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Back In Dr Xenakis' Arms
Amalie Berlin
She can’t resist the doc from her past!But do they have a future?In this Hot Greek Docs story, obstetrician Erianthe Nikolaides is returning home to Mythelios—and dreading seeing her sinfully hot ex Dr Ares Xenakis! She’s still haunted by the devastating circumstances of their break-up. To heal truly she must share her pain with Ares, but when a scorching kiss reignites their desire does she dare risk her heart a second time…?
She can’t resist the doc from her past!
But do they have a future?
In this Hot Greek Docs story, obstetrician Erianthe Nikolaides is returning home to Mythelios and dreading seeing her sinfully hot ex, Dr. Ares Xenakis! She’s still haunted by the devastating circumstances of their breakup. To truly heal she must share her pain with Ares, but when a scorching kiss reignites their desire, dare Eri risk her heart a second time?
AMALIE BERLIN lives with her family and her critters in Southern Ohio, and writes quirky and independent characters for Mills & Boon Medical Romance. She likes to buck expectations with unusual settings and situations, and believes humour can be used powerfully to illuminate the truth—especially when juxtaposed against intense emotions. Love is stronger and more satisfying when your partner can make you laugh through the times when you don’t have the luxury of tears.
Also by Amalie Berlin (#ulink_42f2eb27-3a17-52bf-8e19-3bd5076f4fd8)
The Prince’s Cinderella Bride
The Rescue Doc’s Christmas Miracle
Hot Greek Docs collection
One Night with Dr Nikolaides by Annie O’Neil
Tempted by Dr Patera by Tina Beckett
Back in Dr Xenakis’ Arms
And look for the next book
A Date with Dr Moustakas by Amy Ruttan Available now
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
Back in Dr. Xenakis’ Arms
Amalie Berlin
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-07519-0
BACK IN DR. XENAKIS’ ARMS
© 2018 Amalie Berlin
Published in Great Britain 2018
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Robin Gianna, who dropped everything and drove for over an hour to spend a day at Panera with me when Ares and Erianthe were refusing to take shape. Without her, this book would’ve been ‘Less Than’. Love you, lady.
To Annie O’Neil, Tina Beckett and Amy Ruttan. You three can make any project fun, and I’m always a better writer for having worked with you. <3
Contents
Cover (#ud77f90c8-1f99-5603-8702-1037e92d68f9)
Back Cover Text (#u32c015ec-2b28-588d-909a-a497cd61f67e)
About the Author (#ud8e397c7-a759-50b6-946f-eb611959a03a)
Booklist (#ulink_b9134290-540e-5c30-895c-598dcc1a0f07)
Title Page (#u92c18982-5bf8-582a-97f1-28a071fd76c8)
Copyright (#ud015ba23-1568-5a7b-86e7-9b751fb3b5eb)
Dedication (#u610aebaa-dec2-525a-b82a-a47f2dfc728c)
PROLOGUE (#uda324765-f4ba-570d-9346-d7aca1eb7098)
CHAPTER ONE (#u97ca82bc-bc97-5096-8d5a-bf09afcbd47c)
CHAPTER TWO (#udcf744e6-c5c7-5808-a920-2601ae736efa)
CHAPTER THREE (#ucfbe3802-666e-51bf-b096-c75e1b4e9201)
CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)
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)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE (#ulink_c472afbe-cf2b-587e-95df-c072b05021f9)
Ten years ago...
ARES’S TIRES SPUN gravel as he tore from the access road into the parking lot at Mythelios’s only airport, but they couldn’t compete with the churning of his stomach.
At the edge of the tarmac, he slammed into Park and launched himself from the car.
Please don’t let me be too late.
His heart, still beating hard enough to bruise, hadn’t slowed for a single second since his best friend, Theo, had called him twenty minutes earlier in a blind panic—Theo’s parents were sending his little sister away. Today. Right now. Or maybe a few minutes ago if time wasn’t on his side.
He’d thought he would have more time to spend with her before they took that step—the step he now couldn’t even imagine why he’d agreed to. Her father had said nothing about Erianthe leaving the next morning...
He burst through the chain-link gate along the back of the hangar where all the partners of Mopaxeni Shipping kept their private planes. Gravel became tarmac as he pounded through the baking waves rising from black pavement. Even as fast as he could move, he might as well have been running through quicksand; every yard of effort seemed to return an inch of sluggish distance.
