CHAPTER ONE

      ‘HE’S COMING!’

      Mia James’s stomach clenched unpleasantly as she hurried to stand behind her desk, shoulders back, chin up, heart pounding.

      ‘He’s in the lift now…’

      The numbers above the silver doors glowed, one after another. Two…three…

      Mia watched out of the corner of her eye as her fellow colleagues at Dillard Investments did the same as she had, scurrying to desks, standing up straight. They were like schoolchildren awaiting an inspection by the head teacher. A particularly strict and perhaps even cruel head teacher…the notoriously ruthless Alessandro Costa, self-made billionaire and, as of yesterday, the new CEO of Dillard Investments.

      Yesterday the company had been taken over by Alessandro Costa in a calculated and clever manoeuvre that had shocked everyone involved in the company right down to their toes, including Mia’s boss and the CEO, Henry Dillard. Poor Henry had looked terribly shaken, aging ten years in a matter of minutes as he realised there was nothing he could do to stop Costa International from gaining controlling shares; it had all happened before he’d even had a chance to realise, Costa stalking the company the way a ruthless predator would a prey.

      Four…five… The lift doors pinged open and Mia drew her breath sharply as the new CEO of Dillard Investments stepped through them. She’d seen photos of him online, having done an exhaustive internet search last night when the news had been confirmed that Dillard’s had been taken over. What she’d learned had far from reassured her.

      Alessandro Costa specialised in hostile takeovers and then stripping the companies of their assets and employees, to be absorbed into his behemoth of a corporation, Costa International.

      A few months ago, he’d taken over a company similar to Dillard’s—small, family-owned, a bit antiquated. Now it was virtually gone, swallowed up by the man who was striding onto the top floor of the building Dillard’s owned in Mayfair.

      Mia tried not to make eye contact with Alessandro Costa, but she found she couldn’t stop looking at him. The photos on the internet didn’t do him justice, she realised with an uneasy pang of physical awareness. They didn’t communicate his intense energy, as if a force field surrounded him, as if he crackled.

      Cropped dark hair, as black as midnight, framed a face that was all angles and hard lines, from his jaw to his nose to the dark slashes of brows over cold, steel-grey eyes. His body, tall and lethally powerful, was encased in a hand-tailored suit of dark grey silk, the silver tie at his throat matching the colour of his eyes. He made Mia think of a laser, or a sword…something powerful and lethal. A weapon.

      He came onto the floor with its open-plan desks with quick, purposeful strides, his narrowed, hawk-like gaze moving in quick yet thorough assessment around the room, pinning people in place. It felt as if the very air trembled. Mia was afraid she did. Alessandro Costa was incredibly intimidating.

      She knew everyone’s job was up for grabs, and most likely down the drain as well. In his last takeover, it had been rumoured that Costa had kept three employees out of forty. As personal assistant to the CEO, Mia knew her position would almost certainly be cut. Costa undoubtedly had his own executive assistant already in place, and as he didn’t seem likely to keep Dillard’s going as a separate entity, her job had most likely become obsolete last night, with the takeover.

      Still, she was determined to try to do something to keep it. She’d been working for Dillard Investments since she was nineteen, fresh from a B Tech business course, bright-eyed and determined to make something of herself and, most importantly, to finally be independent.

      All her childhood she’d been under the controlling thumb of her unbearably autocratic father, having to do as he said and dance to his tune, however discordant its notes. Her mother had been the same, cringing and hopeful in dispiriting turns, and Mia had vowed to gain her freedom as soon as she could—and never make the same kind of mistake her mother had, by marrying a charming yet controlling man…or any man at all.

      So now, while Mia knew she could find another job, she resisted the prospect of being fired from this one for no good reason. She’d been here a long time, had worked hard, and had made a few friends along the way.

      She might be likely to lose her job anyway, but she’d go down fighting. She had to, as points of both pride and principle.

      Alessandro Costa had stopped in the centre of the room, his feet spread wide, his hands on his hips. He looked like the king of an empire, surveying his domain. Like something out of a fairy tale, except in a three-piece suit.

      ‘Who is Mia James?’ he asked, his voice slightly accented, the words crisp and precise as they echoed through the open space.

      Mia felt every eye on the floor turn instinctively towards her. Like a child in school being called on by a teacher, she raised her hand, hoping her voice would come out strong.

      ‘I am.’ She might have overshot it, she realised; she sounded strident. Aggressive, even, to hide her nervousness.

      Alessandro Costa’s eyes narrowed even further in appraisal, and his lips flattened into a hard line.

      ‘Come with me,’ he said, and walked into Henry Dillard’s office, the only private space on the floor, an elegant room with wood panelled walls and leather club chairs, tasteful oil paintings and heavy curtains. It felt like a gentleman’s club, or the study of an elegant townhouse, which it very well might once have been. Dillard’s offices were in a former home, although much of it had been gutted for desk space.

      Costa strode towards the big, mahogany desk, inlaid with leather, that Henry had always sat behind while Mia had taken notes or dictation. Henry had been eccentrically old school; he’d only bought a laptop a few years ago, and he’d still depended on Mia to manage emails and spreadsheets, finding both quite beyond him, and not seeming to mind.

      It gave her a pang now to think that was all over; Henry had retreated to his estate in Surrey, and Mia half wondered if she’d ever see him again. Last night, as he’d shuffled out of the office, his business in ruins around him, he’d seemed like an old, broken man, and it had wrung her heart right out. And it was this man’s fault.

      Alessandro Costa stood behind Henry’s old desk, his hands placed flat on its surface, fingers spread wide, as