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She Can’t Say No to the Greek Tycoon

THE KOUVARIS MARRIAGE DIANA HAMILTON

THE GREEK TYCOON’S INNOCENT MISTRESS KATHRYN ROSS

THE GREEK’S CONVENIENT MISTRESS ANNIE WEST

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THE KOUVARIS
MARRIAGE

DIANA HAMILTON

About the Author

DIANA HAMILTON is a true romantic, and fell in love with her husband at first sight. They still live in the fairytale Tudor house where they raised their three children. Now the idyll is shared with eight rescue cats and a puppy. But, despite an often chaotic lifestyle ever since she learned to read and write Diana has had her nose in a book – either reading or writing one—and plans to go on doing just that for a very long time to come.

PROLOGUE

DONE!

Maddie Ryan straightened, hot and sweaty beneath the sun that blazed from a cerulean sky, and rested her grubby hands on her curvy hips. Every leaf and bloom was perfect, the terracotta planters were arranged in attractive groupings around the arcaded courtyard. The ancient central stone fountain was beautifully restored and finally working, sending a silvery plume of water dancing skywards, then falling back into the shallow stone basin, creating lovely water music.

Everything was ready for tonight’s party and her first important commission as a landscape gardener was successfully completed, a commission given by her best friend since schooldays, Amanda.

Thinking of Amanda, she grinned. It was an unlikely friendship—everyone had said so—the tomboy and the fastidious, delicate blonde beauty. But it had worked. On leaving school, Amanda had made her mark as a top model and led a truly glamorous lifestyle. But Maddie, working her way through horticultural college, hadn’t been envious, just happy for her—especially when she’d fallen in love and married a fabulously wealthy Greek tycoon.

Then, three months after the wedding, she’d phoned one chilly spring day. ‘How do you like the idea of a well-paid working holiday? Cristos has bought this fabulous villa just outside Athens. The house is perfect but the grounds are a neglected mess—especially the courtyard. I fancy something Moorish. Could you take the commission? Cristos said money no object.’ A breathy giggle. ‘He’d do anything to please me. He’s not like your normal Greek male; he treats women as if they have minds of their own!’

Tomorrow Maddie would be returning to England with a fat cheque, a tan, and a bunch of happy memories—and the hope that her mother had fielded at least a couple of responses to her adverts in the local press while she’d been away.

Turning to make one final check on the discreetly hidden irrigation system that kept the planters watered, she noticed the stout wooden door that led from the courtyard to the lemon grove swing open. Thrusting out her lower lip, she huffed away the strands of caramel curls that were tangling with the thick upsweep of her lashes and got an unimpeded view of the hunk—no other description fitted—who had sauntered into the courtyard.

Like her, he was dressed casually. Almost threadbare faded jeans, against her skimpy cotton shorts, and an ancient black vest top that except for size matched her own. One of the locals, she deduced as he strolled towards her, looking for casual work. But, unlike the late adolescents she’d hired to help with the heavy stuff, this guy looked older—thirty-four or-five at a guess.

Out of work, with a wife and a brood of young children? Looking to pick up a few days’ pay? What a waste. With looks like his he would never want for work as a male model: tall, dark and gorgeous, his face crafted to guarantee weak knees in the female population. Strong bones, a firm, commanding mouth with just the right hint of sensuality, she listed to herself. Adding, as he came nearer, an intriguing pair of warm golden eyes fringed with sinfully long dark lashes.

Those fascinating eyes held a question as he halted in front of her, and Maddie had to swallow an annoying constriction in her throat as she apologised with genuine sincerity. ‘The project’s finished. We’re no longer hiring. I’m sorry.’

‘Is that so?’ He didn’t look disappointed. He actually smiled. And the effect was electrifying. Fresh perspiration broke out on her short upper lip. A dark eyebrow quirked. ‘And you are?’

‘Mad.’ Qualifying that quickly, in case he thought she really was, she went on, ‘Maddie Ryan. Project designer.’ Christened Madeleine because her mother, having given birth to three boisterous boys, had longed for a daughter she could dress in pretty clothes and bring up to be ultra-feminine. But Madeleine had refused to answer to anything but Mad—or Maddie, at a pinch—and could clearly remember back to the age of three or four, when her poor mother had tried to dress her in something pink and frilly for her birthday party. She had gone stiff as a board, screaming her head off as she’d refused to wear anything so girly.

She adored her parents, but she idolised her big brothers, and had always set out to prove she could do anything they could do—from climbing the tallest trees and tickling trout to paddling a home-made raft across the lake on the estate where her dad was employed as head groundsman. Eventually her mother had resigned herself to having a tomboy daughter—freckle-faced, permanently grubby, sticking plasters adorning her coltish legs, untameable curls—and loved her more than she’d thought possible.

‘So you are English?’ The sexy golden eyes wandered over her, and, nodding the affirmative, Maddie felt her flesh quiver as his eyes swept back up to fuse with hers. In all of her twenty-two years no man had ever had this effect on her, and the unaccustomed and scary stinging sensation of intimacy shook her rigid. ‘Do you speak my language?’ he asked, on a throaty purr that sent something hot sizzling through her veins. Then his eyes dropped to her wide mouth, lips parted as she puzzled over why he should ask that. His attractively accented voice had implied more than mere politeness. ‘I am interested to know how you relayed your wishes to your workers.’

‘Oh—that!’ Maddie relaxed. Friendly question. Friendly she could handle, no problem. She’d had plenty of male friends, both at school and at college. Been best mates with most of the village boys. But never a serious boyfriend. None of her male friends had ever picked her as his special girl. They’d treated her as one of them—come to her with any problems, discussed stuff—but when it came to romance they’d picked the sort of flirty girlies who could simper and giggle for England.

Speedwell-blue eyes smiled. ‘No, I don’t speak Greek. I picked up a few words from the casuals—’ her smile broadened to a wide grin, her neat freckle-banded nose wrinkling ‘—but I sort of guessed they’re not words one would use in polite company! Nikos—the permanent gardener Cristos hired—is pretty fluent in English, and he translated for me.’

Her voice tailed off. Flustered, she noted that he didn’t seem to be listening to her side of this strange conversation. Had he simply asked the first thing to come into his too-handsome head just to keep her talking? Because he was back to making that slow, thoroughly unsettling inventory of her too-bountiful body again, his eyes lingering too long for her comfort on the smooth golden thighs directly beneath the ragged hem of her skimpy shorts.

Pressing her knees close together, to guard against a decidedly perverse instinct to shift them apart and tilt her hips towards that gorgeous, power-packed rangy body, she decided to get rid of him. Aiming for repressive, her words emerged in a husky tone she didn’t recognise as her own. ‘Did you want something? Can I help you?’

Worryingly, he moved just that little bit closer. His broad shoulders lifted infinitesimally, the bronzed skin gleaming like oiled silk, as it made her wonder what that skin would feel like beneath her fingers.

He gave no answer, but the silence sizzled with something unspoken and his slow smile made her tremble, made her wonder what was happening here—because as sure as hens laid eggs no male had ever made her feel this strange before. This—this what? Expectant?

She swallowed thickly just as he said, ‘I think that for now you should find shade.’ With lazy grace, the lightest of touches, he brushed a strand of damp hair away from her hot forehead. ‘You are hot. Very hot!’ Golden eyes danced. ‘I’ll see you around.’

Not if I see you first, was Maddie’s wild unspoken thought as she took the hint and scurried away from his unsettling presence, heading for the wide door that led to the cool interior of the villa. Her skin was still tingling where he had so lightly touched it, sending responsive quivers down her spine.

Typical Greek male, she fumed. Most of the casuals had been the same. Unable to stop strutting their stuff when a female was around. She’d been able to overlook them, no trouble at all. She didn’t do flirting. Didn’t know how. Didn’t want to know how. Hadn’t had any practice.

But the stranger had been different. And how! It had made her feel uncomfortable. An extra large dose of charisma, she decided as she reached the sanctuary of the suite of rooms she’d been given. A knock-out dose that would make him irresistible if he had seduction in mind.

Seduction? She wasn’t going to go there. No way! No doubt he acted that way with any female under ninety. So snap out of it, she scolded herself.

