Читать книгу The Billionaires Collection - Оливия Гейтс - Страница 55

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

HE WAS A SHAREHOLDER? As the sounds of the launch filtered into the office, Bianca’s mind reeled. What had he done? He’d been so angry when he’d left the park, so hell-bent on getting revenge, but this was the last thing she expected to hear.

Why had he waited until now to say anything? Why moments before the launch? What was he up to? The need to warn Dario rushed over her again and she realised sending Liev away would only give him the perfect opportunity for taking his revenge at the worst possible moment.

‘What did you do, Liev?’ She asked the question, hating the trepidation in her voice. None of what he was saying made any sense, and why was it all connected to her?

‘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 words 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.’

‘All over again? When did I first break your heart?’

‘After that night on the island.’ She blushed and lowered her lashes, and he lifted her chin so she had to look at him. He wanted to see the reality of her love in her eyes. ‘You looked so disgusted with me.’

He let a harsh Russian curse slip out, realising how it must have looked to her. She’d been at her most vulnerable then and he’d hurt her at the worst possible time. ‘I was disgusted with myself for pushing you into that situation.’

She reached up and pressed her lips against his briefly. ‘None of that matters now, Liev, and I wouldn’t have changed that night for anything. It was perfect.’

Before she could say anything else, he kissed her, her response firing the need within him, and he had to force himself to stop. He loved her, and as he’d looked into her eyes, he’d seen her love reflected back at him.

* * *

Bianca wanted to keep kissing him, to savour every last minute of the kiss. She loved him. He’d changed her and changed the way she viewed men, albeit in an unorthodox way, but he had and she meant what she’d said. That night they’d spent on his island together was special and she couldn’t ever forget it, wish it undone, for anything. That night she had loved him—truly loved him.

Her grandfather had known that she’d fallen deeply in love with Liev; she was convinced of that now. Thankfully she didn’t think he knew that Liev had blackmailed her, but he had known she loved him and was holding back, denying herself love. ‘Do you know what my grandfather said just before we left?’

She felt Liev’s arms tense around her and his eyes narrowed slightly in suspicion. ‘What did he say?’

‘He told me that whatever I did, I shouldn’t waste a chance of love if it comes along.’ She smiled at him, her heart beating hard with love for him. ‘And I don’t intend to waste it, Liev.’

He closed his eyes in relief, his arms losing their tension, but not lessening their hold on her. ‘Bianca, how can I ever make it up to you, put right all the wrong I’ve done?’

‘Love me.’

‘There was a moment in the park last week when I wanted to tell you I loved you...that I didn’t care about revenge, that all I cared about was you. Do you remember telling me I would one day do anything for love?’

‘Yes,’ she whispered, remembering those exact words.

‘I was almost blinded with jealousy because of the love you had for your grandfather.’

‘It wasn’t my grandfather I was referring to—or the bracelet. It was you and that night at the villa.’

Liev didn’t answer her, at least not with words. Instead he claimed her lips, pulling her so hard against him that she could hardly breathe, but it was exactly where she wanted to be. His hands caressed her and beneath the business suit she wore her body burst into flames.

‘There is only one thing left to do.’ He held her away from him to look into her eyes, his full of desire matching that which raced through her. He stepped back and pulled the ring from his pocket, holding it between his fingers so it glinted beneath the lights. ‘You can choose a different ring if you want, but, Bianca Di Sione, will you do me the great honour of becoming my wife? My real wife.’

‘Yes,’ she whispered. This was the happy ending she’d secretly longed for all her life, since reading that letter, the one so full of love. ‘Yes, Liev, I will and I don’t want a different ring—this one is just perfect.’

He kissed her more deeply than he’d ever kissed her and eventually his lips left hers, leaving her so breathless she could hardly utter a word. ‘Bianca Di Sione, I love you so very much. You have made my life complete.’

* * * * *