Unchained Destinies

Wow! she thought in stunned admiration. What ruinously liquid eyes! Melting chocolate, she missed, and then recoiled in alarm because the chocolate seemed to be darkening and thickening as though he found her attractive. He shouldn’t have eyes you could dream in! she thought crossly. He should be cold and vicious with an icicle gaze, jagged teeth and foul breath!

Lionel had shown her articles and told her tales about this man to make her stomach turn. Staff meetings in rooms without chairs so no one waffled. High pay, long hours, ruthless sackings. Phone-tapping and bugging of his competitors’ offices and a no-hands-barred policy of seducing any woman who might aid his head-hunting expeditions. Secretaries in hysterics. Desperate husbands, suicidal wives whom Vigadó had loved and left.

A man with no morals. Furthermore, a man with only one aim: a driving need that amounted to an obsession to dominate everyone he came across, reducing strong men to quivering wrecks, tough editors to tear, boardrooms into submission.

He was certainly intent, she noticed angrily, on making the most of having a blonde fall like manna from the skies I En panic, she fought down a rush of sinful sensation as his mouth almost nuzzled her cheek. Her hands pushed the broad shoulders but she was locked in place by his immovable arms and all that happened was that her spine arched back and she was staring at his mocking lips.

‘I had no choice but to catch you,’ said his lover-close mouth, letting the lover-husky voice wash warm breath over her dizzily sensitised skin. ‘I walked in, saw a pair of provocative bare legs waving around at eye-level, and then a beautiful blonde fell into my arms. And she began to tremble appealingly, virtually asking for…I wonder what?’

Mariann stiffened. He’d changed from showing anger at the intrusion to acting like a hunter who’d found his dinner wandering provocatively around his lair. That was a deliberate opening gambit—but how to handle it? she wondered. Should it be the usual joky, gentle let-down, or a quick nipping in the bud? Infuriatingly, she couldn’t risk annoying him!

‘I had a shock,’ she confided. ‘Me past life zipped past me eyes.’

‘Oh! That must have been a dreadful experience to go through. I sympathise,’ he murmured insincerely.

‘Ta. I’m okey-dokey now,’ she assured him. ‘Give a girl a bit of breathin’ space, there’s a duck!’

‘No,’ he said succinctly.

Mariann was taken aback. ‘No?’ she repeated.

‘I’m hanging on to you till we establish what you’re doing in here,’ he said in a brittle voice, his grip tightening. ‘These are my premises and it’s after office hours, even Hungarian ones.’

‘I know,’ she said as cheerfully as she could, comparing him mentally to his photograph. He looked much more dangerous in the flesh, as if he’d flick their darts back and deliberately pierce a few of her vital arteries. Darn it, she’d have to soften him up and lull his suspicions by being moronic! And bluff like mad. ‘You’re the home-grown whiz-kid!’ she said with girly admiration.

‘I reckon I am,’ he agreed, his cynical gaze resting thoughtfully on her. ‘Vigadó Gab6r. And you?’

‘Mimi,’ she supplied and flashed a witless smile, deeply disappointed that she dare not risk saying, Call me Mimi!

‘Mimi,’ he repeated and his eyes narrowed suspiciously.

Mariann didn’t blame him. It had seemed a harmless and appropriate choice when she’d been confronted by Vigadó’s lecherous office manager. Being ‘Mimi’ had made her feel coy and less inclined to ruin everything by crushing him with well-directed scorn when he’d suggested bringing a bottle of wine around to wherever she was staying.

Now, with this worldly-wise, laser-sharp tycoon dwelling on the likelihood of the name—instead of being mesmerised like the office manager by the way her vital statistics moved—she sensed she’d made a mistake.

So she grimaced and shrugged. ‘Daft name, ain’t it?’ she chirruped.

‘Yes. Very.’ To her dismay, Mariann’s body betrayed her, tightening with apprehension at his increasingly cynical glance. ‘You’re extremely tense. Women usually relax in my arms. Are you afraid of me?’ he asked with apparent innocence. But his voice had a steely edge to it.

‘You’ve got such…extraordinary eyes!’ she admitted huskily. ‘All glinty, like butcher’s knives. Give me the shivers, they do!’

‘My eyes are telling you what I’m thinking,’ he said tightly. ‘You see, I don’t take kindly to intruders, Mimi.’

‘Intruder?’ She bristled. ‘I’m legit!’

‘Legit what?’ he drawled.

Her head jerked confidently in the direction of the ladders. ‘Decorator, of course! Have paint tin and sandpaper, will travel!’

