He had come to the Schuyler Corporation after doing a business degree in London and thenamaster’sat Harvard. She had been in high school when he had so impressedher father, who had been wanting to step down from his CEO duties for some time. Ranieri had been not only driven and focused, as all those who wanted a CEO position were—he had wanted to keep the family feel of the company intact. He had believed, right from the start, that the family beginnings of Schuyler Corporation were what made it uniquely positioned to succeed in a world overrun with corporations that tended toward soullessness.
He had been speaking Bennett’s love language.
Teenage Annika had not been impressed with the interloper into her family’s affairs, but then, her father had not offered her a vote. And in the fullness of time, even Annika could grudgingly admit that under Ranieri,the Schuyler Corporation had bloomed.He had deliveredhigher profits every single year since he’d started, showed no sign of slowing down, and still maintained the core values that her father had believed in so deeply.
She knew that the financial papers swooned over him. But the papers were neck and neck with all the single women in Manhattan, if not the world, who became giddyat the very mention of his name. Annika had served as her father’s hostess for years after her mother died, and had also served as his date for all the endlessrounds of annual New York social events, where she had gotten to watch Ranieri’s effect on the average Manhattan socialite up close.
Really, she’d made a study of him.
He was beautiful, there was no denying it, but there were a lot of beautiful men in New York City. A lot of sophisticated men, too. Ranieri was different because he had that edge. There was somethingabout the way his features came together.The dark hair, cut brutally short, as if he wantedthe intense gold of his eyes to takeover rooms as he entered. As if it was deliberate. She believed it was.
Ranieri knew exactly what effect he had, and used it ruthlessly. His bold nose and stark, sensual mouth were enough to make anyone’s belly flutter. His dark brows were alwaysaboutto scowl or lift into a mocking arch. He was not given much to smiling. Or laughing, unless it was a short bark of laughter, designed to intimidate. Nor did he trouble himself to make any attempt to engage in anything that could possibly be confused for small talk.
And yet, when he felt like it, he could be charming. In his intense, urbane manner, focusing all of his considerable attention on the unwary person before him and making themflutter.
In a city filled with the glittery and the glamorous, Ranieri was a fierce and elegant blade—never polished enough to take away from the fact that he could kill. And easily.
He just never seemedcivilized,was the thing.
And todayit was even worse than usual.
It had been a rough five years. Her father’s car accident that winter had taken everyone by surprise, perhaps Annika and Ranieri most of all.At first, everyone had imagined that Bennett Schuyler would snap back quickly. Or quickly enough.He had issued his usual commands from his hospital bed and they’d followed them, never imagining that he would slip into a coma a week after his accident.
And then linger, somewhere between death and life,for years.
Annika had imaginedthat the makeshift guardianship her father had insisted upon would end with his death. That Ranieriwould have nothing more to do with her life, thank you very much. She was just glad that she had already graduated from collegeat the time of her father’s accident. She wasn’t so young that she would have been truly under Ranieri’s thumb, and so he hadn’t controlled her as much as he could have. He’d simply controlled all the money. And had taken it upon himselfto act as the unwanted director of the museum, too.
You don’t know what my father’s wishes were for the museum,she had argued, for years.
Neither do you,Ranieri had replied in his usual obdurate fashion.
Annika had been so certain that once the will was read, she would be wellshotof the man.This was not supposed to be happening.
Ranieri surveyed the room, which had fallen silent before him, as ever.
“Leave us, please,” was all he said.
He didn’t have to be loud. He rarely was. He simply spoke,his voice deep and rich with hints of Italy and England alike, making him sound even more intense.
The entire legal team had left the roombefore Annika could even process the command.And then it was just the two of them.
Ranieri gazed at her then,and the look on his face was at least familiar. It was that rather frozen lookhe always aimed her way, as if he couldn’t quite believe that the creature he saw before him was truly the daughter of Bennett Schuyler, renowned the world over for his business acumen and social grace.Ranieri struggled with Annika’s lack of either.
She knew this because he told her so, and she could see he planned to beat that dead horse a little more today, too.Terrific.
“You look a mess,” he told her darkly, and he was correct, of course. But why did he have tosay it?“This is how you choose to honor your father?”
“My father actually did love me.” Sheoften tried to sound as ferocious as he did, but she could never pull it off. She was alwaystoochirpy. That was what he had called it once. Herincessant chirping. “He never held me up to unrealistic standards.”
“Are the standards unrealistic?” His voice cut straight through her, as ever. Ranieri was worse than a cold winter wind howling down one of the New York streets. “I passed any number of women on my way into this conference room, all of whom were apparently capable of brushing their hair.”
Annika glanced at her reflection in the tableagainandcould manage little more than a rueful laugh. “I did brush my hair. Thank you for askingafter my morning routine. It’s just that I didn’t brush itagainafter walking all the way here. I would have. I meant to. It’s only that I had some shoe issues, and that made me late, and I thought you mighthave an aneurysm if I was seriously tardy. So really, if you want to blame someone, blame yourself.”
He did that thing with his jaw that somehow made her think only of great stones, like monoliths set in lonely fields.“And yetyou were, in fact, tardy.”
Annika waved her hand. “Five minutes doesn’t count.”
“Try ten.”