Читать книгу The Ruthless Greek's Return - Sharon Kendrick - Страница 11

CHAPTER TWO

JESSICA’S HEART WAS pounding loudly as she looked across the desk at Loukas, who in that moment seemed to symbolise everything which was darkness...and power. As if he held her future in the palm of his hand and was just about to crush it.

He had begun removing the jacket of his beautiful suit. Sliding it from his shoulders and looping it over the back of his chair and that was making her feel even more disorientated. He looked so...intimidating. Yet the instant he started rolling up his sleeves to display his hair-roughened arms, it seemed much more like the Loukas of old. Sexy and sleek and completely compelling. Her thoughts were skittering all over the place and suddenly she was having to try very hard to keep the anxiety from her voice. ‘What do you mean—I have to change? Change what, exactly?’

His smile didn’t meet his eyes. In fact, it barely touched his lips. He was enjoying this, she realised. He was enjoying it a lot.

‘Everything,’ he said. ‘But mostly, your image.’

Jessica looked at him in confusion. ‘My image?’

Again, he did that thing of joining the tips of his fingers together and she was reminded of a head teacher who’d sent for an unruly pupil and was just about to give them a stern telling-off.

‘I can’t believe that nobody has looked at your particular advertising campaign before,’ he continued. ‘Or why it has been allowed to continue.’ His black eyes glittered. ‘A variation of the same old thing—year in and year out. The agency the company have been using have become complacent, which is why the first thing I did when I took over was to sack them.’

‘You’ve sacked them?’ Jessica echoed, her heart sinking—because she liked the agency they used and the photographer they employed. She only saw them once a year when they shot the Lulu catalogue but she’d got to know them and they felt comfortable.

‘Profits have been sliding for the past two years,’ he continued remorselessly. ‘Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing—because it meant I was able to hammer out an excellent price for my buyout. But it does mean that things are going to be very different from now on.’

She heard the dark note in his voice and told herself to stay calm and find the strength to face her fears. Like when you were playing tennis against a tough opponent—it was no good holding back and being defensive and allowing them to dominate and control. You had to take your courage in your hands and rush the net. Face them head-on. She met his cold, black eyes.

‘Is this your way of telling me that you’re firing me?’

He gave a soft laugh. ‘Oh, believe me, Jess—if I was planning on firing you, you would have known about it by now. For a start, we wouldn’t be having this conversation, because it would be a waste of my time and my time is very precious. Do you understand what I’m saying?’

Yes, she understood. She thought how forbidding he seemed. From the way he was behaving, nobody would ever have guessed they’d once been lovers. She had seen his ruthless streak before—it had been essential in his role as bodyguard to one of Russia’s richest men. But around her he had always been playful—the way she’d sometimes imagined a lion might be if it ever allowed you to get close enough to pet it. Until their affair had finished, and then he had acted as if she was dead to him.

Was that why he was doing this—to pay her back for having turned down his proposal of marriage, even though at the time she had known it was the only thing she could do?

She must not let him intimidate her, nor allow him to see how terrified she was of losing her livelihood. Because Loukas was the ultimate predator...he saw a weakness and then moved in for the kill. That was what he had been trained to do. She clasped her hands together and looked at him. ‘So why are we having this conversation?’

‘Because I have a reputation for turning around failing companies, which is what I intend to do with this one.’

‘How?’

He was looking at her calculatingly, like a butcher weighing a piece of meat on a set of scales. ‘You are no longer a teenager, Jess,’ he said softly. ‘And neither are the girls who first bought the watch. You are no longer a tennis star, either—you are what’s known in the business as a has-been. And there’s no point glowering at me like that. I am simply stating a fact. You were taken on because of who you were—a shining talent whose dreams were shattered. You were the tragic heroine. The sporty blonde who kept on smiling through the pain. Young girls wanted to be you.’

‘But not any more?’ she said slowly.

‘I’m afraid not. You’re trading on something which has gone. The world has moved on, but you’ve stayed exactly the same. Same old shots of you with the ponytail and the pearls and the Capri pants and the neat blouses.’ His eyes glittered. ‘I get bored just thinking about them.’

She nodded, her heart beating very hard, because it hurt to have him talk to her this way. To have her life condensed into a sad little story which left him feeling ‘bored’. She met his black eyes and tried to keep the pain from her face. ‘So what are you planning to do about it?’

‘I am giving you the opportunity to breathe some life back into your career—and to boost Lulu’s flagging sales.’

She wished she’d taken her raincoat off, because her body was beginning to grow hot beneath that scorching stare. She tried to keep her voice calm. To forget that this was Loukas. To try to imagine that it was the previous CEO sitting there, a man with a cut-glass accent who used to ask her for tennis tips for his young daughter. ‘How?’

