‘Don’t call me that,’ she said distractedly, hating the tabloid press’s moniker for her.
It wasn’t that it was cruelly meant, only that they mistook her natural reserve for something far more grandiose: snobbery. Pretension. Airs and graces. The kind of aristocratic aspirations that Marnie had never fallen in line with despite the value her parents put on them. The values that had been at the root of their disapproval of Nikos.
‘So this is revenge?’ she murmured, her eyes clashing fiercely with his. Pain lanced through her.
‘Yes.’
‘A dish best served cold?’ She shook her head sadly, dislodging his hand. ‘You’ve waited six years for this.’
‘Yes.’ He brought his body closer, crushing her with his strong thighs, his broad chest. ‘But there will be nothing cold about our marriage.’
Desire lurched through her. The world began to spin wildly off its axis. ‘There won’t be a marriage,’ she said, with a confidence that was completely forged. Already the options were closing in around her. ‘And there certainly won’t be...what you’re...suggesting.’
‘What’s the matter, agape mou? Do you worry that we won’t still feel as we did then?’
He ground his hips against her and she groaned as sensations that had long since been relegated to the past flared in her belly. Of their own volition her fingers curled into the fabric of his shirt, the warmth from his chest a balm to her fraught nerves.
‘Do you remember how I respected your innocence?’ He brought his mouth close to hers, so that his words were a breath on her lips. ‘How I told you we should wait until we were married, or at least engaged?’
Shame, desire, misery and despair slid through her like a headless snake, twisting and writhing in her heart. She pulled her lower lip between her teeth and nodded once.
‘How, even though I had kissed your body all over, and you had begged me to take you, I insisted that I wanted to wait? Because I thought I loved you and that it mattered.’
He dropped his hands to her hips, holding her still as he pushed against her once more. She tilted her head back as far as she could, the window’s glass providing a hard barrier.
‘Do you remember how you laughed in my face and told me you’d never marry someone like me?’
Those words! How she’d hated saying them! She’d rehearsed them for days, and when the moment had come only the belief that she was doing the right thing for her family had spurred her on to say them. It was the most difficult thing she’d ever done. Even now, six years later, she wondered at the way she’d been led away from him despite the intensity of her feelings.
‘Do you?’ he demanded, scraping his lips against her neck, sending her pulse rioting out of control.
‘Yes!’ She groaned as desire and memory weakened her body.
‘I have met many people like you in my life—like your father. Snobs who value centuries-old fortune above all else.’
‘That isn’t me,’ she said with quiet determination.
‘Of course it is.’ He almost laughed. ‘You broke up with me because you knew your destiny was to marry someone like you. Somebody that your parents approved of.’
‘That’s what they wanted. I just wanted you.’
‘Not enough.’ He sobered, his mouth a grim slash.
Frustrated, she tried to appeal to the man he’d once been: the man who had known her better than anyone on earth. ‘God, Nikos. You know what my life was like then. We’d just buried Libby. We were all in mourning. I couldn’t upset them like you wanted me to. I couldn’t. Don’t you dare think for a moment it was because I thought you weren’t good enough.’
‘You thought as your parents wished you to,’ he said with coldness, shrugging as though it no longer mattered. ‘But they will shortly come to realise there is one thing that carries more sway than birth and breeding. And when you are as broke as your father that is money.’
His words fell like bricks against her chest.
‘Now you will marry me, and he will have to spend the rest of his life knowing it was me—the man he wouldn’t have in his house—who was his salvation.’
The sheer fury of his words whipped her like a rope. ‘Nikos,’ she said, surprised at how calm she could sound in the midst of his stormy declaration. ‘He should never have made you feel like that.’
‘Your father could have called me every name under the sun for all I cared, agape. It was you I expected more of.’
She swallowed. Expectations were not new to Marnie. Her parents’. Her sister’s. Her own.
‘And now you will marry me.’
Anticipation formed a cliff’s edge and she was tumbling over it, free-falling from a great height. She shook her head, but they both knew it was denial for the sake of it.
‘No more waiting,’ he intoned darkly, crushing his mouth to hers in a kiss that stole her breath and coloured her soul.
His tongue clashed with hers. It was a kiss of slavish possession, a kiss designed to challenge and disarm. He blew away every defence she had, reminding her that his body had always been able to manipulate hers. A single look had always been enough to make her break out in a cold sweat of need.
‘No more waiting.’
‘You can’t still want me,’ she said into his mouth, wrapping her hands around his back. ‘You’ve hardly lived the life of a monk. I would have thought I’d lost all appeal by now.’
‘Call it unfinished business,’ he responded, breaking the kiss to scrape his lips down her neck, nipping at her shoulder.
She pushed her hips forward, instinctively wanting more. Wanting everything.
Her brain was wrapped in cotton wool, foggy and filled with questions softened by confusion. ‘It was six years ago.’
‘Yes. And still you’re the only woman I have ever believed myself in love with. The only woman I have ever wanted a future with. Once upon a time for love.’
‘And now?’
