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‘What is it?’ Alexandros’s voice came from far away.
‘Kallie, answer me…’
Her voice was raspy, she couldn’t breathe. ‘I don’t know…must have been something…’
All she did know with some kind of miraculous self-protecting clarity was that he couldn’t know why she was having this reaction. The room was spinning now and she felt herself drooping sideways, unable to sit up. Then she was being lifted up into strong arms, against a firm wall of something…muscle? She didn’t care. She felt sick, but safe. Then she blacked out.
She came to in the most horrific, undignified fashion, hunched over a toilet bowl, her whole upper body dripping wet, retching. Alexandros was behind her, holding her hair back as life slammed back into her and she emptied her stomach. Finally it was over. She was shaking all over violently. She felt herself being pulled back up and a wet cloth over her face and neck. It felt wonderful. Then she was sitting on his lap and being held very firmly against a broad chest until the shaking started to subside. She finally managed faintly, ‘Where…where are we?’
A rumble came from under her cheek. ‘In the staff toilet of the restaurant.’
Kallie closed her eyes and clung to Alexandros. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry…’
When she opened them again, she took in the shower and realised that he must have had to put her underneath it to wake her up somehow. She pulled back.
‘I’m so sorry…’
‘Don’t be. Kallie, what the hell was that?’ His voice was harsh. ‘For goodness’ sake, woman, if you’re allergic to liqueur or coffee, why didn’t you tell me?’
But I’m not! Or, at least, she hadn’t thought she was. But even as Kallie thought about the alcohol in the coffee, she could see the images flood her head again, the acute nausea close behind. She closed her eyes, gripped his shirt and breathed deeply. This was ridiculous. No way could this be affecting her so badly. It had to be the food…or something else. She couldn’t still be so tied into what had happened. The thought that she could be made something in her head shut down.
She shook her head. ‘No, it couldn’t be…’ It couldn’t be!
‘It must have been something I ate.’
‘We had the same thing and I feel fine,’ he pointed out grimly.
She was too weak to argue.
He stood, taking her with him, clasping her to his chest. She only saw then that his own hair was plastered to his head, his chest soaking. He’d got into the shower too? He answered her look. ‘Well, I could hardly avoid getting wet, too, could I? I couldn’t just dump you in there.’
‘Sorry,’ she said in a small voice. Again.
He elbowed his way out of the room and his friend Theo was there, the owner, looking awful and wringing his hands. ‘I am so sorry, Alexandros. I have no idea how this could have happened.’
Kallie gave an involuntary shudder. Alexandros tightened his hold.
‘Theo, it’s fine. Forget it…. we need to leave now, though, we’re wet.’
His friend jumped around, clearly upset, and gave them towels. ‘Your vehicle is right outside the door here, at the back…’
Kallie couldn’t help another wave of mortification. She was sure the great Alexandros Kouros hated this embarrassment. When he climbed into the back of the vehicle, still keeping her tucked into his arms, she resolutely looked out the window, taking her arms away from his neck.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said stiffly yet again, her whole body rigid. ‘I didn’t mean to embarrass you in front of your friends…the people in the restaurant…’
Alexandros looked down at the bent head, her hair no less vibrant, even though it was wet. When she’d taken her arms down from his neck, he’d had the urge to bring them back up. And when she’d gone rigid, the loss of her soft curves nestled into him had been almost like a physical pain. And despite what she seemed to think, when she’d almost collapsed, the entire restaurant could have disappeared for all he’d cared. His only concern had been Kallie and getting her to safety. He’d even bellowed out for a doctor but none had been there.
‘Don’t be stupid, Kallie. We brought you out the back because it was quicker.’
‘Oh…’
He took one of the towels and put Kallie away from him slightly, starting to undo her shirt. She slapped at his hand ineffectually. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’
He pushed her hands out of the way. ‘Kallie, you’re soaked, so am I. Unless you want to get hypothermia, you have to take off your shirt.’
He’d undone all the buttons and was slipping the shirt from her shoulders before she could do anything.
She let out a strangled whisper. ‘The driver!’
