Kitabı oku: «At The Greek Tycoon's Bidding»
At the Greek Tycoon’s Bidding
Cathy Williams
MILLS & BOON
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Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
COMING NEXT MONTH
CHAPTER ONE
THEO was in the middle of reading a financial report when he heard the crash. The sound catapulted through the empty corridors of the office with ear-splitting intensity. Any other person would have reacted in shock, and probably fear. After all, it was late, and even with security guards there was no building in London that could be termed fully safe from someone determined to break and enter. Not Theo Miquel. Without bothering to arm himself with the prerequisite heavy object, dark brows knitted into an impatient frown at being interrupted, he strode out of his plush designer office, activating the switch that flooded the darkness outside with brilliant fluorescent light.
Theo Miquel was not a man to run scared of anything, least of all a would-be intruder who was clumsy enough to signal his arrival by crashing into something.
It didn’t take long for him to pinpoint the origin of the interruption, for sprawled in the corridor was a trolley, the contents of which were scattered across the marble-tiled floor. Cleaning fluids, broom, mop—and a bucket of water which was slowly spreading along the tiles towards the carpeted offices on either side.
As his eyes took in the chaotic sight he heard the clamour of feet pounding up the stairs, and then the security guard was there, out of breath and bristling with apologies. They converged at the scene of the crime at roughly the same time, although it was Theo who was the first to kneel next to the inert body of the girl who had collapsed on the floor.
‘So sorry, sir,’ Sid stammered, watching as Theo felt for a pulse. ‘I came as fast as I could—as soon as I heard the noise. I can take over from here, sir.’
‘Get this stuff cleared away.’
‘Of course, sir. I’m very sorry…She looked a little pale when she came in this evening, but I had no idea…’
‘Stop babbling and tidy this mess up,’ Theo commanded sharply.
He barely registered the flustered guard squeezing dry the mop and soaking up the spilt water before it could intrude into the expensive offices and wreak yet more havoc.
At least the girl hadn’t been inconsiderate enough to die on his premises. There was a pulse, and she might be as pale as hell but she was breathing. She had fainted—probably pregnant. A symptom of the times. Controlling his irritation, he scooped her up, oblivious to the frantic worry pasted on the security guard’s face. He was dimly aware that his employees, whatever their rank, treated him with a certain amount of subservience. He was unaware that this subservience teetered precariously on the brink of downright fear, so he was vastly exasperated when he glanced across to find Sid virtually wringing his hands.
‘I can take care of her, sir…No need for you to get involved…Not a problem…’
‘Just make sure this place is cleaned up and then you can return to duty. If I need you, I’ll call.’
This was an interruption he could well have done without. It was Friday. It was after nine in the night and there was still half a report to get through if he was to e-mail the corrected copy to his counterpart on the other side of the world before their high-level meeting the following Monday.
He kicked open the door to his office and deposited the now stirring body on the long burgundy sofa which occupied one entire wall of the large room. He had not had a hand in designing the décor of his office. If he had, he would probably have chosen the barest of furnishings—after all, an office was a place to work and not a cosy sitting room in which to luxuriate—but he had found over the years, and to his surprise, that the grand, heavy opulence of the room was strangely conducive to concentration. The oak-panelled walls would have been more at home in a gentleman’s club, but there was still something warm about them, filled as they were with books on finance, economics and naturally the accounts of the vast shipping empire that was the very basis of his huge inherited wealth. His desk, fashioned in a time before computers, lacked the convenient set-up to accommodate modems and fax machines and all the various appendages of twenty-first-century living, but it was pleasing to look at and did its job. The windows were floor to ceiling, and lacked the smoked glass effect of the taller, more modern offices all around, but they were charming. In the crazy rush of the city his offices, housed in a grand Victorian house, were a touch of old-world sanity.
It was more than he was currently feeling as he stared down at the girl, whose eyelids were beginning to flutter as consciousness crawled back.
She was solidly built beneath the blue and white striped overalls which covered a choice of clothing Theo would have found offensive on any woman. A thick cardigan of some indiscriminate brown colour and jeans that were frayed at the hems, their only merit being that they partially concealed heavy-duty shoes that would have been more suitable for a man working on a building site than a woman.
