PART I
Chapter 1
The suit was conservative, gray, and boring.
Luke Whitford eyed his reflection in the mirror with a disappointed frown. He looked…fine, but the suit didn’t achieve the effect he had hoped for: he didn’t look older.
Maybe it had been too much to hope for.
Sighing, Luke ran a hand over his smooth jaw, wishing he had some manly scruff to hide his baby face. He was twenty-three, for God’s sake. It was embarrassing that most people didn’t believe he was of drinking age and he had to have his ID on him at all times. Luke blamed his ridiculous mouth: because of his full upper lip his face seemed set in a perpetual pout. It made him look very young, and while normally it wasn’t a problem, it was a pain in the ass to look like a sixteen-year-old when one had to attend an important business meeting. Not that he attended all that many important business meetings.
Luke smiled grimly at his reflection and squared his shoulders. Well, that was about to change. He was going to prove to his father that he could be trusted with the important stuff. Sure, his father was going to be furious when he found out, but this chance was too good to let it slip through his fingers. He wouldn’t get a chance like this again. Normally back in England his dad kept him on a short leash, watching him like a hawk. Luke would have liked to think that the reason for this was his dad’s over-protectiveness, but he wasn’t delusional: Richard Whitford simply didn’t trust his son. Luke tried not to take it too personally—Richard Whitford trusted no one—but it was time to change that. He hadn’t graduated with honors from Oxford only to spend his life being a pretty face for his father’s marketing campaigns. Luke had always hated it, but he was downright sick of it after the last two months he had spent in Moscow, attending meaningless events in his father’s stead for the Russian branch of Whitford Industries.
The email Luke had received a few days ago was a welcome break from the mind-numbing routine he’d grown accustomed to. Well, technically, the message wasn’t for him. If Luke hadn’t been in Moscow, his father’s people would have simply forwarded it to the main office in London where his father currently was. Strictly speaking, Luke was supposed to do the same instead of reading it, but he had been bored and restless and the message had intrigued him.
Richard,
My secretary seems to be having trouble getting through to you. She informs me she’s been unable to reach you. I told her you were a busy man. But I’m a busy man, too. I’m also not a very patient man. We have things to discuss. Saint Petersburg, Feb 21st, 9 p.m., restaurant “Palkin.” I expect you to be there. Don’t be late. You know how much I hate tardiness. I would hate for our friendship to be ruined over such a small thing.
Looking forward to our meeting,
Roman Demidov
Luke had read the message several times. Something about it was off. The friendly tone seemed fake. Or was he just imagining that? He didn’t think so.
Roman Demidov. The name sounded vaguely familiar, but Luke couldn’t remember where he’d heard it. But the man, whoever he was, must be important enough to be able to assume such a superior tone with Richard Whitford. Hell, the guy was practically ordering his father around. Luke had never met anyone who had enough power—and nerve—to do that. Everyone knew Richard Whitford wasn’t someone to be trifled with. Luke’s father was known as the most ruthless, most powerful British billionaire—a billionaire who was rumored to have dealings with the Italian and Russian mafia. Luke wasn’t deaf to the rumors about his father; they’d been around all his life, but no one could ever prove anything. Not even he, Richard’s only son, knew for sure. The fact that the email’s sender wasn’t at all worried about ramifications despite Richard’s reputation meant that, whoever that man was, he wasn’t someone to be trifled with, either.
He should have forwarded the message to his father when he had realized it. But Luke had always been too curious for his own good.
It took only a few minutes of Googling to find the information Luke had needed.
Roman Danilovich Demidov, thirty-two, was a Russian oil tycoon and multi-billionaire. Apparently, he owned dozens of companies all over the world and sat on the board of dozens more.
A multi-billionaire by the age of thirty-two. That kind of thing didn’t seem to be all that strange in Russia. Luke had noticed that many Russian tycoons were rather young.
But it wasn’t Demidov’s age that attracted his attention.
Luke was kind of embarrassed to admit it, but he couldn’t help but stare at the photographs of the guy. Roman Demidov was a tall, dark-haired man with broad shoulders and the kind of muscle definition that most men could only dream of. He looked like a professional boxer rather than a successful businessman.