by Tara Pammi
“Whatever I learned about you that night, I... I kept it to myself. I...trusted that man. But you...you play dirty, Gabriel.”
“I play to win, Princesa. I always have.” His brow rose as he searched her gaze. “It is clear that you truly care for Angelina. And if you agree, maybe I can be persuaded to overlook your deception.” His thumb traced the line of her jaw, a featherlight stroke that branded her. The sound of her harsh breaths filled the silence, her body swaying toward him with a will of its own. She raised her gaze, frowning.
“I could even be persuaded to kiss you again, Princesa. I could give you all the excitement you crave, all the daring moments you want. I might even be willing to show you the passion that you desperately want.’
Toes scrunched in her sensible pumps, body thrumming like a tautly stretched string, Eleni stared into his beautiful gray eyes.
His breath caressed her lips, his gaze studying her as if she were the most beautiful woman on earth. She felt drugged, and he hadn’t even touched her. “So you’re offering me—” somehow she spoke “—an affair in return for looking after your child?”
“We want each other, yes? It’s not a big leap from that.”
What would happen when she spent days in his company with just a little girl for buffer? What would happen when he didn’t stop the next time? When she’d be all twisted and tangled into their lives and he decided he didn’t need her anymore?
Where would she land then?
In the same place, with her heart bruised again by another careless man.
Better that she and Angelina cut that cord now before the damage to that young girl was permanent. Before Eleni herself forgot that no man was worth the heartache that she’d already tasted, thanks to Spiros. Thanks to her father.
Love was not for her, whatever silly dreams she wove.
She put her hand on his wrist and pushed it away. Her palm burned at that innocent contact. Her body whimpered silently at the promise in his eyes. “No.”
“No what?”
“No to everything you suggested.”
“Why not?”
Suddenly, the idea she’d been playing with in her head for a while now was the only lifeline. She would go away. Away from this man and his little girl who already owned a part of Eleni’s heart. Away from the unending void that her life had seemed to be lately. “I plan to leave Drakon for a while.”
His jaw tightened. From one breath to the next, his gaze became hard, all the heat gone. “How long is a while?”
“Months. Maybe a year.” She stepped away, needing the distance. “I’ve always wanted to see the world and this is my chance.”
“And what about Drakon and your duties? What about your precious brothers?”
“Nikandros has convinced me that they’ll be here for the rest of our lives. I’ve never once left Drakon. I’ve seen nothing of the world beyond this palace and its walls. It is time for me to step out.”
Time for her to reach for what she wanted.
Spending all this time with Angelina, nurturing their relationship, seeing the joy that came into the young girl’s eyes when she and Eleni spent time together—it gave form to what Eleni herself desperately craved.
She would never love a man. But being a mother to a baby, bringing love into a child’s life—someone unwanted, like she’d been—that she could do. That was in her hands.
“I wish I could help you, at least for her sake. But I just can’t. I can’t put my life on hold for anyone. Not anymore.”
“When do you plan to leave?”
“In a week maybe. At the most, two. I would like to break it to Angelina with you there. I... I don’t care whether you believe me or not, Mr. Marquez, but I do care about her. So much. If you care about her, and it seems like you do, then tell her that. Show it with your actions.
“And please, stop letting your ego get in the way of it.”
CHAPTER THREE
“IS IT TRUE?”
Gabriel sighed and turned toward the figure standing just outside of his suite. As if entering it might force her to concede that he was a presence in her life, his daughter stood at the threshold, staring at him as if he were the enemy.
Somehow, he made his tone even. “Angelina, come inside.”
She instantly stiffened, her bony shoulders poking out of her T-shirt like spikes. “I don’t want to come inside. I just want to know if it’s true.”
“What is?”
“Ms. Drakos, is she leaving Drakon?” Damn it, he’d hoped she hadn’t heard it yet. “Did she tell you?”
“No,” he lied, feeling a hateful powerlessness within. It seemed nothing he offered could induce the Princess to stay. “But I heard one of the staff talking. They said she’s going away for a while.”
