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‘Later,’ was all she said as she moved forward, head high, her mouth set in a firm, determined line.
‘Later,’ Angelos Rousakis echoed softly as she swept past him, knowing it was a promise as much to himself as to her. His mouth twisted slightly as he watched her walk away from him, the slim back held stiffly straight like her gleaming head. ‘Oh, yes, we’ll talk later, Miss Marshall.’
Let her have her moment of triumph, her belief that she had got the upper hand in the situation—for now. He was quite content to stand back and watch, stand back and let her act out the role of lady of the manor, queen of all she surveyed, for a little while longer. After all, what was that English saying about the harder they fall…? And little Miss Marshall had a very hard fall coming soon.
Not so little, the most masculine part of his nature added in wry acknowledgement. Jessica Marshall had done a lot of growing up in the years since he had last seen her, and she’d done it in all the right ways—physically at least. The delicious promise of a lovely young girl had turned into the fully sensual beauty of a woman. She was taller, slimmer, but her body had rounded in all the right places, adding gentle curves at breasts and hips that raised his pulse to beat stronger, heavier, at the thought of what lay beneath the stark black tailored suit, the neat white blouse that was buttoned right up to the base of her delicate neck, concealing all but the fine skin of her throat.
Her face had lost the faint roundness of youth, the high cheekbones becoming stronger, more sharply defined in the pale oval of her face and the blue-grey of her eyes seemed lighter than ever before in contrast to the rich fall of the burnished chestnut hair and the deep rose tint of the softly curved mouth.
Just for a second the memory of what it had felt like to know the taste of that mouth, have those lips open under his, stabbed at him with erotic sharpness. But the recollection of what had happened afterwards was enough to throw the mental equivalent of a bucket of icy water over any suggestion of the flames that might have flared in his mind, hardening his resolve before it had a second’s chance to waver.
One thing that hadn’t changed about Jessica Marshall was the cold-eyed, disdainful, totally dismissive look she could turn on anyone she considered beneath her contempt. The ‘what is this piece of dirt under my feet?’ expression that she had just used on him was exactly as it had been before, only this time given extra power as a result of seven years’ more maturity, seven years more of having everything her own way.
Well, not any longer. She would find out soon enough why he was here and then the ice queen would struggle to retain that icy calm when everything around her became hotter than hell. Let her see if she could manage to hold on to her hauteur then.
But the other people in the room had started to move forward, following in Jessica’s wake. Outside, where the rain had finally started to ease, the first of a line of sleek black cars had drawn up by the open door. For now, Lady Jessica would have to wait; he had a funeral to go to.
The funeral of the father he had never known.
The father that Jessica Marshall had stolen away from him.
CHAPTER TWO
‘JESSICA, I need to talk to you.’
Simeon Hilton touched Jessica’s elbow to draw her attention away from the elderly lady she was helping into her coat.
‘It is important.’
‘But does it have to be now?’
Jessica cast a quick glance around the room that was now almost empty and gave a small sigh of relief. The ordeal of the day was almost over. Another few minutes and she had hoped to be able to kick off the elegant shoes that had been crippling her for hours, put her feet up and maybe actually enjoy a cup of tea instead of constantly having to snatch a sip here or there, putting it down and forgetting about it or simply holding it in her hand while the liquid inside grew cold as she struggled to make conversation with yet another person she barely knew.
‘Can’t it wait?’
‘I’m afraid not. It’s about Marty’s will.’
The solicitor was obviously on edge. His eyes wouldn’t quite meet hers and he shifted awkwardly from one foot to the other as he spoke, twisting something sharply in her nerves.
‘Is there something wrong? Simeon—what is it?’
‘I’d prefer to do this properly… In private.’
A wave of Simeon’s hand took in the room, indicating the last few remaining stragglers who were finally making their way towards the door. Angelos Rousakis was not amongst them, Jessica was irritated to see. Instead, he was standing at the far end of the room, staring out of the window at the garden where the rain was once more lashing down.
