An Innocent To Tame The Italian
An Innocent To Tame The Italian
Tara Pammi
To discover the truth… He’ll keep his beautiful adversary close For brooding tech billionaire Massimo Brunetti, a cyber-attack on his company is unacceptable. Tracking down the savvy Manhattan hacker, he’s stunned to find gorgeous genius Natalie Crosetto. Yet naïve Nat isn’t the saboteur. To uncover who she’s protecting, Massimo returns to Italy—with Nat playing his fake fiancée! But this untameable Italian might have met his match in innocent Nat, who challenges him…and tempts him beyond reason!
To discover the truth...
He’ll keep his beautiful adversary close
For brooding tech billionaire Massimo Brunetti, a cyberattack on his company is unacceptable. After tracking down the savvy Manhattan hacker, he’s stunned to find gorgeous genius Natalie Crosetto. Yet naive Nat isn’t the saboteur. To uncover who she’s protecting, Massimo returns to Italy—with Nat playing his fake fiancée! But this untamable Italian might have met his match in innocent Nat, who challenges him...and tempts him beyond reason!
Sparks will fly between the billionaire and his fake fiancée!
TARA PAMMI can’t remember a moment when she wasn’t lost in a book—especially a romance, which was much more exciting than a mathematics textbook at school. Years later, Tara’s wild imagination and love for the written word revealed what she really wanted to do. Now she pairs alpha males who think they know everything with strong women who knock that theory and them off their feet!
Also by Tara Pammi (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
Bought with the Italian’s Ring
Blackmailed by the Greek’s Vows
Sicilian’s Bride for a Price
Bound to the Desert King collection
Sheikh’s Baby of Revenge
The Legendary Conti Brothers miniseries
The Surprise Conti Child
The Unwanted Conti Bride
The Drakon Royals miniseries
Crowned for the Drakon Legacy
The Drakon Baby Bargain
His Drakon Runaway Bride
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
An Innocent to Tame the Italian
Tara Pammi
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-08796-4
AN INNOCENT TO TAME THE ITALIAN
© 2019 Tara Pammi
Published in Great Britain 2019
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Note to Readers (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
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For Jen—for talking me up when I’m down, for
untangling complicated plots only we could come up
with, and for always being there to discuss how much
we can push these cranky, arrogant Modern heroes.
This book wouldn’t have been possible without you.
Contents
Cover (#uf1274227-aa87-5c7b-8ba6-318a23f0c0e1)
Back Cover Text (#u4e3aed91-a548-57b9-9a7b-196cbbfd8426)
About the Author (#ub5459067-d9f8-529e-b009-52b2346d6e4c)
Booklist (#u479b72e9-2eb7-5dc8-9bc9-edd415f635e6)
Title Page (#u6be9ad1a-fd07-59bc-802d-4af58583e3db)
Copyright (#ue4157993-2ef0-5116-bbf8-abbcfa76fdf1)
Note to Readers
CHAPTER ONE (#u0ad3e1ab-77be-4434-8fa9-4a4b390ec3ae)
CHAPTER TWO (#ucc3137f1-4646-5280-8b3e-f8f14c0c823f)
CHAPTER THREE (#u8c57f5d1-4c22-5f48-81d1-1821173cff89)
CHAPTER FOUR (#ue0b79f01-22cd-5fb5-b849-7986161ef688)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
“DID YOU FIGURE out why the security breaches keep happening? And how?”
Massimo Brunetti looked up from the three monitors on his desk in the lab that was the hub of his cyber security business. It was a high-security center with thumbprint access only.
A measure he’d taken at the age of sixteen when his father, Silvio, had still been living with them, a matter of self-preservation for Massimo to keep him out. Now, this was his tech center where his servers were stored and where he designed software worth billions.
Only his older half brother, Leonardo, who was currently scrutinizing everything, and their grandmother Greta’s stepdaughter, Alessandra, had access. On the condition that they disturb him only at the threat of the building burning down or an equivalent emergency.
Greta wasn’t allowed. Her emergency the last time had been an epic tantrum on his thirtieth birthday three months ago. The cause was that Leo and he were going to die childless, leaving the dynastic legacy of the Brunettis to perish with them.
She should know Massimo didn’t give a damn about family legacies, especially theirs.
“We have a meeting scheduled for an update in a half hour, Leo,” he said, without raising his head. “You know I do not like it when you barge in here.”
“You’ve been locked up in here for the better part of a week.” Leo’s mouth pinched. “I can’t hide it from the board any longer, Massimo. If it gets to the press that BCS had clients’ financials open for any little Dark Net hacker to find... Merda!”
It would be a disaster of epic proportions.
“It’s bad enough we lost that ten-billion-dollar contract,” Leo finished.
Massimo rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, hoping to alleviate the pulsing prick of pain in his forehead. He had been cooped up in here for too long. “It’s not my fault if people remember the trail of destruction Silvio left in his wake.”
It had taken Leo and him close to fifteen years to restore their family company—a multi-billion-dollar finance giant, Brunetti Finances, Inc.—to its original glory. In fact, it was still a work in progress.
For Greta, it was the family legacy, the name Brunetti synonymous with its prestige. Even now, she could call out half the skyscrapers littered through Milan that had housed the main offices of Brunetti Finances through its two-hundred-year history.
For Leo and him, however, it was the satisfaction of building it up again, bigger and better, a force to be reckoned with, after their father had almost brought it to its knees.
But...for the last six months, more than one contract had fallen through at the last minute. In the first one, they had found that an accountant had leaked their bid details. In the second one, the subcontractor they’d hired had been bought off. Leaving an unholy mess on Leo’s hands.
On top of that, there was this security breach Massimo had discovered a week ago in his own brainchild company, Brunetti Cyber Securities.
Someone was clearly targeting their business. The security breach was far too much a direct attack to ignore. If Silvio wasn’t being monitored 24/7 at a clinic with no resources at hand and no communications beyond Leo, they would know the culprit was him. Their father, once they had grown taller, bigger and stronger than him, despised being powerless.
“Are you sure Silvio’s the only enemy we have?” Leo asked, cocking an eyebrow at his brother. “What about your recent fling? She’s certainly making a lot of noise.”
“Gisela and I are done. Four months ago now.” Massimo let his displeasure show on his face. Leo had no business delving into his personal matters.
“Sì, you and I know that. Does the daughter of the most powerful banking tycoon in Italy know that? Maledizione, Massimo, the woman calls me now.”
The pain behind his eye intensified. If everything hadn’t been going so wrong, Massimo would have laughed at his brother’s expression.
Leo didn’t even give out his number to his own mistress. Who was, very conveniently, a supermodel who had a shot at the end of the world, with an expiry date of two more months, if Massimo’s calculations were right. The last one had been a CEO who met his brother once every two weeks for six months. Before that, had been a photojournalist studying migration patterns of an exotic bird species in Antarctica who went into hibernation for about ten months out of a year.
Leo seemed to have the algorithm for the best kind of mistress all figured out—distance, just as ruthless as him and ambitious. All his relationships ended on amicable footings, too.
It wasn’t that Massimo wanted a cold and clinical relationship like that. He just didn’t have the time or the energy for a deeper one. And he wouldn’t for the next twenty years at least. He doubted he knew what deep, meaningful relationships looked like, anyway. His mother and Silvio—it had been a war. Fought by her, for his sake.
“You need to do whatever is needed to make her understand,” Leo added. “Do not antagonize her father in the process.”
Massimo hated when Leonardo was right. “I’ll take care of it.”
It had been a stupid move tangling with the selfish, spoiled socialite Gisela Fiore. But after the months he’d spent designing his latest product—an e-commerce tool and its subsequent release hitting ten billion in revenue—he’d needed to play. Hard.
Which Gisela excelled at, according to her reputation. The only thing she excelled at. A torrid two-week affair had ensued. At the end of which, Massimo had been itching to get back to work. As was his reputation.
Except Gisela was still sending him alarmingly disturbing texts full of threats followed by sobbing messages. When she wasn’t camping outside the Brunetti brothers’ office building.
“Do you want to hear about the hacker or not?” he challenged Leo.
“Please.”
“I found the trail last night. I also figured out how he gained access through the multiple firewalls I built. Both times.”
“Two times?” Leo asked with cutting focus to the gist of the vast problem on their hands.
“Sì.”
“Cristo, you’re a freaking genius, Massimo. How is that even possible?”
It wasn’t arrogance that made Massimo nod. Computers were his thing. The one thing he was the master of. “The hacker is obviously extremely talented. A true genius, no doubt.”
Leo’s curse exploded in the basement. A few minutes later, his brother was all business again. “But you have the proof tying it to this person, right?”
“Sì. I used the bots to piggyback onto the malware he—”
“Normal people words, Massimo, per favore,” his brother said with a smile, for the millionth time in their lives. “Words a small brain like mine can understand.”
As always, a spurt of warmth jolted through his veins at Leo’s joke. His brother was no fool. But when Massimo had been at his lowest, Leo, with his words, full of concern and praise, had urged him toward realizing his full potential. “I have proof. I have even triangulated the hacker’s physical location. New York.”
“That’s fantastic. I can arrange for a meeting with the commissioner in a half hour. He’ll get the cybercrime division involved. We’ll have the hacker behind bars by tonight and the identity of whoever orchestrated this—”
“No. I don’t want the polizia involved. Not yet.”
“What? Why the hell not?”
“I’ve already figured out a cyber club where this hacker plays. I’ve established contact.”
“Contact with the hacker? Why?”
Massimo shrugged. He couldn’t exactly put it into words—curiosity, thrill, even a certain amount of camaraderie. The hacker intrigued him. “I want to get to know him. Learn how he operates.”
“Dios mio, Massimo, he breached our security. Twice.”
“Essattemente! He could do it again and again. You have to admit that there’s something...fishy about the whole thing. None of the clients’ financials were leaked. I have bots working everywhere they could be sold, like black markets, on the Dark Net. They haven’t surfaced anywhere.
“It’s as if the hacker is taunting me, playing with me. He’s hard to pin down.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“Let me develop a relationship with him. Let me get into his head. When I know how he works, how he’s doing it, I’ll spring the trap.”
“I want your word that he won’t hit our servers again.”
“You losing faith in me, Leo?” he taunted, that resentment in him finding voice. Reminding him that Massimo wasn’t still the always sick runt their father went off on whenever he was on one of his frequent alcoholic tirades. That he wasn’t the younger brother running to his older brother’s arms to hide from his father. That he was the computer genius who’d designed products that generated billions in revenue.
Leo paused at the high-tech sliding doors, frowning.
“Give me a week and I’ll give you the hacker, his life story and the proof of his illegal activities, all tied up with a bow like a Christmas present.”
“A week. At the most,” Leo pushed back. “I want him behind bars.”
One week later
Massimo stood outside the cyber club exit—a metal door of undistinguishable color at the rear of a dilapidated building in one of the run-down neighborhoods of Brooklyn. A far cry from his penthouse that overlooked Central Park that he’d left behind an hour ago.
March snow carpeted the parking grounds in the dark alley, thankfully suppressing the odors emanating from the vast trash containers that stood two feet from him.
The hacker, he’d found, was very much a creature of habit. Unlike Massimo, and much against the popular culture’s rendition of a chaotic, free-spirited genius. Two evenings a week, the hacker came to this club, at exactly eight minutes past nine p.m. and stayed for exactly forty-three minutes. Before going completely off-line.
Like a junkie allowing himself a very strictly mandated and measured fix.
Massimo hadn’t found him anywhere else.
Which meant all Massimo had had were two sessions of forty-three minutes to get to know how the guy operated. And he had. Hackers were a mysterious and antisocial bunch, and yet boastful, too, especially someone at the level at which this particular one operated. All he’d needed to do was compliment him on his modification of a security challenge posed by the master of the club. He hadn’t quite owned up to the breach but the connection had been made.
His heart fluttering against his rib cage like a caged bird, Massimo tucked his hands into the pockets of his trench coat. Adrenaline hadn’t hit him this hard since the release of his latest software product. No, that wasn’t true. The last time he’d been this excited had been when he’d shored up the tunnel this very same hacker had created into BCS.
The metallic whine of the heavy door made his spine lock. Buffeted by the collar of his coat against the harsh wind, Massimo watched a slight figure swathed in black from head to toe, a dark contrast against the snow clinging to every crevice and roof of the building, walk down the steps.
The howl of the frigid wind pushed the hood away from the figure’s face, revealing a delicate jawline with a wide, plump mouth. A too-sharp nose and a high forehead. Broad but sharp cheekbones. A pointed chin. Slender shoulders held an almost boyish figure with long legs swathed in black denim and knee-high boots.
Jet-black hair, wild and curly, the only thing that betrayed the fact that she was a woman. No, the soft fragility, the sharply delicate bones, couldn’t be mistaken for a man.
A painfully young, delicately beautiful woman.
It couldn’t be her... This fragile young woman couldn’t be the hacker that had taken down his firewall, could she? Couldn’t be the diabolically intelligent computer genius that Massimo had been chatting up for the last week. The hacker that Leonardo wanted behind bars pronto. The one who’d kept him up for a fortnight now, given him sleepless nights...
Not a single one of his girlfriends had ever done it.
He laughed, a harsh bark that sounded loud in the silence.
Like a deer caught in the headlights, the hacker’s feet frozen in the snow, her face turned toward him.
Brown eyes with long lashes alighted on his face and paused. He saw her swallow, felt that gaze dip to his mouth and trail back up to meet his eyes. A soft sound, almost like a kitten’s sigh, filled the silence around them. Followed by the soft treads of her boots as she returned to the car.
No, he wasn’t wrong.
He’d even had a quick chat with the hacker from his car before he’d stepped out. He...or she had been inside that building. On an impulse, Massimo grabbed his tablet from the car and sent a quick message through the chat boards.
It wasn’t a sure thing since the hacker never used the chat boards outside of the cyber club. And yet, Massimo had teased him today with a glimpse of the new security software he was building for Gisela’s father’s company. He knew the hacker had been intrigued, had even stayed beyond the forty-three minutes he usually allowed himself.
Vitruvian Man: I can show you the double encryption layer for the new design.
His heart raced. Dios mio, he felt like a teenage boy waiting for his first kiss.
The woman paused, pulled her phone out from the coat jacket. Massimo realized what it meant to wait with bated breath.
His tablet sent out a soft chirp that sounded like a fire alarm in the dark silence.
Her reply shone up at him.
Gollum: Not tonight, thank you. My time’s up. Maybe next time.
The message flashed on his screen and a smile curved his mouth, a flare of excitement running through his veins.
