by Jane Porter
He turned and looked at her, his face still shadowed but she felt his intensity. “I don’t want to live without you, Morgan. I don’t like life without you. And maybe that’s weak—”
“Not weak,” she said, leaving the bed to go to him, wrap her arms around his waist. She held him tightly, chilled by what he had told her, as well as chilled by the reality of her parents taking her to McLean and leaving her there when they knew Drakon wanted her, when they knew Drakon loved her. She didn’t understand their motivations, but then, their lives were about money and appearances and Morgan knew she’d embarrassed them by coming home from Greece, heartbroken and hysterical.
He slid a hand down her back, shaping her to him. “I don’t think you understand how much I loved you,” he said roughly. “How much I will always love you.” His voice cracked, turned hoarse. “There is no one else for me, but you. You aren’t just my wife. You are my world.”
“And you are mine.”
“Why did you leave then?”
“I was honestly falling apart.”
“Why?”
“I loved you so much, it scared me. I’d never felt for anyone what I felt for you…but the feelings were so intense, it made me feel out of control. And then when we made love…that started to do something to my head. Played games with me, made me afraid.”
“Afraid? Why? How?”
“I had so little experience when I met you, and you had so much, and in bed you’re…hot. Erotic. Demanding. You make everything hot and erotic, too.”
“I demanded too much of you?”
“There were times I felt overwhelmed.”
“Thus, your disgust.”
“You never disgusted me. I shouldn’t have said that. It wasn’t true. I was just angry and hurt, and trying desperately hard to keep you at arm’s length since I find you impossible to resist.”
He stepped away from her and went to flip the light switch, turning on the small wall sconces so the room glowed with soft yellow light. “Maybe I didn’t disgust you, but I must have scared you at times for you to even say such a thing.”
“I never minded it being…hot…when you were relaxed with me, and spent a lot of time with me, but once we returned to Athens, I didn’t see you often and then we weren’t talking and it didn’t feel the same. It didn’t feel as warm and safe. It felt more dangerous.”
“But you always came.”
“Because you’ve got great technique.” She managed an unsteady smile. “But I’d rather not come, and just be close to you, feel close to you, than have erotic sex and have you feel like a stranger.”
He sat down on the side of the bed. “Come here.” He smiled crookedly. “Please.”
Morgan walked to him, heart thumping, and feeling painfully shy. “Yes?”
He drew her down onto the bed next to him, and kissed her, once and again, before lifting his head to look down into her eyes. “I love how sensual you are. I love your passionate nature. But I never want you to be uncomfortable with me again…in bed, or out of bed. I love you too much to hurt you or scare you or to push you away. But you have to tell me when something is too much. You have to tell me when I’m being distant or when you feel nervous or lonely or afraid.”
“You want me to talk to you,” she said.
“Yes. I want you to talk to me.”
“That means you have to talk to me, too.”
He smiled even more crookedly. “I know.”
“Okay.”
“But I don’t want you bored…especially in bed.”
“My God, Morgan, I could never be bored in bed with you.”
“No?”
“No! When we’re together it’s not about sex…its about me showing you how much you mean to me. How much I cherish you. How much I worship you. When I touch you, Morgan, I’m telling you that nothing is more important to me than you, and that I love you with all of my heart, and all of my soul.”
“Really?”
“Really.” His gaze searched hers. “All I have wanted for these past five years is to have you come home. I want you home. Morgan, please come home with me—”
“Yes.” She reached up, cupped his cheek, drawing his face toward hers. She kissed him, deeply, and a shiver raced through her as his tongue met hers, teasing her. “Yes. I’m staying with you, going home with you, back to Athens.”
“Even though you hate that white ice cube tray?” he asked, turning his mouth into her hand and kissing her palm.
Another delicious shiver ran through her and she smiled. “But would you mind if I added a few colorful rugs? A few paintings…some throw pillows?”
“Maybe what we really need is a new house for a fresh start—”
“No.”
“Yes. I don’t like the house, either.”
“What?”
He laughed softly. “I hate it. It’s awful. I never liked it. Not while they were building it, and not even when we moved in, but I thought you did like it, so I never told you.”
“I think we have a slight communication problem,” she said drily.
“You think?” he teased, pressing her backward onto the bed, and then stretching out over her, his long hard body covering hers.
“We need to work on it.”
“Mmm,” he agreed, kissing her throat and pushing the covers down to bare her breasts. “We’re going to have to start talking more,” he said, alternately kissing and licking the slope of her breast.
She sighed and arched as he latched onto one of her tight, pebbled nipples. “Okay,” she gasped, desire coiling in her belly.
“Do you like this?” he asked, as he stroked down her flat belly.
“Um, yes.”
“And this?” he asked, his fingers slipping between her legs.
She gasped as he caressed her most sensitive spot. “Yes. And I’m glad we’re talking…but do we have to do it now?”
She felt his silent laughter as his teeth scraped her nipple. “No,” he answered. “I’d much rather just concentrate on you, and making you come.”
“Good.”
She gasped again as his fingers slipped down, where she was slick and wet, and then caressed up over the nub again. “Drakon?”
