Claimed

  Fake it until you make it, she told herself grimly as she stepped into the shower and scrubbed herself raw in an attempt to erase the memory of his touch from her skin. Wasn’t that the phrase? She’d spent a long time pretending that year in Manhattan had never happened and had finally gotten to a place where she was happy. Healthy. And now, here he was, back again, shaking everything up. Shaking her up. And she was just supposed to go along for the ride.

  Cold, hot, cold, hot. Cold.

  No. Not this time. And never again. He was too dominant, his moods too mercurial, and she wasn’t going to take the ride with him again. It had been fun once, but that was before she’d had anything to lose but him. She’d been drifting when she met him at that gala all those years ago. Stealing had lost its thrill and she’d had nothing to replace it until him.

  That wasn’t the case anymore. Now she had a career. She had friendships. She had a life. And she’d worked too damn hard for that life to let him come in and turn it topsy-turvy because of old mistakes. And even older chemistry.

  No, from now on she would ignore Marc whenever she saw him. A quick nod of acknowledgment if she couldn’t get around it, but that was it. No interaction, no arguing, and for God’s sake, definitely no sex.

  Because any interaction with Marc would lead to questions from her peers that she couldn’t answer. Questions that would bring up a past she couldn’t talk about.

  Because one of the world’s leading experts on diamonds—a woman who was allowed into and left alone in vaults all over the world—couldn’t also be the daughter of the most successful jewel thief who’d ever lived. It didn’t work that way.

  And since all she’d had was her work from the moment Marc cast her out on that dirty New York sidewalk, since it was what had saved her when the rest of her world had imploded, there was no way she was risking her career for him. Not now. Not ever again. No matter how powerful the chemistry or how good the sex.

  Some things just weren’t meant to be. And her relationship with Marc was obviously one of those things.

  Now all she had to do was remember that.

  Seven

  “We have a problem.”

  Marc looked up as Nic blew right past Marc’s assistant and entered his office without so much as a knock—or a hello. “What’s going on?”

  His brother slammed his hand down on the desk hard enough to rattle everything resting on top of it—including Marc’s laptop and cup of coffee. For expediency’s sake—and to give him a second to settle the alarm raking through his stomach—Marc grabbed the coffee and put it on the credenza behind him.

  When he turned back to face Nic, Marc was completely composed. He had a feeling he would need it, since Nic was not one to fly off the handle over every small thing. He was volatile, sure—the flip side of the charm that made him such a perfect fit for the public side of the company—but he never panicked. But Marc was pretty sure that panic was what he saw in Nic’s eyes right now. And he’d be lying if he said it didn’t make him more than a little nervous.

  “Tell me.”

  “I just got off the phone with a reporter from the LA Times. She’s doing an exposé on Bijoux and wanted a comment before the article goes to print.”

  “An exposé? What the hell does she have to expose?” Marc stood up then, walked around the desk. “Between you and me, we’re in charge of every aspect of this company. Nothing happens here that we don’t know about.”

  “That’s exactly what I told her.”

  “And?” He ground out the words. “What’s she exposing?”

  “According to her, the fact that we’re pulling diamonds from conflict areas, certifying them as conflict free, and then passing them onto the consumer at the higher rate in order to maximize our profits.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “I know it’s ridiculous! I told her as much. She says she has an unimpeachable source.”

  “Who’s the source?”

  Nic thrust a frustrated hand through his hair. “She wouldn’t tell me that.”

  “Of course she wouldn’t tell you that, because the source is bullshit. The whole story is bullshit. I know where every single shipment of diamonds comes from. I personally inspect every mine on a regular basis. The certification numbers come straight to me and only our in-house diamond experts—experts that I have handpicked and trust implicitly—ever get near those numbers.”

  “I told her all of that. I invited her to come in and take a tour of our new facilities and see exactly how things work here at Bijoux.”

  “And what did she say?”

  “She said she had tried to come for a tour, but PR had put her off. It’s too late now. The story is slotted to run on Friday and that she really would like a comment from us before it goes to print.”

  “That’s in six days.”

  “I’m aware of that. It’s why I’m here, freaking out.”

  “Screw that.” Marc picked up his phone and dialed an in-house number. Waited impatiently for the line to be picked up.

  “Hollister Banks.”

  “Hollister. This is Marc. I need you in my office now.”

  “Be there in five.”

  He didn’t bother to say goodbye before hanging up and dialing another number. “Lisa Brown, how may I help you?”

  He told his top diamond inspector the same thing he’d just told the head of his legal team.

  “But, Marc, I just got in a whole new shipment—”

  “So put it in the vault and then get up here.” He must have sounded as impatient as he felt, because she didn’t argue with him again. She just agreed before quietly hanging up the phone.

  It took Lisa and Hollister less than three minutes to get to Marc’s office, and soon the four of them were gathered in the small sitting area to the left of his desk, listening as Nic once again recounted his discussion with the reporter.

  “Who’s the source?” Marc demanded of Lisa as soon as Nic finished up.