Getting out of her work clothes, she headed for the shower and put him quite brutally out of her mind. Or tried to. With little success, she conceded with vast annoyance.

The party was going with the sort of discreet swing that only serious money could contrive. Ultra-glamorous guests wandered out from the lavish buffet to the courtyard, wine glasses elegantly in hand, murmuring congratulations for the romance of the strategically placed uplighters, the plants Maddie had chosen for their perfume, the pale roses and sweetly scented jasmine festooning the pillars of the arcade. And because Amanda and Cristos, bless them, had made sure everyone present knew she was the creator of the lush loveliness, Maddie kept her fingers crossed that some of the guests might remember her if they needed any work done in the future.

Amanda joined her on the secluded stone seat Maddie had retired to to get her breath back after answering so many horticultural questions, a glass of chilled white wine in her hot hands.

‘It’s going perfectly. Everyone’s impressed. You never know—you might get one or two commissions.’

‘I hope so!’ Maddie grinned at her friend. ‘I’d love to work here again—I’ve fallen in love with the country! And I’ll never be able to thank you enough for thinking of me.’

‘Who else would I think of, dolt?’ Amanda’s lovely face dimpled with affection. ‘And take my advice—if you are offered a commission, charge top dollar. These people come from the top layer of Greek society—money coming out of their ears—they expect to pay mega-bucks. Offer them cut price and they’ll come all over squeamish and run a mile!’

‘I’ll remember that slice of cynicism!’ Maddie took a grateful long sip of wine and pushed her untidy fringe out of her eyes with her free hand, her dancing blue eyes wandering between the groups of beautiful people who were slowly circulating, chatting, the women discreetly pricing and placing each other’s jewels and designer dresses.

Dressing for the party, Maddie hadn’t even tried to compete. Heck, how could she? Willowy she wasn’t, and her wardrobe was as sparse as the hairs on a balding man’s head. So she’d got into the only dress she’d brought with her—a simple blue shirtwaister, plain but presentable.

She immediately wished she didn’t look so ordinary when she saw him.

An uncontrollable something made her heart leap and her stomach perform a weird loop. The guy she’d tagged as a casual worker—magnetic in a white tuxedo, urbane, elegant—was obviously one of the super-wealthy beings her friend mixed with now she’d married into the highest stratum of Greek society. All his attention was being given to the dark, fashionably skinny beauty clinging to his arm as if she’d been grafted there.

‘Oops—latecomer. I’d better do my hostess thing.’

Amanda, noticing the unmissable, rose to her feet, and Maddie, because she couldn’t help it, asked, ‘Who is he?’

‘He’s gorgeous, isn’t he?'Amanda smoothed the ice-blue silk of her skirt and giggled. ‘Dimitri Kouvaris—the shipping magnate and a near neighbour. He walked over this morning to discuss a business deal with Cristos—but he’s taken! The clinging vine is Irini—some distant family connection, I believe—and the general consensus is that wedding bells are soon to be tolled! So you have been warned!’

Great! Maddie thought bracingly. And the warning was unnecessary. Seeing him in this exalted milieu provided the metaphorical bucket of cold water she’d needed—because despite all her good intentions she hadn’t been able to get him or his final words out of her mind. Or the way he’d looked at her, the sexual interest demonstrated by his body language—and what a body!

She had to put a stop to the unwanted and repeated invasion of the totally stupid thought that he might be the one man capable of making her break her vow of chastity. A vow made to herself because her burgeoning career meant far more to her than any romantic entanglement, and because of her need to prove herself to her parent, who seemed to think that a woman needed a man to look after her, to make her whole.

Codswallop!—as she’d inelegantly informed her mother when she’d aired that outdated view.

But she couldn’t help watching the latecomers and noting the way that the hand that wasn’t around the beautiful Irini’s waist lifted in a salute of recognition as he glanced beyond Amanda to where she was sitting on her stone bench.

Her face flaming, Maddie refused to respond, and tried to wriggle further back into the shadows. The last thing she wanted or needed was for him to saunter over, clinging vine in tow, and humiliate her by reminding her how she had mistaken him for a casual worker.

If that had been his intention she was spared, when a group of guests headed by Cristos joined him. But she squirmed with embarrassment and uncomfortably strong frissons of something else entirely when his eyes kept seeking her out. Narrowed, speculative eyes.

A huge shudder racked its way through her. Enough! She wasn’t going to sit here like a transfixed rabbit while that man stared at her! Clumsily, she shot to her feet, and headed briskly back to the villa, where his eyes couldn’t follow her, making for her room and the calming, sensible task of packing for her departure back to England in the morning.

It was beginning to grow dark when Maddie parked her old van at the side of the stone cottage that had been her home for all her life. It had been a tight squeeze with four children, but her mother had made it a comfy home. Too comfy, perhaps, she reflected wryly. Only Adam, the eldest, had moved out, when he’d married two years ago. He and Anne had been lucky to get a council house on an estate a mile away, his job as a forestry worker providing for his wife and the next generation of Ryans—a toddler of eighteen months and twins on the way.

Sam and Ben still lived at home. Their joint market garden business—supplying organic produce to local pubs and hotels—didn’t make enough profit to allow them to move out. Not that they seemed in any hurry to turn their backs on their Mum’s home cooking and laundry service.

Taking the key from the ignition she huffed out a sigh. At nearly twenty-three she should be leaving the nest, giving Mum a break. And she would—as soon as her business took off.

The profits from the Greek job were earmarked for new tools, a possible van upgrade and wider advertising—because the local press had only brought in one enquiry for the make-over of a small back garden in the nearby market town. The clients, recently moved in, wanted the usual. What they called an ‘outdoor room', with a play area for a young child, the ubiquitous decking and a tiny lawn. Bog standard stuff which she’d completed in five days, and nothing else on the horizon.

Normally optimistic—a bit too Micawberish her dad sometimes said, but fondly—Maddie felt unusually down as she locked the van and headed for the side door that led directly into the warm heart of the house—the kitchen. Mum would be beavering away, preparing the evening meal for when her ravenously hungry menfolk returned. Friday night, she usually made a huge steak pie. Maddie would prepare the massive amount of vegetables as soon as she’d got out of her muddy work boots and shed her ancient waxed jacket.

Fixing a bright smile on her generous mouth—dear old Mum had better things to do than look at a long face—Maddie pushed open the door and her smile went. Her mouth dropped open and her heart jumped to her throat, leaving her feeling weirdly lightheaded.

He was there. Dimitri Kouvaris. In the outrageously gorgeous, impeccably suited flesh. Sitting at the enormous kitchen table, drinking tea, and being plied with shortbread by her pink-cheeked chattering parent.

He looked up.

And smiled.

It was a perfect spring day. The day after his bombshell arrival on the scene. Her blue eyes narrowed, Maddie watched him saunter ahead along the narrow woodland path.

Dressed this morning in stone-coloured jeans that clipped his narrow male hips and long legs, and a casual honey-toned shirt that clung to the intimidating width of his shoulders, he dominated the surroundings. The sea of bluebells, now in promising bud, didn’t even merit a glance. She had eyes only for him. And deplored it.

Last night, at Mum’s invitation, he’d stayed for supper, integrating easily with her family. He had explained that he’d met her in Athens through a mutual friend, and that as he was in the area on business he’d decided to look her up.

And she might, if she’d tried hard, have believed it.

But not after the way he’d turned up this morning. All bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, smoothly imparting that as he had a free day and Maddie, as he’d discovered—prised out of someone, more likely!—had no work on, he’d appreciate it if she showed him some of the surrounding countryside. He had tossed in the invitation that they all dine with him that evening at his hotel, erasing Mum’s tiny questioning frown at a stroke.

But Maddie was still questioning.

Why should a drop-dead handsome, rotten rich Greek tycoon with a gorgeous fiancée take the trouble to ‘look up’ an ordinary working girl and her ordinary family? A stranger to male sexual interest, she wasn’t so green as to fail to recognise it when it came her way. She’d registered it on that first day back in Athens. She chewed worriedly on her full lower lip. Trouble was, it was mutual, and she was drawn to him when common sense dictated that she should be running a mile.

