Greek Tycoon, Waitress Wife

Ruthlessly, he increased the sensuality of his kiss, one hand slipping from her jaw to glide with sensuous leisure down the supple length of her spine, drawing her yet closer against him. Curving down over the rounded swell of her bottom so barely covered by the enticing tightness of her skirt.

As he drew her against him, his stance altering instinctively to accommodate her body against the cradle of his hips, he felt her give a soft gasp. It aroused him yet further, and he let his hand edge further down, seeking the hemline of her skirt and ruching it upwards, so that his hand splayed over only the barest, sheerest material between it and her naked flesh.

God, but she was lovely to kiss, to caress. Her sweet, enticing body yielding to his, moulding to his, her tender mouth open to his to taste at will—

Desire speared in him—strong, aroused. Insistent.

He dragged his mouth from hers, still holding her against him. From somewhere, somewhere that required all his strength, he found his voice.

‘Do you still want to leave, Carrie?’

She was staring at him blindly, her pupils huge, lips parted. He could see the hectic pulse at her throat, feel the agitation of her heart against his chest, the peaked tips of her breasts.

She made no answer.

With triumph surging through him, he lowered his mouth to hers again.

Carrie lay, curled back against Alexeis’s strong, hard body. Her mind felt overwhelmed, her body still glowing, pulsing, with what she had experienced.

Which had been something even the most fervid imagination could never, never have imagined!

Oh, God, it had been incredible—amazing! Unbelievable!

Disbelief, wonder, seared through her.

I never knew it could be like that! Never!

She had not stood a chance, she knew—not a single chance of changing her mind. Not from the moment when, filled with the sudden inescapable realisation of why she had come here, she had suddenly felt that she was far, far out of her depth. All the temptation of the evening had suddenly coalesced into reality. The reality of what she was allowing to happen.

Why not? The voice had said to her again.

But at that fateful moment last night, looking down at the superb, lounging figure of the man who had simply knocked the breath from her body the first time she’d set eyes on him, the only words in her mind had been quite, quite different.

Oh, my God—what am I doing—what am I doing?

But she had known—known absolutely—what she was doing. Had known it all evening and had gone with it. Gone with the voice that had tempted her.

And she had known in that moment of standing there, at the end of the evening, that the moment of decision had come. She had known why she was there—known exactly why. There had been only one decision to be made—did she want to stay? To accept what was going to happen? To succumb to the temptation that had been beckoning her all evening?

She stared ahead of her, out over the dimness of the bedroom. What might she have answered had Alexeis not kissed her?

She didn’t know. Because he had kissed her, and in that very first moment, when his cool, long fingers had slid into her hair and his mouth had come down on hers, there had been only one decision—and it had already been made.

And she could not—did not—regret it! Not now, as she lay there, scooped back against the fantastic body that had done things to hers that she had never known were possible! How could she possibly regret it?

It had been a feast of sensuality—a banquet! His touch on her had melted through her like lava, drawing from her a response she had not thought possible. Touch after touch, each more arousing than the last, each more devastatingly intimate, until at last the sensations in her body, so incredible, so exquisite, had fused into an endless stream, intensifying until she was molten. Helpless in his arms, her head threshing from side to side, her body had been incandescent, burning like a flame that consumed all sense, all knowledge, all consciousness, making the whole world only what she was feeling, as if the whole universe were inside her head and nothing else existed!

Only the man making her feel that way. Only the one she’d clung to, cried out to, clutched with her hands, lifted her body to, to catch more, yet more, of that incredible, incredible experience—

She felt the afterglow still infusing through her, in her flesh. Her eyes were heavy, lids sinking. Her lashes fluttered. Around her waist she could feel, like a band, his strong arm pinioning her to him. Holding her where he wanted her to be.

In his arms. His bed.

CHAPTER FOUR

CARRIE sat in the wide leather seat in the first-class compartment of the aeroplane, overcome with wonder and disbelief.

