The Billionaire's Disgraced Virgin (Billionaire Knights Book 2) (5 page)

W
hile Mike settled the bill
, Chloe sat waiting in the limo outside. Then she saw him leaving the store, two Harvey Nichols people in tow carrying boxes and bags. A mixture of excitement and mortification held her in its grip. Excitement for the pretty clothes she’d selected and would now have an opportunity to wear, and mortification that Mike was footing the bill.

She’d never before experienced this confusing thrill and wondered if other women who allowed a man to buy them clothes didn’t feel deeply embarrassed. She’d always done her own shopping. No boyfriend had ever bought her a gift and now here she sat, the unwilling and stunned recipient of a gift as lavish as she’d only imagined the Kardashian women would ever have bestowed upon them.

But then she told herself there was one significant difference: those other women were offered those gifts from the men who loved them, who worshiped the ground they walked on. Mike wasn’t buying her these clothes as a token of his never-ending love. He was simply a bossy overlord who wanted the woman he’d coerced into doing his bidding to look good and present the image he hoped would help him further his goals. He was dressing her up as his own personal plaything, an instrument to land him the deal of a lifetime and make certain she played the part he’d envisioned. Cheeks reddening, she realized he was simply using her, the same way Dixon had used her to further his career.

But then he was stepping into the car and she almost whimpered when she was hit with the overpowering effect of his sheer presence. It overwhelmed her, as did the potent memory of the moment they’d shared in the dressing room.

She daren’t look at him, for fear she’d succumb once more to the devastating effect he had on her body’s capacity to act sensibly and rationally. But then he brought out his laptop and was soon engrossed in his work, the car tooling along, heading out of the busy capital.

He’d told her they were driving up to Oxfordshire, where his family owned an estate, and which would be the scene of the negotiations with the Press Corp people. Inwardly she was already steeling herself for the confrontation with Roderick Holmes. She took out a compact and checked her hair once more. She’d only applied fresh dye the week before, and her natural auburn was still covered up quite well, not even showing at the roots. She hoped the new color would draw attention away from her face, preventing Holmes from recognizing in the woman she was now the erotic image of the girl she’d once been.

As the hours and the miles ticked away, Mike doggedly studied the latest reports on the Press Corp Group. He found it increasingly hard to focus. For some inexplicable reason the mere presence of Chloe set his teeth on edge. She was dressed in a smart charcoal woman’s power suit now, courtesy of Harvey Nichols, and presented such a mix of vulnerability and sheer beauty that the effect was threatening to lay waste to his intention to keep their relationship on a strictly professional footing.

She kept the blouse she was wearing buttoned up to the top and yet the effect was almost as erotically enticing as the black dress he’d admired before, because he was now aware of the curvy woman concealed underneath.

He’d gotten the survey report back from IT. They’d done a thorough investigation of her email and internet behavior from the day she’d entered Knight employ but no red flags had been raised. On her lunch break she habitually checked real estate listings in the English countryside, gardening sites, and Nigella Lawson’s cooking recipes. Not exactly spy material.

He allowed his gaze to slide down to her hands, now resting in her lap, and when he saw how small and delicate they were he could well imagine her in the garden of her cozy home, lovingly placing bulbs in the welcoming soil. From there it was a small leap for his mind’s eye to produce a smattering of images of Chloe smiling at her loving husband, toddlers cavorting in a nearby playpen…

He clamped down on the unwanted imagery and turned his attention to the scenery as the car ate up the miles. He hadn’t been to the domain in Oxfordshire in quite a while. Not since his grandfather had died at the end of a long winter.

He could remember those last dreadful moments when he and his two brothers had gathered around his sickbed. The old man had implored them not to make the same mistakes their father had made. Recently widowed, Knight Sr had dived into the London nightlife with reckless abandon, quickly sinking into a quagmire of dating questionable women and enjoying the dangerous buzz of recreational drugs and booze, until he’d married Caroline Popping, well-known reality star and not a stranger to those very same vices herself.

They’d made quite the couple. Not a weekend had gone by when Dad hadn’t been featured on the front pages of the tabloids, his lurid behavior a disgrace to the entire family and the ancient and respectable house of Knight.

It all had ended quite tragically one night when he’d wrapped his Aston Martin around a tree, returning from yet another drug-fueled celebrity fest in London. Popping, whom Mike now had the debatable pleasure of calling stepmother, miraculously survived with minor scrapes and bruises, but their father had lain slain. The next morning the tabloids had carried the story of the formerly respectable businessman and one of the country’s richest men, succumbed to a hellish orgy of sex, drugs and alcohol.

