Читать книгу Irresistible Greeks: Secrets and Seduction: The Secrets She Carried / Painted the Other Woman / Breaking the Greek's Rules - Линн Грэхем, Julia James - Страница 11

TWO weeks later, Erin stepped out of the car that had collected her at the airport and breathed in slow and deep. Italy, Tuscany in fact, not at all the setting that she had dimly expected Cristo to provide. In truth she had assumed the weekend would take place in London at his apartment, if he still lived there in the city, or even in one of his hotels. A grand fortified house presiding over an incredibly scenic hidden Italian valley had not featured at all.

Even with the sun starting to set in a golden blaze, the views of grape terraces, arrow-shaped cypresses, pine-forested slopes and silver-grey olive trees were magnificent; almost as much so as the wide graceful house with its shallow terracotta red roof and twin lines of tall elegant windows. Bells tinkled while sheep grazed on stretches of lush green grass in a timeless pastoral scene. It was not the backdrop she would have given to Cristo, whom she had once believed could only thrive on the often insane pace of city life.

A small balding manservant was already grasping the small case she had travelled with and with an expansive wave of one hand he welcomed her in English, introduced himself as Vincenzo and invited her to follow him indoors to an imposing marble hall that echoed with their footsteps. He escorted her straight up the sweeping marble staircase to a beautifully furnished bedroom decorated in masculine shades of gold and green. Her cheeks flared as she gazed at the wide gold-draped bed and hastily she glanced away again, preceding Vincenzo into the superb modern bathroom and politely smiling in admiration.

Did the wretched man know what she was here for? Or did he simply assume that she was yet another one of Cristo’s women? And whatever he thought, what did it matter? She studied her taut reflection with self-loathing. Get over yourself, she told herself urgently. It might feel like a lifetime since she had had sex but at the end of the day sex was just sex even with Cristo and not worth risking her security over. She was being practical, choosing the safest option …

Over the past two weeks negotiations over the buyout of Sam’s hotels had speeded up to reach agreement. The deal was signed, sealed and delivered and, whether she liked it or not, she was going to be working for Cristo Donakis again, although presumably only after that forensic accounting team he had mentioned had convinced him that she was to be trusted after all. The sting of his conviction that she was a thief still lingered though, not to mention the necessity of having had to lie outright to her trusting mother to travel to Italy. That latter act sat like a giant stone on her conscience.

Her face and her heart troubled, Erin doffed her light raincoat and agreed to come downstairs to enjoy the coffee that Vincenzo was offering. She had told her mother that she was catching the train up to Scotland to stay with Tom and his wife, Melissa, and their new baby, Karen. What else could she have told the older woman? Deidre Turner would have had a heart attack had she known the truth of what her wayward daughter was about to do and guilt nagged at Erin. Surely sometimes a lie was kinder than the truth, she reasoned uncertainly. But that was of little comfort to a young woman raised to ‘tell the truth and shame the devil’.

Coffee was served on the terrace in the warmth of early evening and she thought about Lorcan and Nuala, resenting the loss of a weekend that she had expected to spend with her twins. As she abstractedly took in the fabulous view shadowing into dark hills and tree tops her phone buzzed and she drew it from her bag.

Wear your hair loose, the text told her.

Cristo was reducing her to the level of a toy with a starring role in his fantasy. The taste of her coffee soured in her mouth. She was sick with nerves. Cristophe Donakis was the man she had once loved beyond belief. Although she had worked hard to hide it, she had absolutely adored him and their intimacy had only added another dimension to that love. This demeaning emotion-free encounter would destroy even the good memories. Though perhaps that would be a godsend? Was Cristo getting a kick out of having her at his disposal? Cristo enjoyed power. Teeth gritting, she finished the coffee and went back upstairs to change. Was she supposed to dress as if this were a date or await his arrival in that vast bed? Tears stung her eyes and she blinked them away furiously as she headed for a shower. No, absolutely no way was she going to wait in the bed! Swathed in a towel, she tugged a silky blue dress from her case.

Cristo leapt out of the helicopter and strode up to the villa, impatience and hunger burning through him. He hadn’t been worth a damn all day, all week for that matter! Just the thought of Erin being there had wiped out his wits, Vincenzo’s call to confirm her arrival catching him in the middle of a board meeting. How many times had he told himself he shouldn’t be doing this? What the hell, he reasoned furiously, why shouldn’t he be a bastard for a change? He had let her off the hook too lightly three years ago. This—being with her one more time—was an indulgence but it was also an exorcism, and when it was done he would be done with her as well.

The pulse in Erin’s neck was beating like crazy as she hovered by the bedroom window, refusing to look outside while her tummy twisted into knots. She had heard the helicopter landing, knew Cristo liked to fly himself, and knew it would be him and that within minutes he would walk through the bedroom door. She clasped her hands tightly together, willing back her nerves, striving for calm and cool.

