Hot Picks: His Bride Of Consequence

CHAPTER FIVE

AND just like that, from the moment she’d fatefully bumped into Alexandros Kouros again, he’d come back into her life with the force of an atom bomb and turned everything upside down and inside out. And all because he needed a convenient wife. Someone who wouldn’t expect a happy ever after when he discarded them by the wayside of his fast-paced life that had no room for a real marriage.

Kallie moved through the next three weeks as though in some kind of a fog. Where once Alexandros had been blissfully absent, now he was everywhere she turned. In her office, at the door of her flat, on the phone, barking terse instructions. The paparazzi had snapped them coming out of the Hotel de Crillon that night after dinner. Kallie had been so shell-shocked coming out that she’d barely noticed the flashing, popping bulbs. And only the next day when she’d opened the papers had she seen the pictures. Headlines screamed of a possible romance…which was promptly confirmed by Alexandros’s PR people. Before she even had time to draw breath, the net was being drawn tighter and tighter around her. And no doubt, she thought bitterly, he saw the justice in dragging her name through the papers now, too.

She drew the line, however, when he sent over a credit card one day close to the wedding with an order to kit herself out, and called him angrily on the phone.

‘I will not be paraded like some gilded lily. And I will not go and buy clothes with your money, to your specifications. You may be as good as blackmailing me to buy yourself a convenient wife but I will not be your chattel, Alexandros. I’ve been dressing myself successfully with no complaints for some time now and I intend to keep doing so.’

‘Well, believe me, you’re going to need a little gilding to be my wife. Your look is far too casually natural—’

Kallie gasped in consternation, seething. ‘Weren’t you the one who implied that I might have had work done? Make up your mind!’

He was quite unconcerned, drawling, ‘That was before I saw you again properly. I’m quite sure now that you’ve had no…surgical enhancements and, believe me, I’m looking forward to finding out for sure.’

That was when Kallie slammed the phone down. She cut up the credit card and sent it back to Alexandros with a courier. Which he received with a wry smile. The first woman, ever, to refuse his money. He wondered what game Kallie might be playing but couldn’t deny that he was growing more and more intrigued by the day. Having to take a convenient wife was turning out to be far more entertaining than he’d first anticipated.

The day before the civil marriage was to take place at the office of the mairie on the Place Du Panthéon, Kallie was meeting her uncle for lunch near his office on the Champs Elysées. The Arc de Triomphe was a mere shape in the distance as she steeled herself and went into the restaurant.

He stood as she approached and they kissed on both cheeks in a warm greeting. She hadn’t seen him since that night at the Ritz. They’d spoken on the phone when she’d delivered her news of the wedding and now she couldn’t put off the inevitable any more. Finally, after she’d prevaricated for as long as possible, he got to the point. Taking her hand across the table, he said gently, ‘Kallie, darling, you know how important to me you are, you’re like another daughter.’

‘I know…’ She tried to keep the emotion out of her voice, aching to be able to confide in someone, anyone.

‘Are you telling me the truth about Alexandros?’ He shook his head. ‘I just find it a little hard to believe that you bumped into him that night and have had this whirlwind romance. I know him, Kallie. He’s not given to random romantic whims…and this, well, it’s completely out of character. Especially with the history between you. I remember how angry he was. That story in the paper—’

Kallie cut him off before he could delve too deeply into the past—the present was hard enough to deal with. ‘Alexei. Please. believe me when I say you don’t have to worry about anything.’ She crossed her fingers under the table on a superstitious reflex. ‘It is true. We met that night and…I don’t know.’ She shrugged and pasted a bland smile on her face. ‘He’s changed. Seven years is a long time. He doesn’t harbour any grudges.’ Her fingers were clenched so tightly that Kallie could feel the blood flow stopping. ‘Trust me, Alexei, I don’t want you to think about it, really. I want to marry Alexandros.’

She prayed that her hopelessly romantic uncle wouldn’t push her to say anything about love. He looked unconvinced for a long moment but then something seemed to pass over his face and he smiled. ‘I do trust you, Kallie.’ He squeezed her hand. ‘I know it can happen like that. After all, didn’t I fall in love with your Aunt Petra in just a week?’

Kallie smiled weakly.

A rogue part of her needed to check something. ‘Alexei, that night at the Ritz, you mentioned that you’d had to go to Alexandros. Is there anything you want to tell me?’

