LITMIR.BIZ

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shoulders hunched with futility. “Yeah.”

      The blue of his eyes seemed to intensify. “Why? What makes you so resistant? Why is the promise of everything you’ve ever dreamed of at your fingertips not as alluring to you?”

      “I told you why in agonizing detail and you already know I hate redundancy. Especially after you took such pleasure in deconstructing my argument and having the last word.”

      “I don’t remember I had the last word.”

      “You didn’t bother to have it. You just ignored mine.”

      “I chose not to engage you again in front of everyone, decided to do so in private. As I am doing now.”

      “You shouldn’t have. I have nothing more to say.”

      “So do you only take exception to leaving your own project behind?”

      “I take exception to being forced to.”

      “Your results won’t evaporate if you shelve them for a while.”

      “I see no reason to while I’m making progress.”

      “There are many reasons, scientific and financial. You’ll also gain expertise working on my projects, your own work would eventually benefit.”

      “If you think I need expertise you shouldn’t want me working on your projects.”

      “I meant added expertise. I wouldn’t have paid all that money if I thought you were anything but the best.”

      She waved his placating response away. “You didn’t pay anything for me. That hundred million—”

      “Two hundred million. Half of which is funding for phase one of all the projects I have planned for you.”

      She forced her open mouth closed. “What’s a hundred million dollars more, huh? But whatever you paid was for our collective services and obedience, probably for the rest of our lives. Now that you’ve found one troublemaking apple in your bushel, you can always toss it out.”

      “I have no intention of tossing you out.”

      “Well, I intend to jump out of the cart myself.”

      His eyes narrowed. “You’re contemplating quitting?”

      “I’m done contemplating.”

      His expression went blank. But though there was nothing to read in it anymore, she felt she was getting the first real glimpse of what he hid beneath the polished exterior of the genius surgeon and suave businessman. Something lurked below his placid surface, something more sharp-edged than his state-of-the-art scalpels. Someone utterly ruthless. No, more. Someone lethal.

      Which was stupid. Whatever else he was, this man was a healer. He didn’t end lives, he saved them. All these feverish thoughts must be the sun frying her brain. Or was it such intense and close exposure to him?

      Then he spoke again, sending her every hair standing on end. “It’s clear contemplation has nothing to do with your decision. I wouldn’t even call such a knee-jerk reaction one.”

      He again sounded like when he’d been addressing their assembly, making her realize how deliberate and calculated he had been in comparison to how he’d been talking to her now. He had been out to subdue and mesmerize everyone. He was trying to make her bow to his will now.

      Well, he should have realized by now that his tried and true methods only backfired with her.

      Bent on walking away this time, she stood as tall as she could. “Call it what you like. I quit, Dr. Balducci. I’m sure my loss will be nothing more than a negligible annoyance, since BIL is chock-full of those who will ecstatically do your bidding.”

      “You can’t quit, Dr. Accardi.”

      “Because the lump sum you paid included my price? Just a sec...” She took the bag off her shoulder, rummaged for her wallet, pulled the money she found and stuck the bills out to him.

      “What’s that supposed to be?”

      Extending her hand as close as she dared get to him, she met his glowering with her own. “I don’t know what the going rate per head was, but taking into account the premises and everything else, I’m sure I didn’t cost you more than that.”

      His eyes fell to the notes before he raised them to her, full of mockery. “I assure you, you cost me much more than that.”

      She refused to lower her hand. “You let me know exactly what I cost you, and I’ll pay for my freedom in installments. Consider this the first one.”

      As he realized she wasn’t joking, his gaze clashed with hers as if to make her cower before him. She was sure such a glare had brought many adversaries to their knees. Tough, it was going to let him down this time. Even if she felt he’d set her on fire if she held his stare any longer.

      A second before she averted her own eyes, he suddenly looked down at the money. He plucked three hundred-dollar bills from the bunch before he raised his eyes again and almost knocked her flat on her back with the mischief filling them.

      “Now you really can’t quit.”

      She gaped at his wicked grin. “What?”

      “You just paid me for shares in your facility. Now you have to stay and run the place with me. Or for me.”

      Before another thought could fire in her stalled brain, he turned and strode away.

      Out of nowhere, a sleek black limo slithered soundlessly up to him.

      Before he got in, he turned to her with a mock salute and said, “See you tomorrow, partner.”

Three

      Antonio caught himself grinning again and again all the way back to his mansion in Holmby Hills.

      Shaking his head for the umpteenth time since he’d left Liliana Accardi gaping at him as if he’d grown a spiked tail and leather wings and taken flight, he again wondered what the hell had happened in that parking lot. Actually, what the hell had happened since she’d blasted him in that meeting room.

      This wasn’t what he’d envisioned at all. Not after everything had gone according to plan. At first.

      He’d made the bid on the lab, knowing he’d find no resistance. He’d finalized everything in record time before moving to the next phase—conquering his new subordinates. He’d done that, too, with more acceptance than his best projections, thanks to his long-perfected methods of making people do his bidding.

      He’d started practicing his influence from childhood when he’d been in the clutches of The Organization, which had taken him and hundreds of children to turn them into lethal mercenaries. Even among his brotherhood, as unyielding as they were, he’d enjoyed a unique position of power. While Phantom—Numair now—had been the leader everyone deferred to, it had been Antonio everyone trusted to have the most levelheaded opinion. When he’d become their medical expert, they’d trusted him with their very lives.

      He’d taken that skill into the outside world after they’d escaped The Organization. Normal people had been no match for the sway he’d honed with some of the world’s most shrewd and lethal people. He’d plowed through the worlds of medicine and business like a laser, being described by rivals and allies alike as irresistible and unstoppable. Not that he reached his goals through aggression or intimidation. He relied on persuasion and manipulation, so no one had a reason to fight him and every reason to succumb to him.

      Among his brothers, he was the one who had an equally close and friction-free relationship with all. Yet he’d allowed not even them beyond the serene facade he’d refined.

      They believed it was Wildcard—or Ivan Konstantinov as he now called himself—who knew Antonio fully, as he’d been closest to him since childhood. But Antonio

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