by Andie Brock
Too late Kate had realised that her mother wasn’t mentally strong enough to have taken on such a weighty responsibility. But by then the Kandy Kate name had already been dragged through the mud—no longer associated with traditional values and a wholesome image but rocked by indiscreet comments from the new boss.
Convinced she knew best, Fiona had waltzed into the office on her first day like an impending storm, immediately making ridiculous demands and crazy decisions. The board had tried to overrule her, but Fiona would have none of it, convinced that they were just being obstructive because they didn’t like her. It had got so bad that anyone who’d tried to stand up to her had been fired on the spot, with senior executives told to clear their desks there and then.
As the carnage had continued Kate had begged her mother to step down, to leave the running of the company to her—for the sake of Fiona’s mental health as well as for the business. But as it had turned out leaving Kandy Kate in her hands had been even worse. Failing to keep a check on the new finance director—appointed by Fiona after the previous one had walked out in protest—Kate had signed papers without looking at them properly and delegated power to him, completely unaware of his fraudulent intentions.
Gullibility, lack of experience, and the fact that Kate had been way out of her depth had cost the company dear. Within months the con man had syphoned off vast quantities of money, leaving Kandy Kate in a more desperate state than ever.
Nearly three years had passed since then, and Kate had wised up considerably. But despite her best efforts—despite selling off just about every asset that Kandy Kate had had left, working all the hours that God sent, begging, borrowing and pleading with banks, investors, and anyone else who might be prepared to pour some serious capital into the business—Kate had got nowhere.
The sad fact was that Kate’s eponymous business was still in a dire state. And, short of a miracle, there was nothing she could do to repair it.
The press, of course, were lapping it up. Fiona O’Connor had always been good tabloid fodder, with her expensive tastes and her erratic outbursts. But, as the face of Kandy Kate, Kate herself was the real prize. Hounded by the press all her life, she never knew when she was going to be snapped by a lone pap, hoping to make a few dollars out of her—though why anyone should be remotely interested in seeing her buying a few groceries in the local deli or snatching a coffee on her way to work she had no idea.
Events like the Executives’ Club, however, were a different matter. Which was why Kate made sure she concealed her identity with a false name, a blonde wig and more make-up than a three-year-old at a clown convention.
Getting into bed, she pulled the covers under her chin.
Maybe it was time to give up. This morning she’d discovered there had been a surge in the price of Kandy Kate’s shares, and that meant only one thing. Someone was planning a hostile takeover. Which was all she needed.
Kate had hoped she might be able to glean some information as to who might be behind the takeover from some of guests at the Executives’ Club. Obviously she’d had to make sure she didn’t reveal who she was, but successful businessmen loved to brag and champagne loosened their tongues. Unfortunately it also loosened their hands, and Kate had found them far more interested in stroking her butt or staring down her cleavage than giving her the lowdown on the latest gossip from the trading floor.
Closing her eyes, Kate willed herself to go to sleep. She was dog-tired...physically and emotionally drained. But sleep refused to come. Instead, Nikos’s powerful image filled her vision, crowding her mind, snapping her eyes open again.
The acute shock of seeing him tonight still held her body in a rigid grip. The three years since she had last seen him had vanished like vapour the second she had set eyes on him again. One glance at that handsome face and the memories of their break-up had come flooding back: the fight, the things they had said...horrible, hateful, brutal words...all recalled with vivid clarity. She felt as if time had simply distilled the pain, making it even more potent as it sank its vicious claws into her once again.
When Nikos had left her, Kate’s whole world had collapsed. Her hopes and dreams had crumbled before her eyes—built, as it turned out, on nothing more substantial than the shifting sands of blind optimism and unguarded love. She had fallen into a place so deep, so dark, that she had feared she would never see the light again.
But somehow she had clawed her way back up. Somehow she had survived.
As she stared up at the peeling paintwork of the ceiling Kate conceded that their relationship had been doomed from the start. The cracks had always been there—just ignored in the first wild rush of all-consuming passion. A time when anything had seemed possible.
She hadn’t been totally blameless. By choosing to play down her family’s wealth and lavish lifestyle she had been guilty of deceiving Nikos. It had been a selfish act, but the relief of being free from the shackles of Kandy Kate that had dominated her whole life had been so wonderful, so liberating, she had lied by omission just to try and keep it that way for as long as possible.
Just for a while she had wanted to be Kate O’Connor—a regular kind of girl from an ordinary background, who happened to have been fortunate enough to fall in love with the most wonderful guy in the world.
But the flipside had meant she’d failed to mention Nikos to her parents. Far less the fact that she had rushed headlong into an engagement with him. That she intended to marry the remarkable Greek man as soon as possible.
Because Kate had known full well the ruckus it would cause. She knew her mother would hit the roof and insist that the engagement was broken off immediately—that there was no way she was going to allow her daughter to marry some penniless Greek bum. And then her poor father would be dragged into it, torn between the two women in his life the way he always was, doing his best to keep the peace.
Kate had decided that she was going to keep the engagement a secret for as long as she could. But when news had arrived that her father had been taken seriously ill her little secret had suddenly begun to grow, to take on a life of its own.
