Loe raamatut: «The Greek Tycoon's Convenient Wife»
‘You’ve bought a bank?’ she repeated in disbelief.
‘Yes, Alice. I own it. You want to know why I didn’t tell you that either? Habit, I guess—it’s become second nature to me to play down my wealth. It tends to attract the wrong kind of women.’
Didn’t he realise that she’d loved him when he’d had nothing—did that count for nothing?
‘You didn’t trust me enough to tell me something like that?’ she questioned slowly. ‘Like I really would have cared about your money?’
‘It was a misjudgement,’ he said heavily.
‘Too right it was, Kyros. One misjudgement too many.’
‘But now that this is all out in the open,’ he said slowly, ‘surely you can see the benefits of our marriage?’
‘You mean our bizarre mockery of a marriage?’
He shook his dark head impatiently. ‘Think about it, Alice. I need a woman in my life,’ he said deliberately. ‘And you fulfil my needs more than anyone else.’ His voice softened. ‘You always did. You get to enjoy all the things that my wealth can provide for you,’ he said. ‘Every day can be like it was yesterday. I have a boat we can sail—a plane we can fly. We can island-hop on one of my helicopters.’ His lips curved into a smile. ‘There will be no more scrimping and saving and making do—you shall have whatever you want, Alice.’
Except the thing which most eluded her—his love.
THE GREEK TYCOON’S CONVENIENT WIFE
BY
SHARON KENDRICK
MILLS & BOON
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To all my lovely Wirdnam cousins,
especially Barbie, Christine and Jane.
CHAPTER ONE
SHE heard a car door slam, the crunch of gravel on the drive, and Alice tensed as the doorbell rang, sounding unnaturally loud as it echoed through the large house.
He was here.
Drawing a deep breath, she applied one final brush-stroke of Racy Red lipstick and then stepped back to survey her handiwork as a very different Alice stared back at her from the mirror.
Had fate stepped in to provide her with the kind of armour she suspected she might need to cope with seeing Kyros again? Normally, she would never have been wearing black satin—a dress so exquisitely fitted that it looked as if she had been poured into it. Nor silk stockings and a pair of killer heels, with their distinctive scarlet soles. The waterfall of glittering stones which dangled from her ears and lay clustered at her throat were not real, but at least they served a pur-pose—for surely their dazzle would distract her ex-lover from looking too closely into her eyes and seeing her troubled thoughts.
She wanted him to look at her and think: Alice looks wonderful, and she wanted him to look at her and think: What a fool I was to let her go. Wasn’t that what every woman would want in the same situation? That a man who had walked away from their love affair so carelessly because she wasn’t Greek should feel a pang of regret?
The doorbell rang again.
‘I’ve only just got out of the bath!’ yelled Kirsty from along the corridor, and Alice drew another breath. Please give me strength, she prayed as she went to answer it.
‘All right!’ she called. ‘I’m coming!’
Her progress downstairs in the too-high heels was slow but her heart was beating like a piston as she pulled open the front door and dazzling summer light flooded in to create an unmistakable silhouette of the man who was standing there. Alice’s mouth dried. Her thoughts had been spinning round and round ever since his phone call. She had tried to imagine what he might look like now—but nothing could have prepared her for the heart-stopping reality of seeing Kyros Pavlidis for the first time in ten years.
He stood in the doorway, almost filling it with his powerful frame. Black jeans and a black T-shirt moulded his hard body—the lean torso and the long, muscular legs.
Against the light she couldn’t see his expression—not at first—only the glitter in his jet-dark eyes. But as she became accustomed to the brightness every feature was revealed to her. The high slash of cheekbones, the aquiline nose—and the slightly forbidding mouth which so rarely softened. His face was as hard and as formidable as she remembered—but he was still devastatingly handsome.
She gripped the heavy oak of the door, afraid that she might crumple. Or show him that she still thought he was the most amazing man she had ever set eyes on. But hot on the heels of confusion came pride. Because this was the man who had hurt her. She had gone to him an innocent and been left a cynic who’d stopped believing in love. So remember that.
‘Hello, Kyros,’ she said calmly.
For a moment Kyros did not respond as fury, disbelief and pure sexual hunger flooded through his veins in quick succession. His assessment of her had been rapid. No wedding ring. No man hovering curiously in the background, monitoring the mystery caller. And the clothes of a whore!
His lips curved in a mixture of distaste and appreciation as he ran his eyes over a black satin dress that showed far too much of those long legs which used to wrap themselves so spectacularly around his neck. It clung to the swell of her breasts and shimmered down over that perfect derriere. How could she contemplate going out wearing something which would make every man with a pulse think what he was thinking right now? How much he wanted her.
