Marriage at His Convenience

‘Now wait just a minute—’ Amber began, but at that moment Sandy walked in with the coffee.

Amber sat bristling with frustration as she watched her secretary, the girl’s eyes awestruck as she asked Lucas breathlessly how he took his coffee.

‘Black, please.’ He favoured her with a broad smile and just sat looking dark and strikingly attractive until the flustered girl handed him a cup of coffee. ‘Thank you.’

Amber thought Sandy was going to swoon. No wonder she had let Lucas in without an appointment. Even her secretary, who had only been married a few months, was not immune to Lucas’s lethal male charm.

When Amber had first seen Lucas walk into her office she had been in shock, but now the shock had worn off, and another much more dangerous emotion was threatening her hard-won equilibrium. Lucas was a handsome devil and he still had the power to stir her feminine hormones.

Amber hastily picked up her cup of coffee and took a long drink of the reviving brew. The days were long gone when she was a slave to the sexual excitement Lucas could arouse with a mere look or touch. He had killed them dead when he had accused her of being an oversexed female, excellent lover material, but never a wife, and then had gone off and married Christina.

For months after his desertion her self-esteem had hit rock-bottom. She’d questioned her own worth; perhaps Lucas had been right about her. She was sex mad, the hedonist he had called her. She certainly had been when she’d been with him. In consequence she had, without really being aware of doing it, adjusted her style of dress to elegant but conservative—no short skirts, or revealing necklines. She wore little make-up and kept her long hair ruthlessl

y scraped back in a tight chignon, and she had no idea she looked even more desirable.

The door closing as Sandy left brought Amber back to the present with a start, and, straightening her shoulders, she was once again in command. She looked at Lucas with narrowed hostile eyes. ‘I don’t need you to tell me what I do or don’t know,’ she said curtly, and, picking up the letter from the desk, she held it out to him.

‘Read that. I saw it for the first time this morning, and as yet I have not had time to respond, basically because I have an unscheduled guest. You.’ His fingers brushed hers as he took the document from her outstretched hand, igniting a tingling sensation on her soft skin. Her golden eyes narrowed warily to his face, sure he had done it deliberately, but he was unfolding the document.

She waited as he read the letter, and then with slow deliberation folded the document back up again. ‘This proves nothing,’ Lucas said bluntly, dropping the letter back on her desk.

‘I don’t have to prove anything to you, Mr Karadines.’ She shrugged dismissively. ‘Now finish your coffee and leave. I have work to do.’ Yes, Amber congratulated herself, she was back on track; the cool businesswoman. ‘And when I get around to contacting the lawyers, and discover the true state of affairs, then if I need to get in touch with you, I will.’ When hell freezes over, she thought silently. Standing up, she drained her coffee-cup and replaced it on the desk, before walking around heading for the door, her intention to show Lucas out as swiftly as possible.

‘Well, well. The hard-bitten businesswoman act,’ Lucas drawled sardonically, rising to his feet, and when she moved to pass him he reached out for her.

Amber felt every hair on her skin leaping to attention as his long fingers encircled her forearm. ‘It is no act. Believe me!’ she retaliated sharply. If he thought he was going to walk all over her again, he was in for a rude awakening.

‘You don’t fool me, Amber.’ His voice dropped throatily, his fingers tightening ever so slightly on her arm. His eyes wandered over her in blatant masculine appraisal, taking in the prim neckline of her blue blouse, the tailored navy blue trousers that skimmed her slender hips and concealed her long legs to the classic low-heeled navy shoes, and then ever so slowly back to her face until she thought she would scream with the effort to remain cool and in control. ‘You may dress like a conservative businesswoman, but it doesn’t change what you are. I always knew you had a passion for sex, but it was only after we parted that I realised you had an equal passion for money,’ he drawled cynically.

She wrenched her arm free from his hold, her whole body rigid with anger. Just who the hell did he think he was? So now she was a gold-digger, as well as a sex maniac in his eyes… With the greatest effort of will, Amber managed to control her fury and say calmly, ‘What exactly do you want, Lucas, barging into my office unannounced? I have neither the time nor the inclination for playing games. You obviously know something about Spiro’s will, which concerns me. So just spit it out and then go.’

His eyes darkened, and for a moment Amber saw a flash of violent anger in their glittering depths, and she knew she had been right to feel threatened. Then he was smiling mockingly down at her. ‘You used to like playing games,’ he reminded her, his eyes cruel. ‘Sexual games.’ His finger lifted and stroked down the curve of her cheek.

‘Cut that out,’ she snapped, taking a deep, shuddering breath. ‘You’re a married man, remember.’ Her golden eyes clashed with his, and as she watched it was like a shutter falling down over his face.

Lucas’s hand fell from her face, his black eyes cold and blank. ‘No, I am not. I told you before, I have no family.’

Confusion flickered in Amber’s eyes. Had he? Then she remembered, but she had thought he’d meant Spiro. ‘But what about Christina and your child?’

‘The child was stillborn. My father died three years ago, and Christina was gone the next,’ he informed her in clipped tones.

Her soft heart flooded with compassion, and unthinkingly she laid a hand on his arm in a tender gesture… Such tragedy must be heartbreaking even for a man as hard as Lucas. ‘I am so sorry, Lucas, I had no idea.’

‘These things happen…’ he brushed her hand away ‘…and, as you never cared much for any of them, I can do without your hypocritical sympathy. I would ask you not to mention the subject again. Except for Spiro, of course,’ he demanded with chilling emphasis.

Why was she wasting her sympathy on this man? Lucas meant nothing to her. He was simply another irritant in an already bad day, she told herself. So why did her cheek still burn where he had touched her, her pulse still race? It wasn’t fair that one man could have such a terrible effect on her senses. She glanced up at him, and briefly his towering presence was a threat to her hard-won sophistication, then she casually took a step back.

‘You want to talk about Spiro, fire away,’ she said flatly, retreating behind her usual hard shell of astute businesswoman, and deliberately she lifted her wrist and scanned the elegant gold watch she wore. ‘But make it quick, I have a lunch appointment.’

‘You have changed, Amber.’ His lips quirked in the semblance of a smile that did not quite reach his eyes. ‘I can remember a time when you begged for my company, you couldn’t get enough of me and pleaded with me to stay with you,’ he said silkily.

The unexpected personal attack made her go white, a terrible coldness invading her very being that he could be so utterly callous as to mention the last time they had been alone together. ‘I can’t,’ she denied flatly. He might even now make her heart race, but no way was she foolish enough to get personal with Lucas Karadines ever again.

‘Liar.’ He smiled sardonically. ‘But I’ll let it go for now, as you say you are busy, and we have a much more pressing item to discuss, partner.’

‘Partner.’ She bristled. What on earth was the man talking about? She’d rather partner a rattlesnake.

‘All right, pretend you’re innocent, I don’t really care. But, put simply, the will Spiro made when you invested in his art gallery made you his heir if anything happened to him.’