And then the door flew open, rocking back on its hinges to frame Cristo, brilliant black diamond eyes snaking across the room to rest on her, his tall well-built body casting a long shadow in the lamp light. And there she was, silvery pale hair tumbling round her shoulders, something pretty and blue swirling round her petite little body, waiting for him just as he remembered from times gone by. Erin. He savoured her, noting the glow of self-consciousness that coloured the beautiful delicacy of her features. He experienced such a charge of hunger at the first glance that a predatory smile crossed his mobile male mouth.

‘Cristo …’ Erin contrived to enunciate with admirable clarity, only the breathy quietness of her voice letting her down.

‘Erin,’ he breathed thickly, closing the distance between them and hauling her straight into his arms.

He said something in Greek as he gazed down at her and she would have given anything to know what it was. ‘What—?’

‘Don’t want to talk, koukla mou,’ Cristo husked, his breath fanning her cheek as he bent his handsome dark head.

His eyes, those beautiful beautiful eyes, lion gold surrounded by spiky black lashes, held hers fast and she literally stopped breathing because the clean designer scent of him was drenching her with every mouthful of air. He looked so good, so irretrievably, undeniably good that his pure impact overwhelmed her. He kissed the corner of her mouth in a tiny teasing caress and she shivered, her thoughts blanking out, her body taking over and she wanted more, wanted more so badly that it hurt. His mouth found hers with a sudden urgency that she welcomed. Her tongue slid against his and the pressure of his lips increased in a deep hot kiss that blew her away. In the midst of it he wrenched free of his jacket and dropped it, yanked at his tie and she trailed it free, her fingers releasing the shirt button at his strong brown throat.

And it took no thought to do any of those things and she was shaken by the instinct driving her at a level she didn’t understand. Her fingers curved to one high cheekbone as she struggled to stay upright with her heart slamming against her breastbone as hard as though she were in race. Her legs felt weak, insufficient to support her and she was fiercely aware of the empty ache in her pelvis and the swelling tightness of her breasts as he spread his big hands over her buttocks and crushed her into his hard erection.

‘I’m burning alive for you,’ Cristo growled almost accusingly, spinning her round to find the zip on her dress and taking care of it with efficiency.

‘Me too,’ Erin admitted with a bitterness she couldn’t hide, her whole body throbbing with uncontrollable desire as deft fingers brushed the straps of her dress off her slight shoulders and the garment pooled in a silky heap round her feet.

Breathing audibly, Cristo spun her back to him and bent to curve his hands round her slim thighs, hitching her up against him and bringing her down on the bed with a sound of satisfaction that started deep in his broad chest. It’s just sex, amazing sex, he adjusted helplessly, but the burn, the burn of excitement was indescribable. He slid a hand beneath her to unclasp her bra and stared down into her amethyst eyes, purple blue like precious gems. Thief, he told himself, liar, cheat but that little mantra of reminders didn’t work its desired magic. He ripped off his shirt, felt her hands sweeping up, up over his chest and honestly wondered if he could hold it together long enough to get inside her.

‘How can you still do this to me?’ he demanded in a fierce undertone, shimmering hot golden eyes pinned to the flushed triangle of her face and then sinking down a level to concentrate on the pale breasts he had uncovered, firm little mounds adorned with large pink nipples that magnetised his attention.

Claiming a straining bud with his mouth, Cristo suckled strongly, using his hands, his lips and the edge of his teeth because he knew how sensitive she was there. As her slim length jackknifed under him, spine arching on a strangled moan, his sense of achievement increased and he let his lips rove hungrily over her dainty breasts, lingering on the swollen straining peaks to torment them with pleasure. His attention glued to her prone body, he backed off the bed again and unzipped his trousers.

Her face hot pink with shame and discomfiture, Erin sat up and clasped her knees. She didn’t want to enjoy anything they did. She wanted to lie there like a stone statue and stay inwardly untouched and detached from him. But Cristo was far too expert a lover to allow her that kind of escape route and he was seducing a response out of her resistant body.

‘I didn’t intend to fall on you like a wild animal the minute I came through the door,’ he volunteered impatiently. ‘I was planning on having dinner first.’

Erin averted her gaze, the victim of unwelcome memories of a passion that had never gone off the boil. ‘You were never very good at waiting. It was always like this for us—’

‘There is no “us” any more.’

