Jaimie: Fire and Ice (The Wilde Sisters 2)

Her new career was exciting but so far, it hadn’t taken her very far.

She had a degree in finance and an MBA in accounting. Numbers, with their intricate simplicity, had always intrigued her. The accounting firm she’d worked for had sent her to do audits for a few realty firms. Gradually, she’d found herself seeing that real estate, especially if she eventually got a broker’s license and worked for an elite firm, could be a challenging and lucrative career.

She’d spent weeks trying to make a decision. A logical decision. Her sisters had teased her. Emily had said she’d make the choice based on statistics and spreadsheets; Lissa had added sequential analysis to the list.

Well, how else to make such a big change in her life?

So, yes, she’d created spreadsheets. She’d amassed statistics. She’d run data backwards and forwards. Then she’d approached one of the Realtors she’d met through work.

Two lunches later, she’d handed in her notice and joined Stafford and Bengs, Realtors. Since then, she’d taken her licensing exam and passed it, passed an ethics exam, and become a Realtor.

Only one problem.

She’d been a terrific accountant, but so far, she was a washout as a Realtor.

It turned out that her love of all things logical worked against her.

She’d show up at a prospective client’s to take a listing and when that client said his place was worth, say, four million, Jaimie would point out why it wasn’t. Another client would say he needed four bedrooms and she’d hear herself saying that actually, three would probably be preferable.

“You’re dealing with people,” Roger Bengs would tell her, “not numbers. Numbers have to add up. People never do.”

She knew he was right.

How else to explain why she’d ever gone out with Steven?

He was handsome. Smart. Polite. Attentive.

At first, she’d been flattered by his attention. That hadn’t lasted long. A few dates and he’d begun talking about their future together, planning it in what had become increasingly frightening detail.

She’d tried laughing, as if his plans were jokes. When that hadn’t worked, she’d told him, politely, that she wanted to be his friend, nothing more.

He’d only become more determined. More insistent.

More frightening.

No. Certainly not. Steven was an annoyance. An irritation. He wasn’t frightening.

It had to be the heat that was making her think such strange thoughts.

Jaimie frowned, took her iPad from her oversized purse and brought up the file she’d created on Zacharias Castelianos.

There wasn’t much in it.

She’d tried Googling him, but she hadn’t come up with anything.

She was pretty sure that his name was Greek. That made sense. It was increasingly common for foreigners to invest in expensive Manhattan real estate. And it was increasingly common for the very wealthy ones to be secretive. They had the means and the money to stay out of the public eye.

It had been easy to form a mental image of the man.

He was a billionaire. A twenty-first-century Aristotle Onassis. Short. Stocky. White-haired. A doughy face. In his sixties. Or more.

Roger Bengs had confirmed it.

“Exactly,” he’d said when she’d described the man she imagined. “Couldn’t have put it better myself.”

So she’d googled Onassis.

Homes everywhere. Yachts. Private islands. Planes. Yada yada yada. And he’d been very fond of women.