Ava scooted into the en suite bathroom and looked longingly at the bath, the size of a small swimming pool. She had discovered new muscles and she ached everywhere. But Giannis was no longer the charming lover of last night and he had not hidden his impatience this morning, she thought ruefully as she bundled her hair into a shower cap before taking a quick shower.
The bag he had given her contained a pair of beautifully tailored black trousers and a cream cashmere sweater. There was also an exquisite set of silk and lace underwear. Remembering her ripped thong brought a scarlet flush to her cheeks. She did not recognise the shameless temptress she had turned into last night. Giannis had revealed a side to her that she hadn’t known existed.
Grimacing at the sight of her kiss-stung lips in the mirror, she brushed her hair and caught it up in a loose knot on top of her head. At least she looked respectable, although she shuddered to think how much the designer clothes must have cost. Everything fitted her perfectly, and when she slipped on the black stiletto heels she’d worn the previous evening she was pleasantly surprised by how slim and elegant she looked. Stuffing her evening gown into the bag that had held her new clothes, she walked into the sitting room.
Giannis was speaking on his phone but he finished the call when he saw her and strolled across the room. His intent appraisal caused her heart to miss a beat. ‘I see that the clothes fit you.’
‘How did you know my size?’
‘I have had plenty of experience of the female figure,’ he drawled.
Inexplicably Ava felt the acid burn of jealousy in her stomach at the idea of him making love with other women. Love had nothing to do with it, she reminded herself. Giannis was a notorious womaniser and she was simply another blonde who had shared his bed for one night. No doubt he would have forgotten her name by tomorrow.
‘Obviously I’ll pay for the clothes,’ she said crisply. ‘Can you give me your bank details so that I can transfer what I owe you, or would you prefer a cheque?’
‘Forget it. I don’t want any money.’
‘No way will I allow you to buy me expensive designer clothes. I’ll find out what they cost and send a cheque for the amount to your London office.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘How do you know that I have an office in London?’
‘I found out from the Internet that you own a cruise line company called The Gekas Experience. TGE UK’s offices are in Bond Street.’ Ava hesitated. ‘I wrote to you a few weeks ago about a serious matter, but you did not reply.’
‘Sheridan,’ he said slowly. ‘I wondered why your name on the place card at dinner last night seemed familiar.’ He frowned. ‘I’m afraid you will have to jog my memory.’
She took a deep breath. ‘My brother, Sam McKay, used to work for a boat valeting company called Spick and Span.’ Giannis’s expression hardened, and she continued quickly. ‘Sam had got involved with a gang of rough youths who made out that they were his friends. They coerced him into taking them aboard one of the boats that he valeted in St Katharine Dock. I don’t know if the gang meant to vandalise the boat, but a fire broke out. My brother was horrified, and he stayed on board to try to put the flames out while the rest of the gang got away. He was the only one to be arrested and charged with criminal damage. But he never meant for your boat to be damaged.’ Ava’s voice wavered as Giannis’s dark brows drew together in a slashing frown. ‘It was just a silly prank that got out of hand.’
‘A prank? The Nerissa was nearly destroyed. Do you know how many thousands of pounds of damage your brother and his friends caused?’ Giannis said harshly. ‘It wasn’t just the financial cost of having the boat repaired. The sentimental value of everything that was lost is incalculable. My father designed every detail of Nerissa’s interior and he was so proud of that boat.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Ava was shocked by the raw emotion in Giannis’s voice. She had only considered the financial implications of the fire, and it hadn’t occurred to her that the boat might be special to him. It made the situation even worse. ‘Sam really regrets that he allowed the gang on board. He thought that they just wanted to have a look at the boat, and he was horrified by what happened.’ She bit her lip. ‘My brother is scared of the gang members, which is why he refused to give their names to the police. He’s young and impressionable, but honestly he’s not a bad person.’
Giannis’s brows rose. ‘The manager of the boat valeting company told me that your brother already had a criminal record by the age of sixteen. Sam McKay clearly has a complete disregard for the law.’
