Redeemed By Her Innocence

CHAPTER THREE

MARTIN’S SUITE WAS in the Duchess Wing, about a mile of plush velvet carpet to the east of the grand ballroom. They walked in complete silence along its length until the ornate double doors came into sight.

Nikos had the good sense not to say a word until they got there but he was weighing up what he’d just heard and it sounded nasty. Whatever the guy had done, breaking a promise sounded like the least of it. And accusing her of being a martyr. Nikos had met more than a few of those, but in his experience they tended to be the nice ones.

Maria had never played the martyr. Maria took what she wanted and what other people wanted too...

‘You all right?’ he asked, his hand on the doorknob. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

Jacquelyn looked up at him with eyes that told him she was still feeling some pain.

‘I’m fine,’ she replied. ‘Thank you.’

Nikos nodded and opened the door of Martin’s suite, ushering her in.

‘I found your friend Jacquelyn. She wants a word.’

Martin looked up, surprised. He was sitting at a fireplace filled with yet another giant arrangement of flowers.

‘Of course. If that’s OK with you, Nikos?’

Nikos stood back and watched her sail right past him and perch on the sofa opposite Martin. Her back was ramrod straight and she turned, flashing Nikos a look that might have said, thank you, but might as easily have said, beat it.

‘Yeah, sure. I was on my way to get my phone. I’ll be back in five. That long enough, do you think?’

Martin nodded vigorously. Jacquelyn didn’t move a muscle.

Nikos closed the door and walked back to his suite.

She was a force of nature, that one. The Ice Queen, but the way she’d blasted that guy was pure fire. It was impressive. And if she pitched like that to Martin he didn’t stand a chance.

Maybe he’d been too harsh on her. She was clearly passionate about her business, and good for her. If he’d been in tough times, the last thing he’d want to do was waste his precious time on small talk with a stranger.

He collected his phone and checked for messages and emails, frowning when he saw yet another one from his accountant, Mark, about the investigation into Maria’s missing assets. He had better get answers from Martin. This whole thing was getting more and more out of hand.

He rounded the corner of the hallway and paused. He put an ear to the door to see if they were still talking.

Martin’s deep voice was making reassuring noises; Jacquelyn seemed to be silent. He knocked on the door and walked in.

‘OK? All wrapped up?’

He didn’t have time to worry if it wasn’t. He had his own issues to deal with now.

‘Nikos. Great timing.’

Martin was facing Jacquelyn. They were both standing, but now Martin was the one who looked imploringly at him, and Jacquelyn’s eyes were bright with—hope?

‘I was just explaining to Jacquelyn that I’m retiring. She’s looking for an investor and I was trying to think of someone else who’d be a good fit. I don’t know if I mentioned but Ariana Bridal goes back quite a long way. They need to modernise, perhaps? Would that be right, Jacquelyn? And so maybe you or your connections would be a...better fit...?’

Nikos shook his head.

‘I’m not looking to invest in anything, Martin. I’m here to sort a problem.’

He held up his phone.

‘A problem that’s giving me a headache. While we were giving out awards, I’ve been getting more messages.’

‘I won’t take up much of your time, Mr Karellis.’

On a heartbeat Jacquelyn turned and walked towards him. She was breathtaking and he realised he was still standing holding his phone in the air. Quickly he pulled his arm down.

‘Time is what I don’t have. Martin?’ he said, meaning, Martin, what the hell are you thinking?

‘Maybe you could squeeze in five minutes with Jacquelyn before you go?’

‘I promise it won’t take longer than five minutes. Ten at the most. Martin understands. This is a business that has so much to offer. We go back decades and we’ve got great plans. We just need a break.’

Nikos looked at Martin, who raised his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders as if to say wouldn’t hurt.

With a sigh that he didn’t even know he was going to make, he breathed out an, ‘OK.’

‘Five minutes. If we get this sorted,’ he said to Martin. Then turning to Jacquelyn, ‘Wait in the bar and I’ll send someone.’

She nodded and smiled, and as she breezed past she stopped suddenly and grabbed his hand in both of hers. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered. ‘I guarantee you won’t regret it.’

He nodded gruffly, but the sensation of his coarse hand in her delicate fingers was sweet and soft and he was happy to linger there for a moment. He smiled, and she smiled back. Light seemed to sparkle in her eyes and her features lit up. The face of an angel.

She squeezed his hand and then let go and headed for the door, trailing behind her delicate scent.

He waited until she had gone and then closed the door. ‘What the hell’s going on, Martin?’ he said. ‘You know I’m under pressure here.’

