Читать книгу Takeover In The Boardroom - Фиона Бранд, Люси Монро, Люси Монро - Страница 12

CHAPTER FOUR

“I’LL BE BACK at three to take you to the lawyer’s office,” Vik informed Maddie as she unlocked her door and stepped inside.

“Are you sure that’s not a conflict of interest?”

“Would you rather go alone?” he asked, a mocking twist on the masculine lips she’d spent far too much time studying as a teenager.

“No.” Especially not after witnessing the media circus outside her building.

The paparazzi had always found her interesting, but it had never been like this.

And it was only getting worse as the morning wore on.

She’d managed to sneak out of the back entrance earlier, but the story and her location had spread in just that amount of time. There were almost as many media leeches haunting the other entrances to the building as in front now.

Even the parking garage hadn’t been free of their presence.

She’d expected Vik to have his driver drop her off, but she could only be grateful he had insisted on getting out of the car and escorting her all the way to her apartment door.

He’d kept his body positioned protectively between her and the reporters stalking her. Vik was also very good at remaining silent no matter what was thrown at them and Maddie found it easier not to react with him as a buffer.

“Security will have the parking garage cleared,” Vik said after a short text conversation on the elevator.

“Thank you.”

They stepped off the elevator into a thankfully empty hallway.

Vik looked both ways before leading her toward her door anyway. “You need a security detail.”

She shrugged, not wanting to get in to this argument right now, and not at all sure she would win it.

“When was the last time you had this lock changed?” he asked as she opened the door.

She looked up at him, wishing it didn’t feel like all the oxygen got sucked out of the air every time she did that. “Why would I have it changed?”

“At least tell me you had new locks installed when you moved in.”

“Why would I?” she asked again. “I’m sure the building management took care of it when the previous tenants moved out.”

His expression said he didn’t share her confidence. “You don’t own the apartment?”

“No.” She’d always planned to move into the mansion once she’d turned it into a school after she got control of her Madison Trust inheritance.

“Who has a key to this door, besides any previous tenant?” he asked with sarcastic emphasis on his last words.

Maddie leaned against the doorjamb when he showed no signs of following her inside. “Romi.” She grimaced. “Perry, but he’s not going to show his face.”

Vik just shook his head before pulling his phone out and making a call. “Get the building access cards affiliated with Madison Archer’s apartment deactivated and new cards issued for her, Ramona Grayson and myself.”

He listened in silence for a moment. “Yes, have Ms. Grayson’s delivered to her and the others to my office. I will pass Miss Archer’s on when I see her later this afternoon. I want a security system installed, along with high-grade safety locks while we are gone.”

The day before, Vik’s high-handedness would have made Maddie livid. Today? It just felt like someone was watching out for her.

“You know, for a corporate shark, you’re pretty good at this white-knight stuff,” she observed as he tucked his phone away.

“I make a good ally.”

“But a terrifying enemy, I bet.”

“You’ll never have to find out.”

“Even if I refuse my father’s ultimatum?” She didn’t bother to point out that if she did agree, she could still choose to marry a different man.

They both knew how unlikely that was.

Her youthful affections notwithstanding, she wasn’t about to marry a stranger or a man who had multiple divorces under his belt.

Vik reached out and cupped her nape, stepping forward until mere centimeters separated their bodies, the heat from his surrounding her in a strangely protective cocoon. He didn’t say anything, just caught her gaze, his dark eyes compelling her to some sort of belief.

Her breath escaped in a whoosh, unexpected and instant physical reaction crackling along her nerve endings while her heart started a precipitando. “Viktor?”

“You will never be my enemy, Madison.”

“You’re so confident I’ll do what you want?”

“I’m confident in you, there’s a difference.”

There so was. He couldn’t have said anything more guaranteed to get to her. People who believed in Maddie were a premium in her life. And less by one after this morning.

Dark espresso eyes continued to trap her even more effectively than his hand on her neck. “Trust me.”

“Do I have a choice?” she asked with an attempt at sarcasm.

“No.” His reply held no responding humor. Tilting his head, he stopped only when their lips almost touched. “You don’t, and do you know why?”

“Tell me,” she said in a voice that barely registered above a whisper.

“You already do.” Then his mouth pressed against hers and the drumbeat in her chest went to the faster paced stretto, while electric pleasure sparked from his lips to hers.

A sensation she’d only known once before despite the fact she’d tried kissing other men. Six years ago when she’d thought the best way to celebrate becoming an adult would be to tell the man she’d been infatuated with for years that she loved him.

Even the memory of that old humiliation could not diminish the feelings of ecstasy washing over her from this elemental connection.

