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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.’