Playing the Billionaire's Game

  PIPPA ROSCOE lives in Norfolk, near her family, and makes daily promises to herself that this is the day she’ll leave the computer to take a long walk in the countryside. She can’t remember a time when she wasn’t dreaming about handsome heroes and innocent heroines. Totally her mother’s fault, of course—she gave Pippa her first romance to read at the age of seven! She is inconceivably happy that she gets to share those daydreams with you. Follow her on Twitter @PippaRoscoe.

  Also by Pippa Roscoe

  Conquering His Virgin Queen

  Virgin Princess’s Marriage Debt

  Demanding His Billion-Dollar Heir

  Once Upon a Temptation collection

  Taming the Big Bad Billionaire

  The Winners’ Circle miniseries

  A Ring to Take His Revenge

  Claimed for the Greek’s Child

  Reclaimed by the Powerful Sheikh

  Rumours Behind the Greek’s Wedding

  Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk.

  Playing the Billionaire’s Game

  Pippa Roscoe

  www.millsandboon.co.uk

  ISBN: 978-1-474-09868-7

  PLAYING THE BILLIONAIRE’S GAME

  © 2020 Pippa Roscoe

  Published in Great Britain 2020

  by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

  All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

  By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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  www.millsandboon.co.uk

  Note to Readers

  This ebook contains the following accessibility features which, if supported by your device, can be accessed via your ereader/accessibility settings:

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  Text to speech

  For Sareeta Domingo, who saw how much

  I was inspired by The Thomas Crown Affair

  and encouraged me to run with it.

  And for Hannah Rossiter, who helped me

  to ensure that it was the best it could be.

  My sincerest thanks to you both.

  xx

  Contents

  Cover

  About the Author

  Booklist

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Note to Readers

  Dedication

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  EPILOGUE

  Extract

  About the Publisher

  CHAPTER ONE

  INTERVIEWER ONE: Ms Keating, you understand that this interview is being recorded for internal Bonnaire’s purposes only and that you do not need a lawyer present?

  MS KEATING: I’m afraid that hasn’t convinced me that I don’t need one.

  INTERVIEWER ONE: But you understand the statement that I have just made?

  MS KEATING: Yes.

  INTERVIEWER ONE: Then, if you would, can you please explain how you came to believe that the painting in question was a fake?

  MS KEATING: As I have already explained, the painting I assessed in Sharjarhere was most definitely not a fake.

  INTERVIEWER ONE: But you have stated that the painting, Woman in Love, up for auction after a private viewing at Bonnaire’s London gallery and damaged on the night of June the twenty-first, was a fake?

  MS KEATING: [brief pause] Yes. That specific painting was a fake.

  INTERVIEWER TWO: And you claim that this was a different painting from the one you assessed, certified and valued in Sharjarhere and attributed to the painter Etienne Durrántez, owned by Sheikh Alham Abrani?

  MS KEATING: Yes.

  INTERVIEWER TWO: Why is that?

  MS KEATING: Because I’m very good at my job.

  INTERVIEWER ONE: We’ll get to that later. For the moment, can you explain the circumstances under which you identified the damaged painting as a fake?

  SIA KEATING HAD been breathing hard even before the harsh ring of her phone broke through the nightmare that held her in its grip. She’d been fighting a losing battle with the stranglehold her sheets had around her arms and neck.

  Several days later she would wonder if that moment hadn’t been prophetic somehow. She’d woken with a feeling of dread. One that seemed to deepen the moment the words reached her from the mobile phone she pressed to her ear.

  ‘Sia, we have a problem.’

  Her heart dropped so quickly she wasn’t able to form a response for David, the head of Scientific Research. Partly because his nickname in the department was the ‘Art Detective’ and as much as she liked the bespectacled, calm-toned man, there was only one reason an art valuer got a phone call from him.

  ‘The Abrani painting. It’s been damaged.’

  Sia flung back the covers and pushed her hair out of her face, concern for the beautiful piece cutting through the fog from her nightmare. ‘How?’

  ‘There was apparently some kind of altercation at the gallery.’

  ‘Galleries don’t have altercations,’ she replied, confused. She cast a look at the clock by her bed. It was two o’clock in the morning. But he’d said the painting was only damaged? If so, then why was David calling her?

  ‘They did tonight. But the painting...there’s a problem. Could you come down and take a look at it for me? Something’s not right.’

