‘Or what? You’ll carry through with your empty threats?’
His fury eased a touch and twisted amusement slid back into place. It never ceased to amaze him how the titled rich felt they were above the tenets that governed ordinary human beings. His own stepfather had been the same. He’d believed, foolishly, that his pedigree and connections would insulate him from his reckless business practices, that the Old Boys’ Club would provide a safety net despite his poor judgement.
Zaccheo had taken great pleasure in watching his mother’s husband squirm before him, cap in hand, when Zaccheo had bought his family business right from underneath his pompous nose. But even then, the older man had continued to treat him like a third-class citizen...
Just as Oscar Pennington had done. Just as Eva Pennington was doing now.
‘You think my threats empty?’ he enquired softly. ‘Then do nothing. It’s after all your privilege and your right.’
Something of the lethal edge that rode him must have transmitted itself to her. Apprehension chased across her face before she firmed those impossibly sumptuous lips.
‘Do nothing, and watch me bury your family in the deepest, darkest, most demeaning pit you can dream of. Do nothing and watch me unleash a scandal the scale of which you can only imagine on your precious family name.’ He bared his teeth in a mirthless smile and her eyes widened in stunned disbelief. ‘It would be my privilege and pleasure to do so.’
Oscar Pennington inhaled sharply and Zaccheo’s gaze zeroed in on his enemy. The older man rose from the chair. Though he looked frail, his eyes reflected icy disdain. But Zaccheo also glimpsed the fear of a cornered man weighing all the options to see how to escape the noose dangling ever closer.
Zaccheo smiled inwardly. He had no intention of letting Pennington escape. Not now, not ever.
The flames of retribution intensifying within him, he unclasped his hands. It was time to bring this meeting to an end.
‘Your time’s up, Pennington.’
Eva answered instead of her father. ‘How do we know you’re not bluffing? You say you have something over us, prove it,’ she said defiantly.
He could’ve walked out and let them twist in the wind of uncertainty. Pennington would find out soon enough the length of Zaccheo’s ruthless reach. But the thought of leaving Eva here when he departed was suddenly unthinkable. So far he’d allowed himself a brief glimpse of her body wrapped in that obscenely revealing red dress. But that one glimpse had been enough. Quite apart from the rage boiling his blood, the steady hammer of his pulse proved that he still wanted her with a fever that spiked higher with each passing second.
He would take what he’d foolishly and piously denied himself two years ago. He would take and use, just as they’d done to him. Only when he’d achieved every goal he’d set himself would he feel avenged.
‘You can’t, can you?’ Oscar taunted with a sly smile, bringing Zaccheo back to the room and the three aristocratic faces staring at him with varying degrees of disdain and fear.
He smiled, almost amused by the older man’s growing confidence. ‘Harry Fairfield is providing you with a bridging loan of fifteen million pounds because the combined running costs of the Pennington Hotels and The Spire have you stretched so thin the banks won’t touch you. While you desperately drum up an adequate advertising budget to rent out all those overpriced but empty floors in The Spire, the interest owed to the Chinese consortium who own seventy-five per cent of the building is escalating. You have a meeting with them on Monday to request more time to pay the interest. In return for Fairfield’s investment, you’re handing him your daughter.’
Eva glared at him. ‘So you’ve asked a few questions about Penningtons’ business practices. That doesn’t empower you to make demands of any of us.’
Zaccheo took a moment to admire her newfound grit. During their initial association, she’d been a little more timid, and in her father’s shadow, but it looked as if the kitten had grown a few claws. He curbed the thrill at what was to come and answered.
‘Yes, it does. Would you be interested to know the Chinese consortium sold their seventy-five per cent of The Spire to me three days ago? So by my calculation you’re in excess of three months late on interest payments, correct?’
A rough sound, a cross between a cough and a wheeze, escaped Pennington’s throat. There was no class or grace in the way he gaped at Zaccheo. He dropped back into his chair, his face a mask of hatred.
‘I knew you were a worthless bet the moment I set eyes on you. I should’ve listened to my instincts.’
The red haze he’d been trying to hold back surged higher. ‘No, what you wanted was a spineless scapegoat, a capro espiatorio, who would make you rich and fat and content and even give up his life without question!’
‘Mr Giordano, surely we can discuss this like sensible business-minded individuals,’ Sophie Pennington advanced, her hands outstretched in benign sensibility. Zaccheo looked from the hands she willed not to tremble to the veiled disdain in her eyes. Then he looked past her to Eva, who’d returned to her father’s side, her face pale but her eyes shooting her displeasure at him.
Unexpectedly and very much unwelcome, a tiny hint of compassion tugged at him.
Basta!
He turned abruptly and reached for the door handle. ‘You have until I ready my chopper for take-off to come to me, Eva.’ He didn’t need to expand on that edict. The or else hung in the air like the deadly poison he intended it to be.
He walked out and headed for the terrace, despite every nerve in his body straining to return to the room and forcibly drag Eva out.
True, he hadn’t bargained for the visceral reaction to seeing her again. And yes, he hadn’t quite been able to control his reaction to seeing another man’s ring on her finger, that vulgar symbol of ownership hollowing out his stomach. The knowledge that she’d most likely shared that hapless drunk’s bed, given the body he’d once believed to be his to another, ate through his blood like acid on metal. But he couldn’t afford to let his emotions show.
Every strategic move in this game of deadly retribution hinged on him maintaining his control; on not letting them see how affected he was by all this.
He stepped onto the terrace and all conversation ceased. Curious faces gaped and one or two bolder guests even tried to intercept him. Zaccheo cut through the crowd, his gaze on the chopper a few dozen yards away.
She would come to him. As an outcome of his first salvo, nothing else would be acceptable.
His pulse thudded loud and insistent in his ears as he strolled down the steps towards the aircraft. The fireworks amid which he’d landed had long since gone quiet, but the scent of sulphur lingered in the air, reminding him of the volatility that lingered beneath his own skin, ready to erupt at the smallest trigger.
He wouldn’t let it erupt. Not yet.
A murmur rose behind him, the fevered excitement that came with the anticipation of a spectacle. A scandal.
Zaccheo compelled himself to keep walking.
He ducked
