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“What did you do, Morgan?”
“I don’t understand.”
“You’ve sold everything,” he added harshly. “You have nothing and even if you get your father back to the United States, you’ll still have nothing.”
“Not true,” she said, locking her knees, afraid she’d collapse, overwhelmed by emotion and memories, overwhelmed by him. She’d been up for two days straight. Hadn’t eaten more than a mouthful in that time. She couldn’t, knowing she would soon be here, with him again. “I’d have peace of mind.”
“Peace of mind?” he demanded. “How can you have peace of mind when you have no home?”
He could mock her, because he didn’t know what it was like to lose one’s mind. He didn’t know that after leaving him, she’d ended up in the hospital and had remained there for far too long. It had been the lowest point in her life, and by far, the darkest part. But she didn’t want to think about McLean Hospital now, that was the past, and she had to live in the present, had to stay focused on what was important, like her father. “I did what I had to do.”
“You sacrificed your future for your father’s, and he doesn’t have a future. Your father—if alive, if released—will be going to prison for the rest of his life. But what will you do while he’s in his comfortable, minimum security prison cell, getting three square meals a day? Where will you sleep? What will you eat? How will you get by?”
“I’ll figure it out.”
“You are so brave and yet foolhardy. Do you ever look before you leap?”
She flashed to Vienna and their wedding and the four weeks of honeymoon, remembering the intense love and need, the hot brilliant desire that had consumed her night and day. She hated to be away from him, hated to wake up without him, hated to breathe without him.
She’d lost herself completely in him. And no, she hadn’t looked, hadn’t analyzed, hadn’t imagined anything beyond that moment when she’d married him and became his.
“No,” she answered huskily, lips curving and heart aching. “I just leap, Drakon. Leap and hope I can fly.”
If she’d hoped to provoke him, she’d failed. His expression was impassive and he studied her for a long moment from beneath his thick black lashes. “How long has it been since you’ve spoken to your father?”
“I actually haven’t ever spoken to him. My mother did, and just that first day, when they called her to say they had him. Mother summoned us, and told us what had happened, and what the pirates wanted for a ransom.”
“How long did she speak to your father?”
“Not long. Just a few words, not much more than that.”
“What did he say to her?”
“That his yacht had been seized, his captain killed and he had been abducted, and then the pirates got back on the phone, told her their demands and hung up.”
“Has anyone spoken with your father since?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Why not?”
“They won’t let us. They say we haven’t earned the right.”
“But you’ve given them three million.”
Her lips curved bitterly and her gaze lifted to meet his. “I can’t sleep at night, knowing I was so stupid and so wasteful. Three million dollars gone! Three million lost forever. It would have been fine if we’d saved my father, but we didn’t. I didn’t. Instead it’s all gone and now I must start over and worse, the ransom has doubled. I’m sick about it, sick that I made such a critical error. I didn’t mind liquidating everything to save my father, but it turns out I liquidated everything for nothing—”
“Stop.”
“You are right to despise me. I am stupid, stupid, stupid—”
He caught her by the shoulders and gave her a hard shake. “Enough. You didn’t know. You didn’t understand how the pirates operated, how mercurial they are, how difficult, how unpredictable. You had no way of knowing. There is no handbook on dealing with pirates, so stop torturing yourself.”
With every sentence he gave her a little shake until she was thoroughly undone and tears filled her eyes, ridiculous tears that stung and she swiped at them, annoyed, knowing they were from fatigue, not sadness, aware that she was exhausted beyond reason, knowing that what she wanted was Drakon to kiss her, not shake her, but just because you wanted something didn’t mean it was good for you. And Drakon wasn’t good for her. She had to remember that.
He saw her tears. His features darkened. “We’ll get your father back,” he said, his deep voice rumbling through her, his voice as carnal as the rest of him, drawing her into his arms and holding her against his chest, comforting her.
For a moment.
Morgan pulled back, slipping from Drakon’s arms, and took several quick steps away to keep from being tempted to return. He’d been so warm. He’d smelled so good. His hard chest, covered in cashmere, had made her want to burrow closer. She’d felt safe there, secure, and yet it was an illusion.
Drakon wasn’t safe. He was anything but safe for her.
He watched her make her escape. His jaw jutted, his brow lowered, expression brooding. “We’ll get your father back,” he said, repeating his promise from a few moments ago. “And we’ll do it without giving them another dollar.”