The kiss didn’t last long, just a matter of seconds, but it could have been hours for the impact it had on her. When Vik pulled away and stepped back, Maddie had to stop herself from following him.

“Three o’clock. Turn your phone ringer off. I’ll text.”

She nodded, her mind blown by a simple kiss. Which did not bode well for her emotional equilibrium.

She fought acknowledging the possibility that tycoon Viktor Beck might well be more dangerous to the almost twenty-five-year-old Maddie as Archer business protégé Vik had been to her as a teenager.

“Go inside and lock the door, Madison.”

She nodded again, but didn’t move as she tried to reconcile the present with the past.

He shook his head, a curve flirting at the corner of the usually serious lines of his mouth. “You’re going to be trouble.”

“That’s what my father says.”

“I was thinking of a very different kind of trouble.” Vik traced her bottom lip. “Believe me.”

“Oh, really.” Her lip tingling from his touch, warmth infused her that corresponded to the heat in his voice.

His smile became fully realized, and it was almost as good as the kiss.

She wasn’t the one who was going to be trouble.

“Oh,” she said again, this time without intending to, her body reacting to that warm expression in ways she just didn’t with other men.

Vik waited in silence, no sense of impatience in evidence, but Maddie knew every minute he spent with her cost his tightly packed schedule.

She nodded to herself this time. “See you later.”

Maddie stepped back into her apartment. Closing the door on him was a lot harder than it should have been.

She threw the dead bolt and a second later there was a double tap on the door. Vik’s goodbye.

Using the pay-as-you-go cell phone she’d bought to provide Maddie Grace, volunteer, with a contact number, she called the school and let them know she wouldn’t be in for at least a couple of days. She couldn’t risk being caught in her Maddie Grace persona and having the best part of her life exposed to the media furor.

The next call she made was to Romi, who started cursing in French when Maddie told her friend that Jeremy Archer was using Perrygate to try to push Maddie into an approved marriage.

Maddie didn’t tell Romi about the threat to her own father’s company or Maddie’s response to it. Romi would demand her friend not sign the papers.

“Are you going to do it? Are you going to marry the man you’ve been crushing on for the last ten years?”

“That was a schoolgirl crush. I’m twenty-four years old now.”

“And still a virgin. Still avoiding relationships.”

“I’m not exactly alone in that.”

Romi’s silence was as good as a verbal acknowledgment.

“Besides, I could marry one of the others.”

“Right.”

“Maxwell Black offered a marriage of convenience with children by artificial insemination.” She couldn’t help a small smile at the memory of her father’s reaction to that offer.

She knew Romi would get a kick out of it as well.

“Max was part of your father’s deal?” Romi demanded in a tone a couple of registers above her normal one.

All of Maddie’s humor fled. “You know Maxwell.”

Silence. “A little.”

“More than a little if you call him Max.”

“We went out a few times.”

“You never told me.”

“It’s no big deal.” But, threaded with vulnerability, Romi’s tone said otherwise.

Maddie warned, “I think he found Perry’s claims about our supposed sex life intriguing.”

“I know.”

“You what?” Maddie practically screeched, her own problems forgotten for the moment. “How do you know that?”

“Do you really need me to spell it out for you?”

“You’re still a virgin.”

Romi had said so and the woman might be a hyperactive, borderline political anarchist and more than a little eclectic in her dress style, but she never lied.

“Technically, that is true.”

“Technically?” Maddie drew the word out.

“Look, Maddie, I don’t want to talk about it.” Vulnerability now saturated Romi’s voice, defenselessness that Maddie could not ignore.

“Okay, sweetie. But I’m here for you. You know that, right?”

“Always. SBC.”

“SBC.” Sisters by choice.

Maddie’s mom had called them that the first time when she was explaining to the elementary school principal why the girls would do better with the same kindergarten teacher.

He’d refused to change their assignments and Helene Archer had called in the big guns.

It was the only time Maddie could remember her father stepping foot in her grade school. Mr. Grayson had come down, too, threatening to withdraw his company’s support from the prestigious private school.

Romi and Maddie had never been assigned different classrooms again.

They had shared everything, including their grief at the loss of the only mother either girl had ever known when Helene Archer’s speedboat had crashed into rocks invisible under the moonless sky.

Maddie hadn’t gotten her propensity for risky behavior from nowhere.

She understood now that her mother’s increasingly erratic behavior had been Helene’s way of crying out for help. Help neither Maddie, nor her father, realized Helene needed.

It was a failure Maddie was still coming to terms with.

* * *

Vik’s text came in at ten minutes to three.

