A Debt Paid in Passion

One that had been in his wallet so long he couldn’t remember when or for whom he’d placed it there. He’d only been grateful to find it when a downpour had turned Sirena from the open front door into his arms. A stumbling bump of her pivoting into him, a gentlemanly attempt to keep her on her feet, a collision of soft curves against a body already charged with sexual hunger.

When she’d looked up at him with wonder as her abdomen took the impression of his erection, when she’d parted her lips and looked at his mouth as though she’d been waiting her whole life to feel it cover her own...

Swearing, Raoul rose to pace his Paris office. It was as far as he was willing to get from London after trying to settle with Sirena once and for all. The remembered vision of her passion-glazed eyes became overlaid with a more recent one: when her lawyer had mentioned her pregnancy and she had shot that petrified look at Raoul.

The baby was his. He knew it in his gut and if he’d been ruthless with her for stealing money, she had no idea the lengths he’d go for his child.

Doubt niggled, though. If the baby was his, and she was the type to embezzle, then try to sleep her way out of it, why wasn’t she trying to squeeze a settlement out of him?

None of it added up and he was losing his mind trying to make sense of it. If she’d only talk to him. They used to communicate with incredible fluidity, finishing each other’s sentences, filling in gaps with a look...

Lies, he reminded himself. All an act to trick him into trusting her, and it had worked. That’s what grated so badly. He’d failed to see that she was unreliable, despite his history with shameless charlatans.

And how the hell had he turned into his father? Was it genetic that he should wind up sexually infatuated with his secretary? He’d successfully ignored such attractions for years. His father had killed himself over an interoffice affair, so he’d made it a personal rule to avoid such things at all costs. It was a matter of basic survival.

His surge of interest in Sirena had been intense right from the beginning, though. He’d hired her in spite of it, partly because he’d been sure he was a stronger man than his father. Maybe he’d even been trying to prove it.

It galled him that he’d fallen into a tryst despite his better intentions. But he might have come to terms with that failing if she hadn’t betrayed him. Suddenly he’d been not just his father, but his mother, naively watching the bank account drain while being fed sweet, reassuring words to excuse it.

I was going to pay it back before you found out.

He tried to close out the echo of Sirena’s clear voice, claiming exactly what any dupe would expect to hear once she realized her caught hands were covered in red. That he’d seen her as steadfast until that moment left him questioning his own judgment, which was a huge kick to his confidence. People relied on him all over the world. His weakness for her made him feel as though he was misrepresenting himself, and more than anything he hated being let down. It galled him. Mere repayment wasn’t good enough to compensate for that. People like her needed to be taught a lesson.

Staring at his desktop full of work, he cursed the concentration he’d lost because of all this, the time wasted on legal meetings that could have been spent on work.

And the worst loss of production was because he was trying to replace the best PA he’d ever had!

Seemingly the best. His only comfort was that he hadn’t given her the executive title he’d been considering. The damage she could have done in a position like that was beyond thinking. She was doing enough harm to his bottom line no longer employed by him at all.

It couldn’t go on. He’d finally, reluctantly, sent her a strongly worded ultimatum and his palms were sweating that she would reject this one, too. She knew him well enough to believe that when he said final, he meant final, but he’d never had anything so valuable as his flesh and blood on the table. If she refused again...

She wouldn’t. Sirena Abbott was more avaricious than he’d given her credit for, but she was innately practical. She would recognize he’d hit his limit and would cash in.

As if to prove it, his email blipped with a message from his lawyer.

Sirena Abbott had an appointment on Monday and wanted the rest of the week to think things through.

Raoul leaned on hands that curled into tight fists. His inner being swelled with triumph. Silly woman. When he said Monday, he meant Monday.

* * *

As Sirena entered the alcove that housed the front of her building, she was still preoccupied by the lecture from the obstetrician about taking time to relax. She needed to read up on side effects of the medication he’d prescribed, too.