So polite, he’d thought during his chats with her. A certain softness buried even in the software jargon in contrast to the ruthlessness with which she’d attacked his firewalls.
It was her.
She was the hacker he’d been chasing, the hacker who it seemed was truly Massimo’s match.
In the few seconds it took him to accept this new discovery, and course-correct his strategy for her, she’d reached her car.
His long legs ate up the distance. The tightening of her shoulders made him stay a few steps from her. He didn’t want to scare her. Not yet.
“Why Gollum?” he said, keeping his tone soft, even as anger and excitement roped through him. “Why not Aragorn, or Gandalf the Wizard?”
She turned. Her eyes ate him up, her breath coming in short, shallow spurts that had nothing to do with the cold. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
When she made to pull the driver’s door to her beaten down Beetle, he crowded her. Still not touching.
The subtle scent of lavender filled his breath, a jarring thread of softness that made him breathe hard. He lifted his phone, the screen showing the chat boards. “I know who you are. I have proof of what you did to Brunetti Cyber Securities. Every last bit.”
The smile faded from his face just as the innocence dropped from hers.
The pointed chin lifted up, the expression in her eyes clear and sharp. “What do you want?”
He let the full power of his fury settle into his words. “Your purse, please.”
She looked at the sea of white snow around them.
“There’s nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. I recommend doing as I ask.”
Slowly, she pulled a wallet out of her back pocket and handed it over.
“Natalie Crosetto,” he said loudly. The name reverberated in the silence, and he breathed a sigh. “You’ve led me on a merry chase all over the internet, Ms. Crosetto, and now, I will run this game. We will go back to my hotel and you’ll explain to me why you’ve been attacking my systems.”
“No!” She took a deep breath. “You’re a stranger. You can’t expect me to let you just...kidnap me!”
“What do you suggest, then?”
“My home. Please. Tomorrow morning.”
“I didn’t take a trip over the Atlantic to let you escape me once I found you. We’ll go to your home if that offers you a modicum of security. You’re free to keep your cell phone and dial the police if you feel a threat to your person at any point, even.
“But you’ll answer each and every one of my questions and you will do so tonight.”
That stubborn chin raised even as her mouth quivered. Scared, and yet she challenged him. “Or else what?”
“Or else you’ll be behind bars tonight. I will even let you call the cops yourself. And you’ll stay there for the next decade, if I have anything to say about it.”
CHAPTER TWO (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
NATALIE CROSETTO STARED at the man lounging on her couch—a soft but old piece she’d picked up at thrift store last month—as if he were a king sitting on his golden throne, surveying a subject brought up for judgment.
Her.
Sweat gathered on her upper lip and the nape of her neck. The tremors that had taken over her body wouldn’t abate.
Jail. He could send her to jail...which meant any chance of her getting custody of Frankie would go up in flames. Christ, why the hell had she let Vincenzo talk her into this? What would happen to her brother if she ended up in jail? No, God, no...
“Head down between your knees. And deep breaths, Ms. Crosetto.” He stood to give her room to sit.
She automatically followed the commanding voice and bent her torso down. The blackness taking over her vision faded, breath rushing into her lungs with the force of a storm. In, out. In, out.
Panic receded, bringing rational thought in its wake.
She couldn’t count on Vincenzo coming to her rescue. Not when she didn’t know how to contact him beyond a number she could text. Not when she didn’t know what the stranger would do with that information.
She had no one to count on but herself. As always.
Still keeping her head down, she went over the jumble of thoughts in her head, unraveling each one.
She’d covered her tracks very well, the first time. This man...he’d have never tracked her by that. But then, she’d tunneled through the firewalls a second time. Albeit with utter reluctance at Vincenzo’s behest. That had been her mistake.
Still, the man on the other end had to be a genius to have tracked her. With unlimited resources. And not just online but all the way here. To show up right outside the cyber club, to taunt her with that text, to trap her so neatly...
She looked up and panic threatened to overwhelm her again.
A stranger in her apartment.
Her sanctuary. Her only safe place from the cruel world outside. She had never even invited Vincenzo here.
God, what a mess.
She pushed a hand through her hair and tugged at it. Her scalp tingled, the pain dispersing the remnants of panic. She’d survived worse situations. She’d find a way out of this, too.
First, she needed to protect herself from him. Needed to get him out of her home.
From the trench coat he’d discarded to the crisp black suit, the cuff links at his wrists, which she’d guess to be platinum, all the way to the handmade black leather shoes he was tapping on her cheap linoleum floor—he was expensively dressed. She might not know all of Vincenzo’s background but he had expensive tastes.
This man was no different.
Even his jet-black haircut, carefully piled artistically at the top of his head, looked expensive, catering to the high cheekbones and forehead, sharpening those features even more. He was no mere IT officer or a hound sent to track her down.
Even if she could get away from him, he or his higher-ups would come after her. Again. Neither could she be a fugitive for the rest of her life. And yet...the need to take control of the situation was overwhelming.
Keeping her eyes on his lean frame lounging against the opposite wall, Nat pushed herself to her feet. Shuffling her feet, she slowly reached for the baseball bat she kept next to the bookshelf. One of the numerous things she’d been collecting to make the tiny apartment a home for Frankie.
The wood felt solid in her hand as she lifted it.
“Drop it, Ms. Crosetto,” he said in a mildly bored tone.
She couldn’t. Not for the life of her.
For a man who topped a couple of inches over six feet, he moved with a grace and economy she couldn’t believe. In two seconds, his lean frame was crowding her. A gasp fell from her mouth when his fingers wrapped around her wrist, forcing her to drop the bat. The thunk of it hitting the floor reverberated in the small space. With a firm grip, he pushed her arm behind her until her upper body arched toward him. Her skin tingled where he held her tightly, but not hurting her.
Head falling back against the wall of his chest, she looked up at him.
And the impact of the man beneath the expensive clothes hit her hard. Hit her in places she didn’t want to think about in front of him.
Intelligence and something else glimmered in his gaze. Dark shadows hung under his penetrating gray eyes. His sharp nose had a small dent right in the middle. His mouth...wide, the bow of the upper lip carved, it was so...sexy.
Awareness rushed in through her blood, settling into a warm throb in her lower belly. A shocking heaviness in her breasts.
Her breaths became shallow. He stood so close that she could see the slight flare of his pupils, the harsh breath he pulled in before his fingers tightened on her wrist.
She wouldn’t be surprised to discover he was one of those male models that seemed to have been born with the perfect bone structure. To whom everything in life came easy. Women at their feet and millions in their bank account.
“Do not dig yourself a deeper hole, Ms. Crosetto.”
The arrogance in his tone banished the airy lethargy in her limbs. “You’re in my home. You cornered me and intruded into my apartment. You—”
He released her instantly. Stepped back, and Nat felt air rushing back into her lungs. “I mean you no harm. Not physically at least. Also, may I remind you that you invited me into your home. And I—” he cast a dismissive look around her living room, that upper lip turned up into a sneer “—expected to find you in something better than this hovel. Didn’t you get paid enough for the hacking job to upgrade from...this?”
She rubbed the sensitive skin at her wrist, more to rid herself of the warmth he left behind than because of any hurt. And to stop herself from smacking the distaste off his curling mouth. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”
He sat back onto the couch, leaning his arms onto his long legs, every movement utterly masculine. And yet graceful. “How much did you get paid for taking down the firewalls at BCS?”
“You’re mistaking me for someone else. I’m nothing but a low-level clerk at a cheap easy-loan company in Brooklyn.”
He rubbed a long finger over his left temple. “No more lies, per favore.” His accent sent shivers down her spine that had nothing to do with fear.
When he looked up at her, impatience swirled in his gaze. “Let’s cut through the innocent act. Now that I have your actual identity, it will take me no time at all to find your financials, every personal record, from your date of birth to how often you visit your ATM.”
In a bare, few words that sent all her assumptions of him grounding into dust, he rattled off, step by step, the date and time to the exact second when she had bypassed his security measures and brought down the firewalls at BCS. And not as if he had learned it by rote.
“So, you’re not just a pretty, rich boy?”
He stilled, except for raising a brow on that gorgeous face. She could swear his eyes twinkled but then she didn’t trust herself right now. “A pretty, rich boy, huh? Remind me to tell my older brother that, sì? He’ll find it amusing.”
Nat could only stare.
“I don’t think you comprehend the trouble you’re in.”
“I’m terrified at the trouble I’m in. You’ve no idea what...” She took a deep breath and pushed her shaking hands behind her. “But attacking even when you’re cornered is sometimes the only defense you’ve left in life.”
Something like interest dawned in his eyes before he went on to outline how he’d tracked her signature to the cyber club, made contact with her. How he’d triangulated her physical location. How when he’d given her a small opening in the guise of his latest tech, she’d all but opened herself to him.
Her foul curse rang like a gunshot.
“It was clever. No, not clever. It was sheer genius. But you made a mistake. You—”
“I came back a second time without masking my trail,” she finished, a knot of tension in her throat. He had her. Nicely trapped. Without doubt.
“Yes, that. But you also shouldn’t have returned to the scene of your crime—that cyber club. Why did you?”
She shrugged, refusing to give any more information. Like how every inch of her had been fascinated by his diabolical talent after he’d patched the tunnel she’d created. How she didn’t even really have the kind of technology on hand to pull off something like this, how even membership to the cyber club had been gained for her by Vincenzo.
“Why are you talking to me instead of turning me in, then?” she challenged boldly, even as fear coated her skin with cold sweat.
If only she could somehow contact Vincenzo...
“How and why.”
“What do you mean?” she said sharply, feeling as if she was a prisoner whose execution had been stayed.
He looked at his fingers and then up. Uncrossed his legs and then crossed them again. Pulling the material of his tailored trousers upward. She’d never realized how distracting a man’s powerful thighs could be. “I want to know how you did it. My firewalls, every bit of technology I design, is cutting edge, the best in the world. What you did should have been...impossible.”
“You’re dangling jail time over my neck as a sword because your ego got dented?” The words pushed out of her. “You and I both know I didn’t touch a single client’s financials. I...didn’t steal anything. I’m not a thief. In any sense of the word.”
“Which brings me to the second question. Why attack the security, bring down the firewalls...something that would have taken you days, if not to steal millions worth of financial info—”
“Five hours,” she chimed in, and could have kicked herself. Damn it, where the hell was her sense of self-preservation? What was it about this man that pushed all the wrong buttons in her?
A stillness came over him. He rotated his neck on his shoulders with that casual masculine elegance. But this time, Natalie saw through it. He was shocked. It was clear in the pinched look around his mouth when he cleared his throat and said, “You did it in five hours?”
“Yes.”
If she could trust her judgment right then, Nat would have called the expression in his eyes excited. No...fascinated. He sounded fascinated and thrilled, his body containing a violent energy. More than angry that someone had attacked his design.
This was personal to him, too, this security breach she’d caused. She had to use that to her benefit, to persuade him to be lenient with her.
But she didn’t trust herself right then, didn’t know if she could pull it off. Not when he distracted the wits out of her. Jesus, the man held her future in his palm.
“How long did it take you the second time?”
“Fourteen hours. I... You made it much more complicated and I was under...duress.”
Another smile, this one flashing his perfect white teeth, the warmth of it reaching his eyes. Nat blinked at the sheer beauty of the man. Dark skin at his throat contrasted against his white shirt. “Nice to know I’m not the only one who gives in to their ego. I had you penned right.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” she whispered, a sane defense for once.
“I knew enough to put a tracker on the malware you introduced when you came back the second time. I have bots scouring through every black market, in case you stole the financials. I’ll find out if you’re part of a hacking syndicate. Any money you took for the job, I’ll find the financial trail.”
“There won’t be any.” Thank God she’d refused Vincenzo’s financial offer. Thank God she’d retained some of her moral sensibilities. Her life had been too much of a bitch for her to afford them. But she’d refused. Because she hadn’t wanted to benefit from illegal activity. “You’ll see that I have two thousand and twenty-two dollars in my checking account and credit cards with over nine thousand dollars in debt. I live in this hovel, as you call it. I don’t own a car. And most weeks, I live on ramen. I didn’t make any money on this. It wasn’t a job. I’m not... My services aren’t for sale.”
“So why do it? If it had been just the one time, I’d have assumed you had chickened out at the sheer scope of what you’d done and its consequences. But to come back...” He raised a hand when she opened her mouth. “Think carefully before you decide on an answer, Ms. Crosetto. And stick to the truth, if you can, sì?
“I’m on a deadline to submit the security designs for a major project and I’m grouchy when I’m pulled away from my lab. Forget the fact that my older brother is breathing down my neck for not just having thrown you in jail when I first found you. One wrong word and I’ll take his advice.”
Sweat rolled down between her shoulder blades. A torrent of lies came and fell away from Nat’s mouth. “I...” She swiped her tongue over her lips. Truth, as much as she could afford, was her only option. “I had no intention of stealing anything. I...have been stupid but I’m not greedy. I’m not a thief...by profession,” she added at the last second.
His arrogant gaze bore through her. “I’m waiting, Ms. Crosetto.”
“I did it on a challenge.” It was the last answer he’d been expecting from his shocked expression. “I... Someone in the club issued a challenge.”
“Who?” he demanded instantly, clearly not buying it.
“I don’t know. All I gathered is that BCS’s security was unbeatable. That your security guy’s a genius. That he...no one could ever bring down his firewalls. I...
“I was foolish enough and egotistic enough to want to beat it. Not to prove anything to anyone. Just for myself.”
“And the second time?”
“Hubris.” This time, she was relieved to speak the truth. “You closed the tunnel minutes after I created it. It shouldn’t have been possible. What you did the second time to put them up—to try to bring it down—it was a high.” She’d constantly moaned about how wrong it was with Vincenzo, but it hadn’t stopped her. He’d known how much she’d wanted to do it.
How exhilarating she found it to pit her mind against the security expert at BCS.
“Once I started, I... I lost the little sense I seem to have been born with. I... I swear, I’ll never do it again. I... I’ve never done this before. Please, you’ve got to believe me.”
“It’s not that simple, Ms. Crosetto.”
“Why not? You said—”
“I don’t trust that brain of yours. I can’t just...let you walk free.”
She reached for the wall behind her, her knees giving out. Fear felt like shards of glass in her throat. “You’ll send me to jail?”
He looked at her with a thoughtful expression, as if she were a bug under a microscope he was wondering whether to crush or not. He studied the beads of sweat over her upper lip. The shivers spewing over her entire body. “No. But I’m not letting you go, either.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’ll accompany me to Milan.”
