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‘Going somewhere?’ that cruel voice mocked her—again.
‘Yes.’ She dived on the offending article that kept getting away from her without her knowing it had. ‘I’m going to find Rico. He’s the only person who can tell you the truth.’
‘You think I would believe anything he said to me?’
Swinging around, Natasha almost threw her bag at him! ‘I will give you back—every single penny of your rotten two million pounds if it kills me trying!’ she choked out.
‘Euros…’
Leo’s smooth drawl sent her still with her blue eyes relaying her next complete daze as to what he was talking about!
‘The money will have been converted into Euros,’ he pointed out helpfully, then he named the new figure in Euros, freezing Natasha where she stood. ‘Of course it means the same when converted back into pounds sterling so long as the exchange rate remains sound, but…’ His shrug said the rest for him—that the figure was growing and growing by the minute in the present financial climate. ‘And then there is the interest I will charge you for the—loan.’
‘I hate you,’ was all she could manage to whisper.
‘Fortunate for you, then, that you fall apart so excitingly when I kiss you.’
‘I need to speak to Rico,’ Natasha insisted.
‘Still hoping the two of you can escape from this?’
‘No!’ She shot up her chin, eyes flashing, hair fascinatingly wild around her tense face. ‘I need him to tell you the truth even if you do refuse to believe it!’
Leo observed her from an outwardly calm exterior that did not reflect what was crawling around his insides. He was blisteringly angry—with himself more than anyone because he would have been willing to swear that the prim, cool and dignified Natasha Moyles he’d believed he knew had been the genuine article.
No sign of her now, he observed.
‘You will have to catch him first,’ he told her dryly. ‘Juno tells me that Rico has already left the country. He hitched a ride on a friend’s private plane out of London airport. He was quicker than you were at realising what was going to come out of his fevered love fest today, you see. A one-minute telephone conversation with Juno after he left here and he knew he’d been sussed. He’s left you to carry the can for him, Natasha.’ He spelled it out for her in case she had not worked that out for herself.
Feeling as if the whole weight of the world had just dropped onto her shoulders, ‘Then you might as well shop me to the Fraud Squad,’ she murmured helplessly.
Leo grimaced. ‘That is still one way for me to go, certainly,’ he agreed, and watched the telling little flinch that she gave up. ‘However, you do still have the other way to pull this around, Miss Moyles…’She even flinched at the formal Miss Moyles now. ‘You could still try utilising the only asset you have as far as I am concerned and make me an offer I won’t want to refuse?’
He was talking sex again. Natasha went icy. ‘The money is peanuts to you, isn’t it?’
He offered a shrug. ‘The difference between the two of us being that I am wealthy enough to call it peanuts, whereas you are not.’
That was so very true that Natasha did not even bother to argue the point. Instead she made herself look at him. ‘So you want me to pay the money back with—favours—’ for the life of her she could not bring herself to call it sex ‘—and in return you will promise me you will not take this to the police?’
Leo smiled at the careful omission of the word sex and for once the smile actually hit the dark of his eyes. ‘You do the prim stuff exceptionally well, Natasha,’ he informed her lazily as he began to walk towards her, putting just about every defence mechanism she possessed on stinging alert. ‘Shame that your hair is floating around your face like a siren’s promise and your lips are still pumped up and hot from my kisses, because it forces me to remember the real you.’
Fighting not to flinch when he reached out to touch her, ‘I want your promise that if I do what you w-want me to do, you won’t go to the police,’ she insisted.
His fingers were drifting up her arms. ‘You do know you don’t have anything left to bargain with, don’t you?’
Pressing her lips together, Natasha nodded, her heart pounding in her chest when his fingers reached her shoulders and gripped. ‘I’m relying on your sense of honour.’
‘You believe I have one?’ He sounded genuinely curious.
She nodded again. ‘Yes,’ she delivered on a stifled breath. She had to believe it because it was the only way she was going to cope with all of this.
He drifted those light caressing fingers along her shoulders until they reached her smooth skin at her nape, making her jump as a long thumb arrived beneath her chin to tilt up her face. His warm, whisky-scented breath had her lips parting like traitors because they knew what was coming next.
‘Then you have my promise,’ he said softly.
It was the most soul-shrivelling thing Natasha had ever experienced when she fell into that deal-sealing kiss.
Then her mobile phone started ringing, shocking them apart with Natasha turning to stare down at the phone in surprise because she thought she’d killed it when she’d thrown it to the floor.
Leo went to pick it up, since she didn’t seem able to move a single muscle, stepping around her and reminding her of a big, sleek giant cat, the way he moved with such loose-limbed grace. Without asking her permission, he sanctioned the call and put her phone to his ear.
It was some fashion designer wanting to know why Cindy had not turned up for a fitting. ‘Natasha Moyles is no longer responsible for her sister’s movements,’ Leo announced before cutting the connection.
Natasha stared up at him in disbelief. ‘What did you say that for?’
He turned a mocking look on her. ‘Because it is the truth?’ She went to take her phone back. He snatched it out of her way, then slid it into his jacket pocket. ‘Think about it,’ he insisted. ‘You cannot continue play your sister’s doormat while you are in Athens with me.’
