Concentrate.
‘I’d like to talk,’ she said.
A muscle moved in his jaw, flexing twice before he spoke. ‘You do not own a phone?’
‘Would you have taken my call?
He met her challenge with a smile—if the tight, humourless twist of his lips could be called a smile. ‘Probably not. But then you and I have nothing to discuss. On the phone or in person.’
An elevator pinged and opened behind him. He inclined his head in a gesture she might have construed as polite if not for the arctic chill in his eyes.
‘I am sorry you have wasted your time.’ And with that he swung away and stepped into the elevator.
Helena hesitated, then quickly rallied and dashed in after him. ‘You’ve turned up after seven years of silence and come after my father’s company. I hardly think that qualifies as nothing.’
‘Get out of the elevator, Helena.’
The soft warning made the skin across her scalp prickle. Or maybe it was hearing her name spoken in that deep, accented baritone that drove a wave of discomforting heat through her?
The elevator doors whispered closed, cocooning them in a space that felt too small and intimate despite the effect of mirrors on three walls.
She planted her feet. ‘No.’
Colour slashed his cheekbones and his dark eyes locked with hers in a staring match that quickly tested the limits of her bravado. Just as she feared that lethal gaze would reduce her to a pile of cinders, he reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and pulled out an access card.
‘As you wish,’ he said, his tone mild—too mild, a voice warned. He flashed the card across a sensor and jabbed the button labelled ‘Penthouse Suite’. With a soft whir, the elevator began its stomach-dropping ascent.
Helena groped for the steel handrail behind her, the rapid rising motion—or maybe the butterflies in her belly she couldn’t quell—making her head swim.
It seemed her ex-lover could not only afford the finest digs in London...he could afford to stay in the hotel’s most exclusive suite.
The knowledge made her heart beat faster.
The Leo she’d known had been a man of understated tastes, stylish in that effortless way of most Italian men but never flashy or overt. She’d liked that about him. Liked his grit and drive and passion. Liked that he was different from the lazy, spoilt rich set her parents wanted her to run with.
And now...?
Her hand tightened on the railing. Now it didn’t matter what she felt about him. All that mattered was the havoc he’d soon unleash on her family. If he and her father went head to head in a corporate war and Douglas Shaw lost control of his precious empire the fallout for his wife and son would be dire. Her father didn’t take kindly to losing; when he did, those closest to him suffered.
‘Has your father sent you?’ The way he ground out the word father conveyed a wealth of hatred—a sentiment Helena, too, wrestled with when it came to Daddy Dearest.
She studied Leo’s face, leaner now, his features sharper, more angular than she remembered, but still incredibly handsome. Her fingers twitched with the memory of tracing those features while he slept, of familiarising herself with that long, proud nose and strong jaw, those sculpted male lips. Lips that once could have stopped her heart with a simple smile—or a kiss.
Emotion rose and swirled, unexpected, a poignant mix of regret and longing that made her chest ache and her breath hitch.
Did Leo smile much these days? Or did those lines either side of his mouth stem from harsher emotions like anger and hatred?
Instinctively Helena’s hand went to her stomach. The void inside where life had once flourished was a stark reminder that she, too, had suffered. Leo, at least, had been spared that pain, and no good would come now of sharing hers.
Some burdens, she had decided, were better borne alone. She let her hand fall back to her side.
‘I’m not my father’s puppet, Leo. Whatever your misguided opinion of me.’
A harsh sound shot from his throat. ‘The only one misguided is you, Helena. What part of “I never wish to see you again” did you not understand?’
She smothered the flash of hurt his words evoked. ‘That was a long time ago. And I only want an opportunity to talk. Is that asking too much?’
A soft ping signalled the elevator’s arrival. Before he could answer with a resounding yes, she stepped through the parting doors into a spacious vestibule. She stopped, the sensible heels of her court shoes sinking into thick carpet the colour of rich chocolate. Before her loomed an enormous set of double doors. It was private up here, she realised. Secluded. Isolated.