by Tara Pammi
Something flashed in her gaze. “I never said they’ll have a happy ending, Nikos. And as to whether Spike will kill her, I’d say you still underestimate Ms. Havisham. She’s not going to let anyone kill her, least of all Spike.”
Standing back, she held the edge of the material in her hand and pulled. “It’s too tight, isn’t it? I should have gone for XXXL instead of XXL.” She winked at him and started pulling the T-shirt up. “Now it’s going to be really hard to get it off.”
He swallowed at the lick of desire in her blue eyes and at the relentless shiver that took hold of his skin. And let his own desire for her mute the warning bells clanging in his head.
CHAPTER TWELVE
IT WAS A whole week before Nikos had finally untangled himself from Lexi and made it to a meeting aboard his yacht with Theo Katrakis. A meeting that Theo had requested days ago. Nikos had deliberately locked himself out of any business matters but for the most important. Walking over to the glass bar that was the pride of the main deck, he was about to reach for whiskey when he saw an ice bucket with champagne. A note said it was from Theo, which meant he had good news for Nikos.
But instead of the fierce rush of satisfaction he expected, an image of Lexi, trembling with cold champagne over her skin, little mewls of pleasure falling from her mouth, flashed in front of him. He was instantly hard as rock, the strength of his desire unprecedented. That was the word for it. His desire, this ever-growing unease he felt right under his skin, everything about the situation he created with Lexi was unprecedented. And through each day, Nikos felt the doubts he experienced at night with Lexi solidify into cold, hard truth.
More than once, he had caught himself, weakening, wavering and shutting out the world and even work. Postponing this meeting with Theo when he had spent more than a year carefully cultivating this association, blocking out Savas instead of finding out what his grandfather was up to even now...when and how had he become this man?
It was like watching himself exist in a different reality, as vivid as the one in Lexi’s comic book, a happy one, a parallel one that seemed as fragile as it was fantastic. The ruthless life he had carefully built into existence slowly unraveled as Lexi wove herself into the very fabric of his life.
For a man who had never had a romantic relationship that lasted more than a few hours, having one with someone like Lexi was like sitting on a box of explosives. Because that’s what he was doing. Only a week ago he had asked her to stay, and yet now, he felt the iron lid he kept on his control shake loose, and everything he had ruthlessly wiped from his life creep back in.
It was when he had caught himself panicking in the middle of the night because she hadn’t been in the bed, wondering if she had left him like his mother had done, like his father had done, that was when he had realized he needed to get out of there. Cold sweat had drenched him just as his darkest fear rose to the surface.
If he let himself feel so much, there would only be pain. After everything he had survived to get here in life, he didn’t want pain.
Hearing a sound behind him, he turned around.
Theo walked in, a frown on his craggy, old face. Silver glinted in his hair, the warm smile he wore belying the calculatingly shrewd light in his dark eyes. Shaking Nikos’s hand, he subjected Nikos to a thorough scrutiny. Nikos brought him to the deck and they settled down on opposite sides of the table.
The sun glinted off Theo’s skin, shadowing his expression from Nikos. “I was surprised to learn you wanted to postpone the meeting, Nikos. Your sister, she is safe, yes?”
Gritting his teeth, Nikos nodded. He couldn’t fault the man for the doubts in his eyes.
“You still want to continue this alliance between us then?”
“Of course I do, Theo. Nothing else is more important to me.”
Leaning forward, Theo smiled. “Then I have three more votes on my side. They will support me without doubt. Savas does not control the board anymore.”
Nikos smiled. This was it. His dream was within reach now. He would sit in that chair, claim the prize of his hard work. He shook Theo’s hands, his breath ballooning up in his chest. He wanted to celebrate with Lexi, he wanted to...
“There is one condition, though.”
He had been expecting this. And Nikos was prepared. “Name your price, Theo.”
Theo held his gaze. “Marry my daughter, Nikos. Join the Demakis and Katrakis name forever.”
A buzzing filled Nikos’s ears. He shot up from his seat and grabbed the railing. The sea glimmered endlessly blue in front of him. But he heard nothing of the waves with blood rushing into his ears.
His first instinct was to scream the denial that was struggling to be let out of his throat. Distaste coated his tongue at the very thought of Eleni Katrakis. He would find a different way to the CEO’s chair. He couldn’t even indulge in the idea of looking at any other woman except Lexi, he couldn’t even...
All his thoughts came to a suffocating halt, his gut twisting into a hard knot. A chill broke out over his skin, despite the sun shining down. Was he actually considering walking away from his life’s mission because of one woman? Turning his back on everything he had worked toward? To give in to the unknown, unnamed sensation in his gut that filled him with fear over tangible prize? To follow in the same path his father had trodden, leaving nothing but destruction in his wake.
Nikos did not want that life; he had done everything he could to get away from it.
He had nothing to give Lexi, not the kind of woman she was—kind, generous, affectionate. The sooner they moved on with their lives the better.
It was an affair—they both had known that from the beginning. And all affairs, at least his, came to an end.
