Caught in the Billionaire's Embrace (11 page)

She'd tried to write him a note, had tried to capture in writing what she so desperately wanted to say to him. But when she'd realized what it was she wanted to say, she'd torn the paper into tiny pieces and let them fall like snowflakes into the tiny handbag that now lay on the counter between her and Ava. They had been silly, anyway, the feelings she'd begun to think she had for him. Impossible, too. Not only because she'd known him less than forty-eight hours. And not only because he was still carrying a torch for someone else. But also because Della wasn't the sort of woman to fall in love. Love was for dreamers and the deluded. And God knew she'd never been either of those.

“There,” Ava said as she finished tallying everything. “If you'll sign here that we agree to agree that you returned everything safe and sound, I'll return the full amount of your damage deposit.”

“But I'm late getting everything back,” Della said. “I was supposed to be here at opening on Sunday. Not Monday.”

Ava made a careless gesture with her hand. “I was supposed to be here Sunday, too. But Mother Nature had other ideas for all of us, didn't she?”

Boy, did she ever.

“So Monday morning is the next best thing,” Ava continued. “I appreciate you being here so promptly.”

Yeah, that was Della. Always perfect timing. Especially when it came to anything that would thoroughly disrupt her life. Had she been five minutes later meeting Egan on New Year's Eve, she would have missed seeing him with the woman she would learn was his wife. Had she been ten minutes later to the office on New Year's Day, she would have missed the memo to her boss that had set everything into motion. She would still be living her life blissfully unaware in New York. Even if she'd ultimately realized Egan was married, and even if she'd quit her job because of him, she would have found another position elsewhere on Wall Street in no time. She would still be picking up her morning coffee at Vijay's kiosk, would still be enjoying Saturdays in Central Park, would still have the occasional night at the Met when she could afford it.

And she never, ever, would have met Marcus.

She couldn't decide if that was a good thing or not. Traditional thinking said it was better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all, but Della wondered. Maybe it was better to never know what you were missing. Not that she
loved
Marcus. But still…

“Did you enjoy
La Bohème,
Miss Hannan?” Ava asked, bringing Della's thoughts back to the present.

She smiled, only having to fake part of it. “It was wonderful,” she said. “I can't remember the last time I enjoyed an evening so much.” Or a night afterward, she added to herself. Or a day after that. Or a night after that.

“I've never been to the opera,” Ava told her. “Never mind a red-carpet event like opening night. It must have been very exciting, rubbing shoulders with such
refined company in a gorgeous setting like the Lyric with everyone dressed in their finest attire.”

The announcement surprised Della, though she wasn't sure why. Certainly there were a lot of people out there, especially her age, which Ava seemed to be, who didn't care for opera enough to see it performed live. It was the red-carpet comment and the breathless quality of her voice when she talked about the refined company that didn't gibe. There was an unmistakable air of refinement and wealth about Ava that indicated she must move in the sort of social circle that would promote opera attendance and red-carpet events, never mind gorgeous settings and fine attire.

Both times Della had encountered Ava, the other woman had exuded elegance and good breeding, and had been extremely well put together in the sort of understated attire that only reinforced it. Today, she wore a perfectly tailored taupe suit with pearly buttons, her only jewelry glittering diamond studs in her ears—large enough and sparkly enough for Della to guess they alone cost a fortune. Her dark auburn hair was arranged in a flawless chignon at her nape, and her green eyes reflected both intelligence and sophistication.

Standing across the counter from her, Della was more aware than ever of her impoverished roots. Although she was dressed nicely enough in brown tweed trousers and an ivory cashmere sweater under her dark chocolate trench coat, she felt like more of an impostor than ever. Ava Brenner obviously came from the sort of old money background that Della had had to insinuate herself into—and still never really belonged in. She recognized all the signs, having been surrounded by people like Ava in her job.

Not for the first time, she wondered why the other
woman ran a shop like this. She was probably rich enough on her own to do nothing but be idly rich, but she'd been at the boutique late Saturday afternoon when Della picked up her clothes, and she was here bright and early Monday morning, too. For some reason, that made Della glance down at Ava's left hand—no wedding ring. No engagement ring, for that matter. She wondered if Ava had ever loved and lost and how she felt about it.

Della pushed the thought away. Women like Ava could pick and choose whomever they wanted for a mate. She was beautiful, smart, successful and chic. Once she set her sights on a man, he wouldn't stand a chance. He would love her forever and make her the center of his universe. No way would she settle for a one-night stand with a guy she'd never see again.