Erin lowered her lashes. He was wrong. Lorcan and Nuala were a wonderful combination of their respective genes and unless she was very much mistaken her toddlers had inherited his volatile nature. Lorcan was wilful and hot-tempered and Nuala was sharp as paint and mercurial, neither of them demonstrating an iota of their mother’s quieter, more settled personality. But she was grateful that Cristo didn’t know about them. Lorcan and Nuala would never get the chance to emulate their father’s tough cynical outlook on the world, where what he wanted always came ahead of what was best for other people. He would not get the chance to turn them into spoilt, selfish children and, after the manner in which he had corralled her back into his bed, she refused to feel guilty about the fact.

She glanced up in the silence.

‘You look like you’re plotting,’ Cristo remarked thoughtfully.

He towered over her, naked and aroused, gazing down at her with hot golden eyes of appreciation. She was appalled when her body reacted deep down inside, her nipples tingling as dampness formed at the heart of her.

‘What on earth would I be plotting?’

‘I don’t know.’ He stroked the tight set of her sultry mouth with a considering fingertip. ‘But you’re wearing the same face you wore when you found out I’d taken business associates to a lap-dancing club, koukla mou.’

Erin flushed as he came down beside her. ‘Not one of my better memories.’

Cristo unclasped the hands she had tightened round her knees and pulled her back against his warm, hair-roughened torso. ‘Nor mine, but unfortunately that kind of venue is par for the course with certain men.’

Her breath scissored in her throat as he found her breasts again, gently, surely shaping and tugging at the swollen tips. He pressed her back against the pillows, long brown fingers dipping below the waistband of her knickers, moving across bare smooth skin to stroke her clitoris. As the ache between her thighs intensified, she shut her eyes tight. He kissed her with hot driving force, skimmed off that last garment and pressed his lips to the smooth slope of her belly. Her eyes flew wide because she had silvery stretchmarks there from her pregnancy and she quivered as he trailed his expert mouth over her abdomen and then lower, startling her with that move. He found her with his mouth and his fingers, delving into the honeyed heat of her until she moaned, hips squirming as the pleasure built. He tipped her back, drowning her in sweet sensation that sent her out of control. Her breath sounded in audible gasps as she shifted helplessly up to him, wanting, needing and then response took over to send her racing into an explosive climax.

‘I love watching you come … it must be the only time in your life that you let go of control,’ Cristo husked, looking down at her with an unusually reflective light in his keen gaze. ‘You’re so different from me.’

Emerging dizzily from the tremors of ecstasy still rocking her body, Erin looked up into his lean dark face and the stunning eyes engaged in tracking her every change of expression. She felt exposed, vulnerable, shaken that he had already seduced her so thoroughly that she could barely recall what day it was, never mind how they had ended up in a bed at such indecent speed. ‘I don’t want to be here doing this with you,’ she said fiercely.

‘Liar.’ He brought his mouth down on hers and her tongue slid against his again and that single kiss was so passionate she shivered.

Cristo donned a condom and came over her like a one-man invasion force, tipping her legs over his shoulders and driving into her so hard and deep that her head fell back in a curtain of shiny silver blonde hair, neck arching feverishly in reaction. It was good, hell it was amazing, she thought furiously, angry with herself, enraged that she hadn’t found it possible to lie there without responding and destroy his desire for her. She knew him well enough to know that if she had held back and failed to respond he wouldn’t have persisted. He shifted position and ground into her faster with hungry pounding strokes that made her heart race as though she were in a marathon. He groaned with unashamed pleasure as she cried out, bucking up to him, reacting helplessly to the delicious friction of his fluid rhythm. And she felt the heat mushrooming up from her pelvis again until an explosion of light shot through her like a flash of white-hot fire, shooting wild hot tension along every limb. He pulsed inside her and groaned as she came apart at the seams in another shattering orgasm.

By the time she came free of that shattering onslaught of raw pleasure, she was trembling and, surprisingly, he still had his arms round her, one hand splayed across her stomach as he pressed his sensual mouth to her damp cheek. ‘You’re amazing. That was so worth waiting for, koukla mou.’

But she hadn’t made him wait; they had ended up in bed five minutes after his arrival. I’m easy, she decided painfully, marvelling that she was still lying in his arms and revelling in that unbelievable sense of closeness with him again. How could she possibly feel connected to Cristophe Donakis again? It felt as if almost three years had vanished in a time slip to deposit her back to when she had cherished such private and vulnerable moments with the man she loved. Only she didn’t love him any more, she told herself bitterly, and he had never loved her and, what was more, he had ruthlessly blackmailed her back into his bed. As she began to reclaim her wits and pull away Cristo pulled away from her to disappear into the bathroom.

She listened to the shower running and wondered how she would live with the victory she had given him, how she would ever look in the mirror and like herself again. It was all right to tell herself that she had done what she had to do to protect her life and her children’s, but what she had just allowed to happen went against her every principle. It was a punishment to appreciate that she had participated in and enjoyed her own downfall.