* * *
Lexi had never felt more intimidated in her life. Even though, for once, she was wearing the right clothes, shoes and even makeup.
The blue cocktail dress was strapless and hugged her chest and waist and then fell to her knees in a playful skirt. Her hair was combed back and piled high, thanks to the stylist that Nikos had insisted on, leaving her nape bare. She had thought the classic lines of the dress would clash with her boyish haircut. But as the stylist had claimed, the blunt haircut made the small planes of her face stand out.
The inaugural party for the hotel on the other side of the island, the same hotel she and Nikos had christened so colorfully just two weeks ago, was open as of tonight. And from what she had overheard from Nikos’s assistant, booked for the next five years through, just as Nikos had predicted. Apparently there were a lot of high-profile celebrities who were really into low-key vacation spots that were a slice of paradise.
Even the party today, set up under an elegant marquee on the beach was a low-key one. Lexi had spotted a celebrity chef that she was dying to tell Tyler about and even a famous underwear model. But more than the international celebrities, it was the presence of Savas Demakis that unsettled her.
With her heated imagination, she had imagined Savas to look cruel and scary. But he looked like any other man here tonight for the most part. Except when he had stopped in front of Lexi fifteen minutes ago and fired off questions without so much as a greeting, as if it was his privilege to be answered.
Cowed by his presence, Lexi had automatically answered. He clearly didn’t like her presence here tonight, but she refused to hide like a dirty secret. With a sigh, she realized that more of Savas’s guests had begun casting looks in her direction, their curiosity blatant.
She would have left for the villa on the other side if it hadn’t been for the fact that she hadn’t seen Nikos in three days. He had spent a week with her and Venetia and Tyler; curiously they had made a very peaceful foursome at the villa before urgent business had called him away. From the way his eyes had lit up, Lexi had known it had to do with the vote for the CEO position on the Demakis board.
She had wished him luck. Only he had told her that he didn’t need luck. And he hadn’t returned or even called her. She had swallowed her disappointment but couldn’t stay away tonight.
According to Venetia, the board was present and was going to make an announcement. Her heart raced as Lexi heard the sounds of a helicopter. She dug her heels into the carpet laid on the beach, fighting the urge to go to Nikos.
She took a champagne flute from a uniformed waiter and joined Tyler and Venetia at their table. The moment Nikos appeared in front of the small dais, people mobbed him from every side.
Glad that she was sitting, Lexi took a sip, just to give her shaking hands something to do.
Surrounded by powerful men and women, Nikos seemed far from the man who had surprised her with the studio.
His gaze raked the crowd, and finding her, settled on her. Across the distance separating them, Lexi felt the weight of it as if he had walked up to her and touched her.
An older man claimed Nikos’s attention and the moment was gone.
A few minutes later, the guests began to settle around the tables under the artistic handmade paper lanterns hanging from the roof of the marquee. And the speeches began.
She had expected Nikos or the American entrepreneur Nathan Ramirez to be giving the speech, but it was the older man who had come to see Nikos on the island a couple of weeks ago. He introduced himself as Theo Katrakis, a board member of the Demakis Board. He went on at length describing Nikos’s achievements, and how his leadership had pumped Demakis International with new blood and money and that congratulations were due to Nikos.
Lexi’s heart thumped hard. Finally, Nikos had what he had worked so hard for.
Nikos was the new CEO of Demakis International. The older man laughed and cracked a joke that Lexi didn’t understand exactly but got the gist of when he invited his daughter Eleni Katrakis to the dais along with Nikos. With Nikos and Eleni on either side, Theo Katrakis beamed and made a comment to Savas.
The broad smile on Savas’s face drove the truth home for Lexi.
Nikos was engaged to Eleni Katrakis.
Lexi’s heart shattered in her chest, her breath hitching in her throat. Her head felt as if it was stuck in a space warp—all sounds and sights warbled in the background against the whooshing in her ears, against the chill on her skin. Like Tyler’s curse and his hands gripping her, Venetia’s shocked glance shifting between her and her brother. But they were all muted against the savage gleam in Savas Demakis’s eyes.
He had stopped history from repeating itself.
He had demanded Nikos pay his price to be the CEO, and Nikos had paid it with his heart. And hers, too.
Because, despite her every effort, she was in love with him. It was the most terrifying truth yet that she had to face. Fear was a physical fist in her gut, a hollowness in her chest.
She had felt like this once before. The memory hit her hard, more sensations and feelings rather than tangible details.
She had been five and after her first day in the public school, she had realized that every other kid in her class had parents. That they didn’t get shuffled from home to home, that they were loved. And that, her parents, for whatever reason, had given her up.
She had cried until her head had hurt, and Mrs. Nesbitt had hugged her hard and washed her face. That’s how she felt now.
Like she had lost something valuable, something precious that she had never had in the first place.
Of all the times to realize how much she wanted him to love her, to hope that he had chosen happiness—hers and his—of all the times to realize that she would forever be alone in this world because she would never stop loving him.