“Well,” Ava said now as she counted out the last of Della's refund, “I hope you'll keep Talk of the Town in mind the next time you need to look your best.”

Right. The next time Della would need to look her best would be when she appeared before the grand jury in two weeks. Somehow, though, she was pretty sure one of her suits from her old life would work just fine for that. But maybe in her new life…

She pushed that thought away, too. Her new life would be miles away from Chicago. And there was little chance she'd need to don haute couture for anything in it. It would be nothing but business attire, since she'd be doing little other than establishing herself in a new job, starting all over again from square one. It was going to be a long time before she was earning enough to recapture the sort of life she'd had in New York.

It would be even longer before she trusted any man enough to let him get close to her again.

That hadn't been the case with Marcus,
a little voice
inside her head piped up.
You got close to him pretty fast. And you trusted him enough to have sex with him.

But Marcus was different, Della assured the little voice. Marcus had been a one-night stand. It was easy to trust someone you knew you were never going to see again.

Seriously?
the voice asked.
Is that the reason you want to go with?

Um, yeah, Della told the voice.

Fine. But you're only kidding yourself, you know.

Shut up, voice.

“Be careful out there,” Ava said, bringing Della's attention back around. “The snow may have stopped, but there are still some slick spots on the sidewalk and slush in the gutters and all kinds of things that could harm you.”

Oh, Ava didn't need to tell Della that.

“Don't worry,” she said. “I can take care of myself.”

And she could, Della knew. She'd been doing it her entire life. That wasn't going to change simply because she had a new life to get under way. Especially since there wouldn't be any Marcuses in her future. Men like him only came along once in a lifetime—if even that often. No way would a man like that show up twice.

In two weeks, Della would be embarking on a second life. A life in which she'd be alone again. Alone still, really, since Egan had never actually been with her the way he could have—should have—been.

Only once in her life had Della really felt as if she was sharing that life—sharing herself—with someone else. And it was someone she would never—could never—see again.

N
ine days after returning the red dress to Talk of the Town, Della was still struggling to go back to her usual routine. It felt like anything but routine now that she had memories of Marcus shouldering their way into her thoughts all the time. The safe house where the feds had placed her was what one would expect to find in middle-class, middle-income, Middle America: sturdy early American furnishings in neutral colors and synthetic fabrics, with white walls and artwork that might have been purchased at any yard sale in suburbia. The lack of personality on the house's part had only contributed to Della's feelings of entrapment during her time here, but that feeling was compounded in the wake of her separation from Marcus. The handful of days she had left here stretched before her like an oceanful of centuries.

And she was even more fearful now than she'd been
before about the uncertainty of her future. Before, she'd been prepared to face life on her own and had felt reasonably certain she would be able to manage. But now she knew what might have been under other, better circumstances. Wonderful. Life with Marcus would have been wonderful. Because he was wonderful. No other man would ever be able to hold a candle to him.

She sighed fitfully. There he was again, at the front of her thoughts. She told herself the only reason she thought him so wonderful was because she knew so little about him. Anyone could be wonderful for thirty-six hours in a small room with no one watching. The time she'd spent with him had been a fantasy.
He'd
been a fantasy. They'd both been playing the role of the phantom, perfect lover. Once free of the hotel room, he might be the same kind of man Egan had turned out to be.

How could she be so certain that Marcus hadn't lied about everything that weekend anyway? He'd said the woman he was waiting for was out of his life, but what if he'd only said that to further his seduction of Della? How could she expect him to have been completely open and honest about himself when she hadn't been open and honest about herself? Once she learned more about him, once she'd discovered what kind of person he really was…

But then, how could she do that when she would never see him again? When she didn't even know his last name? At this rate, he would always be a fantasy to her, and as time went on, he'd grow into an even more legendary lover and all-around great guy, and then she'd really never have a chance to fall in lo—ah, she meant—never have a chance to appreciate someone else she might be compatible with.

A way to counter that possibility came to her immediately, and it wasn't the first time the idea had crept into her brain. This time, it wasn't creeping, though. This time, it was stampeding like a herd of wild, trumpeting wildebeest. And those wildebeest were running right to the laptop in the bedroom.