  For the entire journey between her little studio flat in Archway and the gallery in Goodge Street, Sia’s heart pounded with fear. The kind of fear that heralded the termination of careers. David might just as well have proclaimed the apocalypse had come. Because ‘something’s not right’ could really only mean one thing. And as the tube rattled its way along the tracks one thought reverberated in time with the clicks and clacks.

 
It’s not a fake. It’s not a fake. It’s not a fake.

  It couldn’t be. The painting she had valued two months ago in Sharjarhere was not a forgery because she double-checked, triple-checked her work. Always. She had to.

  Sia bit back the mounting nausea swirling in her stomach. For most art valuers, one or maybe even two forgeries were to be expected. For as well trained as most valuers were, con artists were better, more dedicated, even harder working. They had to be, they got the bigger payout, Sia thought ruefully. Until they were caught.

  Sia’s mind veered dramatically away from the last time she had seen her father in jail. The way he had looked at her from across the table in the visiting room of Brixton Prison, a sheen glistening in his eyes, his body angled slightly to the side, Sia couldn’t help but wonder if he’d purposely arranged himself like a Vermeer. As if everything, his whole life—in hers—had been a forgery.

  It’s not a fake. It’s not a fake. It’s not a fake.

  She ran through the valuation. It had been a bit of a rush as she’d been covering for Sean Johnson, who had fallen ill at the last minute. Even now she felt slightly guilty about the joy she’d felt at having been chosen to replace him and the uncharitable belief that his sickness might have been alcohol-related.

  No matter how good she was, how accurate, precise and detailed, she’d been passed over for evaluations like this again and again. At first, she’d put it down to being the newbie. Then she’d put it down to being paranoid. And three years in and still missing out on some of the big jobs? She’d been forced to realise that her—or, more accurately, her father’s—reputation was once again taking its toll on her life.

  So she’d been determined to ensure that this valuation was perfect. She’d arrived at the palace in Sharjarhere from Athens, where she’d helped her friend Célia d’Argent and Loukis Liordis with an auction that raised an inconceivable amount for charity. Had she been riding so high on her contribution to the charity that she’d missed something at the palace? She shook her head, drawing a slight frown from a fellow tube passenger, even at such an ungodly hour in the morning.

  No, she’d gone through each stage of the valuation process: the signature, the artistic style, the paint, the canvas. She’d removed the frame, checked the backing, the details were all correct—variations in the paint levels and thickness, the blacklight showing nothing untoward.

  And her gut. The natural instinct she’d been born with telling her that she was in the presence of a true Etienne Durrántez, one of the twentieth century’s most famous artists. It didn’t matter to Sia that she knew the painting would fetch more than one hundred million pounds. It didn’t matter to her who would spend such an impossible amount of money on the painting. It was the painting itself.

  The unknown woman stared at the viewer with that same indefinable sense of inner knowledge as the Mona Lisa. The secret smile of, as appropriately titled, a Woman In Love. The swathe of long dark hair was impressive even to Sia, whose tumble of thick Titian waves were so noticeable she almost always swept them up into a bun at her neck. A slash of red across her lips was worn with pride, not arrogance, confidence, not false bravado, and it had made Sia want to have known the mysterious woman. To understand where her sense of admiration sprung from, not for the painter but the model.

  Sia had been so drawn to the painting that there was absolutely no way that it could have been a fake. The signature, the artistic style, the paint, the canvas...she thought, checking through the assessment. And the provenance.

  Her breath caught for just a second. She’d not been shown the provenance. Her manager had informed her that she needn’t ask after it because the paperwork had already been forwarded to Sean. And even as she’d begun to question the unusual chain of events she’d heard it. The sigh.

  It was one that she’d heard so many times in her three years at Bonnaire’s. She could almost picture her manager now. Overweight, red-cheeked and always slightly sweaty, the man practically defined ‘old boys club’. It was the kind of sigh that would usually precede some kind of patronising comment about her youth, gender, looks or inexperience.

  The rage that had roared in her ears had almost blocked out his disappointment in having to remind her that she had been given an opportunity here and instead of making a mountain out of a molehill she should, essentially, keep her pretty mouth shut and get on with it. Yes, he’d actually said that.

  And now, as the tube pulled into Goodge Street station, she was mentally kicking herself for toeing the line rather than following her instinct, trusting her gut. Trusting herself.

  She held her coat tight against the unseasonal bite of the night-time gust of wind as she picked her way past takeaway boxes and black bin bags towards the back entrance of Bonnaire’s, waved her security pass over the sleek black electric reader and pulled the heavy door open.

