Page 202 of Modern Romance Collection December 2024 Books 5-8

‘Mr McIntyre?’ The man’s voice was taut and urgent now.

‘Everything’s fine, Carlos.’ Tiger released his grip and she clutched dizzily at the desk for support. Her whole body felt hollowed out with a hunger she had never felt for any man and she could only watch dazedly as he picked up the lamp and put it back next to the pile of folders.

‘I just knocked something off the desk. It’s all good. In fact, Ms Truitt is just leaving, aren’t you? So you can walk her to the elevator.’

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the shadowy outline of Carlos move away from the door and then her body tensed as Tiger turned towards her, because his pupils had swallowed up his irises so that his eyes were no longer gold, but black.

‘Are you okay?’ He stared down at her, his expression hard, glittering and unreadable, and she nodded.

She couldn’t have answered Tiger’s question aloud. Her breath was gone. Her voice too. Her heart was pounding sluggishly as if she’d been drugged or hypnotised and all her blood seemed to have rushed to her cheeks and her face felt as if it were burning and yet she wanted to lean into him again and the whole thing was so confusing that she couldn’t look at him any more and, ducking down, she began to pick up her things.

‘Need a hand?’

‘No, I don’t,’ she said quickly, but Tiger was already crouching beside her. His nearness made her skin feel unfamiliar, hot and tender and tingling.

‘Don’t,’ she snapped, snatching a packet of tissues from his hand. Her voice sounded high and thin and she understood that it was revealing too much. But she couldn’t do anything to change it without drawing attention to that fact and she had already given away more of herself than was sensible to this man.

There was a long silence as he stared at her for what felt like an eternity and then he spun round and walked around his desk.

‘I’m sure you can find your way out. Don’t forget to sign the NDA. I’ll see you tomorrow morning. Make sure you’re ready. If you keep me waiting, it won’t be my security team knocking on your door. It’ll be the NYPD.’

His eyes roamed down over her body in a way that made her feel unsteady. Unclothed.

‘Dress is smart-casual but nothing flouncy or garish. Keep it subtle. Oh, and, Sydney...’ He paused as she turned to face him, and now his gaze was as hot and bright and destructive as a solar flare. ‘A word of warning. Any little voices in the back of your head suggesting you do a disappearing act—you would be wise to ignore them. Otherwise, you’ll find out exactly what happens when you pull a tiger by the tail.’

He hadn’t given her a time, she realised as she let herself into the apartment, no doubt on purpose to punish her for asking for money.

But she had no choice. She needed money and Harris Carver owed her nothing because she hadn’t delivered. Her spine stiffened as she remembered their brief conversation. She hadn’t told him that she’d been caught red-handed, just that she couldn’t hack the McIntyre server. ‘Thank you for letting me know,’ he’d said and then he’d hung up.

And now she was back to square one. Worse than square one, because she had no money coming in. But at least she wasn’t sitting in a police station, which was good, and in a week this would all be over, and really how bad could it be? It was just a different version of what she’d already done, only, instead of posing as an admin assistant, she would be posing as his girlfriend. So put like that, it was just more role-playing, only with a few added complications.

Her heartbeat jerked in her throat. That was one way of describing Tiger.

She felt suddenly exhausted, as if she had just finished a triathlon. As she sat down on the sofa, her phone pinged and, gazing down at the screen, she felt her breath catch in her throat. It was the NDA. She scrolled down to the bottom because otherwise it wouldn’t let her sign, but she didn’t bother reading it. What was the point? She was hardly going to negotiate her terms. Clicking on the screen, she signed in the box and pressed Send.

There. It was done. She wasn’t going to have to face the police.

And yet she couldn’t properly enjoy the feeling because now it was real. Undeniable. Unavoidable.

Her back prickled against the sofa cushions. Back in his office, it had all felt so surreal, sounreal. The whole time she was there she had just kept thinking, This can’t be happening to me. And as she’d walked back into the apartment it had felt even more like a dream. Or a nightmare.

She glanced down at the screen, her pulse twitching.

But it was time to wake up and smell the coffee. By signing that NDA she was bound to Tiger.

Bound.

Remembering Tiger’s warning about pulling a disappearing act, she got abruptly to her feet and began pacing round the apartment. Round and round as she had once paced the home that became a cage.

Could she run?

No point, she thought, a shiver running down her spine. Nobody could run for ever. Which meant she would have to find a place to hide. Only hiding was worse than running.

Her body stiffened as she remembered what it had felt like waiting to be found. Eyes closed. Braced. Breathing between clenched teeth. Waiting for the sound of his voice, his footsteps. Praying for it in the end because the silence was the most terrible thing of all.

Somewhere nearby a dog barked and her legs slowed then stopped.

No, she wasn’t going to run or hide. And she didn’t need to. Okay, it hadn’t exactly gone according to plan, but everything was under control.

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