‘Kalespera, Alice,’ he said softly as desire began to coil itself deep within him. ‘Did you forget to put your dress on—or are you simply moonlighting as a hooker?’
Despite the outrageous remark, it was the voice that was almost her undoing. She had heard it on the phone, but being coupled with the sight of him in the powerful and glowing flesh simply magnified its impact and Alice only just stopped her knees from buckling. That accent, she thought weakly. That sexy, incomparable Greek accent that took her straight back to a time which was strictly off limits.
‘I told you I was going to a party,’ she said, realising that already he was making her defend her behaviour!
‘In a pair of shoes that should never be worn outside the bedroom,’ he observed, his gaze flicking over the high, patent heels.
Alice gripped the door even tighter. ‘Listen, Kyros—trading insults with someone you haven’t seen for ten years isn’t really the traditional method of greeting in England—or had you forgotten such basic things as manners?’
But Kyros barely heard her—he just continued staring at her intently, as if his vision would suddenly clear and the woman he had been expecting would reappear. The Alice he had known had been pure and innocent, her hair hanging in a flaxen curtain to her waist—not piled up on top of her head in some sophisticated creation of loops and curls that made her look as if she should be working in a casino. She would be clad in a pretty cotton frock or some swirly little skirt and T-shirt. She’d certainly never have worn a dress so obviously sexy or revealing. He would never have allowed her to.
But his eyes gleamed as he was caught in the emerald crossfire of her eyes. ‘Okay, Alice—if it’s convention you want, then convention you shall have.’ He let his gaze drift over her, drinking in that glorious creamy flesh of hers. ‘Long time no see,’ he murmured sardonically. ‘Isn’t that what we should say after so many years?’
Alice felt shaken. His smooth fluency had always been such a foil to his very Greek buccaneering beauty—but that blatant undressing with his eyes had made her feel positively weak, and she wasn’t going to do weak. ‘I wasn’t sure you’d turn up,’ she said.
‘But I told you I’d be passing.’
‘Yes. Yes, I know you did.’ He would pop in, he had said, as if she was nothing but a careless afterthought—which she supposed she was. Had he deliberately highlighted the fact that he wasn’t putting himself out to come and see her? In case she got the wrong idea. He hadn’t even told her he’d be coming alone. She peered over his shoulder, as if expecting to see some exotic Grecian beauty following obediently behind him, but to her utter relief there was no one there.
It wasn’t exactly the warmest welcome he had ever received and Kyros raised his dark brows. In theory, he had known that she wouldn’t be standing there with open arms—but he was still macho enough to be surprised at her coolness. Was she perhaps worried about her parents and their reaction to seeing him? ‘Your mother and father are around?’
‘No. Dad took early retirement from the business and they’re having a new lease of life—they’re on holiday in the Maldives!’ Now why had she told him that?
Kyros’s eyes narrowed. It surprised him to think of a man as vital as her father being retired. ‘And you live here now?’ he questioned. ‘With your parents?’
Perhaps she was being hypersensitive—but now he was making her sound like some sad old spinster who had run home to her parents when her romantic dreams hadn’t quite worked out. Alice laughed. ‘No, of course I don’t live here. I have an apartment in London. I’ve come back for this party.’
‘And you’re still planning on going to it?’
Her lips fell open into a disbelieving ‘O.’ ‘You thought perhaps I’d cancel it once I knew you were coming?’
He gave a slow smile. ‘Why not?’
She wanted to be outraged at his arrogance but how could she be when a tiny part of her had been tempted to do just that? Hadn’t she felt an overwhelming urge to ask Kirsty to get ready at her own house—so that she’d be able to spend a little time alone with the black-eyed Greek she’d never really forgotten?
She’d told herself that it was normal to want to catch up on the lost years. That maybe it would help give her proper closure on their affair once and for all. But all that would have been a lie. There was only one reason why she wanted to spend time with Kyros—and it had nothing to do with talking and everything to do with his dark, sexual allure. ‘Sorry to disappoint you,’ she swallowed.
There was a pause. ‘Ah, but you never did disappoint me, Alice,’ he said softly. ‘Not then, and certainly not now—despite the showgirl appearance.’
He let his eyes drift over her and suddenly Alice wondered why the hell she hadn’t thrown on a silk kimono over the dress. It had been a rebellious gesture to answer the door like this—one intended to demonstrate that she might be almost thirty and unmarried but her figure was as slim and her legs as toned as they had been at university. Yet all it was managing to do was to make her feel vulnerable…naked beneath that candid appraisal which had followed on so quickly from his obvious initial disapproval.
