CHAPTER ONE
LUCY ARMSTRONG HAD planned her own kidnapping meticulously.
Something simple, that wouldn’t cause a fuss, and that would ultimately allow her to get away from her controlling father once and for all.
It wouldn’t be easy. She was a valuable commodity to Michael Armstrong, and not for being his daughter, no, that was the very least of it. A tutor her father had hired for her had discovered she was a genius with numbers and had understood money from an early age, and had passed that discovery on to her father. He’d soon found a use for her, making sure she laundered all that ill-gotten money, and he would definitely not let her go without a fight. He guarded her assiduously and jealously, the same way he’d guarded her mother.
However, Lucy only needed an hour’s physical freedom, long enough for her to implement stage two of her three-stage plan.
Stage two being to throw herself on the mercy of her father’s enemy.
Stage three to request that he kidnap her and hide her for the short amount of time it would take to ensure that she disappeared without a trace so Michael would never find her again.
It wasn’t the best plan she could come up with—she didn’t like relying on other people—but her mother’s death could not be in vain. Lucy had made a promise to her mother before she’d died, that she wouldn’t let herself be kept a prisoner the way her mother had been. That she would get away from Michael, no matter what the cost. And of the few other scenarios she’d run, this one was most likely to keep her out of her father’s clutches for ever.
Or so she hoped. She’d allowed for all kinds of variables, and could predict most things with surety, but she couldn’t account for everything.
The main variable being him.
Vincenzo de Santi. Her father’s enemy number one.
She’d done her research. The de Santis were an old and infamous Italian crime family for whom her father had once worked—at least until the matriarch had been imprisoned and her son, Vincenzo, took over. Then his crusade against the big crime families of Europe began.
One by one Vincenzo had taken them down and turned them in, including his own mother, it was reputed. The de Santi business empire—once a hotbed of white-collar crime—had been cleaned out, all sources of corruption and illegal activity removed. Now it was the very model of a business that excelled. Legally.
Vincenzo de Santi had been ruthless in his quest to drag his family back over to the right side of the law, and with other families in his sights he’d made a lot of enemies. Including her father, who hated him and had sworn to take him down.
Which made him both the perfect target and the perfect refuge.
Lucy peered up at the old, graceful ivy-covered building opposite the bus stop she was currently sitting in.
She’d managed to get hold of de Santi’s schedule, and his visit to London to check on several of his family’s businesses was timely, not to mention useful—for her plan to work she had to talk to him directly and not be dismissed by flunkeys. Right now he was checking on one of his family’s auction houses and she’d decided this was the perfect place to throw herself on his mercy. Far less security than the big skyscraper near the river and it was in a quieter area of the city.
Still, she didn’t have a lot of time. The security detail that followed her wherever she went had no doubt already figured out that she hadn’t gone to powder her nose after all and were tearing up the cafe she’d insisted they stop at trying to find her.
And find her they would, she had no illusions about that.
Which meant she needed to get to stage two of her plan, and quickly.
Keeping her head down, Lucy hurried across the road to the de Santi auction house and pushed through the ornate double doors.
It was cool inside, her footsteps echoing on the marble floor as she walked towards the reception desk. A nearby waiting area was furnished with richly upholstered couches, but there was no one currently waiting. There were pictures on the walls, sculptures on the tables and various other precious items displayed in cases. Silence permeated the place. The kind of silence that only the astonishingly rich and important could buy.
Lucy ignored the art the way she ignored most things, keeping her attention on what was in front of her, since what was in front of her was always the most important thing, and approached the large and obviously antique reception desk.
A beautifully dressed young man sat behind it, looking intently at a paper-thin computer screen, and he glanced up as she approached, his expression pleasant and professional. ‘Can I help you, miss?’
Lucy gripped the strap of her handbag tightly, her heart beating very fast. ‘I need to speak to Mr de Santi immediately, please.’
The man’s pleasant expression didn’t change. ‘Do you have an appointment?’
This part of her plan was always going to be difficult.
All she had was her name, and even though most people didn’t know it, they surely knew of her existence. Or at least, Vincenzo de Santi would know of her existence.
‘No,’ Lucy said. ‘But he’ll want to see me. I’m Lucy Armstrong.’
That clearly meant nothing to the receptionist. His smile changed to one of polite refusal. ‘I’m sorry, Miss Armstrong, but if you don’t have an appointment I’m afraid you can’t see Mr de Santi. He’s a very busy man.’
She’d have only twenty minutes now. Twenty minutes and then they’d find her. They’d track her down and then she’d be dragged back to Cornwall. She wouldn’t be allowed back to London again, and then her mother would have died for nothing.
Ice collected inside her, small tendrils of frost working their way through her veins. She’d become adept at ignoring her emotions, at not seeing anything but the task in front of her, which was generally numbers on a screen, the financial markets she lived and breathed. And for years that had worked very well.
But with freedom so close and the loss of it approaching fast, the fear she’d been trying to suppress was battering at the box she’d locked it in, trying to get out. It had taken her years to muster the courage to put this plan into motion. It had to work. She wasn’t going to get another chance.
‘It’s Armstrong,’ Lucy said, hoping her voice was firm and not shaking. ‘Lucy Armstrong. I’m Michael Armstrong’s daughter.’
The man’s expression still didn’t change. Her father’s name meant nothing to him.
She swallowed, the chill inside her deepening. She’d expected de Santi’s gatekeepers to at least know of her father, but it was obvious that wasn’t the case.
The fear was reaching higher, cold floodwaters threatening to drown her.
Her mother lying on the floor, blood pooling on the carpet where she’d fallen as she’d grabbed Lucy’s hand.