He waited, standing over her, arms folded, his body language informing her in no uncertain terms that, while he might have rescued her, he wasn’t about to allow the act of charity to overstay its limited welcome.
And while he waited, impatience mounting, his eyes roved over her face, taking in the short, straight nose, the wide mouth, and eyebrows that were surprisingly defined and at odds with the pale curly hair that had escaped its restraints.
As her eyes fluttered open he could only assume that he had been taken by surprise, because for a few seconds a confusing surge of awareness rushed through him. She had amazing eyes. The purest and deepest of blues. Then she blinked, disoriented, and the moment was lost as reality took over. The reality of his work being interrupted when time was not on his side.
‘It would appear that you fainted,’ Theo informed her as she struggled into a sitting position.
Heather gazed up at the man staring down at her and felt her throat tighten. For the past six months she had worked in his offices, coming in at six-thirty when she could begin cleaning, after the bulk of the employees had left. From a distance, she had watched him out of the corner of her eye, watched as he worked behind his desk, his door flung open—although she knew, from snatches of conversation she had overheard over the months, that very few would risk popping in for a light chat. She had felt herself thrill to the tones of his dark, deep voice when he happened to talk to one of his employees. He intimidated everyone, but as far as she was concerned he was the most beautiful man she had ever laid eyes on.
The lines of his face were strong—harsh, even—but he possessed a classic beauty that was still aggressively and ruggedly masculine. Midnight-dark hair swept back from his powerful face, curling against the nape of his neck, and even though she had never had the courage to look him in the face she had glimpsed enough to know that his eyes were dark and fathomless, and fringed with lashes that most women would have given their eye teeth for. She supposed that if she had worked for him she might well have found him as forbidding as everyone else seemed to, but he had no influence over the course of her life and so she could appreciate him without fear.
Not that she was by nature the type of girl who cowered in the presence of anyone. By nature she was of a sunny disposition, and was a great believer that she was equal to everyone else, whatever her social standing might temporarily be and however broke she was. What counted lay inside and not in the outer packaging.
While her mind had been wandering down the extraordinary path that had found her lying on the sofa in his office, Theo had taken himself to his drinks cabinet and returned with a small glass of brown liquid.
‘Drink some of this.’
Heather blinked and tried not to stare too hard at him. ‘What is it?’ she asked.
‘Brandy.’
‘I can’t.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I can’t. It’s against company policy to drink while on the job. I could get the sack and I need the money.’
As far as Theo was concerned this was far too much information. All he wanted was for her to guzzle a bit of the brandy, which would have her up and running, leaving him with sufficient time to get through what he had to do if he were to avoid an argument with the latest of his dates, whose temper had already been tested to the limit by the frequency of his cancellations.
‘Drink,’ he ordered, holding the glass close to her lips, and Heather nervously obeyed, taking the tiniest of sips and flushing with guilt.
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ Theo exclaimed. ‘You’ve just fainted! One sip of brandy isn’t selling your soul to the devil!’
‘I’ve never fainted before,’ Heather said. ‘Mum used to tell me that I wasn’t the fainting sort. Fainting was for undernourished girls, not for fatties like me. Claire fainted a lot when we were growing up. Well, not exactly a lot, but a few times. Which is a lot by anyone’s standards…’
Theo experienced the novel sensation of being bombarded on all fronts. For a few seconds he literally lost the power of speech.
‘Perhaps I’m coming down with something,’ Heather remarked, frowning. She sincerely hoped not. She couldn’t afford to start taking time off work because of ill health. Her night job with the cleaning company was on a temporary basis. No sick leave. And her day job as assistant teacher at a school near where she lived just wasn’t sufficient for her to really make ends meet. She felt the colour drain away from her face.
Theo watched, fascinated by this transparent display of emotion, before urgently pressing the glass to her lips. The last thing he needed was another attack of the vapours.
‘You need more than just a sip of this. It’ll restore some of your energy.’