He paled and Kallie’s heart fell. Confirmation…as if she needed it at this stage. Even so, a tiny part of her had clung to some mad, irrational hope. He blustered slightly, clearly embarrassed, his macho Greek pride painfully evident and obviously the reason why he hadn’t said anything about the loan. ‘My dear, don’t be ridiculous, we’re just doing business, that’s all.’

She read far more into his reactions than he suspected. She’d checked up on what Alexandros had said and every word he’d uttered had been true. Things were even worse than she’d anticipated. She didn’t know how Alexei had been managing for so long without a loan. His efforts to secure loans elsewhere were dismayingly documented in financial papers. Guilt made her feel cold inside again. If she’d been the slightest bit interested, she would have noticed. Her shares had long been sucked into the haemorrhaging business.

She had to comfort herself that at least this way she was keeping Alexandros’s lust for revenge to herself. No one else would ever know and the Demarchis shipping fleet would be safe. It was cold comfort, however, as she said goodbye to her still uncomfortable-looking uncle. She’d never felt so alone and vulnerable in her life. As she walked back down one of the most famous boulevards in the world, she felt as if everything was closing in on her and her last chance of possibly avoiding her fate had just disappeared. Snuffed out like the light of a candle. She shivered in the warm spring air.

When she got back to her office Alexandros was waiting for her. Her whole body stiffened in blatant rejection of what was to come the next day. He noted it with narrowed eyes as he watched her walk in from behind her desk. As at home as if he sat there every day. He made a thorough study of her, up and down, taking in the black pencil skirt, the cream high-necked shirt, which she was supremely grateful for now.

‘Can I help you with something?’

He uncurled his tall length from the chair and came around the desk. Devastatingly compelling in a dark suit and dark shirt. Kallie took a step back. The room seemed to have become as hot as hell in seconds. Alexandros flicked his head to indicate the window and looked out. Kallie walked over very warily, keeping a good distance, but even that couldn’t stop the frisson of awareness running through her.

Outside, swarming on the pavement, were what seemed to be hundreds of photographers. The circus that surrounded Alexandros Kouros. She hadn’t seen them before as she’d come in through another entrance. He came and stood beside her. Her skin prickled uncomfortably. So far he hadn’t said a word. The moment seemed to stretch for ever. And finally with silky deadliness he said softly, ‘You see that? They’re all going to be waiting outside the office of the mairie tomorrow. Waiting to see you arrive, go in and then come out on my arm. And they’re going to get the pictures they want. If you’re planning any little surprises, like not turning up, then I will find you, Kallie, and I will take you as far away from here as I can, and we will be married where you will have no escape.’

She turned to face him, dread in her body at his cold tone. This stranger before her. Bitterness laced her voice. ‘I’ve already told you I’d marry you. I’d do anything to save my family from ruin. Even if it means marrying you and subjecting myself to a period of purgatory.’

He turned to face her, his face stamped with arrogance and a sensuality that even now called to her on some base, carnal level. She hated him. She knew she kept telling herself that…and knew it felt as though she was trying to convince herself.

He reached out a finger and trailed it along her jaw. She clenched it and he tapped where it bulged out against her smooth skin.

‘Such dramatic language, Kallie. When you set me up all those years ago, when I was considered as close as family, it made me very wary. I’m just warning you what will happen if you decide to leave your family to their fate. That’s all.’

He was so far off base from how Kallie felt that her head swam. She would never, ever do something to hurt her family. It seemed as if everything, every conversation that had ever passed between them, had turned to poisoned ashes. And amounted to nothing. He’d decided to judge her solely based on what he’d perceived her to have done seven years ago.

She straightened her shoulders and stuck her chin out.

‘I will be there tomorrow, Alexandros, and, believe me, you’re going to be sorry you ever married me.’

‘Somehow I don’t think so. But I admire your attempt at bravado. One other thing. I’ve asked members of our families, just as a little added…insurance.’

Kallie felt her throat clog and wanted nothing more than to hit him right in the solar plexus, wipe that smug smirk from his face. But then he snaked a hand around the back of her head through her hair and pulled her softly to him. Panic coursed through her. Her hands came up in an instinctive and classic defense pose between them.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ She tingled with anticipation.

