The Apollonides Mistress Scandal / Rich Man's Vengeful Seduction: The Apollonides Mistress Scandal / Rich Man's Vengeful Seduction

“It happened just before the show.” Gemma wasn’t confessing that Angelo had been here, in the dressing room. And she’d never told Lucie anything—thankfully no one had commented on the past affair. Perhaps most of the entertainment staff had only been there less than two years. “I’m too dog-tired to cope with Mr. Apollonides,” Gemma muttered. The fatigue was not physical. It went soul-deep. She felt raw and emotionally drained. And she couldn’t face Angelo right now.

The memory of how she’d reacted to his touch had spooked her. The last thing she needed was to feel desire for Angelo Apollonides. She needed time to come to terms with that unexpected complication. When she confronted Angelo it would be in her space, on her terms, not in the dark smoky intimacy of the supper theatre.

At Lucie’s look of blatant disbelief, Gemma added, “And you can tell him that I’m passing for now.” Rejection would do Angelo the world of good. Make him more eager to see her again.

“Gemma, you’re being stupid. In the eight months I’ve been working on Strathmos he’s never once invited an employee for a drink. And you refuse?” Lucie jumped up and started pacing the small space. “I just don’t get you. He didn’t even bring a woman with him to Strathmos this time, rumour has it that he ended it with—” she named a well-known model “—last month. Why not try your luck?”

Gemma didn’t answer. She picked up a bottle of makeup remover and a packet of face wipes and started to clean her face with quick, practised moves. Soon Angelo would come looking for her, and she had no intention of being here.

After a moment Lucie gave a snort of disgust and stalked out of the room, muttering something about being the messenger of bad tidings and that some people had all the luck.

But Gemma knew Angelo’s demand to join him had nothing to do with luck. His reaction on the beach had made it clear he was less than happy about her appearance on Strathmos.

She had to play this very, very carefully. For a year she’d been trying to get close to him. She’d finally been granted a four-week chance when the performer who was originally booked had pulled out. Gemma’s agent had scrambled for the booking. With only eighteen days left to discover what she wanted and find a way to make Angelo pay for the grief he’d caused her, she couldn’t chicken out just because her senses had been set on fire by the touch of a single finger.

Two

Gemma had stood him up!

And she hadn’t even bothered to tell him herself, she’d sent a messenger to deliver the unwelcome news. The anger that had simmered within Angelo since he’d that discovered Gemma was on Strathmos, living and working in his resort, took on a new edge.

Gemma claimed that she’d lost her memory. How had that happened and what did it have to do with him? And why had she returned to Strathmos?

Angelo found himself glaring in the direction where the maddeningly capricious Gemma had vanished from the stage, while the bare skin of her back and that provocative red dress remained imprinted on his vision. He hated the sneaky realisation that he hadn’t stopped thinking about her since he’d arrived back on Strathmos. And now she’d deliberately left him cooling his heels.

Angelo rose to his feet, abandoning the bottle of Bollinger he’d ordered—Gemma had always had a taste for champagne—and, jaw set, stalked out to find her.

She was not in the dressing room. But a comprehensive scan took in the red dress hanging in the closet. Clearly, she’d already been and gone. Nor was she to be found in the row of bars and coffee shops that flanked the theatre. Angelo barely slowed his long strides as Mark Lyme hurried over. Two minutes later, with the next potential crisis averted, he exited the entertainment complex, searching for Gemma’s distinctive dark flame hair under the lamps in the wide paved piazza.

About to veer off to where the staff units were located, he spotted a lone figure walking towards the deserted beach. Hunching his shoulders against the rising wind, Angelo quickened his pace. With her give-away hair, not even the fact that she wore jeans and a bulky sweater could hide that it was Gemma.

He came up behind her. “If I give an employee an order I expect it to be obeyed.” The deceptive softness of his tone didn’t hide his anger—or his frustration.

Gemma’s shoulders tensed and she came to a halt. Then she turned. In the dim light of the lanterns that lined the promenade, he saw her eyebrow arch. “I thought it was an invitation,” she said with soft irony. “One that I never accepted.”

“Or refused.”

She considered him, her head on one side. “Give me one good reason why I should have joined you.”