Heather took a bigger mouthful and felt the alcohol burn pleasantly in the pit of her stomach.
‘You don’t recognise me, do you?’
‘Recognise you? Why on earth should I recognise you? Look,’ Theo said decisively, ‘I have a lot of work to get through before I leave here tonight. You can sit on the sofa till you feel rested enough to leave, but if you’ll excuse me I’m going to have to return to work.’ He was struck by a bright idea. ‘If you like I can get that security guard chap to come and take you downstairs.’
‘Sid.’
‘Sorry?’
‘His name’s Sid. The “security guard chap”. Shouldn’t you know that?’ Heather asked curiously. ‘He’s been working for you for over three years!’ But, like with her, he would have seen him and not registered his face. To a man like Theo Miquel he was literally invisible.
Not liking the accusatory tone to her voice, Theo momentarily forgot the half-read financial report lying on his desk.
‘It beats me why I should know the name of every security guard who’s ever worked here…’
‘You employ him!’
‘I employ lots of people. And anyway, this is a ridiculous conversation. I have work to do and…’
‘I’m an interruption. I’m sorry.’ Heather sighed and felt tears well up as she contemplated the disappearance of her job should she be ill. It was the middle of January. There were a million and one viruses flying about, most of them apparently winging their way from the Far East in an attempt to find more victims.
‘You’re not about to cry, are you?’ Theo demanded. He fished into his trouser pocket and extracted a handkerchief, cursing himself for his good nature in carrying the girl into his office. A complete stranger, no less, who now seemed intent on chatting to him as though he wasn’t a very important man—a man whose valuable time was money!
‘Sorry.’ Heather took the handkerchief and sniffled miserably into it. She blew her nose, which made her feel light-headed all over again. ‘Perhaps I’m just hungry,’ she offered, thinking aloud.
Theo ran his fingers through his hair and cast one despairing glance at the report on the desk. ‘Hungry?’ he said flatly.
‘Doesn’t that sometimes bring about fainting spells?’ Heather asked, looking at him questioningly.
‘I haven’t quite got to that part of my nutrition course as yet,’ Theo said with thick sarcasm, and she smiled. It was a smile that lit up her face. Could have lit up an entire room, for that matter. He felt inordinately pleased at having engineered this response in her. With a stifled sigh of resignation, he decided to put the report on hold for few minutes.
‘I have a call to make,’ he said, walking away even as he took his mobile phone from his pocket. ‘I’m going to give you the land line. Use it to call for some food.’
‘Oh, no! I couldn’t just order food in!’ She shuddered at the cost involved.
‘You can and you will.’ He looked across at her in the middle of handing her the telephone. ‘If you’re hungry then you have to eat something, and there’s no fridge in my office with a handy supply of food. So just order whatever you like. Call the Savoy. Tell them who I am. They’ll deliver whatever you want.’
‘The Savoy?’ Heather squeaked in consternation.
‘On the house, Miss…Miss…I don’t know your name…’
‘Heather. Heather Ross.’ She smiled shyly at him, marvelling at his patience and consideration, especially when you considered that from what she’d gathered, people found him scary.
Theo, she noticed, did not bother to give her his name, but perhaps he assumed that she would already know it—as indeed she did. She saw it every evening in gold plate on his door. Buoyed up by the kick from the brandy, and the realisation that hunger had brought on her unaccountable loss of strength, Heather dialled through to the Savoy, even though the practical streak in her knew that it was a ridiculous nonsense when all she probably needed was a cheese sandwich and a bottle of water. She was vaguely aware, in the background, that an urgent and hushed conversation was being conducted, one to which he clearly did not want her to be a party, and as soon as he was off the phone she turned to him with stricken eyes.
‘I’ve messed up your arrangements for this evening, haven’t I?’
She could tell that this line of conversation was not falling upon fertile ground, but her tendency to blurt out what happened to be in her head did not go hand in hand with the silent approach he clearly wanted. He would order in food for her, or rather get her to order in her own food—which she had sensibly confined to sandwiches, astounded at the effect his name had had on whoever was in charge of the reception desk at the Savoy—but beyond that he did not want her chatter.