  Usually, at two-forty-two in the morning the white-walled offices would have been completely empty. But tonight at least fifteen staff were present and through the windows of the glass-lined meeting rooms she could make out at least two company directors, one of whom was shouting into a telephone, the angry words clearly audible from this distance.

  Ducking into the stairwell that would take her three floors below ground to the extensive lab that took up an entire level, her heels tapped frantically on the concrete staircase as she ran to where she knew both David and the painting would be.

  She ignored the stares of the lab assistants as she went straight to the long bench David used. She glanced to the X-ray room at the back, the red light remaining dark, showing the machine was not in use.

  David was at the computer, already going through the images from the infrared and ultraviolet tests before calling up the X-rays. The moment he caught sight of her, he ushered away a few more technicians from where they were staring at the damaged painting and beckoned her over.

  The moment she caught sight of the painting she couldn’t help the gasp that fell from her lips. Her instant reaction was shock and horror—red streaks poured down the painting, the consistency of wine, but the alcohol had begun to mix with the paint beneath it. Slashes of what had once been raven-black hair now dribbled down the palest of cheeks and the long silver necklace worn by The Woman in Love now pooled downwards towards the painting’s frame in a way that most definitely wouldn’t have happened if it had been the original painting. The real one. The one that had been valued at over one hundred million pounds.

  ‘It’s fake,’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Yes.’

  She collapsed into the chair in front of the painting. ‘This isn’t the painting I valued. David—it’s not. I wouldn’t have made that mistake. Have you checked the photographs from my file?’

  David paused before leaning against the table, facing her with a grim expression.

  ‘I...they haven’t given me access to the file.’

  ‘But that’s...’ Sia trailed off. ‘How are you supposed to evaluate against the initial assessment?’

  ‘Sia, look, I think you should know that—’

  But Sia wasn’t hearing David. She was looking at the small video capture in the bottom of David’s computer screen.

  ‘What’s that?’ she interrupted.

  David cast her one last concerned look before turning back to his screen.

  ‘Security footage from the incident. It looks as if two guys got into a bit of a fight near the painting.’

  Sia was unable to prevent her hand from pressing against her lips in shock at the sight of the fight that had broken out between the two men, causing a glass of wine to be thrown with unwavering accuracy against the painting.

  ‘Is that Savior Sabbatino?’

  ‘Yes, and his brother Santo.’

  Sia bit back her shock. The Sabbatino brothers were more likely to be seen on the cover of a scandal rag rather than security footage. The implications of the da
mage to the painting, the seller and the gallery were beginning to spin beyond the realms of imaginable.

  ‘Can you go back?’ she asked David of the footage. Something was niggling at her and she couldn’t quite tell what it was. She watched the footage again and again—the wine hitting the painting, the shock rippling out not only from the Sabbatino brothers but the attendees of the private viewing as each person turned their head, watching with horrified fascination the damage to such an expensive piece of...piece of...

  There it was again. It was precisely because he was the only person in the whole room who didn’t turn his head. Instead of being drawn to the moment like a driver passing a car accident, he had his back turned and was taking a sip of his drink with something that looked, to Sia, like the ghost of a smile.

  It was a man she would have recognised anywhere. Just like any other red-blooded woman, whether or not they had a penchant for billionaires with bad reputations.

  INTERVIEWER ONE: So you immediately suspected Sebastian Rohan de Luen?

  MS KEATING: Sheikh Alham Abrani was very clear in his instructions. The painting would never be sold to Seba—Mr Rohan de Luen. He had made many offers to purchase the painting in the last ten years, all of which had been far above the asking price, and had been refused each and every time.

  INTERVIEWER TWO: Mr Rohan de Luen is a duke, is he not?

  MS KEATING: His father was the Duque de Gaeten in Spain before being stripped of his lands. However, because this happened after Seb—after he had been titled at the age of eighteen, he was entitled to the...well, to the title, I suppose.

  INTERVIEWER ONE: But on the night you believe you discovered the painting was a fake, he had not been anywhere near it?

  MS KEATING: He was present at the private viewing.

  INTERVIEWER TWO: But the CCTV footage shows that throughout the entire evening he was nowhere near the painting. In fact he remained behind to give a witness statement to the police, who were called in case any charges were to be brought against the two gentlemen involved in an altercation that damaged the painting.