Dark Alpha (ALPHA 2) Read Free

those vibrant red corkscrew curls and chocolate brown eyes, a smooth and creamy complexion, and pouting lips just perfect for… Well, she possessed the sort of wild, untamed beauty it was impossible for him to miss.
    Admittedly, she wasn’t Lucien’s usual type, but if he was honest, he had grown tired of his ‘usual’ type and was looking for a new diversion.
    Unfortunately, not quite the diversion he had gotten from listening to the conversation between the redhead and her friend.
    The woman’s eyes were now wide with shock as she gaped across the room at him, quickly followed by a blush of consternation, as she obviously guessed who he was, and just as quickly recalled that earlier conversation with her friend in the coffee shop.
    A conversation she must know Lucien had overheard.
    Lucien had little sympathy with the girl’s discomfort now. Hearing himself described as a smelly recluse who spent his days watching porn had not been amongst his top ten most pleasant experiences. Although Dair had certainly found the conversation amusing.
    It was true that Lucien preferred not to give interviews, or have his photograph taken. He also lived in a penthouse apartment of a building owned by him, and when he traveled it was always in his own private jet, or limousines with tinted windows. But he had his own reasons for guarding his privacy so obsessively. Reasons that involved his security since moving back to London four years ago, and nothing at all to do with being a smelly recluse who watched porn all day.
    The tiny redhead and her tall friend had taken their seats now, way at the back of the auditorium, the blonde still chattering non-stop, the redhead’s gaze still riveted on him. And, unless he was mistaken, touched with more than a little apprehension.
    Of him?
    Or more likely what, if anything, he might say to Adam Grant about her?
    Lucien may be more than a little irritated at the things he had overheard earlier, and guard his privacy to the point of obsession, but even so he had never asked anyone else to fight his personal battles for him. Why should he, when he was perfectly capable of fighting them himself?
    And where the wild-haired redhead was concerned, a little revenge might even be sweet...

    Oh god, oh god, oh god.
    The same wild litany kept going desperately around inside Nicky’s head as she stared down at the podium at the man she was now sure had to be Lucien Wynter.
    Had he overheard her and Chrissie’s conversation in the coffee shop earlier?
    Those awful things Chrissie had said about Lucien Wynter? That stupid conversation about Nicky finding herself a rich old man to pay off her debts?
    How could he not have heard, when Chrissie had made no attempt to lower her voice?
    “Wow, I take back all that I said earlier—even I can appreciate that is one fine man,” Chrissie murmured softly. “Why do you suppose a man who looks like that would want to hide himself away?”
    Nicky knew absolutely nothing about Lucien Wynter’s private life. No one did. Even the financial pages of the newspapers only ever reported on his business acquisitions, never his personal life.
    Now that she had seen him for herself, Nicky couldn’t help wondering why that was.
    The man was more handsome than any movie star she had ever seen, utterly charismatic, and those rapier sharp eyes were beautiful, so why had the newspapers and media, who felt absolutely no shame in hounding other less photogenic personalities, decided to leave him alone?
    Unless he happened to own those media outlets, of course? Which, considering his wealth, was a distinct possibility, Nicky recognized ruefully.
    There was no doubting he was ‘one fine man’, as Chrissie had commented, but anyone looking into the depths of his hard and challenging eyes couldn’t help but also see the coldness, the icy ruthlessness, that bordered almost on cruelty.
    As Nicky was now doing...?
    The only way she could possibly be seeing into the depths of those