“Mr. Kazarov,” she said, her voice a little too shrill, a little too brittle.
Roman tsked. “After all we were to each other, Caroline? Is this how you greet an old friend?”
“I wasn’t aware we were friends,” she said, remembering with a pang the way he’d looked at her that night when she’d informed him they couldn’t see each other anymore. He’d just told her he loved her.
Roman shrugged. “Then we are certainly old acquaintances.”
One eyebrow arched as his gaze slid down to where she clutched the wrap over her breasts. She’d worn a strapless black dress tonight, but she felt as if she were naked under the silk from the way his eyes took their time perusing her. Heat flared in her core. Unwelcome heat.
“Old lovers,” Roman said as his eyes met hers again.
SCANDAL IN THE SPOTLIGHT
The truth is more shocking than the headlines!
Named and most definitely shamed, these media darlings have learnt the hard way that the press always loves a scandal!
Having a devastatingly gorgeous man on their arm only adds fuel to the media frenzy. Especially when the attraction between them burns hotter and brighter than a paparazzo’s flashbulb …
More books in the Scandal in the Spotlight miniseries available in eBook:
GIRL BEHIND THE SCANDALOUS REPUTATION
by Michelle Conder
BACK IN THE HEADLINES
by Sharon Kendrick
NO MORE SWEET SURRENDER
by Caitlin Crews
Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk
About the Author
LYNN RAYE HARRIS read her first Mills & Boon® romance when her grandmother carted home a box from a yard sale. She didn’t know she wanted to be a writer then, but she definitely knew she wanted to marry a sheikh or a prince and live the glamorous life she read about in the pages. Instead, she married a military man and moved around the world. These days she makes her home in North Alabama, with her handsome husband and two crazy cats. Writing for Harlequin Mills & Boon® is a dream come true. You can visit her at www.lynnrayeharris.com
Recent titles by this same author:
REVELATIONS OF THE NIGHT BEFORE
UNNOTICED AND UNTOUCHED
MARRIAGE BEHIND THE FAÇADE
Did you know these are also available as eBooks? Visit www.millsandboon.co.uk
A Game with One Winner
Lynn Raye Harris
For MPP
CHAPTER ONE
Russian Billionaire Rumored to Be Acquiring Troubled Department Store Chain
SHE WAS HERE. Roman Kazarov knew it as surely as he knew his own name, though he had not yet seen her. The woman at his side made a noise of frustration, a tiny little sound meant to draw his attention back to her. He flicked his gaze over her, and then away again.
Bored. The woman was beautiful, but he was bored. One night in her bed, and he was ready to move on.
Her fingers curled possessively around his arm. He resisted the urge to shake them off. He’d brought her here tonight on impulse. Because Caroline Sullivan-Wells would be here. Not that Caroline would care if he had a woman on his arm. No, she’d made it very clear five years ago that she didn’t care about him in the least.
Had never cared.
Once, her rejection had cut him to the bone. Now, he felt nothing. Nothing but cold determination. He’d returned to New York a far different man than he’d left it five years ago.
A rich man. A ruthless man.
A man with a single goal.
Before the month was out, he would own Sullivan’s, the luxury chain of department stores founded by her family. It was the culmination of everything he’d worked so hard for, the symbolic cherry on top of the ice-cream sundae. He did not need Sullivan’s, but he wanted it. Once, he’d been an acolyte at the feet of Frank Sullivan. And then he’d been unceremoniously tossed out, his work visa terminated, his dreams of providing a better life for his family back home in Russia shattered.
All he’d dared to do was fall in love with Caroline, but that one act had been the same as strapping on wings made of wax and flying too close to the sun. He’d fallen far and fast.
But now he was back. And there was nothing Caroline or her father could do about what he’d set in motion.
As if in answer to some hidden command, the crowd parted to reveal a woman standing on the other side of the room. She was deep in conversation. The glow from the Waterford chandelier overhead shone down in just such a way that it appeared to single her out, wreathing her golden-blond head and milky skin in a nimbus of pale light.
Roman’s gut clenched. She was still beautiful, still ethereal. And she still affected him, which only served to anger him further. He had not expected it, this jolt of remembered lust and bittersweet joy. He stood there and willed the feeling away until he could look at her coldly, critically.
Yes, much better. That was what he wanted to feel—disgust. Hatred.
His jaw tightened. She chose that moment to look up, almost as if she’d sensed something was wrong, as if there was a disturbance in her well-ordered circle of friends. There was a crease in the smooth skin over her hazel eyes, as if she was annoyed at being interrupted.
But then she saw him. Her eyes widened, her pink lips dropping open. She put a hand to her chest, then thought better of it and dropped it to her side—but not before he saw how he affected her. For a long moment, neither of them looked away. She broke the contact first, saying something to the person she’d been talking to, before she turned and fled through a door behind her.
Roman stiffened. He should feel triumphant, yet he strangely felt as if she’d rejected him again. As if his world were about to come crashing down just as it had five years ago. But that was not possible, not any longer. He had the upper hand now. He was the victor, the conqueror.
And yet bitterness coiled inside him, twisting and writhing on the floor of his soul, reminding him of how far he’d fallen, and how hard. Reminding him of how much that fall had cost him before he’d been able to pull himself up again.
“Darling,” the woman at his side said, drawing his attention from the door through which Caroline had disappeared, “can you fetch me a drink?”
Roman gazed down at her. She was pretty, spoiled, an actress with a face and body that usually drove men wild. She was used to commanding attention, to having her whims obeyed without question.
But what she saw in his face must have given her pause. She took a step back, her fingers sliding over the sleek fabric of his bespoke tuxedo. She was already calculating, already trying to recover from her mistake.
Too late.
“I do not fetch,” he told her coolly. And then he reached into his breast pocket and pulled out his wallet. He took out five crisp one-hundred-dollar