When the devil commands…

Nikos Demakis’s plan is set. With his eye firmly on the CEO position of his grandfather’s business he will finally lay his past to rest. And Lexi Nelson holds the key. She might resist, she’ll definitely try to negotiate, but Nikos always gets what he wants.

Lexi has never met anyone like Nikos. The power that he exudes is almost overwhelming. Almost. She’s determined to prove that she’s more than a match for him. But as the playing field changes from power to passion, it soon becomes a battle of wills that she’s not sure she wants to win!

“I mean you no harm, Ms. Nelson.”

“Yeah, right. And I’m a Victoria’s Secret model.”

Laughter barreled out of Nikos.

Her blue eyes wide, she stared at him.

Lexi was no model, with her boyish body and non-existent curves. Yet there was something curiously appealing about her—even to his refined tastes.

“I think you’re a foot too short,” he said, letting his gaze rove over her small breasts and over her hands tightened around her waist.

Crimson slashed her cheeks. She lifted her chin, her gaze assessing him, and despite himself, he was impressed.

“Why the power-play? You didn’t open that file in front of me to double-check your facts. You wanted me to know that you had all that information on me. Is that how you get your kicks? By collecting people’s weaknesses and using them to serve your purpose?”

“Yes,” he replied, and the colour leached from her face.

He had no delusions about himself. He was by no means above using any information in his hands to gain the upper edge in business or in life. And especially now, when it concerned his sister’s wellbeing, he would do anything.

“I need you to do something for me and I can’t take no for an answer.”

TARA PAMMI can’t remember a moment when she wasn’t lost in a book—especially a Mills & Boon® romance, which provided so much more excitement to a teenager than a mathematics textbook. It was only years later, while struggling with her two-hundred-page thesis in a basement lab, that Tara realised what she really wanted to do: write a romance novel. She already had the requirements—a wild imagination and a love for the written word.

Tara lives in Colorado, with the most co-operative man on the planet and two daughters. Her husband and daughters are the only things that stand between Tara and a full-blown hermit life with only books for company.

Tara would love to hear from readers. She can be reached at tara.pammi@gmail.com or via her website: www.tarapammi.com

A Deal with Demakis

Tara Pammi

www.millsandboon.co.uk

For the strongest woman I know—my mother.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

EXTRACT

CHAPTER ONE

“MS. NELSON IS here, Nikos.”

Nikos Demakis checked his Rolex and smiled. His little lie had worked, not that he had doubted it. Not an hour had passed since he had had his secretary place the call.

“Instruct security to bring her up,” he said, and turned back to his guests.

Another man might have felt a twinge of regret for having manipulated the situation to serve his purpose so well. Nikos didn’t.

Christos, it was getting more unbearable by the minute to see his sister trail after her boyfriend, trying to make Tyler remember, and playing the role of the tragic lover to the hilt. Only instead of the usual volatility, Nikos was beginning to see something else in her gaze. Obviously he had underestimated how much power Tyler had gained over her. The announcement that they were engaged had stirred even his grandfather’s attention.

* * *

Just as Nikos had expected, Savas had laid down the ultimatum. Another excuse for the old tyrant to postpone declaring Nikos the CEO for Demakis International.

Sort out Venetia and the company’s yours, Nikos. Take away her bank account, her expensive car and her clothes. Lock her up. She will forget that boy soon enough once she starts remembering what it feels like to go hungry again.

Nikos’s gut roiled, just remembering Savas’s words.

It was time to get the charming, manipulative Tyler out of her life. However, he had no intention of starving his sister to achieve that end. Nikos had done, and would do, anything for survival but hurt Venetia in any way. But the fact that Savas had not only considered it but dangled it like an option in front of Nikos, expected Nikos to put it into action, was unsettling in the least.

His expression must have reflected his distaste, because Nina, the leggy brunette he usually got together with when he was in New York, slipped to the other corner of the lounge.

“Ms. Nelson would like to meet you in the café across the street,” his assistant whispered in his ear.

Nikos scowled. “No.”

Bad enough that he would have to deal with not one but two emotionally volatile, out-of-control women in the coming days. He wanted to get this meeting done with as soon as possible and get back to Athens. He couldn’t wait to see Savas’s reaction when he told him of his triumph.

He grabbed a drink from a passing waiter and took a sip of the champagne. It slid like liquid gold against his tongue, richer and better tasting for his sweet victory. Against Savas’s dire predictions that Nikos wouldn’t find an investor, Nikos had just signed a billion-dollar contract with Nathan Ramirez, an up-and-coming entrepreneur, by granting exclusive rights to a strip of undeveloped land on one of the two islands owned by the Demakis family for almost three centuries.

It was a much-needed injection of cash for Demakis International without losing anything, and a long-fought chance that Nikos had been waiting for. This was one victory Savas couldn’t overlook anymore. His goal was so close that he was thrumming with the energy of it.

But a month of intense negotiations meant he was at the tail end of the high. And his body was downright starved for sex. Swallowing the last sip of his champagne, he nodded at Nina. Ms. Nelson would wait.

Just as they reached the door to his personal suite, the sound of a laugh from the corridor stalled him.

He ordered Nina back into the lounge and walked into the corridor. The question for his security guard froze on his lips as he took in the scene in front of him.

Clutching her abdomen, the sounds of her harsh breathing filling the silence around her, a woman knelt, bent over, on the thickly carpeted floor. His six-foot-two security guard, Kane, hulked over her, his leathery face wreathed in concern. The overhead ceiling lights picked out the hints of burnished copper in her hair.

Nikos stepped closer, curiosity overpowering everything else. “Kane?”

“Sorry, Mr. Demakis,” Kane replied, patting the woman’s slender back with his huge palm. A strange familiarity with a woman he’d just met. “Lexi took one look at the elevator and refused to use it.”

Lexi Nelson.

Nikos stared at the woman’s bowed head. She was still doubled over, slender shoulders falling and rising. “She did what?”

Kane didn’t raise his head. “She said no one was forcing her into the elevator. That’s why she had me call you back asking you to meet her at the cafe.”

Nikos tilted his head and studied the state-of-the-art elevator system on his right side. One sentence from her file popped into his head.

Trapped in an elevator once for seventeen hours.

Of course she could have turned around and left. His irritation only grew, a perverse reaction because her leaving wouldn’t serve his purpose at all. “She walked up nineteen floors?”

Kane nodded, and Nikos noticed that even his breathing was a little irregular. “And you walked up the stairs with her?”

“Yep. I told her she was going to collapse halfway through. I mean, look at her.” His gaze swept over her, a curious warmth in it. “And she challenged me.” He shoved her playfully with a shoulder, and Nikos watched, strangely fascinated. The woman unfolded from her bent-over stance and nudged Kane back with a surprising display of strength for someone so...tiny.

“I almost beat you, too, didn’t I?” she said, still sounding breathless.

Kane laughed and tugged her up, again his touch overtly familiar for a woman he met a mere twenty minutes ago. As she straightened her clothes, Nikos understood the reason for Kane’s surprise at her challenge.

With her head hardly reaching his shoulder, Lexi Nelson was small. Maybe five feet one or two at best, and most of that was legs. The strip of exposed flesh between her pleated short skirt and knee-high leather boots was...distracting, to say the least.

Her shoulders were slim to the point of delicate, her small breasts only visible because of her exertion. Wide-set eyes in her perfectly oval face, a dazzling light blue, were the only feature worth a second look. A mouth too wide for her small face, tilted up at the corners, still smiling at Kane.

Honey-gold hair cut short to her nape, in addition to her slim body, made her look like a teenage boy rather than an adult woman. Except for the fragility of her face.