She shook her head, trying to swim through the emotions barreling through her. Fear and hope knotted painfully in her stomach. “I can’t leave the country. I have...responsibilities.”
“You should have thought of them before you decided to embrace the criminal life. Until I get to the bottom of this, until I decide what to do with you, you’ll be my...guest. If you give me your passport, I’ll arrange for travel immediately. I can’t let you out of my sight and I do not like the idea of—”
“That’s kidnapping!” Nat broke through his casual planning. “You’re kidnapping me.”
He didn’t even blink. “The alternative is jail, Ms. Crosetto. There’s too much at stake to magnanimously forgive you.” He turned to his tablet, as if the topic was done. “Pack your things. We leave as soon as possible.”
“I can’t just... I have to tell someone that I’m leaving the country.”
“A boyfriend? Perhaps the man who put you up to this?”
“No one did,” she repeated, biting away Vincenzo’s name at the last second.
This man was dangerous, in more than one way.
More than panic shimmied through her veins as his gaze touched her face. “My job, my... I don’t even know who you are. What if you were a serial killer? A human trafficker? A harvester of organs who’s salivating at the thought of getting his hands on my body?”
His hands on her body... What was wrong with her?
This time, there was no doubting the twinkle in his eyes. Or the languid heat flaring beneath.
Nat stepped back at the mere thought of what that meant. The last thing she needed was an...attraction between them. She knew squat about men. And less than squat about ambitious, ruthless, gorgeous men like her accuser. “Criminals, Ms. Crosetto, dead or alive, however diabolically clever—” his gaze raked her from top to toe and dismissed her in the same breath “—are not my type.” He couldn’t sound more upper class, refined and sophisticated, if he tried.
Everything she wasn’t.
“But since I do not want a hysterical female on my hands on a long transatlantic flight, I’ll tell you.” He looked around her tiny living room, frowned and then settled those broad shoulders onto the wall behind him. The action pushed his hips and thighs away from the wall, highlighting the lean masculinity of the man. Every gesture, every movement of his, called all her senses to attention.
“I’m Massimo Brunetti, the cyber security genius you took on with such ease. And since I won’t let you near an electronic device in the near future, I’ll also give you the Google version, sì?
“I founded Brunetti Cyber Securities a decade ago when I was nineteen. I’m also the CTO for Brunetti Finances, an international finance giant. My brother, Leonardo, is the CEO. That’s the one who wants you behind bars pronto.
“Our family, if you hadn’t realized already, is old power and wealth, the kind of European dynasty others try to emulate unsuccessfully,” he added, with nothing of the pride that was in his tone when he spoke of his security company. “So, yes, far more than your average pretty, rich boy who likes to have his way. Proceed with caution, sì?
“Also, I’ll allow you one single call and you’ll make it in front of me.”
CHAPTER THREE (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
LACK OF SLEEP made Nat grit her eyes as dawn painted the New York sky beautiful shades of pink and orange. Unlike the light pollution that dimmed its shine in the city, the sky here in the country that she’d been driven into at three a.m. in a tinted limo, her sad little bag in hand, was gorgeous. The private airstrip was a hubbub of activity.
Massimo Brunetti...that name and all the power, wealth and reach that came with it had kept Natalie up all night.
She had Googled him the moment Vincenzo had mentioned BCS to her. Him and his CEO brother, Leonardo Brunetti. If Massimo was the brains behind Brunetti Finances, Leonardo was the heart. Cut in the same cloth as Massimo, ruthless when wielding his power, but much more socially active among the glitterati of Milan. The face of their business, the man who flashed his teeth at his enemies, brought in investors, managed the funds, while Massimo built brilliant software that brought in billions of revenue.
“Powerful men make powerful friends or enemies,” Vincenzo had said, when she’d asked if he knew them. “A small favor,” he’d called it. Easy for her incisive mind.
“Can you bring down BCS’s security, Natalie?”
When she had argued that she couldn’t risk anything criminal, she could never go down that path again, he had clasped her hand.
“I’d let nothing happen to you, cara mia. Find a flaw, bring it down. Nothing more. I’ll not ask you to retrieve anything you discover, if you do crack it. Nothing to steal. Just find a weakness in the system.”
“Then why?”—the only question she’d even thought to ask.
“Let’s just say I have my eyes on the man who built it. I need to know if he’s as good as they say. Not a single hacker I’ve hired so far has been able to get through.”
And that had been his lure and she’d more than happily taken the bait.
She could’ve refused. He hadn’t insisted on it. He hadn’t called it as a return on all the favors he’d done for her and Frankie. He hadn’t once, in the ten years since they’d met, mentioned how he’d saved her from a bullying foster parent, or from a wretched future in the juvie system. He hadn’t mentioned not turning in Nat herself when he’d caught her stealing his wallet the first time they had met.
And yet, she’d done it.
Now she wondered at the questions she should’ve asked then.
What did Vincenzo have against Massimo?
Why this particular man?
Why his company?
Why had Vincenzo targeted the brainchild of tech genius Massimo Brunetti?
Instead, she’d thrown caution to the wind, given in to her one weakness and risked everything.
She hadn’t even been able to reach Frankie during the one call Massimo had allowed her. While he’d watched her like a hawk circling a carcass, Natalie had left a message that she was going out of the country for a friend’s sudden wedding, freeloading on the chance. That she would be out of coverage for a while but would call when she could. Her brother knew what a cheapskate she was.
“You’re quite the storyteller, Ms. Crosetto,” Massimo had said in his delicious Italian accent, all sleep mussed before he’d rushed her out of her apartment in the middle of the night, to collect their documents.
Nat pressed her fingers around the coffee cup in her hand—no rest-stop diesel-like coffee for Mr. Pretty Rich Boy. The dark roast felt like heaven on her tongue, anchoring her.
Her spine straightened against the limo as she heard Massimo step out on the other side. His security detail—one broad six-and-half-footer—and his two assistants: a thin man in his twenties with thick glasses and messed-up curly hair. What she’d expected the computer genius to look like—not the sleek, lean, sex-on-legs stud that was Massimo, shame on her prejudice... And the second one—a woman with a dark complexion, in her forties—followed him while he spoke into his cell phone.
Coffee forgotten, Nat watched him with wide eyes as he walked back and forth in front of her speaking in rapid Italian that she couldn’t understand a word of. After every other sentence, he paused, looked at her, and then started again.
Suit jacket gone, three buttons of the white dress shirt undone, that stylishly cut hair all rumpled up from his stint on her couch, he should’ve looked disheveled. At least a little tired. After all, he’d traveled across the Atlantic the previous day.
Instead, the stubble that coated his jaw and his upper lip, the V of his shirt glinting olive against the white of it, the snug fit of his trousers against lean hips—he was an erotic fantasy given form. The assault on her senses that had begun when she’d found him on her couch, trousers pulled up tight against powerful thighs, shirt equally snug against his shoulders, long lashes fanning against his sharp cheekbones... Her heart hadn’t still recovered from it.
And then while she’d stared at him like an enthralled idiot, he’d opened those gray eyes. For just a second, there had been something in his eyes. Something that made liquid desire float through her veins. Before he sat up with his ubiquitous cell phone attached to his ear.
“The jet is ready. Let’s go.”
That was all he’d said to her, before bundling her into the limo. Coffee had been acquired on the way.
When she’d refused, he’d frowned. “Drink up, Ms. Crosetto. I need you awake and alert.”
She’d tensed so hard her shoulders hurt. “Why?”
“Don’t worry. I’m not going to ask you to breach the security of another company.”
She’d immediately relaxed and then cursed herself when a shrewd light dawned in his eyes. Afraid he’d see even more, more than what she’d already betrayed, she’d looked away.
“I want to know exactly how you were able to create that tunnel through the firewall. Both the first and the second time. Each and every step. I want to also know of any other ways you can breach BCS’s security. All the truth, Ms. Crosetto. Not just the convenient parts.
“If I even get a sniff of duplicity from you, you’ll wish I had sent you to prison in your own country.”
Even the wonderful aroma of coffee had felt like poison then.
The threat still ringing in her ears, she swallowed when he beckoned her from the foot of the air stairs. The arrogance of the man scraped her raw. She’d survived the cruelty and negligence of a foster care system that was supposed to protect her, the heartbreak of knowing that she wasn’t good enough, just yet, to be her younger brother’s family.
No way was she going to let Massimo Brunetti control her with the threat of incarceration. No man was going to make her live in fear every day, not after everything she’d been through. Not this easily.
And just like that, an idea began to percolate in her mind. Her shoulders straight, she tilted her chin and walked toward him with confidence.
The narrowing of his eyes made her smile.
Yep, she’d do what he asked of her, but she’d do it on her terms.
* * *
“Call the cops if you’d like. But I’m not getting on that plane. Not until you hear me out.”
Massimo disconnected his call with Leo, Natalie’s husky voice filled with determination sliding over his skin like a sensuous whisper. That same voice whispering at his ear, after a night spent in bed together, limbs heavy around each other, those dark brown eyes languid with sated desire... His imagination fired up the picture faster than he could breathe.
Dios mio, of all the women to spur this insta-lust in him...she was the worst choice.
He wanted to blame the last six months of his self-imposed celibacy for it. But then, after the fiasco with Gisela, he’d been a little bit disgusted with himself. He should’ve known better than to play with a spoiled princess.
He’d been more than a little tired of playing the same old game of chasing a woman just for sex. He had nothing more to give right now. Not at this point in his life.
And now Leonardo had informed him that Greta had been pulled into the whole mess with Gisela. His nonni had decided that Gisela would make a suitable bride for the scion of the Brunetti dynasty, that she was rich enough, sophisticated enough and blue-blooded enough to spawn the next generation of Brunettis.
Which was happening...never. But it did mean handling Gisela and, now, his nonni without giving offense to the former and hurting the second.
Of all the messes...
“Mr. Brunetti? Did you hear me? I’m not—”
He turned slowly, bracing himself. Still, the up-tilted chin and the wide brown eyes packed a punch.
This morning, she’d dressed in a light green-and-black sweater dress that hugged her slender frame, pointing out curves he’d missed last night. The loose neckline kept sliding off her shoulder showing glimpses of silky skin that beckoned his touch.
The dress ended beneath her buttocks—he’d seen enough when she’d walked ahead of him toward the limo, the knee-high leather boots displaying long legs that went on for miles. The mass of her black curls was pulled away into a tight knot at the top of her head, but in no way contained. Thick stray curls kept framing her face and she blew at them. A nervous tell that had made him smile in the limo. High forehead and a sharp nose only emphasized her gaunt face.
He frowned at the increasing appeal she held for him.
She wasn’t the lush, curvaceous beauty he usually went after. Neither was she, he was sure, the experienced type he preferred, the way she’d jumped every time he came near. Women who owned their sexual desires usually meant uncomplicated but pleasurable affairs.
Delicate collarbones jutting out, the only lush thing about her was that mouth. Collagen had nothing on those luscious lips.
She had that million-dollar look that runway models seemed to have. A fragility that, despite her very clever mind, roused a protectiveness in his chest. The last thing she deserved, given the daggers she shot at him. He’d expected her to try to change his mind this morning, sì, but not with that brash confidence she exuded just then.
“Come, Ms. Crosetto.” He gestured her back toward the limo, taking her wrist in his hand. She was truly delicate in his fingers, and they tightened instinctively. He guided her into the waiting limo and shut the door behind him. Even with the luxurious space, their knees bumped before she tucked them away.
Good, at least one of them needed to be wary of this attraction between them. “You seem to think you have a choice in this situation. My patience runs thin especially as my nonni is cooking up a scheme I abhor on the other side of the ocean.”
“Your nonni?”
“My grandmother.”
“I’ll make this quick.” She swallowed and looked up. “I’m calling your bluff.”
He smiled. “You don’t have any cards.”
She leaned back against the seat, and crossed her legs. Her dress pulled up toward her thighs and he peeked at long, taut muscles. Shamelessly. “I’ll not surrender my freedom to a stranger, a stranger moreover with the power and reach that you have, not only in your country but here, to arrange my visa at such short notice, without some security in place. God knows what you’ll do to me when—” whatever she saw in his eyes, color darkened her cheeks and she cleared her throat “—what you’ll decide for my fate. Even in the worst situations, one always has a choice.”
She roused his curiosity so easily and held it. Turned his expectations upside down. So frequently. Unlike any woman he’d ever known. “Why do you think I’ll accept any condition of yours?”
“Because you and I are alike. Hungry for new challenges. So full of arrogant belief that we’re the best there is. I knew what I was risking when I attacked your security the second time. I knew...and I still couldn’t stop. And you...you want to know how I did it. More than you want me in jail. You want to know what other weaknesses there could be in your design. You hate knowing someone better than you exists.”
“You’re not better than me.” He hated that he sounded like a juvenile teenager trying to get one over the smart girl.
She smiled and grooves dug into her cheeks. Her front two teeth were overlapped, a small imperfection that only made her face more distinct, more memorable. More lovely even. Challenge and knowledge simmered in that smile, tugging at his awareness. “Sending me to jail right now doesn’t serve your purpose. I’d rot there for who knows how long while what I was capable of doing eats away at you. So I’ll let you kidnap me, yes, but at a price.”
Laughter punched out of his mouth. Cristo, she had guts. And smarts. And a tart mouth he desperately wanted to taste right then. Humor and arousal were an unusual combination but had a languorous effect on his limbs. He ran a hand over his bristly jaw, trying to find the rationality, the reason, beneath both.
If he had any sense, he’d dump her at the nearest police station and wash his hands off.
It was what Leonardo was expecting. What the sane part of him said to do.
But he hadn’t arrived at his place in this world without taking risks. By denying his instincts. Forget also the fact that if she went to jail, all her secrets went with her.
He didn’t believe for a second that she’d only done it for the challenge. Either it was an impersonal job she took on for money, or someone she knew was deliberately targeting them.
Leonardo and he had worked too hard, for too long, to let some unknown enemy destroy everything they’d built. For now, he’d play along. Plus he’d be no kind of businessman if he didn’t use her talents to his benefit. At least in the short term. He’d just have to convince Leo of her usefulness to them.
“Bene,” he said.
In the intimacy of the leather interior, her soft gasp pinged on his nerves. Her eyes wide, she stared at him, swallowed, looked away and then back at him again. Her knuckles white against the dark leather.
Cristo, the woman blushed even when she was cornered.
He couldn’t help liking the little criminal. He knew what it was to be the weaker one against a stronger, terrifying opponent, to have no way out, the powerlessness that came with it. “State your condition.”