“Will she come back soon?”
His jaw tight, Gabriel shrugged. “It’s possible, yes. She...said she might be gone for a month or two. She has her own life, pequeña.” The Princess had made that very clear. And looking back over their argument, Gabriel cursed. For a businessman who thrived on negotiations and sweet-talking opponents into his camp, he had acted like a fool. Pushed all the wrong buttons.
Just as she did in him.
The sound of a soft whimper from his daughter jerked his head up. Christ, he would welcome the rebellion over this dejection in her eyes.
“Angelina, you will see her again. And even if Ms. Drakos leaves, you will make new friends. And I’ll always—”
Tears drew paths over her cheeks as his twelve-year-old leaned against the wall and sobbed silently. Something twisted in his chest and Gabriel fisted his hands.
He reached her and even in the midst of her tears, she shrank from him. He caught the curse that wanted to escape his mouth and waited.
Roughly, and with a self-sufficiency that smacked of someone much older, she wiped at her cheeks and looked up at him. Retreated into herself. “Everyone leaves me. First it was my granddad. Then Mom. Now Ms. Drakos.”
“I won’t, Angelina.”
“That’s what you say.”
“What can I do, Angelina? Tell me.”
“You could ask Ms. Drakos not to leave. If you truly care about me, Mr. Marquez,” she drawled in her American accent, as if such a thing was an impossibility, “you will somehow make Ms. Drakos stay.”
Even the request was made with such resignation, such lack of faith that Gabriel felt winded.
Before he could answer, his daughter turned and walked away, her shoulders dejected. Without once looking back.
* * *
“He wants you to be his daughter’s nanny?” said her sister-in-law Mia, who was heavily pregnant with twins, on their morning walk around the gardens Nik had had built for Mia.
Eleni nodded. “Wants? More like ordered me. You should’ve seen him, Mia. He got this look in his eyes, like he wasn’t seeing me anymore. Just a solution to his problem.”
That would make everything right in his world, like all arrogant men expected from those around them.
In the week since Gabriel had made that outrageous offer, she hadn’t heard from him. Hopefully, he’d come to his senses. Yet, Eleni continued to feel his considerable power like a shadow over her life.
The gardens were a riot of color, the sky a perfect blue. All in all, it had been one of those perfect Drakon autumn weeks. Everything was ripe and coming to fruition.
She’d made some inquiries into the orphanages in Drakon and submitted her paperwork. It could take months to get through the bureaucratic red tape, but a fierce sense of rightness filled her. And in the meantime, she was planning her trip.
It might not be as long as she’d suggested to Gabriel but it seemed like the perfect thing before she had a child of her own and the responsibility that would go with being a single mother.
“You refused, yes?” Mia probed.
“Of course, I did,” she replied, as her gaze shied away from Mia’s unbearable concern. Mia knew Eleni was attracted to Gabriel Marquez, t
hat Angelina was coming to mean more and more to her every day. She felt naked, as if all her desperate longing was written on her face for everyone to see.
I could even be persuaded to kiss you again.
Humiliating heat filled her cheeks. She should’ve slapped the arrogant man.
“I’m worried about you, Ellie.” Mia clasped her fingers. “You’re getting far too attached to that little girl. I saw how upset she was a few days ago...”
Swallowing the lump in her throat, Eleni tried to sound casual. Angelina’s crumpled face wouldn’t leave her alone though. She’d been wrong in thinking she could walk out of Angelina’s life without hurting her. “I’ll be fine, Mia. If anything, these last few months with Angie have shown me how much I would like a baby of my own.”
Mia sent her a stunned glance just as they saw Nikandros walk toward them.
“What the hell is going on between you and Gabriel, Ellie?” Nik said, loudly enough for some of the garden staff to look up curiously.
Eleni frowned. “Just a disagreement about his daughter. Why?”