‘No matter.’ He shrugged. ‘I couldn’t make it anyway.’ Not that Claudia had seen it in quite that light. In fact, his ears were still ringing from the sound of the telephone being banged down at the other end, and he could hardly blame her. He consoled himself with the absolute fact that the minute a woman started making demands on his time it was almost certainly the time to dispose of her. In this case, the woman in question had disposed of herself.
‘Was it important?’ Heather asked anxiously.
‘What’s important is lying on my desk, waiting to be read, so if you don’t mind…’ He half expected her to launch into another conversation, but to his relief she maintained an obedient silence, though he couldn’t stop his eyes from straying towards her every so often, distracting him from the task at hand.
By the time the food arrived—couriered over—Theo had abandoned all hope of finishing the report, at least until he had escorted her out of the building.
‘Why have you not been eating?’ he asked, watching as she plunged into her sandwich with the gusto of someone suddenly released from a starvation diet.
‘There’s no need for you to make polite conversation,’ Heather said, tucking into sandwich number two. ‘I know you have heaps of work to do. These sandwiches are fantastic, by the way.’
‘I’ll get back to work once you’ve gone.’
‘Oh, I feel fine now. I might as well finish what I came to do.’ She glanced across at him and then quickly reverted her attention back to the diminishing pile of sandwiches, just in case she found herself staring again.
‘And encourage another fainting fit? I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
‘You mean in case I cause more hassle?’
Theo didn’t immediately answer. He was mesmerised by the sight of a woman eating so much. Judging by the women he knew, eating was fast becoming a dying art form. They nibbled at salad leaves or else pushed food around their plates as if one calorie too many might lead to sudden obesity.
‘I’m hungry,’ Heather said defensively. ‘Normally I’m a very light eater, as a matter of fact. I should really be rake-thin. But I have a very stubborn metabolism. It refuses to do its job.’
‘What’s the name of this firm you work for? I’ll call them and let them know that you’re in no fit state to continue here tonight.’ He reached for the telephone and was halted by her sudden squeak of panic.
‘You can’t do that!’
‘Why not?’ Black eyes narrowed shrewdly on her face. ‘I take it you are legally registered with the company, and not involved in any moonlighting as a tax dodge…’
‘Of course I’m not moonlighting!’ Heather denied hotly.
‘Then what’s the problem?’
‘The problem is that I need to complete this job because I need my time sheet to be signed downstairs! I can’t afford to go home just because I felt a little sick!’ Awareness of her situation rushed through her and she slung her legs over the side of the sofa. All at once, released from the temporary daze of being in his presence and no longer feeling light-headed, she realised what an unappealing sight she must make. Hair everywhere, her robust frame encased in the least flattering garment known to mankind. She hardly presented the storybook image of a fragile, appealing damsel in distress. She ran her fingers self-consciously through her hair, feeling for the elastic band that had gone a bit askew and repositioning her ponytail back to where it should be, along with all the other rebellious curls that had managed to fall out.
‘Give me a minute,’ she said, sucking in a few deep lungfuls of air, ‘and I’ll be on my way.’ She stood up, and sat back down. She looked at him miserably. ‘Maybe I need a few minutes,’ she suggested. ‘I can wait outside. I don’t mind sitting on the ground—just till I gather myself. Honestly, I don’t know what the matter is…’
‘Are you pregnant?’ Theo asked abruptly.
Heather raised horrified eyes to him. ‘Pregnant? Of course I’m not pregnant! Why on earth would you think that? Oh…I know why. I’m young, I fainted, and I’m involved in manual work…therefore I must be a brainless bimbo who’s stupidly managed to get herself pregnant…’
‘That wasn’t my reason for suggesting it…’ Theo lied, discomfited by her accurate assessment of his thought processes.
‘Well, then…’ Another thought lodged in her head and she blushed painfully. ‘It’s because I’m fat, isn’t it?’
Not wanting to encourage this line of conversation, and seriously concerned that getting rid of the girl might prove more difficult than he had anticipated, Theo adroitly changed the subject.
