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‘And I a for you as not aware of their value,’ Sadie countered When his eyebrows lifted and she saw the cynicism in his eyes, she added swiftly, ‘The fact that Monika cheated es does not lessen the value of my qualifications’

‘I agree But it does raise questions about your judgement Academic qualifications on their own are all very well, but the shrewdest and most successful entrepreneurs will admit that it is the instincts they have honed and come to rely on that create the alchemic effect to turn the base enius And that, surely, is true of every sphere of achievement?’

‘You are the one who offered me a job, not the other way around,’ Sadie felt bound to remind him

But instead of responding to the anger in her voice Drax changed the subject, deainst you interest me What exactly did she mean?’

His question had caught her off guard Sadie looked away fro him to see her naked expression and read in it what she would prefer to keep hidden

‘She wanted me to…to persuade her clients that certain invest than she knew them to be’

A tactful and evasive answer, Drax acknowledged But, knowing Monika as he did, it wasn’t one he had any difficulty in interpreting

‘She wanted you to use your sexual allure to sell unsafe investested It was no less than he had worked out for himself, but it inter ested hi about it Because she had felt obliged to give in to Monika’s bullying?

Drax’s good humour evaporated A woman who had sold herself sexually, even if she had been forced to do so by someone else, was not the kind of woman who could becoe that was to be both temporary and unconsummated

When Sadie didn’t say anything his ht mockery disappeared from his voice as he demanded, far more sharply, ‘It was only sexual allure she expected you to use, I trust? And not so more intimate…?’

‘There was a suggestion froht flatter some of the clients a little more than I felt was morally acceptable,’ Sadie told him reluctantly He was, after all, a friend

of Monika’s husband, even if he had made it plain that he did not like Monika herself

‘She wanted you to have sex with her clients in return for the her their business? Is that what you mean?’

‘She never said that in as h what she expected me to do’

‘And did you?’