Spike should kill Ms. Havisham.
He had told her how this was going to end.
She blinked back the searing heat behind her eyes. She couldn’t bear to look at him, couldn’t bear for him to see how much she loved him, couldn’t bear for him to see how much he was hurting her.
She wanted to slink away and hide. She wanted to fly back to New York this minute. If she saw him, she would surely break down, would probably beg him to love her as she did him.
Because she couldn’t be sophisticated enough to not let this hurt, because she couldn’t pretend, even for one second, despite his every warning, that she hadn’t fallen in love with him.
She breathed in a deep gulp of air and fought the desperation.
She wasn’t going to take it lying down. If she was going to lose him anyway, she was going to make him face what he had done. She was going to find the man who’d been kind under the brutal honesty, the man who had shown her what it was to live and make sure he understood what he was giving up.
* * *
It was hours before Nikos had been able to extricate himself from the night’s activities. Every board member wanted to congratulate him; every investor wanted a piece of him. Through every minute of it, he had pushed himself to stay, told himself that this was the moment he had worked to achieve for almost fifteen years.
He searched for words to say to her, wondered about what to say and how to do it without hurting her. Like he had done for three days.
He had seen her, sitting quietly at a table at the back, dressed in blue silk that made her look as breathtakingly lovely as she was on the inside. Nothing else had registered in his mind until Theo had made the announcement.
She had looked shattered, and his throat, it had felt as if he had swallowed glass. Only then, did he realize what he had set in motion.
He stood outside her studio now—it would forever be that in his mind—stunned to see her curled up in the recliner.
He had thought she would have fled in disgust. Maybe even hoped for it, like a spineless coward. He was about to step back out when her eyes fluttered open and instantly focused on him. Her knees tucked to her chest, her hands crossed over, she looked tiny, breakable in the huge recliner.
She offered him a small smile, nothing but sadness in her blue eyes. “Congratulations, Nikos.”
“You’re wearing the dress I picked.”
She looked down and ran a hand over the silk. Moonlight threw just enough light to bare her slender shoulders to him. She met his gaze and the intensity of emotion in it skewered him. “I wore it for you. It made me feel different, confident. I wanted to look beautiful tonight. I had a feeling it was going to be special.”
His heart beat a rapid tattoo, a part of him telling him to stay at the door, to not go to her, to act with honor. What little he had left. “I’ve never seen anyone more beautiful.”
She took a deep breath as though to contain herself. “For once, I believe that.”
Shrugging off his coat, he stayed leaning against the door. “I...had no idea Theo was going to announce it tonight.”
Resignation curved her mouth. “Have you already slept with her?”
The profanity that flew from his mouth should have created a frost in the air around them. But it didn’t wash away the bitter need inside to explain why he had agreed to this. He looked at her, and she seemed different. “Christos, I have no interest in her. I haven’t even looked at her.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
At his silence, she smiled. It was the most cynical thing he had ever seen on her innocent face. And he was responsible for putting it there.
“Say it, Nikos. Tell me to be gone. Tell me to my face that you’re done with me, that our little affair has come to an end. Tell me that you’re moving on with more important things in your life.”
“You know it’s not—”
She shook her head and the words halted on his lips. Not that he had any idea what he was going to say. “Don’t you dare say it’s not like that. People have affairs with each other, and then move on, right? Whisper those little words you wh
ispered to Emmanuelle that day. Tell me it is time to pack up my things. Do I get a goodbye gift?”
“Theos, Lexi. What are you doing?”
Hugging her midriff, she cast a furious look at him. Her face alight with color, her mouth mobile, she looked like an angry tigress and nothing like the woman he had expected. “Were you hoping I would just slink away in the night, heartbroken and pitiful? Or were you thinking I would be so desperate to be loved by you, that I would take you any way I got you, that I would accept what little you offer me?”
“I had to make this choice. This marriage is nothing but an agreement.”
His jaw was tight like a vise, his cheekbones sticking out making him forbidden and stark. But Lexi wouldn’t back down. The hurt continued to splinter inside her as if there was no end to it. As if this moment needed to be entrenched inside her, as if she needed to be changed.
Anger, red-hot and roiling, it was the only way to survive the moment and she clutched it to herself.
Because if she didn’t, she would hear that voice inside her head. That little girl filled with hurt, filled with fear, the one that so desperately wanted to be loved.
The only way to drown out that pathetic voice was to ride the storm of anger. “You think I can find solace in the fact that you’re ruining your life along with mine?”
He shifted back, the expression in his eyes cycling from fury to desperation to a terrifying emptiness within seconds. “Don’t say another word,” he said through gritted teeth, every syllable bellowing around them.
“I won’t stop.” She wiped her tears and looked up at him, her heart breaking in her chest. “You have no idea how much the very thought of leaving you terrifies me. I can’t breathe if I think about not seeing you ever again.” She covered the distance between them, and he braced himself as if she was a weapon that would cause him damage. She reached for his face, and he immediately bent his head, his gaze a glittering pool of anger and something else.