He blinked. Women usually thronged to his side. Hell, he didn’t need to issue invitations. Women gate-crashed celebrity functions to meet him. “Because I wanted to speak to you.”

“What about?” Her tension was tangible.

“Your memory loss.”

“Not true. You invited me for a drink before you knew about that.”

She had him there. What he really wanted to know was why she had come back to Strathmos. It had to be about more than money. His gut told him it had something to do with her amnesia. He wasn’t about to admit that what pricked his ego was the fact that she didn’t remember him. Or was it a ploy? Was her amnesia nothing more than a sham designed to avoid facing up to her treachery three years ago? Or a last-ditch effort to recapture his interest? At last he said, “You’ve forgotten carrying on with every male under the age of eighty at the Rose Ball? You don’t remember about me…us?”

She closed her eyes at the sheer incredulity in his voice. “Is that so hard to accept?” she asked warily. “I have amnesia.”

“How convenient.”

Gemma opened her eyes and met his narrowed gaze. She tried to speak but her voice wouldn’t work. So she simply shrugged and let her arms fall uselessly by her side.

“What kind of amnesia?”

“Does it matter?” The sick feeling in the pit of her stomach tightened. Couldn’t he see how much she hated this? “Fact is, I can’t remember anything about what happened here three years ago. It’s just…one vast blank.”

“It certainly explains how you have the gall to come back.”

She let that barb go. “It’s not easy being here. But I need to find out about my life. What it was like… well…before.” She slid him a sideways look. The anger had faded, but his eyes still glittered with suspicion. “It’s really strange, because I remember lots of stuff before I met you. Most of it, I think. And I know what happened…afterwards. It’s the time in the middle that’s gone.”

He loomed over her. “How did it happen? Did you fall? Did you hit your head? What do the doctors say about the prognosis? Will you ever get that part of your memory back?”

“I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it.” Gemma’s voice sounded thin and thready even to her own ears. “It upsets me.”

Angelo gave a harsh sigh. “I suppose I can understand that. It must be scary.”

Not as scary as Angelo. Even when he was being nice—like now, when his eyes were full of sympathy—there was a taut purpose to his body, an air of danger and tension. Gemma shuddered. Nice wouldn’t last. Not with Angelo Apollonides. He hadn’t transformed a string of family resorts into modern extravaganzas built for year-round entertainment by being a nice, sympathetic kind of guy. He was tough, decisive and ruthless. A man who worked hard—and played harder. A Greek success legend.

His gaze was direct. “Have dinner with me.”

The unexpected request startled her. She chewed her lip. It was what she ought to do.

“Is it such a difficult decision? Do I scare you so much?” His hands came down on her shoulders and the touch scorched straight through her lamb’s-wool sweater.

She went very still. “You don’t scare me at all,” Gemma said with false bravado.

His hands tightened. “Prove it by having dinner with me.”

A dare. How infantile. She froze under his touch. A hint of stubble darkened his jaw and the hard line of his mouth had relaxed into a sensual curve. The dark intensity of his gaze and the way her flesh reacted to his touch told her that he was way out of her league. She wasn’t ready to have dinner with him, to be the sole focus of his attention. He was so much more than she’d expected. But she had no choice. Not if she wanted to learn what she needed. “Not tonight. It’s been a long day. And it’s late.”

He was about to say something, to argue, when his cell phone trilled. He mouthed an apology and turned away, talking rapidly in Greek, and Gemma realised she’d lost his attention.

Gemma wanted to kick something—preferably herself—and she wished desperately she’d accepted his invitation. Even though the prickles of excitement his touch had generated terrified her.

He hit a button and slid the phone into his pants pocket. “Tomorrow night?”

Relief overwhelmed her. She hadn’t blown it. She drew a deep, shuddering breath. “Okay, I’ll have dinner with you.”

“So how did we meet?” The following evening Gemma sat across from Angelo in a secluded corner of the Golden Fleece restaurant, her half-eaten meal of grilled calamari garnished with sliced lemon in front of her.

“At the film festival in Cannes.” Angelo set down his knife. His plate was empty. “I thought you were an actress.”

That would explain some of it. Angelo had never been linked with a dancer previously.

“Oh? What happened next?” She speared another tube of calamari and popped it into her mouth.