He was on a conference call he could not reschedule, but two bodyguards would be at her door in a few minutes. They had AIH indigo-level security IDs and she was not to open the door unless she saw the familiar badges through her peephole.

Specially trained for protecting people rather than corporate property and secrets, the indigo team was her father’s personal security detail. It used to be hers, too. Wanting to live as normal a life as possible, Maddie had refused to be assigned bodyguards when she moved out of the family mansion.

Her father had argued, but ultimately given in.

She didn’t think Vik would be as easily swayed. If he thought Maddie needed a bodyguard for her security, she’d have one.

The same way the company’s on-site security system had been upgraded because Vik deemed it necessary. Her father had been all for it, though.

Nothing was too good for Archer International Holdings.

The limo was waiting in front of the elevator bank in the parking garage. Thankfully, no enterprising reporter had managed to keep vigil. Which probably had less to do with the parking garage guards than the two additional indigo-badge bodyguards standing at attention on either side of the elevator doors.

One of them stepped forward to open the door to the limo and she stepped inside, only then realizing that Vik had taken the conference call on his mobile.

Every dark hair perfectly in place, his designer suit immaculate, he nodded at her while carrying on a conversation in Japanese.

His words did not falter, his Japanese smooth and unhesitating, and yet she felt the weight of his full regard. Like his attention was fully on her.

Like she mattered.

Succumbing to the desire to sit beside him, Maddie settled onto the smooth leather seat across from AIH’s media fixer. Relieved that none of the bodyguards had instructions to join them in the back of the limo, she was still grateful the other occupant gave her an excuse to give in to the irresistible urge.

The need to be near Vik was verging on ungovernable, just like it had been six years ago.

Maddie wanted to chalk it up to the exceptional circumstances. She just wasn’t sure she could.

Which was not enough of a caution to move to the other seat. There was simply no comparison between Vik and Conrad, who until that morning she had found slightly annoying but now considered flat-out obnoxious.

The PR guru took a break from typing madly on his tablet to silently acknowledge her. If his smile looked more like a grimace, she wasn’t interested enough in interacting with him to call him on it.

Besides, Perry’s fake exposé had triggered an ugly media frenzy beyond anything Maddie had ever experienced for her far more innocent escapades.

There was even speculation now that some of her riskier endeavors had been the result of orders from her master. That wasn’t even the worst of it. Maddie did not know how a virgin could be labeled a sex addict with obvious intimacy issues, but she’d stopped reading her Google alerts after that headline.

The limo had exited the parking garage and pulled away from her building when Vik ended his phone call.

“Are you okay?” he asked Maddie.

Honesty would reveal a level of vulnerability she wasn’t comfortable sharing with Vik, much less Conrad. She had no idea how her life had spun out of control so fast.

And Perrygate was only part of it. Her father’s ultimatum and the realization their relationship would never be what she wanted had been followed too closely by the equally alarming, if for different reasons, acknowledgment that she was actually considering marrying her girlhood crush.

“I’m fine.”

“Good,” Conrad said, as if he’d asked the question. “Containing this media bloodbath is going to take serious effort and you need to be on your top game.”

He didn’t have to tell her. Maddie had spent the time since Vik had dropped her off earlier worrying about what would happen if she couldn’t reclaim her reputation.

The all too real prospect of losing her dreams of opening a small charter school tightened Maddie’s throat, so she just nodded.

Once the media started looking more closely at Maddie’s life, her alter ego was bound to come to light and the probability of losing her volunteer position was pretty much guaranteed.

While she enjoyed the anonymity of her Maddie Grace persona, she’d only taken rudimentary steps to keep her two lives separate. She wasn’t James Bond, after all, just a socialite who craved time contributing as a normal person.

The only reason no one had cottoned on to Maddie Grace and Madison Archer being the same person before was that the news simply wasn’t all that interesting. Or it hadn’t been.

Her notoriety as Madcap Madison had been of the innocent variety, good for filler pieces in the social columns, but not salacious enough to really impact circulation numbers. Therefore she had not been interesting enough to be targeted by any serious digging.

She’d no doubt reporters were getting out their sharpest spades now. Perrygate was all that and a bag of chips for the gossipmongers.

The most painful part of Maddie’s predicament was that it wasn’t just her dreams on the line here; Romi was equally invested in the charter school.

Vik sent a text and then pocketed his phone. “Our lack of an immediate response opened the door to other spurious claims from supposed former lovers.”

Vik gave Conrad a look that left no doubt exactly who the VP of Operations for AIH blamed for that mistake.