As she’d rushed to make plans to return to New York Nikos had assumed he would be going with her. But Kate hadn’t been able to let that happen. Her parents hadn’t even known of his existence—she couldn’t arrive back home with him by her side, knowing the way her mother would react and risking damaging her father’s fragile health still further.
So she had insisted Nikos stayed behind in Crete. She could still remember the look of hurt on his face when she’d told him. Standing there in the Greek sunshine, so tall and proud, his dark brows pulling together in surprise, his features had set like stone.
It had all but broken her heart, but Kate had stood firm, slinging her rucksack over her shoulder and turning away when all she’d wanted to do was to fall into his arms and stay there for ever.
If she had come clean there and then, confessed everything, would things have turned out differently?
Kate had gone over that moment in her head a thousand times. But the fact was she hadn’t. And as Nikos’s hurt had quickly turned to a carefully controlled anger, a cold cloud of animosity had descended over them as they’d said their goodbyes.
Nikos’s dry peck on her cheek had only accentuated the widening rift between them.
Her father had died two weeks later. And in the melee of trying to organise everything—taking care of her mother, who had always suffered from fragile mental health, as well as coping with her own crippling grief—suddenly Nikos had arrived. Unannounced. Uninvited. And even though her heart had leapt at the sight of him—even though he had been the person Kate had wanted to see more than anyone else in the world, needed more than anyone else in the world—she had panicked.
Hadn’t she expressly told him not to come? His arrival was going to cause nothing but trouble. And that trouble had started almost immediately.
&nb
sp; Within minutes her guilty secret had been exposed. Dropping his bag, Nikos had looked around the luxurious apartment with a puzzled expression on his face before pulling her into a stiff hug.
With immaculate timing Fiona O’Connor had walked in at that precise moment, demanding to know who this person was. And as Nikos had stepped forward to offer his condolences, and to introduce himself as Kate’s fiancé, she had let out a little scream, her hand fluttering to her throat.
Kate had had no choice but to try and do whatever she could to mitigate the damage, to calm Fiona down. Even though that had meant pushing Nikos away.
And then, on that last evening—the evening of her father’s funeral—her whole shaky world had finally collapsed.
When she’d been at her lowest ebb Nikos had turned on her, slashing through her battered defences, inflicting the sort of crippling pain from which there was no recovery...
Turning on her side, Kate curled herself into a ball as the memory of how Nikos had looked tonight imprinted itself on her brain. Gone had been the laid-back guy she had once known, casually dressed in faded jeans slung low on his hips or board shorts frayed at the hems by the sun and the sea. Gone the mass of wind-blown dark curls. Now his hair was tamed, styled, carefully groomed like the rest of him. Now he wore a dinner suit with the easy confidence of a wealthy man, giving off an air of urbane arrogance that told the world he had made it, that life was his for the taking.
Feeling a stab of pain, she buried her head in her pillow. Not for the first time she conceded that Nikos was the one man who had the wealth and the contacts to save her precious business. But there was no way she would ask him. She might only have a shred of pride left, but she was damned if she was going to give that shred to him. No, hell would freeze over before she ever went crawling to him.
CHAPTER TWO
NIKOS GAZED UP at KK Towers, an imposing glass-fronted building in Midtown Manhattan. He had been surprised to discover that the Kandy Kate headquarters were still located here. From what he’d heard, all the offices and apartments had been leased off, even if the premises still retained the KK name.
Christened by Bernie O’Connor, it had been a glittering symbol of the power and success of the Kandy Kate empire, with its offices sprawling over several floors and the stunning penthouse apartment home to his adored family.
He had never met Bernie, but he had obviously been an astute businessman—something that Nikos respected highly. To have made such a success of the Kandy Kate business in what had to be a very competitive market took intelligence and guts.
It was a shame he hadn’t applied those same principles to his private life. From what Nikos could see, Bernie had made completely the wrong choice of wife.
Fiona O’Connor was an arrogant snob—that much had been obvious from the start. Her rudeness Nikos might have accepted. After all, when they had met Fiona had been recently bereaved...he would have made allowances. He could even have excused her blatant hostility, given the circumstances. Particularly in light of the fact that Kate had conveniently forgotten to tell her mother of his existence. But the way she had looked at him with such abject horror—as if he was worse than nothing—that had got under his skin.
And then there was Kate...
Nikos held his jaw firm as he marched through the revolving doors into a light-filled vestibule. What right did he have to criticise Bernie O’Connor about his choice of partner when he had made the same mistake—with bells on? He too had fallen for totally the wrong woman.
The ‘Kate effect’ had hit Nikos like a tornado. His golden rule of never getting emotionally involved with any woman had been smashed just like that. With a rush of wild exhilaration he had taken Kate’s hand and jumped off the edge of the cliff, self-preservation blown to the wind. Totally consumed by that all-powerful, all-consuming thing called love, he’d had no choice but to obey the fierce command of his heart.
