Wicked Yearning (Tainted Love #5)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Iona

Tall wrought-iron gates creak open at our approach, and a shiver skates up my spine.

A run-down, misty graveyard adjoins the property, reminding me of where we’re all bound.

Does one need good intentions to summon ghosts, or will spirits come to those with wicked intent?

Maybe they only respond to the strongest yearning, good or ill.

I lean forward in the back seat of the plum Ferrari Purosangue SUV that Leith Cargill sent to pick me up. His driver, Draven, has a round head, hard features, and a dirty-blond buzz cut. “Have you worked long for Mr. Cargill?”

Draven’s sharp eyes cut to mine in the rear view. “Since he joined the Syndicate.” He turns up a winding gravel drive bordered by aspens, pines, and birches.

I mentally review Cargill’s memoir. He was hired by Glasgow’s Syndicate Crew, or S. Crew, at age twenty-six, so eight years ago. “Did he find you, or did you find him?”

“I was assigned to him,” Draven says curtly, and the edge in his tone tells me that’s the end of that.

“This is . . . beautiful.” I swallow at the imposing fa?ade of the mansion we’re approaching in Lenzie, north of the city.

According to my research, it’s an eighteenth-century farmhouse with two early twentieth-century additions in back, the south and north wings.

Made of white-painted granite, it has two stories at the front entrance and one large loft-ceilinged floor to either side.

The roof is dark-grey slate, and cypresses scatter the pathway to the front door.

Horses graze in a fenced pasture to the right, and off to the left cows litter a sloping meadow that stretches down toward the graveyard.

The man who owns all this is a self-made multi-millionaire.

“Now I’m filthy rich, I enjoy what I do, and I lack but one thing,” Cargill tells me.

“What’s that?” I ask.

“A wife.”

* * *

One week ago

I’m running late. But I always am whenever I’ve prepped both my appearance and my materials.

Puffing out a resigned sigh, I stuff my notebook and phone into my handbag.

If I’m going to be prompt, I have to sacrifice either make-up or research, adding a wave to my hair or choosing a passage to ask the respondent.

Today, in a bid to look good for this renownedly handsome lawyer, Leith Cargill, I used mascara and eyeliner and waved my straight locks. I donned a black-and-white A-line halter dress with swishy patterns on it—one of my favorites—and four-inch white heels to give height to my five foot six.

But there was no way I was going in half-cocked, without having read the book.

So here I am, seven minutes late, praying Cargill doesn’t notice.

My hands tremble, and my heart plays hopscotch in my chest as I push open the door of the women’s toilet.

Sighting the table where Cargill holds court, I weave through the milling crowd of book fair attendees.

Authors, fans, publishers, promoters, and book influencers like myself pack the cavernous space, a former airport hangar east of the city center.

Everywhere book stands abound, books fan out across trestle tables, and book stacks twist upward like corkscrew towers.

This afternoon represents my big chance to attract followers of a completely different kind from my usual women’s fiction, romance, and historical fiction audiences.

For some inexplicable reason Cargill requested me, of all people, as his interviewer.

His memoir I Took the Low Road, chronicling his life up to when he became the Syndicate’s main legal counsel, has been flying off the shelves.

Glasgow adores its own homegrown mafia.

A rags-to-riches tell-all by said mafia’s chief lawyer? A publisher’s gold mine.

Though I suspect not every one of these three hundred seventy-two pages tells the unvarnished truth.

As I trip toward the author, women of all sorts fawn on him.

A plump, older lady with lovely soft curls and perfect skin engages him in conversation, while twin teens goggle at him from the side.

A young woman of about my age shifts her weight from foot to foot, antsy to have him sign her copy.

And a gaggle of women in their twenties and thirties huddle about whispering and giggling.

His countenance comes more sharply into focus, and oh, my.

Aye, that’s a verra bonnie lad. A thick, tar-black mane crowns a long face with deep-set features.

A broad brow, arresting eyes, and the most perfect cheekbones I’ve seen on a man stir me in the pit of my belly.

His straight, narrow, pointed nose and ripe, shapely lips further define his face, culminating in a strong, angular jaw.

His smooth complexion is sallow, his energy intense.

Soft harmonizes with sharp in his appearance.

Where his jaw could cut quartz, its dusting of dark stubble softens it.