‘For...less noble reasons.’
He stepped away, breaking their kiss so easily it made her head spin.
‘Your father isn’t the only one I intend to prove wrong.’
She narrowed her eyes, her heart racing. ‘What does that mean?’
His laugh was without humour. ‘You said I didn’t mean anything to you. That I had been merely a distraction when you needed to escape grief.’
He brought his face closer to hers once more—so close that she could see the thousands of tiny prisms of light that danced in his eyes.
‘You told me you didn’t want me.’
‘I...’ She squeezed her eyes shut. ‘I don’t remember saying that,’ she lied.
‘You said it. And I will delight in showing you how wrong you were.’
He stepped away, leaving her cresting a wave of emotion. Striving to sound cool, she said, ‘So you’ve been...what? Pining for me for six years? Give me a break, Nikos. You moved on pretty damned fast, so it’s a little disingenuous to be playing the heartbroken ex-lover now.’
‘We were never lovers, agape.’
Her stomach churned; her cheeks were pink. ‘That’s not the point I’m making.’
‘Whatever point it is you are attempting to make it is irrelevant to me.’
She sucked in an indignant breath but he continued. ‘I have not been pining for you. But I am an opportunist.’ His smile was almost cruel—at least it looked it to Marnie. ‘Your father’s situation presented me with an opportunity I felt I couldn’t resist.’
‘Oh, yeah?’ she snapped, trying desperately to think of a way out. A way to make him realise how foolhardy this was!
‘You will spend every day of our marriage faced with the reality of just how wrong you were.’
Speechless, she fidgeted with her ring, her mind unable to grasp exactly wha
t was going on.
Seemingly he took her silence as a form of agreement. ‘A licence can be arranged within fifteen days. I have engaged a wedding planner to oversee the details. Her card is on my desk; take it when you leave.’
She shook her head as the words he was saying tumbled over her. She needed to process what was going on. ‘Wait a second. It’s too sudden. Too soon.’
He arched a single thick brow. ‘Any delay will make it impossible for me to help your father in time.’
‘You’re saying we have to actually be married before you’ll help him?’
His lip twisted in a smile of cynical derision. ‘It would hardly make sense to prop him up before the pleasure of having you... As my wife.’
To Marnie, his slight pause implied that he meant something else altogether. That he wanted to sleep with her before money changed hands. It made her feel instantly dirty, and she shifted away from the window, crossing her arms in an attempt to stem the pain that was perforating her heart.
‘Do you think I’d renege on our deal?’ she asked, realising only after posing the question that it showed her acquiescence when she hadn’t actually intended to agree...yet.
‘I think you will do whatever pleases you—as you always have done.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Forgive me—what is the expression? Having been bitten, I am...?’
‘Once bitten, twice shy.’ She sucked in an unsteady breath, waiting for relief to calm her lungs. But still they burned painfully. She tried to salvage her pride. ‘If I agree to do this, I will go through with it.’
‘I’m not sure I can put much stock in your assurances,’ he said with a shrug. ‘I credit you and your father for my scepticism. Were it not for you, perhaps I would have continued to take promises at face value. Now I live and die by contracts.’
‘That’s fine in business. I’m sure it’s wise, in fact. But marriage is different, surely.’
‘A real marriage,’ he conceded, with a tight nod.
‘You’re saying you don’t want ours to be a real marriage?’
His laugh sent a shiver down her spine. ‘Oh, in the most important ways it will be.’
‘Meaning...?’ she challenged—though how could she not understand his intention?
‘Meaning, Marnie, that I have no interest in paying a hundred million pounds and tying myself to a woman purely for revenge.’
His smile curled her toes.
‘There will be other benefits to our marriage.’
Her heart slammed hard in her chest. ‘I...’ She clamped her mouth shut.
What had she been about to say? That she was still a virgin? That after being so madly in love with him and letting him go she’d found she couldn’t feel that same desire for another man? Especially not the men her parents approved of her dating.
‘I’m not going to sleep with you just because you appear out of the blue...’
‘That is not why you’ll sleep with me,’ he said.
He spoke with a confidence that infuriated her. But he was right! Despite the passage of time, and the insufferable situation she found herself in, she couldn’t deny that the same need was rioting through her now, just as it had in their past.
‘This is a deal-breaker,’ he said with a shrug. ‘These are my terms. Accept them or don’t.’
‘Wait.’ She shook her head and lifted a hand to make him pause for a moment. But she was drowning. Possibilities, questions, wants, needs, doubts were churning around inside her—it was background noise but it was going to suck her under. ‘There’s so much more to discuss.’
‘Such as?’ he prompted, crossing his arms over his broad chest.
She tried not to notice the way the fabric strained to reveal his impressive pectoral definition.
‘Well, such as...’ She darted her tongue out and licked her lower lip. ‘Say I went along with this absolutely crazy idea—and I’m not saying I will, because clearly it’s madness—where would you see us living?’
‘That is also non-negotiable. Greece.’
‘Greece?’ She was in free fall again. ‘Greece, as in... You mean Greece?’