“You’ll pay me for any services I render, like an outside consultant.”
He raised a brow. “You’re not bargaining for me to destroy the proof of your crime?”
She shook her head. And he had a feeling it was to hide her expression. “You won’t give that up. This way, if I end up in jail, I’ll make money to show for it. During the stint, I’ll work on proving to you that I have no agenda of my own.”
“Making money for hacking my system and then more for fixing it? I was right about you.”
“If you were the computer whiz kid the world calls you, you’d have my financials in hand by now.”
“Believe me, I was tempted to find the salacious details of your criminal life last night. But my brother reminded me of the importance of doing this through official channels.
“So I ordered a background check on you. Your whole life will be in my hands in a matter of hours,” he added, making sure she understood the consequences. “Just because I accept your condition doesn’t mean I trust you. Or intend to let you get away with it forever.”
Devoid of color, her skin looked alarmingly pale against the black leather. “Is a background check necessary? All you need is to confirm that I’m dirt poor.”
He shrugged.
What else was she hiding? And how was he going to explain her presence near him, 24/7, to his family, to the world? The last time he’d been in an actual relationship had been...never. He worked hard, partied hard. For more than a decade, he’d worked sixteen-hour days, buried in his lab. Coming up only for refueling.
Brunetti Cyber Securities came first. Always would.
First because he’d needed to prove to his father that he wasn’t the runt he’d been called all his childhood. And prove himself to Leo even, because he’d been the golden son, the adored Brunetti heir at first. Because Leonardo had been everything Massimo hadn’t been able to be.
Later, when Leo had realized the extent of their father’s bullying of Massimo, he’d hated Leo’s pity, his concern for him. Resented him for thinking Massimo needed handouts, that Massimo was weak. But then success itself had become the motivator; the challenge of building better and better cyber systems had become its own drug.
The more he had, the more he’d wanted. The more he wanted his father and his family and his brother to be beholden to his company for fueling much needed funds into Brunetti Finances.
Suddenly, the answer came to him. Two problems and one solution. A tangible use of the attraction between them. An explanation for her presence with him, night and day.
He’d get her to trust him with the complete truth, then he might even take her to bed. Scratch the itch out of his system. Her innocent act would have to drop when he had the background check in his hands.
He pulled up his phone and texted his assistant waiting outside to ready a contract with all the required confidentiality clauses. Another text to notify Leo about the slight modification to his plans. “You’ll have the contract by the time we land. Under one—”
“I won’t leave without it.”
He shook his head. “Not even I can come up with a contract like that immediately. Not without having that background check in hand first.”
“How do I know I can trust you?”
“You don’t.” He shrugged. The hiss of her breath, the filthy curse reverberating in the confined space, made his mouth twitch.
He was enjoying this—this pitting his will against hers, this anticipation in his gut as he waited to see what she’d do next. More than he enjoyed anything with a woman in a long time. Even more than sex. He frowned at the runaway thought. “I have a countercondition of my own.”
“You’re already blackmailing me, kidnapping me, threatening me with incarceration. What else is there?”
“You’ll be my partner for the duration. I’ll compensate you for that, too.”
“Partner? What kind of a partner?” Color left her cheeks, her eyes searching his. “For the last time, Mr. Brunetti, I’m not for sale. I’m not what you think—”
“Calm down, Natalie,” he interrupted her, trying her name on his tongue and liking it. Her eyes sought his in the relative dark, awareness shining through them. She hadn’t missed the intimacy of it, either. “It’s just another part of our deal, sì?”
“Explain. Now, please.”
“I have to explain your presence at my side, 24/7. I need a romantic partner for the foreseeable future. This way—”
“You’ve lost your mind. I’m not staying in Italy any longer than I have to. And I refuse to be your... Why the hell would a man like you need a pretend girlfriend?”
“A man like me?”
He grinned. She glared. “You’re supersmart, obviously given you’re one of the tech billionaires under thirty in the world. You’re—” she licked her lips then and he waited with arrested breath “—a walking, talking stud muffin. Not counting all that dynasty crap you threw at me. Why—?”
“What does a woman do with a stud muffin?”
She rolled her eyes and he laughed. “Why do you need a pretend girlfriend?”
“I was thinking a pretend fiancée actually.” Her eyes bugged and he grinned, explaining, “An ex-girlfriend that I can’t shake off and my nonni have joined forces. Believe me, it’s enough to scare a grown man.”
“So you don’t want to hurt their feelings?”
This time, when he laughed, it felt as if his chest would burst open. The minx was such a contrasting mix of street savvy and naïveté, of smarts and innocence. She’d make a hell of a distraction from the lethargy that had filled him of late when it came to women.
“Feelings, of any of the parties involved, are the least of my concern. Greta, my nonni, is extremely stubborn, and has antiquated views about the whole dynasty and its continuation and legacy and all that rot. For some unfathomable reason, apparently, she’s decided that Gisela Fiore, who comes with a fortune of her own, would be a sweet, biddable wife for me. Gisela is a mistake I shouldn’t have indulged in, and has been...problematic since I ended our purely physical relationship almost six months ago.”
For all her sass, color skimmed up Natalie’s cheeks. “Problematic how?”
“She knows my relationship patterns. She knew it was only an affair. When I retreated to my lab—refueled and ready—”
“What do you mean...refueled?”
“After every big project release, I need to fill the well, so to speak.”
“And you do this...refueling by sleeping with a woman you don’t care about?”
Her distaste made him frown. “I care about the woman’s pleasure. And mine. But, sì. Gisela knew that. Knew my pattern. I made it clear. After it was over, she started texting me a hundred times a day. She’d cry, make a scene at the few social events I attended. She flew to San Francisco and accosted me at a cyber security conference.
“Showed up outside our estate in Lake Como. Cornered my brother, Leo, at one of the events where her father was present, too.”
“And her father is someone whose feelings you do give a damn about?” she said tartly.
Massimo scowled. “Giuseppe Fiore is one of the most powerful banking tycoons in Milan, in all of Italy. BCS is in the running for a hundred-billion-euro security contract with his banks that spans a decade. Leo thinks it’s going to make dealing with him awkward because of Gisela.
“Why should a fling she came into with her eyes open cause problems for me now?”
“Because people are not algorithms that give you the same, expected results every time?”
“Once Giuseppe sees me with you, he’ll understand that Gisela and I are long over. And this is the best way for me to keep an eye on you.”
“If this tycoon’s so rich and powerful, and his daughter’s good enough to be your...whatever, why not just marry her? Or are you holding out for love?”
He stared at her, wondering if she was joking again. Steady brown eyes held his. “Tut, tut, Natalie...you disappoint me. The last thing I need in my life is a wife who wants love and all the rainbows it brings with it. I have nothing to give a wife at present. Or in the foreseeable future.
“Just do your part, sì? The compensation I provide should be big enough for you to get over your distaste for me,” he mocked.
Her nostrils flared. “And if I say no? If I tell your ex and your grandmother that it’s all a big pretense?”
“You won’t do that.”
“I just—”
“Be smart about this, Natalie.” All humor fled his tone. “If I find you’ve told me the truth about your financials, about this not being a job, then what do you have to lose? For once in your life, maybe you could use your interesting capabilities to make a living. Spend a few months in the lap of luxury in Milan. Pretend to be the fiancée of the most—”
“Arrogant, high-handed man on the planet?”
“So?”
“Fine. I agree to your conditions.”
“Bene.”
He stepped out of the limo and helped her do the same, keeping his fingers around her wrist. He liked having the feel of her in his hands, this mystery hacker who’d haunted his days and nights for weeks.
“All that’s left now is to swap our life histories and practice the intimacy we have to pretend in front of my family and the whole world.”
A pithy curse fell from her mouth and Massimo looked down at her.
She was truly the most interesting woman he’d ever met. He wouldn’t hesitate to send her to jail if he found her loyalties lay with their enemy, but he would regret it all the same.
And he didn’t understand even that negligible emotion dogging his rationality, his judgment.
It had never done so before.
CHAPTER FOUR (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
AFTER A TRANSATLANTIC flight to Milan with a creative genius who peppered her with a million incisive questions meant to unsettle her lies. Throwing in a magnificent view of white-tipped Alps, which she’d probably never see again in her life—except maybe on the return flight on her way to jail in New York. Then a quick helicopter ride up to the shores of Lake Como—because, of course, the once-in-a-lifetime scenic drive from Milan to the lake would take forever and time was a precious commodity to a tech billionaire. Finally arriving at a destination where she was nothing but a prisoner, Natalie foolishly assumed she would become oblivious to her surroundings—not the man, of course—or at least be too exhausted mentally and physically to take much more in.
She was wrong.
The chopper landed on the side of a hill, in a sea of lush, perfectly manicured gardens with azaleas and gigantic rhododendrons and a long avenue of tall plane trees that created a walkway to the lakefront. A small boat floated at the end of the steps. Beyond, the calm waters of Lake Como glittered like a dark blanket creating a stunning sight littered with boats of various sizes floating lazily to the gorgeously lit-up houses and villages scattered about.
As Natalie followed Massimo, who seemed to have forgotten about her existence, amid carefully sculpted flower beds, she spotted a hidden cave enclosed by more azaleas and even an artificial Japanese-style pond.
“Your family owns this villa?” she said, her breath catching in her throat.
Massimo stopped, took a look around absentmindedly and then turned to her. “Sì. One of the Brunettis, a count or a duke, maybe, I think in the nineteenth century, took possession of a Benedictine monastery in these grounds and converted it into a sumptuous noble residence. It’s been in the family’s possession ever since. Greta will cram a history lesson down your throat if she catches you staring at it like that.”
Even his mockery couldn’t fracture the awe in her chest. Fountains with water glittering out like liquid gold because of strategically placed lights, a gazebo with creepers enveloping it, two statues of majestic lions at the sides of the carriage entrance... How could he sound so dismissive and unaffected by his family’s legacy? “I’ve never seen such beautiful gardens.”
“You’d love it in spring when they’re a riot of color. They’re Leonardo’s pride. He personally tends to them along with a team of gardeners. He can make the most reluctant plant blossom. He...loves the land and the villa and the...legacy of it all.”
She was out of breath as they walked up the small, steep path while he simply marched on. “You don’t?” she asked, something in his tone snagging her attention.
“I like being the one who saved it, the one who held it for the Brunettis so that they could show it off for another century,” he added mysteriously.
She frowned, wondering at the contradictions of the man.
Finally, they came around the bend to a square plot that housed the villa itself. A grand entrance portico with wide stairs that sloped toward the lake straddled the villa, which would offer three-sixty-degree views of the lake and the mountains from the grand terrace even now overflowing with guests.
The white stucco facade gleamed under the light thrown from the lake. Nat sucked in a breath as the sounds of music and people chatting in Italian flowed over her skin. A line of luxury cars stood like gatekeepers, tasked with keeping riffraff, like her, out.
She shivered even though the wind coming off the lake was more balmy than cold. Cicadas whispered all around them, the scents from the orangery they’d walked by thick and pungent in the air.
It was a world away from Brooklyn and her cheap studio apartment, a world away from everything she’d ever known.
Through the high arched front entrance, she could see suave men dressed in black suits and refined women dressed in cocktail finery with diamonds glittering at their throats and wrists. Uniformed waiters passing around champagne flutes so fine that Nat wondered if they’d break at the slightest pressure.
She rubbed her sweating palms on her hips, which only brought her attention to her own outfit. A thread of shame filled her chest and she chased it away with much needed anger. God, she’d worked hard for every small thing she owned. To make an honest living for herself and for Frankie.
She felt the heat of Massimo’s body next to her, before she heard the curse from his mouth. Frowning, she craned her neck to see him. Flashes of light revealed the tension in his brow, that perfectly carved jaw so tight that it almost seemed fragile. If she didn’t know better, she’d have thought he was no more inclined to go in than she was.
The suavely sophisticated man who’d taunted her was nowhere to be seen. In his place was a stranger with tension thrumming tightly through his lean frame.
“Massimo?” she whispered, unable to stem the concern she heard in her voice. “Is something wrong?”
“My father is here,” he answered softly, before he blew out another soft curse and shook his head. “He is a bully of the worst kind.”
“Must run in the family, then,” she quipped.
“No.” His soft denial was emphatic enough that her head jerked to him. Glittering gray eyes held hers. “I’m nothing like my father.” He rubbed his jaw, a tell she was beginning to recognize he did when stressed. “Dios mio, I forgot it’s his birthday week. That means Greta checks him out of the rehabilitation clinic and parades him in front of our family and friends in an annual tradition. That means—” his gaze swung to the luxury vehicles “—everyone is here.”
“Your father lives at a clinic?” She’d gotten the sense from him that family was important to him. Yet, he stared at his family’s villa like it was a nest of vipers.
“He’s a recovering alcoholic. The recovery, if we can call it that, has been in progress for a decade now. Leonardo put him there years ago. My brother...he’s the best at eliminating anything that could damage our name, our business. Our legacy.”
The bitterness in his words was unmistakable. “What do you mean your grandmother parades him?”
“You didn’t get the sordid Brunetti history online before you attacked BCS?”
The man changed skins as easily as a chameleon—one minute a charming rogue, the next a cunning businessman determined to make her spill her secrets against her own best interests. “I told you, I knew nothing about who and what you are.”
Hesitation flickered in his eyes, before he cast another glance toward the villa. “If you’re to be exposed to them... My father, for most of my childhood, went on alcohol-fueled rampages. He embezzled funds from the company account for his personal use. Affairs with numerous women—both willing and unwilling—lavish parties at the villa... Think of it as a decades-long, out-of-control party that Greta turned away from.
“By the time his misuse of company funds and resources came to Leonardo’s notice, Brunetti Finances, which had once been the leading finance giant in all of Italy, had been on the verge of bankruptcy. A dynasty reduced to nothing but a deck of cards standing on quicksand.
“Leo had to use every inch of his business acumen to stop it from crumbling around our ears. He slogged night and day to get us out from under debt, took control of the board. I designed an e-commerce tool at the same time. He brought in millions in investors, persuaded me to build and release it myself instead of selling the design like I had planned to. I created Brunetti Cyber Securities under the family company’s umbrella and launched the tool. With the revenue from it, we stopped Brunetti Finances from going under.
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Tara Pammi
To discover the truth… He’ll keep his beautiful adversary close For brooding tech billionaire Massimo Brunetti, a cyber-attack on his company is unacceptable. Tracking down the savvy Manhattan hacker, he’s stunned to find gorgeous genius Natalie Crosetto. Yet naïve Nat isn’t the saboteur. To uncover who she’s protecting, Massimo returns to Italy—with Nat playing his fake fiancée! But this untameable Italian might have met his match in innocent Nat, who challenges him…and tempts him beyond reason!