She was now in just her bra and Alexandros was pulling his own sodden shirt off. Totally unashamed, he ignored her concern. He drew her back against his bare chest and wrapped them both in a couple of towels, tucking her arms around his waist. Sensation flooded her belly, her breasts, making them tighten painfully. She bit her lip.
Alexandros looked down briefly and when he caught a glimpse of two perfect creamy half-mounds spilling from her bra, pressed against him, he felt desire rocket straight to his lap.
The inevitable response became more acute. His jaw clenched, the towel dropped slightly. She moved to get comfortable and he gritted out, ‘Kallie, stop moving.’
She felt the hard ridge beneath her and heat flooded her body. The trip back up into the hills was excruciating and by the time they got out, Kallie’s face was hectic with colour, her eyes so bright they looked feverish.
He carried her up to her room and gently stood her outside her bathroom door. She had pulled the towel tight around her upper body and looked anywhere but at the expanse of bare chest in front of her.
‘Do you need help?’
‘No,’ she said quickly, and qualified it. ‘No…thank you. I don’t know what I would have done if—’
‘You need to get out of those wet things before you get a chill.’
She just nodded and went inside, stripped off and had a hot shower. Putting on a voluminous toweling robe, she emerged to find an empty room. Disappointment gushed through her. Then Thea appeared at the door with a look of concern on her face. Which she quickly masked when she saw Kallie.
She bustled in and got Kallie into bed and Kallie’s final thought before she fell into a dreamless sleep was that maybe Thea wasn’t as cool towards her after all. Maybe she could try again. She refused to think of the dark angel who had saved her tonight, who had held her with such tenderness. Because it hadn’t been. That had been her imagination. He had been functional, that’s all.
When Kallie woke the next morning, her stomach muscles felt tender. She must have sensed something because just as she came fully awake, her door opened. Alexandros. Dressed and looking fresh and bright. Clean shaven. Her belly tightened and she pulled the sheet up around her neck.
He walked in and opened the curtains that covered the French doors leading onto her veranda. He stood looking out for a minute, hands stuck deep in his pockets, and then turned around. ‘How are you feeling today?’
‘Much better, thank you. I’m—’
He slashed a hand in the air. ‘Don’t say sorry, Kallie, you couldn’t help it. You must have some kind of sensitivity to liqueurs. Maybe the shellfish.’
You mean a sensitivity to the past!
She watched warily as he came close to the bed. He looked so tall and imposing and masculine.
‘I’m afraid I have to go to London for a couple of days. One of our ships has had a mutiny of sorts among the crew…’ His mouth quirked. ‘It would appear that only I can sort it out.’
Kallie could suddenly see very well that he would be a good negotiator. Tough but firm. Despite what had happened between them. With those people he’d have no bitterness. It was only with her.
She just nodded. His gaze slanted down at her, unfathomable.
‘Don’t miss me too much while I’m gone…’
She shook her head. ‘I won’t.’
But she would. The realisation mocked her.
‘Oh, I’m sure you won’t, Kallie.’ He smiled briefly, tightly.
CHAPTER TEN
AS ALEXANDROS drove away from the villa, he had to concede that being married to Kallie so far was nothing like he’d expected. And he had a feeling that things were only going to get more complicated. Again he had that funny sensation the perhaps somewhere along the line he’d made a monumental error of judgment. For the first time in his life, he hadn’t bedded a woman he’d desired when he’d wanted. But how he wanted her. If she didn’t come to him when he got back, her time was up. No more waiting. He’d had enough of her coy looks and game-playing.
Kallie went downstairs after a while and found some breakfast left over in the dining room. Feeling edgy and not wanting to look at why, she stacked the plates and made her way to the kitchen. She had finished washing them and had started putting them away when she heard a sound behind her. Thea stood there with a disgusted look on her face. ‘Why do you do this? Why? He is not here now. He doesn’t need to see you pretend to be something you’re not!’
Kallie couldn’t take her words in for a moment. Thea looked so hurt, and angry.
‘Thea…’
The older woman huffed, ignoring Kallie, banging open and closing cupboards randomly. Kallie could remember that she’d always done that when she’d got angry or upset when she’d been younger. It had made her laugh and she’d teased Thea about it at one time.
