Table of Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

       CHAPTER SEVEN

       CHAPTER EIGHT

       CHAPTER NINE

       CHAPTER TEN

       CHAPTER ELEVEN

       Copyright

       CHAPTER ONE

      JOEL looked up with a scowl as the intercom buzzed on his desk. ‘Yes?’ he asked curtly, his soft American drawl only faintly discernible.

      ‘Your eleven o'clock appointment has arrived,’ came Cathy's smooth reply.

      Again Joel scowled. He wasn't in the mood for being pleasant this morning; last night's scene with Laura was still too vivid in his mind for him to be feeling polite. He clicked on the intercom again. ‘Show them in, Cathy,’ he said with a sigh.

      His dark mood didn't lift as Cathy opened the connecting door between their offices to usher in the person waiting to see him. Cathy smiled at him before leaving the room, closing the door softly behind her. Joel transferred his attention to the girl who had entered the room at Cathy's bidding.

      He needed no more than his normal male instincts to tell him that here was a beautiful girl. Her hair was a beautiful golden cap, wavy tendrils at her forehead and nape giving her the look of a cherub. But the tall curvaceous body certainly didn't belong to a child, far from it. The clear green eyes surrounded by thick dark lashes and the creamy matt complexion perhaps had too much of a look of forced innocence for Joel's liking, but if she could carry it off with any degree of conviction, who could blame her for trying? And the innocence did look natural, it was only Joel's cynical disbelief of all women that told him otherwise.

      Joel sat forward in his deep leather armchair. ‘What can I do for you—–’ he consulted his appointment book. ‘Miss Halliday?'

      Farrah licked her lips nervously, moving forward over the scatter rugs to stand in front of the huge mahogany desk. The desk seemed to be the only concession made to this room being an office. Huge leather-bound books lined the walls, deep leather armchairs in a rich brown colour stood either side of a huge drinks cabinet that looked, and probably was, a genuine antique, and half a dozen scatter rugs littered the highly polished floor. To Farrah it was like stepping back into the early nineteen-hundreds, and she felt even more unnerved than she had sitting outside in the reception area.

      Joel Falcone was perhaps the only modern thing about this room and yet he wasn't in the least reassuring, with his dark over-long hair tinged with grey at the temples and shaped into the nape of his tanned neck, a hawk-like nose and firm sensuous lips that were now set in a straight forbidding line. But it was the eyes that affected her the most, narrowed icy blue eyes that appeared to miss nothing, and she was sure they didn't. His charcoal grey suit fitted perfectly across his powerful shoulders and the silk shirt gleamed whitely against the darkness of his skin.

      ‘Well, Miss Halliday?’ he said tersely, his voice deep and husky.

      ‘Don't you—–Don't you know me, Mr Falcone?’ she asked tremulously.

      He raised an arrogant eyebrow. ‘Should I?'

      ‘Perhaps not me, but perhaps P-Paul Halliday.’ The last came out breathlessly.

      Joel's dark brow creased in thought. ‘Paul Halliday,’ he repeated slowly. ‘You're his daughter? Or perhaps his wife?'

      ‘His daughter,’ she admitted. Still she saw no dawning comprehension in his dark arrogant face. ‘Don't you know who my father is?'

      Joel began to feel impatient. He couldn't be bothered with this guessing game. ‘As far as I am aware your father works in the accounts department,’ his eyes sharpened with interest. ‘Ah, I begin to understand. Your father stole from this firm, did he not? Are you here to plead on his behalf?’ he mocked cruelly.

      ‘Not plead, no,’ her eyes sparkled angrily. ‘And my father did not steal from you. He borrowed a small amount of money and—–'

      A deep mirthless laugh interrupted her tirade. ‘Your father did not borrow anything. And it was hardly a small sum. Twenty-five thousand pounds taken systematically over eleven months could hardly be classed in that light.'

      Farrah's hands wrung together and Joel was forced to notice what beautiful hands they were, long and tapered with perfectly lacquered nails. ‘But my father needed that money. Oh, I know that doesn't excuse him, but you wouldn't miss twenty-five thousand pounds among your millions.'

      ‘Maybe not, in fact, I'm sure not,’ Joel said blandly. ‘But the excuse that he needed the money is hardly my affair. For whatever reason he stole that money, gambling debts, drink—although if he used all that money on drink he would be in his grave by now, or even if it was to buy you out of trouble, I do not see why my company should bail him—or you—out.'

      She bit her lips hard to stop them from trembling. Her father had warned her that Joel Falcone was a hard man, but she hadn't realised just how hard. She had come here today with the intention of begging if necessary, but she couldn't do such a thing before this hard unyielding man. He would merely look down his nose at her and not give an inch.

      ‘He didn't need the money for himself—or me for that matter. I have no need of money.'

      Joel looked at her elegant summer dress, her sheer tights and the well fitting leather shoes. His eyes moved slowly back to her face, and once again he was struck by her beauty. ‘I can see that. Do you have yourself a rich middle-aged protector who tries to live through your youth?’ he said this with a sneer, and Farrah flinched at his contempt.

      Two angry spots of colour appeared on her creamy cheeks and suddenly she looked very youthful, her eyes wide and distressed. ‘I don't have a rich protector, Mr Falcone,’ she told him stiffly. ‘You just happen to pay well.'

      ‘I