His eyes glint like smoky grey topaz, but his eyebrows arch gently above them.

Though his teeth flash dazzlingly white, his hair, longer at the top and short on the sides, is becomingly disheveled.

His body is even more astonishing. I just manage not to gape, taking in his tall frame folded elegantly in the chair.

In a crisp white button-down shirt, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, his broad shoulders and massive forearms tell of athleticism and excellent genetics.

I lose my breath following the lines of the dark trousers that hug his long, lean thighs.

His clothes aren’t worn—they worship at his altar.

As I approach with faltering steps, he fastens his gaze on me, and my skin heats and prickles.

His expressive hands drape over the ends of the chair arms, and his right index finger makes a swirling motion.

Intended or unconscious? I fixate on the movement, my throat drier than a desert lake in high summer.

I stand on the periphery, awaiting my summons like a child queuing up to sit on Santa’s lap. The willowy boho girl has screwed up the courage to hand him her book to sign. He says a few words that make her blink and stutter a reply, then he crooks his fingers at me.

My heart in my throat, I step forward.

“You’re late,” he observes in a mild tone, his voice rich and smooth like treacle.

“I often am, I’m afraid.” I roll my lips, extending a hand. “I’m?—”

“I know who you are.” His lips twitch. “And I presume you know who I am.”

“Aye.” My eyes dart around for a chair. “It’s a great pleasure?—”

“Let’s begin, shall we? Time is precious.”

Of course, he’s a lawyer.

I catch sight of a folding chair under the long table and bring it over, placing it three feet from him.

Then I set up my tripod and phone. He watches calmly, an amused glimmer kindling in his eyes.

When I’ve got the perfect angle to capture the two of us, I press record and start the Instagram live interview.

“Good afternoon, and welcome to this installment of Iona’s Bookish Rambles.

” I clear my throat, sweeping a lock of hair behind my shoulder.

I’m nervous enough to be interviewing for a make-or-break job.

“Today we’re joined by Leith Cargill, author of I Took the Low Road, a memoir of his early life leading up to when he joined the Syndicate as their chief legal counsel. Mr. Cargill, thank you for being here.”

A charming smile tips up his lips. “Leith, please, Iona. Thank you for having me.”

Lord, this man’s suavity is deadly.

A giddy feeling fills my chest and head. “To what does the title refer, Leith?”

“Two things.” He fans an arm out over the back of his chair, angling his body toward me and crossing his legs.

With his attention trained so keenly on me a steady thump starts up in my clit.

A man has never affected me this way. “My near brushes with death and the so-called low criminal underworld in which I operate.”

While I often only skim books, I read his memoir thoroughly. I press my thighs together, trying to ignore the thrumming at my center. “Will reading your story revise people’s opinion of that underworld?”

He arches a brow. “Everyone is entitled to legal defense. I’m on retainer by the Syndicate to ensure its associates have that.”

I moisten my parched lips. “You ran away from your parents when you were seven. Tell us a bit about that bold move.”

“I was horrified by the way they and their colleagues treated animals.” He tilts his head.

“We lived in north Bangkok, Thailand, and many of the animals they kept didn’t belong in that climate or in a home environment.

My parents were scientists who developed products made from animals, who experimented on animals.

I was surrounded by cruelty to animals, so I left. ”

While surprised he’d make such a stark move at such a young age, I press on. “Where did you go?”

“I ended up working my way around the world in different capacities, picking up schooling as and when I could. I traveled and worked in India till I was eight, and from there I went to Tibet, where I worked for Buddhist monks who educated me in return.” He speaks with the quiet pride of a self-made man.

Our rapt auditors crowd in on all sides, holding their breaths for his every word.

“From eleven to thirteen, while working on vineyards in Croatia, I learned the language, picked up chess and maths from a local chess wizard, and borrowed books from the priest. From there I traveled to Halifax, Nova Scotia, working the dockyards for a year.”

“And your parents never looked for you?”

He hitches a shoulder, his smoldering gaze never veering from me. “They may have, but the world’s a large place, and I kept well hidden.”

I picture a small boy wandering on his own without guidance, drifting from job to job and family to family, seeking kindness wherever he can find it. My heart melts, and the area behind my eyes burns.

“Until you returned to Scotland,” I prompt.