The same threat had been lobbed at Erianthe by her parents when they’d reacted just to the myriad ways she had rebelled. The new millennium might be well underway, but they were still firmly rooted in the past—strict, traditional, image-obsessed Greek Orthodox billionaires, who’d decided that the best place to hide the shameful pregnancy of their teenage daughter was in a convent.
Theo had never believed they’d actually send her away, but Ares had known for nearly eighteen hours. He’d just thought there would be more time before she left. She wasn’t even showing yet.
It was something else Theo didn’t know about—like the yearlong secret relationship they’d carried out to protect the dynamic of their group, their real family—the neglected children of Mopaxeni. A fail-safe in case things went haywire between them.
Theo didn’t know it was Ares’s fault his little sister was basically being exiled to another country, hidden away, with the adoption of her child forced on her by their “loving” parents. He thought his parents were sending Eri away to boarding school, so she would avoid distractions and concentrate on her studies.
He rounded the hangar and saw the plane already pulled out, door open, stairs still attached. The long black sedan her father often drove sat between him and the plane, but the darkened windows on the car blocked him from seeing whether they were still inside or already onboard.
How had Dimitri Nikolaides talked him into agreeing to give her up? To give up his child?
It had seemed like the responsible decision when Ares had gone to her father, but now all he could feel was panic.
He pushed harder, his lungs burning, unable to keep up with the demands he was putting on them in the already sweltering morning sunshine.
“You’re both too young to be parents.”
“You’ll hurt her worse if you’re married by the time you get bored with her.”
“She’s only sixteen.”
Now, seeing it all so rapidly come to pass, it couldn’t be clearer that he’d been wrong. So wrong...so many mistakes. He was losing her—he was losing them both. And then he’d lose the rest of them too.
The door stood open—there was still time. He’d tell her father he wouldn’t give up his rights to his own child. And if that didn’t work, he’d knock Dimitri out and they’d run. They’d run away, just like she’d begged him to. There had to be somewhere they could go.
Rounding the sedan, he’d reached out for the stair rails when a blur of movement in his peripheral vision caused him to slow down. Something impacted on him before he could turn to look back, and sent him sprawling onto the sizzling pavement. Weight and heat.
The air blasted from his burning lungs. Large hands—more than one set—grabbed his upper arms and hauled him up before he could get enough air sucked in to say anything, to do anything. To shout for her.
Guards. Dimitri had brought guards.
Digging in his heels, Ares tried to twist free, but air was still an issue. They began dragging him roughly back around the car, away from her. She must be on the plane.
So close. He was so close.
The adrenaline that had kept him going could hold up for only so long. Eventually all he had left to keep fighting, to let the girl he loved know he was there, was his voice.
“Erianthe!” he shouted, over and over, his eyes locked on the darkened portal into the private jet.
They didn’t stop dragging him toward the rear of the car. They pulled, and he staggered backward still, toward the hangar.
He shouted again. He screamed for her. His vision wobbled from the forced locomotion, but it always returned to the only place of hope he could fixate on.
His heart stopped, then surged into the stratosphere as he finally saw her, there in the doorway. She’d heard him.
Shrugging out of her father’s hands, she launched herself down the stairs and ran straight for him. The shining curtain of her dark hair flew out behind her, and as she got closer he could see how pale she was but for the redness around her midnight eyes.
Closer.
The men stopped dragging him.
Closer.
They let go.
With newfound strength he lunged forward, running to meet her, arms outstretched. If he could just hold her...
With all these people, even the hope he’d clung to couldn’t convince him now that there was any chance they could get away today.
If he could apologize, he’d have that to hold in his heart until he could find a way to get to her.
As he neared, ready to grab her, her face contorted. The tears he’d guessed would be there became rivers down her cheeks and she skidded to a stop, drawing her right arm back in a full swing.
A sharp blast of pain radiated from his left cheek and his head snapped to the side, sending him back a step to maintain his balance.
She’d hit him?
It took a few seconds for the situation to make sense through the expanding hollow filling his chest.
“Eri...” He said her name, the words he’d practiced in the car evaporating in the heat of her stare.
“I trusted you!” She half sobbed, half screamed, smacking away his hand as he instinctively reached for her. “I thought you were different, but you’re just like him.”