‘You could have said no,’ said Martin, eyebrows raised.

‘Garbage. You set me up. There’s no way anyone could say no to that.’

‘She’s quite something, isn’t she?’

‘Hmmm,’ said Nikos, ‘but you do know that I won’t be giving her anything other than some hard home truths? I’m not getting mixed up in anything. Especially with a woman who just needs to stand in a corner and whistle and she’ll have men lying at her feet.’

‘She’s not like that at all. She’s from a very good family.’

‘That counts for nothing. Anyway, let’s get on with this. What’s going down? Why the year-long battle with your lawyers? Just what are you trying to prove?’

Martin stood with his back to the fireplace of flowers. The top of his greying head was visible in the ornate mirror. His face was cast in a sickly pallor, and he frowned and clasped his fingers. He was clearly agitated.

‘I’m not trying to prove or disprove anything. My back’s against the wall. All I know is that Maria had some investments. She was involved in something just before she died. I think it was illegal.’

Nikos nodded. No shocks so far...

‘I see. Do we have any clue as to what it was?’

He noticed Martin wringing his hands again.

‘Not exactly. She never confided in me—apart from the garbled message she left the night she died. And I think that’s what the police are following up too.’

Nikos turned away. The night she died...almost the worst night of his life.

He’d turned up at his villa in Greece and found his wife topless in the hot tub with his old man. The night her drug-taking and his old man’s drug-selling had combined in one fatal party. The night Nikos had walked away and never looked back, not even when she ran screaming after him.

No, he didn’t ever want to think about that night again, but it didn’t seem he had any choice.

‘That stuff about the drugs?’ he said quietly. ‘We both know she bought them from my dad.’

‘I think it’s more than that. I think he’s the one behind the other investments. At least, that’s what he’s telling me...’

Nikos looked up sharply.

‘What do you mean?’

‘I’ve had some communication from him.’

Suddenly Martin’s sickly pallor and wringing hands made sense. Communicating with Arthur was never pleasant and Nikos had studiously avoided it for nearly twenty years. He blocked calls, emails, and every security guard knew his father’s face on sight. He’d left Australia to get away from him, and he was damned if he was going to let him into his life in any way, shape or form ever again.

‘OK. Out with it. What does he want?’

Martin cleared his throat.

‘He wants forty million dollars. He says that that night they both went fifty-fifty on some investment she’d bought into in Cayman. He transferred five million dollars and then she... Well, you know what happened.’

‘You don’t really believe that, do you?’

Martin turned and leaned his hands on the fireplace.

‘I don’t know what to believe. He says he gave her the money and the company has quadrupled in value. He says she invested it—and he works it out to be forty million that he says he’s owed.’

‘Owed?’

‘By you as her beneficiary. And if you won’t pay up—me.’

‘He’s insane. Did you tell him that she left nothing? Zero? That there is no estate—only trails of debt that lead in a hundred different directions. All I have is what I built myself and, trust me, I don’t have a spare forty million lying around. I’d have noticed if I did. What evidence does he have for any of this?’

Martin shrugged.

‘That’s all I know. But I’m guessing you’ll find out one way or another.’

Nikos laughed mirthlessly.

‘I wouldn’t give him forty cents, never mind forty million dollars. After what he did?’

He’d had enough of all this. He walked to the door, was there in three strides.

‘Is that all you’ve got to say?’ said Martin, still hooked around the fireplace.

Nikos turned. ‘What else is there? He’s a lowlife blackmailing piece of scum and if he thinks this is going to result in anything other than me hating him even more, he’s mistaken.’

He opened the door and then closed it again.

‘And I suggest you get yourself some better company to keep, Martin.’

He pulled the door closed and stood in the plush silent hallway, his heart thundering in his ears and his body primed for fight. He had to get a hold of himself or he’d rip someone’s head off. He had to throw everything he had at it. But the fact that it was his old man who had stoked it all to life wasn’t wasted on him. Everything he touched turned poisonous. Every goddamned time.

There would be some grain of truth in that cock-and-bull story because it was too crazy for there not to be. But he wasn’t leaving it up to chance. He was going to go back to the villa and go through the vault. The one place he’d avoided for years might be the one place he’d find what he was looking for.

He speed-dialled his accountant.

‘Mark,’ he said, ‘as soon as you get this I want you to check out every transfer that went into or out of Maria’s accounts around the time she died. I’m looking for an investment in a company registered in the Cayman Islands. It’s probably something that she’ll have buried so it might be hard to find. That’s all I have for now but I think this could be what’s behind the investigation and the letters from Martin Lopez’s solicitors.’