‘I can’t have you collapsing on my premises.’ He walked over to her and looked down at the discreet name label pinned to the front of her overall. Distantly he registered that she certainly was on the plump side. Her breasts, pushing against the unyielding fabric, appeared to be voluminous. In every respect she was physically the antithesis of the women he dated, who were always leggy, brunette, flat chested and ultra-glamorous. ‘Hills Cleaning Services,’ he murmured to himself. ‘What’s the telephone number?’
Heather reluctantly provided him with the information and waited with a sinking heart as he called and explained the situation to her employer at the other end of the line.
‘I’ve been sacked, haven’t I?’ she asked gloomily, the minute he was off the phone.
‘Apparently there have been two incidents recently…?’
‘Oh, not fainting incidents,’ Heather expanded quickly, just in case he began thinking that she was one of those pathetic women who couldn’t take care of themselves. ‘You haven’t told me what they said…’
‘I thought I just had. In a roundabout way.’ Unusual for him to say anything in a roundabout way, but he was reluctantly beginning to feel sorry for the woman. Overweight, insecure, and clearly ill equipped to do any other job. Thanks to him, she would now have to find alternative employment. He felt an uncustomary twinge of guilt. ‘They seem to think that you’re a liability…’
‘That’s silly,’ Heather said miserably. ‘I’m not a liability. I admit a couple of times I got home from work and fell asleep. I just meant to put my feet up for five minutes with a cup of tea, but you know how it is. I nodded off, and by the time I woke up it was too late to do the cleaning job…’
‘You do two jobs…?’ Theo asked in astonishment.
‘I’m sorry. I know you thought you were doing the right thing, and I know you mightn’t have wanted me around just in case I fainted again—which I wouldn’t have, by the way—but thanks to you I’m now out of pocket. They probably won’t even pay me for the hour and a half I’ve been here.’ She stared despondently into the abyss of imminent poverty. Of course there were other night jobs. She could always do that bar one at the local pub. Tom would have her in a minute. But bar work was gruelling and exhausting. At least with the cleaning job she could switch to automatic and get through her work with her mind pleasantly drifting off to a comforting fantasy land in which she actually completed the illustration course she wanted and became famous designing the covers for children’s books.
‘What’s the day job?’ Theo asked curiously. She was now strong enough to sit up. He wasn’t really interested in hearing the ins and outs of her life, but a few minutes’ chat wouldn’t kill him, and it would give her a bit more time to gather her resources. Her hands rested limply on her lap and she was staring into the distance, no doubt contemplating the horror of not earning minimum wages by doing a job that was draining her of all her energy. Thus far, only two women he had dated had held down jobs, and neither had actually seen their jobs as anything more than an interruption of their leisure time—something to do as an amusing distraction from the daily grind of shopping, self-pampering and lunches with their friends.
‘Oh. Day job.’ Heather refocused on the man looking at her and was hit by the realisation that this would probably be the last time she had the pleasure of seeing him. She felt an uncomfortable little void open up in the pit of her stomach. ‘I’m an assistant teacher at the school just around the corner from me,’ she said dully.
‘You’re an assistant teacher?’
His shocked tone managed to raise a smile from her. She could easily have been offended by the implied insult, but she knew that from the Olympian summits which he occupied he would simply have assumed that, as a cleaner, she would be incapable of achieving much else—just as he had assumed that her fainting fit had been brought on by pregnancy.
‘I know. Incredible, isn’t it?’ she replied, grinning, regaining some of her lost spirit. Now she just wanted to drag the conversation out for as long as possible, bearing in mind that she wouldn’t be clapping eyes on him again.
‘Why do you clean offices if you have a perfectly viable daytime job?’
‘Because my “perfectly viable daytime job” just about manages to pay the rent on my room and the bills and I need to save some money up so that I can afford to carry on with my studies.’ Well, he might not have known her from Adam before, but he certainly appeared confounded by her revelation now—the revelation that she actually had a brain. ‘You see,’ she continued, enjoying his undivided attention while she had it, ‘I left school quite young. At sixteen, as a matter of fact. I don’t know why, but all my friends were doing that—leaving to get jobs. Not that there were a whole heap of jobs for school-leavers in the Yorkshire village I came from. But, anyway, it seemed a good idea at the time, and earning money was great. It helped out with Mum, and Claire couldn’t help out there. She wanted to head to London and get into acting…’
‘Claire…?’
