by Jennie Lucas
“Daisy, don’t,” Leo said sharply behind her. “You don’t know what it is.”
But she was already reaching for the bag. It weighed almost nothing. Setting the burlap bag gently on the asphalt, she undid the tie and opened it.
It was a tiny puppy, a fuzzy golden-colored mutt, maybe two months old, wiggling and crying. She stroked it tenderly. “It’s a dog!” Sudden rage filled Daisy. “Who would leave a puppy in a dumpster?”
“People can be monsters,” Leo said flatly. She looked back at him, bemused. Then the puppy whined, weakly licking her hand, taking all her attention.
“She seems all right,” Daisy said anxiously, petting the animal. “But I’d better take her to the vet to make sure.” She looked up at Leo. “Do you want to come?”
He looked grim. “To the vet? No.”
“I’m so sorry. Could we maybe get together later? You could show me your apartment tonight?”
“Tonight?” His jaw set. “I’m having a party.”
She brightened. “How fun! I’d love to meet your friends.”
“Fine,” he said shortly. “I’ll send a car to pick you up at seven.”
“I told you, a car’s not necessary—”
“Wear a cocktail dress,” he cut her off.
“All right.” Daisy tried to remember if she even owned a cocktail dress. Carrying the puppy carefully in her arms, she reached up on her tiptoes and kissed Leo’s scratchy cheek. “Thanks for understanding. I’ll see you at your party.”
“Daisy—”
“What?”
She waited, but he didn’t continue. He finally said in a strangled voice, “See you tonight.”
And he turned away. She watched him stride down the street, his hands pushed in his pockets. Why was he acting so weird? Was he really so embarrassed of where he lived? Embarrassed of his friends?
She looked down at the puppy in her arms, who whined weakly. Turning on her heel, she hurried down the street, going to the veterinary office owned by one of her father’s old friends.
“Dr. Lopez, please,” she panted, “it’s an emergency...”
The kindly veterinarian took one look at the tiny animal in Daisy’s arms and waved her inside his office. After an exam, she was relieved to hear the mixed breed puppy was slightly dehydrated, but otherwise fine.
“Someone must have just wanted to get rid of her. She must have been dumped sometime during the night,” Dr. Lopez said. “It’s lucky the weather isn’t colder, or else...”
Daisy shivered. It was heartbreaking to think that while she’d been snuggled warm in bed in Leo’s arms, some awful person had been dumping an innocent puppy in the alley, leaving her to die in a burlap bag.
People can be monsters. Leo was right. All Daisy had to do was remember those awful lawyers who’d vindictively harassed her innocent father into prison on those trumped-up forgery charges. Her tenderhearted, artistic-minded father had collapsed in prison, surrounded by strangers. He’d had a stroke and died—
“What are you going to name her?” the vet asked, mercifully pulling her from her thoughts. Daisy blinked.
“Me?”
“Sure, she’s your dog now, isn’t she?”
Daisy looked down at the puppy on the examining table. She couldn’t possibly own a pet. She didn’t even rent her own apartment. Franck Bain was due to return from Europe soon, and she’d need to find a new place to live. With her meager income, it was unlikely she’d be able to afford an apartment that allowed a pet. Just thinking of the cost in dog food alone—
No. Daisy couldn’t keep her.
But someone had left this puppy to starve. A sweet floppy mutt who just needed a loving home. Could Daisy really abandon her?
Uncertainly, she reached out and softly stroked the dog’s head. The animal’s big dark eyes looked up at her, and she licked Daisy’s hand with a tiny rough tongue.
No. She couldn’t.
“You’re right. I’m keeping her.” She pushed away the worry of expensive vet bills and dog food. “I’ll think about a name.”
Dr. Lopez tried to wave off her offer of payment, but she insisted on paying. She couldn’t live off the charity of her father’s friends forever. It was bad enough she’d lived in Franck’s apartment for so long, even if he insisted she was the one doing him a favor by house-sitting.
She wondered if the gray-haired artist would still think so, after he discovered she’d brought a puppy home.
