Claimed for His Duty
Tara Pammi
The Wedding Night They Never Had…Leah Huntington’s safety was once entrusted to Greek tycoon Stavros Sporades – but the rebellious heiress was a beacon for fortune-hunters. The only way for Stavros to protect her was to marry her himself!But their marriage was just a façade. Now, five years later, the sassy woman who sashays back into Stavros’s life demanding a divorce is completely different from the wayward girl he married.Stavros demands that Leah proves her troubled past is behind her before he grants her freedom. But one night in the marital bed reveals that his alluring wife might have been innocent all along…Discover more at www.millsandboon.co.uk/tarapammi
“Tell me what I have to do.”
Stavros studied Leah for the longest time. Each falling second twisted her gut.
“Live with me for three months and prove that I can trust you.”
“No.” The table rattled with the force of Leah’s movement.
“This is the only way I will even consider your request.”
“What do you expect me to do for these three months?”
“Convince me that you’re serious about this fashion design career—that you won’t drain your inheritance on some trumped-up business.”
“The vote of confidence in your tone is really inspiring.”
The hardness in his eyes didn’t budge. “I’m giving you a real choice. If you fail, our marriage stands. You’ll be my wife in every sense—for as long as one of us is alive.”
Greek Tycoons Tamed
When power and pride are undone by passion!
Stavros Sporades and Dmitri Karegas are renowned throughout the world as Greece’s most powerful and determined tycoons!
But have these untouchable Greek tycoons finally met the women who can tame them?
Find out in …
Stavros and Leah’s story:
Claimed for His Duty
August 2015
The wife Stavros hasn’t seen for nearly five years is back and demanding a divorce! But Stavros isn’t about to let his errant wife escape from his grasp … they have unfinished business!
Dmitri and Jasmine’s story:
Bought for Her Innocence
November 2015
Dmitri is known for the women who visit his bed as much as for the millions in his bank account.
So when a childhood friend auctions her innocence Dmitri intends to be the highest bidder!
Claimed
for His Duty
Tara Pammi
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
TARA PAMMI can’t remember a moment when she wasn’t lost in a book—especially a romance, which was much more exciting than a mathematics textbook. Years later, Tara’s wild imagination and love for the written word revealed what she really wanted to do. Now she pairs Alpha males who think they know everything with strong women who knock that theory and them off their feet!
Contents
Cover (#u20025029-73ac-575d-b373-a165f64a9507)
Introduction (#u4b60e827-b1e7-57aa-9a04-2dc9f9a41ff9)
Greek Tycoons Tamed (#u5f151fbb-f267-5466-8ef0-455a7d463c0a)
Title Page (#ub1b33b2d-00a2-5acd-83ee-72bd587b76db)
About the Author (#uff9fa83c-7a53-5837-b27b-57a59700e33a)
CHAPTER ONE (#u70c2262b-9fd6-50ca-9753-fb6ba3a5a94d)
CHAPTER TWO (#uabb0a1b3-8fc1-5832-ae4f-3315d5f662cf)
CHAPTER THREE (#uc9f527d9-5a6a-5345-b386-e13ac5c5ae70)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u5ac76817-7ae3-5115-8093-9014da79ce5b)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_7a473b78-ad6e-5e3a-b730-bb16d1fb6cbd)
LEAH HUNTINGTON COLLAPSED onto the plastic chair behind her small desk, her knees buckling out from under her. The red stamp spelling out “REJECTED” on the application form blurred in front of her eyes. Her heart squeezed painfully as she fingered the flat sketches on her drawing board, the possibility of seeing her creation take form now evaporating like a puff of smoke.
Sweat ran down her back, the slow whir of the ceiling fan scraping against her nerves. She ran cramped up fingers over her neck, feeling the muscles tighten with tension.
Mrs. DuPont, the buying manager for a retail store, had given Leah only two months to create her first collection and all Leah had now were flat sketches. And as she had to do everything herself instead of contacting a factory like she did for the fashion house, every minute was important.
The most important of it being the funds she required to source raw materials... There were a hundred things she needed and it was all sitting in that bank.
She dialed the number for the bank manager she had spoken to just two days ago.
Her heart hammered painfully, thudding faster and faster, an ominous pounding she couldn’t breathe past. There could be only one man behind this. Her stomach twisted as the bank manager coughed on the other end of the phone. His answer was curt, immediate as though he had been rehearsing the explanation, waiting for Leah to call.
They couldn’t use the trust fund as security to approve her loan because—Leah could hear the hushed reverence in the manager’s voice as he uttered the name—the trustee overseeing her fund had denied the use of the trust fund, her trust fund, as security.
Stavros.
Leah threw the handset across the room, every inch of her shaking. She kicked the chair aside, the impact of it jarring up her leg, every nerve cell in her humming with outrage.
How much more was he going to punish her? How long was she going to let him?
She picked up the phone again, her vision blurry now with unchecked tears. Her throat burned as she took a deep breath, her thumb hovering over the numbers on the handset.
She wanted to demand an explanation, she wanted to...
But what was the point? His secretary would politely tell her that he was not available. It was the same answer she had received over the last year every time she had tried to contact him. Even though they both lived in Athens, they might as well have been living on the opposite ends of the planet.
She bit her lower lip, her nails digging into her skin. A sob built inside her chest, fury rising through her like a storm that could swallow her in its clutches.
She had to put an end to this. She had to break free of the leash he bound her with, controlling her every step, every choice, while he enjoyed his life. She had let him do it for five years.
Five years of a sterile life, five years of being his prisoner—that she had accepted out of guilt and fear.
Scrubbing the tears from her cheeks, she pulled up the society feature she had purposely clicked away from this morning on her laptop.
Stavros’s business partner and her grandfather’s second godson, Dmitri Karegas, was throwing a party aboard his yacht.
Stavros and Dmitri were cut from the same cloth—breathtakingly gorgeous, built their empires from nothing under her grandfather Giannis’s guidance, and considered themselves gods, their will law for the normal mortals they walked amongst.
Stavros hated parties with an intensity Leah had never been able to understand, but Dmitri would be there.
She just had to make sure the decadent playboy, who apparently was always surrounded by a group of willing women, noticed her presence aboard his latest toy.
Had to, somehow, gain his attention.
Her stomach clenched as she shoved the bedroom door open and walked toward the closet.
Every step toward it, every thought in this direction—was like walking to her own doom.
But Stavros had left her no choice...left her with no way out.
She dialed another number on her phone and booked a taxi. A shiver traveled over her spine as she viciously pushed the cotton tops and skirts in her closet away until she reached the end.
She pulled the gold silk dress, the one designer label she had kept, her fingers shaking violently as she realized how little fabric there was of the dress. Her back would be totally bare, which meant she had to go without a bra.
And it would leave most of her legs, her thighs bare too. So no underwear either.
Five years ago, she hadn’t even blinked when she had worn it. Had thought it nothing to parade around with Alex and Calista, showing every bit of skin she could expose, barely looking decent...
And she had been almost twenty pounds heavier...
Just thinking of how she must have looked then made her cringe.
What the hell had the designer been thinking? What the hell had she been thinking?
She had been trying to please Calista, who had decreed she wear it that night... That’s what she had been thinking.
Yet nothing else in her closet would do for tonight.
Of all the things to think about when her life was eternally stuck in this rut, when the very walls of this apartment were closing in on her...
Her palms were sweating as she pulled the dress to herself. The dress would fall scandalously above her knees, just about covering her buttocks.
It was the most outrageous dress she owned, the sartorial equivalent of a tramp and she had worn it the night Stavros had decided her fate. Fitting then that it was the one that would at least get her an audience with the man who was her jailor.
Every muscle in her trembled, and her mouth was coated with bitter fear as she walked into the bathroom and splashed water on her face.
He was going to explode, he was going to despise her even more, if that was possible. But she couldn’t bear this...this isolation anymore.
She couldn’t bear to continue like this. Something had to give.
* * *
Leah clutched the leather seat of the taxi, holding onto it a like a lifeline, the curious glances the cabbie threw her way doing nothing to propel her out.
She took a deep breath and looked out the dirty window. The marina was busy, a few of the yachts moored there highlighted by the setting sun. But even amidst the loud luxury, one yacht stood out, its gleaming white exterior splendid in the setting sun’s light.
She took the bills out of her gold-lined clutch and handed it over. This was it.
