for bruises. There wouldn’t be any. His touch hadn’t been brutal, but its implacability had scared her.

‘Let’s get one thing straight,’ she said finally, looking up into his arresting, aristocratic face. ‘My mother loved your father.’

‘You expect me to believe that?’ Jonas shook his head, his lips curling in a sneer. ‘I’m not some callow kid who believes in fairy tales. She was on the make—out to snare a rich lover. It was obvious to everyone.’ He raised a silencing hand when she would have spoken. ‘She flaunted herself every chance she got.’

‘My mother never—’

‘He was years older, with a wife, a home, a family. He had an extraordinarily comfortable lifestyle, the respect of his peers and a social life he revelled in. You think a man of my father’s disposition would give all that up unless he’d been lured into it by a clever gold-digger?’

Ravenna hesitated, as ever torn by the knowledge of how many people had been hurt by Piers and her mother. But loyalty made her speak up.

‘You don’t believe in love, then?’

‘Love?’ He almost snorted the word. ‘Silvia pandered to his desires in the most obvious way. I’m sure he loved flaunting her just as he loved showing off his other possessions.’ His gaze raked the room, lingering on a Cézanne on the far wall that Ravenna knew for a fact was a copy of an original sold just last year. The derisive twist of Jonas’ lips told her he knew it too.

‘And as for her...’ Wide shoulders shrugged. ‘He was just a meal ticket. They had nothing in common except a love of luxury and an aversion to hard work. Why should she toil on as a housekeeper when she could be kept in style for simply letting him—’

‘That’s enough!’ Bile blocked Ravenna’s throat and she swallowed hard, forcing it down. ‘I don’t want to hear any more of your poison.’

His brows rose. ‘You’re hardly a schoolkid any more, Ravenna.’ This time when he said her name there was no lingering warmth and no frisson of subtle reaction. ‘You can’t pretend.’

‘Leave it!’ She put up her hand for silence. ‘We’ll never agree, so leave it.’ She hefted in a deep, steadying breath. ‘Just cut to the chase and tell me why you’re here.’

* * *

Fury still sizzled in Jonas’ blood so he took his time slowing his breathing and finding his equilibrium. It wasn’t like him to lose his cool. He was known for his detachment, his calm clarity of vision even in the most potentially dangerous of commercial ventures.

And in his personal life...he’d learned his lesson early, watching his father lurch from one failed love affair to another. He’d seen the ecstatic highs of each new fixation, then the boredom and disappointment of each failure.

Jonas wasn’t like his father. He’d made it his business to be as different from the old man as humanly possible. He was rock steady, reliable, controlled.