‘Just the one other thing I need to confirm for myself before I make you my wife…check the levels of compatibility…’

‘Levels of—’

And before she could speak another word, his head had dipped, daylight disappeared and his mouth was on hers. Warm and intoxicating and hot and…words disappeared. Kallie found her hands resting against his broad chest, his heat coursing over her skin, making her heat up all over. She felt herself wanting to melt into him, against his hard length. His lips moved against hers, hard and insistent. A completely instinctive unbidden response made her open her mouth and at the first touch of his tongue to hers, an explosive heat erupted deep in her belly.

She felt him pulling her in tighter, lifting her up against him. She wanted nothing more than to give in…lean against him, savour the support. Her eyes flew open. His were shut. Hidden.

What was wrong with her? What was she thinking?

She welcomed reality, letting it flow through her like ice, dousing the flame of desire that wanted to burst into flame like a flash fire. His mouth was still moving over hers, and a weak part of her was an insistent voice saying, Give in, give in.

She clenched her hands into fists with a huge effort and pushed against his chest. It was like a steel wall, immovable. She twisted her mouth away from his and was shocked at how ragged her breathing was. Pushing her chest against his, making her very aware of how her breasts had begun to ache, her nipples so hard they chafed against her bra. He tried to twist her head back and Kallie struggled in earnest now, beating against his chest, her breath coming more and more ragged and jerky. She still couldn’t speak.

He finally loosened his hold and Kallie used it to push herself out of his arms, staggering back against the desk behind her. If it hadn’t been there, she would have fallen to the floor, she knew that for sure. Her hands clung to the ridges behind her, her entire body pulsed, heat melted the ice and she had the strongest urge to throw herself back into his arms and beg him to kiss her again. She tried to bring her breathing under control and marvelled that kissing him so chastely at seventeen certainly hadn’t prepared her for this…

She was undone. In the space of seconds. Had given in spectacularly before she’d stopped, letting him know of her weak acquiescence. She couldn’t look up and saw his feet come into her line of vision on the floor in front of her. A hand came under her chin, tipping it up to face him, and she shut her eyes.

‘Kallie, closing your eyes isn’t going to make the truth go away.’

Against her better judgment she opened them and tensed herself for his look of triumph. But it wasn’t there. Instead was a look she couldn’t read and his eyes were dark, darker than she’d ever seen them. With deep glowing embers in their depths. Embers that she had lit? The thought made something rip through her. She trembled.

She had to try and claw back some modicum of dignity and found a voice from somewhere.

‘Truth…’ She didn’t even have the energy to voice it as a question.

‘That there’s enough electricity between us to power the national grid.’ His eyes fell to her mouth and Kallie felt it quiver in response as if it were begging for his own lips again. ‘And that tomorrow we get married and…this we’ll come back to. We’ll have plenty of time on our honeymoon.’

Kallie opened her mouth and couldn’t speak for a few seconds. Honeymoon! ‘That’s ridiculous. There’s no way this is going to happen.’ Panic was making her sound breathless. ‘I am not going anywhere with you for any honeymoon. I have to work, I can’t just leave—’

He put a finger to her mouth. ‘Oh, yes, you are. It’s part of the deal. Make sure you’re packed…’

Alexandros strode through the mass of photographers outside Kallie’s office. Unlike with other celebrities, who they would crush around, intimidate into submission, a space was left around Alexandros. That held a certain kind of respect. As if they knew that with one swipe of his hand, one word, he could do some serious damage. He ignored the barrage of questions and got into the back of his car. The blacked-out windows concealed him from view immediately.

He tersely instructed his driver to take the long way back to his office. He needed to think, to collect himself. And this was as alien a concept to him as the thought of taking public transport. But the fact of the matter was that his body still throbbed with a level of arousal he’d never experienced before.

What the hell had just happened back there?

He ran a hand through his hair and stared unseeingly out of the window. He hadn’t planned on kissing Kallie. But when she’d walked in, so prim and proper in her buttoned-up shirt and tight skirt that drew the eye to the toned length of thigh, he hadn’t been able to resist.

All he did know was the moment he’d taken Kallie into his arms he hadn’t felt like he’d thought he would. Oh, he’d felt the desire. That had been like a neon sign that lit up whenever he was near her…it hadn’t been that. It had been something else, something he’d never felt before. He’d expected to feel detached…but he hadn’t. He’d felt anticipation that had gone beyond the mere physical. As if he’d finally had something within his grasp that he’d been searching for. A sigh had gone through him when his mouth had touched hers. A sigh of relief…

His whole body tensed in the back of the car in absolute rejection of his thoughts. And for the first time since seeing Kallie again, he questioned whether or not he was doing the right thing. His mouth pulled into a thin line. The fact of the matter was, though, that he’d left it too late now. He would need to find a wife to marry within twenty-four hours if he was to make the deadline of Dimitri’s will. And he certainly couldn’t afford to let this slip through his hands merely because he was having these…doubts.