She didn’t let herself think, she didn’t let herself even look around over the next few minutes. Keeping her shoulders straight, head held high, she reached the security personnel guarding the planked entrance. Except for the glimpse of recognition in his gaze, the six-footer didn’t budge a muscle.
Leah raised a brow haughtily, the gesture taking everything she had.
Yes, she had spent the past five years working as an apprentice in a mid-level fashion house, away from the spotlight, locked up in a bubble where no one knew who she was, where no one cared except that she didn’t put a toe out of line.
She slept, she woke up, went to work, went back to her apartment, ate dinner and fell into bed again, while Stavros’s minion, Mrs. Kovlakis, her housekeeper, watched her, made sure she didn’t comit any further scandalous acts. But that didn’t mean anyone had forgotten what she had done, or what Stavros had done to her as punishment.
Especially in this crowd that hung on to every word from Stavros’s lips as if it was the Holy Bible. It felt like an eternity but only a few seconds passed before the man stepped aside. Taking his proffered hand, Leah stepped onto the deck, her guts twisting into a gooey mess.
For a few dazzling minutes, she forgot why she was there as she ventured further. Uniformed waiters passed around champagne. The party was in full swing on the deck, inebriated, sweaty bodies pressing against each other...
Excitement and an electric energy touched the air, and she swayed automatically to the music.
So everything she had heard of Dmitri’s parties was true...and strangely the antithesis of everything Stavros was. So he wouldn’t be here. But she needed to be recognized, which meant she had to grab Dmitri’s attention, especially if he was busy ravishing his latest arm candy.
Smiling for the first time since this afternoon, she walked toward the glittering glass bar that she had read about, planted herself on one barstool, ordered a cosmo and proceeded to get drunk.
* * *
Stavros Sporades frowned as his cell phone beeped for the tenth time in the last five minutes. He picked up the phone and smiled at Helene, loath to ruin their private dinner. It was the first time he was relaxing in a month and he guarded his downtime as fiercely as he did his work time.
He picked up his champagne flute and took a sip before clicking Yes.
Dmitri’s drawling tone reverberated in his ears. “She’s here. Aboard my yacht.”
Stavros fell back against the seat in silent shock. Only one woman being aboard Dmitri’s yacht would cause him to call.
Leah.
His blood pumped furiously through his veins. “Are you sure it’s her?”
A mocking laugh met his ears. “It took me a few minutes to recognize her, but yes, it’s her. She’s drunk and dancing.”
Drunk and dancing...
Instead of seeing Leah’s face, he saw his sister Calista, unmoving and pale in death. He had tried so hard to find some kind of closure from Calista’s untimely death, and yet, the anger and the powerlessness were just as raw, just as fresh.
Gritting his jaw, Stavros calmly pocketed his phone. Fury reverberated within, leaving his chest perversely cold. He made his apologies to Helene and exited the rooftop restaurant.
She’s doing very well, Mr. Sporades, Mrs. Kovlakis had said about Leah, in her nasal voice on his weekly phone call. Almost a changed personality, if you can believe.
Had the woman been just telling him what he had wanted to hear?
Within minutes, his pilot landed them on Dmitri’s luxury yacht.
He stepped onto the helipad, a corrosive anger roped with heart-pounding fear running through him. “Where is she?”
His gaze deceptively calm, Dmitri pointed to the dance floor on the lower deck. “I could have had the security personnel grab her, but I think that would have made the situation worse.”
Stavros nodded, unwilling to meet his oldest friend’s eyes.
His control was barely teetering on the edge as it was. He didn’t want to be thankful for the fact that it could have been worse, much worse than Dmitri’s yacht.
He didn’t want to feel grateful that it was just alcohol, not drugs.
Cristos, he didn’t want to set eyes on the woman he had married as punishment and penance.
He didn’t want to set eyes on Leah.
* * *
Even in the drunken haze caused by the three cosmos she had consumed, Leah knew the exact moment Stavros had reached the dimly lighted dance floor.
The hairs on her neck shot up, her stomach plummeted. An unbearable cold claimed her skin even though the breeze from the sea was warm. She shook her head slowly to clear the fog and looked up.
The famous, specially commissioned, glittering glass bar that was the prize of Dmitri’s yacht showed a hundred reflections of Stavros. Narrowly sculpted face as if a sculptor had been asked to keep austerity at the front of his mind, the sharp, long bridge of his nose that was arrogance embodied, the cruel slash of his wide mouth that instantly reminded her of that one punishing kiss, and the tawny, long-lashed eyes...
And the hatred blazing in them when he met her gaze in the glass—a hundred flickers of fire that could scorch her in so many ways.
Nausea bubbled through her and Leah stumbled.
Shaking uncontrollably, she wrapped her fingers around the nape of the twenty-something guy she had been dancing with for the last quarter of an hour. Although it was more him holding her boneless body up.
Thankfully, the stranger’s face was blurry to her. She didn’t want to remember anything from this night tomorrow. She moved her feet slowly in rhythm with the beat of hip-hop blaring around them. His hands moved over her hips, hesitated, then moved back up over her back, before embracing her.
Her stomach quivered, the faint whisper of something as mundane as comfort warming her insides.
How pathetic had her life become if the man’s thin body comforted her?
Willing herself to ignore the cloud of black thunder she could sense around her, she dragged in a raspy breath. Softly ominous whispers emerged through the din and music, the sweaty, swaying bodies parting without his uttering a word. It was as if even the air in that lower deck was suspended in the face of the thundering storm.
She pulled herself up and kissed her companion’s smooth, almost boyish jaw and whispered sorry.
It wasn’t the poor guy’s fault that he had no knowledge of who she was or he wouldn’t have dared to touch her. Would have sidled away from her, treating her like a pariah as the rest of the crowd had done once Dmitri had walked by, his gray gaze devouring her with unhurried interest. Once they had all realized she was Leah Huntington Sporades, prisoner and possession of Stavros Sporades, not to be looked at or even spoken to, especially by another man.
Because, Alex, her one friend who hadn’t turned away from her, who had tried to contact her even after Calista’s death and her marriage, had ended up in jail on some trumped-up charges Stavros and that equally arrogant Dmitri had fabricated out of thin air.
The depth of her hatred for Stavros left her shaking uncontrollably.
A steel band wound around her waist and jerked her away from the stranger. Maybe he was even a teenager, she thought, feeling old and tired at just twenty-four.
She fell against a solid, hard frame with a soft thud that knocked the breath out of her.
Unlike the man she had been dancing with, Stavros was all hard, unforgiving muscle that sent her body into shock at the contact.
Long fingers held her arms in a grip this short of hurting and turned her, the heat emanating from his body hitting her like a wave of the sea.
Blinking, Leah raised her gaze and then shied away immediately.
Coward, a voice mocked her inside but she didn’t care.
The soporific effect of the alcohol she had consumed stunting the hatred that buzzed her blood, she went like a doll incapable of independent motion as he picked her up and threw her over his shoulder.
The jutting bones of his shoulders dug into her rib cage, her breasts crushed by his muscular back but Leah refused to let even a whimper emerge.
The world tilted upside down and a tear seeped through despite her efforts. The quiet hush that preceded them was like the calm before the storm...
She had done what she had wanted to do.
She had made a spectacle of herself, she had Stavros’s attention.
Except nothing could numb her to the blistering contempt that had flashed in his gaze in the split second she had looked into it.
She squeezed her eyes shut and gave herself over to the haze in her head.
* * *
Leah jerked and breathed in great gulps as ice-cold water drenched her from all sides. She yelped and scooted back on her bum but there was no escape from the chilly spray. Her breath came in quick, short bursts, her lungs struggling to pump it out.
Another hard surface at her back thwarted her attempt at escape and she gave up, shuddering.
Reaching out with her hands, she touched cold marble. Her gaze flew open and she blinked to get the water out. The gold silk plastered to her body offered no protection against the cold. Shivering, she looked around, the chill sinking into her blood, raising goose bumps over her skin.
With shaking hands, she pushed her wet hair out of her face, her mascara running in black rivers down her fingers. So much for waterproof.
Blew out a long breath through her mouth and tried to make sense of her bearings.
She didn’t need to turn to see Stavros standing there, watching her with malicious satisfaction. Could muster not a bit of surprise at what he had done.
