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Genevieve Spenser adjusted her four-hundred-dollar sunglasses, snon and stepped aboard the powerboat beneath the bright Caribbean sun It was early April, and after a long, cold, inter in New York City she should have been ready for the brilliant sunshine dancing off the greeny blue waters Unfortunately she wasn’t in the , she didn’t want to be there She had a six-week sabbatical from her job as junior partner in the law fir forward to soreat deal different In two days’ time she’d be in the rain forests of Costa Rica with no h heels and no expectations to live up to She’d been so ready to shed her protective skin that this final task see it was

The Grand Cayman Islands were on her way to Central America Sort of And one extra day wouldn’t make any difference, Walter Fredericks had told her Besides, what red-blooded, single, thirty-year-old fe even a short aazine’s Sexiest Man of the Year, billionaire division? Harry Van Dorn was gorgeous, char and currently betives, and the law firm that represented the Van Dorn Foundation needed soned This was perfect for everyone Serendipity

Genevieve didn’t exactly think so, but she kept her mouth shut She’d learned diplomacy and tact in the last few years since Walt Fredericks had taken her under his wing

She pulled out her pale gray Armani suit, put on the seven-hundred-dollar Manolo Blahnik shoes she hadn’t even blinked at buying—the shoes that hurt her feet, made her tower overelse When she first brought theh to look at the price tag and burst into tears What had happened to the idealistic young wo people? The rescuer, who spent her ?

Unfortunately she knew the answer, and she didn’t want to dwell on it In her tightly controlled life she’d learned to look forward rather than back The shoes were beautiful and she told herself she deserved theht them to see Harry Van Dorn, as part of her protective armor

They didn’t ed with a ot seasick, but she always felt vaguely trapped She could see the ainst the brilliant horizon; it looked nore the sea surrounding theood at ignoring unpleasant facts—she’d learned the hard way that that hat you had to do to survive

And her job should only take a few hours She’d let Harry Van Dorn feed her, get hiht with her in her slied to have them couriered back to New York she’d be free Only a y It was far too beautiful a day to have this sense of iht Caribbean sun

Her tranquilizers were in her tiny purse Harry Van Dorn’s crew had gotten her colass of iced tea in one hand It was a sih matter to sneak one yellow pill out and take it She’d almost planned to leave them behind in New York— she didn’t expect to need tranquilizers in the rain forest, but fortunately she changed herto take a few et by on sheer determination until then

Genevieve had been on yachts before—Roper and coal concerns for myriad charitable foundations, and one from her job as public defender to private law practice, and she’d hoped specializing in charitable foundations was still close enough to honorable work to assuage the remnants of her liberal conscience She’d been quickly disillusioned—the foundations set up as tax shelters by the wealthy tended to spend ascushy jobs for their friends as they did on the actual charity, but by then it was too late, and Genevieve was committed

Harry Van Dorn’s floating palace, SS Seven Sins, was on a grander scale than she’d seen so far, and she knew for a fact it ned by the Van Dorn Trust Foundation, not Harry himself—a nice little tax write-off She stepped aboard, her three-and-a-half-inch heels balanced perfectly beneath her, and surveyed the deck, keeping her expression impassive With any luck Harry Van Dorn would be too busy on the putting green she could see up at the front of the ship to want to wasterooer Damn, she wasn’t in the mood for this

She plastered her practiced, professional smile on her Chanel-tinted lips and stepped inside the cool confines of a massive room beautifully furnished in black and white, with er She could see her reflection in at least three different directions She’d already checked her appearance before she’d left thatblond hair neatly arranged, her pale gray suit hanging perfectly on her shoulders and disguising the fifteen pounds that she knew Roper et al didn’t approve of Genevieve didn’t approve of it either, but all the dieting and exercise in the world couldn’t seee it

“Ms Spenser?” It took a lare of the sun on the water to the die room, and she couldn’t see anyone but th