The image of an Amazonian woman on her crinkled T-shirt—long-legged, big-breasted, clad in a leather outfit with a gun in her hand—invited a second look, and not only because of the exquisite detail of it but also because the woman in the sketch was a direct contrast to the woman wearing it.

“Please escort Ms. Nelson into my office, Kane,” Nikos said. Her blue gaze landed on him and widened. “You are causing too much distraction here.” Her smile slipped, a tiny frown tying her brows. “Wait in my office and I will see you in half an hour.”

He didn’t turn around when he heard her gasp.

* * *

Lexi Nelson snapped her mouth shut as Nikos Demakis turned around and left. He was rude, terse and had a spectacular behind—the errant thought flashed through her mind. Surprised by her own observation, she pulled her gaze upward, her breath still not back to normal. Powerfully wide shoulders moved with arrogant confidence.

She hadn’t even got a good look at the man, yet she had the feeling that she had somehow angered him. She trembled as the elevator doors opened with a ping on her side. Ignoring Kane’s call, she marched down the path his rude boss had taken, wondering what she had done to put him out of sorts.

She had walked up nineteen floors and had almost given herself a heart attack in the process. But she couldn’t risk leaving without seeing him, not until she knew how Tyler was. She had planned to dog his New York base the whole week, determined to get answers, until she had received a call from his secretary summoning her here. The moment she had introduced herself at the security desk and asked to see Mr. Demakis, she had been herded to the elevator which she had promptly escaped from.

Lexi came to an abrupt stop after stepping into a dimly lit lounge that screamed understated elegance. High ceilings, pristine white carpets and floor-to-ceiling glass windows that offered a fantastic view of Manhattan’s darkening skyline. A glittering open bar stood on one side.

It was as if she had stepped into a different world.

She worked her jaw closed, the eerie silence that befell the room penetrating her awe. While she had been busy gaping at the lush interior of the lounge, about ten men and women stared back at her, varying levels of shock reflected in their gazes. It was as though she were an alien that had beamed down from outer space via transporter right in front of their eyes.

She offered them a wide smile, her hands clutching the leather strap of her bag.

Having realized that she had followed him, Nikos Demakis uncoupled himself from a gorgeous brunette he was leading out of the lounge.

Lexi clutched the strap tighter, fighting the flight response her brain was urging her into.

“I asked you to wait in my office, Ms. Nelson.”

Her mushy brain was a little slow processing his words when presented with such a gorgeous man. Dark brown eyes fringed by the thickest lashes held hers, challenging her to drop her gaze. The Italian suit, she would bet her last dollar that it was handmade, lovingly draped the breadth of his wide shoulders, tapering to a narrow waist. A strange fluttering started in her belly as she raised her gaze back to his arresting face.

Nikos Demakis was, without exaggeration, the most stunning man she had ever laid eyes on. Easily two inches over six feet, and with enough lean muscle to fill out his wide frame, he was everything she had been feverishly dreaming about for the past few months; her space pirate, the villainous captain who had kidnapped her heroine, Ms. Havisham, intent on opening the time portal.

Her heart racing, her fingers itched to open the flap of her bag and reach for the charcoal pencil she always kept with her. She had done so many sketches of him but she hadn’t been satisfied.

A real-life version of Spike, marauding space pirate extraordinaire.

“Excuse me? Are you drunk, Ms. Nelson?”

Blushing, Lexi realized she had said those words out loud. There was a sly look in his eyes that sent a shiver down her spine. As if he could see through her skin into the strange sensation in her gut and understood it better than she. “Of course not. I just...”

“Just what?”

She pasted on a smile. “You reminded me of someone.”

“If you are done daydreaming, we can talk,” he said, pointing toward a door behind her.

“There’s no need to walk away from your...party,” she said, cutting her gaze away from him. What had she done wrong? “I just want to know how Tyler is.”

He flicked his head to the side in an economic movement, and his guests moved inward into the lounge, or rather retreated from her. Even their conversations restarted, their apparent curiosity swept away by his imperious command. Her spine locked at the casual display of power. “Not here,” he said, and whispered something in the brunette’s ear, while his gaze never moved from her. “Let’s go into my office.”

Lexi licked her lips and took a step to the side as he passed her. Now that she had his complete attention, a sliver of apprehension streaked through her. She looked around the lounge. Safety in numbers. Really, what could he do to her with his guests outside the door? But the sheer size of the man, coupled with that unexplained contempt in his gaze, brought out her worst fears. “There’s nothing to talk about, Mr. Demakis. I just want to know where Tyler is.”

He didn’t break his stride as he spoke over his shoulder. “It was not a request.”

Hints of steel coated the velvety words. Realizing that she was staring at his retreating back again, she followed him. Within minutes, they reached his state-of-the-art office, this one with an even better view of Manhattan. She wondered if she would be able to see the tiny apartment she shared with her friends in Brooklyn from here.

A massive mahogany desk dominated the center of the room. A sitting area with its back to a spectacular view of the Manhattan skyline lay off to one side and on the other was a computer, a shredder and a printer.

He shrugged his jacket off and threw it carelessly onto the leather chair. The pristine white shirt made him look even more somber, bigger, broader, the dark shadow of his olive skin under it drawing her gaze.

He undid the cuffs and folded the sleeves back, the silver Rolex on his wrist glinting in the muted light.

Leaning against the table, he stretched his long legs in front of him. Whatever material those trousers were made of, it hugged his muscular thighs. “I asked you to wait.”

Coloring, Lexi tugged her gaze up. What was she doing, blatantly staring at the man’s thighs? “I walked up nineteen floors for a few minutes of your time,” she finally said, feeling intensely awkward under his scrutiny. He just seemed so big and coordinated and thrumming with power that for the first time in her life, she wished she had been tall and graceful. A more nonsensical thought she had never had. “Tell me how Tyler is and I’ll be on my way.”

He pushed off from the table and she tried not to scuttle sideways like a frightened bird. Hands tucked into the pockets of his trousers, he towered over her, cramming his huge body into her personal space. His gaze swept over her, somehow invasive and dismissive at the same time. The urge to smooth out her hair, straighten her T-shirt, attacked again.

“Did you just roll out of bed, Ms. Nelson?”

Her mouth dropped open; she stared at him for several seconds. The man was a mannerless pig. “As a matter of fact, yes. I was sleeping after an all-nighter when the call came in. So please forgive me if my attire doesn’t match your million-dollar decor.” For some reason, he clearly disliked her. It made her crabby and unusually offensive. “FYI, you might have nothing better to do with your time than loll around with your girlfriend, but I have a job. Some of us actually have to work for a living.”

Amusement inched into his gaze. “You think I don’t work?”

“Then why the sneering attitude as if your time is more precious than mine? You obviously make more money per minute than I do, but mine pays for my food,” she said, shocked at how angry she was getting. Which was really strange. “Now, the sooner you answer my question, the sooner I’ll be out of your hair.”

He shifted closer, unblinking and Lexi’s heart pounded faster. A hint of woodsy cologne settled tantalizingly over her skin. She stood her ground, loath to betray how unsettling she found his proximity. “You’re here for your precious Tyler. No one’s forcing you. You can turn around and walk down the stairs the same way you came up.”

Lexi wanted to do exactly that, but she couldn’t. He had no idea how much it had cost her to come here to his office. “I had a phone call from someone who refused to identify himself that Tyler has been in a car accident along with your sister.” Maybe this was Nikos Demakis’s response to his worry over his sister? Maybe usually, he was a much more human and less-heartless alien? “How is he? Was your sister hurt, too? Are they okay?”