Just the sight of him sent a nervous thrill down her spine, one that she had grown accustomed to all through the church ceremony and again at the graveside, when she had fought with her tears as the coffin had been lowered into the ground. It was a shiver that had nothing to do with the cold, sneaking wind that had replaced the rain showers for a while. It had everything to do with the terrible sense of apprehension that shuddered over her skin every time she looked at him. She still had no idea at all why he was here, and he clearly was in no sort of a hurry to explain.
It was like waiting for a tiger to pounce. Like being stalked silently and intently by a big, powerful, dangerous predator and never ever knowing just when the beast would leap and she would feel the rake of its claws, the tear of its teeth.
She’d tried to convince herself that she was being over-imaginative. That for some reason, a reason she couldn’t manage to come up with herself right now, Angelos had felt obliged to come and pay his last respects to the man who had once, very briefly, been his employer seven years ago. But no matter how she tried, that line of reasoning just didn’t convince. For one thing, Angelos had never been the sort of man who felt obliged to do anything. Even as a much younger man, he had clearly been in control of his life and bowed to no one when it came to making decisions about it. And now, at thirty, he had so obviously made his way in the world and come so far from the man he had been that she couldn’t imagine him conceding anything to anyone.
Which meant that he was here for his own reasons and he was determined not to let her know what those were until he was good and ready.
Well, they’d have to wait until she’d spoken to Simeon now.
‘Just give me five minutes then…’
Another round of the room, shaking hands, saying goodbyes, filled in the time she’d asked for and soon everyone had left. Everyone except for Simeon, who was busy with some call on his mobile phone, and Angelos, who was still standing exactly where he had been before, hands pushed deep into the pockets of his superbly tailored trousers, his long legs slightly apart, feet in highly polished hand stitched boots planted firmly on the wooden floor, his attention fixed on the view beyond the window.
Seeing him like this, anyone would think that he was the owner of the Manor House, Jessica told herself irritably. He stood there like the lord of all he surveyed when really he was…
He was what?
The question stopped her dead. Her already reluctant steps towards the man at the window faltered to a halt as she remembered just how little she actually knew about Angelos Rousakis. And about the Angelos who had appeared here this afternoon she knew nothing at all. Wherever he had lived, whatever he had done, he had prospered, there was no doubt about that, but she knew nothing of his story, of his way of life.
Had he gone back to his native Greece when he had left here…?
The thought died in her head as, his attention caught by her presence, Angelos turned his head slowly and she met his black-eyed gaze head on.
She had managed to avoid doing this all day and now she knew why. Being fixed by that polished jet stare made her feel like a butterfly, trapped and pinned to a board, unable to move. His expression was calm, even bland, but behind the heavy, hooded lids burned something she couldn’t understand or explain—she only knew that she didn’t trust it for a moment.
‘Miss Marshall…’
His tone was calm too, the inclination of his dark head in acknowledgement of her just enough to be polite, but his expression still gave nothing away.
‘You have a spectacular view,’ she heard him continue with a strong sense of disbelief. Did he really think that she had approached him to chat casually, make light conversation?
‘I don’t believe I ever saw it the last time I was here.’
‘Things were…very different then…’ Jessica managed, her tongue tangling over the words. Because she had the feeling that, coming close to him like this, she had made a terrible mistake. And suddenly she knew just what she had been avoiding all day.
By dodging any contact with him all through the afternoon she had also managed to avoid looking at him—really looking at him. Looking at him up close. And, by doing so, she knew she had been trying to deny the potent impact that he had on her senses. He had a raw, masculine appeal that had reached out and grabbed her years before, when she had been only eighteen, fresh out of school and naïve as anything. And that appeal was still there, intensified, concentrated, enhanced by seven years of maturity, seven years of success, it seemed. If Angelos had once been her Black Angel, then now he was all that and more—a Black Archangel. The epitome of male power and strength and pure, distilled, masculine sex appeal.
It was the recognition of that that had had her on the run all afternoon, dodging any contact with him that might have forced her to face up to the truth sooner. The bitter memories of the past, the sense of apprehension about his reasons for being here, even the fact that she was engaged to be married—nothing could come between her and the fact that Angelos Rousakis was the most devastatingly sexy man she had ever encountered in her life.