Nik looked away and back. “He’s threatening to pull Marquez Holdings out of Drakon if you don’t cooperate with his demand.”
“Cooperate? He can’t do that!” Eleni’s heart sank to her toes. She’d known he was ruthless, but this was beyond belief. “Can he, Nik? I know Andreas had his reservations about Gabriel but I thought we had an ironclad contract.”
Nik pushed his hand through his hair, visibly shaking. “We do. Legally, he can’t just pull his company out of Drakon. But the last thing we need in this economy is to get into a legal battle with him. He could raise a hundred issues and stall all our projects. He’s...everything Andreas said he is when things don’t go his way—an utter bastard. He’s already canceled two of the investor meetings for no good reason.”
Eleni rubbed a hand over her forehead, frustration coiling inside her. Just when she’d finally decided what she wanted in life... “I’ll do anything for you and Andreas and... Drakon, Nik.” Her daredevil brother had never seemed so anxious. “I’m sorry for—”
“Christos, Ellie! I don’t blame you for any of this.”
Eleni swallowed the lump in her throat. Her brothers did love her. Curse the blasted man for making her doubt it.
“All he keeps saying is that he wants full access to you. When I said you were not a resource to be loaned out, he had the gall to say that Andreas and I use you.” Nik looked away from her, shame filling his eyes.
“Nik, you can’t let him get to you like that.” And yet, Gabriel had pinpointed both her own fear and apparently Nik’s misgivings like a laser pointer. He rooted out weaknesses and he didn’t care what he did with them.
Fury coursed through her veins.
“He didn’t say anything I haven’t been thinking the last few months. What does he want with you?”
“He wants me to help him forge a connection between him and his daughter. Be...available to them. Make it a priority in my life. When I told him that I was planning to travel, he—” She shivered, remembering the look in his eyes. He hadn’t said anything and yet Eleni had known the matter was far from over. “He’s desperate and he’s pushing back.”
“Stop being so damned generous, Ellie.”
“I don’t like what he’s doing any more than you. Given the state Angelina was in when I told her, I...” Tears filled her eyes, frustration coiling inside her. “I feel guilty. I didn’t realize how attached she was getting to me. And now, if he walks away from Drakon, it will undo everything Andreas and you are trying to do. There’s only one solution.”
“I can’t let you be his daughter’s nanny, Ellie. Haven’t you given enough to this family and Drakon?” With another curse, Nikandros pulled her into his arms and Eleni went like a rag doll. The familiar scent of her brother calmed the panic in her tummy.
She knew, just as Nik did, that the ruthless Spaniard had left her no way out. He knew she’d do anything for her brothers. And Angelina too.
Gabriel held all the cards but Eleni had the blood of stubborn warriors in her veins, however tainted her father had thought it.
She didn’t intend to let the arrogant Spaniard take anything that she didn’t want to give.
* * *
She had come to him finally, bristling with righteous fury.
And dressed to kill.
Gabriel watched, transfixed, as Eleni Drakos waited by the steps, awareness jolting him.
The white stone of the restaurant showed off that innate elegance, that quiet grace of hers, reminding him that legitimate or not, she was very much from the illustrious House of Drakos.
The setting sun caught the copper highlights in her shoulder-length hair. Her face didn’t have those arresting, stark angles her brothers’ did. Nor symmetric features, with her too-proud nose that was clearly inherited from her father. She was neither conventionally beautiful nor had the haughty elegance of a woman born to one of the most distinguished royal houses of the world.
And yet there was a fresh, voluptuous beauty to her form.
The pink fabric of her dress barely kissed her knees and skimmed her lush curves like a lover’s hands every time the breeze pressed it against her body. A white metal ring circled her neck, from which the dress flowed down. It bared her rounded shoulders, exposing miles of golden skin.
Up close, the dress was an invitation to sin. A birthmark on her fragile collarbone, the rounded curve of her hip, those long fingers of hers that she used to tuck a stray lock behind her ear—everything about her hit Gabriel like a blow to his solar plexus.