“You were beautiful—and funny. I enjoyed your company so I invited you to spend a weekend at Poseidon’s Cavern.” He named one of the famous resorts that he owned. “You accepted. And, when business called, you came back to Strathmos with me—it’s where I live, after all.” He gave her a grin that transformed his face, the harsh line of his mouth softening into a passionate curve.

Gemma set her knife and fork together and shifted in her chair, uncomfortable with the notion that it had been so easy for him. “And then I got a job in the resort? Right?”

“Do you want desert?”

“No, thanks.”

“Coffee?”

She shook her head, impatient for his answer to her questions.

He came around and pulled out her chair. Close to her ear he murmured, “There was so much more glamour in being the boss’s girlfriend than working.” His voice was loaded with cynicism. “And you’d led me to believe you were taking a break from stage work. I had no idea you were an exotic dancer until about a month later.”

“Oh.” Gemma rose and shot him a wary glance. “I never wanted to…leave?”

He gave a hard-edged grin. “Why should you have? You had it all. Great resorts to live in, an unending credit line and good sex.”

That was supposed to be funny? Gemma had never felt less like laughing in her life. She walked quickly ahead, not noticing the attractive man with long dark hair who waved to her. She smouldered silently until they exited the restaurant.

“So I no longer had a career—” She squawked in shock as Angelo pulled her into an alcove behind an immense bronze statue of Hephaestus. The sconce of fire that burned in the statue’s raised hand cast leaping shadows against the walls. Gemma opened her mouth to protest.

“If you mean, you no longer danced half naked in an upmarket bar, then no, you no longer had a career. Instead you had me.” In the close confines of the alcove his face had changed, toughened. He looked hard and ruthless and suddenly Gemma could see exactly why he was such a successful businessman and commanded so much respect. She had to take care not to provoke him.

“I had you.” Gemma struggled to keep the anger at his arrogance out of her voice. “And what did you get out of this deal?”

“A beautiful woman in my bed.”

“I don’t suppose it occurred to you I might’ve wanted more?”

“More?”

“A career—”

He gave a snort. “You scored by being my live-in lover. Travel to different resorts. A-list parties. No need to work. Believe me, it was better for you my way.”

His way. Gemma had a feeling that most things ended up his way. The alternative would be for his kept mistress to hit the highway. “Did you love me?”

“Love you?” His head went back and she could see she’d surprised him.

“Yes, did you love me?” She pressed. “With all this good sex, did you feel anything for me at all?”

“Look, Gemma, this wasn’t about love. It was about two consenting adults who met and enjoyed time together.” He spread his hands sideways. “Hell, we were hardly Romeo and Juliet.”

“If we had been Romeo and Juliet, you’d have been dead by the end,” Gemma said through gritted teeth.

“Hey,” he objected, “what are you getting so worked up about? All I meant was that we weren’t young lovers, dizzy from an attack of first-time love.”

“Did I love you?”

He gave an astonished laugh. “What’s the fixation with love? You certainly never told me you loved me. But then you weren’t in it for love. And nor was I.”

Gemma bit her lip, thinking furiously. “I can’t believe I would’ve lived the kind of life you’ve painted for any other reason than because I loved you more than anything in the world. It’s so against everything I believe in.”

“Well, you showed no sign of loving me…and if that’s what you believe now, then you’ve changed.”

She stilled. “Maybe I have.”

His eyes darkened. “Gemma.” He stretched out a hand and stroked her arm. “You should—”

“What am I doing?” She dropped her face into her hands, then raked her fingers back through her hair.

“Trying to regain your memory? Maybe this will help you remember.” There was a huskiness to his voice that caught her attention.

Slowly she raised her head. He was close, far closer than she’d realised and in the flickering light his gaze was intent. Her heart started to pound. She swallowed and the sudden ringing silence stretched between them.

“Yes?” The sound was little more than a croak. But Angelo understood. It meant yes to so much more. Even to that which she most feared.

The instant his lips brushed hers Gemma knew her life would never be the same again. Every preconception she had of what it might’ve been like to be kissed by him vanished.

It was fire and light. Energy and emotion. Then his tongue touched hers and sparks shot through her. Adrenaline. And something magical.