The scandal had very nearly destroyed the family and the business that carried their once proud name, and it had been a dark time for everyone. Which was why their grandfather had urged them to be extremely careful to whom they plighted their troth. Stuart had gotten married last year, and the marriage proved an exceedingly happy one, the once stalwart Stuart really opening up and becoming the loving dad Mike had never seen in him. Steve, his youngest brother, was a different story. After returning from his third tour of duty, heavily scarred both emotionally and physically, he’d retreated to another family property, a small private island off the coast of Scotland, to quietly recover without being a nuisance to his friends or family.

And while Stuart ran the day-to-day business of Knight Enterprises, it was left to him, Mike, to take care of its future, expanding Knight into other arenas and making certain they remained the number one player in their field.

He hadn’t wanted to move in a different direction altogether, but the more he thought about it the more it made sense to take over Press Corp. He’d even become convinced it wasn’t merely necessary but highly critical to the future of the group. There were rumors that Press Corp had been looking into taking over Knight, and that would have been a lot worse. It just went to show the old adage was true: it was either eat or be eaten in the cutthroat world of business.

He chanced another glance at the woman seated not a foot away from him and vowed once more not to let his personal feelings interfere with his business savvy. Now was not the time to get all hot and bothered about Chloe Ross. Now was the time to let cool calculation rule his decisions for the next few days, until the deal was signed and then they’d go their separate ways once again.

They’d left the motorway and were traveling along smaller country lanes. Chloe was excited to see the lush greenery stretching out for miles and miles, occasionally interspersed with sleepy little villages. This was the English countryside at its finest and most enchanting, and she wasn’t surprised to find that being away from her cramped living quarters and the bustling metropolis was lifting her spirits all of its own accord. She’d rolled down the window and let her eyes roam freely across the fields with their dandelions, poppies and buttercups, the delicious scents of summer reaching her nostrils as the car slowed down its pace. For a brief moment she was back in Poole, long before the drama was to derail her life, and she felt a definite joy in her heart that mitigated to some extent the dread she’d been feeling ever since she’d been forced to accept this assignment.

“This part of the country brings back fond memories,” Mike suddenly supplied. She threw him a quick look and saw that a slight smile had curled up the corners of his mouth. A thrill of anticipatory pleasure raced through her, and an image of Mike and herself entwined on the backseat of this very car, his lips brushing hers flitted across her mind’s eye. She squashed it immediately.

“Did you grown up here?” she ventured.

“Yes, I did. The whole family lived here for quite a long time, actually. My parents, my two brothers and I, and even my father’s parents, who had their own rooms in a separate wing of the house. Father traveled up to London for work but he found it essential his three sons would grow up here, where he’d enjoyed such a happy childhood himself. We went to school around here, and in the summer the rest of the family would come up and join us.”

“That must have been wonderful.” She couldn’t keep the sigh from her voice. She herself had grown up in a small town and often longed for those halcyon days.

“It was,” he confirmed. “Until mother died and…” His voice betrayed his distress, and she quickly glanced at him, only to see his face darkening with a scowl, the shadows of his past apparently deep and troubled. “But let’s not talk about that,” he finally said, and proceeded to hand her a file folder. “These are the latest numbers I’ve managed to finagle from the Press Corp accounting department. If you would take a look and offer me your conclusions?”

His tone had become clipped. She took the file folder. “I’ll do it right now.”

“Please do. Imagine we’re going into battle and we need all the ammunition we can find to come out victorious, Miss Ross.”

He was directing an odd look at her, Chloe saw, and for a moment she had the impression he was trying to convey something, but then the moment passed and he was engrossed in his laptop once again, and she in the documents he’d handed her. When the car finally turned off the road and zoomed beneath an arched gateway, she’d already drawn her conclusions from the new material and closed the file folder.

Press Corp was essentially a company that had overstretched itself when it had expanded into the Chinese market and now found itself in troubled financial waters. They urgently needed refinancing or might have to start selling off parts of their empire. It made them vulnerable to a takeover, which was probably why Roderick Holmes, who was in his seventh decade now, was interested in the deal with Knight. Instead of being a sitting duck for a hostile takeover he could set his own terms and retain a large measure of control. One of the stipulations was that his daughter Eileen would take over as CEO of the Press Corp Group. She would likely be present this weekend.

Chloe glanced out the window as Knight Castle loomed up in the distance, an impressive gray structure astride lush green land and confidently dominating its surroundings with its ancient ramparts and battlements.

S
he could only imagine growing
up here, surrounded by so much space. It must be wonderful to raise a child. A family. And a pang of sorrow assaulted her at the realization she herself would never be in the circumstances to raise a family of her own, would never be able to share the unique bond of love with a husband and the children who would grow from that bond. But then that was nothing new—that was the way she’d known her life would be like since she’d been seduced by Lewis Dixon. So why was being here reminding her of her terrible loss? She was simply here as an accountant, playing a small role in the negotiations that were about to take place. So she ignored the aching pain for what could have been, and decided to focus on the dangers that lay ahead.