She looked up at him, surprised. “How?”
“I know people.”
She blinked at him. Of course he knew people—Drakon knew everyone—but could he really free her father without giving the pirates more money? “Is that possible?”
“There are companies … services … that exist just for this purpose.”
“I’ve looked into those companies. They cost millions, and they won’t help me. They loathe my father. He represents everything they detest—”
“But they’ll work with me.”
“Not when they hear who they are to rescue—”
“I own one of the largest shipping companies in the world. No maritime agency would refuse me.”
Hope rose up within her, but she didn’t trust it, didn’t trust anyone or anything anymore. “But you said … you said you wouldn’t help me. You said since you’d given me the check—”
“I was wrong. I was being petty. But I can’t be petty. You’re my wife—” he saw her start to protest and overrode her “—and as long as you are my wife, it’s my duty to care for you and your family. It is the vow I made, and a vow I will keep.”
“Even though I left you?”
“You left me. I didn’t leave you.”
Pain flickered through her. “You owe me nothing. I know that. You must know that, too.”
“Marriage isn’t about keeping score. Life is uneven and frequently unjust and I did not marry you, anticipating only fun and games. I expected there would be challenges, and there have been, far more than I anticipated, but until we are divorced, you are my wife, and the law is the law, and it is my duty to provide for you, to protect you, and I can see I have failed to do both.”
She closed her eyes, shattered by his honesty, as well as his sense of responsibility. Drakon was a good man, a fair man, and he deserved a good wife, a wife less highly strung and sensitive … a wife who craved him less, a wife who could live and breathe without him at her side….
Morgan wasn’t that woman. Even now she wanted to be back in his arms, to have his mouth on hers, to have him parting her lips, tasting her, filling her, possessing her so completely that the world fell away, leaving just the two of them.
That was her idea of life.
And it was mad and beautiful and impossible and bewitching.
“It’s not your fault,” she whispered, wrapping her arms around her, wishing she’d needed less talk and tenderness and reassurance. “It’s mine. Maybe even my father’s. He spoiled me, you know, and it infuriated my mother.”
“Your mother did say at our wedding that you were your daddy’s little girl.”
Morgan’s breath caught in her throat and she bit into her bottom lip. “Mother had Tori and Branson and Logan, and yes, I was Daddy’s girl, but they were Mother’s darlings, and you’d think since she had them living with her, choosing her, she wouldn’t mind that I chose to live with Father, but she did.”
“What do you mean, they lived with her, and you lived with Daniel? Didn’t you all live together?”
Morgan shook her head. “Mother and Father lived apart most of the time. They’d put on a show for everyone else—united front for the public, always throwing big parties for the holidays or special occasions … Christmas party, New Year’s party, birthdays and anniversaries. But behind closed doors, they could barely tolerate each other and were almost never in the same place at the same time, unless there was a photo shoot, or reporter about. Mother loved being in the society columns, loved having our lavish, privileged lifestyle featured in glossy magazines. She liked being envied, enjoyed her place in the sun. Father was different. He hadn’t grown up with money like Mother, and wasn’t comfortable in the spotlight. He lived far more quietly … he and I, and Jemma, when she joined us. We’d go to these small neighborhood restaurants and they weren’t trendy in the least. We loved our Mexican food and Greek food and Indian food and maybe once every week or two, we’d send out for Chinese food. After dinner, once my homework was done, we’d watch television in the evening … we had our favorite show. We had our routines. It was lovely. He was lovely. And ordinary.” She looked up at Drakon, sorrow in her eyes. “But the world now won’t ever know that man, or allow him to be that man. In their eyes, he’s a greedy selfish hateful man, but he wasn’t. He really wasn’t—” She broke off, drew a deep breath and then another.
“Mother used to say I was a demanding little girl, and she hated that Father humored me. She said he spoiled me by taking me everywhere with him, and turning me into his shadow. Apparently that’s why I became so clingy with you. I shifted my attachment from my father onto you. But what a horrible thing for you … to be saddled with a wife who can’t be happy on her own—”
“You’re talking nonsense, Morgan—”
“No, it’s true.”
“Well, I don’t buy it. I was never saddled with you, nor did I ever feel encumbered by you. I’m a man. I do as I please and I married you because I chose you, and I stayed married to you because I chose to, and that’s all there is to it.”
