‘I did exactly what you told me to do. I went to see Dario. I went with the intention of telling him I knew all about his latest product, that I would leak it all to the media as payment for what ICE had done to my family. I wanted revenge and Dario was the way to get to the man who’d been responsible for destroying so many companies.’
She saw his jaw clench as he finished speaking, as if he was trying to bite down the anger he felt. Nothing made sense. Had he blackmailed Dario too? But her brother would never take that. Would he?
‘What did Dario say?’ Her voice was more of a cracked whisper as she hardly dared to ask. Liev must have seen Dario after she’d called him; otherwise her brother would have said something when she’d called to confess what she’d done. Thank goodness she’d finally plucked up the courage to tell him. At least he would have been forewarned. Then she recalled her brother’s words. I’ve got it covered. What had he meant?
Liev crossed back to the window, looking far too much in control of himself and the discussion. How did he always manage to turn everything to his advantage? He’d even turned a prison sentence into something beneficial to him.
‘Dario listened to all I had to say, something I did not expect. Then he picked up a file, one he had ready after your warning call. He showed the various correspondences that had been made to my father or his beneficiary. As you know from your research on me, I’d purposefully lived under the radar. The letters never reached me.’
‘And that’s why you didn’t leak the information you so cruelly duped out of me?’ Bianca’s mind was racing to keep up with these new events. Surely Dario would have called her, told her what had happened.
‘In part, but I couldn’t have gone through with it, Bianca.’
He turned those slate grey eyes on her and her heart flipped, sending a dart of annoyance through her. She shouldn’t feel anything for this mercenary man. ‘So our sham of an engagement has been wasted? The past two months have been for nothing?’
‘Hell, Bianca, can’t you see? I couldn’t go through with it because it would hurt you.’
She looked at him, suspicion filling her mind, her heart. What was he trying to do now? Make her think he actually had feelings for her? That he felt guilty for what he’d done?
‘You are just saying that because it’s all gone wrong. All you want is to justify blackmailing me and keeping an old man from something he treasured.’
‘I’m saying it because...’ He paused and she looked at him warily. ‘Because I love you, Bianca.’
A heavy silence settled between them and she blinked in shock. Had she heard right? Had he said the words that deep down she’d wanted to hear—and from him?
‘You love me?’ The question slipped from her lips in a silky whisper and she saw for the first time the anxiety in those grey eyes as he watched her, intense expectation on his handsome face.
This was almost too much. The man who had stolen her heart was confessing his love for her. Hope rushed through her. She blushed and she lowered her gaze beneath his fierce scrutiny. But how could the blackmailer become a lover? Was it possible?
‘Yes, Bianca, I love you. Ever since my parents died, I’ve shut out sentiments I considered to be weakening. After one disastrous affair, I focused my energy on avenging the destruction of my father’s business and ultimately life as I knew it.’
He paused again and she walked towards him, still unsure of what was really happening, but unable to resist the pull of attraction, the flare of hope which urged her to take a chance. He looked into her eyes as she stood before him and then slowly reached out and took her hand in his and drew her closer. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t break the heady spell that had filled her office.
‘You’ve changed all that. You brought light back into my life. You made me feel real, whole. Bianca, you are my life.’
‘But what about ICE?’ She had to ask. She couldn’t ignore the launch that was probably happening right now.
* * *
Liev looked down into Bianca’s face, saw the worry and confusion swirling in her eyes and longed to kiss her, to prove what he felt was real. But he had more explaining to do yet.
‘Dario was understandably angry.’ That was an understatement. He’d been furious, but as he’d given vent to his anger, not over the fact that Liev had wanted to ruin the business as a means of revenge, but the fact that he’d used Bianca so appallingly, Dario had let slip one important bit of information.
How could you use Bianca so cruelly? Don’t you know she loves you? Dario’s words had sliced through the angry atmosphere, shattering all his plans for revenge as if they were made of the finest crystal and had just been hit with a rod of iron. He’d known then that the revenge he’d wanted for years could never be taken. Not when the woman who’d stolen his heart loved him, despite her claims of hate the day he’d given her the bracelet and she’d returned the ring.
‘But you told him—about your father’s business?’ She looked up at him, all wide-eyed and innocent, and again the urge to press her to him and kiss her forged forward.
‘That was easily sorted, once he showed me the file. What he wasn’t so easily placated over was the way I’d treated you—and rightly so.’ He brushed his fingertips over her face, watched as her eyelashes fluttered briefly closed.
‘I knew all along that would be a problem when we ended our engagement. I just hoped none of my brothers or sisters would find out about the deal I’d struck for the bracelet.’ Her earnest words cut him deeply. How could he have been so callous? She hadn’t deserved any of that. ‘What did he say?’
Most of what Dario had said he couldn’t repeat, but one sentence had kept playing over and over in his mind, until he knew he had to come and see her, had to risk everything. Don’t you know she loves you?
‘That I’d hurt you, treated you badly, didn’t deserve you. The usual brotherly type of things.’ He tried to inject lightness into his voice, but as his last wor
ds rushed out, he failed. ‘And he was right.’
‘No, no, don’t say that.’ The husky whisper forced his eyes closed, and when he looked at her again she was smiling up at him. ‘That’s what brothers do—and offer you a deal so that you don’t have to break my heart all over again.’