Distracted, she didn’t notice anyone until a lean, masculine body stepped out of the shadows. Her pulse leaped in excited recognition even as she jerked in alarm.

Her keys dropped with a clatter. Pressing herself into the glass door, she pulled her collar tighter to her throat. His familiar scent overwhelmed her, spicy and masculine beneath a layer of rain. The late-afternoon gloom threw forbidding shadows into the angles of his features and turned his short, spiky lashes into sharp blades above turbulent eyes. He was compelling as ever and she was as susceptible as always.

“Hello, Sirena.”

That voice.

“What are you doing here?” Her knuckles dug into her neck where her pulse raced with dangerous speed. She was supposed to be avoiding this sort of elevation of her heart rate, but Raoul had always done this to her. Thank God she’d spent two years perfecting how to hide her girlish flushes of awareness and awestruck admiration. With a tilt of her chin she conveyed that he didn’t intimidate her—even though she was in danger of cracking the glass at her back, she was pressed so hard against it.

“You didn’t really think I’d wait until Friday,” he said, uncompromising and flinty.

“I didn’t think you’d be waiting at my door,” she protested, adding with admirable civility, “I’ll review the documents tomorrow, I promise.”

Raoul shook his head in condescension. “Today, Sirena.”

“It’s been a long day, Raoul. Don’t make it longer.” Her voice was weighted with more tiredness than she meant to reveal.

His eyes narrowed. “What sort of appointment did you have? Doctor?”

A little shiver of premonition went through her. Something told her not to let him see how unsettling the news had been, but the reality of all those tests and personal history forms had taken a toll. If she had thought she could avoid signing a shared custody agreement with Raoul, today she’d learned it was imperative she do so.

“Is the baby all right?” Raoul demanded gruffly. The edgy concern in his tone affected her, making her soften and stiffen at the same time.

“The baby is fine,” she said firmly. If the mother could keep herself healthy enough to deliver—and ensure there was at least one parent left to rear it—the baby was in a great position for a long and happy life.

“You?” he questioned with sharp acuity. Damned man never missed a thing.

“I’m tired,” she prevaricated. “And I have to use the loo. It’s only five o’clock. That gives me seven hours. Come back at eleven fifty-nine.”

Raoul’s jaw hardened. “No.” Leaning down, brushing entirely too close to her legs, he picked up her keys and straightened. “No more games, no more lawyers. You and I are hammering this out. Now.”

Sirena tried to take her keys, but Raoul only closed his hand over them, leaving her fingers brushing the hard strength of his knuckles.

The contact sent an electric zing through her nervous system, leaving her entire body quivering over what was a ridiculously innocuous touch.

She’d been too stressed and nauseous to have sexual feelings these last months, but suddenly every vessel in her body came alive to the presence of this man, the avenging god who had never had any genuine respect for her in the first place.

Tamping down on the rush of hurt and disappointment that welled in her chest, Sirena found her spine, standing up to him as well as a woman in flats could to a man who was head and shoulders taller than she was.

“Let’s get something clear,” she said, voice trembling a bit. She hoped he put it down to anger, not weak, stupid longing for something that had never existed. “Whatever agreement we come to is contingent on paternity tests proving you’re the father.”

Raoul rocked back on his heels. His negotiation face slid into place over his shock. In the shadowed alcove, Sirena wasn’t sure if his pupils really contracted to pinpoints, but she felt his gaze like a lance that held her in place. It made her nervous, but she was proud of herself for taking him aback. She couldn’t afford to be a pushover.

“Who else is in the running?” he gritted out.

“I have a life beyond your exalted presence.” The lies went up like umbrellas, but she had so few advantages.

He stood unflinching and austere, but there was something in his bearing that made her heart pang. She knew he was the father, but by keeping him guessing she was performing a type of torture on him, keeping him in a state of anxious inability to act. It was cruel and made her feel ashamed.

Don’t be a wimp, Sirena. He could take care of himself. The only thing she needed to worry about was her baby.

“Let’s get this done,” she said.

CHAPTER THREE