He picked up his briefcase and walked over to the penthouse suite’s private lift. ‘I remember the letter you sent asking me to drop the charges against your brother. I did not reply because frankly I was too angry. Sam broke the law and he must face the consequences,’ he said coldly.
‘Wait!’ Ava hurried across the room as the lift doors opened and she followed Giannis inside. She jabbed her finger on the button to keep the door open. ‘Please hear me out.’
‘I’m in a hurry,’ he growled.
‘When I read in a newspaper that you would be attending the charity fundraising dinner I decided to try to meet you. My friend works for the event’s management company which organised the evening, and Becky arranged for me to sit at the same table as you. I hoped to persuade you to find it in your heart to give my brother another chance.’
‘I don’t have a heart.’ Giannis reached out and pulled her hand away from the button and the lift doors instantly closed. ‘Your methods of persuasion were impressive, I’ll grant you. But it was a wasted performance, angel-face.’
Ava gave him a puzzled look. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Oh, come on. You obviously had sex with me because you thought I would let your brother off the hook.’
‘I did not. I didn’t plan to go to bed with you—it just...happened,’ she muttered, shame coiling through her like a venomous serpent. To say that she had handled things badly would be an understatement. Last night she had behaved like the slut that Giannis clearly believed she was, but she refused to give up trying to help Sam.
The lift doors opened on the ground floor and she shot out behind Giannis when he stepped into the foyer. ‘My reason for having sex with you had nothing to do with my brother,’ she told him, her stiletto heels tapping out a staccato beat on the marble floor as she tried to keep pace with his long stride. Her voice seemed to echo around the vast space and she blushed when she became aware of the curious glances directed at her by other hotel guests. The terribly sophisticated receptionist standing behind the front desk arched her brows.
‘Why don’t you announce on national TV that we slept together?’ Giannis threw her a fulminating look, his dark eyes gleaming like obsidian.
‘I’m sorry.’ Ava lowered her voice. ‘I don’t want you to have the wrong impression of me. I don’t usually sleep with men I’ve only just met and I don’t understand why I behaved the way I did last night. I suppose it was chemistry. There was an instant attraction that neither of us could resist.’
He growled something uncomplimentary beneath his breath. ‘Next you’ll be telling me that we were both shot through the heart by Cupid’s arrow.’ Giannis halted beside a pillar. ‘Last night was fun, angel-face, and maybe I’ll look you up the next time I’m in town. But I’m not going to drop the charges against your hooligan brother. Even if I wanted to, I don’t think it would be possible. As I understand English law, it is the Crown Prosecution who decide if the case should go to court.’
‘You could instruct your lawyer to withdraw your complaint of criminal damage inflicted on your boat, and if you refuse to provide evidence to the court the case against Sam will be dropped.’
She grabbed Giannis’s arm as he turned to walk away and felt his rock-hard bicep ripple beneath his jacket. ‘It’s true that Sam has a police record. Like I said, he was drawn into the gang culture through fear. It’s
not easy being a teenager in the East End,’ she said huskily. ‘Sam will almost certainly be given a custodial sentence and I’m scared of what will happen to him in a young offender institution. My brother is not a hardened criminal; he’s just a silly kid who made a mistake.’
‘Several mistakes,’ Giannis said sardonically. ‘Perhaps spending a few uncomfortable weeks in prison will teach him to respect the law in future.’
Giannis had not been lying when he’d stated that he did not have a heart, Ava thought bleakly. His phone rang, and she dropped her hand from his arm and moved a few steps away from him, although she was still able to overhear his conversation. A few minutes later he finished the call, and his expression was thunderous as he strode across the lobby without glancing in her direction.
She gave chase and caught up with him, positioning herself so that she was standing between him and the door of the hotel. ‘I appreciate you must be annoyed that, from the sound of it, you might have lost a business deal to buy a fleet of ships. But I can’t... I won’t stand by and watch my brother be sent to prison.’
His dark brows lowered even further. ‘How the hell do you know about my business deal?’
