“And yet, here we are,” he says, still wearing only his pants and shoes as he walks over to the bar in the bedroom to pull out a bottle of Remy to pour. He raises one eyebrow my way as though to ask if I’d like some, and I shake my head no.
“Is this what the next thirty-odd days are going to be like? You asserting your dominance, forcing me to accompany you as you destroy one man after another, only to end with sex?”
“You say that like it isn’t the perfect aphrodisiac. Don’t deny watching a man lose a million euros wasn’t a turn on for you, Sloane. Especially knowing why I operate the way I do.”
I think about the words he said right before he finally agreed on the condom. That he was intrigued by me, but that could mean anything. He did make it clear that sex has always been on his mind.
“Is this why you wanted me for the full forty days? To screw me?”
“Would you believe me if I said the thought hadn’t crossed my mind at all?” he responds with a teasing grin before taking a sip.
My lips tighten, pressing together with anger.
Magnus walks over toward me, perched on the bed. Something about him in nothing but those pants seems even more erotic than if he were naked.
“What is it you want, Sloane?”
I stare at him a moment, mostly to regain my composure.
What do I want?
Obviously, I need what I came here to Monte Carlo for in the first place. But need and want are two different things. One is survival; the other is…what?
I stare at Magnus as he tries to read me. Is he a man I could fall for? Is he the man I’ve already fallen for?
I shake my head, realizing he’s a distraction, one which I can’t fall prey to. The sex is good. Dizzyingly good, mostly in the pure primality of it. Just…letting go like that, fierce and hungry and…
Focus, Sloane!
“Back on your boat, I asked you to tell me everything. So tell me. No distracting me with metaphors about hunting or sharks or guppies. Tell me, what is it Gabriel wants to know? What is it every financial expert is craving to know? What is it you’re planning now that you’re almost one year away from your deadline…with only two more men to destroy?”
Magnus considers me for a long moment. Behind those expressive green eyes, I can see his mind working. He isn’t the kind to trust anyone, and with his history, I don’t blame him.
But this, as the saying goes, is the moment of truth.
“Nothing.”
I sigh and slide my eyes away, realizing this is just another power play, hunt, game, whatever the hell he wants to call it.
“Sloane.”
Something in his voice draws my eyes back to him, and I’m surprised at what I find there. Magnus stares at me with all the intensity of a star reaching supernova status.
“That’s the truth. Everything I’ve done this past year—selling off assets, hosting dinner parties with random CEOs, sports stars, celebrities? That’s my bluff. My grandfather was the one to teach me. Make people think you have a royal flush…only to lay your cards flat to reveal nothing more than a single high card.”
I stare at him, trying to comprehend what he’s saying. Magnus Reinhardt planning…nothing? It would be like Beyoncé switching to heavy metal, or Francis Ford Coppola switching to romcom.
Which is the genius of it.
Those examples just prove the rule.
The ultimate bluff.
“Now, you get it,” he says, reading my thoughts.
“So this is it for you? Your…what? Your final act?”
“You make it sound so anticlimactic.”
“It is.”
“Which makes it so much more climactic,” he says with a wry smile.
“I can’t tell if you’re still bullshitting me,” I say, considering him.
Magnus comes in closer, his half-naked body invading my space, with only a thin sheet separating us.
“Does it matter?”
“Of course it does. Or have you forgotten why I’m here in the first place?”
“That’s something you don’t have to worry about. I told you.”
“I’d feel a lot more reassured if you told me the truth.”
His eyes cloud over a bit, and he looks past me at Monte Carlo through the window.
“Everything I own, every piece of real estate, every business, every sports franchise, every last dollar in my various bank accounts, even that damn yacht, has been nothing more than a tool for me. It’s helped me get back at the people involved in that money laundering scheme that ended up getting my parents killed because they knew too much. Even if some of them weren’t financially ruined, they at least felt my bite, which was enough for me. When the last two are finally dead, I’ll have accomplished everything I swore I would. So what does one do when the hunt is over, and their hunger is sated?”
He’s still staring past me at Monte Carlo.
Magnus’s eyes slide to me, remaining so intensely focused I’m almost certain I know the answer.
“When you make partner, what then, Sloane?”
“What do you mean?” I ask, a little thrown by this sudden shift in topic.
“You’ll have accomplished exactly what you wanted. What then?”
I shrug. “I suppose…marriage and children. Isn’t that what everyone wants?”
“Is it?”
“Don’t you?”
“I’ve been so focused on getting what I want, I never took the time to seriously think about it.”
I feel a tiny pang of guilt, mostly because I can relate. I’ve always been subconsciously cognizant of the dangers of putting off domesticity in favor of my career, especially as I creep toward thirty. Hasn’t every ambitious woman been beaten over the head with it?
Now that partnership is within reach, it doesn’t seem so bright and shiny a prize.
The brass ring.
Lara’s words come roaring back. Marriage to Magnus? I almost laugh, but there’s something in his gaze, still glued to mine that stops it before it can even find a foothold. Despite his glaringly