Turning as the narrow path debouched onto a wide grassy meadow, Dimitri waited for her, his heartbeats quickening. Glossy curls surrounded her flushed heart-shaped face, her sultry lips were parted; her lush body was clothed in faded jeans and a workmanlike shirt. She was as unlike the elegant designer-clad females who threw themselves at him on a tediously regular basis as it was possible to be.

Testosterone pumped through his body. Self-admittedly cynical about the female half of the population, who looked at him and saw nothing but spectacular wealth, this immediate and ravaging physical awareness had never happened to him before. And no way was he about to knock it. He wanted her and would have her—would fight to the death to claim her!

‘Why are you here? What do you want?’ She sounded breathless. She was breathless. Yet the pace he’d set hadn’t been in the least taxing. All part and parcel of the effect he had on her, she conceded uneasily, and quivered as he took her hand and raised it to his lips.

The warmth, the firmness of his mouth as it trailed over the backs of her fingers, took what was left of her breath away. And when he murmured, ‘You want the truth?’ it took an enormous effort of will to look him in the eyes.

‘What else?’ she said.

Meeting those spectacular, mesmeric golden eyes had been a big mistake, she registered, as her knees went weak and simultaneously her breasts peaked and thrust with greedy urgency against the thin cotton of her shirt.

As if he knew exactly what was happening to her, his long strong hands went to her waist, easing her against his body, making her burningly, bone-crunchingly aware of the hard extent of his arousal.

Feverishly torn between what her mind was telling her and what her body craved, it took some moments before she registered his, ‘I need to get back to Athens within the month. And when I go I will take you with me. As my wife.’ When it did, her mind took over with a vengeance.

Pulling away from him, she squawked, ‘Have you gone crazy? How can you want to marry me? It’s madness. You hardly know me!’ Then her eyes narrowed to scornful slits. ‘Is that the way you usually get into a girl’s knickers? Promise to marry her?’

Shaken by his sudden peal of laughter, she could only splutter as he folded his arms around her and vowed, ‘I knew I wanted you in my body and in my soul the first time I saw you. And if that is crazy, then I like being crazy. Tonight, at dinner, I will ask your father’s permission to court you. And then I will do everything in my power to persuade you to accept me.’

At her shaky accusation, ‘You are mad!’ he lowered his head and kissed her. And all the niggling questions as to why a guy like him, who could pick and choose between the world’s most beautiful women, should earmark her as his future bride disappeared for the next earth-shattering couple of hours.

CHAPTER ONE

HIS face like thunder, Dimitri Kouvaris strode down the first-storey corridor of his sumptuous villa on the outskirts of Athens, hands fisted at his sides, his wide shoulders as rigid as an enraged bull about to charge.

Eleni, the youngest member of his household staff, flattened herself against the wall at his approach, and only expelled her pent-up breath as he shot down the sweeping staircase two treads at a time.

The soles of his handmade shoes ringing against the marble slabs, he crossed the wide hallway and after a cursory rap entered his aunt’s quarters.

‘Did you know about this?’ he demanded on a terse bite, lobbing over the piece of paper crumpled into his fist. And he watched, the gold of his eyes dark with inner fury, as the thin pale fingers of his father’s elder spinster sister smoothed the creases out.

The few words burned like acid into his brain.

Our marriage is over. My solicitor will be in touch regarding our divorce.

Three months and she said it was over! No explanation. Nothing but a note left on the pillow of their opulent marriage bed. How dared she?

‘She dishonours the Kouvaris name!’ he bit out, and the silvery head rose from her prinked-lipped perusal. The sharp black eyes were disdainful as his seventy-year-old aunt dropped the note on the small table at her side and fastidiously wiped her fingers on a silk handkerchief.

‘You dishonoured our family name when you made her your bride,’ Alexandra Kouvaris pronounced, with a profound lack of compassion. ‘A common gold-digger with her eye obviously on a handsome divorce settlement. A high price to pay for an abortive attempt to get an heir, nephew.’ She settled back in her chair with a rustle of black silk and reached for the book she’d been reading, dismissing him. ‘No, I didn’t know she’d gone. I am not in her confidence and I have not pined to be in that position. I suggest you check the contents of your safe to see how much of the jewellery she persuaded you to lavish on her she’s taken with her.’

His mouth flat with distaste, Dimitri swung on his heels and left. He couldn’t verbally flay his aunt for voicing what everyone would be thinking—although he’d had to bite his tongue to stop himself from doing just that. In the mood he was in he’d lash out at anyone who dared to breathe in his presence, he conceded savagely. In scant seconds he was back in the bedroom he’d shared with his bride, dragging open hanging cupboards and drawers, eventually standing, brows clenched, staring out of one of the tall windows that gave a partial view of the distant Acropolis.

She seemed to have left in just the clothes she was wearing, her passport and handbag her only luggage. Not one item of designer clothing or jewellery was missing. Was she, as his aunt had stated, going for the much larger prize? Aiming to reach a divorce settlement of half of his vast wealth, making him a laughing stock?

His strong teeth ground together. Over his dead body! Prick a Greek male’s pride and the wrath of the gods would descend in dire retribution!

Hadn’t he given her everything a woman could possibly want? An enviably beautiful home, unlimited funds, servants to cater to her every whim, great sex. His tight features turned dark with temper as too-vivid memories of the way his pre-marriage largely ignored lunch-breaks had turned into sheer paradise between the sheets with his wife, because the hours before nighttime had always seemed impossible to get through without availing himself of the delights of her luscious, responsive body.

Had her generous response been nothing but an act? His lovemaking something to be endured to keep him sweet and unsuspecting until she sneaked away and petitioned for divorce?

No one did that to Dimitri Kouvaris! No one!

Turning in driven haste, he used his mobile to instruct his senior PA to cancel all meetings for the next three days. He stuffed a few necessities into an overnight bag with his free hand. Then, ending the call, he keyed in the number of the airport and finally, on receiving the information he needed, contacted the pilot of his private jet.

Tears welled in Joan Ryan’s tired eyes as she turned to slide the kettle onto the hotplate of the ancient Aga. That dratted inner shaking had started up again, and over the last twenty-four hours she had drunk enough tea to float a battleship.

Nevertheless, she had to be sympathetic and helpful, put her other problems aside, because no sooner had Joe, her husband—who should by rights be resting, according to doctor’s orders, following his heart scare, not getting himself stressed out—together with their three sons walked out of the door than her son-in-law had walked in. And dropped another whopping bombshell.

Maddie had walked out on their marriage.

Maddie wanted a divorce.

It couldn’t be happening, she thought on a spurt of uncomprehending agitation. She couldn’t for the life of her understand how that marriage had gone so wrong, so quickly. Her daughter had looked radiant with happiness when she’d made her wedding vows in the small parish church just three months ago. She and Joe had been so happy too. Just fancy—their tomboy daughter, who’d never even had a proper boyfriend, marrying such a handsome, wealthy, generous dream of a man. Their adored Maddie stepping ecstatically into an assured future.

And now this!

Dimitri looked strained—as any man would after such a shock, not to mention a headlong dash from Greece and driving up here in a hired car. So a nice cup of tea …

She turned, carried the pot to the big old table, and noted that he had sat himself in Joe’s chair, his finely made yet strong hands clenched on the pitted pine tabletop.

‘I wish I could help,’ Joan mourned, feeling useless. ‘For the life of me, I can’t understand it. She’s never given the smallest hint that anything was wrong in her phone calls. But then, she wouldn’t.’ She dredged up a sigh. ‘That’s Maddie for you. She’s always had a streak of independence a mile wide.’ Hand shaking, she covered the pot with its padded cosy. ‘I’ve heard nothing since her last call a week ago. She hasn’t turned up here.’

With an effort, Dimitri forced his hands to relax, flatten against the grainy surface. Joan Ryan was obviously as much at sea as he was.

Forget the acid burn of anger inside him. Clearly the poor woman was worried sick. He liked Maddie’s parents—admired their capacity for hard work, their honesty, their love for their family. He couldn’t bring himself to tell Joan that her beloved daughter was a sly, scheming gold-digger, marrying him only for what she’d decided she could screw out of him!