‘Really. Then why the nerves?’

Annoyed with herself, she tried to ease her tension and widened her eyes in simulated awe. ‘Dunno. But I’ve never been this close to a millionaire before!’

‘Billionaire,’ he corrected, reaching out unexpectedly to smooth her hair back off her face.

‘Ooh! Don’t! Tickles!’ she gurgled in panic, arching away. He’d find the join!

His mouth thinned. He was quite unaffected by her girly appeal, she realised in dismay. ‘How did you know who I was when I first walked into the office, Mimi?’ he asked with a sudden, devastating softness.

For a fraction of a second, she didn’t know what to say, then managed to pull herself together. ‘I’m not daft!’ she replied scornfully. ‘Who else would have a key?’

‘The janitor.’

‘In a vicuna coat? What do you pay janitors in Hungary?’ She laughed. ‘And would he be so bossy?’ she asked wickedly. Vigadó gave her a shrewd look. Divert him! her brain screamed. All she could manage was a simpering look of the utmost stupidity.

‘Mimi, I do believe you’re up to no good,’ he said softly. The glint in his eyes looked lethal.

She did a mock ‘who, little me?’ expression because she was temporarily lost for words, her throat dry with fear. It could be her paranoia that sensed a sinister meaning behind that remark. Or…Her heart somersaulted. There was a chance, a remote chance, that he’d glimpsed her at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October.

Except…No! That had been the month she’d had long hair the colour of coal-tar—and had flown home early with flu. How could he recognise her? As a mere assistant to her last editor, she’d been one of the insignificant crowd, far from Vigadó’s glittering entourage. And she’d been power-suited, immaculately made-up and wearing her frigid ‘no-dice, hands-off expression to keep three lusting authors at bay—and cursing her editor for entrusting them to her care.

Today, she was a blonde waif in cut-off, ragged shorts and a vest T-shirt and no make-up. He was being naturally suspicious, nothing more—and it wasn’t surprising.

Cautiously, pretending to be fussing with her hair, she checked that no conker-coloured strands were escaping from Marilyn and then tried a resentful look on him. She had to fight this to the last ditch. It was all or nothing, sink or swim!

‘I think you’ve got a nerve! I’m doin’ everyone a favour, being here!’ she declared stoutly.

‘By waving your legs around enticingly? By launching yourself prettily into my arms?’ he purred. It was like the caressing purr of a contented tiger, who was about to pounce…devour flesh and crunch bones!

‘I told you. Me and my mates is decoratin’ the place,’ said Mariann, her perkiness not too successful because of the shake in her voice.

‘I haven’t seen them, but I’ll agree that you decorate it very prettily,’ he husked, his smoky accent deeper, more distracting than ever.

‘Ta. Mind you, if I’ve still got me looks, it’s no thanks to you,’ she reminded him, putting him firmly in the wrong. ‘It’s a miracle I’m in one piece at all, what with you comin’ in without warning.’

‘Why is an English girl working as a decorator in Budapest?’ he asked reasonably, but sardonically.

She simpered and launched into her story. ‘I’m helpin’ a couple of fellers I know. András and János. They’re fittin’ this job in as a favour. My mum’s Hungarian. I got family over here,’ she added truthfully. ‘Not a crime, is it? I got to eat, you know.’ A mischievous impulse, born of desperation, made her launch into wild, inventive improvisation to establish her credentials before making a quick exit. ‘I hope you know you’ve ruined me snake ‘n’ adder!’

His eyebrow rose quizzically, as well it might, she thought ruefully. And then she caught an excitement running through her veins and realised that playing risky games with the master of deception was rather enjoyable!

‘Snake and…adder?’ he drawled, his eyes narrowing.

‘Cockney rhyming slang. Adder—ladder!’ she explained sweetly, reasoning that it was rather unlikely that a Hungarian would be any kind of an expert.

‘I’m fascinated by your barrow-boy wit!’ he marvelled sarcastically. ‘This is almost like My Fair Lady.’

‘It is?’ A little puzzled, Mariann let her eyelashes do a bit of overtime and prayed that that was admiration gleaming in his eyes.

‘The simple Cockney girl in that particular musical turned into a raving beauty with a shrewd mind and a cut-glass accent,’ he murmured and she smiled uncertainly.

‘Oh, yeah. Audrey Hepburn. ‘Scuse me,’ she said, trying to ease out of his vice-like grip. Her hand looked decidedly white. Didn’t he care about hurting women? ‘I’d better give me ladder the once-over before I clean me brushes and go—’

‘I was intending to give you the once-over, after your fall down the…’ he paused, delicately, his mouth ironic ‘…adder!’

