An Enticing Debt to Pay

‘You remember far more of that day than I do.’ Another lie. Two in one day had to be a record for her. Maybe if she kept it up she could even sound convincing.

Did she imagine a slight softening in those grey eyes?

No. Easier to believe she’d scored her dream job as a pastry chef in a Michelin-starred restaurant than that this steely man had a compassionate side.

‘You haven’t changed that much.’ His deep voice stirred something unsettling deep inside.

‘No? You didn’t even recognise me.’ She pulled back but he didn’t loosen his grip. He held her trapped.

For a moment fear spidered through her, till she reminded herself he had too much pride to force himself on an unwilling woman. His hold wasn’t sexual, it was all about power. The charged awareness was all on her side, not his.

She had no intention of analysing that. She had enough to worry about.

‘You’ve changed a lot.’ Her tone made it clear it wasn’t a compliment. At twenty-one he’d been devastatingly handsome but unexpectedly kind and patient. She’d liked him, even more than liked him in her naïve way.

Now he was all harsh edges, irascible and judgemental. What was there to like?

‘We’re not here to discuss me.’ His eyes searched hers. Stoically she kept her head up and face blank. Better to brazen out her claim than show a hint of doubt.

Yet inside she was wobbly as jelly. The past days had taken their toll as she saw how grief had ravaged her mother, making her seem frail. Ravenna had sent her away from the apartment so ripe with memories of Piers. She’d offered to pack up the flat and deal with the landlord, but even those simple tasks were a test of Ravenna’s endurance. Now this...

‘We’re here to discuss my money.’ Jonas’ fingers firmed around her. ‘The money stolen from my account.’

Ravenna swallowed hard at his unrelenting tone.

Just what was the penalty for theft and forgery?

* * *

Jonas felt her hand twitch in his.

A sign of guilt or proof she lied about being the one who’d ripped him off?

Her soft eyes were huge in her finely sculpted face, giving her an air of fragility despite her punk-short hair and belligerently angled chin.

Jonas wasn’t sentimental enough to let looks mar his decision-making. Yet, absurdly, he found himself hesitating.

He didn’t want to believe Ravenna guilty.

Far easier to believe her rapacious mother had organised this swindle. After years keeping his emotions bottled up he’d almost enjoyed the roaring surge of fury against his father’s mistress that had borne him across the channel in a red-misted haze.

But what bothered him most was the recognition he didn’t want it to be Ravenna because he remembered her devastating innocence and honesty years ago. He didn’t want to reconcile that memory with the knowledge she’d become a thief.

Jonas’ lips twisted. Who’d have thought he still had illusions he didn’t want to shatter? He’d been too long in the cut-throat business world to believe in the innate honesty of mankind. Experience had taught him man—and womankind were out for all they could get.

Why should this revelation be so unwelcome?

‘You say you wrote the cheques?’

Again that jerk of tension through her. Her pulse tripped against his palm and he resisted the absurd impulse to caress her there.

She nodded, the movement brief but emphatic.

‘How did you get access to the cheque book?’ Piers would have been canny enough to keep it close at hand, not lying around. ‘Were you living here with them?’

‘No, I—’ She paused and her gaze shifted away. Instinct told him she hid something. ‘But I visited. Often. My mother and I have always been close.’

That at least had the ring of truth. He remembered her misery in her teens, not simply because she hated school and the vicious little witches who made her life hell there, but because she didn’t want to disappoint her mother by leaving. She cared what her mother thought.

Enough to learn her mother’s ways in seeking easy money from a man? Had she modelled herself on Silvia?

The notion left a sour tang of disappointment on his tongue.

‘You’re hurting me!’

Jonas eased his grip, but didn’t let her go. He was determined to sort this out. Until then he’d keep her close.

‘Why did you need the money?’

Her eyebrows arched and she tilted her head as if to inspect him. As if he weren’t already close enough to see the rays of gold in the depths of her eyes.

‘You’re kidding, right?’ Her tone of insouciant boredom echoed the attitude of entitlement he’d heard so often among wealthy, privileged young things who’d never worked a day in their lives. Except something in her tone was ever so slightly off-key.

Suspicion snaked through him.

He pulled her closer, till her body mirrored his. He felt the tension hum through her. Good! He wanted her unsettled.

‘A girl needs to live, doesn’t she?’ This time there was an edge of desperation in her tone. ‘I’ve had...expenses.’

‘What sort of expenses? Even shopping at the top Parisian fashion houses wouldn’t have swallowed up all that money.’

Her gaze slid from his. ‘This and that.’

A cold, hard weight formed in the pit of Jonas’ belly. He was surprised to feel nausea well.

‘Drugs?’

She shook her head once, then shrugged. ‘Debts.’

‘Gambling?’

‘Why the inquisition? I’ve admitted I took your money. That’s all that matters.’ Her gaze meshed with his and a jagged flash of heat resonated through Jonas. It stunned him.

How could a mere look do that? It wasn’t even a sultry invitation but a surly, combative stare that annoyed the hell out of him.

Yet aftershocks still tumbled through his clenching belly and he found himself leaning closer, inhaling her warm cinnamon and hot woman scent.

This couldn’t be happening.