Lithe, bronzed and truly magnificent, Cristo reappeared with a towel wrapped round his lean hips just as a knock sounded on the bedroom door. ‘I told Vincenzo to bring up dinner,’ he remarked carelessly.

Erin scrambled out of bed naked and vanished into the bathroom to use the shower. She was on automatic pilot, desperate to escape his presence lest she lose what little distance she had contrived to achieve. Stepping out of the shower again, she saw the black towelling robe hanging on the back of the door and made use of it because she hadn’t packed anything that practical. She rolled up the sleeves, tied the sash tight.

Cristo had donned close-fitting jeans and a black tee. A heated trolley now stood beside the small table in the corner.

‘How did Vincenzo get all that food up here?’ she asked stiffly.

‘There’s a lift. The last owner was an elderly lady with mobility problems.’

‘When did you buy this place?’

‘About a year ago. I wanted somewhere to relax between business trips,’ Cristo said, sounding amazingly calm and distant after what they had just shared. ‘What would you like to eat?’

‘I’ll see to myself.’ Her tummy rumbled as, maintaining a scrupulous distance from his lean, powerful body, she studied the tempting array of dishes. She was surprised that she was so hungry but then nervous tension had pretty much killed her appetite over the previous forty-eight hours while she was forced to pretend to everyone around her that life was normal. She chose meat-stuffed tortelloni and Panzanella salad and lifted a slice of home baked bread.

His lean, darkly handsome face composed, Cristo poured wine for them both and sat down in a fluid movement. His assurance set her teeth on edge. He had blasted her pride and confidence out of existence because all of a sudden she didn’t know who she was any more. She was not the mature, self-contained woman she had believed she was and that acknowledgement hurt.

‘Doesn’t it bother you that you blackmailed me into bed?’ Erin shot at him abruptly.

‘It might have started out that way, but that’s not how it concluded,’ Cristo fielded smooth as glass, his gaze welded to her. Gleaming silvery fair hair tumbled loose round her slight shoulders, accentuating her flawless features. He had burned for her from the first moment he saw her standing wet and tousled beside the swimming pool where they had met. He had burned the same way when he met her again in Sam Morton’s office. He wasn’t happy that she set him on fire. He wasn’t happy that one wildly exciting taste of her had only primed him to want the next. Toxic, he reminded himself grimly.

Erin met cool, measuring, dark golden eyes that contained not an ounce of remorse and gritted her teeth, afraid to utter a word in her own defence, for what exactly could she say? They both knew that she had not played the part of an unwilling victim. ‘I don’t understand why you wanted me here,’ she admitted tightly. ‘After all, when we split up, you made it clear that you were bored with our relationship.’

Cristo became very still. ‘I never said I was bored.’

Barely forgotten frustration invaded Erin afresh. It was a throwback to the bewilderment of the past when she had tormented herself for months in the aftermath of their breakup wondering what she had done or not done to make him want his freedom back. Suddenly that old curiosity was biting into her like a knife point. ‘Then why did you ditch me?’

His lean, strong face was impassive. ‘I doubt that you want the answer to that question.’

Erin stabbed a piece of juicy tomato with her fork. ‘It’s a long time ago, Cristo,’ she said drily.

‘Precisely,’ he slotted in sardonically.

‘But I would still like to know why,’ Erin completed doggedly.

Cristo set down his wine glass, brilliant dark eyes pinned to her and she felt the chill like ice water spilling across her skin. ‘You cheated on me …’

Erin stared back at him in astonishment. ‘No. I didn’t.’

‘I caught the guy in your bed in your hotel room the night after your birthday bash,’ Cristo countered flatly. ‘You cheated on me.’

Erin was frowning. ‘Who did you see in my hotel room?’

Cristo shrugged a broad shoulder and dealt her a satiric glance. ‘I have no idea who he was. I let myself into the room intending to surprise you and instead I got the surprise.’

Erin was stunned. ‘But I wasn’t there—you didn’t see me.’

Cristo dealt her a scornful look. ‘I saw the man, the discarded clothes, the wine glasses and I could hear the shower running in the bathroom. I didn’t need to see you as well.’

Erin was so tense she was barely breathing. In a sudden movement she pushed back her chair and stood upright, her amethyst eyes bright with anger. ‘Well, actually you did because that wasn’t me in the bathroom! I didn’t even stay in London that night.’

Cristo gave her an unimpressed look. ‘It was your room and he was in your bed—’

Anger coursed through her in a torrent of incredulous rage. ‘And you’re only telling me this now, nearly three years later? Why didn’t you mention it at the time?’

‘I didn’t see any point in staging a messy confrontation. I had seen all I needed to see,’ Cristo derided with harsh assurance.