Why had no man stolen her away from under her brothers’ control?
What had he been thinking, taunting her with the promise of desire between them?
“You’re staring, Mr. Marquez.”
Something floral floated toward him. “I’ve never seen you in a dress, Princesa. You look—” he leisurely swept his gaze over her, and saw a rewarding blush steal up through her cheeks “—stunning.”
“And of course you’re surprised by that,” she said dismissively. If he weren’t obsessed with every small detail about her, he would have missed the quiver in her voice. The quick flick of her lashes to hide the widening of her eyes.
Was she truly so unused to a man’s attentions? Had no man ever wanted her? Touched her? The last thought consumed him. He frowned. “Surprised? What do you mean?”
“You thought I would come here with my tail tucked between my legs, desperate for your promise. Desperate for your—”
The picture she painted made him smile. “If you keep saying it, I promise, Princesa. I will begin to like it.”
“Like what?”
“You being desperate for me. In any and every way.”
She gasped, her eyes voluptuously wide in her lush face before she flicked those thick lashes down.
The lower lip jutted out in a silky pout. Painted a soft pink, her mouth was a lush invitation. “I needed to feel good about myself today, Mr. Marquez. Sort of like being equipped for war.”
“This is war for you?”
“Are you saying it isn’t? I don’t bend to your will like every other being on the planet so you threaten what I hold most dear. The last thing I need is to be riddled by my own insecurities in the midst of it. I have no intention of letting the press coin another—”
“I do not agree with the—”
“You’ll find that I’m the most sensible, practical woman you’ve ever met and yet you have the...alarming ability to make me lose my faculties.”
He stared at her slack-jawed for a few beats before he burst out laughing.
Shoulders rigid, hands fisted, she stood with a patient look.
“Here I assumed you’d dressed up for the simple reason of impressing me. That you were hoping to make me lose my faculties.”
The tight purse of her lips said it had crossed her mind. “How I dress reflects on my brothers and the House of Drakos, so really, this—” she did a sw
eeping movement with her hand over her dress, and Gabriel smiled “—has nothing to do with you, Mr. Marquez. You have made the little squabble between us into a national matter. I...could give it no less importance.”
Gabriel felt a sting of irritation at the mention of her brothers. He held her elbow and nudged her toward the entrance of the restaurant.
“My daughter’s happiness is not a little squabble.”
“It isn’t.” She sighed, her shoulders dropping. “Which is the only reason I’m here to negotiate. Nikandros would rather you sink everything than let me come here, let me bargain with my life. But I can’t allow you to go on some macho rampage on Drakon just because you aren’t getting your way. Neither can I bear to ignore the fact that I miscalculated.”
“Miscalculated what?”
Such raw emotion flickered in her big eyes that Gabriel took a step back. Used to sophisticated, modern women, who, like him, thought emotions were weaknesses, who played games with his head and body, the Princess was a whiplash against his senses.
“How my departure might affect Angelina. I didn’t realize how attached she has grown to me, how she could see this also as abandonment.” Her mouth trembled, her eyes wide in her face. “The sounds of her tears won’t leave me alone.”
Gears turned in his head as he evaluated the situation.
There had to be something she wanted that he could provide. Everyone, especially women, wanted something from him. Even his friend Alyssa, who was full of integrity, had needed his backing when she’d first started out.
He was convinced that she would be the best thing for Angelina—she had proved it to him a hundred times over the past two weeks, even as he’d threatened everything she held dear.
A soft gasp from her lush mouth was her only sign that she’d noticed the empty restaurant. They followed the concierge to an intimately laid out dinner on the famed terrace that offered panoramic views of mountains that bracketed Drakon on one side.
The crystal flutes and the champagne bucket glittered in the orange light of the setting sun. He watched the open expressions on her face—awe, a flicker of joy when she saw the mountain peaks followed by dismay and then that practical, nothing-will-efface-me sensibility of hers.