The car had swung around the back of the castle and parked on the circular gravel drive. Heavy oak doors had swung open and a liveried footman was hurrying down the stone steps to relieve the car of its luggage. Her eye was drawn to three more cars parked in the driveway. And when Mike spoke, her heart constricted. “Looks like Holmes has beaten us to it.” He gestured to the Rolls Royce, accompanied by two Range Rovers. “Holmes and his team,” Mike stated a little grimly. And with these words he purposefully set foot for the castle, compelling Chloe to follow in his wake. She suddenly found herself slightly out of breath, a sickening sense of nausea holding her in its grip.

As she mounted the steps to the iron-studded oak doors she glanced up at the castle facade, the gray brick robust and ancient and covered in vine, and thought she could see the heads of three young boys peering over the parapet, looking for mischief. And even though she fought against it, the notion that Mike and his brothers had enjoyed such a carefree childhood here managed to imbue the man with life. The man she and hundreds of others only knew as one of the captains steering the company was a flesh and blood person with a fascinating past. She suddenly wondered what had happened to him. Why the darkness had entered his eyes when he’d talked about his time here. She remembered her colleagues mentioning something about the death of the Knight boys’ mother. She’d paid only scant attention, having enough troubles of her own to dig into the troubled past of others. Now, though, her curiosity was piqued, and she longed to know more about Mike. Longed to discover how he’d become the formidable man he now was.

Once inside, the cool grandeur of the entrance hall impressed itself upon her, with its myriad of portrait paintings of what she assumed were illustrious members of the Knight ancestry. The floors were white marble and the walls were covered in velvet wallpaper with floral motif, topped by gilded ceiling moldings. And as she glanced up she marveled at the crystal chandelier, casting its golden light across the frescoed ceiling and the impressed visitors below.

She caught Mike’s eye and was entranced by the way the light lent his tan skin, stretched taut over exquisitely sculpted cheekbones, a soft glow. He stood erect and tall, toned and immaculately clad in his superbly tailored bespoke suit.

She had the distinct impression that he, too, was gearing up for the upcoming meeting with Press Corp’s president and CEO. Nothing in his manner betrayed nervousness, though. Quite the contrary, judging from the smile he awarded a middle-aged full-figured woman with graying hair who’d joined them. Unlike Chloe, Mike Knight was obviously in complete command of both himself and his surroundings. But then this was, of course, his ancestral home, the place where he ruled supreme. Just like he ruled over her, she bitterly thought.

The woman directed an inquisitive look at her, and Mike told her, “This is Chloe Ross, Maria. She’ll be my personal assistant throughout the negotiations.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” Maria said, her cheerful face displaying a welcoming smile. “Do I show you to your room now, Miss Ross?”

“A little later, Maria,” Mike told her. He raised a sardonic eyebrow. “Since our guests have arrived it only seems fair to pay them our respects first.”

That nausea was back in full force, as the import of his words struck her. They were going to meet Roderick Holmes. She’d hoped for a brief respite, in which she might be able to freshen up a little after the drive, and prepare herself mentally for the ordeal that was to come, but there would be no reprieve.

She followed Mike as he strode to the door nearest to him, and she thought she could hear the murmur of voices coming from beyond it. Suddenly she felt she couldn’t possibly go through with this. Her legs were weakening and her heart was pounding frantically against her ribcage, her breath coming in ragged gulps. Mike must have noticed, for he turned and regarded her sharply.

She was looking as pale as when they’d first met, Mike thought, and when his gaze dropped from her face to her hands he saw they were shaking uncontrollably. It confirmed his suspicion that she was a corporate spy terrified of being found out. Hadn’t she taken the opportunity to warn Holmes they were about to come face to face? Hadn’t they made some kind of arrangement to pretend not to recognize one another? Obviously she was still scared stiff of the impending meeting, which told him she might be a corporate spy but she was most certainly not a cold-blooded one. It was just as he’d suspected: Holmes had approached her, preying on her financial vulnerabilities to offer her a deal, and she’d never imagined finding herself in this particular situation, probably hoping to deliver him her reports from the company’s back benches.

“Pull yourself together, Miss Ross,” he admonished her harshly. “Now is not the time to fall apart!”

She nodded, but it was obvious that without some stern support she was going to collapse. He placed his hands on her shoulders and made her change direction, propelling her to his housekeeper instead. “Pour her a brandy, Maria. And then send her this way.”