Even through every nerve in her flinched at the cold, Leah could still feel his wrath, the heat of his anger. She stretched her arm, still shaking and turned off the glinting silver faucets.
Suddenly, all she wanted to do was curl up in the marble tub and close her eyes. Her body sank into the tub as if her muscles had no rigidness anymore.
“Get out of the tub.” The quiet command landed on her like a slap, jerking her back to the purgatory that waited for her.
And the man who wanted to punish her for the rest of her life.
Even after years, she had no strength to face Stavros, couldn’t face...
No, she wouldn’t feel sorry for herself. Not after all that she had done today to just see him.
Clutching the marble, she pulled herself up to her legs.
Seconds piled on as the shaking in her legs subsided and the luxuriously spacious bathroom stopped swaying in front of her.
Blinking at the glare of light from a crystal chandelier overhead, she took in the dark oak floors and the blue sea outside the window.
Instead of the din, so nerve-racking that she swayed, utter calm reigned.
On shaking legs, she stepped out, dripping water everywhere. Her shoulders shook with the effort it took to keep standing.
A towel came straight at her with a resounding, “Cover yourself.”
She buried her face in the plush cotton, taking the few seconds of privacy it afforded to shore up her defenses. But the contemptuous note in his tone pricked, as if a needle had punctured her skin and drew blood.
Fighting the urge to stay behind the towel, she straightened her spine and threw the towel back. “I’m wearing a dress, thank you. It’s your fault if it reveals more than it covers,” she said, brazening it out.
The plush cotton landed on one arrogant shoulder and she saw those broad shoulders tense. Felt his perusal as if he had laid those big hands on her...
Which was the strangest, scariest thought she had to have ever had.
“I see that you still don’t know what is good for you then, Leah.”
Gathering her wet hair in one hand, she squeezed the water out. Forced an indifference she didn’t feel in the least. Because the reality of her reaction to him was too scary. “More like an allergic reaction to you. I’d rather catch pneumonia and die than be saved by you.”
He reached her suddenly, a wall of fury and contempt that narrowed her very world to him.
Fear and confusion and so many things that she had battled over the last decade deluged her.
The overhead monster lighting illuminated his stark features—a sharper slap to her senses than the ice-cold water, but it was the tawny eyes that knocked the breath out of her.
Calista.
Calista had had those same eyes, except they had been kind, quick to smile, always in search of the next thrill, luring men into her orbit like a spider did with her web.
Her gut twisted into that insidious, painful knot that crept into her when she didn’t make a conscious effort to turn her mind to something else, something other than Calista and that night.
It didn’t help. Nothing did. But amidst the shock of seeing him again, something else penetrated through with an insidious clarity as he neared her.
Set against the severity of his face, the lush lashes and the glittering eyes stood out like an oasis in a desert. Rendering the man impossibly gorgeous, darkly stunning.
His scent was alien, yet alluring.
Leah breathed in a lungful before she could stop, a feverish shiver taking hold of her limbs that had nothing to do with her wet dress.
“Stavros, I—”
Long fingers crawled up her nape into her scalp, tilted her up, while the other hand clasped her jaw loosely.
He studied her every feature with such thorough appraisal that her insides turned into gooey pulp.
No one had even touched her in so long...it had to be why she could feel his touch like a brand on her skin...why such heat was pooling under her skin and rushing to the fore.
Why she wanted to sink into his rough touch more than she wanted to breathe...
Until she realized what he was doing.
He was checking if her pupils were dilated, wondering if she was high.
She stared into his glittering gaze, noted the concrete set of his jaw. Saw a shadow of something in his face that hurled the words past her throat. “I’m not high, Stavros.” It came out as a whisper, an entreaty, and Leah recoiled at that pleading tone.
When he didn’t relent, she grabbed his wrists. Every cell in her rose to attention as the whorls of hair there tickled her palm, as a shot of electricity sparked in the air.
“I remember the last time you said those words...” He sounded as if he was far away, in another place, another time.
Leah jerked his hand away, the heat from his body potent in its draw. Her skin tingled, every muscle in her rearing to get closer to him to soak up that deceptive warmth. She would freeze to death before she sought anything from him. “I’m telling the truth, Stavros.”
I have never touched drugs, she wanted to scream, like she had the night when Calista had died. But he hadn’t even acknowledged her teary words.
His teeth bared in an entirely cold smile. “Ditching your security detail, lying to Mrs. Kovlakis, appearing on Dmitri’s yacht of all places—which is infamous for its wild parties, and knocking back drinks, forgive me if I don’t take your word for it.”
How unfailingly polite he was... He had done that before too, even as he had ruined her life.
You can either marry me or you can go to jail, Leah. The choice is yours.
“It got your attention, didn’t it?” she said, realizing too late she had given herself away. Not that she had meant to keep it a secret.
CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_481bc2b2-32bd-543f-afb1-06bd309d323f)
“WHAT?”
Stavros loosened his grip on Leah, struggling to get himself under control, struggling to get his neurons to fire again.
Guilt roiled through him, a heavy pulsing weight in his gut, something he had managed to subdue into a dull ache. But one look at Leah was enough to unman him again.
He took a step back as a sharp scent combined with the scent of her skin teased him softly, the cold from her arms clinging to his fingertips.
Frowning, he muttered a curse.
For the first time in his adult life, he lost the razor-sharp concentration that had made him a force to be reckoned with in the business circles of Athens. For several seconds.
“What did you say?”
She glared at him. “You, Stavros. You were the prize in this tacky show. If you had returned a single phone call, if you had read even one of my numerous emails to you... So, of course, I had to lower myself to your standards, didn’t I?”
“My standards?” He was beginning to sound like an idiot and yet, it seemed his brain’s higher functions had fractured.
An ominous thud started somewhere in the regions of his heart. His gaze swept over her with a swift greed he had no chance of curbing. The gold silk dress was almost the color of her skin that had a golden tone that no amount of spray tan could manufacture.
The result was that the dress moved sinuously against those high breasts, dipped at her waist, painting an erotic picture of almost nudity that had knocked him for sixes when he had first spied her at the bar.
Any traces of the curvy, awkwardly brazen girl he had married were gone. Instead, the woman who stood there—the delicate contours of her face rendering her infinitely fragile, her body bordering on scrawny, which made her breasts stand out even more—was a complete stranger.
“This is what you expect of me, isn’t it? So I delivered. And here you are, in front of me, for the first time in five years as if I had conjured you with a spell.”
A spell, as preposterous as it sounded, could be the only thing that could explain how dumbfounded he was.
Her long brown hair was plastered to her scalp and sprayed her face with drops of water when she rubbed it roughly. And every move was touched with an elegant sensuality that, he knew, was more innate than manufactured.
He had handled her so roughly just now, blinded by fury and fear. And any time he felt that unbalanced, his temper took a nasty dive, as his sister used to call it. “You look like... What the hell have you done to yourself?” he said, his control snapping.
She didn’t even flinch, although he saw her lashes flicker down for a second. Her oval face was so thin and fine-boned that her light brown eyes were like dark, murky pools in it. Her arms were thin, too, but at least there was muscle tone to it.
Her hand curving over her hip, her tarty dress clinging to her wet skin, her teeth chattering in her mouth, she thrust one bony hip out in a seductive little moment. “What? You don’t like my utterly fabulous and thin body? Your prison sentence has had at least one perk, Stavros. I lost so much weight that even the models parading through the fashion house keep asking me for tips. I can’t count the number of times Marco has asked me to do a shoot, told me I would be a natural...”
It was the utterly uncaring, blind privilege in her words that broke the haze from Stavros’s eyes. She was manipulating him, working herself under his skin like she always did, and yet he could do nothing to stop her.
From the moment he had laid eyes on her, Leah had been nothing but a spoilt, selfish, pleasure-seeking brat who didn’t know the value of what she had or the people she hurt around her.
So she looked different. It didn’t mean anything except that she had another bow in her arsenal for causing trouble. The first thing he needed to do was to get that...body covered up.
He grabbed her wrist, realized how fragile she was, and loosened his grip. Dragged her with him to Dmitri’s bedroom.
“Wow.” Her unconcerned exclamation boiled his blood anew.
He stilled on the way to the wardrobe, her stretched out body on Dmitri’s vast bed sending the most insane urge to pull her off it.
Cristos, something was wrong with him.