Leaving the vet’s, she went to the nearest bodega and bought puppy food and other pet supplies. Passing another aisle in the store, she hesitated, then furtively added a pregnancy test into her basket, too. Just so she could prove her fears were ridiculous.
After Daisy got the puppy back home and fed, she stroked her fur. “How could anyone have thrown you away?” she whispered. “You’re perfect.” Finally, gathering her courage, she left the tiny dog to drowse on the fluffy rug in front of the gas fire and went into the elegant modern bathroom to take the pregnancy test. Just get it over with, she told herself. Once she took the test, she would be able to relax.
Instead, she found out to her shock her fears were right.
She was pregnant.
Pregnant by a man she loved, though she barely knew him.
Pregnant by a man who would never marry her.
Daisy didn’t have any money. She didn’t have a permanent home. She didn’t have a family. Soon, she’d be raising both a puppy and a baby, utterly alone.
She couldn’t do it alone. She couldn’t.
Could she?
She had to tell Leo at the party tonight. The idea terrified her. What would he do when he found out she was pregnant? What would he say? Fear gripped Daisy as she looked at herself in the bathroom mirror.
What had she done by following her heart?
* * *
Leonidas Niarxos was in a foul mood as he arrived at his skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, the headquarters of his international luxury conglomerate, Liontari Inc.
“Good morning, Mr. Niarxos.”
“Good morning, sir.”
Various employees greeted him as he stalked through the enormous lobby. Then they took one look at his wrathful face and promptly fled. Even his longtime chauffeur, Jenkins, who’d picked him up in Brooklyn—around the corner from Daisy’s building, so she wouldn’t see the incriminating Rolls-Royce—had known better than to speak as he’d driven his boss back across the Manhattan Bridge. Leonidas was simmering, brooking for a fight. But he had only himself to blame.
He hadn’t been able to tell Daisy his real name.
She’d looked at him with her mesmerizing green eyes, her sensual body barely covered by a sheet, and she’d hinted that seeing where Leonidas lived might make a difference—might give them a future.
At least, that was what he’d wanted to hear. So he’d given in to the temptation to postpone his confession. He’d convinced himself that pleading his case in the private luxury of his mansion, later, after he’d made love to her one last time, might lead to a different outcome.
Now he was paying for that choice. Leonidas Niarxos, billionaire playboy CEO, had just been upstaged by a dog. And he would be forced to confess his true identity in the middle of a political fundraiser, surrounded by the ruthless, powerful people he called friends. Besides, did he honestly think, no matter where or when he told Daisy the truth, she’d ever forgive what he’d done?
Standing alone in his private elevator, Leonidas gritted his teeth, and pushed the button for the top floor.
Daisy was different from any woman he’d ever met. She loved everyone and hid nothing. Her emotions shone on her face, on her body. Joy and tenderness. Desire and need. Her warmth and goodness, her kindness and innocent sensuality, had made him feel alive as he’d never felt before. She’d even been a virgin when he’d first made love to h
er. How was it possible?
Leonidas never should have sought her out a month ago. But then, he’d never imagined they would fall into an affair. Especially since he’d sent her father to prison.
A year ago, Leonidas had heard a small-time Brooklyn art dealer had somehow procured Love with Birds, the Picasso he’d desperately sought for two decades. His lawyer, Edgar Ross, had arranged for Leonidas to see it in his office.
But he’d known at first sight it was fake. He’d felt heartsick at yet another wild-goose chase, trying to recover the shattered loss of his childhood. He’d told his lawyer to press charges, then used his influence with the New York prosecutor to punish the hapless art dealer to the fullest extent of the law.
He’d found out later that the Brooklyn art dealer had been selling minor forgeries for years. His mistake had been trying to move up to the big leagues with a Picasso—and trying to sell it to Leonidas Niarxos.
The old man’s trial had become a New York sensation. Leonidas never attended the trial, but everyone had known he was behind it.