She looked away, giving him her profile. It was such a beautiful profile. Delicate. Elegant. The long, black eyelashes, the sweep of cheekbone, the small straight nose, the strong chin, above an impossibly long neck. The Copeland girls were all stunning young women, but there was something ethereal about Morgan … something mysterious.
“You’re exhausted,” he added. “I can see you’re not eating or sleeping and that must change. I will not have you become skin and bones again. While you’re here, you will sit and eat real meals, and rest, and allow me to worry about things. I may not have been the patient and affectionate husband you wanted, but I’m good at managing chaos, and I’m damn good at dealing with pirates.”
He didn’t know what he expected, but he didn’t expect her to suddenly smile at him, the first smile he’d seen from her since she arrived, and it was radiant, angelic, starting in her stunning blue eyes and curving her lips and making her lovely face come alive.
For a moment he could only look at her, and appreciate her. She was like the sun and she glowed, vital, beautiful, and he remembered that first night in Vienna when she’d turned and looked at him, her blue eyes dancing, mischief playing at her mouth, and then she’d spotted him, her eyes meeting his, and her smile had faded, and she’d become shy. She’d blushed and turned away but then she’d peek over her shoulder at him again and again and by the end of the ball he knew he would have her. She was his. She would always be his. Thank God she’d felt the same way. It would have created an international scandal if he’d had to kidnap her and drag her off to Greece, an unwilling bride.
“I am happy to allow you to take the lead when it comes to the pirates,” she said, her smile slowly dying, “and you may manage them, but Drakon, you mustn’t try to manage me. I won’t be managed. I’ve had enough of that these past five years.”
Drakon frowned, sensing that there was a great deal she wasn’t saying, a great deal he wouldn’t like hearing, and he wanted to ask her questions, hard questions, but now wasn’t the time, not when she was so fragile and fatigued. There would be time for all his questions later, time to learn just what had dismantled his marriage, and who and what had been managing her, but he could do that when she wasn’t trembling with exhaustion and with dark purple circles shadowing her eyes.
“I’m concerned about you,” he said flatly.
“There’s been a lot of stress lately.”
He didn’t doubt that, and it crossed his mind that if he’d been a real husband, and a more selfless man, he would have gone to Morgan, and offered her support or assistance before it’d come to this. Instead, he, like the rest of the world, had followed the Copeland family crisis from afar, reading about the latest humiliation or legal move in the media, and doing nothing.
“I can see that, but you’ll be of no use to your father, if you fall apart yourself,” he said. “I’ll make some calls and the staff can prepare us a late lunch—”
“Do we really need lunch?”
“Yes, we do. And while I understand time is of the essence, not eating will only make things worse. We need clear heads and fierce resolve, and that won’t happen if we’re fainting on our feet.”
Morgan suddenly laughed and she shook her head, once again giving him a glimpse of the Morgan he’d married … young and vivacious and full of laughter and passion. “You keep using ‘we,’ when we both know you mean me.” She paused and her gaze lifted, her eyes meeting his. “But I do rather like the image of you fainting on your feet.”
His gaze met hers and held and it was all he could do to keep from reaching for her. He wanted her. Still wanted her more than he’d wanted anyone or anything. “Of course you would,” he said roughly. “You’re a wicked woman and you deserve to be—”
Drakon broke off abruptly, balling his hands into fists and he realized how close he’d come to teasing her the way he’d once teased her, promising her punishment, which was merely foreplay to make her hot, to make her wet, to make her shudder with pleasure.
It used to give him such pleasure that he brought her pleasure. He wasn’t good at saying all the right words, so he used his body to say how much he adored her, how much he desired her, how much he cherished her and would always cherish her.
But only now did he know she’d hated the way he’d pleasured her.
That she’d been disgusted—
“Don’t,” she whispered, reaching out to him, her hand settling on his arm. “Don’t do that, don’t. I know what you’re thinking, and I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said what I did, shouldn’t have said it how I did. It was wrong. I was wrong. I was upset.”
His body hardened instantly at her touch, and he glanced down at her hand where it clung to his forearm. He could feel her warmth through the softness of the cashmere, and the press of her fingers, and it was nothing at all, and yet it was everything, too. Nothing and everything at the same time.