His brows locked together into a formidable frown, he stared down at her. “You’re asking after the woman who, for all intents and purposes, stole your boyfriend of—” he turned and picked up a file from the desk behind him in a casual movement and thumbed through it “—let me see, eleven years?”

There was no winning with the infuriating man. “I thought maybe there was a reason you were being a grouchy, arrogant prig—you know, like worry about your sister. But obviously you’re a natural ass...” Her words stuttered to a halt, the bold letters N-E-L-S-O-N written in red on the flap of the file ramming home what she had missed.

She moved quickly, a lifetime of ducking and evading bred into her muscles, and snatched the file out of his hands. She found little satisfaction that she had surprised him.

Cold dread in her chest, she thumbed through the file. There were pages and pages of information about her and Tyler, their whole lives laid out in cold bare facts, complete with mug shots of both of them.

Spent a year in juvenile detention center at sixteen for a household robbery.

Those words below her picture felt as if they could crawl out of the paper and burn her skin. Sweat trickled down between her shoulder blades even though the office was crisply cool. She dropped the file from her hands. “Those are supposed to be sealed records,” she said, struggling through the waves of shame. She marched right up to him and shoved him with her hands, the crushing unfairness of it all scouring through her. “What’s going on? Why would you collect information on me? I mean, we’ve never even laid eyes on each other until now.”

“Calm down, Ms. Nelson,” he said, his voice gratingly silky, as he held her wrists with a firm grip.

The sight of her small, pale hands in his big brown ones sent a kick to her brain. She jerked her hands back. How dare he toy with her?

“I’ll lose my job if that information gets out.” She clutched her stomach, fear running through her veins. “Do you know what it feels like to live on mere specks of food, Mr. Demakis? To feel as though your stomach will eat itself if you don’t have something to eat soon? To live on the streets, not knowing if you will have a safe place to sleep in? That’s where I will be again.” She looked around herself, at the thick cream carpet, at the million-dollar view out the window, at his designer Italian suit and laughed. The bitter sound pulsed around them. “Of course you don’t. I bet you don’t even know what hunger feels like.”

His mouth tightened, throwing the cruel, severe lines of his face into sharp focus. For an instant, his gaze glowed with a savage intensity as though there was something very primitive beneath the sophistication. “Don’t be so sure of that, Ms. Nelson. You’ll be surprised at how well I understand the urge to survive.” He bent and picked up the file. “I don’t care if you robbed one house or a whole street to feed yourself. Nothing in the file has any relevance to me except your relationship with Tyler.”

His smooth mask was back on as he handed the file to her. “Do what you want with it.”

* * *

Nikos smiled as the slip of a woman snatched the file from him. Clutching the file to her body, she moved to the high-end shredder, ripped the pages with barely controlled vehemence and pushed them in.

With his photographic memory, he didn’t need to refer to the file, though. She was twenty-three years old, grew up in foster care, had little to no education, worked as a bartender at Vibe, a high-end club in Manhattan and had had one boyfriend, the charming Tyler.

Based on the personal history between her and Tyler, and the codependent relationship between them, Nikos had expected someone meek, plain, biddable, easily led, someone with no self-esteem.

The woman standing in front of the shredder, while small and not really a beauty, didn’t fall into any of those categories. The tight set of her shoulders, the straight spine, even her stance, with her legs apart and hands on her hips, brought a smile to his face. The fact that she wasn’t exactly what he had been expecting—really, though, what kind of a woman would be concerned about her lover’s new girlfriend?—meant he would have to alter his strategy.

She turned around, dark satisfaction glittering in her gaze. The hum of the shredder died down leaving the air thick with tension.

He ran his thumb over his jaw. “Are you satisfied now?”

“No,” she said, her mouth set into a straight, uncompromising line. “Whatever you might have read in that file, it should tell you I’m not an idiot. It was one paper copy I shredded. You and your P.I. still have the soft copy.”

He raised a brow as she picked up the paperweight from his desk and tossed it into the air and then caught it. “Then what was the point in shredding it?”

Up went the paperweight again, her blue gaze, alight with defiance, never wavering from him. “A symbolic act, an outlet because as much as I wish it—” she nodded at the shredder behind her and caught the paperweight in a deft movement “—I can’t do that to you.”

Nikos reached her in a single step and caught the paperweight midair this time, his hand grazing hers. She jumped back like a nervous kitten. “I mean you no harm, Ms. Nelson.”

“Yeah, right. And I’m a Victoria’s Secret model.”

Laughter barreled out of him. Her blue eyes wide, she stared at him.

She was no model with her boyish body and nonexistent curves. Yet there was something curiously appealing about her even to his refined tastes. “I think you’re a foot shorter—” he let his gaze rove over her small breasts, and her hands tightened around her waist “—and severely lacking in several strategic places.”

Crimson slashed her cheeks. She lifted her chin, her gaze assessing him, and despite himself, he was impressed. “Why the power play? You didn’t open that file in front of me to double-check your facts. You wanted me to know that you had all that information on me. Is that how you get your kicks? By collecting people’s weaknesses and using them to serve your purpose?”

“Yes,” he replied, and the color leached from her face. He has no delusions about himself. He was by no means above using any information in his hands to gain the upper edge in business or life. And especially now when it concerned his sister’s well-being, he would do anything. If you didn’t protect the ones who depended on you, what was the point of it all? “I need you to do something for me and I can’t take no for an answer.”

CHAPTER TWO

DISBELIEF PINCHING HER mouth, she stared at him. “It didn’t occur to you to just ask nicely?”

He covered the distance between them, shaking his head. She stepped back instantly, but not before he caught her scent. And racked his brains trying to place it. “Nicely? Which planet are you from? Nothing in this world gets done with please and thank you. Hasn’t your life already taught you that? If you want something, you have to take it, grab it with both hands or you’ll be left behind with nothing. Isn’t that why you robbed that house?”

“Just because life gets hard doesn’t mean you lose sight of the good things.” Her hands tightened around the strap of her bag, her skin tugged tight over her cheekbones. “I robbed the house because it was either that or starve for another day. It doesn’t mean I’m proud of my actions, doesn’t mean I don’t wish to this day that I had found another way. Now, please tell me what happened to Tyler.”

Her words struck Nikos hard, delaying his response. The woman was nothing short of an impossible paradox. “Venetia and he were in a car accident.”

Her face pale, she flopped onto the leather couch behind her, her knees tucked together. “Physically, there’s not a scratch on him,” Nikos offered, the pregnant silence grating on his nerves.

She pushed off from the couch again. “The person who called me made it sound like it was much worse. I kept asking for more details but he wouldn’t answer my questions.”

She walked circles around him, running long fingers over her bare nape. Once again, the boyish cut only brought his attention to her delicate features. Bones jutted out from her neck, the juncture where it met her shoulders infinitely delicate.

Her knuckles white around her bag, she came to a stop in front of him. Shock danced in her face. “It was your doing. You had one of your minions call me and make it sound like that. Why?”

He shrugged. “I needed you to be here.”

“So you manipulated the truth?”

“A little.”

Her forehead tied into a delicate little frown, she cast him a sharp look.

“I don’t have a conscience when it comes to what I want, even more so when it comes to my sister, Ms. Nelson. So if you are waiting for me to feel guilty, it’s just a waste of time. Except for a hitch in his memory, your ex is fine.”

“A hitch in his memory?”

“A short-term memory loss.” He leaned against his desk. “To my sister’s eternal distress, he doesn’t remember anything of their meeting, or their plans to marry.”

He paused, watching her closely, and right on cue, the color leached from her face.

Her teeth dug into her lower lip. “They are engaged?”

He nodded.

She ran a shaking hand over her nape again. “I don’t understand why you are telling me this.”

“All he remembers is you, and he keeps asking for you. It’s driving Venetia up the wall.”