He wouldn’t have believed it himself until today. Women had been coming on to him since he’d hit his late teens, and he’d learned to suss out gold-diggers from a hundred paces. He would have staked his life on Maddie being genuine, wanting him only for himself, wanting children as much as he did. Had his brain gone soft that first time he’d seen her, wanted her as he’d never wanted any other woman, his heart and soul telling him that here was the one woman in the world he could trust implicitly?

But what other explanation could there be? Colour scorched across his angular cheekbones. Until today their marriage had been fantastic. Not a cross word, just soft words and smiles. Laughter, joy. She’d been just that little bit quieter of late, he’d noted, and once, when he’d gently asked if there was anything wrong, she’d turned that lovely smile on him, reached for him, and assured him that everything was perfect.

An obvious and utterly devious truth—because everything had been going to her greedy plan. He truly didn’t want to believe that of her—not of her. But, lacking any other explanation, he had to face it.

Joan pulled out a chair, sat heavily, and poured the tea with a shaking hand. Compassion for her distressed state forced him to say, ‘Try not to worry. She’ll turn up. She would have taken a scheduled commercial flight, so it would take her much longer to get to Heathrow and then make her way here than it took me. Where else would she go?’ He’d checked the departure times of flights to the UK, guessing she would be heading for home. ‘Can you think of anywhere else?’

Unable to speak for the lump in her throat, Joan shook her head. The lump assumed monumental proportions as Dimitri supplied reassuringly, ‘She’ll turn up here. I’m sure of it. But should she phone ahead I must ask you not to tell her I’m here. I need to talk to her, to sort things out.’

Carefully, keeping his tone gentle, schooling out the anger, the outraged pride of the Greek male, he covered her workworn hand with his own—because Joan Ryan was a patently good woman, and none of this was her fault. ‘You mustn’t worry.’

Kindness was her undoing. She’d genuinely had no intention of burdening him with her family’s problems—certainly not while he was so upset over Maddie’s desertion. But Joan couldn’t stop the torrent of sobs that racked her comfortable frame, and then her handsome, caring son-in-law fetched the box of tissues from the windowsill, slid it in front of her and put a compassionate hand on her shoulder.

‘What’s wrong, Joan?’ he asked. He’d expected her to be puzzled and upset by her daughter’s behaviour, but not to the extent of breaking down entirely. ‘Tell me. I might be able to help.’

It all came pouring out.

It was late, and as dark as a country night could be. The taxi driver was grumbling under his breath as he negotiated the twisting, narrow, tree-hung lanes. Maddie, leaning forward, had to give him directions.

‘It’s about a mile ahead,’ she told him as he took the left-hand fork she’d just indicated. ‘I’ll tell you when we get there.’ She subsided, stuck with her own thoughts. And they weren’t pleasant company.

The journey from Athens had been a complete nightmare. She wasn’t going to think about her broken marriage—it hurt too much—so she’d think about the trials of her flight to freedom instead. Her departure from Athens had been delayed by a couple of hours. Eventually reaching Heathrow, she’d queued for ages to get her euros changed to sterling, then headed for Euston and sat over a cup of what was supposed to be coffee while she’d waited for a train to Shrewsbury. She had phoned home to say she’d be arriving—probably at midnight at this rate, after the difficulty of finding a driver willing to take her way out to the sticks.

Mum had sounded a bit odd on the phone. Maddie hadn’t told her that her marriage was over—that would have to be done face to face. It would upset her parents; she knew that. They thought she’d made the perfect marriage.

And it could have been so perfect. She’d loved him so very much. Enough to push her doubts as to why he should want to marry so far beneath him out of her mind. Doubts that had trickled slowly but inexorably back on her return to Athens as his bride. Her insides twisted painfully, and she had to stiffen her spine and remind herself that she would not be used. That she would never regret walking out on him, that she would not weep for him.

Did he think she was without pride? Did he think that she was too stupid to discover the truth? That she was too besotted with him, too enthralled by his magnificent body, his lovemaking, the things he could give her, ever to go looking for it?

As the headlights picked out the driveway to the small stone house she rocketed thankfully out of her pointless mental maunderings and stated, with feeling, ‘You can drop me here.’

Tears of weak relief blurred her eyes. Home at long last! To the beginning of a new and independent life. Apart from starting divorce proceedings, she need never allow a single thought centring on Dimitri Kouvaris into her head again.

Stumbling with fatigue, she headed up the short track after paying off the driver, and in the total darkness bumbled into the rear of a car parked beside the two beat-up Land Rovers belonging to her father and brothers.

Muttering, Maddie bent to rub her bruised shins. She registered the slam of a car door, and looked up to find the dark, strangely intimidating figure of Dimitri blocking her path.

‘Get in the car.’

The terse command sent a shiver prickling down her now rigid spine.

Her mind was a chaotic jumble of shock. What did he think he was doing here? Didn’t he understand a simply written statement that their marriage was over? Her throat worked convulsively, and her, ‘I’m not going anywhere with you!’ emerged on strangled, breathless tones that made her cringe at her seeming indecisiveness. She spoke more firmly, with effort. ‘I am going home. Let me pass.’ This because he had pinioned her arms in strong, masterful hands, and his touch still had the power to melt her.

‘Your family have retired for the night,’ he relayed. ‘We have discussed the issue and have agreed that it is best that you go with me to my hotel. We need to talk.’

‘No!’ Maddie bit out in mutiny. ‘There’s nothing to talk about.’

As she knew from painful experience, he could talk her into believing black was white, and despite her staunch intention to put him out of her life she knew that as yet she was too raw and hurt to keep to that resolve if he decided to use his devilish charm to make her change her mind. For his own despicable ends.

‘You can’t make me go anywhere with you,’ she flung in challenge.

‘No?’ Still sounding measured—conversational, almost—he parried, ‘I have been waiting in that car for over half an hour now, and patience is not my strong point. I have never forced any woman to do anything against her will. But—and this I promise—should you refuse, your family will be homeless by the end of the month. You have the power to stop that happening. It is your choice.’

CHAPTER TWO

WITH deep reluctance Maddie approached the passenger door Dimitri was holding open. Even in the darkness there was no mistaking the grim, forbidding cast of his bold features.

She swallowed convulsively. It was the first time she’d been on the receiving end of his displeasure. The first time he’d shown his true colours. The rest—the smiles, the softness, the warmth and indulgence of the past three months—had been nothing but one huge act, she reminded herself firmly.

Feet dragging to a halt as she reached the open car door, she sucked in a deep breath. She wasn’t looking at him now. She could feel his icy rage. It penetrated her layers of clothing, prickled her skin.

‘I’m waiting.’ Then his voice softened. ‘I will take you to your parents first thing in the morning, I give my word. Until then it is best they relax in the belief that we are sorting our own problems out.’

‘Why? They’re not children in need of fairy tales!’

‘I will explain.’ His voice hardened with impatience. ‘But not here.’

The line of Maddie’s mouth grew stubborn. Used to having his every whim catered to immediately, Dimitri Kouvaris didn’t do waiting. Well tough. It was time he learned.

Ignoring him with some difficulty, she managed to get her mind back on track. She had two options. She could stick to her guns—walk on up to the cottage, rouse her parents, and ask them what the hell her soon to be ex-husband was talking about. How could he threaten to make them homeless? He was talking rubbish, surely?

Only he didn’t make idle threats, she acknowledged with an inner shudder. He had a reputation in business for ruthlessness. What he said, he meant, and pity any person who got in his way or tried to pull the wool over his eyes. She had never seen that side of him before, but it had been there, hadn’t it? Cleverly hidden, but there, in a marriage that had had one purpose only. To get an heir. That cold ruthlessness was out in the open now, she recognised, and resignedly plumped for the second option.

Her chin defiantly angled, Maddie slid into the passenger seat, her heart jolting as the door at her side closed with force. If there was the slightest chance that he could carry through with that threat then she owed it to her parents to fall in with his wishes.

For now. Only for now, she promised herself.