What on earth am I doing? What on earth am I doing?

The words circled slowly in her brain. It was hard to think coherently, rationally. Hard to think at all. She didn’t want to, she knew. She wanted very much not to think. To simply—accept. Accept that something had happened that had never happened to her in her life before and never would again. She had spent the night—the most amazing, incredible, breathtaking night of her life!—with a man who had been a stranger twenty-four hours ago. And now, even more unbelievably, she was flying to New York with him!

It was like some kind of fantasy—the kind you dreamt up when life looked grim and you needed something rose-tinted and impossibly wonderful to think about. The mental equivalent of eating a cream cake or pigging out on a box of Belgian chocolates.

Her head turned to look at the most incredible man in the world, sitting beside her—an entire tray of cream cakes, a kilo of Belgian chocolates all in his own right!

She gazed helplessly, disbelievingly, at his profile. His attention was focussed on the screen of his laptop, resting on the table provided by the airline seat, his long legs extended.

Her heart swelled. God, he was so gorgeous to look at! She could gaze at him non-stop, like an idiot, just drinking him in. Everything about him was incredible—from the strong nape of his neck, the dark satin sheen of his superbly cut hair to the strong line of his jaw, the sweep of lashes around those eyes that could melt, melt, melt her into mush just by glancing at her…

A thrill went through her like a huge bubble of champagne, lifting her from her seat.

I’m with him—I’m really with him! He’s taking me to New York and I can go on being with him all that time!

That was the thought she wanted to go on thinking—feeling—like champagne in her veins, intoxicating her. But the other thought—the one that was trying to circle slowly—was also there.

What am I doing here?

The only answer she could give was the wonder, disbelief and delight that was intoxicating her. That was all the answer there was.

I’m here because I couldn’t be otherwise! I couldn’t turn it down—couldn’t say no. How could I have? How could I have?

In less than twenty-four hours her life had been turned upside down and she had been swept away. And she was helpless, quite helpless, to do anything else but let it happen.

A deep, heartfelt sigh of sheer happiness breathed from her.

Beside her, Alexeis, supremely conscious of the slender, beautiful body so close to his, heard her exhalation and glanced at her. Approval and satisfaction reflected in his eyes before he turned back to his work.

Yes, he had made a good decision. Definitely a good decision. A good decision to follow the unexpected impulse that had impelled him to order the car to stop as it drove past her, and a good decision to fold her soft, yielding body to his and make her his own. It had been an amazing night. Extraordinary not just for the novelty of it but for whatever it was that had made possessing her so deeply satisfying. He wanted—quite naturally, quite obviously—to repeat the experience for quite some time, he knew, and to do that he’d needed to make the decision he had made this morning: to take Carrie with him. Yes, it was an impulse. No, he did not normally take women with him. But so what? He was taking Carrie with him. Why? Because she was, right now, exactly what he wanted.

Rapidly, mentally, he ran through just why that was. She was beautiful, obviously—he wouldn’t have bothered with her otherwise. But hers was a beauty, a wide-eyed, fair-haired, tender-mouthed loveliness—that appealed to a taste in him that he hadn’t hitherto been aware of. That in itself was a charm that he was more than appreciative of. Her body was all that he could want—soft breasts, slender waist, gently rounded hips, long legs, and skin like the satin bloom of a peach growing into ripeness.

Caressing her, possessing her, had been a pleasure that was as rewarding as he had anticipated.

A slight frown flickered in his eyes. She had been everything he’d expected, it was true—soft, silken, and very, very seducible. And she hadn’t been, as he had known, a virgin. That, he knew, he would have found an impediment. However, she was not much experienced—certainly not in all the ways of pleasure he was used to. He had sensed her inexperience in some forms of intimacy, had sensed, too—a sensual smile of recollection played about his mouth as memory caressed his mind—how much of a revelation it had been to her that such intensity of sensation was possible…

She had gasped, cried out, eyes distended, wonder and amazement in her face, as he had brought her time after time to the point of ecstasy. It had been, he mused, a particular satisfaction of his own to afford her such an experience as she had clearly never known before.