She went up and put her hand on Thea’s arm. ‘Thea…please. Can we talk?’
Thea finally let Kallie lead her over to the table. But she wouldn’t look at her. So Kallie started anyway, and haltingly told Thea exactly what had happened that night. Right up to when Alexandros had thrown the newspaper at her feet the next morning.
She wasn’t even really aware she’d stopped until Thea looked at her and said quietly, ‘Eleni?’
Kallie nodded silently.
Thea sighed heavily. ‘I think I do believe you. I knew that girl was a bad egg—’
Kallie dashed away wetness she hadn’t noticed on her cheeks. ‘But—’
Thea was indignant. ‘Look! Even now you jump to defend her—what is wrong with you? You have to tell Alexandros.’
Kallie shook her head. ‘I can’t, Thea. I promised I wouldn’t and he’ll go after her.’
Thea snorted. ‘Her? Of course he wouldn’t, that’s just the problem. It was you he always cared about, not her, that’s why she did it, and why he was so angry with you…’
Kallie didn’t believe it. He hadn’t really cared about her at all, that had been obvious in the way he’d been so quick to judge her.
‘Thea, I can’t tell him.’ Kallie explained about Eleni’s fragile mental and physical health.
Thea gave her a withering look. ‘Please, that girl is just a manipulator.’
‘But, Thea, can’t you see? How can I take the risk of telling Alexandros when he could very well decide to punish her…or her family?’
‘That was always your problem, Kallie, you were too nice…and too naïve. It was always you he cared about…that was where the problem started. Eleni was jealous.’
Kallie winced. Was Thea right? Wouldn’t he want to punish Eleni? She couldn’t take the chance that he wouldn’t. Some dark emotion was rearing its ugly head and she didn’t want to look at it. No matter what Thea said, she had to protect Eleni.
Thea got up to make them both some coffee and changed it to green tea when she saw how Kallie paled at the smell. Her unconscious concern told Kallie she was on the way to being forgiven. The relief was immense. Thea came back.
‘Child, you have no idea what happened to him after that…you think it was just the break-up of the engagement?’
Wasn’t that bad enough?
Kallie shrugged awkwardly. ‘I know he must have loved her…’ Despite what he had told her before.
Thea laughed. ‘Love? You can’t still be that naïve surely? He didn’t love her. He was being forced to marry her by his mother in order to save Kouros Shipping. He had no choice in the matter. When his father died and left him in control, the old cronies didn’t have faith in him. They started to sell out, the company came close to bankruptcy. That merger was his only hope.’ She looked at Kallie carefully. ‘Didn’t you know about this?’
Kallie knew she wasn’t going to like what she was going to hear, and shook her head. ‘No. He only told me a few times that he wasn’t sure how he felt about taking over the business…’ She smiled tightly. ‘He used to tell me that he wanted to do a degree in fine arts.’
That was so far removed from the man today that Kallie couldn’t even believe that he had said it once. Thea brought her back to earth with a crash.
‘Which you confided in Eleni, and which she obviously then leaked to the papers, along with that photo…’
‘Oh, God…’ Kallie had never read the whole piece, she’d been too heart-sick.
‘Yes. They vilified him, the golden boy of the shipping world who never wanted to go into the business, he wanted to go to art college! With the merger and engagement falling through, the company going down the tubes, Alexandros had to work twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week to bring things back…But he did. And no one would dare remind him of it today.’
Unmistakable pride shone from Thea’s face. The past took on a different hue immediately. The person that Alexandros had become when his father had died had been born out of great responsibility and necessity. Not a greedy desire to make money. Kallie felt ill again. She looked at Thea with stricken eyes.
‘My parents…they threw him out of the house. I’ll never forget it.’
Thea nodded. ‘I thought so.’ She shook her head at Kallie’s look. ‘No, he didn’t tell me, but I knew something bad had happened over there. He never mentioned your family again. And, in truth, you, your parents, your cousins were all the family he really had.’
Kallie felt numb. More than numb. She’d known they’d always been close, but he’d always seemed so…self-sufficient. He’d always held something back. He’d never talked about his own family. Not really. For the first time she could see how it could have been possible for her parents to judge him so harshly…if they’d felt they hadn’t known him that well.