He stared at her for a long moment, his eyes mocking her. ‘Athens. My home.’
‘But I’ve always lived here. I can’t move.’
Their eyes locked; it was a battle of wills and yet when he spoke it was with an easy nonchalance she admired.
‘I will be spending a considerable fortune to save your father’s reputation. You do not think it’s fair that you should make some concessions?’
‘Marrying you is not a c-concession,’ she stammered in disbelief. ‘It’s so much more than that. And the same can be said of moving to a different country.’
‘You are so sheltered,’ he murmured. ‘What would you suggest? That we live in London? Within arm’s reach of your father? A man I will always despise? No.’
‘How can I marry you knowing you feel that way about him?’
His expression was rock-hard. ‘You will find a way.’ He shrugged. ‘While it might be difficult for you, it is the only way to spare him—and your mother—from a considerable fall from grace.’
‘So this is how it would be? You’d dictate terms and I’d be expected to fall in with them?’
The air was thick between them. He studied her for a long moment and she wondered if he wasn’t going to answer. Finally, though, he sighed.
‘I have no intention of being unreasonable. When you make a fair request I will hear you out. But this is not one of those instances. I live in Greece. My business is primarily controlled from Athens. You still live with your parents, who hate me as much as I do them. You have no business to speak of. It is obvious that we should move.’
‘Just like that?’ she murmured, shaking her head at his high-handed dictatorial manner even when a small part of her brain could see that he was raising a decent rationale for the suggestion.
‘These are my terms,’ he said again.
‘You’re unbelievable,’ she replied softly, worrying at her fingers.
She spun her ring some more, trying to think of a way to appease him that didn’t involve anything so drastic as this ridiculous marriage. But there was nothing. He had the money. And there was no way he’d help unless she made it worth his while.
‘Yes.’ He shrugged. ‘So?’
‘I wouldn’t want a big wedding.’ She was thinking aloud, really, though to her ears it sounded as though she was going along with his proposal. ‘If I had my way it would just be us. No fanfare. No fuss.’
‘Hmm...’ he murmured with a shake of his head. ‘And no one need ever know? No. I want the world to see that you are my wife. You—a woman who once felt I was far beneath her. A woman who declared she’d never marry someone like me. I want your father to have to stand beside us, smiling as though I am all his dreams come true, when we three will know that I am the last man on earth he wants his daughter to marry.’
The way he’d been treated by her and her parents was a nauseating truth. She wished—not for the first time—that she’d been able to stand up to them. That she’d been wise enough to fight for the relationship that had mattered so much to her.
‘Nikos...’ She furrowed her brows, searching for words. ‘You have to understand why I...why I couldn’t be with you. You know how my parents were after Libby...after...’
He studied her face, torn between listening and shutting down this hollow explanation.
‘I know I never explained it properly at the time. The way I was always in her shadow. The certainty that I was a poor comparison to her. The absolute blinding fact that they wished again and again that I could be more like her.’ She swallowed, an image of her sister clouding her eyes and making her heart ring with nostalgic affection. ‘They wanted me to marry someone like Anderson—her fiancé. And I wanted their a
pproval so badly I would have done anything they asked.’
He compressed his lips. ‘Yes. I presumed as much at the time.’
He brought his face closer to hers, so she could feel the waves of his resentment.
‘You walked away from me and what we were to each other as though I was nothing to you. You can blame your sister, or you can blame your parents, but the only one who made the decision was you.’
‘I’m trying to explain why...’
‘And I’m telling you that it does not matter to me.’ His eyes flared. ‘You were wrong.’
She had been. In the six years since she’d watched Nikos leave for the last time, his shoulders set, his head held high, she’d never met anyone who excited in her even a tenth of the emotions he had. He alone had been her true love. And she’d burned him in a way that he’d apparently never forgive.
He brought the conversation back to the wedding. ‘The guest list will be extensive and the press coverage—’
‘Nikos!’ Marnie interrupted, her voice strained.
Something in the pale set of her features communicated her distress and he was quiet, watchful.
‘Please.’ Her throat worked overtime as she tried to relieve her aching mouth. ‘I can’t do that.’
‘You do agree to marry me?’
She nodded. ‘But not like that. I... You know how I feel about the media. And, more to the point, how they feel about me.’ She flashed a look at him from beneath thick dark lashes. ‘I’ll marry you. I will. But without all the fuss. Please.’
It was tempting to push her out of her comfort zone. To say that it was a big wedding or none at all. She was staring at him with a look of icy aloofness that had no doubt helped earn her the nickname of Lady Heiress. That look of untouchable elegance bordering on disdain that he understood was her tightly held shield in moments of wrenching panic. That same look he was desperate to dislodge as soon as possible, shaking her into showing her real feelings.
‘You don’t like the press any more than I do,’ she said with measured persistence. ‘If you insist on a big wedding we’ll both know it’s simply to be spiteful to me. And you’re not that petty—are you, Nikos?’
Bought for the Billionaire's Revenge Page 3
