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the room.
    â€œGracie, please show Danielle to her bedroom.” Cole lifted the mink off the back of the chair and brought it to Danielle, holding it open for her. She sighed in relief, not quite ready to brazenly walk through the mansion half-naked, and turned around, slipping her arms into the sleeves.
    â€œYou know,” Cole said quietly behind her, “had you applied earlier, you would have been automatically denied based on the age requirement that slaves be at least twenty-five years old. Happy birthday, by the way.” He wrapped his hands around the upper part of her mink-covered arms. “I still have my doubts, but I’m willing to give you some time to prove to me your sincerity. If I decide you’re not being honest with me, I’ll send you back home.” He gently turned her to face him. “I don’t care who your father was.”
    She gasped, his words causing her muscles to tense and her heart to race. “You know who I am.” Why hadn’t he mentioned it earlier?
    His expression grew somber. “Of course. I wouldn’t have permitted you here based on your ridiculous application. Consider this a favor.” He took her hand in his and kissed the inside of her wrist, eliciting an involuntary shiver. “And, Danielle, you should know . . . I always collect on my favors.”

Chapter Four
    C OLE REMEMBERS ME .
    Danielle nervously toyed with her locket as she followed a very perky Gracie through the mansion. The woman chattered incessantly and pointed out each room with great detail. So far, she’d learned Cole’s grandfather had built the family home after returning from World War Two and that Cole had turned it into a sex club when his parents had moved out fifteen years ago.
    She tried to keep up, but her mind kept wandering back to the feel of Cole’s arms around her and the way his eyes seemed to see straight into her soul.
    He not only knew who she was, he’d approved her application because of it. What motivated his decision? Guilt because he’d knowingly allowed her father to go to prison for crimes he hadn’t committed?
    For too long, she’d carried around the guilt of causing her mother’s death during childbirth. Saving Tasha, the only mother she’d ever known, would hopefully alleviate some of the guilt, but she also couldn’t ignore the presented opportunity to learn the truth about her father’s alleged crimes and clear his name. She owed it to him after the way she’d left things on her last prison visit. Eight years later, the cruelty of her final words still haunted her.
    And yet she’d forgotten everything once that electric buzz filled her body just as it did the first time she’d set eyes on Cole DeMarco. She’d been seventeen when she’d spied him from the stairs of her home. He and her father had finished their meeting and were saying their good-byes.
    He’d looked like a hero out of one of her historical romances about pirates, with a goatee and long black hair he wore in braids. He hadn’t worn a business suit like the other men her father did business with, but instead wore jeans and a Detroit Tigers T-shirt. He’d been far younger too. Closer to her age than her father’s forty-five years.
    She’d willed him to turn his head. To see her. Just as she’d given up and had been about to go back upstairs, he’d looked directly at her. Their gazes locked for only a moment, but it had been enough to send her pulse skyrocketing and for an ache to settle between her legs.
    Then he’d gone, leaving her wondering if she’d imagined it.
    But in her fantasy, he’d crossed the foyer of the home and climbed the staircase to her. He’d taken her hand. Her dream fast-forwarded to the moment when he’d taken her virginity and vowed to love her for the rest of their lives.
    Although he’d only visited the house a couple more times, she had