He thought he would see triumph, pure female spite. Because whatever else he might think, Venetia had stolen Tyler from this woman. He braced himself for a deluge of tears, OMGs and “why-did-this-happen-to-me?”s. At least, that’s how Venetia had reacted, even though she had been pretty unscathed from the accident. But once the doctors had informed them about the memory loss, it had become worse as though she had taken on the leading role in a Shakespearean tragedy. And contrary to his expectations, that their relationship would lose its appeal, Venetia had only held on harder to Tyler.

Seconds ticked by. Ms. Nelson stared out through the glass windows, but the tears didn’t fall. She took a deep breath, pressed her fingers to her forehead and turned toward him. “Where is he now, Mr. Demakis?”

The glimmer of stark pain in her eyes rendered his thought process still. Much as he would detest it, he wanted her to throw a tantrum. That he could handle. This quiet pain of hers, the depth of emotion in her eyes, however, he wanted no part of it.

It reminded him of another’s pain, another’s grief so much that a chill swept through him. He had worked very hard to keep his father’s face neatly tucked away. And he wanted to leave it that way. “On our island in Greece.”

“Of course, it is not enough that your sister and you are gorgeous. You have to own an island, too.”

He smiled at the caustic comment, at the glimpse of anger.

“All the lengths you have gone to get me here, I’m assuming it’s not for the pleasure of giving me bad news. No more games. What is it that you want me to do?”

“Come with me to Greece...take care of him. Venetia won’t stop turning everyone’s life into a circus until he remembers her.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Her gaze flew to him, shock dancing in its blue depths. “Did I miss the memo on amnesia that says there’s a switch to turn it on and off? An ex’s kiss, maybe? What makes you so sure that I can just make him remember her?”

“Your ex wants to come back to New York so that he can see you,” he said, joining her in the small sitting area. “Venetia won’t let him out of her sight until he remembers their great love. His confusion and her ongoing drama are driving me insane.”

“And I care about this why?”

Her tone was so irreverent that it was like seeing a different woman. “You don’t. That’s why the little twisting of the truth.”

The moment he stepped into the sitting area, she tensed. Nikos could almost feel her suspended breath as she wondered if he would sit too close. Stifling a curse, he settled onto the coffee table instead. Instantly, her breathing evened out. Never had a woman irritated him so well and so easily.

“I want her future settled. More than anything else in the world. Which means, the only thing to do is for you to join them. With the long history between you two and your unwavering support now, Tyler will mend soon. He will remember his undying love for Venetia, and they can ride off into the sunset together,” he said, struggling to keep the mockery out of his tone.

She settled back onto the couch, and crossed her legs. “You’ve got balls asking me to help you.”

Nikos grinned. There was such a change in her demeanor, in the way she met his gaze head-on from the woman who had timidly followed him in. Because she knew now that he needed her, and she was adjusting her attitude based on that just as he had done. And to his surprise, he liked this gutsy version of her so much better. “My...manhood has nothing to do with the matter at hand. It’s something I need to do for my sister, and I’m doing it.”

Pink flooded her cheeks and she averted her gaze from him as though she had just realized what she had blurted out. He had a feeling she did that at lot—spoke without thinking it through.

Scooting to the edge of the couch, she pointed a finger in his direction, her little body shaking. “Just a month ago, you had two giant brutes pick me up like I was a sack of garbage and had them throw me out, and I mean, they literally dropped me on that concrete road outside your estate in the Hamptons.”

She had no idea how much he regretted that decision. By the time Venetia had dropped her bombshell at that very party, announcing that she and Tyler were engaged, Lexi Nelson had already been thrown out.

“You somehow bypassed security, broke into my estate and almost ruined the party, Ms. Nelson. It seems your colorful past is not as completely behind you as you would believe,” he said lazily, and her color rose again. “You’re lucky I didn’t have you arrested for trespassing.”

Her chin tilted up stubbornly. “I meant no harm. All I wanted was to see Tyler, even then.”

“Ah, yes. The wonderful Tyler. For whom you will risk anything, it seems.” He bent forward, leaning his elbows on his knees. “The fact that he didn’t answer your million calls on his cell phone didn’t alert you that he wanted to have nothing to do with you? Because you don’t strike me as the particularly stupid kind,” he added, more than a whisper of curiosity niggling him.

A shadow darkened her blue gaze, and he knew she was remembering her conversation with Tyler. “He was angry with me, yes. But I didn’t want him to make a mistake.”

“You don’t really believe that even now, do you? Because that would make you the most pathetic woman on the planet.”

Her blue gaze widened. “Wow, you really don’t believe in pulling your punches.”

“Because hearing the actual truth instead of your own romantic version sticks in your throat?” he said, a burst of caustic anger filling him. He ran a shaking hand through his hair, annoyed by the strength of his own reaction. Telling this woman that her love for that boy had turned her into a fool was not his responsibility. But making sure his sister didn’t fall into the same mold was. “You’re right. I don’t care why you went to see him. All I care about now is that you take care of him.”

“Why go there? Why not just bring him back here, back to New York? As you’ve already learned from that file, Tyler and I have lived here our whole lives. I’m sure being in a new country amidst strangers doesn’t help.”

“The answer to that question is one word, Ms. Nelson. Venetia. Believe me when I say that it’s better for all parties involved if we do this there.”

She nodded and stood up.

He studied her, her calm demeanor not sitting well with him. She was ready to abandon the sense she was born with for the man she loved, even if he had kicked her to the curb. Was all that fire he had spied in her just a sham? And why did he care when that’s what he needed to happen? “I have already arranged for you to leave immediately with your boss at Vibe.”

She met his gaze then, a quick flash of anger in hers. “Of course you have.” She pulled her bag over her head and adjusted it over her breasts.

Coming to a halt at the door, she tugged it open, and leveled that steady gaze at him again. “I find it really curious. Why would you think you needed all that information on me?”

Nikos shrugged. “Let’s just say I wanted to make sure you accepted my...proposal.”

She didn’t even blink. “And yet you were also very confident that I would come. Please tell me.”

If she wanted to hear what he found so distasteful about her coming here, so be it. “I was standing in the corridor with Venetia when you managed to sneak into the party that night. I heard what he said to you.”

She flinched, her tight grip on the doorknob turning her knuckles white. He couldn’t contain the disdain that crept into his words nor did he want to. And the way she stared at him, focused, every muscle in her face stiff and tense, she heard it, too. “He called me a selfish bitch who couldn’t stand the fact that he had found love with someone else and moved on, that I couldn’t be happy for him,” she recited, as though she was reading lines from a play.

“He conveniently turned his head and walked away while you were thrown on the street,” he continued, refusing to lay off.

“And you thought no self-respecting woman would agree to help him after that.”

He nodded. “I thought I would need some additional...leverage to persuade you. Obviously I don’t.”

She raised an eyebrow, her chin tilting up. “No?”

“You’re here, aren’t you?” he said, standing up. Lexi Nelson was the epitome of everything that had gone wrong in his life in the name of love. He felt a tight churning in his stomach, a memory of the grief and rage that he had propelled into the need to survive, for his sister’s and his sake. “One call and barely an hour later, you come running back for him, your heart in your throat, and you walked up nineteen floors. Why ask so many questions, Ms. Nelson? Why pretend as though there’s even a doubt as to whether you will drop everything to take care of him?”

Lexi struggled to remind herself that Nikos Demakis didn’t know her, that his opinion didn’t matter. But the incredible arrogance in his words that she had fallen into his plans exactly as he had intended chafed her raw.

How she wished she could turn around, throw his disdain back in his face.