  “Why are you asking me? I have no idea who would make up a false story like this and feed it to the LA Times. I’m sure it’s none of our people.”

  “The reporter seemed pretty adamant that it was an insider. Someone who had the position and the access to prove what he or she is saying.”

  “But that’s impossible. Because what the person is saying isn’t true. The claims are preposterous,” Lisa asserted. “Marc and I are the first and last in the chain of command when it comes to accepting and certifying the conflict-free diamonds. There’s no way one of us would make a mistake like that—and we sure as hell wouldn’t lie about the gems being conflict-free to make extra money. So even if someone messed with the diamonds between when I see them and when Marc does, he would catch it.”

  “Not to mention the fact that there are cameras everywhere, manned twenty-four seven by security guards who get paid very well to make sure no one tampers with our stones,” Nic added.

  “What this person is saying just isn’t possible,” Lisa continued. “That’s why Marc insists on being the last point of contact for the stones before we ship them out. He verifies the geology and the ID numbers associated with them.”

  “There is a way it would work,” Marc interrupted, his stomach churning sickly. “If I were involved in the duplicity, it would explain everything.”

  “But you’re not!” Nic said at the same time Lisa exclaimed, “That’s absurd!”

  Their faith in him was the only bright point in a day that was rapidly going from awful to worse.

  “It’s what they’ll argue,” Hollister said, and though it was obvious by his tone that he disagreed, the thought still stung. This was more than a company to Marc, more than cold stones and colder cash. His great-grandfather had started the company nearly a hundred years before and it had been run by a Durand ev
er since. He’d put his life into continuing that tradition and building Bijoux into the second largest diamond distributor in the world. He’d brought it into the twenty-first century and created a business model that didn’t exploit the people who most needed protection. Not dealing in blood diamonds was a matter of honor for him. To be accused of doing that which he most abhorred...it made him furious—and determined.

  “I don’t care what you have to do,” he told Hollister. “I want that story stopped. We’ve worked too hard to build this company into what it is to have another setback—especially one like this. The jewel theft six years ago hurt our reputation and nearly bankrupted us. This will destroy everything Nic and I have been trying to do. You know as well as I, even if we prove the accusations false in court, the stigma will still be attached. Even if we get the LA Times to print a retraction, it won’t matter. The damage will have already been done. I’m not having it. Not this time. Not about something like this.”

  It took every ounce of his self-control not to plow his fist into the wall. Goddamn it. He wasn’t doing this again. “Call the editor of the LA Times. Tell him the story is blatant bullshit and if he runs it I will sue their asses and tie them up in court for years to come. By the time I’m done, they won’t have a computer to their name let alone a press to run the paper on.”

  “I’ll do my best, but—”

  “Do better than your best. Do whatever it takes to make it happen. If you have to, remind them that they can’t afford to go against Bijoux in today’s precarious print media market. If they think they’re going to do billions of dollars of damage to this company with a blatantly false story based on a source they won’t reveal, and that I won’t retaliate, then they are bigger fools than I’m already giving them credit for. You can assure them that if they don’t provide me with definitive proof as to the truth of their claims, then I will make it my life’s work to destroy everyone and everything involved in this story. And when you tell them that, make sure they understand I don’t make idle threats.”

  “I’ll lay it out for them. But, Marc,” Hollister cautioned, “if you’re wrong and you’ve antagonized the largest newspaper on the West Coast—”

  “I’m not wrong. We don’t deal in blood diamonds. We will never deal in blood diamonds and anyone who says differently is a goddamn liar.”

  “We need to do more than threaten them,” Nic said into the silence that followed his pronouncements. “We need to prove to them that they’re wrong.”

  “And how exactly are we going to do that?” Lisa asked. “If we don’t know who they’re getting information from, or even what that information is, how can we contradict them?”

  “By hiring an expert in conflict diamonds,” Hollister chimed in. “By taking him up to Canada where we get our stock, letting him examine the mines we pull from. And then bringing him back here and giving him access to anything and everything he wants. We don’t have any secrets—at least not of the blood diamond variety. So let’s prove that.”

  “Yes, but getting an expert of that caliber on board could take weeks,” Lisa protested. “There are barely a dozen people in the world with the credentials to sign off unquestioningly on our diamonds. Even if we pay twice the going rate, there’s no guarantee that one of them will be available.”

  “But one is available,” Nic told her even as he cast a wary look at Marc. “She lives right here in San Diego and teaches at GIA. She could totally do it.”

  Hell. He couldn’t say he was surprised—from the moment Hollister had suggested hiring an expert, Marc had known they would end up here. But that didn’t make it any easier to take.

  “Dude, you look like you swallowed a bug,” his brother told him.

  Yeah, that was pretty much how he felt, too, except worse. Because, no. He wasn’t calling her. He couldn’t call her. Not with their distant past and definitely not with what had just happened between them the night before. She’d laugh in his face. And if she didn’t...if she didn’t, she’d probably deliberately sabotage them. No, he wouldn’t put the future of his company in her hands.