‘I can speak Greek and I couldn’t help but hear some of your conversation just now, concerning someone called Markou who has rejected your offer to buy his shipping company.’ Ava bit her lip, and something flashed in Giannis’s dark eyes that reminded her of the stark sexual hunger in his gaze when he had taken her to bed last night. ‘I’m sure your business deal is important to you, but my brother is important to me,’ she said huskily. ‘Is there any way I can persuade you to give Sam another chance?’
He did not reply as he stepped past her and nodded to the doorman, who sprang forwards to open the door.
Ava followed Giannis out of the hotel and shivered as a gust of wind swirled around her and tugged at her chignon. Although it was early in September, autumn had already arrived with a vengeance. A thunderstorm was forecast but at the moment drizzle was falling and she could feel it soaking through her cashmere jumper. The miserable weather suited her mood of hopelessness as through a blur of tears she saw a sleek black car parked in front of the hotel.
She watched Giannis unlock the car and throw his briefcase onto the back seat. The knowledge that she had failed to save her brother from a likely prison sentence felt like a knife in Ava’s heart.
‘Have you never done anything in your past that you regret?’ she called after him. He hesitated and swung round to face her, his dark brows snapping together.
Desperate to stop him getting into his car and driving away, Ava raced down the hotel steps but she stumbled in her high heels and gave a cry as she felt herself falling. There was nothing she could do to save herself. But then, miraculously, she felt two strong arms wrap around her as Giannis caught her and held her against his chest. In the same instant, on the periphery of her vision she saw a bright flash and wondered if it had been a lightning strike as the storm blew up.
The thought slipped away as the evocative scent of Giannis’s aftershave swamped her senses. Still in a state of shock after her near fall, she rested her cheek on his shirt front and heard the erratic thud of his heart beneath her ear. She wished she could remain in his arms for ever. The crazy notion slid into her mind and refused to budge.
There was another flash of bright light. ‘Who is your mystery blonde, Mr Gekas?’ a voice called out.
Ava heard Giannis swear beneath his breath. ‘What’s happening?’ she asked dazedly, lifting her head from his chest and blinking in the blinding glare of camera flashes.
When a taxi had dropped her at the hotel entrance the previous evening she had noticed the crowd of paparazzi who had gathered to take photos of the celebrity guests arriving at the party. Evidently some of them had waited all night to snap guests leaving the hotel the next morning, and they had struck gold when they had spotted Europe’s most notorious playboy and a female companion.
‘Hey, Mr Gekas, over here.’ A photographer aimed a long-lens camera at them. ‘Can you tell us the name of your girlfriend?’
‘I certainly can,’ Giannis said calmly. To Ava’s surprise, he did not move away from her as she had expected. Instead he kept his arm clamped firmly around her waist as he turned her to face the paparazzi. ‘Gentlemen,’ he drawled, ‘I would like to introduce you to Miss Ava Sheridan—my fiancée.’
She couldn’t have heard him correctly. Ava jerked her eyes to his face. ‘What...?’ she began, but the rest of her words were obliterated as his dark head swooped down and he crushed her lips beneath his.
The kiss was a statement of pure possession. Giannis ground his mouth against hers, forcing her lips apart and demanding her response, re-igniting the flame inside her so that she was powerless to resist him.
Ava felt dizzy from a lack of oxygen when he finally lifted his head a fraction. ‘What the hell?’ she choked, struggling to drag air into her lungs when he pressed her face into his shoulder.
‘I need you to be my fake fiancée,’ he growled, his lips hovering centimetres above hers. ‘Play along with me and I’ll drop all the charges against your brother.’
Her eyes widened. ‘That’s blackmail.’
His fingers bit into her upper arms as he hauled her hard up against his whipcord body. To the watching photographers they must have looked like lovers who could not keep their hands off each other. ‘It’s called business, baby. And you and I have just formed a partnership.’
CHAPTER FOUR
‘YOU’VE GOT A damned nerve.’
Giannis flicked a glance at Ava, sitting stiffly beside him. It was the first time she had uttered a word since he had bundled her into his car and driven away from the hotel. But her simmering silence had spoken volumes.