For several seconds, he stared blindly at the rows of neatly arranged Savile Row shirts. Wondered what he was doing in there.
“Dmitri does know how to party and live in style, doesn’t he?”
With a curse, he grabbed a shirt and threw it at her just as she pulled herself up. Her legs, long and toned, with black leather strips from her three-inch sandals winding round and round to her calves, glimmered against the dark red of Dmitri’s sheets.
“Let me get this straight. You dressed like a ten-pound hooker, got drunk and plastered yourself over that boy to get my attention? And it has nothing to do with the fact that a normal, alcohol-and drug-free life was getting to you?”
The shirt he threw came flying back at him, missing him narrowly. He turned and stilled.
The goose bumps on her skin stood out, her eyes huge in her oval face.
“I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for a year. If you had the decency to speak to me, I wouldn’t have had to do anything so drastic. It’s the first time I’ve touched alcohol in five years. Not surprisingly, I’m not driven to drink anymore.”
For all his self-discipline over the last few years, he couldn’t stop looking. He couldn’t stop devouring every small bit about her like he couldn’t stop breathing.
Her nipples pebbled against the flimsy dress, her breasts, unsupported by a bra, heaving with her harsh breathing.
She looked like a red-blooded man’s wet dream, and he was in no way impervious to the effect.
No!
This was Leah, a chain of duty and reminder of his failure around his neck. He had absolutely no interest in her except to keep her safe.
With ruthless will that had directed that he marry the woman responsible for his sister’s death, he cut that line of thought.
“Meaning I drove you to drink?” When she remained resolutely mute, he took another clearing breath. He couldn’t get this riled up over her. “Good for you. But I’m sure some habits are harder to kick than others. Like finding a scapegoat to hide your weaknesses behind.”
She flinched. He saw her swallow and turn away.
Hated the vicious satisfaction her pale face gave him. This was why he had avoided seeing her for so long.
With her mere presence, Leah reduced him to a hurtful, raging bastard with no control, ripped off any semblance of closure he deluded himself into achieving.
“I didn’t make a spectacle to discuss my shortcomings with you.” Said in that flippant voice that he had heard so many times.
But her whole body shook with the breath she dragged in. Curved like a bow, her pink mouth looked inviting. Like it was made for mindless kissing.
He studied it with rising fascination, the relentless drag of guilt and anger he felt in her presence dulled by something new, something far more dangerous.
He pushed a hand through his hair, wondering what was getting into him. “You have my attention now, Leah. Tell me, what is that you want?”
“You’ve proved to the whole world what an honorable man you are by marrying the disreputable Katrakis heiress. You’ve kept your word to Giannis. You’ve punished me for five years for my sins and more. Now...please, cut the leash on my life, Stavros.”
Her gaze held steady when he looked up, the fluttering pulse at her neck the only sign of her desperation. She linked her hands in front of her, and for a moment, Stavros couldn’t help but be impressed by her determination to keep a lid on her temper.
It was like watching a volcano trying to contain the lava within.
“Did you think for a second what you did would completely defeat your goal, Leah? How could finding you drunk and plastered over someone persuade me to let you go? Within the month, you will be back to it all, the drugs, the parties. And I can’t let that happen.”
Every drop of blood fled from her face. “You cut me off from the entire world. You cut me off from my friends. You have your goons watch over me night and day. You... And that’s fine too.
“But...you’ve been ignoring my emails, your hateful secretary is forever deflecting me. You...you can’t just take me on as a responsibility and then...just lock me up. I’m not a possession to safeguard. You left me no choice.”
“There are always choices. It’s a pity that with everything you have in the world, you never learned to make the right ones.”
“I’m not interested in discussing the past or the present.” If she did, she would crumple to the floor in a helpless heap. Like she had been for the first couple of months after Calista had died. “All I care about is myself and my future.”
“Of course.” His jaw tightened. “So you have nothing to say to me, nothing to ask?”
She shook her head. “I have a hundred things to organize for my collection. I’m already behind. All I want is a phone call authorizing the release of the...”
He prowled toward her in a slow gait that sent her heart thumping like a bass drum.
“You haven’t seen me, or anyone for five years. Aren’t you even remotely curious, Leah?”
“About what?” she managed to whisper, under the thrall of his mesmerizing gaze.
With a smooth flick of his wrist, he tugged her and she fell into him with a gasp. Every muscle in her body sighed at the contact with his hard one. A little more pressure and he had her locked in his arms with their faces only inches apart. Leaving her with no choice except to look into the anger that turned his eyes into dark gold. “About how your grandfather is doing, you ungrateful little brat.” At her gasp, his hold tightened further, this short of hurting. Sinuous heat burst in her belly and Leah struggled. “Is it too much to hope you would care about the man who took care of you when your father died?”
With a grunt, Leah pushed him back, hating the fact that he had muddled with her head with so little effort. She couldn’t let on how rattled she was by his presence, how out of balance she felt when he touched her, even innocently.
She breathed in roughly, gritting her jaw so tight that she would need to see a dentist soon. There should have been smoke coming out of her ears too. “First of all...I’m not sixteen anymore so stop calling me a brat.
“Secondly, not that I have to explain myself to you, I know how Giannis is doing. I speak to his nurse every day.”
She instantly regretted her words when she saw the disbelief in his gaze.
Turning away from him, she walked to the mini fridge in the corner, needing the time away from his scrutiny to compose herself. Grabbed a bottle and gulped the water down so fast that her throat burned at the chill.
And yet she could feel the heat pooling under her skin as he watched her from the other side of the room, could feel an unnamed charge building up in the room...
This slicing awareness of him, this reaction to his nearness...it was intolerable and utterly frightening. Stavros had only wreaked destruction on her life—why didn’t her body understand that?
“You haven’t visited him once in five years.”
Her chest ached at the thought of seeing Giannis. God, how she wanted to see that kind smile... Even through his heart attack and triple bypass surgery five years ago, Giannis had survived. She wouldn’t risk it by seeing him now.
“My relationship with Giannis is none of your business.”
His mouth stretched into a smile, the straight upper lip losing its severity in the process. “I’m making it mine.”
“And I’m saying ‘No more.’ I have spent five years living a life you dictated, Stavros, down to the food I ate, the clothes I wore, the people I spoke to. Whatever you think needed fixing in me, it is fixed now. I want to lead my life, I want to build a career...” Frustration filled her throat with tears. “What more do you need to be convinced that I can lead my own life?”
“Not getting a phone call from Dmitri that you are drunk and plastered over some boy would have been a start.”
“I told you why I did that. If I hadn’t, you would have gone another decade without answering my phone calls.” She hated that her every action was being driven by him. That even in her own mind, she had no freedom. And it could not continue.
“I have spoken to a friend of mine. Philip is a lawyer.” She stepped back from him, willing herself to stay strong. “I’m aware of my rights, Stavros. There are a hundred different reasons that could be cited and accepted by the court for a divorce.”
“A divorce?”
“Yes. I want a divorce. I want to never see you again. And I’m sure the thought of being rid of me forever fills you with happiness. So give us both what we want.”
A small smile touched his mouth but didn’t reach that compelling gaze. Again, Leah had a feeling that it hid so much she didn’t know. “You have rights and lawyers. But it could take years if I didn’t agree, Leah. We could be celebrating a ten-year anniversary before we even get through the preliminaries.”
“Is this what I have become for you?” Leah grabbed the edge of the desk to hide the trembling of her hands, a scream building away in her chest.
Hot tears prickled behind her eyelids. “Someone to punch, something to punish eternally so that you can feel better about what happened to Calista? Believe me, I wish it had been me that ended up dead that night and not her. But you know what? Wishing doesn’t make anything come true.”
Because even though she had never touched drugs in her life, she had enabled Calista that night. And that guilt choked her.
For the first time that evening, or maybe in forever, he looked so shocked that Leah would have celebrated it as a victory if not for the gnawing in her gut.
Slowly, he recovered, those long lashes hiding his expression. “I have never wished that you had died instead that night, Leah.”
She didn’t want to believe him. But Stavros was never less than honest.
Of course he wouldn’t have wished Giannis Katrakis’s granddaughter’s death. His control, not only over his actions, but even his very thoughts had always disconcerted and fascinated her in equal measure.
He lived by such a stringent code of his own rules, and applied it to everyone around him that no one could really hold up to it.
Not Dmitri, not Calista and definitely not her.