She held her breath, didn’t move in case the magic vanished. Then his tongue swept her mouth and the fire leapt inside her. Gemma groaned, closed her eyes and abandoned herself to the wonder.

When his fingers stroked the naked skin of her shoulder, every nerve ending went crazy. Frissons rippled down her spine and a reckless want followed. She moved closer, pressing herself up against him, until she felt the unmistakable ridge of his erection through the soft silk of her dress. It was a shock…a sign of how out of control this had become…but it was also incredibly satisfying.

Whatever the past held, Angelo wanted her. Now.

She sighed into his mouth, he deepened the kiss and his breathing grew ragged. His hand closed on her shoulder and he pulled her against him.

At last he raised his head. “Do you remember that?”

Gemma stared at him, then regretfully shook her head.

He put her away from him, his hands shaking a little. “Thiavlo. I think we both need to cool down. Let’s visit the casino—you always enjoyed that.”

“Okay,” she managed as he led her out from behind the inscrutable Hephaestus. Her knees shook. She had never felt less like gambling in her life.

Large double doors opened into the Apollo Club, the casino reserved for A-list clientele. Crystal chandeliers hung from the domed ceiling painted with beasts and heroes from myths Gemma knew well. The ambience in the room warned her that the stakes would be frighteningly high.

Angelo led her to a table with a group of men in tuxedos and two women—a blonde and a brunette—in evening gowns, jewels glittering at their necks and wrists. No voices hummed in here. Only the clatter of chips broke the solemn silence.

Murmuring an order, Angelo placed a wad of notes on the table. An elegant croupier in a long black dress slid several stacks of chips across the baize. Angelo passed the stacks to her, and Gemma realised he’d spent a small fortune for her to fritter away. She started to feel ill. “I can’t gamble that kind of money.”

The look he gave her was more than a little pointed. “It never troubled you in the past.”

Gemma bit her lip. “What if I lose it all?”

Angelo shrugged. “Then I’ll buy more.”

And what would he expect from her then? Sex? Obviously that had happened in the past. Something within her shrivelled at the thought.

“No!” She shoved the chips back at him. “I might have forgotten how to do this, forgotten the rules.”

“Try and we’ll see.”

“Angelo, I don’t want to do this.”

His gaze held hers. After a long moment he said, “All right. We’ll see if we can penetrate that memory another way. Keep these—” he separated a small heap of chips “—in case you decide you want to play later.”

She shook her head and pushed the chips away. “I don’t feel like gambling tonight.”

“Would you like to go for a drink?”

She nodded. This close she could see the laugh lines around his eyes, the glitter in his compelling eyes. He stilled in the act of gathering the chips and stared down at her.

“Gemma?”

With a start, she looked away, breaking the tenuous thread that linked them, and turned her head, searching for the source of the call that cut through the hush of the huge room.

“I thought it was you.” The guy coming towards her was darkly tanned with Gallic features and carefully styled shaggy black hair. Gemma stared at him blankly.

The blonde at their table squealed in delight and grabbed his arm. He bent to kiss her cheek. Her much older companion didn’t look happy.

The hand cupping Gemma’s elbow tensed. “Did you invite him?” Angelo murmured in her ear.

“Invite him?” She swung around to cast Angelo a frown. “What are you talking about? I don’t even know—” She broke off.

“Who he is,” Angelo finished smoothly, and started to laugh, but Gemma noticed his eyes were devoid of humour. “I don’t think Jean-Paul will appreciate being forgotten so soon.”

“Who is he?” Gemma hissed.

“Jean-Paul Moreau.” From Angelo’s air of expectancy Gemma suspected the name was supposed to mean something to her. It didn’t.

She lifted her shoulders and let them drop. “So…” she prompted.

“Your lover.” Some ugly emotion flashed over Angelo’s face then his features turned wooden. “The man I threw naked out of my—our—bed three years ago.”

Three

Gemma stared.

Angelo’s shocking revelation was the last thing she’d expected. Yet, judging by his narrow-eyed expression, he clearly believed it to be true.

She tested the discovery against her own belief. No, she couldn’t accept it. Angelo must’ve made some awful mistake.

But before she could question him further, a mist of designer aftershave surrounded her. Then came a whisper of “Cherie, you are more beautiful than ever,” and male lips nudged her cheek.