Tendrils of honey-blonde hair had worked loose from her chignon to curl around her cheeks. She smelled of soap and lemony shampoo and he had no idea why he found her wholesome, natural beauty so incredibly sexy. He cursed beneath his breath. She was an unwelcome distraction but she might be the solution to his problem with Stefanos Markou.
He focused his attention on the traffic crawling around Marble Arch. ‘It was damage limitation,’ he drawled. ‘Thanks to social media, pictures of us leaving the hotel will have gone viral within minutes. I couldn’t risk my reputation. Anyone who saw the photographs of us together would have assumed that you are my latest mistress.’
Ava made a strangled sound. ‘You couldn’t risk your reputation? What about mine? Everyone will believe that I am engaged to the world’s worst womaniser. I can’t believe you told the photographers that I am your fiancée.’ She ran a hand through her hair, evidently forgetting that she had secured it on top of her head. Her chignon started to unravel and she cursed as she pulled out the remaining pins and combed her fingers through her hair.
‘You’re right,’ she muttered, scrolling through her phone. ‘The news of our so-called engagement is all over social media. Thankfully my mother is at a yoga retreat in India where there is no Internet connection. She was seriously stressed about my brother and I persuaded her to go abroad and leave me to deal with the court case. But Sam is bound to see this nonsense and I can’t imagine what he’s going to say.’
‘Presumably he will be grateful to you for helping him to avoid going to prison,’ Giannis said drily. He sensed Ava turn her head to stare at him, and a brief glance in her direction revealed that her eyes were the icy grey of an Arctic sky.
‘You can’t really expect me to go through with the ridiculous charade of pretending to be your fiancée,’ she snapped.
‘Oh, but I can, glykiá mou.’
For some reason her furious snort made him want to smile. Usually he avoided highly emotional women but Ava’s wildly passionate nature fascinated him. She was beautiful when she was angry and even more gorgeous when she was aroused, he brooded. Memories of her straddling h
im, her golden hair tumbling around her shoulders and her bare breasts, round and firm like ripe peaches, caused Giannis to shift uncomfortably in his seat.
He cleared his throat. ‘I thought you wanted to keep your brother out of jail?’
‘I do. But two minutes before we walked out of the hotel you had refused to help Sam. I don’t understand why you have changed your mind, or why you need me to be your fake fiancée.’
‘Like I said, the reason is business. More specifically, the only chance I have of doing a deal with Stefanos Markou is if I can prove to him that I am a reformed character. He has refused to sell Markou Shipping to me because he disapproves of my lifestyle and he thinks I am a playboy.’
‘You are a playboy,’ Ava interrupted.
‘Not any more.’ Giannis grinned at her. ‘Not since I fell in love with you at first sight and decided to marry you and produce a tribe of children. Markou is an old-fashioned romantic and you, angel-face, are going to persuade him to sell his ships to me.’
Her expression became even more wintry. ‘There’s not a chance in hell that I’d marry you and even less chance I’d agree to have your children.’
Giannis’s fingers tightened involuntarily on the steering wheel as a shaft of pain caught him unawares. He had thought he’d dealt with what had happened five years ago, but sometimes he felt an ache in his heart for the child he might have had. Caroline had told him she’d suffered a miscarriage, but in his darkest hours he wondered if she had decided not to allow her pregnancy to continue because she hadn’t wanted to be associated with him after he’d admitted that he had spent a year in prison.
He forced his mind away from the past. ‘Forgive me for sounding cynical, but I am a very wealthy man and most women I’ve ever met would happily marry for hard cash. However, I have no intention of marrying you. I simply want you to pretend that we are engaged and planning our wedding. I’m gambling that Stefanos would prefer to sell Markou Shipping to me rather than to a rival company because he knows I will have the ships refurbished in Greece and employ the local workforce. All we have to do is convince him that I have turned into a paragon of virtue thanks to the love of a good woman.’
Wed for His Secret Heir Page 5