“Yes, gynaika mou?”
“Make love to me. And love me. Forever.”
He shifted, bracing his weight on his arms and looked down into her eyes for an endless moment. “Always. Always, and forever, until I die.”
EPILOGUE
“WILL YOU DO it, Logan? Cover for me for a few days so Drakon and I can have a brief getaway?” Morgan asked, speaking calmly into the phone, trying to sound relaxed, even though she was frustrated with Logan for dodging her calls for the past week. “You’d just be a point person for a few days, if there are any communication issues, but I doubt there will be.”
“I can’t drop everything and take over Dad’s search just so you and Drakon can have a second honeymoon,” Logan said, her voice sharp on the speakerphone. “Some of us have jobs, Morgan. Some of us must work as we don’t have wealthy husbands to take care of us.”
“Would you like a wealthy husband, Logan?” Drakon said, unable to remain silent in his seat across from Morgan’s on his private jet. They were still on the ground, hadn’t closed the doors, because Morgan had refused to take off until Logan promised she’d help. “You know it can be arranged.”
“No, thank you, Drakon. I am quite capable of taking care of myself,” Logan retorted crisply.
Drakon smiled. “You might actually enjoy a strong Greek husband…almost as much as he’d enjoy managing you.”
“Not going to happen,” Logan snapped. “But if it will help me get off this call, then yes, Morgan, I will be your contact person should something happen while you and Drakon are doing whatever you and Drakon do.”
Drakon arched a brow at Morgan, and Morgan shook her head at him, blushing. “I seriously doubt anything will happen, though. We’re only going to be gone a few days…just for a long weekend—�
�
“I got it. You’re just gone a few days. Dunamas is doing all the intelligence work and orchestrating the rescue. They’ll call me if they can’t reach you should there be developments.” Logan paused. “Did I forget anything?”
Morgan grimaced. “No. That’s pretty much it.”
“Good. Now go…scram. Enjoy your trip. And try to have fun. Dad’s going to be okay.” Logan’s voice suddenly softened. “I’ll make sure he is, I promise.”
Morgan hung up and looked at Drakon, who had just signaled to his flight crew that they were ready to take off. “Why am I worrying so much?”
His amber gaze met hers. “Because you deliberately withheld information from her, knowing she’d never agree to help us if she thought she’d have to deal with Rowan.”
Morgan chewed on her lip. “Let’s just hope she doesn’t have to deal with him. Otherwise there’s going to be hell to pay.”
“Rowan said the exact same thing.”
* * * * *
At The Greek Boss’s Bidding
For two of my favourite heroes, my brothers, Dr. Thomas W. Porter and Robert George Porter.
Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
EXCERPT
PROLOGUE
THE HELICOPTER SLAMMED against the rocky incline of the mountain thick with drifts of snow.
Glass shattered, metal crunched and red flames shot from the engine, turning what Kristian Koumantaros knew was glacial white into a shimmering dance of fire and ice.
Unable to see, he struggled with his seatbelt. The helicopter tilted, sliding a few feet. Fire burned everywhere as the heat surged, surrounding him. Kristian tugged his seatbelt again. The clip was jammed.
The smoke seared his lungs, blistering each breath.
Life and death, he thought woozily. Life and death came down to this. And life-and-death decisions were often no different than any other decisions. You did what you had to do and the consequences be damned.
Kristian had done what he had to do and the consequences damned him.
As the roar of the fire grew louder, the helicopter shifted again, the snow giving way.
My God. Kristian threw his arms out, and yet there was nothing to grab, and they were sent tumbling down the mountain face. Another avalanche, he thought, deafened by the endless roar—
And then nothing.
CHAPTER ONE
“OHI. NO.” THE deep, rough voice could be none other than Kristian Koumantaros himself. “Not interested. Tell her to go away.”
Standing in the hall outside the library, Elizabeth Hatchet drew a deep breath, strengthening her resolve. This was not going to be easy, but then nothing about Kristian Koumantaros’s case had been easy. Not the accident, not the rehab, not the location of his estate.
It had taken her two days to get here from London—a flight from London to Athens, an endless drive from Athens to Sparta, and finally a bone-jarring cart and donkey trip halfway up the ridiculously inaccessible mountain.
Why anybody, much less a man who couldn’t walk and couldn’t see, would want to live in a former monastery built on a rocky crag on a slope of Taygetos, the highest mountain in the Peloponnese, was beyond her. But now that she was here, she wasn’t going to go away.
“Kyrios.” Another voice sounded from within the library and Elizabeth recognized the voice as the Greek servant who’d met her at the door. “She’s traveled a long way—”
“I’ve had it with the bloody help from First Class Rehab. First Class, my ass.”
Elizabeth closed her eyes and exhaled slowly, counting to ten as she did so.
She’d been told by her Athens staff that it was a long trip to the former monastery.
She’d been warned that reaching rugged Taygetos, with its severe landscape but breathtaking vistas, was nearly as exhausting as caring for Mr. Koumantaros.
Her staff had counseled that traveling up this spectacular mountain with its ancient Byzantine ruins would seem at turns mythical as well as impossible, but Elizabeth, climbing into the donkey cart, had thought she’d been prepared. She’d thought she knew what she was getting into.