Recovering from the memory, she shook her head. “Right. You didn’t wish my death because who else will you take out your sadistic side on if I were gone?”
“You call the last decade of your presence in my life sadism. I call it masochism.”
She knew, had always known, what he thought of her. But hearing it in his own words... Her fingers pressed into the glass in her hand, the urge to throw the glass, water and all, at his head bubbling up inside her.
His amused gaze followed her shaky movements. “Try it.”
The utter satisfaction in his voice got through to her like nothing else could.
He expected this of her. He expected a juvenile tantrum and she had already catered to him today and for years. Every time he had warned her to not do something, she had done that and more. Had lashed out against him from the moment she had landed in Greece.
Hating Stavros, especially when he had continuously given her ample reasons, had been easier than dealing with the grief and fear inside her.
No more, Leah.
There was power in that choice, power in saying she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of being right about her anymore.
Instead, she took a deep breath, reminded herself why she was here. It would be great if Stavros released those funds to her. But she had known it wouldn’t be that simple.
Any other man would have sent the woman he thought responsible for his sister’s death to the other end of the world.
Instead, hours after he had buried Calista, he had bound her to him in the most sacred of bonds.
She didn’t even care about the divorce. The mockery of her marriage had never meant anything to her. All she wanted was to succeed, to give her life meaning, to take the joy she had always found in designing and creating to the next step.
“What do I have to do that you will release those funds?”
“Will you do anything I ask of you?”
Something in the silky tone of his voice—a flicker of interest maybe, nudged her into panic zone again. “My personal life is my own. Even with the shackles you bound me with, I have friends who mean something to me. If you order me to cut ties with them, I won’t.
“Last time you cut off my friends from me and gained control over my life, I was...I was too...”
“Too high to even notice what was going on around you?”
She hadn’t even gone on the anti-anxiety medication that had been prescribed after her dad’s death, hadn’t wanted to numb the grief of his death.
But it was pointless to defend herself when he had already passed judgment.
“I know how much you resented my responsibility from the moment I stepped off that plane. It doesn’t have to be like that anymore.”
Walking around the desk, he reached her side, and Leah fought the automatic impulse to step back, to keep some distance between them.
With his Greek-god good looks and smoldering arrogance, Stavros had always made her feel like the proverbial ugly duckling, made her feel even more awkward than she already had, surrounded by her grandfather’s high-class society friends.
It seemed like a thoroughly unwelcome awareness took the place of her anxiety now. The faint stubble on his tight cheeks, the perfectly etched curve of his mouth...
The collar of his dress shirt was open, showing his olive skin. Holding her breath in, she pulled her gaze to his.
Every nerve in her body thrummed as he neared her. At thirty-three, he was a decade older than her. So why couldn’t he have grown a paunch and become bald? Couldn’t fate or whatever it was up above give her a break at least in this?
Couldn’t he have been a little less gorgeous?
“If you have waited five years, what’s three more months for a divorce? Or is this Philip more than just a lawyer?”
“Philip is only a friend. And if you want to continue satisfying your twisted sense of duty...fine.”
Stavros watched in rising fascination as she closed her eyes and pulled in a long breath.
Shame filled him as he took in her slender frame. He hadn’t seen her once in five years. He hadn’t even made a call. Had just left her to Mrs. Kovlakis’s care.
It had been unbearable to even look at her after Calista’s death.
Theos, he had been so angry with her...
He had granted her request to apprentice at the fashion house, and yet, he hadn’t really done his duty, had he? Marrying her to protect her from fortune hunters that had always surrounded her like vultures, to protect her from her own reckless lifestyle, as he had promised Giannis, had only been the first step.
He had let grief and anger distract him. It had been easy to forget about her, easier even to tolerate her presence in his life from a distance.
A possession to safeguard?
She was right—it had gone on too long. He had resented his future with her for long enough.
“I’ve learned all I could at the fashion house. I have made some good contacts, and I would like to leave it now.”
Tension swathed him as she interrupted his thoughts. He should never have left her alone for so long, shouldn’t have given her this chance to go on the offensive.
“Leave and go where?”
“Ideally, I would love to go to New York City. But it—”
“New York and your inheritance—I can see where this is going.”
“—will be like starting all over,” she continued, glaring at him. “I have made some good contacts here—buyers at retail stores, models who like what I have come up with so far. So I decided against it. But I do need to take the next step now. The fashion industry moves so fast that waiting until the few people that like my designs forget me will harm any future I have in it.”
“What is the next step?”
Sudden energy filled her eyes. “I’m going to take a chance and start freelancing, do custom orders for now. Right now, I have interest from a woman who buys for a small retail store in London.”
“Going out on your own, especially in your field, is a risky venture. Shouldn’t you continue at the fashion house?”
“I have been making clothes all my life, Stavros. I have worked there for seven years and except for being allowed to give input on a senior designer’s creations, I don’t have any growth there.”
“But you don’t know anything about running a business.”
“You grew up on some itty-bitty farm and Dmitri...what was he...a drug runner or a pimp? I forget... The point is both of you knew less than squat when Giannis brought you here.”
He continued staring at her, his silence wreaking havoc on her breathing.
“I need to take this shot. And I need money up front for all the costs. I can’t access my trust fund unless you stop controlling it, unless you step down from your role as...”
“Ahhh...” He smirked and Leah wished she could get away with slapping the hateful man. But one wrong breath now and he would never listen to her again.
“That’s what this is all about. Money.”
“Yes, money,” she added, mimicking his sarcastic tone. Easy for him to look down upon her when he had gazillions of it. “Money that my father left me and has nothing to do with you or Giannis or my mother or the bloody Katrakis dynasty’s inheritance.”
“Fine.”
Was that it? So easy? Leah let out a long breath. Excitement fizzed through her. She would call her contact at the textile factory as soon as she got out. She would have to finalize and place orders for the raw materials, would have to hire someone to help with the sewing, would have to order equipment...
“Show me a proposal for this alleged business you want to start. If I find it sound,” he said, stressing how improbable he found the very idea, “I will invest in it myself.”
Anger and hurt ripped through Leah, leaving her trembling all over. Her chest was so tight that it was a miracle she could breathe.
She wanted to smash the expensive porcelain vase on the side table next to her, she wanted to let the scream building away in her chest loose, she wanted to...
“I don’t want your investment. I don’t want anything from you. I want my money. I want this...my career—I need this to be about me, Stavros, something I love doing, something I can take on without fear. Something I give all of myself to.”
“I should have made my intentions clearer to you far sooner. You were right, I shouldn’t have let it go on for so long. But now that you are here, I will correct the situation immediately.”
Her heart lurched into her throat, cutting off Leah’s breath. Whatever it was that he meant, it wasn’t going to be remotely what she wanted. “What do you mean?”
“When I gave my word to Giannis that I would protect you, even from yourself, I didn’t mean it temporarily, Leah. I meant the until death do us part. Whatever way that death might come for you. So let’s get two things straight.”
He looked like someone had carved his features in stone, removed every ounce of emotion from it. “This lawyer friend of yours... he should know better than to tangle with my wife.
“Secondly, you’ll move in with me.”
“What? Why?”
“Because it’s high time we started our life together.
“And as for your career, we will get a fashion house, London or Milan or Paris, whatever you choose, to launch a line for you. As my wife, you will lack for nothing.”
CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_9dd303b2-7770-5d1e-8925-7707b20fdd62)
LAUNCH A LINE from a top design house in the world? Lack for nothing as his wife?
His wife?
He had to be joking; he had always liked making her miserable!
You cannot see that boy anymore, Leah...
No more trips to New York...
Giannis allows you far too much financial freedom but not anymore...
Leah met his gaze and everything within her stilled.
Stavros Sporades didn’t give his word or make a promise easily. When he did...
Fear struck her so hard that her knees shuddered under her.
He instantly moved forward to catch her but Leah jerked away from him. “Don’t come near me,” she whispered.
She grabbed the door to stop from sliding to the floor in a puddle. She wanted to scream her denial but what left her mouth was a soft gasp.
He would never forgive her, or himself, for Calista’s death, never even give her a chance. Would punish them both for the rest of their lives.
And to even contemplate being his wife in the true sense of the word...
Perversely, she felt a chilly calm inside instead of a boiling rage. “When I decided to come here today, I didn’t even care about whether I was married to you or not. I didn’t care about being so lonely all these years...friends I knew once living their life to the fullest... I lived it as if I deserved to be punished. But now...I won’t quietly accept your word this time.