For Alexandros, who never ever doubted a decision he’d made, this was also a new concept. Not a welcome one. His mind even seized on Isabelle for a moment. He grimaced. There were plenty of women who would be only too happy to comply with his need for an immediate wife. But he had Kallie so well trussed now, not to mention the arousal that hummed in his every vein, why shouldn’t he use her? Have her. Sate himself with her.

After all, wasn’t this just meant to be just a diversion for him? An amusement? A timely revenge and a way to get his needs met, both in and out of bed?

It was only then that the belated thought struck him—he’d called at her office to see if she’d received the pre-nuptial agreement. He’d never before had a lapse like that in his concentration. He found himself ignoring the need to dwell on why he’d been acting so out of character and quickly instructed his bodyguard to go back and pick it up.

It was a couple of minutes after Alexandros had left that Kallie fully realised that he’d gone. She still hadn’t moved. She felt as though she’d been flung into another dimension. He’d just kissed her, she told herself rationally. And told you that he expects you to go on a honeymoon…

She felt dizzy, disjointed…her head was fuzzy. She went on shaky legs and sat down behind her desk. Her glazed eyes took in a note on the top of her pad. The big brusque handwriting that could only belong to one person. Him.

‘Please sign the pre-nuptial agreement and send it back.’

Kallie read it and reread it, finally, slowly coming back to her senses. She heard the bells of a church ring ominously in the distance. Like a nail going into a coffin, her fate was sealed, this was it. He hadn’t even had the decency to tell her this much. He’d gone from issuing terse instructions to leaving curt notes. He’d waltzed into her office, tested her out like some Arabian prince buying a new girl for his harem. To see if she met with his approval. Her mouth twisted, she couldn’t help the shudder of reaction that went through her. Well, apparently she did. Lucky her.

Her assistant popped her head around the door at that moment, diverting her thoughts, and when Kallie nodded she came in. Holding out a manila envelope, she said, ‘Sorry, this came earlier, but I got distracted when Alexandros…’ She blushed prettily and Kallie scowled. ‘Sorry. When Mr Kouros arrived.’

She beat a hasty retreat and Kallie scowled even harder. Another female ready to drop at his feet. Was no one immune to the man’s charm? She ripped the envelope open and a sheaf of papers fell out. The agreement. Kallie skimmed it feeling numb. It outlined the terms of the marriage—basically she was entitled to nothing in the event of the divorce. That didn’t surprise her. It also specified the terms of the loan to her uncle, the generosity of which surprised her. He genuinely was reserving all punishment just for her. It suited her fine. She didn’t want to touch a penny of his money.

She signed quickly, without thinking, and shoved the papers back into the envelope. About to call Cécile back in, she looked up when a shape appeared at the doorway. She almost thought it was him until she saw his bodyguard come in. She pulled herself together and held out the envelope.

‘Mr Kouros sent you for this?’

He took it and left.

The reality was stark. From now on, as long as he desired, for as long as they would have the reaction they’d both just had to a simple kiss, she was Alexandros Kouros’s property. For better or worse.

CHAPTER SIX

‘FOR better or worse…’

The words swam over Kallie’s head. She stood in the mairie’s office with Alexandros by her side. Everything seemed to be swimming, ever since she’d come in the door with Alexei and seen Alexandros standing there. In a steel-grey suit, looking so tall and dark and vibrantly handsome that she’d stumbled on her walk towards him.

Members of both their families were seated behind them. The speed with which the last few weeks had flown, the reaction of her body just standing beside this man…was overwhelming. She struggled to fix her gaze on a point in the distance and only belatedly realised that Alexandros was turning her towards him, having been told he could kiss his wife.

His wife…

Kallie looked up into his face, helpless now. Bound to him in front of everyone, in front of society. Wordlessly she tried to communicate with him. Willing the harsh, stark lines of his face to relax…just for a moment so that she could reach something of the person she’d once known. But they didn’t. That person was gone. As his head bent towards hers for the second time in two days, she felt every treacherous cell in her body leaping in response, hungering for his touch, his mouth on hers. She fought it, though…tensed her entire body and willed herself with every fibre of her being not to have the same reaction as yesterday.