The Most Coveted Prize

‘Were you? Or were you perhaps hoping that I had chosen it because of you? Because I wanted to … please you?’

‘No!’

The lift had come to a halt and the doors were opening. Hot-faced, Alena was glad of the fact that several other people were waiting to get in. Blindly she stepped out of the lift, her head down, feeling both embarrassed and exposed, stripped bare of her defences. She felt somehow as though he could see right through into the vulnerable heart of her. His penetrating green gaze was far too keen and astute. But then it had probably looked upon many women who had been as sensually aware of him as she was now. Many, many women. For her, though, all this was very new—taking her up to the heights and then plunging her down into the depths until she was so shaken up that she felt in danger of losing the power to reason.

Instinctively heading for the main doors to the building, she was brought to a halt when Kiryl reached for her arm, holding it in a firm grip and half turning her towards him. He was standing so close to her that she could feel the power of his male sensuality engulfing her. Like a force-field it surged round her, locked round her effortlessly, holding her captive.

‘I am considering your charity because of my own mother.’

His words were so unexpected that it took Alena several seconds to grasp their meaning. Her lungs greedily sucked in the air she had briefly denied them before she was able to question, ‘Your own mother?’

Good—he had her hooked now. But then, given what he knew about the close relationship she had had with her own parents—especially her mother—it had been a foregone conclusion as far as Kiryl was concerned that to bring his own mother into any conversation he had with her was bound to elicit both her interest and ultimately her sympathy. Right now, though, having piqued her interest, it was best to keep her guessing a little, so Kiryl shook his head.

‘This is not the time for such a discussion,’ he told her. ‘It is something better discussed over lunch. Do you mind riding back in a taxi? Only when I’m in London I prefer to use taxis rather than to have a car and driver following me around. I like the freedom it gives me.’

‘No,’ Alena assured him, forced into a small self-conscious half-laugh as she admitted, ‘I love London taxis. And I’d much rather use them than have a car and driver too.’ She pulled a small face. ‘Vasilii doesn’t understand that, and doesn’t really approve.’

It was a small thing to know that he too loved the freedom that being in London gave her. A small thing, and yet immediately it made her feel more relaxed in his company—as though they shared something.

Watching her, Kiryl smiled secretly to himself. He knew perfectly well, from the information garnered by his agent, every single like and dislike Alena possessed. His goal now was to disarm her to such an extent that she ended up trusting him.

Once they were inside a taxi he told her, ‘I thought we’d have lunch back at your hotel.’

Alena nodded her head. The hotel did have an excellent restaurant, she knew. The kind of restaurant where important business was conducted on a regular basis. A man’s restaurant, Alena often felt, with a menu that was heavy on traditional gourmet meat and fish dishes and portions which she found far too generous. It was silly of her to feel disappointed. This was, after all, a business lunch and not a date. Kiryl was obviously a busy man, just like her brother, and she knew that in similar circumstances Vasilii would have done exactly the same thing.

The reminder to herself that their lunch was a business lunch had her sitting up straight on her own side of the shiny leather taxi seat as she automatically adopted what she hoped was the right pose for a businesswoman.

From his own side of the seat Kiryl, who had relaxed into the darker shadows of the corner of the seat refused to allow himself the mistake of looking at her. Not yet. That would come later. As a boy, running wild with other boys like himself—poor, ragged, half-starved boys, living hand to mouth under the aegis of their elderly foster grandmother, some of them lucky enough to have mothers who worked—he had learned to fish. Sometimes the fish he’d caught had been the only meal there was, so he had had to learn how to take his time and to wait for the right moment to catch his prey unawares.

He knew his silence now was bound to add to the tension he could see Alena was already feeling, and that suited him. Fate had handed the very best wild card he was ever likely to get when it had brought Alena Demidova into his life—without her brother.