And just like that he brought the scene in Rico’s office pouring back in. Rico hadn’t only involved her in his thieving scam, but he’d been treating her like his doormat, too! Natasha turned away, despising herself for being so gullible—despising Rico for making her see herself like this! And then there was Cindy, her loving sister Cindy playing the selfish, spoiled brat who took anything she felt like because she always had done and been allowed to get away with it!
Then another thought arrived, one that hit her like a brick in the chest. Cindy didn’t even need Natasha to keep her life running smoothly because arrangements were already in place to hand her singing career over to a professional agency. One of those big, flashy firms with the kind of high profile Cindy had loved the moment its name was mentioned to her. From as early as next week, Natasha would no longer be responsible for Cindy at all, in effect, to free her up to concentrate on her wedding preparations and her move to Milan!
And she’d just found the reason why Cindy had been doing that with Rico. Cindy was about to get everything she’d always wanted—a high-profile management team that was going to fast-track her career and more significantly her absolute freedom from the restraints the sister she resented imposed.
She lifted a hand up to cover her mouth. Her fingers were trembling and she felt cold through to the bone.
‘What now?’ Leo Christakis shot at her.
She just shook her head because she couldn’t speak. Cindy being Cindy, she just could not let Natasha walk off into the sunset with her handsome Italian without going all out to spoil it. I’ve had your man, Natasha. Now you can trip off and marry him. She could hear Cindy’s voice trilling those words even though they had not yet been said!
Cindy’s little swansong. Her wonderful farewell.
‘She set me up,’ she managed to whisper. ‘She knew I was going to meet Rico today so she made sure she got to his office before I did and set me up to witness her doing—that with him.’
‘Why would your own sister want to set you up for a scene like that?’
‘Because I’m not her real sister.’ Natasha slid her fingers away from her mouth. ‘I was adopted…’ By two people who’d believed their chances of having a child of their own had long passed them by. Five years later and their real daughter had arrived in their arms like a precious gift from heaven. Everyone had adored Cindy—Natasha had adored her!
A firm hand arrived on her arm to guide her down into the chair again, then disappeared to collect a second brandy. ‘Here,’ he murmured, ‘take this…’
Natasha frowned down at the glass, then shook her head. ‘No.’ She felt too sick to drink anything. ‘Take it away.’
Leo put the glass down, but remained squatting in front of her as he’d done once before. Strong thighs spread, forearms resting on his knees. His suit, she saw as if for the first time, was made of some fabulously smooth fabric, expensive and creaseless—like the man himself.
And his mouth might look grim, but it was still a mouth she could taste; she felt as if she already knew it far more intimately than any other man’s mouth—and that included Rico.
‘Stop looking at me as if you care what’s happening inside my head!’ she snapped at the way he was squatting there studying her as if he were really concerned!
He had the grace to offer an acknowledging grimace and climbed back to his full height. So did Natasha, making herself do it, feeling cold—frozen right through, because it had also just hit her that she was on her own now. No sister. No fiancé. Not even a pair of loving parents to turn to because, although they’d loved her in their own way, they had never loved her in the way they loved Cindy. Cindy was always going to come first with them.
‘So what is it you want me to do?’ she murmured finally in a voice that sounded as cold as she felt.
Leo threw her a frowning dark look. ‘I told you what I want.’
‘Sex.’ This time she managed to name it.
‘Don’t knock it, Natasha,’ Leo drawled. ‘The fact that we find we desire each other is about to keep you out of a whole lot of trouble.’
He turned away then, leaving her to stare at his long, broad back. He was so hard she had to wonder who it was that had made him like that.
Then she remembered Rico telling her that Leo had been married once. From what Rico had said, his wife had been an exquisite black-haired, black-eyed pure Latin sex bomb who used to turn men on with a single look. The marriage had lasted a short year before Leo had grown tired of hauling her out of other men’s beds and he’d kicked her out of his life for good.
But he must have really loved her to last a whole year with a faithless woman like that. Had his ex-wife mangled up his feelings so badly she’d turned him into the ruthless cynic she was looking at now?
As if he could tell what she was thinking he glanced round at her, catching the expression on her face. Their eyes maintained contact for a few nerve-trapping seconds as something very close to understanding stirred between them, as if he knew what she was thinking and his steady regard was acknowledging it.
‘OK, let’s go.’ Just that quickly he switched from seeming almost human to the man willing to use her for sex until he could get his precious money back. ‘Take it or leave it, Natasha,’ he cut into the thrumming thick nub of her silence— there because she was finding the switch much harder to make. ‘But make your mind up, because we have a flight to catch.’
A flight to catch. A life to get on with while she put her own on hold—again.
Natasha answered with a curt nod of her head.
It was all he required to have him reach out and pull her back into his arms. The heat flared between them. She uttered a helpless protest as his mouth arrived to claim hers. And worst thing of all was how the whole heady, hot pleasure of it caught hold of her as fast as it took him to make that sensual stroking movement with his tongue along the centre of hers. By the time he drew back, she was barely focusing. Her lips felt swollen and thick—but deep inside, in the core element where the real Natasha lay hidden, she still felt as cold as death.