She had been beautiful, funny, clever...like no woman he had ever met before. The summer they had spent together in his home town of Agia Loukia, had been so special, so wonderful, that Nikos had assumed their joy would last for ever. And when Kate had accepted his proposal of marriage he had thought their future set, their happiness complete.
But too late Nikos had realised that when you jumped off a cliff, at some point you had to come back down to earth. And the crash landing he and Kate had made had been spectacularly horrendous.
Discovering that Kate had never told her parents about him—never even mentioned him—had been the first punch in the gut. No wonder she hadn’t wanted him to accompany her to New York when her father had been taken ill. No wonder she hadn’t wanted him at Bernie’s funeral.
His first niggling thoughts that she might actually be ashamed of him had soon solidified into rock-hard certainty as Kate had continued to treat him with cold distance...holding him at arm’s length, pushing him away. Gone had been the warm and loving woman he had fallen in love with in Crete, to be replaced by someone he’d barely recognised—someone who had hardly been able to bring herself to look at him.
Their final showdown had had an air of inevitability about it. But even so it had been far harder, far more painful than Nikos could ever have imagined. Discovering what Kate really thought of him, and the pitifully low opinion she had of him, had felt like a stab to the heart. It still did.
But now it was time to expunge that memory. Now the tables had turned. Now Nikos intended to exact his revenge.
The concierge behind the gleaming wooden desk indicated the elevator for Kandy Kate’s headquarters. Not the sleek, burnished gold affair at the end of the lobby, but a much smaller one, with an old-fashioned metal grid that you had to pull across manually. There was a moment’s hesitation after Nikos pressed the button, and then the elevator slowly ground its way down to what felt like the bowels of the earth.
He had decided not to announce his arrival. He preferred to take his chances rather than give Kate the opportunity to disappear or prepare pretty lies. In his experience an element of surprise always worked in his favour.
The Kandy Kate office was at the end of a long corridor, its name stuck on the middle panel of a half-glazed door. After a single sharp knock Nikos walked straight in.
The room was small, gloomy and empty. There was no natural light, and a fluorescent strip bulb cast a depressingly cold glow over a cluttered desk, a couple of wooden chairs. A rustling noise to the left alerted him to another, smaller room, not much more than a cupboard. Someone of indeterminate age and sex was in there, squatting on the floor in front of an open filing cabinet drawer.
‘Hi!’ Nikos raised his voice as the person obviously hadn’t heard him. ‘I’m looking for Kate O’Connor.’
He saw the figure go rigid. As it slowly moved to stand Nikos felt the breath catch in his throat. Of course. She still hadn’t turned around, but as she pulled out the buds in her ears, cutting short the tinny buzz of music from the phone she retrieved from her pocket, it was obvious. The shape of the back of her head, the long sweep of her neck...
Once again it had taken him a couple of seconds to recognise her, but if this was another disguise she was going to have to try a lot harder.
He advanced further into the room, positioning himself in the doorway of the glorified cupboard. ‘I see I have found her.’
‘Nikos!’
His name was a dry accusation on her tongue. As she finally turned to face him Nikos caught the alarm in her wide green eyes, saw the way her face had drained of colour. He heard the snatch of her indrawn breath. It was all suitably gratifying.
Nikos blatantly stared at her, ignoring the normal rules of decorum. They were way past that.
She was dressed entirely in black, her face free from make-up, her dark hair cropped short, cut into the nape of her neck so that it exposed her ears. With an unwanted kick of lust Nikos found himself wondering how that hair would fe
el beneath his fingertips. She looked elegant, fragile, beautiful. Certainly nothing like the woman he had seen last night. A pair of plain silver earrings dangling from her lobes were the only hint of adornment.
She looked away, avoiding his gaze. Nikos could see her desperately working to regain her composure, to pull a mask of indifference into place. He held the silence.
‘What do you want?’ Her voice sounded faint. ‘Why are you here?’
‘That’s not much of a greeting, Kate.’ Now his taunting animosity had kicked in. ‘Not much of a welcome after all these years.’
‘You’ll get no welcome from me.’ Her head swung back, her words falling like shards of glass.
‘No. Of course I won’t. How foolish of me.’
With a mocking stare, he stepped out of the doorway back into the office. After a moment’s hesitation he strode over to a chair, picking up the pile of papers from the seat and holding them in his hand as he waited for Kate to squeeze in the other side of the desk.
‘All right if I sit down?’
He waved the papers at her and Kate snatched them back. Nikos seated himself, stretching out his legs and crossing them at the ankles before linking his hands behind his head and leaning back in a classic display of dominance.
‘So, tell me, Kate—how have you been?’ He let his eyes drift over her face, watching the way the colour flooded back.
Kate gave him a fierce glare. ‘I’m sure you haven’t come here to ask after my well-being. I repeat, Nikos, what do you want?’
‘A cup of coffee would be nice, since you’re asking.’
‘What do you mean by walking in here uninvited?’ Her breath sounded dry in her throat.
‘I make a habit of turning up uninvited.’ Nikos gave her a pleasant smile. ‘You should know that by now.’ He watched as his barb sank in. ‘Now, how about that coffee? Black, one sugar for me. But I expect you remember that.’