To discover the truth...
He’ll keep his beautiful adversary close
For brooding tech billionaire Massimo Brunetti, a cyberattack on his company is unacceptable. After tracking down the savvy Manhattan hacker, he’s stunned to find gorgeous genius Natalie Crosetto. Yet naive Nat isn’t the saboteur. To uncover who she’s protecting, Massimo returns to Italy—with Nat playing his fake fiancée! But this untamable Italian might have met his match in innocent Nat, who challenges him...and tempts him beyond reason!
Sparks will fly between the billionaire and his fake fiancée!
TARA PAMMI can’t remember a moment when she wasn’t lost in a book—especially a romance, which was much more exciting than a mathematics textbook at school. Years later, Tara’s wild imagination and love for the written word revealed what she really wanted to do. Now she pairs alpha males who think they know everything with strong women who knock that theory and them off their feet!
Also by Tara Pammi (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
Bought with the Italian’s Ring
Blackmailed by the Greek’s Vows
Sicilian’s Bride for a Price
Bound to the Desert King collection
Sheikh’s Baby of Revenge
The Legendary Conti Brothers miniseries
The Surprise Conti Child
The Unwanted Conti Bride
The Drakon Royals miniseries
Crowned for the Drakon Legacy
The Drakon Baby Bargain
His Drakon Runaway Bride
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
An Innocent to Tame the Italian
Tara Pammi
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-08796-4
AN INNOCENT TO TAME THE ITALIAN
© 2019 Tara Pammi
Published in Great Britain 2019
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Note to Readers (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
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For Jen—for talking me up when I’m down, for
untangling complicated plots only we could come up
with, and for always being there to discuss how much
we can push these cranky, arrogant Modern heroes.
This book wouldn’t have been possible without you.
Contents
Cover (#uf1274227-aa87-5c7b-8ba6-318a23f0c0e1)
Back Cover Text (#u4e3aed91-a548-57b9-9a7b-196cbbfd8426)
About the Author (#ub5459067-d9f8-529e-b009-52b2346d6e4c)
Booklist (#u479b72e9-2eb7-5dc8-9bc9-edd415f635e6)
Title Page (#u6be9ad1a-fd07-59bc-802d-4af58583e3db)
Copyright (#ue4157993-2ef0-5116-bbf8-abbcfa76fdf1)
Note to Readers
CHAPTER ONE (#u0ad3e1ab-77be-4434-8fa9-4a4b390ec3ae)
CHAPTER TWO (#ucc3137f1-4646-5280-8b3e-f8f14c0c823f)
CHAPTER THREE (#u8c57f5d1-4c22-5f48-81d1-1821173cff89)
CHAPTER FOUR (#ue0b79f01-22cd-5fb5-b849-7986161ef688)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
“DID YOU FIGURE out why the security breaches keep happening? And how?”
Massimo Brunetti looked up from the three monitors on his desk in the lab that was the hub of his cyber security business. It was a high-security center with thumbprint access only.
A measure he’d taken at the age of sixteen when his father, Silvio, had still been living with them, a matter of self-preservation for Massimo to keep him out. Now, this was his tech center where his servers were stored and where he designed software worth billions.
Only his older half brother, Leonardo, who was currently scrutinizing everything, and their grandmother Greta’s stepdaughter, Alessandra, had access. On the condition that they disturb him only at the threat of the building burning down or an equivalent emergency.
Greta wasn’t allowed. Her emergency the last time had been an epic tantrum on his thirtieth birthday three months ago. The cause was that Leo and he were going to die childless, leaving the dynastic legacy of the Brunettis to perish with them.
She should know Massimo didn’t give a damn about family legacies, especially theirs.
“We have a meeting scheduled for an update in a half hour, Leo,” he said, without raising his head. “You know I do not like it when you barge in here.”
“You’ve been locked up in here for the better part of a week.” Leo’s mouth pinched. “I can’t hide it from the board any longer, Massimo. If it gets to the press that BCS had clients’ financials open for any little Dark Net hacker to find... Merda!”
It would be a disaster of epic proportions.
“It’s bad enough we lost that ten-billion-dollar contract,” Leo finished.
Massimo rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, hoping to alleviate the pulsing prick of pain in his forehead. He had been cooped up in here for too long. “It’s not my fault if people remember the trail of destruction Silvio left in his wake.”
It had taken Leo and him close to fifteen years to restore their family company—a multi-billion-dollar finance giant, Brunetti Finances, Inc.—to its original glory. In fact, it was still a work in progress.
For Greta, it was the family legacy, the name Brunetti synonymous with its prestige. Even now, she could call out half the skyscrapers littered through Milan that had housed the main offices of Brunetti Finances through its two-hundred-year history.
For Leo and him, however, it was the satisfaction of building it up again, bigger and better, a force to be reckoned with, after their father had almost brought it to its knees.
But...for the last six months, more than one contract had fallen through at the last minute. In the first one, they had found that an accountant had leaked their bid details. In the second one, the subcontractor they’d hired had been bought off. Leaving an unholy mess on Leo’s hands.
On top of that, there was this security breach Massimo had discovered a week ago in his own brainchild company, Brunetti Cyber Securities.
Someone was clearly targeting their business. The security breach was far too much a direct attack to ignore. If Silvio wasn’t being monitored 24/7 at a clinic with no resources at hand and no communications beyond Leo, they would know the culprit was him. Their father, once they had grown taller, bigger and stronger than him, despised being powerless.
“Are you sure Silvio’s the only enemy we have?” Leo asked, cocking an eyebrow at his brother. “What about your recent fling? She’s certainly making a lot of noise.”
“Gisela and I are done. Four months ago now.” Massimo let his displeasure show on his face. Leo had no business delving into his personal matters.
“Sì, you and I know that. Does the daughter of the most powerful banking tycoon in Italy know that? Maledizione, Massimo, the woman calls me now.”
The pain behind his eye intensified. If everything hadn’t been going so wrong, Massimo would have laughed at his brother’s expression.
Leo didn’t even give out his number to his own mistress. Who was, very conveniently, a supermodel who had a shot at the end of the world, with an expiry date of two more months, if Massimo’s calculations were right. The last one had been a CEO who met his brother once every two weeks for six months. Before that, had been a photojournalist studying migration patterns of an exotic bird species in Antarctica who went into hibernation for about ten months out of a year.
Leo seemed to have the algorithm for the best kind of mistress all figured out—distance, just as ruthless as him and ambitious. All his relationships ended on amicable footings, too.
It wasn’t that Massimo wanted a cold and clinical relationship like that. He just didn’t have the time or the energy for a deeper one. And he wouldn’t for the next twenty years at least. He doubted he knew what deep, meaningful relationships looked like, anyway. His mother and Silvio—it had been a war. Fought by her, for his sake.
“You need to do whatever is needed to make her understand,” Leo added. “Do not antagonize her father in the process.”
Massimo hated when Leonardo was right. “I’ll take care of it.”
It had been a stupid move tangling with the selfish, spoiled socialite Gisela Fiore. But after the months he’d spent designing his latest product—an e-commerce tool and its subsequent release hitting ten billion in revenue—he’d needed to play. Hard.
Which Gisela excelled at, according to her reputation. The only thing she excelled at. A torrid two-week affair had ensued. At the end of which, Massimo had been itching to get back to work. As was his reputation.
Except Gisela was still sending him alarmingly disturbing texts full of threats followed by sobbing messages. When she wasn’t camping outside the Brunetti brothers’ office building.
“Do you want to hear about the hacker or not?” he challenged Leo.
“Please.”
“I found the trail last night. I also figured out how he gained access through the multiple firewalls I built. Both times.”
“Two times?” Leo asked with cutting focus to the gist of the vast problem on their hands.
“Sì.”
“Cristo, you’re a freaking genius, Massimo. How is that even possible?”
It wasn’t arrogance that made Massimo nod. Computers were his thing. The one thing he was the master of. “The hacker is obviously extremely talented. A true genius, no doubt.”
Leo’s curse exploded in the basement. A few minutes later, his brother was all business again. “But you have the proof tying it to this person, right?”
“Sì. I used the bots to piggyback onto the malware he—”
“Normal people words, Massimo, per favore,” his brother said with a smile, for the millionth time in their lives. “Words a small brain like mine can understand.”
As always, a spurt of warmth jolted through his veins at Leo’s joke. His brother was no fool. But when Massimo had been at his lowest, Leo, with his words, full of concern and praise, had urged him toward realizing his full potential. “I have proof. I have even triangulated the hacker’s physical location. New York.”
“That’s fantastic. I can arrange for a meeting with the commissioner in a half hour. He’ll get the cybercrime division involved. We’ll have the hacker behind bars by tonight and the identity of whoever orchestrated this—”
“No. I don’t want the polizia involved. Not yet.”
“What? Why the hell not?”
“I’ve already figured out a cyber club where this hacker plays. I’ve established contact.”
“Contact with the hacker? Why?”
Massimo shrugged. He couldn’t exactly put it into words—curiosity, thrill, even a certain amount of camaraderie. The hacker intrigued him. “I want to get to know him. Learn how he operates.”
“Dios mio, Massimo, he breached our security. Twice.”
“Essattemente! He could do it again and again. You have to admit that there’s something...fishy about the whole thing. None of the clients’ financials were leaked. I have bots working everywhere they could be sold, like black markets, on the Dark Net. They haven’t surfaced anywhere.
“It’s as if the hacker is taunting me, playing with me. He’s hard to pin down.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“Let me develop a relationship with him. Let me get into his head. When I know how he works, how he’s doing it, I’ll spring the trap.”
“I want your word that he won’t hit our servers again.”
“You losing faith in me, Leo?” he taunted, that resentment in him finding voice. Reminding him that Massimo wasn’t still the always sick runt their father went off on whenever he was on one of his frequent alcoholic tirades. That he wasn’t the younger brother running to his older brother’s arms to hide from his father. That he was the computer genius who’d designed products that generated billions in revenue.
Leo paused at the high-tech sliding doors, frowning.
“Give me a week and I’ll give you the hacker, his life story and the proof of his illegal activities, all tied up with a bow like a Christmas present.”
“A week. At the most,” Leo pushed back. “I want him behind bars.”
One week later
Massimo stood outside the cyber club exit—a metal door of undistinguishable color at the rear of a dilapidated building in one of the run-down neighborhoods of Brooklyn. A far cry from his penthouse that overlooked Central Park that he’d left behind an hour ago.
March snow carpeted the parking grounds in the dark alley, thankfully suppressing the odors emanating from the vast trash containers that stood two feet from him.
The hacker, he’d found, was very much a creature of habit. Unlike Massimo, and much against the popular culture’s rendition of a chaotic, free-spirited genius. Two evenings a week, the hacker came to this club, at exactly eight minutes past nine p.m. and stayed for exactly forty-three minutes. Before going completely off-line.
Like a junkie allowing himself a very strictly mandated and measured fix.
Massimo hadn’t found him anywhere else.
Which meant all Massimo had had were two sessions of forty-three minutes to get to know how the guy operated. And he had. Hackers were a mysterious and antisocial bunch, and yet boastful, too, especially someone at the level at which this particular one operated. All he’d needed to do was compliment him on his modification of a security challenge posed by the master of the club. He hadn’t quite owned up to the breach but the connection had been made.
His heart fluttering against his rib cage like a caged bird, Massimo tucked his hands into the pockets of his trench coat. Adrenaline hadn’t hit him this hard since the release of his latest software product. No, that wasn’t true. The last time he’d been this excited had been when he’d shored up the tunnel this very same hacker had created into BCS.
The metallic whine of the heavy door made his spine lock. Buffeted by the collar of his coat against the harsh wind, Massimo watched a slight figure swathed in black from head to toe, a dark contrast against the snow clinging to every crevice and roof of the building, walk down the steps.
The howl of the frigid wind pushed the hood away from the figure’s face, revealing a delicate jawline with a wide, plump mouth. A too-sharp nose and a high forehead. Broad but sharp cheekbones. A pointed chin. Slender shoulders held an almost boyish figure with long legs swathed in black denim and knee-high boots.
Jet-black hair, wild and curly, the only thing that betrayed the fact that she was a woman. No, the soft fragility, the sharply delicate bones, couldn’t be mistaken for a man.
A painfully young, delicately beautiful woman.
It couldn’t be her... This fragile young woman couldn’t be the hacker that had taken down his firewall, could she? Couldn’t be the diabolically intelligent computer genius that Massimo had been chatting up for the last week. The hacker that Leonardo wanted behind bars pronto. The one who’d kept him up for a fortnight now, given him sleepless nights...
Not a single one of his girlfriends had ever done it.
He laughed, a harsh bark that sounded loud in the silence.
Like a deer caught in the headlights, the hacker’s feet frozen in the snow, her face turned toward him.
Brown eyes with long lashes alighted on his face and paused. He saw her swallow, felt that gaze dip to his mouth and trail back up to meet his eyes. A soft sound, almost like a kitten’s sigh, filled the silence around them. Followed by the soft treads of her boots as she returned to the car.
No, he wasn’t wrong.
He’d even had a quick chat with the hacker from his car before he’d stepped out. He...or she had been inside that building. On an impulse, Massimo grabbed his tablet from the car and sent a quick message through the chat boards.
It wasn’t a sure thing since the hacker never used the chat boards outside of the cyber club. And yet, Massimo had teased him today with a glimpse of the new security software he was building for Gisela’s father’s company. He knew the hacker had been intrigued, had even stayed beyond the forty-three minutes he usually allowed himself.
Vitruvian Man: I can show you the double encryption layer for the new design.
His heart raced. Dios mio, he felt like a teenage boy waiting for his first kiss.
The woman paused, pulled her phone out from the coat jacket. Massimo realized what it meant to wait with bated breath.
His tablet sent out a soft chirp that sounded like a fire alarm in the dark silence.
Her reply shone up at him.
Gollum: Not tonight, thank you. My time’s up. Maybe next time.
The message flashed on his screen and a smile curved his mouth, a flare of excitement running through his veins.
So polite, he’d thought during his chats with her. A certain softness buried even in the software jargon in contrast to the ruthlessness with which she’d attacked his firewalls.
It was her.
She was the hacker he’d been chasing, the hacker who it seemed was truly Massimo’s match.
In the few seconds it took him to accept this new discovery, and course-correct his strategy for her, she’d reached her car.