He clicked off the phone as a waiter walked past with a tray of drinks. Parties were still kicking off but he was in no mood to party. What he needed now was silence. And sleep.

He was jet-lagged and pumped with adrenalin, and there wasn’t enough whisky in the whole place to knock him under. He needed to stand in a hot shower and hit the sack.

He pushed open the door of his suite, stepping out of his trousers, removing his jacket, heaving at his tie and unbuttoning his shirt with fingers that even now still shook with rage.

In the shower he stood, water from all angles pummelling his back and legs and head. He had to cool it. Be cool. Rein it in, Nikos. Calm it.

He thought of his mother lying in her bed in the nursing home. He thought of her sweet smile in the photograph of them at the beach, and then he thought of the blank, unseeing eyes that had looked at him the day before.

Every step he took was for her. To make her proud, to make all her own suffering worthwhile. He wasn’t going to go under because of his father. He wasn’t going to let Arthur ruin his reputation or his fortune. He was going to fight back.

He turned off the jets of water and dried himself. There was a noise outside. He opened the bathroom door a crack and listened. Someone was battering on the door. Martin?

He walked through the room, kicking up his suit trousers and catching them in his right hand as he opened the door with his left.

But it wasn’t Martin. It was the blonde in the blue dress.

‘Hi,’ he said, confused. Then he slapped his forehead. ‘Damn. Sorry. You’ve been waiting in the bar to see me. I said I’d send for you.’

Her eyes opened like starbursts, falling from his face to his chest and the towel knotted at his hips.

‘Sorry, I was taking a shower.’

She stared at her feet, then down the hall, then at her feet. ‘I am so sorry. I really did not mean to disturb you. It was getting so late... I’ll go back and wait downstairs.’

‘What time is it?’ he said, trying to bury his impatience. This he could do without.

‘Um...’ she said. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know. My phone ran out of power.’

‘And I clearly don’t have a watch on,’ he said with a cynical chuckle.

She blushed furiously. She was very, very pretty when she blushed. She was very pretty, full stop. He could be in the mood to spend some time with her. That would be better than whisky at taking the edge off, for sure.

‘Come in. I’ll get some clothes on. We can chat now.’

He threw the door back and walked inside, tossing the trousers over a chair in the passing.

‘If you don’t mind, I’d rather not.’

He turned around, couldn’t hide his surprise, but she was staring at her feet, her hands clasped in front of her.

‘Much as I want to have a meeting with you, it wouldn’t be appropriate for me to come in while you’re undressed.’

He walked to the wardrobe and helped himself to a large white fluffy bathrobe, tied it at his waist.

‘Suit yourself,’ he said.

She looked up. Further along the hallway, noise bubbled out as a door opened. After-parties were probably taking place all over the hotel and she was too prudish to step over the threshold of his room?

‘I hope you understand,’ she said, taking another step back from the doorway. ‘I want to talk about my business—that’s all.’

He almost laughed out loud but when her face didn’t break into a smile, he realised she was completely serious. How about that? She’d secured a meeting with him, but only on her terms. And those terms were...refreshing.

‘Well, that’s fine by me—but I won’t be around for much longer if you still want that five minutes.’

‘Maybe I could come by tomorrow morning before you leave?’

That would be a no, he thought.

With his flight scheduled for ten thirty, he’d be out of here an hour earlier, and the thought of cramming anything else into his head right now was not appealing at all.

But she looked so young, so full of hope. Like a flower opening its petals at the first burst of sunshine. He didn’t really want to crush her, did he?

He nodded.

‘OK. Come for breakfast. Nine.’

The sweet joy that spread across her face was beautiful, like a child’s, and it was amazing how good that made him feel—for a second.

‘Thank you so much. I promise not to waste your time.’

‘We’ll see,’ he said.

But as he put his hand on the door and began to close it, his phone lit up. Mark. More bad news.

CHAPTER FOUR

A SLEEPLESS NIGHT, anxiety and a heatwave. What a killer combo. But at least she had a reason, and a fast-approaching deadline.

Jacquelyn flew around the studio tidying up the mess she’d made over the previous four hours. She was exhausted but she was getting ready to meet Nikos Karellis and for the first time in ages she felt hopeful, optimistic—happy?

It wasn’t what she’d set out to do, but it was even better than finance from Martin Lopez. This was a chance with House, for goodness’ sake! It was the retail sensation that had expanded when everyone else was shutting up shop and disappearing down online rabbit holes.

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