Just like she’d thought she knew what she was getting into when she agreed to provide Mr. Koumantaros’s home health care after he was released from the French hospital.
In both cases she had been wrong.
The painfully slow, bumpy ride had left her woozy, with a queasy stomach and a pounding headache.
Attempting to rehabilitate Mr. Koumantaros had made her suffer far worse. Quite bluntly, he’d nearly bankrupted her company.
Elizabeth tensed at the sound of glass breaking, followed by a string of select and exceptionally colorful Greek curses.
“Kyrios, it’s just a glass. It can be replaced.”
“I hate this, Pano. Hate everything about this—”
“I know, kyrios.” Pano’s voice dropped low, and Elizabeth couldn’t hear much of what was said, but apparently it had the effect of calming Mr. Koumantaros.
Elizabeth wasn’t soothed.
Kristian Koumantaros might be fabulously wealthy and able to afford an eccentric and reclusive lifestyle in the Peloponnese, but that didn’t excuse his behavior. And his behavior was nothing short of self-absorbed and self-destructive.
She was here because Kristian Koumantaros couldn’t keep a nurse, and he couldn’t keep a nurse because he couldn’t keep his temper.
The voices in the library were growing louder again. Elizabeth, fluent in Greek, listened as they discussed her.
Mr. Koumantaros didn’t want her here.
Pano, the elderly butler, was attempting to convince Mr. Koumantaros that it wouldn’t be polite to send the nurse away without seeing her.
Mr. Koumantaros said he didn’t care about being polite.
Elizabeth’s mouth curved wryly as the butler urged Mr. Koumantaros to at least offer her some refreshment.
Her wry smile disappeared as she heard Mr. Koumantaros answer that as most nurses from First Class Rehab were large women Ms. Hatchet could probably benefit from passing on an afternoon snack.
“Kyrios,” Pano persisted, “she’s brought a suitcase. Luggage. Ms. Hatchet intends to stay.”
“Stay?” Koumantaros roared.
“Yes, kyrios.” The elderly Greek’s tone couldn’t have been any more apologetic, but his words had the effect of sending Kristian into another litany of curses.
“For God’s sake, Pano, leave the damn glass alone and dispense with her. Throw her a bone. Get her a donkey. I don’t care. Just do it. Now.”
“But she’s traveled from London—”
“I don’t care if she flew from the moon. She had no business coming here. I left a message two weeks ago with the service. That woman knows perfectly well I’ve fired them. I didn’t ask her to come. And it’s not my problem she wasted her time.”
Speaking of which, Elizabeth thought, rubbing at the back of her neck to ease the pinch of pain, she was wasting time standing here. It was time to introduce herself, get the meeting underway.
Shoulders squared, Elizabeth took a deep breath and pushed the tall door open. As she entered the room, her low heels made a faint clicking sound on the hardwood floor.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Koumantaros,” she said. Her narrowed gaze flashed across the shuttered windows, cluttered coffee table, newspapers stacked computer-high on a corner desk. Had to be a month’s newspapers piled there, unread.
“You’re trespassing, and eavesdropping.” Kristian jerked upright in his wheelchair, his deep voice vibrating with fury.
She barely glanced his way, heading instead for the small table filled with prescription
bottles. “You were shouting, Mr. Koumantaros. I didn’t need to eavesdrop. And I’d be trespassing if your care weren’t my responsibility, but it is, so you’re going to have to deal with me.”
At the table, Elizabeth picked up one of the medicine bottles to check the label, and then the others. It was an old habit, an automatic habit. The first thing a medical professional needed to know was what, if anything, the patient was taking.
Kristian’s hunched figure in the wheelchair shuddered as he tried to follow the sound of her movements, his eyes shielded by a white gauze bandage wrapped around his head, the white gauze a brilliant contrast to his thick onyx hair. “Your services have already been terminated,” he said tersely.
“You’ve been overruled,” Elizabeth answered, returning the bottles to the table to study him. The bandages swathing his eyes exposed the hard, carved contours of his face. He had chiseled cheekbones, a firm chin and strong jaw shadowed with a rough black beard. From the look of it, he hadn’t shaved since the last nurse had been sent packing.
“By whom?” he demanded, leaning crookedly in his chair.
“Your physicians.”
“My physicians?”
“Yes, indeed. We’re in daily contact with them, Mr. Koumantaros, and these past several months have made them question your mental soundness.”
“You must be joking.”
“Not at all. There is a discussion that perhaps you’d be better cared for in a facility—”
“Get out!” he demanded, pointing at the door. “Get out now.”
Elizabeth didn’t move. Instead she cocked her head, coolly examining him. He looked impossibly unkempt, nothing like the sophisticated, powerful tycoon he’d reportedly been, with castles and estates scattered all over the world and a gorgeous mistress tucked enticingly in each.
“They fear for you, Mr. Koumantaros,” she added quietly, “and so do I. You need help.”
“That’s absurd. If my doctors were so concerned, they’d be here. And you…you don’t know me. You can’t drop in here and make assessments based on two minutes of observation.”