His long legs ate up the distance. The tightening of her shoulders made him stay a few steps from her. He didn’t want to scare her. Not yet.
“Why Gollum?” he said, keeping his tone soft, even as anger and excitement roped through him. “Why not Aragorn, or Gandalf the Wizard?”
She turned. Her eyes ate him up, her breath coming in short, shallow spurts that had nothing to do with the cold. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
When she made to pull the driver’s door to her beaten down Beetle, he crowded her. Still not touching.
The subtle scent of lavender filled his breath, a jarring thread of softness that made him breathe hard. He lifted his phone, the screen showing the chat boards. “I know who you are. I have proof of what you did to Brunetti Cyber Securities. Every last bit.”
The smile faded from his face just as the innocence dropped from hers.
The pointed chin lifted up, the expression in her eyes clear and sharp. “What do you want?”
He let the full power of his fury settle into his words. “Your purse, please.”
She looked at the sea of white snow around them.
“There’s nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. I recommend doing as I ask.”
Slowly, she pulled a wallet out of her back pocket and handed it over.
“Natalie Crosetto,” he said loudly. The name reverberated in the silence, and he breathed a sigh. “You’ve led me on a merry chase all over the internet, Ms. Crosetto, and now, I will run this game. We will go back to my hotel and you’ll explain to me why you’ve been attacking my systems.”
“No!” She took a deep breath. “You’re a stranger. You can’t expect me to let you just...kidnap me!”
“What do you suggest, then?”
“My home. Please. Tomorrow morning.”
“I didn’t take a trip over the Atlantic to let you escape me once I found you. We’ll go to your home if that offers you a modicum of security. You’re free to keep your cell phone and dial the police if you feel a threat to your person at any point, even.
“But you’ll answer each and every one of my questions and you will do so tonight.”
That stubborn chin raised even as her mouth quivered. Scared, and yet she challenged him. “Or else what?”
“Or else you’ll be behind bars tonight. I will even let you call the cops yourself. And you’ll stay there for the next decade, if I have anything to say about it.”
CHAPTER TWO (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
NATALIE CROSETTO STARED at the man lounging on her couch—a soft but old piece she’d picked up at thrift store last month—as if he were a king sitting on his golden throne, surveying a subject brought up for judgment.
Her.
Sweat gathered on her upper lip and the nape of her neck. The tremors that had taken over her body wouldn’t abate.
Jail. He could send her to jail...which meant any chance of her getting custody of Frankie would go up in flames. Christ, why the hell had she let Vincenzo talk her into this? What would happen to her brother if she ended up in jail? No, God, no...
“Head down between your knees. And deep breaths, Ms. Crosetto.” He stood to give her room to sit.
She automatically followed the commanding voice and bent her torso down. The blackness taking over her vision faded, breath rushing into her lungs with the force of a storm. In, out. In, out.
Panic receded, bringing rational thought in its wake.
She couldn’t count on Vincenzo coming to her rescue. Not when she didn’t know how to contact him beyond a number she could text. Not when she didn’t know what the stranger would do with that information.
She had no one to count on but herself. As always.
Still keeping her head down, she went over the jumble of thoughts in her head, unraveling each one.
She’d covered her tracks very well, the first time. This man...he’d have never tracked her by that. But then, she’d tunneled through the firewalls a second time. Albeit with utter reluctance at Vincenzo’s behest. That had been her mistake.
Still, the man on the other end had to be a genius to have tracked her. With unlimited resources. And not just online but all the way here. To show up right outside the cyber club, to taunt her with that text, to trap her so neatly...
She looked up and panic threatened to overwhelm her again.
A stranger in her apartment.
Her sanctuary. Her only safe place from the cruel world outside. She had never even invited Vincenzo here.
God, what a mess.
She pushed a hand through her hair and tugged at it. Her scalp tingled, the pain dispersing the remnants of panic. She’d survived worse situations. She’d find a way out of this, too.
First, she needed to protect herself from him. Needed to get him out of her home.
From the trench coat he’d discarded to the crisp black suit, the cuff links at his wrists, which she’d guess to be platinum, all the way to the handmade black leather shoes he was tapping on her cheap linoleum floor—he was expensively dressed. She might not know all of Vincenzo’s background but he had expensive tastes.
This man was no different.
Even his jet-black haircut, carefully piled artistically at the top of his head, looked expensive, catering to the high cheekbones and forehead, sharpening those features even more. He was no mere IT officer or a hound sent to track her down.
Even if she could get away from him, he or his higher-ups would come after her. Again. Neither could she be a fugitive for the rest of her life. And yet...the need to take control of the situation was overwhelming.
Keeping her eyes on his lean frame lounging against the opposite wall, Nat pushed herself to her feet. Shuffling her feet, she slowly reached for the baseball bat she kept next to the bookshelf. One of the numerous things she’d been collecting to make the tiny apartment a home for Frankie.
The wood felt solid in her hand as she lifted it.
“Drop it, Ms. Crosetto,” he said in a mildly bored tone.
She couldn’t. Not for the life of her.
For a man who topped a couple of inches over six feet, he moved with a grace and economy she couldn’t believe. In two seconds, his lean frame was crowding her. A gasp fell from her mouth when his fingers wrapped around her wrist, forcing her to drop the bat. The thunk of it hitting the floor reverberated in the small space. With a firm grip, he pushed her arm behind her until her upper body arched toward him. Her skin tingled where he held her tightly, but not hurting her.
Head falling back against the wall of his chest, she looked up at him.
And the impact of the man beneath the expensive clothes hit her hard. Hit her in places she didn’t want to think about in front of him.
Intelligence and something else glimmered in his gaze. Dark shadows hung under his penetrating gray eyes. His sharp nose had a small dent right in the middle. His mouth...wide, the bow of the upper lip carved, it was so...sexy.
Awareness rushed in through her blood, settling into a warm throb in her lower belly. A shocking heaviness in her breasts.
Her breaths became shallow. He stood so close that she could see the slight flare of his pupils, the harsh breath he pulled in before his fingers tightened on her wrist.
She wouldn’t be surprised to discover he was one of those male models that seemed to have been born with the perfect bone structure. To whom everything in life came easy. Women at their feet and millions in their bank account.
“Do not dig yourself a deeper hole, Ms. Crosetto.”
The arrogance in his tone banished the airy lethargy in her limbs. “You’re in my home. You cornered me and intruded into my apartment. You—”
He released her instantly. Stepped back, and Nat felt air rushing back into her lungs. “I mean you no harm. Not physically at least. Also, may I remind you that you invited me into your home. And I—” he cast a dismissive look around her living room, that upper lip turned up into a sneer “—expected to find you in something better than this hovel. Didn’t you get paid enough for the hacking job to upgrade from...this?”
She rubbed the sensitive skin at her wrist, more to rid herself of the warmth he left behind than because of any hurt. And to stop herself from smacking the distaste off his curling mouth. “I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”
He sat back onto the couch, leaning his arms onto his long legs, every movement utterly masculine. And yet graceful. “How much did you get paid for taking down the firewalls at BCS?”
“You’re mistaking me for someone else. I’m nothing but a low-level clerk at a cheap easy-loan company in Brooklyn.”
He rubbed a long finger over his left temple. “No more lies, per favore.” His accent sent shivers down her spine that had nothing to do with fear.
When he looked up at her, impatience swirled in his gaze. “Let’s cut through the innocent act. Now that I have your actual identity, it will take me no time at all to find your financials, every personal record, from your date of birth to how often you visit your ATM.”
In a bare, few words that sent all her assumptions of him grounding into dust, he rattled off, step by step, the date and time to the exact second when she had bypassed his security measures and brought down the firewalls at BCS. And not as if he had learned it by rote.
“So, you’re not just a pretty, rich boy?”
He stilled, except for raising a brow on that gorgeous face. She could swear his eyes twinkled but then she didn’t trust herself right now. “A pretty, rich boy, huh? Remind me to tell my older brother that, sì? He’ll find it amusing.”
Nat could only stare.
“I don’t think you comprehend the trouble you’re in.”
“I’m terrified at the trouble I’m in. You’ve no idea what...” She took a deep breath and pushed her shaking hands behind her. “But attacking even when you’re cornered is sometimes the only defense you’ve left in life.”
Something like interest dawned in his eyes before he went on to outline how he’d tracked her signature to the cyber club, made contact with her. How he’d triangulated her physical location. How when he’d given her a small opening in the guise of his latest tech, she’d all but opened herself to him.
Her foul curse rang like a gunshot.
“It was clever. No, not clever. It was sheer genius. But you made a mistake. You—”
“I came back a second time without masking my trail,” she finished, a knot of tension in her throat. He had her. Nicely trapped. Without doubt.
“Yes, that. But you also shouldn’t have returned to the scene of your crime—that cyber club. Why did you?”
She shrugged, refusing to give any more information. Like how every inch of her had been fascinated by his diabolical talent after he’d patched the tunnel she’d created. How she didn’t even really have the kind of technology on hand to pull off something like this, how even membership to the cyber club had been gained for her by Vincenzo.
“Why are you talking to me instead of turning me in, then?” she challenged boldly, even as fear coated her skin with cold sweat.
If only she could somehow contact Vincenzo...
“How and why.”
“What do you mean?” she said sharply, feeling as if she was a prisoner whose execution had been stayed.
He looked at his fingers and then up. Uncrossed his legs and then crossed them again. Pulling the material of his tailored trousers upward. She’d never realized how distracting a man’s powerful thighs could be. “I want to know how you did it. My firewalls, every bit of technology I design, is cutting edge, the best in the world. What you did should have been...impossible.”
“You’re dangling jail time over my neck as a sword because your ego got dented?” The words pushed out of her. “You and I both know I didn’t touch a single client’s financials. I...didn’t steal anything. I’m not a thief. In any sense of the word.”
“Which brings me to the second question. Why attack the security, bring down the firewalls...something that would have taken you days, if not to steal millions worth of financial info—”
“Five hours,” she chimed in, and could have kicked herself. Damn it, where the hell was her sense of self-preservation? What was it about this man that pushed all the wrong buttons in her?
A stillness came over him. He rotated his neck on his shoulders with that casual masculine elegance. But this time, Natalie saw through it. He was shocked. It was clear in the pinched look around his mouth when he cleared his throat and said, “You did it in five hours?”
“Yes.”
If she could trust her judgment right then, Nat would have called the expression in his eyes excited. No...fascinated. He sounded fascinated and thrilled, his body containing a violent energy. More than angry that someone had attacked his design.
This was personal to him, too, this security breach she’d caused. She had to use that to her benefit, to persuade him to be lenient with her.
But she didn’t trust herself right then, didn’t know if she could pull it off. Not when he distracted the wits out of her. Jesus, the man held her future in his palm.
“How long did it take you the second time?”
“Fourteen hours. I... You made it much more complicated and I was under...duress.”
Another smile, this one flashing his perfect white teeth, the warmth of it reaching his eyes. Nat blinked at the sheer beauty of the man. Dark skin at his throat contrasted against his white shirt. “Nice to know I’m not the only one who gives in to their ego. I had you penned right.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” she whispered, a sane defense for once.
“I knew enough to put a tracker on the malware you introduced when you came back the second time. I have bots scouring through every black market, in case you stole the financials. I’ll find out if you’re part of a hacking syndicate. Any money you took for the job, I’ll find the financial trail.”
“There won’t be any.” Thank God she’d refused Vincenzo’s financial offer. Thank God she’d retained some of her moral sensibilities. Her life had been too much of a bitch for her to afford them. But she’d refused. Because she hadn’t wanted to benefit from illegal activity. “You’ll see that I have two thousand and twenty-two dollars in my checking account and credit cards with over nine thousand dollars in debt. I live in this hovel, as you call it. I don’t own a car. And most weeks, I live on ramen. I didn’t make any money on this. It wasn’t a job. I’m not... My services aren’t for sale.”
“So why do it? If it had been just the one time, I’d have assumed you had chickened out at the sheer scope of what you’d done and its consequences. But to come back...” He raised a hand when she opened her mouth. “Think carefully before you decide on an answer, Ms. Crosetto. And stick to the truth, if you can, sì?
“I’m on a deadline to submit the security designs for a major project and I’m grouchy when I’m pulled away from my lab. Forget the fact that my older brother is breathing down my neck for not just having thrown you in jail when I first found you. One wrong word and I’ll take his advice.”
Sweat rolled down between her shoulder blades. A torrent of lies came and fell away from Nat’s mouth. “I...” She swiped her tongue over her lips. Truth, as much as she could afford, was her only option. “I had no intention of stealing anything. I...have been stupid but I’m not greedy. I’m not a thief...by profession,” she added at the last second.
His arrogant gaze bore through her. “I’m waiting, Ms. Crosetto.”
“I did it on a challenge.” It was the last answer he’d been expecting from his shocked expression. “I... Someone in the club issued a challenge.”
“Who?” he demanded instantly, clearly not buying it.
“I don’t know. All I gathered is that BCS’s security was unbeatable. That your security guy’s a genius. That he...no one could ever bring down his firewalls. I...
“I was foolish enough and egotistic enough to want to beat it. Not to prove anything to anyone. Just for myself.”
“And the second time?”
“Hubris.” This time, she was relieved to speak the truth. “You closed the tunnel minutes after I created it. It shouldn’t have been possible. What you did the second time to put them up—to try to bring it down—it was a high.” She’d constantly moaned about how wrong it was with Vincenzo, but it hadn’t stopped her. He’d known how much she’d wanted to do it.
How exhilarating she found it to pit her mind against the security expert at BCS.
“Once I started, I... I lost the little sense I seem to have been born with. I... I swear, I’ll never do it again. I... I’ve never done this before. Please, you’ve got to believe me.”
“It’s not that simple, Ms. Crosetto.”
“Why not? You said—”
“I don’t trust that brain of yours. I can’t just...let you walk free.”
She reached for the wall behind her, her knees giving out. Fear felt like shards of glass in her throat. “You’ll send me to jail?”
He looked at her with a thoughtful expression, as if she were a bug under a microscope he was wondering whether to crush or not. He studied the beads of sweat over her upper lip. The shivers spewing over her entire body. “No. But I’m not letting you go, either.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’ll accompany me to Milan.”
She shook her head, trying to swim through the emotions barreling through her. Fear and hope knotted painfully in her stomach. “I can’t leave the country. I have...responsibilities.”