Leo thought about just saying to hell with it and taking her back upstairs to bed and forgetting about the rest of this. She had no idea—none whatsoever—what that hopeless look on her face teamed with the buttoned-up suit was doing to him.
He turned away from temptation, frowning at his own bewildering inclinations. How had he gone from being a tough business-focused tycoon to a guy with his brains fixed on sex?
More than his brains, he was forced to acknowledge when he had to stand still for a moment and work hard to bring much more demanding body parts under control.
Then she moved, swinging him back round to look at her, and he knew then exactly why he was putting this woman before his cool business sense. She had been driving him quietly crazy for weeks now, though he had refused to look at the reason why until Rico had ruined his chances with her.
Rico’s loss, his gain. Natasha Moyles was going to come so alive with his tutelage she was not going to be able to hide anything from him. And he was going to enjoy every minute of making that exposure take place. Then once their six weeks were over he would get his money back and walk away so he could get on with his life without having her as a distraction that constantly crept into his head.
Maybe it was worth the cool two million to achieve it.
‘I need to speak to m-my parents…’
‘You can ring them—from Athens. Hit them with a situation they cannot argue with.’
‘That wouldn’t be—’
‘You prefer to relay the full ugly details to their faces?’ he cut in on her. ‘You prefer to explain to them that you and Rico have been caught thieving and that their other daughter is a man-thieving tramp?’
The tough words were back. The sigh that wrenched from Natasha was loaded down with defeat. ‘I will need to get my passport from the apartment,’ was all she said.
‘Then let’s go and get it.’ Leo held out his hand to her in an invitation that was demanding yet another surrender—one that sizzled in the short stillness that followed it.
A step on the road to ruin, Natasha recognised bleakly as she lifted her hand and settled her palm against his. His long tanned fingers closed around her slender cold fingers, she felt his warmth strike through her icy skin and his strength convey itself to her as he turned and trailed her behind him into the hallway, then out of the house.
CHAPTER FOUR
OUTSIDE the afternoon sunlight was soft on Natasha’s face. The short journey to her apartment was achieved in silence. The first thing she saw when they arrived there was Cindy’s silver sports car and her aching heart withered, then sank.
Leo must have recognised the car, too, because, ‘I’m coming in with you,’ he insisted grimly.
It had not been a request. And anyway Natasha was glad she was not going to have to face Cindy on her own.
Feeling dread crawling across her flesh, she walked into the foyer with Leo at her side. The janitor looked up and smiled. It was all she could do to smile politely back by return.
‘I’ve mislaid my keys,’ she told him. ‘Do you think I could borrow the spare?’
‘Your sister is home, Miss Moyles,’ the janitor informed her. ‘I can call up and she will let you—’
‘No.’ It was Leo who put in the curt interruption. The janitor looked up at him and it didn’t take a second for him to recognise that he was in the presence of a superior power. ‘We will take the spare key, if you please.’
And the key changed hands without another word uttered.
In the lift, Natasha began to feel sick again. She didn’t want this confrontation. She would have preferred not to look into Cindy’s face ever again.
‘Do you want me to go in for you?’
The dark timbre of his voice made her draw in a breath before she straightened her shoulders, pressed her tense lips together and shook her head. The moment she stepped into the hi-tech, ultra-trendy living room, her sister jumped up from one of the black leather chairs.
Cindy’s eyes were red as if she’d been crying and her hair was all over the place. ‘Where have you been?’ she shrilled at Natasha. ‘I’ve been trying to reach you! Why didn’t you answer your damn phone?’
‘Where I’ve been isn’t any of your business,’ Natasha said quietly.
Cindy’s fingers coiled into fists. ‘Of course it’s my business. I employ you! When I say jump you’re paid to jump! When I say—’
‘Get what you came for, agape mou,’ a deep voice quietly intruded.
Leo’s dark, looming presence appeared in the doorway. Cindy just froze where she stood, her baby-blue eyes standing out as hot embarrassment flooded up her neck and into her face. ‘M-Mr Christakis,’ she stammered out uncomfortably.
Ah, respect for an elder, Natasha noted, smiling thinly as she walked across the room to open the concealed wall safe where she kept her personal papers.
‘I didn’t expect you to come here….’
Nor had Cindy expected Leo Christakis to catch her with Rico, thought Natasha, and that was why she was embarrassed to see him again.
Leo said nothing, and Natasha winced at the dismissive contempt she could feel emanating from that suffocating silence. Cindy just wasn’t used to being looked at like that. She wasn’t used to being ignored. Embarrassment and respect changed to a sulky pout and flashing insolence, which she turned on Natasha.
‘I don’t know what you think you are doing in my safe, Natasha, but you—’
‘Be quiet, you little tramp,’ Leo said.
Cindy flushed to the roots of her hair. ‘You can’t speak to me like that!’
Natasha turned in time to watch the way Leo looked her sister over as if she were a piece of trash before diverting his steady gaze to her. ‘Got what you need?’ he asked gently.