The frown flickered in his eyes again. It was a novelty, he knew, to have a sexual partner such as she was—one he had to lead almost every step of the way. And his reward had been more than pleasure. Something had made him want to watch, intently, as her body caught fire from his ministrations, to hear her cry out, and then, as the fire ebbed from her, the flames of ecstasy extinguished, to fold her to him, to hold her, cradle her. Then, as he had reaped his own reward, his own rich satiation, something more had made him feel that it was a feeling richer than any he had felt with any other woman…

But why not? he reasoned. She was not like his usual fare, so his experience, his response, had been different. That was all. Simply—different.

He turned to glance at her again. She was leafing through a glossy magazine now—her head slightly bowed and her lovely profile exposed to him—and he let his eyes linger a moment. Yes, different indeed. And not just in looks and style.

In personality too.

She was quiet, for a start. She did not try to talk to him, to make sophisticated conversation or demands of him. She simply gave a fleeting smile, almost shy, her eyes only briefly meeting his, before drawing away as if she were not sure whether to look at him. Nor did she seem, like all the other women of his acquaintance, to relish and revel in the attentions of other men. All the women he had selected for his leisure hours had always known how prized they were, and had taken it for granted—expected it as their due—that male eyes would be drawn to them.

Carrie was not like that. She seemed rather to be embarrassed by heads turning as she walked beside him. Alexeis had been highly aware of how she had immediately drawn male attention when she came into the airport, and when they boarded the plane. But she had seemed either unconscious of the way men were looking at her or, at the other extreme, uncomfortable with it.

He had never known a woman with her calibre of looks to be so.

He had put it down to her being self-conscious about her new clothes. She had spent the day in Knightsbridge, with a personal shopper that his London PA had organised, and when she had walked into the VIP lounge he had known at once that it had been well worthwhile.

If she had looked unknowingly erotic in that black and white uniform last night, now she simply looked stunning. She was wearing a pale aqua suit, with bracelet-length jacket sleeves and a pencil skirt, and her hair was dressed in a style that was simple, but extremely effective, the front strands drawn back to the nape of her neck to give her a profile that was almost pre-Raphaelite.

He had not been able to take his eyes from her.

As he’d escorted her on to the plane he’d known, with absolute certainty, that he had definitely—quite definitely—made an excellent decision.

* * *

Two weeks in New York. Two weeks with Alexeis. Two weeks of a world, a life, Carrie had never dreamt of having. Far, far different from anything she had ever known. With every day—more with every night—her real life seemed a universe away. With every day this new life she was leading was becoming more and more real to her.

And yet still a fantasy come true.

How could it not be? How could it not be like a fantasy to be staying in a world-famous hotel by Central Park, a guest in a lavishly appointed suite, eating in one gourmet restaurant after another, dressed in clothes that she had only ever before seen in glossy magazines. Night after night to be taken to glamorous, glittering parties, sometimes in fantastic multi-storeyed apartments in uptown Manhattan, sometimes in the mansions of Long Island, drinking champagne as if it were water, wearing evening gowns so beautiful they were fit for a princess. How could it not be a fantasy come true?

And to have at the glowing, radiant heart of it Alexeis at her side.

Just thinking about him made her weak with longing for him. The hours without him seemed endless, and though she knew, of course, that he was here on business, she had to school herself to patience until she could be with him again—even if much of the time it was in public rather than in private. He socialised a great deal, but he didn’t seem to mind that she was a less than scintillating partner for him. All of the women they’d met in New York seemed to have high-powered careers, or else be engrossed in a host of other activities—running charity events, involved in the arts or media or fashion—always something glamorous, something prestigious, something that made Carrie feel dull and boring in comparison.

