One Reckless Decision

“You must bolster the family fortune,” he had told her matter-of-factly six weeks earlier, as if he was not discussing her future. Her life.

“I don’t understand,” she had said stiffly, still wearing her black dress from their father’s memorial service earlier that day. She had not been in mourning, not even so soon after his death. Not for Gustave Barbery, at any rate—though she would perhaps always grieve for the father Gustave had never been to her. “All I want is access to my trust fund a few years early.”

That bloody trust fund. She’d hated that it existed, hated that her father thought it gave him the right to attempt to control her as he saw fit. Hated more that Peter was its executor now that her father was dead—and that, for her mother’s sake, she had to play along with him in order to access it. She’d wanted nothing to do with the cursed Barbery fortune nor its attendant obligations and expectations. She’d spent years living proudly off of her own money, the money she’d earned with her own hands—but such pride was no longer a luxury she could afford. Her mother’s health had deteriorated rapidly once Gustave fell ill; her debts had mounted at a dizzying rate, especially once Peter had taken control of the Barbery finances eight months ago and had stopped paying Vivienne’s bills. It fell to Tristanne to sort it out, which was impossible on the money she made scraping out the life of an artist in Vancouver. She had no choice but to placate Peter in the hope she could use her trust to save her mother from ruin. It made her want to cry but she did not—could not—show that kind of weakness in front of Peter.

“You don’t have to understand,” Peter had hissed at her, triumph and malice alive in his cold gaze. “You need only do as I say. Find an appropriately wealthy man, and bend him to your will. How hard can that be, even for you?”

“I fail to see how that would help you,” Tristanne had said. So formal, so polite, as if the conversation were either. As if she did not feel like giving in to her upset stomach, her horror.

“You need not concern yourself with anything save your own contribution,” Peter had snapped. “A liaison with a certain caliber of man will make my investors more confident. And believe me, Tristanne, you’ll want to ensure their confidence. If this deal does not go through, I will lose everything and the first casualty will be your useless mother.”

Tristanne understood all too well. Peter had never made any secret of his disdain for Tristanne’s mother. Gustave had put his empire in Peter’s hands at the onset of his long illness, having cut off Tristanne for her rebelliousness years before. He had no doubt expected his son to provide for his second wife, and had therefore made no specific provision for her in his will. But Tristanne was well aware that Peter had waited years to make Vivienne Barbery pay for usurping his own late mother’s place in what passed for Gustave’s affections. He had dismissed her failing, fragile health as attention-seeking, and allowed her debts to mount. He was capable of anything.

“What do you want me to do?” Tristanne had asked woodenly. She could do it, whatever it was. She would.

“Sleep with them, marry them, I do not care.” Peter had sneered. “Make certain it is public—splashed across every tabloid in Europe. You must do whatever it takes to convince the world that this family has access to serious money, Tristanne, do you understand me?”

On the Katrakis yacht, Tristanne looked away from the financier and back to Peter, whose gaze burned with loathing. And as easily as that, her indecision vanished. Better to burn out on Nikos Katrakis’s fire—and annoy Peter in the process by contributing using his avowed worst enemy—than suffer a far more clammy and repulsive fate. Tristanne repressed a shudder.

When she returned her attention to Nikos Katrakis, the dragon, his half smile had disappeared. Though he still lounged against the bar, Tristanne sensed that his long, hard-muscled body was on red-alert. She had the sense of his physical might, of tremendous power hidden in casual clothes. It made her throat go dry.

This is a terrible mistake, she thought. She knew it in her bones. She felt it like an ache, a sob. But there was nothing to do but go for it.

“I would like you to kiss me,” she said, very distinctly. And then there was no going back. It was done. She cleared her throat. “Here and now. If it is not too much trouble.”

Of all the things Nikos Katrakis had expected might happen during the course of the afternoon’s party, being solicited in any form by the Barbery heiress had not made the list.

A hard kind of triumph poured through him. He was sure that she could see it—sense it. How could she not?