The drive to the nearby small market town was accomplished in tight silence. Unlike her journey with the taxi driver, Maddie had no need to give Dimitri directions through the tangle of narrow lanes. The Greek drove and navigated as he did everything else—exceptionally well—and he would have exact recall of the tortuous route between her home and the hotel he’d been using just over three months ago, when he’d embarked on his sneaky campaign to persuade her to marry him.

Unwilling to give headroom to the thought of how absurdly gullible and bird-brained she’d been back then, Maddie clamped her teeth together until her jaw ached, and made herself think of the present.

It was blistering her mind. His totally unexpected presence. His weird threats. If she, loving him with a depth that had shaken her, could take the sensible course, end their marriage and walk away then why couldn’t he? It would be so much easier for him, given that he had never loved her in the first place, had seen her only as a walking, fertile womb.

Her smooth brow furrowed as she tried to find an answer. She had genuinely believed that, knowing her decision to end their marriage, he would have shrugged those impressive shoulders and consigned her to history. A swift divorce—made simpler because of her firm intention not to ask for any financial settlement—followed smartly by a marriage to another such as she—a gullible little nobody from an ordinary, fairly simple but prolific family. The sort who wouldn’t know how to stand her ground against the mighty Kouvaris empire when she found herself in the divorce courts, her child given into his custody.

Her face flamed with a mixture of outraged pride and humiliation. She should have cottoned on—at least suspected his motives all those months ago. It had been there right under her nose if only her starstruck eyes had been able to see. His questions, which had given him the information that she came from undeniably fecund stock. Their—what had his snooty aunt called it?—their hole-and-corner wedding. And the lack of anything as romantic as a honeymoon. Not that she’d minded that. She had assured him that she understood perfectly when he’d pleaded that pressure of work meant he had to be in Athens, soppily saying that where he was was where she wanted to be. She’d been too blinded by love to read anything into any of it.

Her hands clenched, her fingernails cutting into her palms. Looking back, she just didn’t believe herself! How could she have thought, for one insane moment, that a man as knock-'em-dead gorgeous, charismatic, sophisticated, rotten rich and frighteningly clever would want to tie himself for life to an ordinary-looking, low-status nobody like her?

As he brought the car to a halt in front of the small town’s only hotel Maddie made herself a set-in-concrete promise. If her devious husband tried to make her change her mind, because he’d decided he didn’t want the delay of even a quickie divorce and then the tiresome chore of hunting down another sucker, with the tedious expenditure of all that seemingly effortless charm to get her to marry him, and had decided he’d be better off sticking to the brood mare he’d got—which, thinking about it, was the only motive possible for him being here at all—then she would resist all his attempts to her very last breath!

With scarcely controlled impatience Dimitri fisted the ignition key and exited the car, reaching the passenger side in a handful of power-driven strides.

He wrenched the car door open and ordered, ‘Come.’ He had to use every last ounce of self-control to stop himself from hauling her to her feet. In the space of twenty-four hours his wife had changed from a voluptuous, adoring wanton to an ice-cold stranger. And he didn’t know why—although he had strong and utterly distasteful suspicions. It was driving him insane. And no one, not even his wife, would be allowed to do that!

As if she sensed the stirrings of his volcanic anger, Maddie moved. Slowly swinging her feet to the ground, she exited the car and stood, facing the timber-framed façade of the hotel. The light from above the main entrance illuminated her. She was wearing jeans and a lightweight jacket, a leather bag clutched in one small hand, a mutinous twist to her mouth.

Dimitri cupped an unforgiving hand beneath her elbow and headed to the main door. If he bent his head he could tease the mutiny away, feel those lush lips tremble beneath his own, flower for him. The gateway to paradise. She liked sex, more than met his demands. But no way would he oblige—now, or in the foreseeable future. That would be part of her punishment!

No, the sex hadn’t been feigned. Everything else in their marriage had been, though. Starting with her wedding vows, uttered with her eye on the main chance. He was ninety per cent sure of it. Three months of her life in exchange for a settlement that would keep her in luxury for the rest of her days. Logically, it was the only scenario that remotely fitted in with what she had done—and, heaven knew, he’d racked his brain to try and find another, coming up with a big fat zero.

She would not do that to him!

He removed his hand from her arm as if even that connection was poisonous.

Maddie shivered as the heavy main door swung closed behind them and he strode away from her. She hadn’t wanted this confrontation; it had been forced on her. No wonder her nerves were going haywire, adrenalin pumping through her veins. He was rigid with anger, she recognised. And she could understand it.

He was a busy man, a driven man. Amanda had told her, in one of her long, chatty phone calls after Maddie had returned to England that first time, that Dimitri Kouvaris had pumped her for information. About her, about her family. Stupidly, the knowledge had excited her, made her feel almost special. How he would hate the waste of his time. Not that it had taken much of that, she recalled with a sickening lurch of her tummy. Five days later, after having gathered the necessary information from her unsuspecting friend, he had charmed her into a state of besotted adoration with very little effort.

No, he would view the three months of their marriage as an unforgivable waste of his time and effort. And it would have taken an effort on his part to treat a peasant as if she were a princess, she decided with a resurgent cynicism. As for the other—the sex—trying to get her pregnant at every opportunity with no result, while thinking of the time when he could get rid of the wife he didn’t love and marry the woman he did love, must have infuriated him.

He’d hidden it well. She had to give him that.

But now it was showing.

Thing was, was she brave enough to handle it? Discover what he meant by those threats? And the answer was, she had to be.

At this late hour the hotel foyer was deserted, the lights low, adding another layer of atmosphere to the heavy exposed beams and oak panelling of what had once been a coaching inn. The night porter had emerged from his cubby-hole behind Reception and was handing Dimitri a key. A few inaudible words were exchanged, and then he swung round on his heels and faced her, his stance disdainful, coated in ice.

Sucking in her breath, she obeyed his curtly expressive hand gesture and made herself move towards him, her head high. True, she wasn’t here of her own free will—but she’d be damned if she was going to let herself down and act like a victim.

‘We can talk in the lounge.’ Her voice as firm as she could make it, Maddie gestured towards a partly open door. The steel grille was lowered over the bar, but there were comfy lounge chairs grouped around the tables, and the light from the foyer gave sufficient illumination.

Totally ignoring that sensible suggestion, just as if she’d never spoken, Dimitri started up the uncarpeted broad oak staircase, and Maddie, biting back a howl of fury, followed.

Arrogant low-life!

Still seething, Maddie caught up with him as he opened a door and reached in to switch on a light.

‘In.’

Her stomach clenched painfully. This icily intimidating side of him was alien to her. But she was going to have to get used to it—at least for as long as it took him to spell out what had to be, surely, his groundless threats.

Slightly comforted by that slice of common sense, Maddie stepped into a room that looked as if it hadn’t had a makeover since the sixteenth century. And all the better for it, she approved, making an inventory of the jewel-coloured rugs laid over wide, highly polished oak boards, the ornately carved four poster bed and linen press, the tapestry-like curtains. It took her weary mind off being here with the husband she had loved to distraction and now hated with a vehemence that made her bones tremble.

An overnight bag stood at the foot of the bed. So he must have checked in here before driving out to her parents’ home. To wait. Somehow he had known that she must contact her folks on her arrival back in the UK, stay with them or in the vicinity until the divorce came through, she deduced tiredly—though the reason for his precipitate actions escaped her. And how had he arrived ahead of her?

She would have already been waiting for her delayed flight when he’d returned at lunchtime, making for the bedroom as usual and more of the sex he was so good at—the hoped for end result his son and heir—and finding her note instead.

And yet he had been ahead of her, waiting for her. His private jet—of course! Why hadn’t she remembered that? Because she’d never rated the outward signs of his financial clout, only the man himself. The super-wealthy had the means for getting things done that humble peasants could only dream of, she decided with resignation, as a firm hand in the small of her back propelled her towards two wing chairs at opposite ends of a low, dark oak table.

She sat, was grateful to. She couldn’t remember ever feeling this weary and drained in her life before. Dimitri was hovering over her, his hands in the trouser pockets of his superbly tailored pale grey suit, the fabric pulled taut against his pelvis.