But she couldn’t turn him away, not now. Not only would it make her look foolish, it would hint to Kyros that he still exerted some kind of power over her—and he didn’t, did he? Not anymore. And besides, Alice was curious. You didn’t spend years wondering and aching to know what had happened to the one man you’d ever loved, only to shut the door in his face.
So wasn’t this her opportunity to change the tape? To wipe the bad memories clean and replace them with new ones? To realise that Kyros was just a man and not a god, and that she had moved on. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if she could do all that?
She stepped back. ‘You’d better come in,’ she said.
‘At last,’ he murmured sardonically, and as he stepped into the house it felt like a kind of victory—as he looked around the large hallway which itself was as big as a room.
It was a cosy, English family home—with its books and cushions, its walls studded with paintings and photos and its scruffy, overstuffed sofa. He remembered the first time he had come here and how alien it had seemed—for he recalled envying such an environment, while feeling stifled by it at the same time.
He remembered the home-made cake which her mother had produced. The cups of faintly scented tea in cups so delicate that they were almost transparent. And the dog which had sat at his feet—its liquid brown eyes huge as it silently begged for food.
‘But you mustn’t give him any,’ Alice had giggled. ‘He’s a greedy pig!’
He had fed the dog, of course—as he suspected he had been supposed to all along, for everyone had laughed. Was that some kind of silent test he had passed? he wondered. Some crude initiation test to see whether the dark and macho Greek would be accepted into a family home which was light years away from the dysfunction of his own? For Alice had looked deep into his eyes and smiled and in that moment he had felt…
What?
Danger?
Oh, yes. Along with the certainty that he was getting in too deep—and the even greater certainty that he was much too young to settle down, and when he did it would never be with someone like Alice.
He stared at her now. Beneath the too-heavy makeup she still had the most beautiful pair of eyes he had ever seen on a woman—green and deep as a forest glade. He remembered the flow of her hair like a bright cascade—a waterfall of moonlight over her bare back. He felt the call of forgotten poetry and the hard stir to his groin and he sank down onto one of the battered sofas before it became a talking point.
‘So…what exactly are you doing in England?’ questioned Alice, quickly walking across to the other side of the room and away from his dangerous proximity.
He stretched his long legs out in front of him and watched with a curl of wry amusement as Alice perched herself self-consciously on a piece of furniture as far away from him as it was possible to be. That flash of bare thigh above her stocking top was quite something. ‘I’ve been to a wedding,’ he drawled.
It was the last thing she had expected him to say. Alice’s fingernails gripped the sofa. Kyros and weddings went as well together as water and electricity. And didn’t the very word sound uncomfortably intimate, especially to her, who had once—mistakenly as it turned out—rather hoped to marry him? What an idiot she had been. She stared at him. ‘Anyone I know?’
‘My twin brother Xandros.’
‘Xandros?’
‘You sound surprised.’
Alice shook her head in disbelief. ‘Surprise doesn’t come close to it. I thought your brother was a commitment-phobe—legendary for the number of lovers he had.’
‘So he was,’ he agreed, with a careless shrug. ‘But it seems that even the world’s most restless lovers can be tamed—for now he has met and married a woman called Rebecca—’
‘She’s not Greek?’ Alice interrupted quickly, with a sudden painful pounding of her heart.
‘No. She is English.’ Their eyes met. ‘Just like you.’
No, not like me at all, thought Alice trying not to allow the hurt to show. Kyros had done his best to convince her that their upbringings were too dissimilar for the relationship to work—and that the cultural differences would sound a death-knell to a shared future. Or maybe that had just been him alighting on the perfect excuse to finish a youthful romance that she’d had no desire to let go of. ‘I thought that you and your brother were estranged. That you didn’t speak anymore.’
Kyros raked a hand through his thick dark hair. It was true—he and Xandros had fought all their lives and eventually they had fallen out in dramatic style. His twin had left the island for America and had never returned, both brothers telling themselves it was for the best—and that was how the rift had been born. How black and white things could seem when you were eighteen years old—and then somehow life turned them grey and indistinct.
‘That was a long time ago,’ he said offhandedly. ‘Time heals—and both of us seem to have forgotten what the original row was about. So I thought, why not go to his wedding?’ It had meant a lot to Xandros, or so he had told him just before the ceremony, when he’d clasped Kyros in a fierce hug. His wincing face hidden from view, Kyros had submitted to this unheard of and unwanted display of emotion, telling himself that his brother was clearly overwrought with wedding plans.