“Hello—” she tried frantically to remember his name “—Jean-Paul.”

“I thought you were ignoring me, cherie. You stared straight through me earlier. I’m glad to know you remember your old friends.”

Beside her Angelo snorted. Gemma shot him a warning look. She didn’t want Jean-Paul knowing about the amnesia.

At least not yet.

Coming face-to-face with a man Angelo considered her lover had taken her aback. Much as she disliked Angelo, he had no reason to lie to her about the past. She needed to learn more.

With an extravagant flourish Jean-Paul produced a roll of euro notes from inside his jacket and signalled to the croupier. When the chips came, he slipped one pile across to Gemma. “For you, cherie.”

The smile Jean-Paul gave her was disconcertingly intimate. The secretive smile of a man to a woman he knew very, very well.

Gemma could sense Angelo’s silent tension. Her stomach rolled over. “Thanks,” she said stiltedly. Realising that she sounded terse she pointed to the unused chips on the table that Angelo had been in the process of gathering up before Jean-Paul’s arrival. “But I have enough—and we’re going for a drink.”

Jean-Paul’s gaze swept over her, explicit, knowing. Leaning towards her, he whispered, “Cherie, you’re not the kind of woman ever to have enough. Here—” he slid a handful of chips towards her “—have a bet on me.”

“Enough!” Angelo said harshly. A tanned arm hooked around Gemma’s waist from behind, his other hand pushed his chips towards the croupier. “The lady doesn’t want your chips.” Against the length of her spine Gemma could feel Angelo’s body through the thin silk of her dress. It was at once comforting and vaguely threatening. His arm lay coiled around her, under her breasts like a hard band, and awareness of his strength, his power, shivered through her.

It was the sudden ratcheting tension in his body that made her realise that Jean-Paul had moved. Within Angelo’s hold, she twisted around on her stool. The two men faced each other like duelling adversaries.

Jean-Paul’s gaze shifted from Angelo to Gemma and his mouth twisted. “It’s like that, is it? Cherie, don’t be fooled. Apollonides is the same man as three years ago. Work will always be his first mistress. Will that be enough for you this time around? Or will you come searching for warm arms, words of lo—”

“I said enough.” Even Jean-Paul heard the suppressed violence in the whip-crack sound and took a hasty step back. “You go too far, Moreau. If I catch you near Gemma I will have you thrown off the island. Do you understand?”

A Gallic shrug and Jean-Paul smiled. “Keep cool, man. It doesn’t mean a thing—it never did.” But there was a wariness in his dark eyes that hadn’t been there seconds before.

The last thing Gemma wanted was a scene. Already they were attracting the glances of people alerted by the bristling men and hissed words. The two women at their table were staring openly, while the croupier called for bets with a touch of desperation.

“Angelo—”

The arm tightened, cutting off her protest. “Gemma, you will not encourage this man. Moreau, you will keep your distance from Gemma. I’ve told you both before, I don’t share my woman. Understand that.” Releasing his hold on her, Angelo moved between her and Jean-Paul and with a hard glance at her, he added, “Both of you.”

Then, in a swift movement, he swept the euro notes off the table and nodded at the croupier. “Come, Gemma. Let’s go.”

Without a glance in Jean-Paul’s direction, Gemma slid from the stool.

The hand that came down on her shoulder was possessive, a warning. His woman. Angelo had warned Jean-Paul—and her—that he had no intention of sharing his woman, clearly not for the first time. Did that mean he still considered her his woman?

A frisson of dark emotion speared her. Gemma wasn’t sure what to make of his claim and kept silent as they left the gaming room.

By the time they exited the elevator a floor down and walked out the hotel into the starry night, the anger inside Angelo was still simmering. Maintaining a terse silence, he strode along the path lit by decorative Victorian-style lamps. He was aware of the anxious glances Gemma kept casting him as she hurried along beside him, her high heels clicking against the terra-cotta flagstones.

“I’m sorry about what happened.”

He shrugged. “It had to happen sooner or later. And it’s only a matter of time before it happens again…before another man rises from the ashes of your past.”

“I don’t remember him,” she said quickly.

Too quickly? “Meaning, you won’t remember the others, either?” He shot her a derisive smile. “Poor bastard. I can almost feel pity for him.”