Smothering a groan as a hatefully familiar, ultra-responsive frisson lurched through her entire body at his sexy magnetism, Maddie closed her eyes to shut him out. She didn’t need that kind of betrayal from her own body—not now, not ever again. All she needed right now was the healing oblivion of sleep.

And if he was waiting for her to ask him to explain himself, to instigate some kind of conversation, then he could wait. This—whatever it was—was his idea, most certainly not hers.

She heard the discreet knock at the door, sensed him move and opened her eyes reluctantly in time to see the night porter place a tray on the table. Something changed hands—a tip, presumably—and Dimitri sat in the chair opposite, surveying her with golden eyes lacking in expression over a lavish platter of sandwiches, a wine bottle and glasses.

Her lungs aching with the effort to hold back a hysterical peal of laughter, Maddie gripped the arms of her chair to keep herself grounded. An outraged husband about to read the Riot Act and explain vile threats to his runaway wife and the first thing he thinks about is his stomach! The situation was farcical!

But there was nothing off-the-wall about his containment as he poured wine into two glasses and slid two sandwiches onto a delicate china plate and put it in front of her. There was even a hint of a smile on that devastatingly handsome mouth as he imparted, ‘If, like me, you haven’t eaten since breakfast, you’ll need this.’

‘Not hungry.’ Maddie eyed the food with disdain, her stomach rolling sickly as she experienced total recall of precisely why she hadn’t been able to face breakfast, or the thought of food since then.

As usual, he had risen first, full of vitality, leaving her to come awake more slowly, stretching luxuriously in the rumpled bed, sated with the passion of the night before. She had pushed away the uncomfortable thought that their time in bed together was the only time she was truly happy. The rest of the time everything conspired to make her feel purposeless, a thing of little use, an unsavoury intruder into a rarefied atmosphere.

She had followed him down, a silk robe covering the naked voluptuous body he always seemed so wild for—gratifyingly belying the snide rumours and wicked lies she’d been fed just lately—expecting to share a pot of coffee with him before he left for his high-tech head office in the city, as she always did. She’d needed her Dimitri fix to carry her through the morning before they enjoyed a long and intimate lunch-break together.

Slipping silently into the sunny room where the first meal of the day was taken, her eyes had gone soppy at the sight of that tall, commanding figure, dressed that morning in pale grey trousers that hugged his narrow hips and skimmed the elegant length of his strongly muscled legs, his white shirt spanning wide shoulders, his suit jacket draped over the back of one of the dining chairs.

His broad back to her, he had been speaking into his cellphone. He hadn’t seen her—as the contents of a conversation that was to turn her life upside down soon evidenced.

‘Be calm, Irini,’ he had soothed. ‘We discussed this. It will take time. Please be patient.’ A short silence from him, then, decisively, ‘I will be with you in less than five minutes, and of course I love you. You are—’ Another silence while he had listened to what was being said, then, his voice full of soft emotion, ‘Be calm, sweetheart. Five minutes.’

Heart pounding, blue eyes stunned, she’d watched him snatch up his suit jacket and stride out through the open French windows, heading for the woman he did love, leaving the woman who was just a commodity clutching the doorframe for support, the lies turned into truth, the rumours into hard, hateful, hurtful fact. The last straw.

At least he hadn’t lied. He had never said he loved her, had he?

Now, Dimitri helped himself from the platter, golden eyes assessing beneath the thick dark sweep of his lashes. She was pale, her skin ashen beneath the light golden tan, the band of freckles across her nose standing out starkly. He had always found those freckles endearing—those and the caramel curls now delightfully tamed by the best hairdresser in Athens. The fierce, rapacious need for her wildly sensuous body, his need to soften the raging heat of lust into something infinitely more tender, more fulfilling, made him furious with his body for responding to his thoughts. Blisteringly angry with her for what she had seemingly proved herself to be, he said, with more force than necessary, ‘Eat before you pass out.’

Never one to respond positively to anything smacking of bossiness or bullying, Maddie flattened her mouth stubbornly. She crossed her arms over the breasts he had once said he worshipped, and clipped out at him, ‘I didn’t come here to eat with you. I came because you made threats against my parents and I demand to know how you think you can threaten them.’

‘So, she finally speaks.’ Dimitri was lounging back now, holding a wine glass in one beautifully crafted hand. His voice was smooth as silk he told her, ‘No one makes demands of me—not even my wife. Understand that and you’ll be a wiser woman.’

With an effort he kept his cool. She had never asked for anything—had made no demands. Hadn’t needed to. He’d given her everything, and gladly. High status, an assured position in Greek society, wealth beyond avarice, jewels—and she’d thrown the lot back in his face.

His heart thumped with the outraged anger of savaged pride. Because she wanted even more. The sort of divorce settlement that would keep her in luxury for the rest of her life without the burden of having a husband. Until she came up with another plausible reason for leaving him, it was the only motive that made any sense.

He was taunting her, Maddie deduced with mounting horror, her skin crawling with the onset of panic. No doubt he would tell her what he’d meant by that threat in his own good time.

But she didn’t have time, she thought wildly. Draining tiredness, the beginnings of a thumping headache and the awful emotional trauma of the day meant that any minute now she would break down, scream and throw things, or dissolve in floods of helpless tears, betraying how desperately unhappy his betrayal and cynical manipulation of her had made her. She wouldn’t be able to prevent it happening if she had to suffer this unwanted confrontation, this not knowing, for much longer.

Dimitri set his glass down with an irate click. The gold of his eyes frosted. Time she learned she couldn’t make him look a fool, shame and dishonour him. Time she knew who called the shots.

‘You are my wife. There will be no divorce. You will return with me to Greece. If the marriage ends at some time in the future, as seems likely, then I will be the one to end it. I demand that much. I will not be made to look a fool in front of my friends and colleagues.’

Because she hadn’t given him an heir, Maddie translated, chilled to the bone by his harshly decisive delivery. Hanging on to her rapidly fleeing composure, she managed, ‘You can’t stop me suing for divorce. Or make me go anywhere I don’t want to be.’

Fully expecting a blistering statement of the opposite—because the rich and the powerful had ways of getting everything they wanted—she was speechless when he gave a slight shrug of his magnificent shoulders and uttered blandly, ‘True.’

With one hand he loosened his tie and settled back in his seat, graceful in his relaxation. He was more gorgeous than any man had a right to be, she decided in utter misery—then gave herself a sharp mental kick. The days of her overwhelming love for him were over. He was no longer the light of her life, and she no longer felt herself melting inside when she looked at him.

‘But?’ she all but snapped at him. It wasn’t in the nature of the beast to simply cave in. There had to be a ‘but'.

There was.

‘But, if you follow that road be sure that your parents will be homeless by the end of the month. It’s in my power to prevent that happening. I will do so—but only if you agree to everything I ask of you. And if you think that you can divorce me, claim a large settlement and help your parents financially, live the high-life, forget it. Any lawyer I employ will make sure you receive absolutely nothing.’

CHAPTER THREE

APPALLED by that implied insult, Maddie could only stare at him, feeling her face redden. It showed how little he thought of her! Was proof—if she had needed any after what she’d been told—that outside the bedroom he viewed her with contempt, a necessary evil.

She fisted her hands in her lap—a labourer’s hands: short nails, slightly callused palms, as his aunt had commented with acid—and took a long breath. She wasn’t interested in his insults. He couldn’t hurt her more than he already had done, and she certainly wouldn’t lower herself by telling him she’d had no intention of asking him for anything except her freedom because he wouldn’t believe her. Why waste her breath when there were more important questions to ask?

The eyes she at last dragged from the cynical gold of his fell on her untouched wine glass. With the distinct feeling that there was worse to come, she reached forward, swept it up and swallowed a long draught. The rush of alcohol into her bloodstream helped her to challenge him, ‘I don’t believe you. Prove it. Why should my parents lose their home? Why don’t we go back right now and ask them?’

