Temptation In The Boardroom. Paula Roe

time since he’d started this quest. Instead he felt nothing. Nothing at all except a numbness, an absence of feeling that was almost frightening in its intensity.

      He distracted himself by glancing at Francesca. Her long lashes swept down over her cheeks as she took a sip of the vodka then pushed the glass away. Whatever had gone on outside had rattled her. Even in his distracted state, the glitter in her gray eyes burrowed itself beneath his skin. What had gone on between her and Leonid?

      They finished the vodka. Leonid requested a fully executable contract be sent to his lawyer the following morning. If he got the green light that Harrison was sure he would because the lawyers had already scoured the document, he would sign.

      He kept waiting for the euphoria to hit him. While he smiled at Leonid’s joke about missing their personal chess matches each day. As they said goodbye to the two men and climbed into the car, Francesca stopping to speak to Viktor. While he stared out at a now dark New York. It never came. Why wasn’t he on top of the world? Why didn’t the victory feel sweet instead of bittersweet? He could close in on Anton Markovic now and bring it all full circle. Make him understand his pain. Wasn’t that what he’d always wanted?

      It made no sense.

      He glanced at Francesca. The pinched look hadn’t left her face. If anything it was worse. “Did you let him down easy?”

      She turned a conflicted gaze on him. “I told him I was hung up on someone else. It seemed nicer to do it that way.”

      He wondered if she meant him. He could not deny he was more than a little hung up on her. And fighting it bitterly.

      Her gaze fell away from his. He rested his head against the back of the seat. “What did Leonid say to you outside?”

      Her mouth pressed into a straight line. “He asked me if he should sign the deal. If you were the honorable man he thought you were.”

      His head came off the seat. Her gaze moved back to his, stark and most definitely under siege. Aristov had asked her that?

      “What did you say?”

      “I said you were a good man. That I wouldn’t be working for you if you weren’t.”

      It had cost her integrity a great deal to say that knowing the scenario he’d painted. He closed his hand over the fist she had curled on the seat. “Thank you.”

      Her gaze dropped to his hand. “It’s the truth. You are a good man.”

      With a cross to bear she didn’t agree with... His hand remained closed over her fist. He fought the desire to bring it to his mouth, to press his lips to her skin until she released the tension and he could taste the salt on her skin. He wanted her. He wanted her so badly he could taste her already under his mouth. But she was unavailable to him.

      He released her hand before he did it. His skin pulsed with the need for more because that touch, her touch, was the only thing making him feel alive right now.

      He brought his back teeth together. Fought it. Recited to himself all the reasons he couldn’t have her. Good reasons.

      Derrick slid the partition open and asked, “Where first?”

      He gave him Francesca’s address.

      She shook her head. “We’re closer to you. I need the papers for the Detroit project to work on while you’re out in the morning. I’ll come up, get them, then Derrick can drive me home.”

      It made sense. It would also get him out of this car sooner. “Fine. That works.”

      Derrick stopped in the circular driveway at the side of the building. They rode the elevator to the penthouse in silence, neither of them about to address the tension and push things over the edge.

      He found the papers she needed on the desk in his study and carried them out to the living room. “Text me if you need any clarification.” The delicate fingers he’d just held closed around them. Her gaze fastened on his, probing, seeking. “I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon then.”

      “Yes.” He willed her out of the apartment with a curt, dismissive look. He needed to be alone or he needed to drown himself in her, but he couldn’t do anything in between.

      She was halfway to the door when she stopped and turned around. “Harrison, are you okay?”

      “I’m fine. Thank you for your help today.”

      She nodded and left. When the door closed behind her and he heard the sound of the elevator whishing its way toward ground level, he poured himself a drink he knew he didn’t need and took it out onto the terrace. The moon was a perfect, giant orb in a sheet of black. Luminous; full of promise. It should have been another signpost of where he was headed. Vengeance. Yet he continued to feel nothing. The fear he dreaded always found a way in, insidious as it was, worming its way into his consciousness.

      He lifted his palms to his temples. Willed it away. It was nights like this, nights when he scaled Mount Everest and won, when any other human being would have been basking in the glory, that he wondered if the darkness would claim him, too.

      There had never been any sign he had picked up his father’s genetic markers for mania, but the depression beckoned, whispering along the edges of his mind. He raised his eyes to the Grant tower, a shining beacon of what made America great. Had his father known how close to the flame he was flying? Or had he been blinded by the heights he ached to achieve?

      Would it be too much for him? His head pounded with the weight of too many decisions. Too many paths that were no longer clear. Too much, too much.

      A jet banked over the Hudson, the lights on its wings flashing in the darkness. He stared at it, hypnotized by the pulsing flares. Is destiny the fate of every man? Is your path irreversible no matter how you pursue it? Or is there a way to rise above it? A way to blaze a path that is yours and yours alone?

      The throbbing in his head intensified. He needed to escape, but he didn’t know how.

       CHAPTER NINE

      FRANKIE COULDN’T GET into the car. The haunted, hunted look on Harrison’s face when she’d left, the way he’d been ever since Leonid had agreed to sign the deal, was gnawing at her. She’d expected him to be victorious and superior. Instead she’d found him dark and introspective.

      Working nearly 24/7 with someone meant you were in tune with their moods, and the Harrison she’d witnessed tonight was one she hadn’t seen before. One that scared her. Leonid might have passed it off as exhaustion, distraction, but she knew it was much more.

      Derrick gave her a quelling look. He wanted to get home to his family. He thought she was nuts standing here on the sidewalk, utterly caught in limbo.

      She got into the car. They pulled smoothly away from the sidewalk, weaving into traffic. Her stomach churned in big, conflicted circles. She had led Leonid to believe he could depend on Harrison when in reality he would likely be bitterly disappointed. Whether Leonid had read between the lines or taken her words at face value was something she would never know.

      A soft curse left her lips. She didn’t want anyone’s future revolving around her. Then to make her choice only to have Harrison turn into a stone wall when he had been handed everything he’d wanted? What is going on?

      She clenched her hand into a fist and pressed it against the seat. Was he feeling guilty for what he was about to do to Leonid even though he’d laid his cards on the table? Or had he finally realized, with the final piece in place to destroy Anton Markovic, that vengeance was a poor substitute for a broken heart? That it would never bring his father back?

      Or was it something else entirely? That call from Tom Dennison today? The twisting in her gut intensified. She couldn’t do it.

      She tapped on the screen. Derrick opened it. ‘Yes, ma’am?”