It was only later that Leonidas had regrets, especially after his lawyer had told him about the man’s daughter, who’d loyally sat behind her elderly father in court, day after day, with huge eyes. He’d seen the daughter’s stricken face in a poignant drawing of the courtroom, as she’d tearfully thrown her arms around her father when the verdict had come down and he’d been sentenced to six years. She’d clearly believed in Patrick Cassidy’s innocence to the end.
A few months ago, on hearing the man had died suddenly in prison, Leonidas hadn’t been able to shake a strange, restless guilt. As angry as he’d been at the man’s deceit, even he didn’t think death was the correct punishment for the crime of art forgery.
So last month, Leonidas had gone to the Brooklyn diner where Daisy Cassidy worked as a waitress, to confirm for himself the girl was all right, and anonymously leave her a ten-thousand-dollar tip.
Instead, as the pretty young brunette had served him coffee, eggs and bacon, they got to talking about art and movies and literature, and he was amazed at how fascinating she was, how funny, warm and kind. And so damn beautiful. Leonidas had lingered, finally asking her if she wanted to meet after her shift ended.
He’d lied to her.
No. He hadn’t lied, not exactly. The name he’d given her was a nickname his nanny had given him in childhood, Leo, along with his patronymic, Gianakos.
Leo, Daisy called him, her voice so musical and light, and hearing that name on her sweet lips, he always felt like a different person. A better man.
No woman had ever affected him like this before. Why now? Why her?
He’d never intended to seduce her. But Daisy’s warmth and innocent sensuality had been like fire to someone frozen in ice. For the first time in his life, Leonidas had been powerless to resist his desire.
But after tonight, when he told her the truth at his cocktail party—hell, from the moment she saw his house, when she obviously believed he lived in some grim studio apartment—he’d have no choice but to do without her.
Just thinking about it, Leonidas barely restrained himself all afternoon from biting the heads off his vice presidents and other employees when they dared ask him a question. But there was no point in blaming anyone else. It was his own fault.
Sitting in his private office, with its floor-to-ceiling windows with all of Manhattan at his feet, Leonidas gazed sightlessly over the city.
Was there any chance he could keep her?
Daisy Cassidy was in love with him. He’d seen her love in her beautiful face, shining in those pale green eyes, though she’d made some hopeless attempts to hide it. And she believed him to be some salesclerk in a Manhattan boutique. She loved him. Not for his billions. Not for his power. For himself.
If she could love some poverty-stricken salesclerk, couldn’t she love Leonidas, too, flaws and all?
Maybe if he revealed why he’d been so angry about the Picasso, and the horrible secret of his childhood...
He shuddered. No. He could never tell anyone that. Or about his true parentage.
So how else could he convince her to stay?
Leonidas barely paid attention to a long, contentious board meeting, or the presentations of his brand presidents, discussing sales trends in luxury watches and jewelry in Asia and champagne and spirits in North America. Instead, he kept fantasizing about how, instead of losing Daisy with his confession tonight, he could manage to win her.
She would arrive at his cocktail party, he thought, and hopefully be dazzled by his famous guests, along with his fifty-million-dollar mansion. He would wait for just the right moment, then pull her away privately and explain. There would be awkwardness when she realized he’d been the one who’d arranged for his lawyer to press charges against her father. But Leonidas would make her understand. He’d seduce her with his words. With his touch. And with the lifestyle he could offer.
Daisy was living in the borrowed apartment of some middle-aged artist, an old friend of her father’s. But if she came to live with Leonidas, as the cosseted girlfriend of a billionaire, she’d never have to worry about money again. He’d give her a life of luxury. She could quit her job at the diner and spend her days shopping or taking her friends to lunch, and her nights being worshipped by Leonidas in bed. They could travel around the world together, to London and Paris, Sydney, Rio and Tokyo, to his beach house in the Maldives, his ski chalet in Switzerland. He’d take her dancing, to parties, to the art shows and clubs and polo matches attended by the international jet set. He would shower her with gifts, expensive baubles beyond her imagination.
Surely all that could be enough to make her forgive and forget his part in her father’s imprisonment? Surely such a life would be worth a little bit of constructive amnesia about her father? Who had been guilty, anyway!
