Androletti's Mistress. Melanie Milburne

met him.

      The modelling meant nothing to her; it had always been a means to an end. She had hidden behind it, enjoying the benefits of financial security in order to rise above her impoverished background. No one knew that the glamorous Nikki Ferliani was actually Nicola Jenkins, the eldest child of Kaylene and Frank Jenkins, brought up surrounded by poverty, violence and crime. And certainly no one knew her father was serving a life sentence for murder, with ‘never to be released’ stamped on his file.

      Not even Joseph had known about that.

      And then there was Jayden.

      He was happy at Rosedale House, or at least as happy as someone with permanent and severe physical and mental disabilities could be. The level of care he received there was the best that money could buy. If she had to move him away from the dedicated staff who had grown so fond of him, she would never be able to forgive herself. After all, wasn’t it her fault he had been injured in the first place?

      She slowly turned around, her expression stripped of all emotion as she faced her nemesis. ‘I need some time to think about this.’

      ‘You have the next ten seconds,’ he said, lifting his wrist to look at his watch, and began to count them. ‘Nine, eight, seven six, five—’

      ‘All right,’ she said, her stomach somersaulting in dread at what was ahead. ‘I will be your…er…trophy mistress.’

      His eyes came back to hers, his inbuilt cynicism glinting in their smoky depths. ‘I knew you would see sense. You are far too mercenary to throw away a fortune such as this.’

      She ran her tongue over the desert dryness of her lips. ‘When do you want me to…to start?’

      He reached into the pocket of his trousers and brought out a set of keys. He walked to where she was standing, took her clenched fist and, unpeeling her stiff fingers, placed the keys in her palm. ‘You started five minutes ago,’ he said.

      Nikki closed her fingers around the cold metal of the keys, wincing as they bit into the soft flesh of her palm.

      Now, there’s another irony, she thought as she followed him a moment later into the Toorak mansion. Within her very own hand lay the keys to her new prison…