Maybe she didn't know Marcus's last name. But she knew where he worked. Fallon Brothers. The company must employ thousands of people nationwide, but Marcus wasn't the most common name in the world, and she could narrow the search to Chicago. He'd said himself he was a fixture on a number of websites, so by doing an internet search of his first name and Fallon Brothers and the city of Chicago, she'd probably get a lot of hits. A lot of
notorious
hits. Maybe if she could see him on notorious sites, surrounded by notoriously beautiful women in notoriously compromising situations, she'd realize he wasn't the kind of man she needed in her life anyway. Maybe if she could see him in his natural state of debauchery, it would be easier to forget him.

What could it hurt? She would never see him again. He would never be able to find her, if he was even trying. In a matter of days, she would be swallowed up even deeper into the system with a new name, address and social security number. And then there would
really
be no way for him to find her.

As she folded herself onto the bed and fired up the laptop, Della's heart began to race, and her stomach erupted with nerves. She wasn't sure what was more exciting—the prospect of learning more about Marcus or the prospect of seeing his face again, even if it was just in an online photo.

She brought up the Google page and clicked on the
image option, then typed in the name
Marcus
and the word
Chicago,
along with the words
Fallon Brothers
in quotation marks. And in the blink of an eye—literally—she was staring at the first three rows of what the site told her was hundreds of images. Marcus was in every one of the first batch. And the second, third and fourth batches, too. As she scrolled down the page, she saw him in even more, sometimes alone, but more often with women. Lots of women. Lots of different women. All of them smiling. All of them clinging. All of them beautiful.

Only when Della moved her hand to run her finger over the mouse pad did she realize it was trembling. In fact, all of her was trembling. She had no idea why. Maybe because seeing Marcus online only reaffirmed that the weekend had really happened. That he really existed. That she had some link, however tenuous, to him. From now on, no matter where she was, or what she was doing, or who she was, she would still be able to find him. She would have physical photographs of him to go along with the insubstantial pictures in her mind. He wouldn't be ephemeral, as she had feared. He could still be with her forever.

Even if he wouldn't be with her forever.

She flexed her fingers to calm them and chose a photo of Marcus alone to move the mouse over. It wasn't one of the candid shots, but rather a posed, formal portrait that must have been one he'd had taken for professional reasons. It was probably from the Fallon Brothers website. When the cursor moved over it, the picture grew larger and added information, starting with a url, then the fact that it was a jpg—sized seventy-something by eighty-seven-something else—then,
finally, a description that read Marcus Fallon, Chief Investment Officer, Fallon Brothers Chicago.

Della's hand began to tremble again, and her stomach pitched with nausea.

Marcus Fallon. He was a member of the Fallon family and one of the highest ranking executives in the company. She'd known he must be well-connected to the business. It didn't take seeing him in a place like the Windsor Club to know how well-paid he was or how many perks he must have enjoyed. But this… This went beyond well-connected. And it went way beyond well-paid with excellent perks. He was a descendent of some of the very people who had designed the way the country did business. His ancestors had been the equivalent to royalty in this capitalist society. As such, he was, for all intents and purposes, a prince.

So CinderDella's Prince Charming really was a prince. And she… Well, that would put her in the role of pauper, wouldn't it?

She recalled his assurances that he had friends with clout on the East Coast who might be able to help her out, and her stomach pitched again. Those friends were probably of equal rank to him in New York's financial district. Some of them might very well be officers of Whitworth and Stone. She wouldn't be surprised if some of his friends ended up behind bars because of her. Oh, yeah. He would have loved to help her once he learned what the nature of her “trouble” was. He would have been on the phone in no time flat, tipping off everyone he knew that might be at risk.

Any small hope that Della might have been harboring that she and Marcus still had a chance—and she was surprised to discover she had indeed been entertaining hope, and not such a small amount at that—was well
and truly squashed at the realization. Once she gave her testimony to the grand jury, she would be an exile in the financial world. It didn't matter that she was bringing to light illegal activity that should be stopped and punished. No one on Wall Street was going to applaud her, and every door would slam in her face. People like Marcus—and Marcus himself—would want nothing to do with her. She would be bringing down some very powerful people. And other very powerful people didn't like it when that happened. Especially when it was a peasant doing the tearing down.

Unable to help herself, Della clicked on the link and found herself looking at a larger version of Marcus's photo, and it was indeed on the Fallon Brothers website. She read that he was the eldest great-grandson of one of Fallon Brothers' founding members who would be moving into his father's position as CEO in the not-too-distant future. She read about his hobbies and favorite pastimes—she already knew about opera, squash and port, but the sailing and polo came as something of a surprise—and about his education at the country's finest schools. All in all, it was a sanitized version of the Marcus she knew and wasn't particularly helpful. Once she got past the part about him being the crown prince of the Chicago financial kingdom, she meant.