“I’m going to file for divorce, Stavros.”
A tic played in his jaw, the only thing that betrayed his even gaze. He looked insurmountable, like a boulder intent on crushing her. “Lawyers and court proceedings cost money.”
That patronizing tone set her teeth on edge. “I will sell myself if I have to, to pay for it. Within the week, I will move out of that flat, will be handing in my resignation at the fashion house. The moment I step out of here, I’m going to call Philip and tell him what I plan to do.”
He moved to block her path, his gait predatory. “I’m not your enemy, Leah.”
Panic pushed a hundred different flight routes in her head, one more desperate than the next. “No? Because God help me the day you decide that you are. If your goons even lay a finger on me, I will go to the media and start talking about how you have treated me over the last five years. I’ll tell them I’ve been nothing but a glorified prisoner.
“I’m sure they would love to hear that saintly Stavros Sporades is nothing but a sadist.”
“I do not care what the media calls me.”
Nausea pooled in her mouth. “They will, of course, dig through the whole story again about that night and Calista.”
If there was fury before in his eyes, now there was nothing but the bitterest loathing for her. And seeing as she felt the same inside, that she despised herself for how far she was taking this, his loathing couldn’t touch Leah.
For once, his opinion of her couldn’t hurt her, as twisted as it was.
“If he even hears a whiff of it—” a vein throbbed in his temple and his hands fisted at his side “—Giannis, who...has done nothing but love you, he will be destroyed to see the Katrakis name dragged through mud. You will kill him with your stupid stunt, and my grandparents...they can’t bear to think of Calista’s death anymore.”
“But you already know that I don’t care about anyone but myself, don’t you?” she bluffed, swallowing the bile that rose through her.
She couldn’t betray the depth of pain that she held at bay every day thinking of her grandfather, of knowing he was close by but not seeing him.
Guilt ate through her insides. But she had no recourse except to threaten Stavros like this. She forced a smile, her cheeks hurting at her continued pretense. “If you don’t want me to drag the Sporades name and the Katrakis name through mud, you will have to agree.”
She opened the door and looked at him again, feeling truly afraid for the first time. She had gambled on the one person that she loved with all her heart. She could never hurt her grandfather. Even speaking about it like this was cutting her in two. But she had to make sure Stavros would believe her capable of it. “You will have to release those funds and you have to cut the strings you hold over my life. The choice is yours, Stavros.”
“I thought I knew the depths of selfishness you could sink to, but you always manage to surprise me, Leah.”
Desolation filled her at the utter resignation in his voice. That he believed her bluff didn’t fill her with relief or gratitude however. Only painted a picture of what her life would be like with him.
And thinking of being caught in a circle of hatred and hero worship, she didn’t have to try to sound like she didn’t care. “What’s new about that, Stavros? And who knows? Once I’m out of your life, you might even thank me for it.”
Without stopping for even a breath, she rushed out of the bedroom and through the corridors, her legs barely holding her up.
She made it to the main deck before she collapsed onto the floor and clutched her knees. Leaning her head against her knees, she fought to corral her uneven breathing.
The very real possibility of Stavros still not believing what she had threatened sent a shaft of fear through her.
Her nape prickled as she heard someone approach, and instantly, she straightened her shoulders. She couldn’t afford to let him see her like this... He would know that she had been bluffing. And she would be worse off than she had started today.
Breathing hard, she composed herself and looked up.
His hip lolling against the bar counter in casual elegance, Dmitri watched her with gray eyes. “Hello, Leah.”
Shuddering, Leah swallowed the hard knot in her throat.
She couldn’t break down now, not when Stavros was so close.
A daring mockery in his gaze, Dmitri extended a hand to pull her up.
Leah grabbed his hand and pushed herself to her feet.
His hands were callous but didn’t leave her shaking like Stavros’s grip had done. His mocking gaze didn’t compel her to react nor did his arrogant perusal leave her off balance and breathless. She didn’t feel compelled to be better than she was, or to give up in frustration because nothing would ever change, as she did with Stavros.
She didn’t feel anything except questionable warmth at seeing a familiar face.
Why Stavros of all men? Was she that much of a sucker for pain?
“I can see that you’re—” Dmitri’s gaze swept over her “—looking astonishingly well, so I’m not going to ask how you have been.”
Set against Stavros’s lacerating contempt, there was a slumbering, almost comforting quality to Dmitri that had always put her at ease. Looking into the bottomless depths of Dmitri’s eyes now, she wondered how much of that warmth was a deceptive facade.
“Come, I’ll take you home. Stavros will thank me for stopping his precious wife from getting arrested for indecent exposure.”
Leah shivered, only barely stopping herself from covering her chest with her arms. Hearing herself referred to as Stavros’s wife, even the mention of that bond that tied them together made her queasy inside, and Dmitri knew it.
Straightening her shoulders and resolutely holding her arms down, she glared at him. “Then he shouldn’t have dumped me in that monstrous tub of yours.”
His laughter swathed her. Leah ducked, just enough when he threw an arm to pull her to him.
“I’m not playing your games, Dmitri, so back off.”
His eyes warmed up even more. The few times she had come into contact with him, he had at least had a kind smile for her, whether real or fake.
Familiar trust awoke in her, something inside her desperate for a friend after Stavros’s stinging scorn.
Unless it was part of his game to get her to trust him and pump her for information so that he could take it back to Stavros... She sighed, feeling immensely tired and lonely.
“I have missed your sharp tongue all these years.”
“Wish I could say the same, but I don’t have your gift or charm for lying.”
Reaching her, he hooked her arm through his and herded her toward the steps. “Let’s not pretend about your talents. At least not with me.”
Swallowing her fear, Leah dragged her feet. Dmitri saw far more than he let on. As different as they were, his friendship with Stavros was as inviolate as their devotion toward Giannis.
Donning that mask of reckless ignorance, Leah faced him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about but I can find my own way, thank you.”
“I heard your conversation, Leah.”
“Then you’re as uncivilized as they say.”
He stared at her with unblinking eyes. “I had the yacht empty in five minutes but I couldn’t leave. I was afraid of what you both would do to each other,” he drawled silkily.
Every time she had seen Giannis with either Dmitri or Stavros, she had felt a yawning chasm in her chest knowing she could never share something like that with her own grandfather. And that it was her choice.
“It doesn’t concern you, Dmitri.”
Grabbing her arm, he turned her. “You’re playing a dangerous game with Giannis’s life, Leah. This is not like one of those antics you used to take up just to make Stavros furious.”
That he had always seen through her ploys unnerved Leah. “All I want is my freedom, Dmitri, a chance to live my life. You get that, don’t you?” she threw back at him, remembering bits and pieces of what Calista had told her about Dmitri’s life before Giannis had plucked him off the streets of London.
“Try a different way then. For once, try to change the dynamic between you two, Leah.”
“How?” she whispered, her voice breaking. “He’s left me no choice. In that moment—” she pointed to the ominously quiet lower deck, her heart pounding in her chest “—it started as a bluff. But I... I don’t know what I’m capable of anymore.”
“Stavros and you are intent on destroying each other.”
“Me destroy Stavros? All the power, all the cards are in his hands, Dmitri. As always.” And the worst part was that she had given it all to him with her irresponsible behavior.
All she had today was the wretched power to hurt Giannis. And Leah was terrified that she would use that power. Desperation turned her words into a pitiful entreaty.
“If you count Stavros as your friend, if you really care about Giannis’s well-being, then convince Stavros that I don’t need his brand of protection anymore. Please, Dmitri.”
* * *
Two days later, Stavros and Dmitri were sparring in the ring in the ultra-sophisticated, custom-built gym attached to Dmitri’s Athens apartment.
It had started when Stavros had suggested Dmitri could work his way out of a temper instead of losing it when Giannis had brought him to Athens years ago, morphed into a way for them to resolve arguments when they struggled to keep up with the rigorous, grueling schedule that Giannis set for them.
A habit they had carried into adulthood.
But today, Stavros was the one who felt bloodthirsty, like he was coming apart at the seams.
After two days in which he had been supremely unproductive, he still hadn’t been able to master his reaction to seeing Leah.
You already know that I don’t care about anyone but myself, don’t you?