Mariann squirmed, not wanting to risk having a handson experience with Mr Bedroom Eyes himself and wondering what it would take to free herself.

‘You tryin’ to stop the blood flowing to me fingers?’ she asked in pointed objection.

‘Is that what I’m doing? Dear me! No wonder I’m known for breaking butterflies’ wings on wheels,’ he said in a low, unnervingly cruel undertone. He smiled unpleasantly, as though contemplating a few butterflies he’d destroyed, and Mariann’s pulses lurched erratically. ‘In certain circumstances, I use more force than necessary.’

‘What circumstances?’ she asked hoarsely.

His sharply sculptured lips curled into a calculating smile that coincided with the pressure of his hips against hers. ‘When I’m aroused in one way or another.’

Aroused. Mariann swallowed hard. Was that anger or passion in his tone? She found it confusingly hard to tell. ‘You come to the boil a bit quick!’ she observed, her jaunty tone belying her fear.

‘Depends how high the heat is turned up,’ he said meaningfully. Mariann took the hint. She’d overdone it. This guy needed no encouragement for his sexual urge to take over. ‘Now let’s find out all about you, shall we?’

‘I’m better at talkin’ when I can breathe,’ she husked. His thumbs were now massaging in an irritatingly rhythmic way over her flesh. Her tingling flesh. How could it tingle? she thought in mortification.

‘And I’m better at getting information out of people when I have some kind of a hold over them,’ he replied coolly.

She gasped at his blatant threat and decided it was time this trickster experienced a dirty trick or two in return. So she inhaled deeply. Vigadó’s avid eyes fell to her T-shirt, which he watched with close interest as it rose beneath the strain of her lifting breasts.

And then, ‘Read all about it!’ she yelled, approximately two inches from his mesmerised face.

‘What the devil—?’ he roared, flinching violently.

She was free!’ ‘Just checking my lungs work all right,’ she said with bright innocence, taking a precautionary step or two nearer to the sanctuary of her outdoor clothes. A bit of bleached-blonde Marilyn slid seductively over one eye and she decided to leave it there. Her giggle surfaced at his pained expression. ‘I haven’t gone mad.’ She grinned. ‘That was-—’

‘I know,’ he grated irritably. ‘I’ve heard newspaper venders shouting that phrase in London. You bring the city sounds vividly back to me,’ he added in icy sarcasm. ‘You’ll be doing the Lambeth Walk and impressions of Big Ben chiming next.’

She flung him an amused look and then her hand flew to her mouth to stifle a laugh. ‘Oh, my!’ she gasped. ‘The paint’s gone all over your nice pin-stripe!’

His gaze followed hers. ‘Dammit!’ he cried irritably, slipping his arms out of the expensive coat—mercifully untouched—and passing it imperiously to her. ‘Look what you’ve done!’

Annoyed by his arrogant manner, she flung the coat in the general direction of his luggage and decided to have a dig at him. ‘I didn’t ask you to clutch me to you like a drownin’ man grabbin’ a lifebelt!’ she argued indignantly.

‘I was steadying you, after your launch into space,’ he said in chilling tones. ‘And I don’t quite see myself as a drowning man.’

‘Like a leech, then,’ she said in a kindly way, because he was, having sucked the life blood from her boss’s business.

His lips compressed. ‘I think I’m beginning to understand what you’re trying to convey,’ he said caustically. And suddenly she saw that he looked tired, as though his journey had been a long one. Tired was good news, she thought, giving a sigh of relief. He’d be less of a menace. ‘Have you got any turps?’ he snapped.

‘Sure,’ she chirruped. She strode over to She tool box and solemnly handed him the bottle and some rags.

‘You?’ Curt and barely civil, he held out the bottle.

Thanking him politely, she took the worst of the stains off her shorts and then turned her attention to the spots on her legs, aware that his eyes kept flicking over to watch her movements. No harm in that. Plenty of men had ogled her legs before—but this time she felt more uncomfortable than usual so she gave one hasty, make-do rub and waited anxiously for the chance to leave.

Her heart was racing at an all-time high. That would be due to the danger, of course. But being found out was far less worrying than the air of sexual violence he was projecting. And also worrying was her extraordinary pagan response to it. What had happened to her immunity, her sense of the ridiculous when men became doe-eyed and panting?

Unfortunately for her, this guy was light-years away from being doe-eyed or panting. She, however, had felt alarmingly close to sinking, with a mindless sigh, into his arms! Extraordinary—and humiliating that she was reacting to his leader-of-the-pack attitude by virtually rolling over in submission!