Maddie felt no smugness at the media fixer being so obviously in the doghouse with Vik. Her life was too out of control to harbor even a hint of that, but she couldn’t help the small thrill of pleasure at him taking her side.

From the moment he’d stepped in and ordered Conrad’s cooperation that morning, Maddie had known she wasn’t alone in facing the painful consequences of her onetime friend’s betrayal.

Conrad tugged at the collar of his shirt. “We’re working on retractions, but the best strategy for solidifying the prank angle is to give the media hounds another story.”

“What do you mean? Like a two-headed baby from outer space, or something?” Maddie asked as her phone chimed to indicate a text from one of her select group.

Thinking it was Romi, she pulled out her phone and checked the message. It wasn’t from her SBC; it was from Vik and said, You are not fine. We will talk. Later.

She texted back. If you say so.

Vik pulled his phone out and replied to her text while speaking. “Or something. A glossy celebrity gossip magazine has already offered a two-page spread announcing our formal engagement in exchange for exclusive photos of a lavish, well-attended wedding reception.”

“We’re engaged now?” Had she missed something between the text convo and their in-person discussion?

Vik didn’t answer, but waited in silence for her to come to her own conclusion.

“It’s the best way to stop any more dirty snow falling in this avalanche,” Conrad said unctuously.

“Dirty snow? Really?” she asked sarcastically.

“Do you have a better word for it?”

“Perrygate.”

“Appropriate, but don’t use it on your social networks,” Conrad instructed her. “It implies a negative rift between you and Mr. Timwater. We’re dismissing all this as a joke gone wrong.”

“Then you can play it off as the bad joke that ruined a friendship. I won’t play nice with Perry.” She couldn’t.

Conrad frowned thoughtfully. “It would be better for you to be seen as the forgiving friend. Waiting a few months to cut the man from your life will increase your popularity.”

“I don’t care.”

“Timwater isn’t coming within a hundred feet of Madison, not even to apologize.” Vik’s voice brooked no argument.

And Conrad proved he was more intelligent than other evidence to the contrary because he didn’t make one. “Fine. Fine.” He started taking notes. “‘The Prank That Ended a Friendship.’ I can use that. We can spin the angle even. ‘The Bad Joke That Almost Ended an Engagement.’”

Maddie looked at Vik. “Is he for real?”

Part of her knew this was the way things had to be, that Conrad was just doing his job, but having her life reduced to clichés and headlines was not fun.

“It’s going to be okay, Madison.” Vik pulled her cold hand into his own. “Trust me.”

He had never hesitated to invade her personal space, or to touch her, though she’d never noticed him being so free with others. It was one of the reasons she’d convinced her eighteen-year-old self that Vik might return her feelings.

She’d realized later that the small touches were probably the result of the way his Russian grandparents had raised him. Maddie had figured she hadn’t seen him behave that way with others because he had so few personal relationships.

None but his grandparents and her father that she’d ever actually come into contact with.

That was one thing she and Vik had in common.

A very small inner circle.

She didn’t comment on this now, just gave thanks for the fact he was willing to offer her the kind of comfort she needed and had never been able to ask for.

Vik squeezed her fingers. “Conrad is one of the best in the business. Before this morning I would have said the best.”

Conrad flinched, proving he’d been listening even as he typed.

“And our engagement is the only way to restore my reputation?” she asked almost rhetorically.

She didn’t see another way out, either.

Her father had more leverage for his plan than he could possibly comprehend. The realization of Maddie and Romi’s dreams relied on a reputation Maddie could not afford to lose.

Vik frowned. “I’m sorry, Madison, but nothing is going to make the story go away completely.”

“Why not?” Media fixers worked miracles.

Isn’t that what everyone said? If they couldn’t fix this, her and Romi’s dreams were going to crash and burn. There was no way Maddie was going to let that happen.

Conrad looked up from his tablet. “Some people will always believe that where there is or was smoke, there had to be some ember of fire.”

“But there isn’t one.”

The twist of Conrad’s lips said he was probably one of those people.

Vik’s hand moved to Maddie’s thigh, bringing her attention careening back to him and him alone. “I believe you.”

“No matter what the press has claimed, I’ve never even had a serious boyfriend,” she admitted painfully.

Something flared in Vik’s eyes, but he just nodded. “You’ve been too busy getting into trouble.”

“Not this kind of trouble.”

“I know.”

“And not even my usual in the last six months.”

Conrad’s head snapped up. “Is that true?”

“I haven’t done anything zany or even remotely newsworthy since I broke my pelvis in that botched skydiving landing.”

Conrad narrowed his gaze. “What about parties? Random hookups?”