So she went back to Google and began clicking on some of the other pictures she'd found. There was one of Marcus with a former Miss Illinois taken at a New Year's Eve party last year. That would have been right around the time Della's world was beginning to fall apart, but Marcus looked as if he didn't have a care in the world. Another photo showed him and a
very
generously endowed redhead at a fundraiser for a children's hospital. Yet another had him sitting
on the deck of a high-rise with Lake Michigan in the background and a
very
generously endowed blonde in his lap. The next was a picture of him at some red-carpet event with a woman who looked very much like a certain Hollywood starlet who was known for appearing in public without underwear.

This was how she needed to remember him, Della told herself. In photos taken within months of each other in which he was with a different woman every time. She had to stop thinking of him as Prince Charming and start recognizing the fact that he was just another rich guy with a sense of entitlement who took advantage of everyone who crossed his path. His emotions ran as deep as a strand of hair, and he thought of little other than how to make his own life more enjoyable. He had probably stopped thinking about Della the moment he woke up and found her gone.

He wasn't Prince Charming from a fantastic castle in an enchanted land, she told herself again. He was a big, nasty toad from the toxic swamp of entitlement. The sooner she forgot about him, the better.

She told herself the same thing in a dozen different ways, every time she clicked on a new photograph. But her memories of him crowded out her admonitions. She remembered his smile and his tender touches, and the genuine sadness in his eyes when he had talked about the woman who hadn't been with him that night. That was the real Marcus Fallon, she knew. Maybe not Prince Charming. But not a toad, either.

She just hoped that, wherever he was, he was remembering her fondly, too.

 

Marcus sat in the study of his Lakeshore Drive penthouse, his black silk robe open over a pair of
matching pajama bottoms, nursing a glass of port and sifting through a thin file of information that had been couriered to him that afternoon. Beyond the expansive picture window to his right, Lake Michigan was as inky black as the sky above it, dotted here and there with lights from commercial vessels in the usual shipping lanes that twinkled the same way the stars above them did.

He didn't much notice the vista, however, settled as he was in a boxy, overstuffed club chair that was bathed in the pale amber glow of a floor lamp beside it. Much of the room was amber, in fact, from the coppery fabric of the chair to the golds and browns of the area rug, to the bird's-eye maple paneling to the small, sculpted bronze originals displayed on the built-in shelves. Marcus liked the warm colors. They made him feel calm.

Usually.

Tonight, he felt anything but. Because the file he had thought would be stuffed with information about Della Louise Hannan of New York City contained little he couldn't have discovered by himself. That didn't, however, make what information was here any less interesting. Especially the part about her having worked at Whitworth and Stone, one of Wall Street's biggest—if not
the
biggest—powerhouses. Marcus knew more than a few people who worked there. And since Della's position as executive assistant to one of its executives would have had her moving in the upper echelon of the business, there was a small chance someone he knew there had at least made her acquaintance. Tomorrow, as soon as the business day started on the East Coast, he would make some phone calls.

Not that having any information about Della's time at
Whitworth and Stone would help him much now, since she hadn't worked at the brokerage house for nearly a year. In fact, Della Hannan had pretty much dropped off the face of the map in mid-January of this year and hadn't been seen or heard from since. The apartment where she had lived was now being rented by a married couple who had moved into it in March—and it had been advertised as being a “furnished apartment,” because Della had left virtually all of her belongings behind, and her landlord had claimed them on the grounds she hadn't fulfilled the terms of her lease. She'd left her job as abruptly, had simply not come to work one day…or any day afterward.

What was even more troubling was that, in spite of her sudden disappearance, no one had reported her missing. Not a family member, not a friend, not a neighbor, not a lover, not her employer. There was no police report on file, no formal complaint from her landlord, nothing in her personnel file at Whitworth and Stone about why she may have stopped coming to work after more than a decade of not missing a single day.

There was, however, office chatter about why that may have happened. Word in her department was that Della had been dating an executive in another part of the business who had turned out to be married. Whether or not Della had known about his marital status was a bit murky. Either she had known and then been angry that the man refused to leave his wife, or she hadn't known and had left once she discovered the truth. In either event, her office affair seemed to be the reason everyone cited as to why she no longer worked at the company.