‘And is he…. happy?’ questioned Alice.
‘Happy?’ Kyros’s mouth hardened. How foolish and predictable women could be—with their naïve supposition that happiness was a permanent state! Something which came ready-made and indestructible with the marriage certificate. Happiness was like a bubble—perfection itself until it popped and then it was gone, leaving no trace other than a faint memory.
Yet, undeniably, he had been slightly taken aback to observe his brother in the throes of a love affair. To see his tough twin unashamed of showing the world—and a woman—how much he adored her had filled Kyros with unease. It could not last—it rarely did—and such a weakness would come back to haunt him. As well as effectively slicing off a huge piece of his considerable fortune if they divorced.
‘Oh, everyone can be happy for a while,’ he said, his black eyes hardening into shards of jet as he looked at her. ‘Whether it will last, who knows? I doubt it.’
‘What a cynic you are,’ Alice observed wryly.
‘Or realist?’
Their eyes met in a long, unspoken moment until Kyros finally broke it—because the slow flicker of desire was threatening to catch fire. Her fingers were bare, yet he wanted to make sure—because the new breed of women in Western society often seemed to decline to wear a wedding band.
‘You don’t have a husband yourself, Alice?’
She shook her head. ‘No, I don’t.’
‘A boyfriend, then?’
‘Again, no.’
He smiled. ‘No one who could match up to me, ne?’
Had he read her mind? Damn him. That no man had ever captured her heart and her body in the way that Kyros had. ‘Certainly not in the ego department,’ she said drily.
He laughed, shifting his position on the sofa very slightly. ‘Nor any other department, I imagine,’ he murmured.
‘I really haven’t given it a lot of thought,’ she said, ignoring the blatantly sexual boast and praying that the lie would not show and that nothing in her expression would alert him to the sleepless nights she’d spent aching for him after he’d gone. It had taken a lot of time and a lot of work to reach a place where the thought of Kyros didn’t bring an involuntary catch to her throat—and she wasn’t going to throw it all away now. ‘Or rather, I haven’t given you a lot of thought.’
‘Really?’ he questioned sardonically.
‘The past is a place I don’t choose to visit often, Kyros—apparently it’s best left behind,’ she continued, though inside she was wondering how she could have forgotten his arrogance. His obvious belief that his memory should burn as bright as some eternal light. ‘We had an affair when we were both young. It ended. So what?’ She shrugged. ‘It happens to everyone.’
Kyros’s eyes narrowed first with disbelief, and then irritation. Was it possible that she was speaking the truth? That she could dismiss her ‘affair’ with him as if he were just some insipid ex-boyfriend?
Well, either she meant what she said, or she was trying to make a point—to show him she no longer cared. And either way she would take those words back, Kyros thought as the hard beat of desire made him want to take her there and then.
He had come here tonight on an impetuous and half-formed wish to see what had happened to her—but her throw-away remark was like hurling a bucket of petrol over the smouldering embers of a fire which had never quite died.
He wanted her.
Still wanted her.
And tonight he would have her. He would peel that tarty-looking dress from her body and bare the breasts he knew so well and he would take them into his mouth and suckle them. He would soon discover for himself how time had changed and refined the curves of her body and her secret feminine places.
His mouth dried. He would make her keep her shoes on. He would make love to her and finally slake his desire for her. Only this time he would walk away and he would finally be free—for there would be no lingering trace of her left in his mind or his body. He would shake off every last trace of her in one long and delicious night of sex.
‘Indeed, it does happen to everyone—for nobody’s experience is unique,’ he agreed softly, his gaze settling on the scarlet gleam of her lips. Like a snake uncoiling itself, he rose from the sofa with a fluid grace and began to walk across the room towards her. ‘So tell me about this party you’re going to tonight.’
Alice’s breathing began to quicken. ‘There’s… nothing much to tell.’
He thought of what a stir she would create in that outrageous outfit. He thought of all the times she had dressed for him. And undressed for him, and suddenly a great rush of jealousy washed over him—hot poison firing his blood. ‘Whose party is it?’
She registered the sudden animosity in his body language. ‘Kyros! You can’t just waltz back into my life after ten years and start interrogating me about who I associate with!’
‘Can’t I?’ He took a step closer. ‘And that still doesn’t answer my question, Alice.’