But this wasn’t about the infuriating man in front of her. This was about her friend, her family, the one person in the entire world who had always cared about her. After Tyler’s caustic words, after this last fight, she had finally accepted that whatever had been between them had never stood a chance. And she had no idea why.

It would hurt to see Venetia Demakis with him for sure. The young heiress was everything Lexi wasn’t. Rich, sophisticated and exceptionally beautiful.

But what if she was being given another chance to right things between her and Tyler, to have her friend back? He had been there every time she had needed him. Now it was her turn.

The scorn of the man in front of her, however, was a bitter pill to swallow. She was going to say yes, but it didn’t mean she had to do it on his conditions.

She leveled her gaze at him, stubbornly reminding herself that Nikos Demakis needed her just as much as she needed to see Tyler. And she couldn’t let him forget that, couldn’t let him think for one moment that he had the upper hand. “You have made a miscalculation, Mr. Demakis. I have no wish to help you or your sister.”

His dark brown gaze gleaming, he neared her before she could blink.

She stood her ground, but she was too much of a chicken to wait and hear what he would threaten her with. “Not without a price.”

“What is it that you want, Ms. Nelson?”

“Money,” she said, satisfaction pouring through her at the surprise in his eyes. She smiled for the first time in more than a month. Her heart thundering inside her chest, she closed the door and leaned back against it. “You have oodles of it and I have none.”

The dark browns of his eyes flared with something akin to admiration. Lexi frowned. She had meant to anger him, needle him, at least. She had uttered the first thing that had come to her mind. Instead, the edge of his contempt, which had been a tangible thing until now, was blunted.

“Quite the little opportunist, aren’t you?” he said, gazing at her with intense interest.

There was no rancor in his words. Struggling to keep her confusion out of her face, she smiled with as much fake confidence as she could muster. “I have to protect my interests, don’t I? You’re asking me to put my life here on hold and place my trust in someone like you.”

He laughed. “Someone like me?”

“Yes, by your own admission, you don’t have a conscience when it comes to what you want. What if things don’t go your way, what if something happens that you don’t like? You’ll blame me...”

“Like what?”

“Like Tyler regaining his memory and deciding he didn’t want to be with Venetia anymore.”

A feral light gleamed in his gaze. “That would not do.”

“I have no older brother to rescue me, no family to watch out for my welfare,” she said, swallowing the painful truth. “For all I know, you and your sister could do untold harm to me, so I’m being prepared.”

“Believe me, Ms. Nelson. Family is highly overrated. You grew up in foster care—doesn’t that tell you something?”

The vehemence in his tone gave her pause. She had wondered a million times why her parents might have given her up, wondered in the lowest times if there was anyone who thought of her, who wondered about her, too. Except for excruciating sadness and uncertainty, it had brought her nothing. “But you’re here, aren’t you? Taking every step to ensure Tyler remembers your sister, setting her world to rights. Making sure no one deprives her of her happily ever after.”

“What if I don’t agree to your condition?” He moved in that economic way of his and locked her in place against the door. His scent teased her nostrils, his size, the quiet hum of power packed into his large body, directed toward her making her tremble from head to toe. He had neatly sidestepped her question. “What if, instead, I alert your boss about your colorful teenage years?”

It took everything within her to stay unmoving, to meet his gaze when all she wanted was to skittle away from him. Don’t betray your fear, she reminded herself, even though she had no idea if it was his threatening words or his nearness that was causing it. “You will ruin me and it will be pointless, but it won’t go like that. Are you that heartless that you would wreck a perfect stranger’s life because she won’t suit your plans?”

“Yes, I will,” he whispered, moving even closer. His palm landed on the door, near her face, his breath feathering over her. The heat of his body coated her with an awareness she didn’t want. Every inch of her froze, and she struggled to pull air into her lungs. “Make no mistake about me. To ensure my sister’s happiness, I will do anything that is required of me, and not feel a moment’s regret about it.”

Her stomach tight, she forced herself to speak. She had no doubt that he was speaking the truth. “But it doesn’t really serve your purpose, does it? Ruining me won’t set your sister’s world right. You need me, and you don’t like it.” His mouth tightened an infinitesimal amount and she knew she had it right. “That’s why you collected all that information. Because you needed at least an illusion that you have the upper hand in the situation, to make sure you’re the one with control.”

Something dawned in his gaze and she knew she had hit the nail on its head. Her pulse jumped beneath her skin. “You have twisted something very straightforward into a game. I would have dropped everything to take care of Tyler. But now, I’ll only come if you agree to my condition,” she finished, every nerve ending in her stretched tight.

She was playing a dangerous game. But she would do this only on her terms, refused to let herself be bullied again. Even for Tyler.

His gaze swept over her. “Fine. Just remember one thing. I’m agreeing because this suits me. This way, you’re my employee. You do what I say. You can’t cry foul, can’t say I manipulated you.”

“Even if I did, it’s not like you’ll lose any sleep over it.”

His teeth bared in a surprisingly warm smile. “Good, you’re a fast learner. I’m the one who will be paying you. I’ll even have my lawyers draw a contract to that effect.”

“Isn’t that a little over-the-top? I’m there to help Tyler, not for any other reason.” His continued silence sent a shiver of warning through her. “Am I?”

He didn’t answer her question and his expression was hidden by the thick sweep of his lashes. A knock sounded on an interconnecting door she hadn’t noticed. The brunette she had spied earlier walked in, her mouth set into a charming pout. Her long-legged gait brought her to the sitting area in mere seconds while her expertly made-up gaze took in Nikos and her with a frown.

She pulled him toward her, nothing subtle or ambiguous in her intentions. “I thought you wanted to celebrate, Nikos. Are you ever going to be free?”

Her mouth dry, Lexi watched, her thin T-shirt too warm.

His gaze didn’t waver from Lexi. A sly smile curved his mouth as he obviously noticed the heat she could feel flush her cheeks. He wrapped his hand around the woman’s waist, his long fingers splayed against the cream silk of her dress. “I believe Ms. Nelson and I have concluded our business to mutual satisfaction. So, yes, I’m free to celebrate, Nina.”

CHAPTER THREE

NIKOS CURSED LOUDLY and violently. The words swallowed up by the crowd around him didn’t relieve his temper one bit.

It had been three days since Lexi Nelson had come to see him and yet the sneaky minx had avoided his assistant’s phone calls. Exasperated, Nikos had been reduced to having Kane discover her shift times at the club. Thoroughly disgusted by his minions’—a word he couldn’t stop using ever since she had—failure to persuade the woman to leave for Greece, he had flown back to New York.

He had arrived at three in the morning, forced himself to stay awake and arrived at Vibe five minutes after five. Only to find her gone. So he had his chauffeur drive him to her apartment in Brooklyn.

But even after a ten-hour shift, the irritating woman still hadn’t returned. He had been ready to call the cops and report her missing. In the end, he had entered her apartment, barged into a bedroom and forced the naked couple in the bed to tell him where Ms. Nelson was. Her eyes eating him up, the redhead had finally informed him that Lexi had gone straight to another shift at a coffee shop around the corner.

So here he was standing on the sidewalk at nine in the morning outside the bustling café amidst jostling New Yorkers. He was tired, sleep-deprived and furious.

He understood the need for money. He was the epitome of hunger for wealth and power, but this woman was something else.

Ordering his chauffeur to come back in a few minutes, he entered the café. The strong smell of coffee made his head pound harder. With the hustle and bustle behind the busy counter, it took him a few moments to spot her behind the cash register.

His heartbeat slowed to a normal pace.

A brown paper bag in hand, she was smiling at a customer.

Her hair was combed back from her forehead in that poufy way. The three silver earrings on her left ear glinted in the morning sunlight as she turned this way and that. A green apron hung loosely on her slender frame.