He leaned back in his chair, his outward air of relaxation mocking the churned-up way she was feeling inside.

‘By giving you a new look—one which reflects the woman you are now and not the girl you used to be. We make you over. New hairstyle. New clothes. We do the whole Cinderella thing and then reveal you to the public. The nation’s sweetheart all grown up. Just imagine the resulting publicity that would generate.’ His eyes glittered. ‘Priceless.’

She shifted uncomfortably in her chair. ‘You make me sound like a commodity, Loukas,’ she said, in a low voice.

He laughed. ‘But that’s exactly what you are. Why would you think any differently? You sell images of yourself to promote a product—of course you’re a commodity. You just happen to be one which has reached its sell-by date, I’m afraid—unless you’re prepared to mix it up a bit.’

She met the hard gleam of his eyes and a real sense of sadness washed over her. Because despite the way their affair had ended, there had still been a portion of her heart which made her think of him with...

With what?

Affection?

No. Affection was too mild a description for the feelings she’d had for Loukas Sarantos. She had loved him despite knowing that they were completely wrong for each other. She had loved him more than he’d ever known because she’d been trained to keep her feelings locked away, and she had taken all her training seriously. The way they’d parted had filled her with regret and she’d be lying if she tried to deny that sometimes she thought about him with a deep ache in her heart and a very different kind of ache in her body. Who didn’t lie in bed at night sometimes, wondering how different life might have been if you’d taken a different path?

But now? Now he was making her feel angry, frustrated and stretched to breaking point. He made her want to pummel her fists against him, but most of all he made her want to kiss him. That was the most shameful thing of all—that she was still in some kind of physical thrall to him. She wanted him to cover her mouth with one of his hot kisses. To make her melt. To feel that first sharp and piercing wave of pleasure as he entered her and have it blot out the rest of the world.

She stared into his mocking eyes, telling herself that her desire was irrelevant. More than that, it was dangerous, because it unsettled her and made her want things she knew were wrong. No good was ever going to come of their continued association. He wanted to change her. To make her into someone she wasn’t. And all the while making her aware of her own failures, while he showcased his own spectacular success.

Was that what she wanted?

‘Why are you doing this, Loukas?’

‘Because I can.’ He smiled. ‘Why else?’

And suddenly she saw the Loukas of old. The man who could become as still as a piece of dark and forbidding rock. Foreboding whispered over her skin as she rose to her feet. ‘This isn’t going to work,’ she said. ‘I just can’t imagine having any kind of working association with you. I’m sorry.’

‘You should be.’ His voice was silky. ‘I’ve had my lawyers take a good look at your contract. Refuse this job and you aren’t in line for any compensation. You leave here empty-handed. Have you thought about that?’

Briefly, Jessica imagined Hannah, happily backpacking in Thailand. Hannah who had defied all expectations to land herself a place at Cambridge University. Her teenage half-sister on the other side of the world, blissfully oblivious to what was going on back home. What would she say if she knew that her future security was about to be cut from under her, by a black-eyed man with a heart of stone?

But as she bent to pick up her handbag she told herself that she would think of something. There were opportunities for employment in her native Cornwall—admittedly not many, but she would look at whatever was going. She could turn her hand to plenty of other things. She could cook and clean or even work in a shop. Her embroidery was selling locally and craftwork was becoming more popular, so couldn’t she do more of that? Better that than to stay for a second longer in a room where the air seemed to be suffocating her. Where the man she had once loved seemed to be taking real pleasure from watching her squirm.

Her fingers curled around the strap of her handbag. ‘You might want to think about changing your own image rather than concentrating on mine,’ she said quietly. ‘That macho attitude of yours is so passé.’

‘You think so?’ he drawled, leaning back in his chair and surveying her from between narrowed eyes. ‘I’ve always found it particularly effective. Especially with women. Most of them seem to get turned on by the caveman approach. You certainly did.’

With his middle finger, he began to draw a tiny circle on the contract and Jessica found herself remembering when he used to touch her skin that way. The way he used to drift his fingertip over her body with such light and exquisite precision. She’d been unable to resist him and she wondered whether any woman would be capable of resistance if Loukas Sarantos had them in his sights.

And suddenly he looked up and smiled—a cruel, cold smile—as if he knew exactly what was running through her mind.

‘Yes,’ he said softly. ‘I still want you, Jessica. I didn’t realise quite how much until I saw you today. And you’d better understand that these days I get everything I want. So I’ll give you time to reconsider your decision, but I’m warning you that my patience is not infinite. And I won’t wait long.’

‘Don’t hold your breath,’ she said, meeting his eyes with a defiant look which lasted only as long as it took her to walk out of his office, her heart pounding as she headed for the elevator.