He was close enough now for her to be able to detect his raw, masculine heat—the shimmering aura of sexuality which always seemed to radiate from his powerful frame. For the first time she noticed the tiny lines which fanned out from the sides of the black eyes. The faint hint of silver at the sides of his thick ebony hair. The deepening of lines around the strong, firm mouth. ‘But I don’t have to answer your question.’
‘Whose party is it?’ he persisted softly, but at that moment there was the clip-clopping of heels on the stairs and a woman wearing a very tight silver catsuit walked into the room.
‘I can’t breathe in this thing!’ she was saying, holding a half-drunk glass of wine and smiling until she saw him, and then she stood stock-still, her face freezing like a cartoon character.
Kyros stared at her in utter disbelief. ‘Who the hell is this?’ he said.
Alice watched as Kirsty began to blink rapidly, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing—completely ignoring the fact that his greeting had been so rude and unwelcoming. It might have been comical if it hadn’t still inexplicably had the power to hurt—the sight of her best friend staring open-mouthed at Kyros as if some kind of god had just materialised.
‘Well, hel-lo,’ said Kirsty. ‘You must be—’
‘This is Kyros. Kyros, this is Kirsty,’ said Alice quickly. ‘You remember, I told you—Kyros and I knew each other at university.’
‘Er, that’s right,’ said Kirsty, her fingers unconsciously moving up to pat at her red hair. ‘But I had no idea that—’
That he was quite so stunning? Or that he was standing there in her parents’ sitting room—legs apart and hands resting arrogantly on his narrow hips as if he owned the place—looking at the two of them as if a couple of aliens had just landed?
‘Do you always go out dressed like this?’ he demanded.
Kirsty giggled. ‘Of course not—but the theme of the party is “Divine Decadence”. Didn’t Alice tell you?’
Black eyes fixed on Alice, sending several conflicting messages sparking at her from their ebony depths. ‘No,’ he said softly. ‘She omitted to mention that fact. I think she found it slightly amusing to allow me to carry on thinking that she enjoyed dressing like a lady of the night, didn’t you, Alice?’
‘I think I did,’ Alice agreed blandly, and smiled. ‘Kyros was just passing by on his way back from a wedding,’ she told Kirsty. ‘And he’s just leaving.’
‘Oh!’ Kirsty pouted. ‘What a pity.’
Kyros’s expression was lazy and complicit as he subjected the redhead to a slow smile. ‘Indeed it is—for I am rarely in this country.’
Alice saw the question coming from a mile off, but it was too late to field it because Kirsty was already asking it.
‘Well, why don’t you come, too?’
‘He can’t. It’s a themed party, remember?’ Alice snapped. ‘And Kyros isn’t dressed for it!’
‘Oh, I don’t know—he looks divinely decadent to me,’ gurgled Kirsty.
‘You think so?’ Kyros’s lips curved into a smile. ‘Well, I should like to come along if you are sure I will not be in the way? If you are sure that your host will not object, ne?’
He was peppering his words with Greek deliberately, thought Alice furiously, knowing damned well the effect they had on women—for hadn’t they once had that same effect on her? Just as he was dazzling Kirsty with one of his rare and brilliant smiles. Either way, her friend was shaking her head as if he had just suggested the most outlandish thing on earth.
‘Object—to you?’ Kirsty gave him a conspiratorial grin. ‘I don’t imagine you ever have much trouble getting into parties, Kyros! Anyway, it’s a pretty casual do. The more the merrier—and single men are always at a premium.’
Especially men like you, her eyes seemed to say and Alice bit her lip, furious now. Kirsty was managing to make them sound like a small pack of man-eating women! The kind who were pushing thirty and were desperate to get their hands on anything with testosterone. How could she?
It was true that she had convincingly told her friend that she’d got over Kyros years ago. But she’d mainly been getting in practice for when she came face-to-face with him herself. Surely Kirsty could have guessed that she didn’t want him anywhere near her?
But at least the party was local—a few short streets away. It would be all too easy to leave unnoticed once it got going—and she could lose herself in the crowd. Why, doubtless Kyros would quickly be surrounded by women and probably wouldn’t even notice her slip away.
‘Yes, you’re very welcome to join us, Kyros,’ Alice agreed indifferently, although her fast-pounding heart told a different story entirely.
Kyros felt the flare of desire mingled with curiosity as she deliberately turned away from him and he observed the stiff set of her back, which was at such odds with the delicious curve of her bottom. Was she really as immune to him as she appeared? Would he have to work very hard to get her into bed tonight?
But the prospect of such a sexual conquest as this thrilled him and it was a long time since a challenge had filled him with quite so much excitement.