She thanked the customer and ran her hands over her face. He could see the pink marks her fingers left on her skin even from the distance. And that was when Nikos noticed it—the tremble in her fingers, the slight sway of her body as she turned.

He tugged his gaze to her face and took in the dark shadows under her stunning blue eyes. She blinked slowly, as though struggling to keep her eyes open and smiled that dazzling smile at the next customer.

Memories pounded through him, a fierce knot clawing his gut tight. He didn’t want to remember, yet the sight of her, tired and ready to drop on her feet, punched him, knocking the breath out of him.

He hadn’t felt that bone-deep desolation in a long time, because as hard as Savas had made him work for the past fourteen years, Nikos had known there would be food at the end of it. But before Savas had plucked them both from their old house, every day after his mother had died had been a lesson in survival.

The memory of it—the smell of grease at the garage, combined with the clawing hunger in his gut while the lack of sleep threatened to knuckle him down—was as potent as though it was just yesterday.

The bitter memory on top of his present exhaustion tipped him over the edge.

A red haze descending on him, he stormed through the crowd and navigated around the counter.

With a gasp, Lexi stepped back, blinking furiously. “Mr. Demakis,” she said, sounding squeaky, “you can’t be back—”

He didn’t give her a chance to finish. Ignoring the gasps and audible whispers of the busy crowd, he moved closer, picked her up and walked out of the café.

Crimson rushed into her pale cheeks, and her mouth fell open. “What are you doing?”

She wriggled in his hold and he tightened his grip. “Seeing dots and shapes, Ms. Nelson? I’m carrying you out.”

Weighing next to nothing, she squirmed again. The nonexistent curves he had mocked her about rubbed against his chest, teasing shocking arousal out of his tired body.

For the first time in his life, he clamped down the sensation. It wasn’t easy. “Stop wiggling around, Lexi, or I will drop you.” To match his words, he slackened his hold on her.

With a gasp, she wrapped herself tighter around him. Her breath teased his neck. He let fly a curse. As rigid as a tightly tuned chassis in his arms, she glared at him. “Put me down, Nikos.”

His limo appeared at the curb and he waited while the chauffeur opened the door. Bending slightly, he rolled her onto the leather seat. She scrambled on her knees for a few seconds, giving him a perfect view of her pert bottom in denim shorts before scooting to the far side of the opposite seat.

He got into the limo, settled back into the seat and stretched his legs. Perverse anger flew hotly in his veins. He shouldn’t care but he couldn’t control it. “A bartender at night, a barista by day. Christos, are you trying to kill yourself?”

Lexi had never been more shocked in her entire life. And that was big, seeing that she had run away from a foster home when she was fifteen, had stolen by sixteen and had been working at a high-class bar in Manhattan, where shocking was the norm rather than the exception, since she had been nineteen.

She clumsily sat up from the leather seat. The jitteriness in her limbs intensified just as the limo pulled away from the curb. “I can’t just leave,” she said loudly, her words echoing around them. The arrogant man beside her didn’t even bat an eyelid. “Order your minion to turn around. Faith will lose her job and I can’t—”

He leaned forward and extended his arm. Her words froze on her lips and she pressed back into her seat. The scent of the leather and him morphed into something that teased her ragged senses. The intensity of his presence tugged at her as if he were extending a force field on some fundamental level. Outside the limo, the world was bustling with crazy New York energy, and inside...inside it felt as if time and space had come to a standstill.

He reached behind her neck and undid the knot of her apron. She dug her nails into the denim of her shorts, her heart stuck in her throat. The pad of his fingers dragged against her skin and she fought to remain still. The long sweep of his lashes hid his expression but that thrumming energy of his pervaded the interior. Bunching the apron in his hands, he threw it aside with a casual flick of his wrist.

Even in the semicomatose state she was functioning in, unfamiliar sensations skittered over her. She had never been more aware of her skin, her body than when he was near. Noting every little movement of hers, he handed her a bottle of water. “Who is Faith?”

The question rang with suppressed fury. Lexi undid the cap and took a sip. She was stalling, and he knew it.

“Why are you so angry?” she blurted out, unable to stop herself.

He pushed back the cuffs of his black dress shirt. The sight of those hair-roughened tanned arms sent her stomach into a dive. “Who is Faith?” he said again, his words spoken through gritted teeth.

She sighed. “My roommate, for whom I was covering the shift. She’s been sick a few times recently, and if she misses any more shifts, she’ll lose her job. Which she will today, because of you.”

He leaned back, watching her like a hawk. His anger still simmered in the air but with exhaustion creeping back in, she didn’t care anymore. She let out a breath, and snuggled farther back into the plush leather. She was so tired. If only she could close her eyes for just a minute...

“What does this Faith look like?”

“Almost six feet tall, green eyes, blond.”

“But she’s a natural redhead, isn’t she?”

Heat crept up her neck at the way he slightly emphasized the word redhead. “How would you know something like that?” Tension gripped her. “Nikos, you barge into my work, behave like a caveman and now you’re asking me these strange questions without telling me what—”

“The last time I checked, which was an hour ago, your so-called ‘sick’ friend was lolling about in bed naked with a man, while you were killing yourself trying to do her job. From what I could see of her, which was a lot, she’s perfectly fine.”

Her cheeks heating, Lexi struggled to string a response. “Faith wouldn’t just lie...”

Faith would. And it wasn’t even the first time, either. Her chest tightened, her hands shook. But Faith was more than a mere roommate. She was her friend. If they didn’t look out for each other, who would?

Struggling not to show how much it pained her, she tucked her hands in her lap. “Maybe it wasn’t Faith,” she offered, just to get him off her back.

“She has a tattoo of a red rose on her left buttock and a dragon on her right shoulder. When it was clear no one would answer, I opened the door and went right in. Your friend, by the way, is also a screamer, which was how I knew there was someone inside that bedroom.”

Flushing, Lexi turned her gaze away from him. Even if she didn’t know about the tattoos, which she did, the last bit was enough to confirm that he was talking about Faith. “All right, so she lied to me,” she said, unable to fight the tidal wave of exhaustion that was coming at her fast. As long as she had felt that she was helping Faith, she’d been able to keep going. She pulled up her legs, uncaring of the expensive leather. “What I don’t get is why you felt the need in the first place to barge into our apartment and confront her.”

“You left that bar at five in the morning, and two hours later, you weren’t at your apartment in Brooklyn. I’ve no idea how you’ve managed to not get yourself killed all these years.”

Her breath lodged in her throat, painfully. Hugging her knees tight, she stared at him. Shock pulsed through the exhaustion. She lived in the liveliest city on the planet, and even with Tyler around, she’d felt the loneliness like a second skin most of her life. Nikos’s matter-of-fact statement only rammed the hurtful truth closer.

“You don’t have to worry about me. I take my safety very seriously.” His anger was misplaced and misdirected. Yet it also held a dangerous allure.

His nostrils flared, his jaw tight as a concrete slab. “My sister’s welfare depends on you,” he said, enunciating every word as though he was talking to someone dimwitted. “I need you alive and kicking right now, not dead in some Dumpster.”

“You don’t like it that you felt a minute’s concern for me? At least it makes you human.”

“As opposed to what? Are you also a part-time shrink?”

The caustic comment was enough to cure her stupid thinking.

“As opposed to an alien with no heart. Why is this even relevant to you? Are you keeping tabs on all my friends so that you can manipulate me a little more?”

“She took advantage of you.” He looked at her as though he was studying a curious insect, something that had crawled under his polished, handmade shoes. “Aren’t you the least bit angry with her?”