He looked away from her hand, up into her eyes, angry with her all over again, but also angry with himself. How could he have not known how she felt? How could he have not realized that she didn’t enjoy … him … them?
“Rest assured that I will not take advantage of you while you are here,” he said, trying to ease some of the tension rippling through him. “You are safe in the villa,” he continued, hating that he suddenly felt like a monster. He wasn’t a monster. Not even close. It’s true he could be ruthless in business, and he had a reputation for being a fierce negotiator, a brilliant strategist, an analytical executive, as well as a demanding boss, but that didn’t make him an ogre and he’d never knowingly hurt a woman, much less his wife. “You are safe from me.”
“Drakon.”
“I’ll have your bag taken up to the Angelica Suite,” he said. “It’s the second master suite, on the third floor, the suite one with the frescoed ceiling.”
“I remember it.”
“It’s in the opposite wing of where I’m staying but it should give you privacy and I think you’ll find it quite comfortable. I can show you the way now.”
“There’s no need to take me there,” she said hoarsely. “I remember the suite.”
“Fine. Then I’ll let you find your way, and as I have quite a few things to do, I’ll eat as I work, and I’ll have a light lunch sent to you in your room, but we’ll need to meet later so I can fill you in on the arrangements I’ve been able to make for your father.”
Morgan was glad to escape to her room, desperate to get away from Drakon and that intense physical awareness of him….
She’d hurt him. What she’d said earlier, about their sex life, about their marriage, it’d hurt him terribly and she felt guilty and sorry. So very sorry since she knew Drakon would never do anything to hurt her. He’d always been so protective of her but he was also so very physical, so carnal and sexual and she was a little afraid of it. And him. Not when she was with him, making love to him, but later, when he was gone, separated from her. It was then that she analyzed their relationship, and what they did and how they did it and how little control she had with him.
It frightened her that she lost control with him.
Frightened her that he had so much power and she had so little.
It had niggled at her during their honeymoon, but their picnics and dinners out and the afternoon trips on his yacht were so fun and romantic that she could almost forget how fierce and shattering the sex was when he was charming and attentive and affectionate. But in Athens when he disappeared into his work life, his real life, the raw nature of their sex life struck her as ugly, and she became ugly and it all began to unravel, very, very quickly.
Upstairs in her suite, Morgan barely had time to open the two sets of French doors before a knock sounded on the outer bedroom door, letting her know her overnight bag had arrived. She thanked the housemaid and then returned to the first of the two generous balconies with the stunning view.
She had never tired of this view. She couldn’t imagine how anyone could tire of it.
The Amalfi Coast’s intense blues and greens contrasted by rugged rock had inspired her very first jewelry collection. She’d worked with polished labradorite, blue chalcedony, paua shell, lapis lazuli and Chinese turquoise, stones she’d acquired on two extensive shopping trips through Southeast Asia, from Hong Kong to Singapore to Bali.
It’d been a three-month shopping expedition that big sister Tori had accompanied her on for the first month, and then Logan came for the second month, and Jemma for the third.
By the time Morgan returned to New York, she’d filled two enormous trunks of stones and had a briefcase and laptop full of sketches and the first orders from Neiman Marcus and Bergdorf Goodman. The designs were pure fantasy—a stunning collection of statement-making collars, cuffs and drop earrings—and had cost her a fortune in stone. It had tested her ability to execute her ideas, but had ended up being worth every stress and struggle as the Amalfi Collection turned out to be a huge success, generating significant media attention, as well as the attention of every fashion designer and fashion publicist of note, never mind the starlets, celebrities and socialites who all wanted a Morgan Copeland statement piece.
Morgan’s second collection, Jasper Ice, had been inspired by her love of the Canadian Rockies and ski trips to Banff and Lake Louise. The collection was something that an ice princess in a frozen tundra would wear—frosty and shimmering pieces in white, silver, blush, beige and pale gold. The second collection did almost as well as the first, and garnered even more media with mentions in virtually every fashion magazine in North America, Europe and Australia, and then photographed on celebrities and young royals, like the Saudi princess who had worn a gorgeous pink diamond cuff for her wedding.
Morgan was glad Jasper Ice did well, but the cool, frozen beauty of the collection was too much like her numb emotional state, when she’d been so fiercely, frantically alive and in love with Drakon Xanthis.