She darted a quick, resentful glance at him and he looked away. His strong but deft fingers worked at the cloth, stretching it taut across his well-developed thighs. In fact, he was very muscular all over. And she wished he were a seven-stone weakling. She’d feel safer. At the moment, she felt as safe as a rabbit in a trap. She shivered—and knew with a sinking heart that she had to abandon her attempt and try again the next evening. All she needed was a good exit line.

CHAPTER TWO

IN FRUSTRATION, Mariann began to pack up her things. While Vigadó worked doggedly at the stains on his trousers, her mind drifted to another man who’d always dominated his environment: István, her sister’s guy.

Fondly she contemplated the love-affair between istvá and Tanya—its ups and downs and eventual state of bliss. Whenever they’d looked into each other’s eyes, her heart had contracted with a wistful envy. A mutual adoration like that was very moving. But bitter experien perience reminded her that men like him were rare, very rare and the odds against falling in love with a man who met her special needs were virtually nil.

Marian smiled gently. Nevertheless, their happiness had given her hope. Things could turn out well after difficulties. The thought inspired her to persevere with her daring plan.

Maybe Lionel’s wife would return to him when she found out what a monster Vigadó really was. And Mary O’Brien—surely she wouldn’t approve of the working methods of a brute whose sole motive was profit and dam the consequences? All they needed was Mary’s secret address and they were home and dry.

‘Is the paint coming off?’ she enquired sweetly, her eyes lingering on the fine tailoring of his double-vented jacket and ferociously knife-edged trousers. Some of Lionel’s authors had probably funded that suit!

‘No. I hope the cleaners will have better luck. I hate waste,’ he frowned, dropping the cloth rag in. defeat. Foiled for once, and obviously hating the experience, he impatiently thrust back a hank of silky black hair that spoilt his impeccable appearance by daring to dip its wave on to his broad forehead.

‘Disasters will happen. I’m sure it’ll clean out,’ she said soothingly, screwing the top back on the turps. ‘Well, since you’ve arrived, I’ll get out of your way now.’

‘No, you won’t! You’ll tell me what you’re planning first,’ he said aggressively.

Mariann bit back her annoyance. ‘You’ll be dead surprised!’ she promised wryly.

‘You may be right, you may be wrong,’ he said in an ice-splintered voice, and pushed his hands deep into the pockets of the sharply tailored jacket. ‘Why don’t you show me what you have in mind?’

Later! she thought, hugging her secret to herself. ‘All right. Come and see.’ Serenely content to be deceiving the dreaded monster, she knelt on the dustsheet beside the stack of paint tins.

‘Here?’ he asked lazily. ‘How original.’

‘You’ve got a dirty mind,’ she reproved and grabbed a screwdriver, ignoring Vigadó’s mock-exclamation of lecherous surprise and levering open a tin. She’d cheerfully directed the decorators to some interesting shades, just for fun, pretending that ‘Viggy’ would ‘adore’ her choice. And she’d enjoyed picking out the colours, majestically arranging for the bill to be sent to the Dieter Ringel office. ‘Cantaloupe,’ she pronounced proudly, showing him and revving up her cheery Cockney impersonation to full throttle. ‘Bright, innit? Once it’s slapped on the walls, you’ll be real chipper! What do you think?’

‘Can’t say it’s been one of my life’s ambitions to work inside a melon,’ he grunted, crouching beside her on the dustsheet. His hand stretched out to her discarded boiler suit beside him and fingered the emblem on the pocket reflectively. ‘Kastély Huszár,’ he mused, flicking a quick glance at Mariann’s widening eyes. ‘The hotel…How did you get hold of this?’ he demanded sharply.

‘Monogrammed, is it? That’s posh for you!’ she exclaimed.

And inwardly she groaned. Oh, help! He might know the countess! She made a mental note to ring István’s mother and beg her not to reveal the family connection between them. Vigadó had to continue to believe that she was a simple, uncomplicated girl with nothing but empty space between her ears. If he got wind of the fact that she worked for a publisher—

‘Are you having trouble formulating an answer?’ he asked with sinister softness.

She blanched at the barbaric growl and sharpened her defences. Travel-weary he might be, but he was still more alert than most guys on their fifth cup of coffee.

‘I didn’t steal it, if that’s what you’re thinking,’ she said, much on her dignity. ‘The hotel supplied me with it,’ she told him truthfully, rather pleased with her evasion. ‘It’s had a revamp,’ she explained. ‘Decorators everywhere.’