Chloe was glad for the intervention, though she was mortified of having to be spoken to by Mike that way. She was a professional, after all, and falling apart on the eve of this most important business deal wasn’t going to win her any points with him. If she kept this up she would be out of a job even if he finally managed to sign the deal. Feeling dreadful and still racked with nausea she followed Maria along a maze of corridors until they finally entered the kitchen.

The woman gave her a commiserating look. “I know just how you feel,” she told her. “When I was first introduced to Mike I was so nervous I couldn’t eat a bite! I was trembling where I stood, but he really put me at ease, he did, and the interview turned out to be more like a nice little chat between old friends!”

She couldn’t imagine any interview with Mike to be a friendly chat, but she nodded and gratefully accepted the shot glass Maria handed her, the tawny liquid sloshing invitingly. She knocked it back in one gulp, earning herself an approving grin from the housekeeper.

“Plant yourself over there,” the rosy-cheeked woman said, pointing to a sturdy wooden kitchen chair. She did as she was told, and soon enough she found herself relaxing slightly, the nervous tension holding her in its iron grip slowly ebbing away. The agony of having to go through this ordeal confirmed her opinion that Mike was nothing more than a cold-hearted dictator coercing others to do his bidding. And it might have been the brandy, or the fact that she was so very nervous, but she suddenly heard herself asking, “What happened to Mike’s mother?” Instantly she expected to be told off by the housekeeper.

Instead, Maria’s face took on a look of profound sadness. “Cancer took her, didn’t it? Mike was only nine at the time, can you imagine? Too young to be without his mum if you ask me. And then when Mr. Knight remarried things just went from bad to worse.” She offered Chloe a glance. “But then I’m sure you know all about that.”

Chloe realized she shouldn’t be here, taking Knight history lessons from the housekeeper. Fear was keeping her glued to her chair, however—hoping against hope that Mike would simply forget she existed and would ignore introducing her to the man she already knew all too well. “I’m afraid I must be one of the few people who doesn’t know a thing about the Knight family,” she admitted.

This seemed to give Maria pause. For a moment her desire to gossip warred with the compunction to follow Mike’s order to return Chloe to his side, but then the gossipy side won out. Taking a seat, she lowered her voice. “Well, Mr. Knight went off and married that Caroline Popping, didn’t he?”

Chloe’s eyebrows rose. She wasn’t a keen reader of gossip sites or tabloids, but even she’d heard of Caroline Popping. “The Caroline Popping?”

Maria nodded sternly. “The one and only.”

It took a second shot of brandy for Maria to finish telling the tale of the death of Mike’s father in a drug-induced frenzy and Chloe’s heart bled for the three brothers. So Mike was a victim too. It suddenly induced her to adjust her opinion of him as a cold-hearted dictator. Suddenly she could imagine Mike as a nine-year-old, feeling bereft and alone after his mother died, and then for the next decade, as he grew into a man, having to watch his father succumb to a life of excess and scandal. Her heart suddenly bled for him.

But then she couldn’t put off the inevitable any longer, and she followed Maria back to what the housekeeper told her was the reception hall that would host the negotiations. Steeling herself for the confrontation, she saw that Mike was accompanied by three men and a woman, all chatting amiably. The moment she joined them, Mike gave her a scrutinizing look that penetrated her very soul, and finally placed a hand on her shoulder and introduced her as a member of his team.

She exchanged handshakes with the three men, one of whom she recognized as Roderick Holmes, a rail-thin septuagenarian with jowly face. Mike introduced the others as the head of the Press Corp legal department, Holmes’s CFO, and the woman as Eileen Holmes.

To her elation the Press Corp tycoon only awarded her a cursory look, eager to resume his conversation with Mike. He quite obviously hadn’t recognized her. Her heart did another somersault, only this time with relief flooding through her, and another, more alarming sensation as the warmth of Mike’s hand seeped through her suit jacket and into her skin, eliciting ripples of pleasure to spread out from where he touched her. But then he released his hand, and she felt a betraying sense of bereavement at the lack of connection.

A fleeting momentary desire to feel his hands on her skin startled her, and then her eyes fastened on his lips as he was talking to the small company, and she involuntarily parted her own lips in anticipation of the feel of his before she caught herself. She was acting like a complete fool, and knew it was simply the relief at finding Roderick Holmes completely oblivious of her that was making her feel giddy and entertaining quite inappropriate thoughts about Mike.

And she was gratefully accepting a glass of champagne when she happened to glance toward the door as it opened to allow another visitor entrance.

“Ah, there is my executive editor now,” she heard Holmes offer as if through a thick fog of dread. The ground threatened to open up beneath her feet and swallow her whole, and suddenly she wished that it would. For the man who’d entered was none other than Lewis Dixon, the man who’d callously destroyed her life five years ago.