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“You know, for a corporate shark, you’re pretty good at this white-knight stuff,” she observed as he tucked his phone away.
“I make a good ally.”
“But a terrifying enemy, I bet.”
“You’ll never have to find out.”
“Even if I refuse my father’s ultimatum?” She didn’t bother to point out that if she did agree, she could still choose to marry a different man.
They both knew how unlikely that was.
Her youthful affections notwithstanding, she wasn’t about to marry a stranger or a man who had multiple divorces under his belt.
Vik reached out and cupped her nape, stepping forward until mere centimeters separated their bodies, the heat from his surrounding her in a strangely protective cocoon. He didn’t say anything, just caught her gaze, his dark eyes compelling her to some sort of belief.
Her breath escaped in a whoosh, unexpected and instant physical reaction crackling along her nerve endings while her heart started a precipitando. “Viktor?”
“You will never be my enemy, Madison.”
“You’re so confident I’ll do what you want?”
“I’m confident in you, there’s a difference.”
There so was. He couldn’t have said anything more guaranteed to get to her. People who believed in Maddie were a premium in her life. And less by one after this morning.
Dark espresso eyes continued to trap her even more effectively than his hand on her neck. “Trust me.”
“Do I have a choice?” she asked with an attempt at sarcasm.
“No.” His reply held no responding humor. Tilting his head, he stopped only when their lips almost touched. “You don’t, and do you know why?”
“Tell me,” she said in a voice that barely registered above a whisper.
“You already do.” Then his mouth pressed against hers and the drumbeat in her chest went to the faster paced stretto, while electric pleasure sparked from his lips to hers.
A sensation she’d only known once before despite the fact she’d tried kissing other men. Six years ago when she’d thought the best way to celebrate becoming an adult would be to tell the man she’d been infatuated with for years that she loved him.
Even the memory of that old humiliation could not diminish the feelings of ecstasy washing over her from this elemental connection.
The kiss didn’t last long, just a matter of seconds, but it could have been hours for the impact it had on her. When Vik pulled away and stepped back, Maddie had to stop herself from following him.
“Three o’clock. Turn your phone ringer off. I’ll text.”
She nodded, her mind blown by a simple kiss. Which did not bode well for her emotional equilibrium.
She fought acknowledging the possibility that tycoon Viktor Beck might well be more dangerous to the almost twenty-five-year-old Maddie as Archer business protégé Vik had been to her as a teenager.
“Go inside and lock the door, Madison.”
She nodded again, but didn’t move as she tried to reconcile the present with the past.
He shook his head, a curve flirting at the corner of the usually serious lines of his mouth. “You’re going to be trouble.”
“That’s what my father says.”
“I was thinking of a very different kind of trouble.” Vik traced her bottom lip. “Believe me.”
“Oh, really.” Her lip tingling from his touch, warmth infused her that corresponded to the heat in his voice.
His smile became fully realized, and it was almost as good as the kiss.
She wasn’t the one who was going to be trouble.
“Oh,” she said again, this time without intending to, her body reacting to that warm expression in ways she just didn’t with other men.
Vik waited in silence, no sense of impatience in evidence, but Maddie knew every minute he spent with her cost his tightly packed schedule.
She nodded to herself this time. “See you later.”
Maddie stepped back into her apartment. Closing the door on him was a lot harder than it should have been.
She threw the dead bolt and a second later there was a double tap on the door. Vik’s goodbye.
Using the pay-as-you-go cell phone she’d bought to provide Maddie Grace, volunteer, with a contact number, she called the school and let them know she wouldn’t be in for at least a couple of days. She couldn’t risk being caught in her Maddie Grace persona and having the best part of her life exposed to the media furor.
The next call she made was to Romi, who started cursing in French when Maddie told her friend that Jeremy Archer was using Perrygate to try to push Maddie into an approved marriage.
Maddie didn’t tell Romi about the threat to her own father’s company or Maddie’s response to it. Romi would demand her friend not sign the papers.