‘We were different people.’
She flung the words at him, using the snappish tone as a defence, hoping to hide her inner confusion. He might show every sign of having prospered since she had last seen him, but it didn’t alter the fact that she had once cost him his employment, his only home. Honour demanded that she should acknowledge that but the words tangled up on her tongue as Angelos lifted a sardonically enquiring eyebrow.
‘Were we?’
‘Yes. Totally different.’
Suddenly Jessica had had more than enough of this mystery—more than enough of his unsettling presence with no explanation for it.
‘So perhaps you’ll explain just what you’re doing here. What is it you want?’
‘What do I want?’
Angelos made a pretence of actually considering the question, looking around him with a thoughtful, assessing expression on his stunning face.
‘Well, I wouldn’t mind a house like this for a start. I always thought it was amazing when I worked here—and that was before I’d ever seen inside.’
‘It’s not for sale!’
This time, tormented by unease, she’d spoken too quickly, snapped too hard. She’d given too much away and she knew by the way that those brilliant black eyes narrowed sharply that he’d caught every trace of the discomfort she was trying to hide from him. He’d caught it and, she was beginning to suspect, had a strong suspicion of just what was firing it.
‘Not to the likes of me, hmm?’ he questioned softly, the words coming low and deadly like a striking snake. ‘Is that it, Jessica? Is that what you mean? That the Manor House can only belong to some purebred Englishman with aristocratic blood in his veins? Not some former Athens street urchin who’s fit only to groom your thoroughbred mare, to clean the mud from her coat when you come back from a ride around the estate and then to polish the tack ready for your next ride?’
‘I never said…’ Jessica blustered, horrified that he should even believe her capable of any such thought. ‘I…’
But Angelos hadn’t finished with her.
‘Or was that disappointment in your tone?’
‘Disappointment?’
‘Did you think that I was going to say that I wanted you? That that was why I’d come back—because I couldn’t get you out of my mind? That from the moment I kissed you all those years ago, I have always wanted you, always dreamed of you, always determined to have you? And now that I’ve made my fortune, now that your stepfather can no longer come between us, I’ve come back to claim you, to take you as my bride?’
‘No! Never! No way!’
Her voice was high and shrill—too high and shrill, she read in his face—and with every note it rose higher, with every violent shake of her head in emphasis, she was betraying the way that he had got to her. The way that, just for a terrible, weak, unguarded moment, she had actually felt a small, shivering thrill at contemplating the possibility he had laid before her.
‘I can’t think of anything I’d want less!’
His swift smile caught her on the raw. It was cold, mirthless, icy—a flashing gesture of triumph, without a trace of warmth in it anywhere, and not the tiniest gleam of light in the dark depths in his eyes. Somehow she knew she’d fallen right into the trap that he’d set for her—a trap she hadn’t even noticed he’d been laying.
‘Don’t you think that would sound more valid if you’d pointed out that you’re engaged to be married?’
For a moment the cold question stole away any words from her mind. How had he…?
Of course—he’d spotted her ring. But the way he made her feel—the way he obviously intended to make her feel—was that he believed her fiancé should have been uppermost in her thoughts. Which he should, she acknowledged, a terrible sense of embarrassment and guilt running through her.
She should have refuted Angelos’s suggestion with a furious, I’m not interested in any man other than my fiancé! Chris’s name should have been the first on her lips.
And that, she felt, was the trap that Angelos had planned—had expected her to fall into. Just the thought made something icy-cold slither nastily down her spine.
‘So tell me, where is your fiancé today? I would have thought that he would want to be here to support you at this time.’
Jessica bridled at the note of condemnation in his voice. Once again she wished that Chris had been here to refute the other man’s obviously critical opinion of him, just as she had wished that Marty would see what she saw in her fiancé rather than always being suspicious of his motives.
‘He had urgent business that called him away. Otherwise he’d have been here like a shot. And he wouldn’t have left my side for a moment.’