Her words rang through him, her glittering gaze and her vibrating body etched into his brain.
The brazen curve of her mouth, the reckless shrug with one hand on a bony hip, her dark brown hair drying in curls around that angelic face... Cristo, he still couldn’t believe that...boldly stunning creature had been Leah.
Leah, who had jumped like a live wire when he had touched her without meaning to...
Leah, who, even at a naive sixteen, had somehow always pushed all the wrong buttons in him...
Leah, who was, even now, insidiously unfurling the iron fist with which he ruled his...
No!
Moving his right foot forward, Stavros swung his left hook with a vicious fury. The thwack of his knuckle against Dmitri’s jaw, and the hiss of his exhale, followed by the filthiest curse words reverberated in the quiet.
Shock flashed in Dmitri’s eyes.
That Stavros had gone on the offense when it had always been about letting Dmitri work through one of his tempers, who learned to use his fists on the streets of London amidst gangs, spoke to his ragged control.
“Ding, ding,” Dmitri mocked, dark amusement in his gaze. “Point for Leah Huntington Sporades.”
Gritting his jaw, Stavros shot him a filthy look.
Massaging his jaw with one hand, Dmitri reached for a bottle of water with the other. “In all the years that we have known each other, you have never gone on the offensive. Today’s win has to go to her.”
Knowing how cunningly perceptive Dmitri was, Stavros decided to leave. It had been a miracle in itself that Dmitri had—showing what Giannis would have called uncharacteristic wisdom—left Stavros alone after Leah’s latest stunt.
He didn’t want to discuss Leah, with him of all people.
Dmitri’s jaw was already black and blue, and for once, Stavros enjoyed the result of his loss of control. “Put some ice on it.”
Dmitri stopped him with a hand on his arm. “You’re pushing it too far, Stavros.”
“Leave it alone, Dmitri.” He knew exactly what his friend was talking about.
Moving around him, Dmitri blocked his path. “You went above and beyond what Giannis asked of you. Wash your hands off.”
Giannis, to whom he and Dmitri owed their entire world, had asked for only one thing in return after becoming their salvation when they had been nothing but uneducated thugs.
And Stavros had failed spectacularly at it. “Have you forgiven yourself for everything you have ever done? Or failed to do?”
All emotion seeped out of Dmitri’s face, leaving an uncaring mask in its place. “Do I look like I have been punishing myself for the last decade?”
Stavros made a doubtful sound of assent in his throat. “See you next week.”
“Giannis asked you to protect her, Stavros, ne?” His breath hung in his throat as Stavros waited. “But what I saw two days ago... He should have entrusted me with Leah. I would have seduced her within the day, made her fall in love with me and then cast her aside after a week. She would have learned her lesson.
“But you—”
Stavros curled his hand around his friend’s throat, fury filling every vein. The thought of Dmitri seducing and throwing away Leah made him crazy like a rabid dog he had once put down as a teenager. “She is not one of your party bunnies, Dmitri. She’s...she’s Leah.”
His breathing loud to his own ears, Stavros stilled. Dmitri watched him with hooded eyes, not even trying to shake off his grip. They both knew what he had been about to say.
She is my wife.
When had he become so possessive of Leah? When had she gone from a chain around his neck to something that could incite him like this?
“To see Stavros Sporades’s ironclad control unravel like this... But even a man made of stone would have noticed that gorgeous body. Leah could always get under your skin so easily,” Dmitri continued, frowning, “but now, she has another weapon to wield against you.”
“Enough, Dmitri! I don’t interfere in your life nor pass judgment on it.”
“But Leah is not just any woman. If you’re doing this just because you suddenly have the hots for your little wife—”
“Some days, I don’t know whether to call you friend or foe.”
Dmitri didn’t even blink. “You are the most honorable man I know, Stavros. Until I met you, I didn’t know what it was. There are days when I still don’t. But Leah’s threat concerns Giannis. You need to make a decision soon.”
“I already made one. Five years ago.”
“Then why have you left her under someone else’s care, kept her at a distance? Either she’s truly your wife or you’re through with her.
“You can’t hang both your lives in limbo as if it was some sort of penance.”
A chill seeped into his skin despite the fact that he was sweating. Stavros let Dmitri go. “What if she hasn’t changed? What if she...”
“Give her a chance at least, Stavros. To prove you right or wrong.”
It was Dmitri that finally left the room.
Everything Dmitri had said was stuff he had already been over a thousand times.
The moment Dmitri had called him, guilt had clung to Stavros.
All his life, he had tried to do his duty by his grandparents, by Calista, by Giannis. He hadn’t let his own fears or wants matter. He had always done the right thing. He knew what he had to do now, knew Leah deserved a chance. And yet, he wavered, for the first time in his life.
Never had his mind or body been so out of sync as it was now.
Five years ago, he had let his anger detract him, and now the intensity of his want for her was a weakness he had never had to deal with before. He wiped his face and looked at himself in the mirror.
He had let nothing but his responsibilities, his sense of duty, guide him his entire life.
Nothing was going to change that, not his reckless, selfish, brazen wife of all people in the world.
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_be8c5367-a414-54a1-b665-1e8f0b140a12)
STANDING AT THE small balcony that offered a view of the colorful Athens evening ahead, Leah looked out.
She had been running for the past hour, the one thing that had always grounded her. Yet, all she felt like was running away, and this time, not looking back.
The panic-fueled urge was like an itch under her skin, a fire in her nerves.
It was a quarter past five and already the cafes and eateries were filling up with locals and tourists alike. Laughter and excited phrases in Greek swirled up through the air. It was a sight that had brought her a smile countless number of times after another long, lonely day. Today, it couldn’t dispel her anxiety even a little bit.
Sighing, she went back inside. The pristine white walls that she had refused to adorn with even a single photo closed in on her and she started pacing.
Why hadn’t she run away before now? Why hadn’t she walked away from Stavros and this...pitiful thing between them that was a marriage, and not looked back?
Had she been so lonely to cling to this familiar world even knowing that she could never be close to her grandfather in the way it mattered? Had even Stavros’s punishment been better than facing a life alone in the world?
She would never forgive herself for the part she had played in it, but, to this day, she had no idea that Calista had been using. Had no idea that hiding Calista’s involvement in everything Stavros had abhorred about Leah would go that far.
Had no idea what it was about Stavros that made the worst parts of her manifest so well.
Impulse and fear making her movements jerky, she reached her closet and pulled out a shoulder bag that had collected dust from sitting unused for so long. Grabbed a few clothes and threw them in the bag.
For two days, she had waited calmly, taking Philip’s advice to not do anything rash. Had waited for the explosion from Stavros to come. Had barely slept a wink, was driving herself crazy.
She couldn’t wait to see if Stavros would take her bait. She would have to cut her ties, beginning with this flat and her job.
Just as she grabbed her phone, it pinged and the name Stavros popped up on her screen.
Leah dropped it with a gasp, her heart jamming in her throat. Perspiration condensed on her forehead as she stared down at the phone on the dull carpet.
It pinged again, jolting her out of her haze. She swiped it open to the text.
Come down to the café in ten minutes. I have an offer for you.
An offer? Could she trust him? Had she finally got through to him?
Will scream if I see your ‘security guys.’
She waited, her breath hanging in her throat.
Enough drama, Leah. Come down or I come upstairs.
The thought of Stavros invading her private space, as much of a jail as it was, sent her fingers flying over the phone.
Fine, see you in a bit.
Feeling more hopeful than she’d been in months, she was about to step into the shower when it pinged again.
Leah...Dress appropriately.
Leaning against the bathroom wall, she made an utterly juvenile face at the phone. The small space thundered with the boom of her heart.
Stavros was here because he had bought her bluff. It wouldn’t do to let on how petrified she was inside, to let him set the tone for this conversation.
It was like a mask she had to wear and the more she did it, the more it felt like she would become that uncaring, selfish person that he had always despised.
* * *
He had said ten minutes.
By the time he spied her crossing the street from her building to the café, it was well over half an hour. In true Leah form, she had also blatantly disregarded his last text.
The peach-colored silk blouse pressed against her body, neatly delineating the globes of her high breasts as a gust of wind blew across the street. He saw her shiver and grab the edges of the long-sleeved cardigan together.
Heat uncoiled under his own skin, a soft, sinuous gathering of something molten.
