Enemy In His Boardroom (Red-Hot Icelandic Nights #1)

Chapter One

Diana

He’s waiting for me.

The winding glass and stone lobby of Iceland’s international airport is packed with families, business travelers, an excited-looking group of women sporting massive backpacks and hiking boots, and a harried young man trying to keep his gaggle of high school students together.

Pure chaos. The kind I usually enjoy when I’m traveling as I watch the people around me, spinning stories in my head about where they’re from and where they’re going.

Reassuring myself there are good people in the world as I watch parents comfort overwhelmed children and friends excitedly make plans.

But as I hold Ari Valdasson’s gaze, the chaos and stories fade.

All I can hear is the thundering of my own heart.

He looks just like he did three months ago when I turned and our eyes locked in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

White-blond hair, a chiseled face comprised of sharp angles and punctuated by dark brows.

Towering above the other people in his orbit, clad in a tailored black suit molded perfectly to broad shoulders and a lean waist.

Beneath the crisp white shirt and perfectly knotted black tie is a sculpted chest dusted with curling blond hair.

A chest I became intimately familiar with when I ripped his shirt open and slid my hands over every inch of heated skin I could find.

When he eased me back into the mattress, muscles slick with sweat as he gripped my hips and pushed inside me, filling me until I couldn’t tell where I ended and he began.

I swallow hard. I’d left the Baccarat Hotel in the early hours of the morning.

I hadn’t wanted to leave. I’d wanted to curl up in the circle of his arms, savor the heat of his body, see his smile when he first opened his eyes.

Craved the intimacy so much it had scared me into slipping out of bed, grabbing my things, and sneaking out the door.

I’d been walking toward the subway, telling myself I had done the right thing, when Liam had called me.

One of my two best friends. The only one still talking to me, and even then he’s pulled back, too, ever since Aislinn withdrew from our lives.

So when he said he had a favor to ask, I said yes without hesitation. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him.

Including pretending to be engaged.

What, I wonder for the umpteenth time, are the odds the man I indulged in my first ever one-night stand with would turn out to be my best friend’s half brother?

My gaze darts back up. Dark blue eyes bore into mine. More like cold chips of ice set into an angular face marked by cheekbones I could sharpen an ax on. His sculpted, prominent jaw narrowing to pointed chin balances his sheer masculinity with a sense of regal authority.

Authority I’ll be submitting to for the next four weeks as I serve as a corporate negotiator between AuraGeothermal and Hellas Global Shipping.

I square my shoulders and walk toward Ari.

Each step tightens the muscles in the back of my neck.

He watches me with icy detachment. So different than the man I met in the halls of the museum.

A man who watched me with fire in his eyes and a confident tilt to his lips as he’d approached me with slow, measured steps.

The desire had been instant. But the warmth behind his smile, the attentiveness as we’d wandered the museum, had reeled me in.

I’d never met a man as handsome as Ari, nor one who had put me so at ease even as he’d ignited desires I’d never experienced before.

All reasons why I’d done the unthinkable and ended up in his bed that night.

Stupid reasons, stupid decisions, I remind myself as I close the last few steps between us. Decisions that will not be repeated.

“Miss North.”

His voice rumbles through me, rich and deep, slow and deliberate. I inhale deeply, try to grasp onto some semblance of control, as I set my suitcase upright and hold out my hand.

“Mr. Valdasson.”

He doesn’t even glance down at my hand. Just stares at me. My first test.

I keep my hand out, tilt my head to one side. Yes, the man’s seen me naked. Well, almost. As naked as I allow myself to get with another human being. But I’m not going to let that intimidate me, distract me from my job.

At last, he reaches out. His hand engulfs mine, his long, tapered fingers sliding over my skin and leaving little fires smoldering in their wake.

Oh, good job, I mentally snap at my hormones. If one handshake is all it takes to remind me of how he trailed his fingers down my neck right before he kissed me in Central Park, the next four weeks are going to be me roasting in a different kind of fire. One of the hell-on-earth variety.

He lets go. I resist the urge to smooth my hand over my pants and give him a polite smile.

“I didn’t expect you to meet me.”

He arches one condescending eyebrow. “I’m not here for you.”