‘To protect you from the unwanted attentions of former servants who don’t know their place?’ Angelos drawled cynically, every word riddled with disbelief. ‘Then it’s just as well that that’s not why I’m here.’
This, Jessica suspected, was her cue to ask him just why he was here, but it was a cue she had no intention of taking up. Quite frankly, by now she didn’t care what had brought him here today and she didn’t want to find out. All she wanted was for him to go, to take with him the desperate, uneasy, guilty, uncomfortable feelings he’d roused in her simply by walking back into her life, and leave her in peace.
And she hoped and prayed that she would never, ever see him again.
With an effort she switched back to the icy politeness she’d adopted in the first moments she’d seen him—was it really only a couple of hours ago?
‘Well, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to leave. Everyone’s gone home…’ She indicated the empty room with a wave of her hand, taking a step back and half turning, so that his path to the door was completely free, totally unobstructed. ‘And so should you.’
Once more those narrowed eyes seared over her face, then flicked away to look at the open door, before coming back to lock coldly with her uneasy blue gaze.
‘I think not,’ he said firmly, his tone making it plain that he was not prepared to tolerate any argument. ‘There’s no way I’m going anywhere.’
‘But…’
Jessica glanced swiftly round, looking for Peters, but the butler had disappeared. And she had to wonder whether the older man would be able to manage to eject the powerful Greek whose imposing shoulders spoke of an impressive strength. The way that Angelos’s powerful legs and feet were planted so firmly made her think of a commanding tree that would never be easily uprooted.
Her head felt as if it were spinning, but whether from panic or anger she had no way of knowing.
‘Mr Rousakis, I have to tell you to leave!’
‘Miss Marshall, you are not in a position to tell me to do anything,’ he tossed back, the bite of cold anger making her breath catch in her throat. ‘Not any more.’
‘I—’ Jessica began when she heard a soft step behind her.
‘Mr Rousakis…’ It was Simeon Hilton’s voice and when she spun round it was to find the lawyer standing close behind her. ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you arrived. I trust you had a comfortable journey.’
To Jessica’s total consternation, Simeon was holding out his hand towards the Greek, a smile on his face.
‘Mr Rousakis was just leaving…’ she managed but much of the strength had gone out of her voice as her confidence started to seep away. She had forgotten that Simeon had told Peters to wait for Angelos. That he had been expecting him.
Beyond the window, the rain had stopped but the slow, ominous passage of a dark cloud across the face of the weak, struggling sun made her tremble in sudden uncertainty. There was something going on. There were undertones here that she didn’t understand.
‘Shall we get started?’
To her horror, Simeon was addressing Angelos, not her, and there was something in that that was more than just a bond between the two men in the room. Simeon’s approach was—respectful—professional.
‘I have all the papers in the library.’
‘But…’ Somehow Jessica found the strength to speak even though a growing sense of fear and apprehension was threatening to close off her throat. ‘But this is a private matter between you and me, Simeon.’
She’d got that wrong, she knew as soon as the words were out. She could read her mistake in Simeon’s face, in the coolly knowing expression in Angelos’s eyes. This was not just between herself and Simeon. Angelos was somehow involved, though she had no idea how and why.
‘Just what is going on?’
It was Angelos who answered her.
‘I suggest you join us in the library,’ he declared with cool arrogance. ‘You’ll find out everything there.’
And, without even a second glance at her face, he turned and walked from the room, Simeon at his side, their long strides taking them across the room, away from her, while she stood and stared in blank bewilderment. It was almost, Jessica thought anxiously, as if Angelos was the owner of the Manor House, when everyone knew that she was the nearest thing that Marty had had to living family. Forcing her legs to move, she hurried after them, the sound of her heels tapping on the polished floorboards beating out the same sort of staccato tattoo as the uneven, jerky beat of her heart.
‘I thought you wanted to talk to me about my—about Marty’s will!’ she declared as she burst through the door into the library after them. Her noisy arrival made Angelos glance up from the tray on a table set in the wide bay window where he was pouring himself a drink from the jug of water that stood there too. ‘That is surely none of Mr Rousakis’s business.’
‘It is now.’