Daisy had to forgive him, he thought suddenly. Why wouldn’t she? Whatever Leonidas desired, he always possessed. Daisy Cassidy would be no different. He would pull out all the stops to win her. And though he’d never offer love or marriage, he knew he could make her happy. He’d treat her like the precious treasure she was, filling her days with joy, and her nights with fire.
Leonidas had never failed to seduce any woman he wanted. Tonight would be no different. He would make her forgive him. And forget her foolish loyalty to her dead father.
Tonight, Leonidas thought with determination, a sensual smile curving his lips. He would convince her tonight.
CHAPTER TWO
DAISY LOOKED UP at the five-story brownstone mansion with big eyes. There had to be some mistake.
“You’re sure?” she asked the driver, bewildered.
The uniformed chauffeur hid a smile, dipping his head as he held open the passenger door. “Yes, miss.”
Nervously, Daisy got out of the Rolls-Royce. She’d been astonished when the limo had picked her up in Brooklyn. Her neighborhood was prosperous, filled with a mix of artists and intellectuals, plumbers and stockbrokers. But a Rolls-Royce with a uniformed driver had made people stare. She’d been dismayed. The fancy French restaurant had been bad enough. How much had Leo spent renting this limo out? He shouldn’t spend money he didn’t have, just to impress her! She already thought he was perfect!
Although it was true she didn’t know everything about him...
Standing on the sidewalk, she looked back up at the five-story mansion. This tree-lined lane in the West Village of Manhattan was filled with elegant houses only billionaires could afford. She craned her head doubtfully. “Is there a basement apartment?”
The chauffeur motioned toward the front steps. “The main entrance, miss. I believe the party has already started.”
There was indeed a stream of limousines and town cars letting people out at the curb. An elderly couple went by Daisy, the wife in an elegant silk coat and matching dress, the husband in a suit.
/> She looked down at her own cocktail dress, which she’d borrowed from a friend. It was green satin, a little too tight and way too low in the bosom. Her cheap high heels, which she’d worn only once on a humiliating gallery night where she hadn’t sold a single painting, squeezed her feet painfully.
She glanced behind her, longing to flee. But the driver had already gotten back into the Rolls-Royce and was driving away, to be immediately replaced by arriving vehicles, Italian and German sports cars attended by three valets waiting at the curb.
Daisy glanced toward the subway entrance at the far end of the lane, which ended in a busier street. She could make a run for it. Her puppy, who still didn’t have a name, had been left in the care of the same friend, Estie, who’d been her pal in art school. Daisy could still go back home, cuddle the dog and eat popcorn and watch movies.
Except she couldn’t. With a deep breath, she faced the brownstone mansion. She had to talk to Leo and tell him she was pregnant. Because she needed answers to her questions.
Would he help her raise the baby?
Would he marry her?
Could he love her?
Or would she face her future all on her own?
Swallowing hard, Daisy followed the elderly couple up the steps to the open door, where they were welcomed by a butler. As he looked over Daisy’s ill-fitting cocktail dress and cheap shoes, the butler’s eyebrows rose. “Your name, miss?”
“Daisy Cassidy.” She held her breath, half expecting that, whatever the chauffeur had said, she’d been dropped at the wrong house and would be tossed out immediately.
Instead, the butler gave her a warm smile.
“We’ve been expecting you, Miss Cassidy. Welcome. Mrs. Berry,” he glanced at a plump, white-haired woman nearby, “will take you inside.”
“I’m Mr. Niarxos’s housekeeper, Miss Cassidy,” the older woman said kindly. “Will you please come this way?”
Bewildered, wondering who Mr. Niarxos was—perhaps the butler?—Daisy followed the housekeeper through a lavish foyer. She gawked at the brief vision of a gold-painted ceiling above a crystal chandelier, high overhead, and a wide stone staircase that seemed straight out of Downton Abbey. They followed a steady crowd of glamorous guests through tall double doors into a ballroom.