“She doesn’t mean to—”

“Hurt you? And yet it seems she has accomplished that very well.”

Was she imagining the compassion in those brown depths? Or was her sleep-deprived mind playing tricks on her again? She scrunched back into the seat, feeling as stupid as he was calling her. “Faith’s had a rough life.”

“And you haven’t?”

“It’s not about who had the roughest life or who deserves kindness more, Nikos. Faith, for all her lies and manipulation, has no one. No one who cares about her, who would worry about her. And I know what that loneliness feels like. I don’t expect you to—”

“I know enough,” he said with a cutting edge to his words. “You haven’t signed the contract yet. Now you have forced me to fly back to New York for the express purpose of accompanying you to Greece.”

Way to go, Lexi, exactly what you wanted to avoid.

“I’ve been busy.”

He leaned forward in a quick movement. For such a big man, he moved so quickly, so economically. But she must be getting used to him because she didn’t flinch when he ran the pads of his thumbs gently under her eyes. The heat of his body stole into hers. “Are you having second thoughts about dear Tyler? Have you decided that he’s not worth the money I’m paying?”

It almost sounded as if he wanted her to refuse to help him. Which couldn’t be true.

She had been unable to sleep a wink ever since the horrid contract had arrived on her doorstep and she had taken a look at the exorbitant amount of money listed there. More than she had ever seen in her lifetime or probably ever would.

Just remembering it had her heart thumping in her chest again.

Money she could use to take art classes instead of having to save every cent, money she could use to, for once, buy some decent clothes instead of shopping the teenager section at the department store or thrift store.

Money she could use to take a break from her energy-draining bartending job and invest her time in developing her comic book script and develop a portfolio without having to worry over her next meal and keeping a roof over her head.

The possibilities were endless.

Yet she also knew that anything she bought with that money would also bring with it an ick factor. It would feel sullied.

But there had been something more than her discomfort that had held her back from signing that contract.

The man studying her intently had volunteered it happily enough. In fact, he had seemed more than happy to make her his paid employee.

Because it gave him unmitigated power over her. That was it.

She stilled in place, her stomach diving at the realization. That’s what had given her the bad feeling.

If she had accompanied him without complaint, it meant she was doing him a favor. This way, she wasn’t. It seemed he was either prepared to blackmail her into it or pay her an enormous amount of money so that she was obligated to do as he ordered.

Rather than simply ask her for help. The lengths he would go to just so that his position wasn’t weak made her spine stiff with alarm.

“About that money,” she began, feeling divided in half within. She couldn’t even stop seeing the number in front of her, a bag with a dollar sign always hovering in her subconscious as though she was one of her own comic characters, “I was angry with you for manipulating me. I can’t accept—”

His long, tanned finger landed on her mouth, short-circuiting her already-weak thought process. Her skin tingled at the barest contact. “In the week that I have had the misfortune to make your acquaintance,” he said, leaning so close that she could smell his cologne along with the scent of his skin, “asking for money to look after Tyler was the one sensible, one clever thing you did.”

Really, she had no idea what he would say next or what would suddenly send him into a spiral of anger.

“Don’t embrace useless principles now and turn it down, Ms. Nelson. Think of something wild and reckless that you have always wanted but could never afford. Think of all the nice clothes you can buy.” His gaze moved over her worn T-shirt, and she fought the impulse to cover her meager chest. “Maybe even something that will upstage Venetia in front of your ex?”

Her mouth falling open wordlessly, she stared at him. Apparently, her new, standard expression in his company. “I have no intention of competing with Venetia, not that I harbor any delusion that I even could.”

Dark amusement glittered in his gaze. It was as if there was a one-way connection between them that let him see straight into her thoughts. Like Mr. Spock doing a Vulcan Mind Meld. If only it worked both ways. She had absolutely no knowledge about him, whereas he literally had a file on her.

He settled back into the seat and crossed his long legs. “You’re a strange little woman, Ms. Nelson. Are you telling me you didn’t think of using this opportunity to win him back? That the idea didn’t even occur to you?”

“No,” she repeated loudly, refusing to let him sully her motives. She would love to have her friend back, yes, but she wasn’t going to engage in some bizarre girl war with Venetia to get Tyler back the way he assumed.

“Fine. My pilot’s waiting. We leave in four hours.”

“I can’t leave in four hours,” Lexi said, anxiety and the energy it took to talk to him beginning to give her a headache. “I have to find someone to sublet my room, have to get the plumber to fix the kitchen before I leave and I promised Mrs. Goldman next door that I would help her after her surgery in two days. I can’t just up and leave because your sister can’t bear the thought of not being the center of Tyler’s universe for a few more days.”

He shrugged—a careless, elegant movement of those broad shoulders. “I don’t care how many things you had lined up to do for your parasitic friends or how much you were planning to bend over backward for the whole world, Ms. Nelson. I won’t wait anymore.”

She frowned. “I don’t bend over back—”

His gaze sliced through her words. “You’re the worst kind of pushover.”

She slumped against the seat, bone-deep exhaustion taking away her ability to offer even token protest. She shouldn’t be hurt by his clinical, disparaging words. But she was.

And the fact that his words could even affect her only proved him right.

How could she feel bad about what a stranger, someone as ruthless as Nikos Demakis thought about her?

“Your room at the apartment will go nowhere. If there’s anything else you need help with—” his gaze lingered on her clothes again “—something that is solely your concern, your problem, I can have my assistant at your disposal.”

“If I don’t agree?”

He shrugged. “Your agreement or the lack of it doesn’t play into it. The choice is whether you travel as my guest or my captive.”

“That is kidnapping.”

He plucked a couple of pages from his case and pushed it toward her along with a legal pad and a pen. “It’s hard to admit, but I see that I did this all wrong.”

“What?”

He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. His gaze solemn, he blinked. Really, no single man should be allowed to be so gorgeous. “I should have appeared on your doorstep with my heart in my hands, pleaded my sister’s case, begged you to help, tried to become your best friend. Maybe talk about my own horrible childhood, pretend to be on my death bed—”

“Okay, okay, fine. You’ve made your point,” Lexi said loudly, cutting off his mocking words. She had always liked to help if she could. She would not let the manipulative man in front of her make her feel stupid about it.

Pulling her gaze away from him, she scanned the document again. She’d had the contract looked over by a paralegal friend, but there was no discounting the hollow fear in her gut.

She would be in his personal employ for two months and would be paid fifty thousand dollars for it, half now, and half when he deemed her job done, subject to his sole discretion.

She was being paid an exorbitant amount of money to spend time with Tyler on a Greek island, the likes of which she had no other hope of seeing in this lifetime.

Yet as the limo came to a stop on her street in the cheap neighborhood of her apartment complex, she couldn’t shake off a feeling that there was an unwritten price that she would have to pay.

And she had no idea what that was.

CHAPTER FOUR

NIKOS CLOSED HIS laptop, and refused the stewardess’s offer of a drink. He hadn’t had a good night’s sleep in four days now. He had finalized the deal with Nathan Ramirez; he finally had a solution for Venetia’s problem. And yet he was restless with a weird kind of pent-up energy simmering just below his skin.

He itched to get back to his garage and get his hands dirty. He had been pushing himself this past month and he needed a break. Once everything was settled with Venetia, he would take her on a vacation. She had always wanted to see more of New York.

The passing mention of New York and his thoughts immediately shifted to Ms. Nelson. Not a peep sounded from the rear cabin. There was something about the woman that always left him on edge. Stepping into the cabin, he froze.

She lay on the very edge of the bed, half out, half in. Her knees tucked tight into her legs, her hands wrapped tight around herself, she slept hunched tight into a ball.

Her honey-gold hair glinted in the low lights, her wide mouth open like a fish.