  He said as much to Nic, who rolled his eyes in exasperation. “Weren’t you the one saying we can’t afford to screw around with this? Isa’s here, she has the experience, and if you pay her well and get a sub to carry her classes, she’s probably available. It doesn’t get much better than that.”

  “You should give her a call,” Hollister urged.

  “Yeah, absolutely,” agreed Lisa. “I’d forgotten about Isabella Moreno being here in San Diego. I’ve met her a few times and she’s really lovely—we should totally get her. I can try to talk to her, if you’d like.”

  Marc almost said yes, almost passed the buck onto Lisa to deal with. But he couldn’t. It would be a slap in the face to Isa—an even bigger one than he’d already delivered to her this morning—and he couldn’t afford that. Couldn’t afford to antagonize her when she might very well be the only thing standing between Bijoux and total ruin.

  The irony of the situation was not lost on him.

  “No,” he told Lisa harshly, after a few uncomfortable seconds passed. “I’ll take care of getting her on board.”

  He sounded more confident than he felt. Then again, it wasn’t as if he had a choice. He couldn’t fail. Not now, not on this. His family’s business depended on it.

  He would do whatever it took to convince Isa to take on Bijoux—and him.

  Eight

  Isa was in the middle of a cleaning frenzy, one that involved scrubbing down every surface in her house that Marc might have touched. She knew it was ridiculous, knew it had to be her mind playing tricks on her, but that didn’t matter. Not when she could smell him everywhere.

  Inconsiderate bastard, leaving his dark honey and pine scent all over her house. She refused to acknowledge the little voice that whispered it wasn’t her house he’d left his scent on. It was her.

  She’d made it through the entire space and was on her knees scrubbing the bottom shelf of her refrigerator when the doorbell rang. She nearly ignored it—it wasn’t like she was in the mood to talk to anyone. But when the ringing gave way to a loud and urgent pounding, she rushed to the front door and pulled it open. She lived in a good neighborhood, but that didn’t mean someone wasn’t in trouble. Maybe they needed—

  She froze as she looked straight up and into Marc’s narrowed eyes.

  So not an emergency, then.

  She slammed the door shut in his face before she could worry about what she was giving away by doing so. Then she sagged against it and forced herself to pull air into lungs that had forgotten how to breathe.

  What was he doing here? When he’d walked out this morning, she’d been certain she’d never have to see him again—maybe only from a distance on the GIA campus. Had counted on it, in fact. No matter what she’d told herself, her feelings for him, for what had happened last night, were still too raw for her to face him again.

  Not yet, she told herself as she worked to get her ragged heartbeat under control. Preferably not ever, but definitely not yet.

  Except Marc hadn’t gotten the message. The pounding on her door started again, along with his voice, low and urgent, ordering her to “Open up, Isabelle.”

  It was his use of her formal first name that got her brain functioning again.

  She thought about ignoring him. About walking into her bedroom at the back of the house and turning on music, the TV, the shower—anything to drown out the sound of his voice. But doing so would make her look even more ridiculous, more pathetic, than she already did. And that was saying something.

  It was that thought—along with her smarting pride—that finally made the decision for her. She rubbed her suddenly sweaty palms down the front of her jean-clad thighs and turned to open the door.

  “Hi, Marc,” she said as she once again peered up at him, a
fake—but bright—smile curving her lips upward. “Sorry about that. You caught me in the middle of something...” She tried to ignore the way her voice trailed off uncertainly, prayed that he would be gentleman enough to do the same. She didn’t know what it was about Marc Durand that turned her into a babbling schoolgirl with a crush on the most popular boy in school, but she didn’t like it.

  Marc must have been feeling merciful, because he didn’t call her on her blatant lie. Nor did he try to put his hands on her. Instead, he raised a brow and asked, “Can I come in?”

  No. She had spent the past two hours eradicating his presence from her house and now he wanted back in? With his gorgeous scent and his larger-than-life personality and his big hands, which he had used to drive her to orgasm again and again?

  No, he couldn’t come in. He shouldn’t come in.

  But, big surprise, knowing the danger was very different from acting on it. Instead of sending him away with another slammed door in his face, she pulled the door open wider and stepped back so he could get inside without his body brushing against her traitorous one. “Of course, yes. I assume you’re here for your socks?”

  Both brows went up this time. “My socks?”

  “Yes.” She cleared her throat, awkwardly. “They’re very nice socks. I found them when I was straightening up. You must have forgotten them when you left this morning.”

  Very nice socks? Was she suddenly twelve? she asked herself fiercely. Socks were socks, for God’s sake.

  Judging by the strange look he shot her, Marc definitely seemed to think so, too. “Oh, um, thanks? I hadn’t really noticed.”

  “How do you not notice that you’re not wearing socks with your dress shoes?” She glanced down at his bare ankles doubtfully, even as she told herself to forget about the damn socks. “I can’t believe your shoes are all that comfortable, even if they are Hugo Boss.”

  Then she bit her lip because, really, could she sound more obsessed? She kept harping about his “nice socks” and she knew what kind of dress shoes the man wore. He was probably counting himself lucky for the narrow escape he’d made this morning.