His head angled on one side. ‘Everyone knows that. István Huszár and that English manager of his have made the hotel world-famous. You’ve worked there?’ he probed, his glacial eyes boring into her soul.

Her heart began to thump. Lying didn’t come easy to her, not after being brought up as a vicar’s daughter! ‘Did a few jobs,’ she answered with a vigorous nod.

She smiled ruefully, thinking of when she’d helped her younger sister Sue to soothe a few hundred guests when their brother’s wedding at the castle was dramatically cancelled. Or when she’d packed up the wedding presents. What a terrible day that had been! She could have wept—would have done—if Tanya hadn’t been relying on her support. But the apparent disaster had brought Tanya and István together after years apart. Crises were often turning points.

Vigadó had stood up smoothly and was running incredulous eyes over her rather skimpily clad body. ‘You’re telling me you really are a decorator?’ he asked in mild disbelief.

Mariann nodded blithely. After doing out their Devon home and her London friends’ flats, she reckoned she could call herself that. ‘That’s right,’ she said, thinking she was almost home and dry. A little more proof and he’d be convinced. Perhaps some colourful Cockney would help! ‘Okey dokey, swivel your peepers this way—’

‘Do you think,’ he interrupted with a heavy sigh, ‘that you could speak normal, undecorated English? I don’t think my jet-lagged brain can cope with riddles.’

‘I meant’ she said, cheerfully in command of the situation, ‘for you to see what else we were doing.’ Hoping to convince him by sheer self-assurance, she opened tins enthusiastically. ‘Sultana skirting boards, flapjack ceiling and cane-sugar door panels with a cream surround. What do you think? Come on, be honest.’ Mariann leapt up eagerly and her big smile broadened with delight at his shattered expression.

‘Sounds like a greengrocer’s shop in the West Indies,’ he said caustically.

‘Too right!’ she sympathised. ‘But there’s colour charts for you,’ she added, disclaiming all responsibility for the manufacturer’s wild fantasies.

‘This building is part of Budapest’s historic Castle district,’ he said wearily. ‘You’re working in what was once an eighteenth-century salon—’

‘But the colours would look stunning!’ she cooed.

‘If this is a joke…’ he began in stiff anger.

And she couldn’t resist teasing him. ‘Too unconventional? I thought it might be.’ She sighed. ‘Colours are supposed to reveal your inner character.’ She eyed his suit with a professional air and let her gaze linger for a fraction too long on the lines of the beautiful body beneath. Wasted on a man like that…

‘Enlighten me as to my character,’ he said in clipped tones.

With pleasure! she thought. ‘A guy who believes in straight-down-the-line commitment with no sideturnings, who’s organised, ruthless to a fault, with no grey areas and no maybe,’ she replied, sounding annoyingly husky. Conventional or not, he looked devastating. But then his earthy, raw sensuality would fight its way through anything he chose to wear. Stopping herself from wool-gathering, she waved an expressive hand towards her kaleidoscopic pile of clothes. ‘What do mine say?’

He scanned the heap of reds, oranges and shocking pinks. ‘They don’t “say”, they shout,’ he grated in disapproval. ‘They scream in raucous tones that you’re as fast and as brash and as exciting as a fairground ride. A chameleon landing on those clothes would have a nervous breakdown.’

‘You’re funny!’ she said in surprise. She was grinning good-naturedly at his assessment, not in the least bit bothered by it because she was proud of brightening a grey world, one hand jammed into her tiny waist above the womanly swell of her hip, her long legs and bare feet planted assertively apart.

‘Hilarious. Stick your tongue out,’ he commanded abruptly.

She almost obeyed. ‘What?’ She gaped in astonishment.

Suddenly he was as close as a tango dancer, looming over her, his snazzy-suited body authoritative and slightly menacing. A faint quiver of nerves rippled from her head to her toes. When his hand enclosed her bare arm like an iron manacle again, she wondered seriously whether she could actually get away with deceiving him. Those eyes of his could penetrate flaws inside iron girders.

‘Stick your tongue out,’ he repeated softly, and Mariann found herself swaying towards him, helplessly mesmerised by his smoulderingly sexy eyes.

She fought the urge to lift her mouth to Vigadó’s inviting lips. He was even more wickedly sexy in the flesh than on paper, and of course that was how she had expected him to stay—a paper threat. It hadn’t been her intention to be around when he arrived. If he’d stuck to his schedule, she thought resentfully, like any normal businessman, whose life was run by his Filofax, she would have extracted all the information she needed and been on her way before he ever knew he’d been invaded by decorators!