“You should have thought of them before you decided to embrace the criminal life. Until I get to the bottom of this, until I decide what to do with you, you’ll be my...guest. If you give me your passport, I’ll arrange for travel immediately. I can’t let you out of my sight and I do not like the idea of—”
“That’s kidnapping!” Nat broke through his casual planning. “You’re kidnapping me.”
He didn’t even blink. “The alternative is jail, Ms. Crosetto. There’s too much at stake to magnanimously forgive you.” He turned to his tablet, as if the topic was done. “Pack your things. We leave as soon as possible.”
“I can’t just... I have to tell someone that I’m leaving the country.”
“A boyfriend? Perhaps the man who put you up to this?”
“No one did,” she repeated, biting away Vincenzo’s name at the last second.
This man was dangerous, in more than one way.
More than panic shimmied through her veins as his gaze touched her face. “My job, my... I don’t even know who you are. What if you were a serial killer? A human trafficker? A harvester of organs who’s salivating at the thought of getting his hands on my body?”
His hands on her body... What was wrong with her?
This time, there was no doubting the twinkle in his eyes. Or the languid heat flaring beneath.
Nat stepped back at the mere thought of what that meant. The last thing she needed was an...attraction between them. She knew squat about men. And less than squat about ambitious, ruthless, gorgeous men like her accuser. “Criminals, Ms. Crosetto, dead or alive, however diabolically clever—” his gaze raked her from top to toe and dismissed her in the same breath “—are not my type.” He couldn’t sound more upper class, refined and sophisticated, if he tried.
Everything she wasn’t.
“But since I do not want a hysterical female on my hands on a long transatlantic flight, I’ll tell you.” He looked around her tiny living room, frowned and then settled those broad shoulders onto the wall behind him. The action pushed his hips and thighs away from the wall, highlighting the lean masculinity of the man. Every gesture, every movement of his, called all her senses to attention.
“I’m Massimo Brunetti, the cyber security genius you took on with such ease. And since I won’t let you near an electronic device in the near future, I’ll also give you the Google version, sì?
“I founded Brunetti Cyber Securities a decade ago when I was nineteen. I’m also the CTO for Brunetti Finances, an international finance giant. My brother, Leonardo, is the CEO. That’s the one who wants you behind bars pronto.
“Our family, if you hadn’t realized already, is old power and wealth, the kind of European dynasty others try to emulate unsuccessfully,” he added, with nothing of the pride that was in his tone when he spoke of his security company. “So, yes, far more than your average pretty, rich boy who likes to have his way. Proceed with caution, sì?
“Also, I’ll allow you one single call and you’ll make it in front of me.”
CHAPTER THREE (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
LACK OF SLEEP made Nat grit her eyes as dawn painted the New York sky beautiful shades of pink and orange. Unlike the light pollution that dimmed its shine in the city, the sky here in the country that she’d been driven into at three a.m. in a tinted limo, her sad little bag in hand, was gorgeous. The private airstrip was a hubbub of activity.
Massimo Brunetti...that name and all the power, wealth and reach that came with it had kept Natalie up all night.
She had Googled him the moment Vincenzo had mentioned BCS to her. Him and his CEO brother, Leonardo Brunetti. If Massimo was the brains behind Brunetti Finances, Leonardo was the heart. Cut in the same cloth as Massimo, ruthless when wielding his power, but much more socially active among the glitterati of Milan. The face of their business, the man who flashed his teeth at his enemies, brought in investors, managed the funds, while Massimo built brilliant software that brought in billions of revenue.
“Powerful men make powerful friends or enemies,” Vincenzo had said, when she’d asked if he knew them. “A small favor,” he’d called it. Easy for her incisive mind.
“Can you bring down BCS’s security, Natalie?”
When she had argued that she couldn’t risk anything criminal, she could never go down that path again, he had clasped her hand.
“I’d let nothing happen to you, cara mia. Find a flaw, bring it down. Nothing more. I’ll not ask you to retrieve anything you discover, if you do crack it. Nothing to steal. Just find a weakness in the system.”
“Then why?”—the only question she’d even thought to ask.
“Let’s just say I have my eyes on the man who built it. I need to know if he’s as good as they say. Not a single hacker I’ve hired so far has been able to get through.”
And that had been his lure and she’d more than happily taken the bait.
She could’ve refused. He hadn’t insisted on it. He hadn’t called it as a return on all the favors he’d done for her and Frankie. He hadn’t once, in the ten years since they’d met, mentioned how he’d saved her from a bullying foster parent, or from a wretched future in the juvie system. He hadn’t mentioned not turning in Nat herself when he’d caught her stealing his wallet the first time they had met.
And yet, she’d done it.
Now she wondered at the questions she should’ve asked then.
What did Vincenzo have against Massimo?
Why this particular man?
Why his company?
Why had Vincenzo targeted the brainchild of tech genius Massimo Brunetti?
Instead, she’d thrown caution to the wind, given in to her one weakness and risked everything.
She hadn’t even been able to reach Frankie during the one call Massimo had allowed her. While he’d watched her like a hawk circling a carcass, Natalie had left a message that she was going out of the country for a friend’s sudden wedding, freeloading on the chance. That she would be out of coverage for a while but would call when she could. Her brother knew what a cheapskate she was.
“You’re quite the storyteller, Ms. Crosetto,” Massimo had said in his delicious Italian accent, all sleep mussed before he’d rushed her out of her apartment in the middle of the night, to collect their documents.
Nat pressed her fingers around the coffee cup in her hand—no rest-stop diesel-like coffee for Mr. Pretty Rich Boy. The dark roast felt like heaven on her tongue, anchoring her.
Her spine straightened against the limo as she heard Massimo step out on the other side. His security detail—one broad six-and-half-footer—and his two assistants: a thin man in his twenties with thick glasses and messed-up curly hair. What she’d expected the computer genius to look like—not the sleek, lean, sex-on-legs stud that was Massimo, shame on her prejudice... And the second one—a woman with a dark complexion, in her forties—followed him while he spoke into his cell phone.
Coffee forgotten, Nat watched him with wide eyes as he walked back and forth in front of her speaking in rapid Italian that she couldn’t understand a word of. After every other sentence, he paused, looked at her, and then started again.
Suit jacket gone, three buttons of the white dress shirt undone, that stylishly cut hair all rumpled up from his stint on her couch, he should’ve looked disheveled. At least a little tired. After all, he’d traveled across the Atlantic the previous day.
Instead, the stubble that coated his jaw and his upper lip, the V of his shirt glinting olive against the white of it, the snug fit of his trousers against lean hips—he was an erotic fantasy given form. The assault on her senses that had begun when she’d found him on her couch, trousers pulled up tight against powerful thighs, shirt equally snug against his shoulders, long lashes fanning against his sharp cheekbones... Her heart hadn’t still recovered from it.
And then while she’d stared at him like an enthralled idiot, he’d opened those gray eyes. For just a second, there had been something in his eyes. Something that made liquid desire float through her veins. Before he sat up with his ubiquitous cell phone attached to his ear.
“The jet is ready. Let’s go.”
That was all he’d said to her, before bundling her into the limo. Coffee had been acquired on the way.
When she’d refused, he’d frowned. “Drink up, Ms. Crosetto. I need you awake and alert.”
She’d tensed so hard her shoulders hurt. “Why?”
“Don’t worry. I’m not going to ask you to breach the security of another company.”
She’d immediately relaxed and then cursed herself when a shrewd light dawned in his eyes. Afraid he’d see even more, more than what she’d already betrayed, she’d looked away.
“I want to know exactly how you were able to create that tunnel through the firewall. Both the first and the second time. Each and every step. I want to also know of any other ways you can breach BCS’s security. All the truth, Ms. Crosetto. Not just the convenient parts.
“If I even get a sniff of duplicity from you, you’ll wish I had sent you to prison in your own country.”
Even the wonderful aroma of coffee had felt like poison then.
The threat still ringing in her ears, she swallowed when he beckoned her from the foot of the air stairs. The arrogance of the man scraped her raw. She’d survived the cruelty and negligence of a foster care system that was supposed to protect her, the heartbreak of knowing that she wasn’t good enough, just yet, to be her younger brother’s family.
No way was she going to let Massimo Brunetti control her with the threat of incarceration. No man was going to make her live in fear every day, not after everything she’d been through. Not this easily.
And just like that, an idea began to percolate in her mind. Her shoulders straight, she tilted her chin and walked toward him with confidence.
The narrowing of his eyes made her smile.
Yep, she’d do what he asked of her, but she’d do it on her terms.
* * *
“Call the cops if you’d like. But I’m not getting on that plane. Not until you hear me out.”
Massimo disconnected his call with Leo, Natalie’s husky voice filled with determination sliding over his skin like a sensuous whisper. That same voice whispering at his ear, after a night spent in bed together, limbs heavy around each other, those dark brown eyes languid with sated desire... His imagination fired up the picture faster than he could breathe.
Dios mio, of all the women to spur this insta-lust in him...she was the worst choice.
He wanted to blame the last six months of his self-imposed celibacy for it. But then, after the fiasco with Gisela, he’d been a little bit disgusted with himself. He should’ve known better than to play with a spoiled princess.
He’d been more than a little tired of playing the same old game of chasing a woman just for sex. He had nothing more to give right now. Not at this point in his life.
And now Leonardo had informed him that Greta had been pulled into the whole mess with Gisela. His nonni had decided that Gisela would make a suitable bride for the scion of the Brunetti dynasty, that she was rich enough, sophisticated enough and blue-blooded enough to spawn the next generation of Brunettis.
Which was happening...never. But it did mean handling Gisela and, now, his nonni without giving offense to the former and hurting the second.
Of all the messes...
“Mr. Brunetti? Did you hear me? I’m not—”
He turned slowly, bracing himself. Still, the up-tilted chin and the wide brown eyes packed a punch.
This morning, she’d dressed in a light green-and-black sweater dress that hugged her slender frame, pointing out curves he’d missed last night. The loose neckline kept sliding off her shoulder showing glimpses of silky skin that beckoned his touch.
The dress ended beneath her buttocks—he’d seen enough when she’d walked ahead of him toward the limo, the knee-high leather boots displaying long legs that went on for miles. The mass of her black curls was pulled away into a tight knot at the top of her head, but in no way contained. Thick stray curls kept framing her face and she blew at them. A nervous tell that had made him smile in the limo. High forehead and a sharp nose only emphasized her gaunt face.
He frowned at the increasing appeal she held for him.
She wasn’t the lush, curvaceous beauty he usually went after. Neither was she, he was sure, the experienced type he preferred, the way she’d jumped every time he came near. Women who owned their sexual desires usually meant uncomplicated but pleasurable affairs.
Delicate collarbones jutting out, the only lush thing about her was that mouth. Collagen had nothing on those luscious lips.
She had that million-dollar look that runway models seemed to have. A fragility that, despite her very clever mind, roused a protectiveness in his chest. The last thing she deserved, given the daggers she shot at him. He’d expected her to try to change his mind this morning, sì, but not with that brash confidence she exuded just then.
“Come, Ms. Crosetto.” He gestured her back toward the limo, taking her wrist in his hand. She was truly delicate in his fingers, and they tightened instinctively. He guided her into the waiting limo and shut the door behind him. Even with the luxurious space, their knees bumped before she tucked them away.
Good, at least one of them needed to be wary of this attraction between them. “You seem to think you have a choice in this situation. My patience runs thin especially as my nonni is cooking up a scheme I abhor on the other side of the ocean.”
“Your nonni?”
“My grandmother.”
“I’ll make this quick.” She swallowed and looked up. “I’m calling your bluff.”
He smiled. “You don’t have any cards.”
She leaned back against the seat, and crossed her legs. Her dress pulled up toward her thighs and he peeked at long, taut muscles. Shamelessly. “I’ll not surrender my freedom to a stranger, a stranger moreover with the power and reach that you have, not only in your country but here, to arrange my visa at such short notice, without some security in place. God knows what you’ll do to me when—” whatever she saw in his eyes, color darkened her cheeks and she cleared her throat “—what you’ll decide for my fate. Even in the worst situations, one always has a choice.”
She roused his curiosity so easily and held it. Turned his expectations upside down. So frequently. Unlike any woman he’d ever known. “Why do you think I’ll accept any condition of yours?”
“Because you and I are alike. Hungry for new challenges. So full of arrogant belief that we’re the best there is. I knew what I was risking when I attacked your security the second time. I knew...and I still couldn’t stop. And you...you want to know how I did it. More than you want me in jail. You want to know what other weaknesses there could be in your design. You hate knowing someone better than you exists.”
“You’re not better than me.” He hated that he sounded like a juvenile teenager trying to get one over the smart girl.
She smiled and grooves dug into her cheeks. Her front two teeth were overlapped, a small imperfection that only made her face more distinct, more memorable. More lovely even. Challenge and knowledge simmered in that smile, tugging at his awareness. “Sending me to jail right now doesn’t serve your purpose. I’d rot there for who knows how long while what I was capable of doing eats away at you. So I’ll let you kidnap me, yes, but at a price.”
Laughter punched out of his mouth. Cristo, she had guts. And smarts. And a tart mouth he desperately wanted to taste right then. Humor and arousal were an unusual combination but had a languorous effect on his limbs. He ran a hand over his bristly jaw, trying to find the rationality, the reason, beneath both.
If he had any sense, he’d dump her at the nearest police station and wash his hands off.
It was what Leonardo was expecting. What the sane part of him said to do.
But he hadn’t arrived at his place in this world without taking risks. By denying his instincts. Forget also the fact that if she went to jail, all her secrets went with her.
He didn’t believe for a second that she’d only done it for the challenge. Either it was an impersonal job she took on for money, or someone she knew was deliberately targeting them.
Leonardo and he had worked too hard, for too long, to let some unknown enemy destroy everything they’d built. For now, he’d play along. Plus he’d be no kind of businessman if he didn’t use her talents to his benefit. At least in the short term. He’d just have to convince Leo of her usefulness to them.
“Bene,” he said.
In the intimacy of the leather interior, her soft gasp pinged on his nerves. Her eyes wide, she stared at him, swallowed, looked away and then back at him again. Her knuckles white against the dark leather.
Cristo, the woman blushed even when she was cornered.
He couldn’t help liking the little criminal. He knew what it was to be the weaker one against a stronger, terrifying opponent, to have no way out, the powerlessness that came with it. “State your condition.”
“You’ll pay me for any services I render, like an outside consultant.”
He raised a brow. “You’re not bargaining for me to destroy the proof of your crime?”
She shook her head. And he had a feeling it was to hide her expression. “You won’t give that up. This way, if I end up in jail, I’ll make money to show for it. During the stint, I’ll work on proving to you that I have no agenda of my own.”
