fade. Not even your very capable PR fixer, Ramona Tate, will be able to spin you out of this.”
The chicken salad they’d had for lunch swirled nauseatingly inside her. “How did you know about Derek? From Ted?” She would have staked her reputation on Ted’s loyalty to the institute.
She had staked her reputation on it.
The look Rourke gave her was almost pitying. “Ted Bonner has never betrayed anyone or anything, least of all the Armstrong Institute.”
“Then how did you come across such privileged information?”
“There are some things that even the venerable Armstrong family can’t hide,” he said, leaning toward her. “Do you really think that I would consider investing in the institute without knowing exactly what I’d be getting into? I made it my business to know as soon as Ted called to set up a meeting with you. I didn’t get to where I am by being naive, Lisa.”
“Did you get there by resorting to blackmail to get what you want?” She was shaking and very much aware that he hadn’t answered her. “Or are we just special that way?”
His smile was cold. The wolf in full, ravenous mode, greeting Red Riding Hood right at the door. “Oh, princess, you are definitely special. And don’t consider it blackmail when we’re all getting something we want out of the deal.”
Fury bubbled inside her, vibrating through her voice. “You met me yesterday with no intention of investing.”
He didn’t deny it.
“So what happened between yesterday and today? Some angel visit you in your dreams and tell you it was time for an heir?” She struggled to keep her voice down.
His gaze drifted from her face, down her body, and back up again. “Something visited me in my dreams,” he allowed.
There was no mistaking his implication and she flushed so hard, she was practically seeing him through crimson.
Or else that was her fury.
She’d never been so close to losing control. She wanted to yell and pound her hands on something.
He would make a satisfying target.
She took a deep breath, waiting until her vocal cords didn’t feel as if they were strangling her. “I have no intention of being your broodmare, and even less intention of allowing you to ruin my institute!”
“You might want to think about it,” he suggested, when she turned on her heel and started walking away from the fountain. “I’ll give you until tomorrow afternoon. That’ll give my media director time to leak the…appropriate news.”
He’d been talking with his media director for much of their drive to Greenwich. She felt even sicker. She looked back at him. “Appropriate.”
“Don’t agree to my…proposal—”
“Proposal!” She snorted. “Insane proposition, maybe.”
He barely paused over her interruption. “—and it’ll be just as I’ve described. A hailstorm of disaster will come down on the institute by the time people tune into the evening news. But if you do agree, I’ll work equally hard at ensuring the world never knows what sort of thievery you have going on in your family. And the only thing in the news will be a human interest blip about our upcoming marriage.”
She hated, absolutely hated the fact that there was a stinging burn deep behind her eyes. There was no way she’d show any sort of weakness in front of this man. “Why should I trust you?”
He held up his hand. “Scout’s honor.”
She stared at him, her hands curling and uncurling at her sides. “I’ve never come as close to wanting to hit someone as I am now.”
“Your brother Derek would make a better target.” His voice was flat. “He’s the one who put you in this position.”
And how badly she wanted to be able to deny it.
But she couldn’t.
Derek. Her own brother. The one she’d always been able to turn to. He’d been the one to teach her to drive when her father was too busy to and her mother was disinclined to. He’d been the one to help her pass her high-school math classes, to whisk her away for a day of sailing when all the rest of her friends were primping for the prom that she’d never been asked to go to. She’d gone to the same university as he; he’d told her what teachers were good and which ones to avoid. He’d taken her out for her first legal beer.
And he’d been her biggest supporter when it came to convincing their father that she—youngest of the Armstrong siblings—had what it took to become the head administrator of the institute.
She hated him for what he’d done to all of them. Couldn’t understand how he could have done what he’d done.
And she wished like hell that she could cut off the memory of all that he’d meant to her.
“Come on, Lisa.” Rourke’s voice dropped gently; the predator sensing weakness. “It won’t be so bad. A handful of years at the outside is all you’ll be giving up. And in exchange, the institute will be set for the next fifty years when the next generation takes over. You can expand. Open another location on the west coast if you want. The sky will be the limit.”
She didn’t care about expansion. Or new sites. She cared about the site—the only site—they had. She cared about what it would do to her father if the institute fell from grace while it was under her watch. Gerald’s health had been declining for years. She wasn’t sure if he could survive such a mammoth, shocking disappointment.
She and Paul and the others at the institute had all agreed that it was best to keep Derek’s horrible misdeeds from their parents. It wouldn’t solve anything if they knew, and would only upset them.
She pressed her fingers to her temples.
But if Rourke was to be believed—if she didn’t go along with his plan—there was no way that her parents wouldn’t learn what Derek had done.
It was unbearable to even contemplate.
“My driver can take you back to your hotel,” Rourke said, and she decided she was losing her mind to think there was a hint of compassion in his voice. “You have some thinking to do.”
“According to you, there’s no thinking to be done. Agree or suffer the consequences.”
“The institute can’t hide its financial precariousness much longer. Even if I did nothing, the truth would come out.”
“But you’re prepared to help it along.” Her voice was thick. She looked at him, wishing she could understand what was ticking behind his impenetrable gaze. “And for what? What did we ever do to you?”
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t like thieves.”
“I don’t like drivers who run red lights,” she exclaimed. “But I don’t take it so personally that I deliberately go hunting them down!”
“I
