Tempted by My Best Friend's Billionaire Dad

The lower part of the Aegis smelled of diesel, salt air, and old money. Lisa Moon didn't belong on a two-hundred-foot yacht floating off the coast of Monte Carlo, and she certainly didn't belong in the crew room below the waterline with a stolen master key card in her hand. But six thousand dollars in unpaid school fees left no room for pride. Alice Thorp's birthday party was going strong three floors above…a blur of champagne, gold dust, and expensive laughter…while down here, Lisa was just the poor girl nobody noticed, dragging a bulky cloth laundry bag across the polished wood floor. She reached for the handle of the private study, her hands slick with sweat, when the steel door at the end of the corridor hissed open. Lisa ducked behind the metal case of the backup generator, pulling the cloth bag over her knees. Icy metal pressed into her back. She held her breath, pressing her ribs against her knees until her chest burned. Two men stepped into the cramped passage. The first was Edwin Thorp, Alice's uncle…a man whose face was always turning up in money-scandal news, red-faced and breathing hard. The second man moved without a sound. A fitted, charcoal-gray suit, broad shoulders that filled the confined space, silver running through his dark, swept-back hair. Frank Thorp. Alice's father didn't look like a man who came to his daughter's twenty-second birthday party. He looked like a hunter who had stepped out of the boardroom to look at something dead in his path. "You're out of options, Edwin," Frank said. His tone wasn't raised. It was low, heavy, and completely without warmth, like stone grinding against stone. "The offshore accounts in Panama were caught by government investigators two hours ago. You signed the transfers using the firm's main bank code." "It was a short-term loan, Frank!" Edwin's voice cracked, high and desperate. He pulled back his sleeve to show a heavy gold watch. "Jonathan promised the offshore returns! The old man said…" "Jonathan is eighty-two years old and waiting for a kidney in Zurich," Frank cut in, moving closer. His height cast a long shadow over the metal wall, swallowing his younger brother whole. "He doesn't cover your debts anymore. I do. And I don't cover betrayal." Lisa squeezed her eyes shut, her fingers clamped over her mouth to muffle her quick breaths. Just walk past, she begged silently. Just go back upstairs. "You think you're untouchable," Edwin sneered, his fear turning into sudden, wild anger. "You think because you run the firm, you own every piece of the Thorp family. You don't own me, Frank. And I'm not going to prison so you can keep playing God." A metallic clack echoed down the cramped passage. Lisa's eyes snapped open. Through the shadow of the generator case, she saw the dull black shine of a pistol in Edwin's hand. He was shaking badly, pointing the barrel straight at Frank's chest. Frank didn't flinch. He stood perfectly still, hands resting calmly in his trouser pockets, studying the weapon as if it were nothing more than a small paperwork error. "You don't have the nerve for it," Frank said quietly. "Lower the weapon before Glover finds you down here." "Glover isn't coming to save you!" Edwin shrieked. The panic in Edwin's face was total…the wild desperation of a trapped animal. His finger twitched near the trigger. Lisa moved before her mind could catch up with the madness of it. She didn't think about her future, her law career, or the fact that Frank Thorp barely knew her name beyond the formal dinners Alice invited her to. She only saw a man about to be shot dead three feet in front of her. She pushed off from behind the generator case, grabbing the metal fire extinguisher from its wall hook. "Drop it!" she screamed. The abrupt crash of metal and her raw, piercing voice broke the standoff. Edwin recoiled, his head jerking toward the shadow where Lisa appeared. His finger pulled back on the trigger without thinking. The loud report inside the enclosed passage sounded like an explosion. A blinding white flash lit the air. Lisa felt a sudden, icy shock cut clean through her left shoulder, followed at once by a wave of burning heat that pulled the air straight out of her lungs. Her knees buckled. The floor tipped beneath her boots. She didn't hear the fire extinguisher hit the ground; she only felt the steel deck slam into her hip. Before she could fall all the way down, a pair of strong arms caught her. The smell of wood, tobacco, and blood filled her senses. Frank had closed the gap in less than a second. He hauled her against his chest, his broad palm clamping over her collarbone, applying pressure directly to the wound. "Lisa," he growled. It was the first time she had ever heard him say her name, stripped of all business calm, raw and dangerous. Above them, the door burst open. Michael Glover ran down the steps, a silenced gun already drawn, aimed at Edwin in a heartbeat. Glover didn't shoot; he simply swept Edwin's legs out from under him with a brutal kick, sending the shaken man face-first onto the deck and pinning his head beneath a boot. "Get him out of here," Frank ordered, his hands were covered in Lisa's hot, dark blood. "Take him to the harbor house. No doctors, and make sure no police enter." "Understood, sir," Glover replied, dragging the sobbing Edwin up by his collar and pushing him toward the back exit. Lisa gasped, her fingers catching weakly at the sleeve of Frank's suit jacket. Pain spread down her chest like fire, making every breath feel like a sob. "I…I saw…" "Be quiet," Frank ordered. He shifted his weight, lifting her into his arms with no effort at all. He didn't care about the stain spreading across his gray jacket or the blood dripping onto his leather shoes. He held her close, his attention fixed on hers with an expression that frightened her more than Edwin's gun ever had. "Look at me, Lisa," he ordered, his thumb sliding up beneath her chin, forcing her head up. "Keep your eyes on me." "I was just…getting the laundry," she choked out, tears cutting clean tracks through the dust on her cheeks. "Alice…Alice sent me…" "Alice isn't here," Frank replied, his tone dropping into a clipped, frightening note of total control. "You are in my world now. Do you understand what just happened down here?" Lisa shook her head weakly, her vision beginning to fray at the edges, dissolving into a blur of gray spots. "He…he was going to kill you." "He tried," Frank corrected. He began climbing the cramped metal stairs, carrying her as easily as if she weighed nothing at all. "And you stepped in front of a bullet for a man you don't know. That makes you either remarkably brave or unforgivably foolish." "I'm broke," she whispered, her voice fading to a rasp as numbness crept through her arms and legs. "I can't…I can't die broke." A flicker crossed Frank's stern features…a quick, sudden c***k in his composure. He stopped at the top of the stairs, looking down at the pale, shaking law student bleeding into his shirt. "You aren't going to die," Frank promised, his words quiet but absolute. "You saved my life, Lisa Moon, which means as of this second, your life belongs to me. I own your debts, and I own your silence." "I won't say anything…" "I know you won't," he murmured, his grip tightening around her waist just as unconsciousness finally claimed her. "Because if you do, the bullet will be the least of your worries."