‘At this hour?’ Dimitri drawled, as if hearing words from a total idiot, and leaned forward to remove the half-empty wine glass from fingers that threatened to shatter the delicate stem. He set the glass down on the table and edged the plate of untouched sandwiches further in her direction. ‘They are sleeping, happy in the knowledge that we will have kissed and made up after our lovers’ tiff and, almost as importantly, that I will help them out of their present difficulties. They have a load off their mind—isn’t that how you English would put it?’

Torn between outrage that he should have made light of her precipitate flight back to England and the need to know what the so-called difficulties were, she chose the latter as being far more pertinent.

‘What difficulties?’ she got out, regretting the urgent note in her voice, but wanting to get it out into the open and get out of here. Away from the man she could no longer stand being near to. ‘Tell me!’ she pressed, with fuming vehemence, because he seemed to be intent on keeping his mouth shut and his ace up his sleeve, and was looking at her as if she were an object of mild scientific interest.

Dimitri blinked once, then twice. What was that old-hat come-on? You look magnificent when you’re angry! In this case it was spot-on! However …

Seething with sheer frustration, Maddie watched him tilt his arrogant head, veil his brilliant golden eyes and steeple his fingers as he recited, in a tone so matter-of-fact it made her blood steam in her veins, ‘Your father has reached retirement age. The company he works for has terminated his employment, and with it his tenure of the cottage. The accommodation is required by the groundsman who is to take his place, apparently.’

‘They told you this?’ Maddie asked thinly.

She felt sick. It could be so true. Six years ago old Sir Joseph had sold the Hall and its estate to a business consortium who had turned it into an upmarket conference centre, complete with a golf course, indoor swimming pool and sauna, clay pigeon range and access to excellent trout fishing. Her dad hadn’t liked the new regime. Had missed Sir Joseph and the relaxed chats they’d enjoyed over a whisky and a pipe apiece as they discussed estate matters in the cluttered estate office. On one of the last of those occasions the elderly man had confessed that it was time he moved on. He didn’t want to, that went without saying. But he couldn’t keep up with overheads, he wasn’t getting any younger, and he had no family to take over. Miserable situation, but there it was.

But a job was a job, as Dad had said, and the cottage was their family home—and hadn’t Sir Joseph promised that it would be theirs for as long as they wanted it?

However, that wouldn’t sway the hard-nosed businessmen who ran the estate now. Concessions for loyalty, long service, personal liking and respect wouldn’t come into it. None of them would have heard the words ‘old retainer', and if they had they would have dismissed them as being laughably archaic. Suddenly the threat of seeing her parents homeless didn’t seem empty at all.

‘Initially your mother told me,’ Dimitri verified. ‘When I arrived at your home she was obviously upset. I assumed it was because you’d been in touch and told her you were ending our marriage.’ He levelled an incisive look at her, the planes of his darkly handsome face hard and unforgiving. ‘But that was not so. When I dealt her that second blow of bad news she broke down and wept.’

Maddie’s heart twisted. Anguish leapt to her throat and choked her. Both her parents thought Dimitri Kouvaris was the cat’s whiskers. Charming, considerate, super-wealthy, a miracle of perfection—the type of husband they could only have dreamed of for their lovable but unsophisticated tomboy of a daughter. Of course Joan Ryan would have been devastated by his news. But if she’d been able to get her side of the story in first her mother’s dismay at the marriage breakdown wouldn’t have been so absolute. She would have been disappointed that the dream husband had shown himself to be a cynical, manipulating, cruel brute, but she would have been on her side all the way.

‘So you arrived, unasked and unwanted, and put the boot in!’ Maddie derided at volume, hating him for causing her mother even more distress. She half heaved herself out of the chair, her only thought to get back to her parents and tell the dark story of why Dimitri had really married a no-account nobody like her. She would do everything she could to help them move, find somewhere else to live, fight the men in suits. Surely there must be a law against that sort of heartless treatment?

‘Sit down.’ A warning ran like steel through his voice. ‘If any boot, as you so oddly put it, was used, then it was your foot wearing it. Remember that.’

Subsiding with ill grace, blue eyes simmering with mutiny, Maddie pointed out, ‘OK, so you’ve told me why my folks will be thrown out of their home. But that doesn’t change anything. You can’t do anything about it—’

‘True,’ he cut across her, smooth as silk. ‘I cannot stop them losing the cottage. When the consortium took over your father was required to sign a contract of employment. I saw the document, and I read the small print—which your father failed to do. According to him, he was so pleased to be kept on he signed without reading it. It is watertight. However, if you cast your mind back and think clearly, instead of exploding every two seconds, you will recall that I said I could prevent them being without a home of their own provided you fall in with my wishes.’

She hadn’t forgotten—how could she? But, really stupidly, she’d hoped he had. And now she had to sit here and listen—force herself to forget how once she’d loved him and how he’d used that love to blind her to what was in his handsome, cruel head. Difficult to do when faced with all that lean, taut, utterly devastating masculinity, the blisteringly hot memories of how it had once been between them.

She shifted uncomfortably as a responsive quiver arrowed down her spine and lodged heatedly in the most private part of her body. Her face flamed at the uncomfortable knowledge that she still wanted him physically, even as her head and heart hated him.

Mistaking that fiery colour for the precursor of yet another mutinous outburst, Dimitri put in, smooth as polished marble, ‘Your parents and brothers have made tentative plans of their own. Not having the wherewithal to buy a property, nor sufficient income as things stand to rent one, Sam and Ben aim to find cheap lodgings. Your parents plan to move into Adam and Anne’s spare room while they wait for the council to offer them accommodation—not the most promising situation, I think you’ll agree?’

Maddie stayed mute. It was a wretched situation. Her parents had no savings. Any spare cash they’d had had been used to help their children. No matter how her eldest brother and her sister-in-law welcomed them into their small home, things would get tricky. Adam’s young family was growing, and space was at a premium and, used to being Queen Bee in her own home, her mother would begin to feel in the way—past her sell-by date. Her parents, bless them, deserved better than that. But she wouldn’t give Dimitri the satisfaction of agreeing with him. On anything. Ever again.

Dimitri frowned, slashing dark brows clenching above shimmering golden eyes. Her body language was sheer stubborn mutiny. He would change that. His wife would once again become compliant. It was she who had drawn up the battle lines, and no Greek male could fail to rise to the challenge, meet it and overcome it. Utterly.

Time to deliver his knock-out blow, he decided, harshly ignoring the sharp stab of regret for what they’d once had. Or what he’d thought they had, came the cynical reminder.

‘When I arrived, your brothers were out, trying to persuade the farmer they rent their piece of land from to agree to rent out the adjoining field and so allow your brothers to produce more and become more profitable.’ His tone showed his aggravation as he demanded, ‘Are you listening?’

Maddie shrugged, she didn’t care if she infuriated him. He deserved it. She was ahead of him in any case. Sam and Ben had often said they needed more land under cultivation. Their organic produce was always in demand. They could sell it twice over easily. But for that they needed more land, another bigger greenhouse, more hours in the day. With Dad out of work it would make sense to expand and let him in as a partner.

Inwardly seething, Dimitri battened down the imperative to shake her until her pretty white teeth rattled—or, more productively, to kiss her senseless until she was clinging, hanging wide-eyed on his every word.

Better yet, and less hurtful to his pride, would be to render the coup de grace. Subdue, once and for all the stubborn streak he had never suspected she had.

So his voice bordered on the purr of a jungle cat with its prey within its grasp as he imparted, ‘They returned, their plans in ashes. The said farmer had stated that he was selling up. Even renting the piece of land they are currently working might prove to be a problem with a new owner. They could either buy the lot—farmhouse included—or nothing.’ He paused a moment to let that further piece of bad news sink in. Then, ‘The idea I put to your parents and brothers was this. That I buy the farm and they live there and work the land, expand their business.’ He allowed himself a small smile. ‘To say that they approved the scheme is an understatement. To counter the general non-stop outpourings of gratitude I explained that as they are now part of my family by marriage it is my duty and pleasure to do all I can to help them. Of course,’ he completed, in a tone so honey-sweet it set her teeth on edge, ‘the whole thing is contingent on your remaining my wife until I, and only I, decide otherwise. Ensuring that I continue to regard your family as my family, my responsibility.’