It was so much worse than she’d ever known. ‘He must despise me.’
Thea got up to rinse her cup. ‘In truth, Kallie, he was too busy to hate anyone. He just got on with it.’ She came back and stood in front of her, tipping her face up with an old calloused hand, her eyes dark and bright with emotion. She looked pointedly at the ring on Kallie’s finger, the simple platinum band. ‘He’s married you, Kallie, for a reason…’
Thea was right, but there were two reasons. Revenge and desire. Guilt burned into Kallie like a brand. There was no way she could tell him the truth, because there was no way she could betray Eleni, risk her fragile health. And right now Kallie felt like she didn’t even deserve forgiveness. The facts were still the same. If she hadn’t gone out there to kiss him that night, when her instinct had warned her against it, none of this would have happened. And she had. So she was the one who had to deal with it.
She had a lot to think about over the next twenty-four hours. She and Thea were tentatively re-establishing their friendship. By the following evening, after dinner and when Thea had gone to bed, Kallie sat up, determined to wait for Alexandros to come home. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do, or say. She felt as if a protective layer of skin had been ripped off and she didn’t know if she could hide it from him.
It got so late that Kallie felt herself falling asleep. Giving up, she went to bed. She’d see him in the morning, or perhaps he wouldn’t be back for another few days. She felt hollow at the thought.
Kallie woke with a start. She’d been having a dream of some sort. Her heart was racing and she felt hot all over. Bleary-eyed, she got out of bed and went into the bathroom to get some water. Everywhere was quiet. She immediately thought of Alexandros. Had he come home? She knew she’d only been asleep at most for a couple of hours. About to go and get back into bed, Kallie stopped and looked at the knob of the adjoining door. In her fanciful imagination, it seemed to glow slightly in the moonlit room. She hadn’t pulled the curtains earlier.
She felt herself walking towards the door as though compelled. He probably wouldn’t even be there, she assured herself. She touched the knob. Her breath was coming in shallow bursts…and she hadn’t even turned it yet! With a disgusted shake of her head at herself, she twisted it and the door fell back towards her, surprising her with how heavy it was.
The room was dark. She crept in. The bed was flat. No one there. In the half-light, like her own room, she could just make out shapes. It was stark and masculine. Fitting for someone like Alexandros. And yet there were paintings on the walls, not abstract, as she would have expected, but small exquisite studies, portraits…landscapes.
She suddenly felt like a voyeur and turned to go back to her own room, and in that very instant the bathroom door on the other side of the room opened, light spilled out and Alexandros walked out, rubbing his hair with a towel, stark naked.
She must have gasped, or something, because he stopped, every line in his body rigid, and looked up, seeing her instantly. He didn’t drop the towel, just stood there, unashamed and magnificent. She didn’t know how long they stared at each other. She was only aware of the drumbeat of her heart, the way her whole body seemed to be melting, igniting…
‘Kallie…’
He was real, wasn’t an apparition. Kallie finally moved. She turned and would have run back to her bedroom if she’d had the co-ordination, but she didn’t. She stumbled at the door and it slammed shut in her face, keeping her inside the room. She could have stamped her foot in frustration. No doubt he was thinking that she had heard him come back and was fulfilling her wifely duty.
Her hand had gone sweaty in seconds, the knob wouldn’t turn and she let out a small whimper of frustration. And then stopped. The carpet had muffled his approach but she could feel body heat behind her and she closed her eyes. And all she could see was him. Without even really looking, she’d made an imprint on her retinas of his body and it was all she could see now, every toned, muscled, perfectly formed part of him. Not an ounce of fat, not a blemish on that smooth, olive, silky skin.
Heavy hands dropped to the bare skin of her shoulders and she couldn’t repress a shudder of reaction. He turned her to face him and she couldn’t resist. She kept her eyes closed, knowing if she moved even slightly that she’d come into contact with that hard body.
‘Kallie…’ A thread of something laced his voice—was it amusement? Irritation? ‘Open your eyes, dammit.’
