A Deal with Demakis

She offered him a small smile, nothing but sadness in her blue eyes. “Congratulations, Nikos.”

“You’re wearing the dress I picked.”

She looked down and ran a hand over the silk. Moonlight threw just enough light to bare her slender shoulders to him. She met his gaze and the intensity of emotion in it skewered him. “I wore it for you. It made me feel different, confident. I wanted to look beautiful tonight. I had a feeling it was going to be special.”

His heart beat a rapid tattoo, a part of him telling him to stay at the door, to not go to her, to act with honor. What little he had left. “I’ve never seen anyone more beautiful.”

She took a deep breath as though to contain herself. “For once, I believe that.”

Shrugging off his coat, he stayed leaning against the door. “I...had no idea Theo was going to announce it tonight.”

Resignation curved her mouth. “Have you already slept with her?”

The profanity that flew from his mouth should have created a frost in the air around them. But it didn’t wash away the bitter need inside to explain why he had agreed to this. He looked at her, and she seemed different. “Christos, I have no interest in her. I haven’t even looked at her.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

At his silence, she smiled. It was the most cynical thing he had ever seen on her innocent face. And he was responsible for putting it there.

“Say it, Nikos. Tell me to be gone. Tell me to my face that you’re done with me, that our little affair has come to an end. Tell me that you’re moving on with more important things in your life.”

“You know it’s not—”

She shook her head and the words halted on his lips. Not that he had any idea what he was going to say. “Don’t you dare say it’s not like that. People have affairs with each other, and then move on, right? Whisper those little words you whispered to Emmanuelle that day. Tell me it is time to pack up my things. Do I get a goodbye gift?”

“Theos, Lexi. What are you doing?”

Hugging her midriff, she cast a furious look at him. Her face alight with color, her mouth mobile, she looked like an angry tigress and nothing like the woman he had expected. “Were you hoping I would just slink away in the night, heartbroken and pitiful? Or were you thinking I would be so desperate to be loved by you, that I would take you any way I got you, that I would accept what little you offer me?”

“I had to make this choice. This marriage is nothing but an agreement.”

His jaw was tight like a vise, his cheekbones sticking out making him forbidden and stark. But Lexi wouldn’t back down. The hurt continued to splinter inside her as if there was no end to it. As if this moment needed to be entrenched inside her, as if she needed to be changed.

Anger, red-hot and roiling, it was the only way to survive the moment and she clutched it to herself.

Because if she didn’t, she would hear that voice inside her head. That little girl filled with hurt, filled with fear, the one that so desperately wanted to be loved.

The only way to drown out that pathetic voice was to ride the storm of anger. “You think I can find solace in the fact that you’re ruining your life along with mine?”

He shifted back, the expression in his eyes cycling from fury to desperation to a terrifying emptiness within seconds. “Don’t say another word,” he said through gritted teeth, every syllable bellowing around them.

“I won’t stop.” She wiped her tears and looked up at him, her heart breaking in her chest. “You have no idea how much the very thought of leaving you terrifies me. I can’t breathe if I think about not seeing you ever again.” She covered the distance between them, and he braced himself as if she was a weapon that would cause him damage. She reached for his face, and he immediately bent his head, his gaze a glittering pool of anger and something else.

Standing on her toes, she kissed his cheek, and he shuddered. Burying her face in his chest, she hugged him tight, learning and memorizing the scent and feel of him.

“I’m petrified that I will never see you again, that I’ll never hear your voice again, never kiss you again. That no one will ever think me beautiful—” Her voice broke. “That no one will ever tell me to stand up for myself, that no one will ever think I’m extraordinary. I’ve never been more terrified that I’ll never be loved, Nikos.”

She pressed another kiss on his palm, and looked up at him. The pain she saw in his eyes stole her breath, knuckled her so hard in the gut that she swayed. But she didn’t relent. She would say this to him, for herself. “I’m in love with you. I think I’ll always love you. If you weren’t so blinded by your ambition—”