‘My sister. The skinny, beautiful one I mentioned to you?’ Heather’s eyes misted over with pride. ‘Long blonde hair…big green eyes…She needed all the money Mum could spare so that she could get started in her career…’
This woman, Theo thought, was an open book. Had no one ever told her that the allure of the female sex lay in the ability to be mysterious? To stimulate the chase with teasing pieces of information dropped here and there? Her frankness was beyond belief. Now she was telling him all about her sister and the fabulous career that had taken her across the Atlantic, where she was now modelling and already getting bit parts in daytime soaps.
Theo held up his hand to put a stop to the deluge of personal chatter.
He hardened himself against the immediate dismay that brought a flush of pink colour to her cheeks.
‘You seem to be fully recovered,’ he informed her. ‘I’m very sorry that you no longer have your job with the cleaning firm, but it’s probably for the best if you’re physically not up to it…’ He stood up, decisively bringing her presence in his office to an end, and waited until she had followed suit. Her hair was still continuing to rebel against the clips and elastic band, and now she was standing up he could see that she was shorter than he had thought—at best five foot four. She smoothed down her unflattering overall and he resisted the urge to give her a piece of good advice. Namely that she would probably be able to get a decent well-paid job if she paid a bit more attention to how she looked. Employers tended to look at the general appearance of their employees and were often influenced by it, unfair though it was.
‘Maybe you’re right. I guess I shall just have to go and work for Tom. He won’t mind if I oversleep now and again. He likes me, and he’ll pay me just so long as I give him what he wants…’
Theo paused in mid-stride, holding the door open while Heather walked past him, oblivious to the horror on his face. Ever the optimist, she was already working out the pros of the job she had previously dismissed out of hand. For starters, it was close, and would involve no public transport travel—which was always a concern to her, bearing in mind what you read in the newspapers. Also, Tom would be much more lenient than the cleaning company if she accidentally skipped an evening’s work. And maybe, just maybe, she could drop the name of the pub into this conversation and casually mention that Theo might like to come along and patronise it some time.
She opened her mouth to voice that tantalising suggestion, only to discover that she had been walking towards the elevator on her own. He was still standing by his door and staring at her as though she had mutated into another form of life.
‘Oh!’ Heather blinked, disappointed that he wasn’t at least walking her to the lift, then she chastised herself for being silly. Prior to this evening the man hadn’t even known of her existence, even though he must have at least glimpsed her off and on over the previous months! He had been good enough to look after her in his office, interrupting his own busy work schedule, which he had not been obliged to do. Crazy to think that he would accompany her on her journey down! She gave him a little wave. ‘Thank you for being so kind and looking after me,’ she said, raising her voice to cover the yawning distance between them. ‘I’ll just be off!’
Theo had no idea how he had managed to become unwittingly embroiled in the concerns of a perfect stranger, but, having been instrumental in getting her the sack, he felt morally obliged to question her decision about taking on a job that sounded very insalubrious indeed. Who was this Tom character? he wondered. Probably some sad old man who thought he could pay for the services of a naïve young girl in desperate need of cash. And naïve she most certainly was. Theo couldn’t remember a time when he had been confronted by someone so green around the ears.
‘Give me a minute.’ He returned to the office, hesitated for a few seconds in front of his computer before shutting it down, grabbed his coat, his laptop and his briefcase and then exited, switching off the light behind him before closing and locking his door.
Heather was still there by the lift, looking utterly bemused. A revelation of his own sentiments, he thought wryly. No time to fulfil his commitment to Claudia, but now perversely driven to accompany this stranger to her house because she had succeeded in rousing some kind of a sense of duty in him. He likened it to the sentiment someone might feel when confronted by a defenceless animal accidentally caught under the wheels of a car and in need of a vet.
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