“Did you not hear her, Conrad?” Vik asked, dropping the temperature in the limo with the ice in his tone. “Madison does not do random hookups.”

“She said she hasn’t had a serious relationship, that the men claiming to have engaged in BDSM encounters are lying. Miss Archer never claimed to be celibate.” Okay, so Conrad had been listening.

Vik didn’t thaw even a little. “You can take no random hookups as a given.”

“Can I?” Conrad asked Maddie, surprising her with his tenacity.

“Yes,” she replied firmly. “I haven’t been out in the evening except to attend charity events since my accident.”

“With Perry as your escort?” Conrad asked, sounding unhappy by the possibility.

Which she could understand, in light of recent events. She wouldn’t call the emotion she was feeling right now unfettered joy, either.

“A couple of times.”

Vik’s jaw hardened.

“Most events, Romi and I go together. Perry isn’t all that interested in helping others.” Maddie felt disloyal admitting that truth, but Romi had always said it.

Perry had never been as interested in the causes Maddie supported as the A-listers and potential business contacts he could meet at certain events.

“You’ve been at most of them, yourself,” she offered to Vik.

He frequently represented AIH at that sort of thing, being an expert at making connections Perry only aspired to. Maddie knew that Vik also supported the causes in very tangible ways, both on behalf of the corporation and personally.

The gorgeous, corporate white knight nodded.

“That could work in our favor, unless you were photographed with your date for the evening,” Conrad mused. “Even then, we could make it work.”

“Vik hasn’t had a date with him at one of these events in over a year.” Knowledge that revealed how much attention Maddie paid to Vik.

A fact she’d done her best to hide even from herself, darn it.

His raised brow and knowing look said he realized that, too.

“That’s good. We can back-engineer a budding relationship you’ve taken pains to keep out of the media spotlight.” Conrad took more notes on his tablet. “This works.”

Maddie turned toward Vik. “We’re really getting married?”

“You tell me.”

“Only it doesn’t seem possible.” Everything since her nearly spilled cup of coffee that morning felt like a dream, at times odd, unpleasant and bordering unbelievable.

“Believe it,” Vik said, unconsciously answering her silent thoughts.

She narrowed her eyes, trying to read him. “How can you take this so calmly?”

“What am I supposed to be upset about?”

“Yesterday you were a free agent. Today you are engaged.” Didn’t that bother him, even a little?

Or was it something Vik had planned all along? Somehow, she couldn’t quite dismiss that possibility.

“We are not engaged yet.”

Something went tight in her chest. “But—”

“We will finish this discussion after you meet with the lawyer.”

What did that mean? Did he think they were engaged, or not? Were they engaged? Had she said yes? She was pretty sure she hadn’t. And she might know her choices were very limited, but did Vik? Really?

He returned his attention to his phone and sent a text.

This time she had no doubts it was to her.

Sure enough a few seconds later, her phone chimed. Trust me.

Trust him. Right. He thought it was that easy? “You aren’t going to try to talk me out of signing the paperwork?”

“I told Jeremy threatening Romi could boomerang on him.”

“He didn’t believe you.”

“He has a hard time backing off once he’s set a thing in motion.”

“Are you saying he’s already started the wheels of destruction for Mr. Grayson’s company? They used to be good friends.”

Vik shrugged noncommittally. “He’s done the research on how to make it happen.”

“And he didn’t want to waste his efforts?” Her dad could be so cold, but then that wasn’t breaking news.

“You and I have agreed Jeremy could have no idea how spectacularly it would come back to bite him on the ass.”

“But you aren’t trying to change my mind.”

Conrad stopped typing and listened as if he, too, was curious about what was motivating Vik’s behavior.

Vik ignored the other man, his focus entirely on Maddie. “Those shares ultimately belong to you.”

“My father doesn’t see it that way.”

“It never occurred to Jeremy that any child of his would consider AIH as a means to an end rather than the end itself.”

What did he know? Did Vik realize she had always intended to use her income from the shares to run the school?

It wouldn’t be a long stretch from what she’d told him that morning.

What he couldn’t know was that Romi would do the same. She wanted the school as much as Maddie.

Vik’s dream was something quite different, but obviously just as important to him. “You want the company.”

“Like your father, I want to leave a legacy for my children.” Some might think the lack of emotion in Vik’s deep tones belied his words.

Maddie knew better.

His dark brown eyes burned with certainty. “Archer International Holdings will be that legacy.”

“But we’re not engaged.” She couldn’t help the small bit of sarcasm.

Maddie was unsurprised by Vik’s lack of response.