Her voice faint, Maddie managed, ‘That’s blackmail! I don’t want to be married to you. You know I don’t!’

‘Take it or leave it. Your choice.’

In emotional turmoil Maddie shot to her feet, her fingertips flying to her temples. She couldn’t think straight. Her imagination was working overtime as she pictured her family’s relief. Even now her mother would be dreaming of furnishing and decorating the farmhouse, of welcoming her menfolk home from the fields with her famous steak and kidney pie!

Her mouth worked with the onset of hysteria, and the edifice of her earlier determination to cut him out of her life crumbled utterly when he rose with languid grace and came to stand in front of her, his voice cool to the point of uninterest as he asked, ‘Your choice?’ And then, his voice roughening, as if he was uncomfortable with what he had to tell her, he stated, ‘And to help you make that choice I’m afraid I have to tell you that less than a week ago your father was taken into hospital with a suspected heart attack.’

He saw her rock on her feet, saw the little colour she had in her face drain away and could have hit himself. Placing his hands lightly on her shoulders, he apologised gently, ‘I’m sorry. I could have come at it in a gentler way. The good news is that it was very minor—a warning, and no damage done. Provided he takes his medication and avoids stressful situations all will be well. Your mother told me she was in the process of writing to you to put you in the picture without alarming you unduly.’

This close, she could feel the enervating potency of his lean, hard masculinity, the power of him. That, plus the news of her father’s illness, shattered her into honesty, her voice cracking as she cried, ‘What choice? I’m between a rock and a hard place!’

‘You put yourself there,’ he reminded her flatly. ‘It’s make-your-mind-up time. Return to Greece with me, as my wife, or deny your family the opportunity to make a new life for themselves.’ He thrust his hands into his trouser pockets and drawled, ‘Tough, isn’t it? Turn your back on your hopes of a massive divorce settlement, or—’

‘You can be so stupid!’ she blistered, stung again by his insulting suggestion that she only wanted rid of him because of what she could get out of him. She could put him straight on that score, but the truth would gain her nothing and lose her the only thing she had left. Her pride. And, what option did she really have, especially now that the sneaky wretch had raised her parents’ hopes to stratospheric heights? How could she face them with the news that her soon-to-be-ex-husband had withdrawn his generous offer? And heap a bucketload of stress on her father? She couldn’t do that to them. Deliberately closing her mind to what she was letting herself in for, she gritted, ‘OK—have it your way! And you can keep your obscene fortune intact! Satisfied?’

Not waiting for his response, and hating him for having the upper hand, she turned on her heels, snatched up her bag, headed for the door and said, as coolly as her frustration would allow, ‘Take me home. I’ve got my own key. I can let myself in without disturbing them.’

‘You have the regrettable tendency to behave like someone who has had her brain surgically removed—did you know that?’ Dimitri enquired silkily, narrowing the distance she had put between them. ‘As we have kissed and made up, as far as your parents are concerned, it would look very odd if we did not spend the night together, don’t you think?’

Chagrin made her clamp her teeth together. He was right. Give her family one inkling that her husband was blackmailing her and they would close ranks, refuse to accept the lifeline he was offering. And how would that affect Dad’s health?

It didn’t bear thinking about. Her whole system shuddering with reaction, she suffered the indignity of having him remove her jacket, the nerve-racking way those golden eyes drifted over her upper body, where her T-shirt clung to her generous curves, and would have moved smartly away if her legs had had any strength left, and didn’t feel and behave as if they were made of wet cotton wool.

‘It’s been a long day,’ he remarked, as casually as if they were an old married couple, perfectly in tune with each other. ‘I suggest we turn in. In the morning we will break the good news of our reconciliation to your family, and I will make that farmer an offer he can’t refuse.’

He turned away then, a man completely and aggravatingly in control, removing his tie as he reached for his overnight bag, magnanimously offering, ‘Use the bathroom first.’

Scooping up her own bag, Maddie scuttled for the en suite bathroom and closed the door firmly behind her, regretting the lack of a lock.

It was small, nothing like the luxury she was used to—a huge marbled and mirrored space, an elegant shower room and a spa bath big enough to swim in, surrounded by potted plants with shiny green leaves and glass shelves holding luxurious toiletries—but it was sanctuary.

Her emotions all over the place, she stood for a while, her breathing shallow and fast as she reflected that she’d been right. He’d decided that he might as well get an heir with the wife he did have rather than waste time finding another! And his macho Greek pride came into it, too. Of course it did. He would end the marriage when it suited him. Anything else would be unthinkable.

Battening down hysteria, she informed herself that she held the trump card. As long as she didn’t get pregnant—and she’d make sure he never laid a hand on her again—his hateful plans would take a nosedive. Ignoring her past susceptibility where he was concerned, she felt comforted by the control she had in her hands, and opted for a soothing wallow in the bath rather than the quick shower the lateness of the hour dictated.

She stayed in the water until it began to cool. She had hoped it would soothe her, but it couldn’t. The knot of pain inside her intensified until she felt she would die of it. She had loved him so, and now that love had turned to acid, burning her insides. As she heard Dimitri tapping on the door, calling her name, another thought hit her like a falling brick wall, and she jerked upright in sick horror. He had mentioned caring for her family only as long as they were his family through marriage.

Refuse to give him an heir and he would cut his losses and end their marriage.

Give him an heir and still he would divorce her, take her child from her, no doubt using top lawyers and low-down lies to prove to a court that she was an unfit mother.

What price his so-called duty of care then? Her parents and brothers would be out of his property at the speed of light.

She was in a no-win situation. She caught her lower lip between her teeth to stop herself screaming and the door crashed open, to reveal six foot plus of Greek male magnificence, clad only in boxer shorts, and glowering like thunder.

Two paces brought him looming over her as he got out through clenched jaws, ‘Why didn’t you answer? I thought you might have passed out, hurt yourself! Instead—’ Throwing her a look of utter disdain now, he plucked a towel from the heated rail and tossed it to her. ‘Cover yourself,’ he said, reminding her, to her shame and confusion, that she was stark naked, rivulets of water coursing down her too generous figure. ‘If I want what still appears to be on offer, I will take it. But don’t hold your breath.’

Humiliated beyond bearing, fingers fumbling, Maddie wrapped herself clumsily in the towel, clambering out of the bath patronisingly aided by one large strong hand around her upper arm.

She shook his supportive hand away as soon as her feet hit the bath mat. He thought she’d planned this. Remembering how in the past she had always responded to her adored and beautiful husband’s sexual overtures with greedy, hedonistic delight he would think that!

Would think she had decided she might as well enjoy that side of marriage if it would help her towards a large chunk of alimony.

A gold-digger and a harlot!

Smothering a yelp of distress, she darted into the bedroom and stared at the room that had become her prison with wild blue eyes. Impossible to swallow her pride and tell him why she had really left him. Show him the open wounds of the love he had savagely killed, reveal herself to be a victim, still bleeding from his cruel betrayal. Everything in her rebelled against it.

Let him think she wanted a large part of his fortune if he wanted to. But let him think she still wanted him sexually? No way!

In next to no time she had whipped the patchwork quilt off the bed, leaving him with the duvet, snatched one of the pillows and curled herself into a ball on the floor, a bundle of misery as she contemplated a future that looked bleak from every angle. She was fighting tears as she heard him give a low, derisive laugh when he exited the bathroom and encountered her sleeping arrangements, heard the dip of the mattress as he availed himself of the comfortable bed.

And, on a surge of rage, she wanted to go and hit him!

Silence.

A thick silence that expanded suffocatingly as the floor beneath grew harder and sleep was impossible to find.

Unable to handle the fact that he should be sleeping the sleep of a man who had got his own way, while his subjugated commodity of a wife lay on the floor like a pet dog, she shot at him, ‘Tell me why you would go to so much trouble and expense to keep a wife who only wants rid of you! It doesn’t make sense!’

To her it did. Perfect sense from his point of view. But she wanted to force the truth out of him. All she got was a drowsy but blood chilling, ‘You are my wife. You will stay my wife until I decide otherwise. There is nothing more to be said on the subject.’