He didn’t follow her. Had she really thought he would? Had there been a trace of the old Jessica who thought he might rise to his feet and cover the distance between them with a few purposeful strides, just like in the old days? Yes, there had. And wasn’t part of her still craving that kind of masterful behaviour? Of course it was. What woman could remain immune to all that brooding power, coupled with the steely new patina which his wealth had given him?

She shook her head as she left the building, realising that Suzy had been right. He was dangerous and the way he made her feel was more dangerous still. Far better that she walked away now and left him in the past, where he belonged.

Hurrying through the emerging rush hour, she caught the train to Cornwall with seconds to spare, but the usually breathtaking journey was shrouded in darkness. The January evening was cold and rain lashed against the carriage windows, seeming to echo her gloomy mood.

She leant her head back against the seat, wondering if she was crazy to have turned her back on a job which had been her security for so long. Yet surely she’d be crazier still to put herself in a situation where Loukas held all the power.

Her love for him might have been replaced by a mixture of anger and frustration—but she was far from immune to him. She couldn’t deny the sharp kick of desire when she looked at him, or her squirming sense of frustration. And if that frustration had been unexpectedly powerful, was that really so surprising? Because there had been nobody else since Loukas. No other lover in eight long years. He had been her first man and the only man. Wasn’t that ridiculous? And unfashionable? He’d accused her of being stuck in a rut, but he didn’t know the half of it.

Because nobody had come close to making her feel the way Loukas had done. She’d tried to have relationships with other men but they had left her feeling cold. She stared out of the window as the train pulled into the darkness of a rain-lashed Bodmin station. Other men had made her feel nothing, while her Greek lover had made her feel everything.

Just under an hour later and she was home. But the sight of the little Atlantic-facing house which usually filled her with feelings of sanctuary tonight did no such thing. Rods of rain hit her like icy arrows as she got out of the taxi. The crash of the ocean was deafening but for once she took no pleasure from it. Tonight the sound seemed lonely and haunting and full of foreboding.

And of course, the house was empty. She seemed to rattle around in it without the noisy presence of her half-sister. Jessica listened to the unusual sound of silence as the front door slammed closed behind her. She missed Hannah. Missed her a lot. Yet who would have thought it? It certainly hadn’t been sunshine and laughter when Jessica’s father had split from her mother, to marry his long-term mistress who was already pregnant with his daughter, Hannah.

Jessica had been badly hurt by her parents’ bitter divorce and the news that she was going to have a stepmother and a brand-new baby sister had filled her with jealousy and dread. There had been plenty of tensions in their ‘blended’ family, but somehow they had survived—even when Jessica’s mum had died soon after and the villagers had whispered that she’d never got over her broken heart. Jessica had tried to form a good relationship with her stepmother and to improve the one she had with her perfectionist father. Until that terrible day when an avalanche had left both girls orphaned and alone.

After that, it had been a case of sink, or swim. They’d had to get along, because there had been no alternative. Jessica had been eighteen and Hannah just ten when the policeman had knocked on the door with that terrible expression on his face. The authorities had wanted to take Hannah into care but Jessica had fought hard to adopt her. But worse was to come when Jessica realised that her father had been living a lie—spending money on the back of her future earnings, which were never going to materialise. The lawyers had sat her down and told her that their affluent lifestyle had been nothing but an illusion, funded by money they didn’t have.

She’d been at her wits’ end, wondering how she could support herself and Hannah, because there was precious little left after the big house had been sold. That was why the Lulu job had been such a lifesaver. It had given her money to pay the bills, yes, but, more preciously, it had given her the time to try to mother her heartbroken half-sister in a way that a regular job could never have done.

She had learnt to cook and had planted vegetables. And even though the plants hadn’t done very well in the salty and wind-lashed Cornish garden, just the act of nurturing something had brought the two sisters closer together. She had attended every single school open evening and had always been there for Hannah, no matter what. She’d tried not to freak out when the young teenager was discovered smoking dope at a party, telling her that everyone was allowed one mistake. She’d stayed calm the year Hannah had flunked all her exams because of some school bad-boy who’d been giving her the runaround. Instead, she had quietly emphasised the importance of learning and told her how much she regretted her own patchy education—all sacrificed in the name of tennis. And somehow love had grown out of a relationship which had begun so badly.

Jessica had cried when she’d seen Hannah off at Heathrow Airport just before Christmas, with that ridiculously bulky rucksack dwarfing her slender frame, but she had waited until the plane had taken off before she had allowed the tears to fall. Not just because she kept her emotions hidden as a matter of habit, but because she knew this was how it was supposed to be. She knew that saying goodbye was part of life.

And today she’d said goodbye to a part-time modelling career which had never been intended to last. She’d had a good run for her money but now it was time to try something new.

Jessica bit her lip as the rain beat down against the window and tried to block out the memories of Loukas’s mocking face. She would think of something.

She had to.