“Making money for hacking my system and then more for fixing it? I was right about you.”
“If you were the computer whiz kid the world calls you, you’d have my financials in hand by now.”
“Believe me, I was tempted to find the salacious details of your criminal life last night. But my brother reminded me of the importance of doing this through official channels.
“So I ordered a background check on you. Your whole life will be in my hands in a matter of hours,” he added, making sure she understood the consequences. “Just because I accept your condition doesn’t mean I trust you. Or intend to let you get away with it forever.”
Devoid of color, her skin looked alarmingly pale against the black leather. “Is a background check necessary? All you need is to confirm that I’m dirt poor.”
He shrugged.
What else was she hiding? And how was he going to explain her presence near him, 24/7, to his family, to the world? The last time he’d been in an actual relationship had been...never. He worked hard, partied hard. For more than a decade, he’d worked sixteen-hour days, buried in his lab. Coming up only for refueling.
Brunetti Cyber Securities came first. Always would.
First because he’d needed to prove to his father that he wasn’t the runt he’d been called all his childhood. And prove himself to Leo even, because he’d been the golden son, the adored Brunetti heir at first. Because Leonardo had been everything Massimo hadn’t been able to be.
Later, when Leo had realized the extent of their father’s bullying of Massimo, he’d hated Leo’s pity, his concern for him. Resented him for thinking Massimo needed handouts, that Massimo was weak. But then success itself had become the motivator; the challenge of building better and better cyber systems had become its own drug.
The more he had, the more he’d wanted. The more he wanted his father and his family and his brother to be beholden to his company for fueling much needed funds into Brunetti Finances.
Suddenly, the answer came to him. Two problems and one solution. A tangible use of the attraction between them. An explanation for her presence with him, night and day.
He’d get her to trust him with the complete truth, then he might even take her to bed. Scratch the itch out of his system. Her innocent act would have to drop when he had the background check in his hands.
He pulled up his phone and texted his assistant waiting outside to ready a contract with all the required confidentiality clauses. Another text to notify Leo about the slight modification to his plans. “You’ll have the contract by the time we land. Under one—”
“I won’t leave without it.”
He shook his head. “Not even I can come up with a contract like that immediately. Not without having that background check in hand first.”
“How do I know I can trust you?”
“You don’t.” He shrugged. The hiss of her breath, the filthy curse reverberating in the confined space, made his mouth twitch.
He was enjoying this—this pitting his will against hers, this anticipation in his gut as he waited to see what she’d do next. More than he enjoyed anything with a woman in a long time. Even more than sex. He frowned at the runaway thought. “I have a countercondition of my own.”
“You’re already blackmailing me, kidnapping me, threatening me with incarceration. What else is there?”
“You’ll be my partner for the duration. I’ll compensate you for that, too.”
“Partner? What kind of a partner?” Color left her cheeks, her eyes searching his. “For the last time, Mr. Brunetti, I’m not for sale. I’m not what you think—”
“Calm down, Natalie,” he interrupted her, trying her name on his tongue and liking it. Her eyes sought his in the relative dark, awareness shining through them. She hadn’t missed the intimacy of it, either. “It’s just another part of our deal, sì?”
“Explain. Now, please.”
“I have to explain your presence at my side, 24/7. I need a romantic partner for the foreseeable future. This way—”
“You’ve lost your mind. I’m not staying in Italy any longer than I have to. And I refuse to be your... Why the hell would a man like you need a pretend girlfriend?”
“A man like me?”
He grinned. She glared. “You’re supersmart, obviously given you’re one of the tech billionaires under thirty in the world. You’re—” she licked her lips then and he waited with arrested breath “—a walking, talking stud muffin. Not counting all that dynasty crap you threw at me. Why—?”
“What does a woman do with a stud muffin?”
She rolled her eyes and he laughed. “Why do you need a pretend girlfriend?”
“I was thinking a pretend fiancée actually.” Her eyes bugged and he grinned, explaining, “An ex-girlfriend that I can’t shake off and my nonni have joined forces. Believe me, it’s enough to scare a grown man.”
“So you don’t want to hurt their feelings?”
This time, when he laughed, it felt as if his chest would burst open. The minx was such a contrasting mix of street savvy and naïveté, of smarts and innocence. She’d make a hell of a distraction from the lethargy that had filled him of late when it came to women.
“Feelings, of any of the parties involved, are the least of my concern. Greta, my nonni, is extremely stubborn, and has antiquated views about the whole dynasty and its continuation and legacy and all that rot. For some unfathomable reason, apparently, she’s decided that Gisela Fiore, who comes with a fortune of her own, would be a sweet, biddable wife for me. Gisela is a mistake I shouldn’t have indulged in, and has been...problematic since I ended our purely physical relationship almost six months ago.”
For all her sass, color skimmed up Natalie’s cheeks. “Problematic how?”
“She knows my relationship patterns. She knew it was only an affair. When I retreated to my lab—refueled and ready—”
“What do you mean...refueled?”
“After every big project release, I need to fill the well, so to speak.”
“And you do this...refueling by sleeping with a woman you don’t care about?”
Her distaste made him frown. “I care about the woman’s pleasure. And mine. But, sì. Gisela knew that. Knew my pattern. I made it clear. After it was over, she started texting me a hundred times a day. She’d cry, make a scene at the few social events I attended. She flew to San Francisco and accosted me at a cyber security conference.
“Showed up outside our estate in Lake Como. Cornered my brother, Leo, at one of the events where her father was present, too.”
“And her father is someone whose feelings you do give a damn about?” she said tartly.
Massimo scowled. “Giuseppe Fiore is one of the most powerful banking tycoons in Milan, in all of Italy. BCS is in the running for a hundred-billion-euro security contract with his banks that spans a decade. Leo thinks it’s going to make dealing with him awkward because of Gisela.
“Why should a fling she came into with her eyes open cause problems for me now?”
“Because people are not algorithms that give you the same, expected results every time?”
“Once Giuseppe sees me with you, he’ll understand that Gisela and I are long over. And this is the best way for me to keep an eye on you.”
“If this tycoon’s so rich and powerful, and his daughter’s good enough to be your...whatever, why not just marry her? Or are you holding out for love?”
He stared at her, wondering if she was joking again. Steady brown eyes held his. “Tut, tut, Natalie...you disappoint me. The last thing I need in my life is a wife who wants love and all the rainbows it brings with it. I have nothing to give a wife at present. Or in the foreseeable future.
“Just do your part, sì? The compensation I provide should be big enough for you to get over your distaste for me,” he mocked.
Her nostrils flared. “And if I say no? If I tell your ex and your grandmother that it’s all a big pretense?”
“You won’t do that.”
“I just—”
“Be smart about this, Natalie.” All humor fled his tone. “If I find you’ve told me the truth about your financials, about this not being a job, then what do you have to lose? For once in your life, maybe you could use your interesting capabilities to make a living. Spend a few months in the lap of luxury in Milan. Pretend to be the fiancée of the most—”
“Arrogant, high-handed man on the planet?”
“So?”
“Fine. I agree to your conditions.”
“Bene.”
He stepped out of the limo and helped her do the same, keeping his fingers around her wrist. He liked having the feel of her in his hands, this mystery hacker who’d haunted his days and nights for weeks.
“All that’s left now is to swap our life histories and practice the intimacy we have to pretend in front of my family and the whole world.”
A pithy curse fell from her mouth and Massimo looked down at her.
She was truly the most interesting woman he’d ever met. He wouldn’t hesitate to send her to jail if he found her loyalties lay with their enemy, but he would regret it all the same.
And he didn’t understand even that negligible emotion dogging his rationality, his judgment.
It had never done so before.
CHAPTER FOUR (#u10ed7f6d-642f-5792-b28a-29a4aba44543)
AFTER A TRANSATLANTIC flight to Milan with a creative genius who peppered her with a million incisive questions meant to unsettle her lies. Throwing in a magnificent view of white-tipped Alps, which she’d probably never see again in her life—except maybe on the return flight on her way to jail in New York. Then a quick helicopter ride up to the shores of Lake Como—because, of course, the once-in-a-lifetime scenic drive from Milan to the lake would take forever and time was a precious commodity to a tech billionaire. Finally arriving at a destination where she was nothing but a prisoner, Natalie foolishly assumed she would become oblivious to her surroundings—not the man, of course—or at least be too exhausted mentally and physically to take much more in.
She was wrong.
The chopper landed on the side of a hill, in a sea of lush, perfectly manicured gardens with azaleas and gigantic rhododendrons and a long avenue of tall plane trees that created a walkway to the lakefront. A small boat floated at the end of the steps. Beyond, the calm waters of Lake Como glittered like a dark blanket creating a stunning sight littered with boats of various sizes floating lazily to the gorgeously lit-up houses and villages scattered about.
As Natalie followed Massimo, who seemed to have forgotten about her existence, amid carefully sculpted flower beds, she spotted a hidden cave enclosed by more azaleas and even an artificial Japanese-style pond.
“Your family owns this villa?” she said, her breath catching in her throat.
Massimo stopped, took a look around absentmindedly and then turned to her. “Sì. One of the Brunettis, a count or a duke, maybe, I think in the nineteenth century, took possession of a Benedictine monastery in these grounds and converted it into a sumptuous noble residence. It’s been in the family’s possession ever since. Greta will cram a history lesson down your throat if she catches you staring at it like that.”
Even his mockery couldn’t fracture the awe in her chest. Fountains with water glittering out like liquid gold because of strategically placed lights, a gazebo with creepers enveloping it, two statues of majestic lions at the sides of the carriage entrance... How could he sound so dismissive and unaffected by his family’s legacy? “I’ve never seen such beautiful gardens.”
“You’d love it in spring when they’re a riot of color. They’re Leonardo’s pride. He personally tends to them along with a team of gardeners. He can make the most reluctant plant blossom. He...loves the land and the villa and the...legacy of it all.”
She was out of breath as they walked up the small, steep path while he simply marched on. “You don’t?” she asked, something in his tone snagging her attention.
“I like being the one who saved it, the one who held it for the Brunettis so that they could show it off for another century,” he added mysteriously.
She frowned, wondering at the contradictions of the man.
Finally, they came around the bend to a square plot that housed the villa itself. A grand entrance portico with wide stairs that sloped toward the lake straddled the villa, which would offer three-sixty-degree views of the lake and the mountains from the grand terrace even now overflowing with guests.
The white stucco facade gleamed under the light thrown from the lake. Nat sucked in a breath as the sounds of music and people chatting in Italian flowed over her skin. A line of luxury cars stood like gatekeepers, tasked with keeping riffraff, like her, out.
She shivered even though the wind coming off the lake was more balmy than cold. Cicadas whispered all around them, the scents from the orangery they’d walked by thick and pungent in the air.
It was a world away from Brooklyn and her cheap studio apartment, a world away from everything she’d ever known.
Through the high arched front entrance, she could see suave men dressed in black suits and refined women dressed in cocktail finery with diamonds glittering at their throats and wrists. Uniformed waiters passing around champagne flutes so fine that Nat wondered if they’d break at the slightest pressure.
She rubbed her sweating palms on her hips, which only brought her attention to her own outfit. A thread of shame filled her chest and she chased it away with much needed anger. God, she’d worked hard for every small thing she owned. To make an honest living for herself and for Frankie.
She felt the heat of Massimo’s body next to her, before she heard the curse from his mouth. Frowning, she craned her neck to see him. Flashes of light revealed the tension in his brow, that perfectly carved jaw so tight that it almost seemed fragile. If she didn’t know better, she’d have thought he was no more inclined to go in than she was.
The suavely sophisticated man who’d taunted her was nowhere to be seen. In his place was a stranger with tension thrumming tightly through his lean frame.
“Massimo?” she whispered, unable to stem the concern she heard in her voice. “Is something wrong?”
“My father is here,” he answered softly, before he blew out another soft curse and shook his head. “He is a bully of the worst kind.”
“Must run in the family, then,” she quipped.
“No.” His soft denial was emphatic enough that her head jerked to him. Glittering gray eyes held hers. “I’m nothing like my father.” He rubbed his jaw, a tell she was beginning to recognize he did when stressed. “Dios mio, I forgot it’s his birthday week. That means Greta checks him out of the rehabilitation clinic and parades him in front of our family and friends in an annual tradition. That means—” his gaze swung to the luxury vehicles “—everyone is here.”
“Your father lives at a clinic?” She’d gotten the sense from him that family was important to him. Yet, he stared at his family’s villa like it was a nest of vipers.
“He’s a recovering alcoholic. The recovery, if we can call it that, has been in progress for a decade now. Leonardo put him there years ago. My brother...he’s the best at eliminating anything that could damage our name, our business. Our legacy.”
The bitterness in his words was unmistakable. “What do you mean your grandmother parades him?”
“You didn’t get the sordid Brunetti history online before you attacked BCS?”
The man changed skins as easily as a chameleon—one minute a charming rogue, the next a cunning businessman determined to make her spill her secrets against her own best interests. “I told you, I knew nothing about who and what you are.”
Hesitation flickered in his eyes, before he cast another glance toward the villa. “If you’re to be exposed to them... My father, for most of my childhood, went on alcohol-fueled rampages. He embezzled funds from the company account for his personal use. Affairs with numerous women—both willing and unwilling—lavish parties at the villa... Think of it as a decades-long, out-of-control party that Greta turned away from.
“By the time his misuse of company funds and resources came to Leonardo’s notice, Brunetti Finances, which had once been the leading finance giant in all of Italy, had been on the verge of bankruptcy. A dynasty reduced to nothing but a deck of cards standing on quicksand.
“Leo had to use every inch of his business acumen to stop it from crumbling around our ears. He slogged night and day to get us out from under debt, took control of the board. I designed an e-commerce tool at the same time. He brought in millions in investors, persuaded me to build and release it myself instead of selling the design like I had planned to. I created Brunetti Cyber Securities under the family company’s umbrella and launched the tool. With the revenue from it, we stopped Brunetti Finances from going under.
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Tara Pammi
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 23.04.2024
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О книге: To discover the truth… He’ll keep his beautiful adversary close For brooding tech billionaire Massimo Brunetti, a cyber-attack on his company is unacceptable. Tracking down the savvy Manhattan hacker, he’s stunned to find gorgeous genius Natalie Crosetto. Yet naïve Nat isn’t the saboteur. To uncover who she’s protecting, Massimo returns to Italy—with Nat playing his fake fiancée! But this untameable Italian might have met his match in innocent Nat, who challenges him…and tempts him beyond reason!