But she wouldn’t let it get her down. After all, she would remind herself, if Alexeis didn’t mind her being so different from the glamorously sophisticated circles he moved in, then why should she? And besides, when she was alone with Alexeis she didn’t feel dull or awkward. Even though he lived in so utterly a different world from her, came from so entirely a different background, it didn’t seem to matter. Being with him, she just felt—at ease.

She didn’t know why—didn’t question it. Only accepted it—gratefully. Just as she accepted that he had, for reasons she did not question either, swept her away into this wonderful, wonderful world with him.

Nor did she ask the question she dreaded—how long would she have with him? How long before the fantasy ended and Alexeis left her life as swiftly as he had entered it?

But she wouldn’t think about that. Hurriedly she pulled her mind away. She would make the most, the very most, of each and every wonderful day—and more, the passionate, breathtaking nights she had with him, living out this most incredible of romantic fantasies…

For as she knew this could only be a fantasy, she also knew, with a strange tremor of her heart, that there could never, ever again be a man in her life like Alexeis. It was not just the wealth and the glamour—that was only the gilding. The gold—the pure, pure gold—was Alexeis himself. He was her treasure, who made this time so precious.

And when it ended…?

No—again she pushed the thought aside. It would come, but not yet. Not yet. Not today—not tonight.

But come it did. When Alexeis’s final day in New York arrived, Carrie was still determined not to think of it. Yet it seemed that there was a hard, heavy stone inside her chest. At breakfast she was subdued, picking at her food.

‘You are not hungry?’ Alexeis eyebrows rose in surprise. Carrie always ate heartily in the morning—but then, like him, she needed to restore her energy levels after the exertions of the night.

‘No, not really,’ she answered, and set down her fork, abandoning half of the delicious Eggs Benedict that she usually polished off. But she had no appetite—only that hard, heavy stone inside her.

‘You don’t feel well?’ he asked. There was concern in his voice.

She gave a quick shake of her head. ‘It’s just because it’s the last day,’ she said.

‘So New York has enraptured you?’ he commented. ‘Even though—’ a note of mock severity came into his voice ‘—you have hardly made the most of all the shops! Well, perhaps those in Chicago will tempt you more, ne?’

‘Chicago?’ Carrie’s voice was puzzled.

‘Our next destination,’ said Alexeis. He looked at her. ‘You have no urgent need to go back to London, do you?’

Carrie stared at him. The hard, heavy stone inside her seemed to be poised on the brink of melting away like snow in summer. But did she dare believe what he might be saying?

Alexeis watched her expression. It was something he found very enjoyable to do—and not just now. He had enjoyed watching her expression on their first evening in New York, when she’d gazed at her reflection, wearing an evening gown that had cost five thousand dollars. Her face had come alight with disbelief and wonder at the image she had made. And when he’d escorted her to cocktails on the rooftop terrace of a skyscraper, or to a party on a multi-million-dollar yacht on the Hudson, to dress circle seats at the latest Broadway musical. Wherever he took her, whatever the experience, the location, her face was so very, very expressive.

And not just as she was experiencing what life was like when she was at his side. What he enjoyed most of all was watching her face as he made love to her. He took almost as much pleasure in her pleasure, as he took in his own.

And he took pleasure, too, in just being with her. That was strange for him, he knew. With other women, their primary value to him was as a sexual partner, skilled and experienced. Sophisticated in their tastes and expertise, they were social partners too, who could be relied on to move easily in his world. But not otherwise to spend time with. But Carrie—well, she was different. She seemed just to—to be there—part of his daily life.

He frowned minutely. He’d never thought of women in that way—as companions. His frown deepened. When he was alone with Carrie, what did they do? What did they talk about? He tried to think. Obviously a great deal of their time together they were in bed, but, even so, there was a lot of time when he was not making love to her. When he was simply having breakfast with her, chatting, relaxed, or late at night or in the early morning, together in bed, embracing her, half asleep, half awake, talking of… Well, what did they talk about? Nothing specific, nothing memorable. Yet the very fact that he could not recall was in itself notable.

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