She opened them. And was surprised to see that the room was lighter than she’d thought, the moonlight stronger. The lean lines of his face were starkly outlined, as was the need in his eyes. She couldn’t look down to see if he’d put on the towel, the thought of him naked nearly made her legs buckle. That tiny movement had him pull her into him. She felt the towel, but it was a feeble barrier against the hot, hard erection underneath. Her legs were trembling in earnest now, his arms the only thing holding her up.
Her own silky vest and lace panties were no sort of barrier either. She felt the door against her back and his arms slackened, hands coming around her face. He was crowding her, nudging her thighs apart with his own hair-roughened one. Like a deadly inevitability it washed over her. This was it. No going back. This is what she was here for, what had sparked between them when they’d first looked at one another again.
And suddenly it didn’t matter right at that moment why she was there, because all Kallie was aware of was his thigh between hers, and how she ached to feel more, experience him fully. She could have tried to run away but she might as well be running from herself. Maybe if he’d come out with clothes on…maybe this heated insanity wouldn’t have taken her over body and soul…But to have seen him naked…
With a guttural, broken moan of something in Greek, he bent his head and took her mouth in an onslaught so savage, so passionate that Kallie’s head almost exploded with the feeling. Electricity coursed through her body. Unable to resist the overwhelming need, she strained to meet him on tiptoe, wrapped her arms around his neck. She ached to be closer and welcomed his thigh between hers, trapping it. She could feel the moist expression of her lust between her thighs, moistening her panties, and moved subtly against him. The pulse between her legs beat for release.
He tore his mouth away and moved it down, trailing kisses along her jaw, down to her neck. Kallie’s head fell back and hit the door but she didn’t even notice the brief pain. All the muscles in her neck corded as she felt his hand move to cup one silk-covered breast, feeling, caressing through the fabric and then, with his thigh still holding her in place, his mouth touched her, surrounded the distended peak and suckled through the fabric. Her back arched and she could feel herself starting to splinter into tiny pieces. Nothing had ever prepared her for this wealth of feelings and sensations.
Before she could lose it completely he pulled back. Kallie opened glazed eyes and looked into his, which burnt with the glowing embers of his desire. For her. It was too huge a moment to take in. All she could do was…experience, feel.
She stretched up and took his face in her hands, bringing it down, and when his mouth touched hers again she sighed with deep satisfaction. Moving her hands down, she revelled in the feel of his skin, his broad shoulders, down over biceps, bunched from holding her waist, spanning it with his hands. Her hands moved all the way down until she came to the towel and she slid them around the back, underneath and snagged it off, her hands running over the taut globes of his bottom.
His big frame shuddered as his erection pressed against her belly. ‘Kallie, Kallie…this is all I’ve thought about…since seeing you…I want you so much…’
She kissed his neck, his shoulder, the words slipping out easily. She didn’t even have to think about them. ‘I want you too…’
‘Then why did you try to leave?’
She was breathless, half-incoherent. ‘I…I didn’t know you were here…I didn’t want you to think that I was giving in…’
Something about the way she said it, some kind of defiant independence, made her seem unbearably vulnerable. He had to drive it down. ‘Well, you’re here now. It’s too late to go back.’
He lifted her up in a graceful movement and carried her over to the huge bed, laying her down with surprising care. She lay back and watched as he rested on strong arms over her. Like his namesake, one of the fabled Kouros statues. For a split second clarity and sanity rushed in. This man despised her…was bedding her as a form of punishment. Yet how could it feel so good? Going against her instincts to just say nothing, Kallie felt something inexorable rise up within her.
Alexandros felt himself close to exploding with how tightly this woman had him wound. But just then she came up on her elbows, her eyes darkened with passion but glittering with something else. Something he couldn’t define.
‘Alexandros…how can you…? How can we do this, when you hate me so much?’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
WHAT?
Something in his body went cold. Not his desire. Nothing could put that out now. His thoughts raced even though he didn’t want to think. He had to admit that since he’d been gone, he’d found himself thinking of her, the past…wanting to come back to her with a hunger that had to be purely physical. It certainly felt that way now when she lay on his bed, in front of him, eyes darkened, lips plump from his kisses. Anything else, anything more, had to be their history, that was all.