The silk blouse was paired with an even more flimsy pair of shorts that showcased her long legs. The glint of a toned thigh muscle, the way her wavy brown hair swept into a high ponytail swung with her long-limbed stride as she walked toward the café in her knee-high leather boots turned more than one male head.
She walked with the innate grace of an athlete, confident in her own skin. There was nothing of the Leah he had married and not because she had grown into her beauty. It was like a fire burned within, one that made her something to behold.
Was it truly as she had claimed and about her career? Or was it a man? Every cell in him went on high alert at the thought.
The last man Leah had been close with had been a crook of the first order—Alex Ralston, who was in jail even now for possession and distribution of drugs.
“When will you learn that defying me only wrecks your own life, Leah?” he said, dragging her down to the seat next to him.
Crossing her legs in a languorous gesture, she curved her pink-glossed mouth in a too sweet smile. “When will you learn that you cannot order me around, Stavros?”
As silky soft as her skin had been to the touch, her pulse had been pounding a thousand beats a minute. She was nervous. And yet, she was doing everything she could to not let him see it.
He waved away the waiter that arrived at their table with a beaming smile for her.
She waved him back with a friendly smile. When he glared at her, she sighed.
“I am hungry, Stavros. I rarely, if ever, eat out so I’m going to pretend you enjoy my company and make the most of it.”
He waited in silence as the young waiter appeared again. Watched in mounting fascination as she ordered three appetizers and two entrees in fractured but perfectly accurate Greek.
“I’m not eating,” he said dismissively as the waiter left.
“I know. It’s Friday evening and you’ll have dinner with Helene Petrou, ex-lover and—” a curse flew from his mouth “—current friend.”
Leaning forward in an elegant move, he pinned her gaze. “How do you know about that?”
“Philip has his resources.”
“So your little lawyer asked you to casually throw that into the conversation?”
“Actually, quite the opposite. He told me not to even betray the fact that I knew anything about her,” she said with that blunt and reckless honesty.
Stavros settled back slowly.
Leah had zero self-preservation. How was he supposed to believe that she could look after herself?
“Then why did you?”
“I don’t want to wage a war against you, Stavros. It’s... my last choice. I bring it up because I was...shocked to hear her name after so many years. That you see her apparently on a weekly basis.”
“Shocked to learn that I keep in touch with a woman I admire?” he said, choosing his words carefully.
Looking anywhere but at him, she nodded. The fine sheen of color in her cheeks snagged his attention.
Brazen, reckless Leah was uncomfortable?
“I remembered that Calista...she talked so much about you guys. That you were made for each other,” she said, her gaze wandering off into the distance.
The look in her eyes was a compelling blend of pain and ache that Stavros had never seen before. Did she truly mourn Calista that much? “Leah?”
She blinked and then curved her mouth. But the artifice of the action wasn’t lost to him. “You would be free. To be with her.”
“You want me to be with Helene?” he said, shocked.
“Yes.” She took a sip of water, her gaze lingering on him. “Of course, I would prefer it if you were as miserable as you’ve always made me, but if your happiness is the price of my freedom...then so be it.”
“That’s very magnanimous of you, Leah.” The whole conversation was twistedly perverse. “I’m surprised you remember her. Or anything from that time.”
His dig bounced off her. “Her resume is far too impressive to forget. Businesswoman, fashion icon, former model and the best of all, the one who could stand up to Stavros Sporades’s infinitely impeccable standards for a woman.”
He stared at the almost cynical twist of her mouth, something in her tone grating at him. “You have quite the opinion about her.”
“Of course, I do. I was obsessed with...” Coloring, she trailed her gaze away from him. “How successful she was at such a young age.”
He had a curious feeling that it wasn’t what she meant to say. If he compartmentalized his abhorrence for everything Leah represented and his unwise awareness of her every move, he could admit that Leah was funny and resilient as hell.
The more he pondered that, the more he realized how true it was.
Despite losing her father suddenly in a car accident and being thrust into an unfamiliar world that Giannis and he lived in, he had never seen her morose or down.
That same selfishness that he abhorred also lent her a strange strength. It was as if she stood behind a veil that separated her emotions, her very self from the people around her.
“So was all that food to please the waiter?”
“Where are your manners, Stavros?”
“All my finer qualities disappear like a mist when it comes to you, Leah.”
“I was running this afternoon. So all that food is for me.”
Stavros nodded, understanding the toned litheness of her body. “What happened to walking out the flat and the job? To letting your little lawyer loose on me?”
He saw her still for a second before she turned toward him. “I... Philip advised me to not do anything rash.”
“And you listened.” Which meant she trusted him, which meant Stavros needed to know everything about him.
The waiter brought the food and she grabbed a fork. A satisfied sound erupted from her mouth, drawing the gaze and attention of more than one man sitting at the neighboring tables.
She looked up from her food suddenly and blushed. “So what is your offer?”
“I’m proposing a compromise.”
“Nothing you ever suggest is a compromise. It will be your will, only couched in deceptive words. You did the same thing to...”
At the sudden glint in his gaze, Leah fiddled with the fork and looked away.
“To whom?”
Her shrimp suddenly tasted like sawdust in her mouth. Leah swallowed it down with a sip of her water. “To me and Calista, of course, countless times. Anything she proposed, you forbade it.”
Like the time when she had wanted to study art in Paris one year, and when she had wanted to travel to New York with Leah. Like the time when Calista had wanted to start bartending at a nightclub where her friend had worked.
And when he refused her, one of Calista’s rages would begin. Just the memory rattled Leah on a deep level. Calista had had a temper but she had hidden it so thoroughly from her brother.
“For instance?” he added softly, and Leah blinked. “You looked so pained just now, tell me what you were thinking, Leah.”
The inherent command rankled Leah, and yet, beneath it, she sensed his eagerness, his curiosity. That there could be more to Stavros than rules and duty...it threw her.
He had only been in his twenties when she had arrived in Athens, and yet, all she remembered about Stavros was his incredible sense of responsibility and duty toward all of them.
For the first time, she wondered what drove him to it.
Her curiosity tempered her response. “Why do you want to know?”
He blinked now, as if he couldn’t believe that she dared question him. No, it wasn’t that. Dumbfounded, she watched as he struggled to put his thoughts into words. “I... Even though I gave her everything she could ever want, I never understood—” something in her loosened as he visibly swallowed “—why Calista chose to follow your lead, how I failed to protect her.”
The anguish in his gaze sent memories and impressions hurtling through Leah. Her shoulders shook. “I don’t know—”
“Not that I expect you to know the answer, when you’re the one who led her to drugs.”
Her head jerked up.
Arrogant implacability wreathed his features. As if he had realized who he was talking to. As if there could be nothing but contempt between them.
“No, of course not,” she whispered, buffeting herself against the immense hurt his words caused. Leah put her fork down.
Despite all her grand plans and ideas for adventures, Calista had never even lifted a finger in the house. Whereas Leah, whose mother had died giving birth to her, had always done more than her share to help out her dad even from a young age.
My saintly brother has servants for that... It had been her favorite thing to say when Leah would suggest cleaning up or cooking sometimes.
She had been sixteen and afraid and grieving in her own way. How much of her understanding of Calista would hold up today? For a minute, it seemed she and Stavros had found something common in their grief over Calista.
But no, the past was done. She had to look forward to the future.
Collecting herself, Leah looked up at him. “Tell me what I have to do.”
He studied her for the longest time. Each falling second twisted her gut. “Live with me for three months and prove that I can trust you.”
“No.” The table rattled with the force of her movement.
“This is the only way I will even consider it.”
“What do you expect me to do these three months?”
“Convince me that you’re serious about this fashion design career, that you won’t drain your inheritance on some trumped-up business.”
“The vote of confidence in your tone is really inspiring.”
That hardness in his eyes didn’t budge. “I’m giving you a real choice. If you fail, our marriage stands. You’ll be my wife in every sense for as long as one of us is alive.”
A violent tremble started at the base of her spine and spread upward and outward. The happy voices around her buzzed as if they were noise feedback. And in that space between them, a charge built up winding and changing with every breath they took.
Leah struggled against it, rationalized against it. He met his lover every week. He could not be attracted to her. Nor she to him.
This charge was antagonism that had gone unaddressed for so many years, hatred and resentment and their struggle against this very fate that was spilling over into something else. Maybe it would be true if she believed it enough, she thought desperately.
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