Well, screw you, too.

“I see.”

“Georgios Xenakis’s plane just landed.”

My curiosity piques. Georgios Xenakis is the CEO of Hellas Global Shipping, the Greek shipping and logistics company currently battling out a contract with Ari’s geothermal energy company.

It’ll be my job over the next four weeks to help them settle their differences, iron out a contract, and finalize their business deal.

Or as Liam once described my career, helping grown adults settle their squabbles.

He’s not wrong. I love what I do, helping businesses and executives overcome disagreements and find common ground so they can move forward.

Using the communication and mediation skills I developed through years in foster care and honed in college to make a difference.

But every now and then, it feels like mediating a quarrel between toddlers.

The image of Ari Valdasson, CEO of one of the world’s most respected geothermal energy companies, with a net worth exceeding well over a billion dollars, squabbling like a child makes my lips twitch.

“Something amusing, Miss North?”

“Not at all, Mr. Valdasson. I’m looking forward to working with you and Mr. Xenakis.”

“Then, you won’t mind altering our schedule for the day and meeting at two.”

He’s testing me. I wrap my professionalism around me like a shield, tilt my chin up, and give him a thin-lipped smile.

“Of course not.”

Yes, we have a history together. A brief night we both went into knowing it wouldn’t go beyond sunrise.

It’s been three months since I saw Ari. One month since Liam ended our supposed engagement.

I’m very good at my job. I know I can make a difference here if Ari can put the past behind him and focus on business.

Ari turns and walks away. I stare at his back. Is he just this rude with me? If he’s like this with everyone, it’s no wonder Aura’s negotiations with Hellas aren’t going well.

He glances over his shoulder at me. “The limo’s outside.”

I shoulder my bag and follow in his wake.

We step outside into a chilly drizzle. I grimace just as Ari looks back at me.

His expression doesn’t change, but I can feel his disapproval, cold and biting.

I steel myself against it, against the faint, hurt pulsing beneath the layers of shield I’ve built up over the years.

He turns to face me. “Problem?”

Irritation creeps in. Even during the torturous dinner in New York where Liam introduced me to his long-lost half brother, Ari wasn’t this abrupt or discourteous.

He had been distant, focused primarily on Liam and asking questions about Liam’s childhood with his adopted parents, his time in foster care after they passed in a car accident.

They’d chatted business, college, careers.

He’d asked a bit about my degree and my work.

Formal, polite, as if I hadn’t just been straddling his naked hips twenty-four hours prior.

None of the disdain or loathing seeping from him now.

“The only problem is if our history together is going to be an issue for you.”

He leans down. I breathe in and immediately regret it.

A heady scent fills my senses, smooth whiskey and cedar with a touch of earthiness.

It sparks memories, memories of me gasping his name as my fingers delve into his hair, of the feel of his body against mine as our limbs tangled together, of his pressing the sweetest kiss to my temple as I drifted off to sleep.

“If an isolated incident from three months ago was going to be a problem, I wouldn’t have hired you in the first place.”

The warmth evaporates at the frigid ice in his tone. Frustrated by my own weakness, I raise my chin.

“Why did you hire me?”

“Undergraduate degree in business with multiple semesters abroad in Europe and Asia. Internship with a German logistical operations company the summer before your senior year. Graduate degree from Georgetown School of Foreign Service. Three years working for the New York City Economic Development Corporation, and now, just over a year with Lumen International Consultants.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Impressive recitation, but also a little creepy.”

“You have experience working with Greek companies as well as logistical operations with international transportation. Every reference I contacted spoke highly of you.”

“Surprised?”

He cocks his head. “Given that you lied to me, yes, I’m surprised.”

Guilt swells in my chest, a pressure pushing on my ribs as I try to take a deep breath.

As far as Ari knows, I did lie. We spent hours together that night, from wandering the Met and strolling through Central Park to dining at an upscale French eatery before tumbling into bed.

As the elevator doors had closed and the car had whisked up toward his penthouse, he’d pinned me against the wall, wrapping my wrists in one grip as his other hand had brazenly cupped my breast.

“Is there anyone else?”

I’d been telling the truth when I said no. But he didn’t know that.

Couldn’t know it.