Her white T-shirt couldn’t hide the outline of her small breasts. A plastic watch with a big dial in the shape of a skull covered most of her wrist. A thoroughly distracting strip of her back was exposed by the scrunched-up top, above denim shorts. Delicate calves and even more delicate feet topped with toes painted black completed the picture.

Even while telling himself that he should just walk away, he stood rooted to the spot.

He usually paid very little attention to the women he slept with. What he wanted, he took and got the distraction out of the way. Because that’s all anything a woman ever had been to him. Something to take the edge off the grueling hours, or the pace he had set himself to succeed.

Ms. Nelson, on the other hand, perplexed, irritated and downright annoyed him with her mere existence. There was such a mix of innocence and calculation about her that he found mesmerizing. He smiled, remembering her confusion, her beautiful blue eyes widened, her breath hitching in and out uncomfortably, when he had leaned toward her in the car.

Noticing a page peeking from under her arms, he leaned over her and pulled the rolled-up magazine.

His blood slowed in his veins to a sluggish pace as he breathed in that scent of her. Vanilla, that’s what she smelled of. Simple yet fascinating, like her.

He straightened the magazine and looked at the article she had been reading. How To Use Sex to Get Your Man Back.

So the little minx did want that parasite back. Apparently, being called a selfish bitch wasn’t enough of a deterrent for her. Displeasure and a relentless curiosity vied within him. What kind of a woman worried about an ex who turned his back on her, a friend who manipulated her and yet faced Nikos down when he had cornered her?

Shaking his head, he tried to stem the flow of resentment coursing through him. Because that’s what it had to be. Ms. Nelson’s effervescent outlook toward life and her sheer naïveté were beginning to grate on him. The sooner he got her out of his life and back to her I’m-all-that-is-love-manipulate-me-all-you-want existence, the better.

Muttering a curse, he turned around to leave when a sleepy moan rumbled from the bed. Still hunched tight, she scooted a little more over the edge. With a quick movement, Nikos caught her just as she would have toppled off the bed.

He ended up on his knees next to the bed, her slender body cradled on his forearms. Blue eyes flew open, terror cycling through them.

Before he could blink, she squirmed in his hold, throwing punches and kicking her legs. He turned his face just at the right time, and her punch landed on his jaw. His teeth rattled in his mouth. Grunting at the pain shooting up his jaw, he threw her onto the bed none too gently.

She rolled over to the other side, and stared up at him, her eyes wide and full of shock. “What are you doing?”

“What do you think?” he shouted back, running a hand over his jaw. “I should have let you fall. The bump would have given you some much-needed sense.”

Theos, but the woman could throw a mean punch. If he hadn’t turned he would have had a severely displaced nose.

She scooted to her knees on the other side, her movements wary and tight, her mouth pinched. “I’m sorry. I just acted on reflex.”

Running a finger over his jaw, he looked at her and curbed his anger. “Would you like to explain, Ms. Nelson?”

Her hair stood up at awkward angles. Moving as though in slow motion, she got off the bed, walked around it and stopped at a good distance from him.

Her gaze was set on his jaw, her lips trembling. “I’m fine,” he said, cringing at the thought that she might cry. He sat down on the bed and waved toward the empty spot. “Sit down.”

Remaining silent, she slid down onto the edge of the bed, leaving as much distance as possible between them. And it finally struck him. All the times she had scrunched tight when he came near. Even now her slender frame was coiled with tension. For some reason, the thought filled him with a cold anger.

“You’re afraid of me.”

Her silence rang around them.

He shoved away the questions and, of all the strangest things, the dent to his ego, aside. He might not like her but the fear in her eyes, it had been real. “I know that you think me a heartless bastard, and you are right, but I would never lay a finger on you.”

She met his gaze finally. “I think I know that.”

“Well, that’s good, then.” This time, he couldn’t keep the sarcasm out.

She grimaced, and took a deep breath. “Sorry, that didn’t come out right. I know that you won’t harm me, Nikos, at least not physically,” she added, just to annoy him, he was sure. “And it’s not your intentions I’m scared of but...” Pink flooded her cheeks “But your... I mean...”

“Theos, Lexi! Just say it.” Sitting here in the intimate confines of the luxurious cabin, he had never felt the strange energy that suddenly arced into life in the cabin.

Lexi sighed, fighting the urge to run away from the cabin. Even though the temperature was perfect, she still felt a line of sweat down her spine. And their sitting here on the same bed, even with the breadth of it separating them, it felt too intimate. Too many things, strange and unnerving, crowded in on her. But the man did deserve an explanation.

“Your size...I mean...you are a big man.”

Amusement glittered in his gaze. “Yes. I’m six foot three. I am big, everywhere. And so far, you’re the only woman who has not been spectacularly happy about it.”

“What does your size have to do with women being hap...” Heat rose up through her as she realized his meaning, tightening her cheeks, and there was nothing she could do about it. “Oh.”

He laughed and she couldn’t help but smile back. He looked gorgeous, down-to-earth and not at all like someone who should have scared her so much. “You gave me the perfect opening.”

She nodded, and made a movement to stand up when he threw out his arm to stop her. He did it slowly, as if to not frighten her again. “Once again, you’ve made me extremely curious. And you owe me an explanation,” he said, rubbing at his jaw.

Lexi pulled up her feet and hugged her knees. “This...it’s nothing that is useful to you,” she said, dragging her feet.

He didn’t bat an eyelid at the insult. “Tell me anyway.”

“I was transferred to a new foster home when I was twelve.” She smiled, warmth filling her despite everything else that had happened. “I loved it immediately because the last one, they had always been kind to me but I was the only kid. The new home was perfect because there were six of us and it’s where I met Tyler.

“But our foster parents had a son. Jason was almost seventeen, older than any of us, and was this huge, burly guy. From the day I walked in, he picked on me. Every month, it got worse. Sometimes he would just lift me up and throw me down, sometimes lock me in the closet. I got pretty smart about avoiding him for the most part. For two years, it went on but it was the place that I had been the happiest. Except for those moments with Jason. The worst was when...”

Nikos’s hand clasped hers, his fingers strong and rough against hers. Holding back the urge to pull away, she took a breath. Her hand was tiny in his, but it felt good, strong, a spark of comfort filling her up. “You don’t have to continue.”

Lexi looked up, but didn’t let go of his hand. She hated that the shadow of that fear that had been her constant companion in those years was still there with her. She swallowed the hot ache in her throat. “No...see, I thought I was over it. But I guess, the way I’ve been reacting around you...” Her fingers twitched in his grasp but he held on tight. “I...I refuse to give him any power over me.”

She closed her eyes and instantly she was back in that room where she had slept again, on the metal-framed bed that had creaked with Jason’s weight, the scent of his sweat, and she could feel his body pressing down on hers. “One night when I was fifteen—” her words came out in a ravaged whisper “—I was sleeping and I guess, I don’t know...I don’t know why he lay down next to me. I had no idea that he was even back in the house. One minute I’m sleeping peacefully, and the next, I wake up, and he is all over me.” She shivered and her short nails dug into Nikos’s palm. “He pinned me down with his huge body, locked my arms over my head. I can still feel his breath over my face. I don’t know for how long. But I couldn’t breathe, or move.”

“Did he—”

The utter savagery in Nikos’s words broke the hold of the memory. “No. I don’t know what he intended. And thanks to Tyler, I never had to find out.”

“Of course.” The two words were laden with a vehemence that jerked her gaze to his face. “That’s when you ran away?”

“Yes. I couldn’t take it anymore. Except within a week, we realized how hard it was to feed ourselves. But Tyler refused to leave me.” And she wouldn’t leave him now.

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