Irresistible Bargain with the Greek

Roughly, he turned away from the view he couldn’t see, was blinded from seeing by his inner turmoil. He couldn’t bear to see the azure pool where they had disported themselves, dazzling in the hot sunshine, the terrace they had lounged on, dined on, with candlelight catching her hair, the languorous warmth of the night like a caress...

He stalked indoors. He wanted out of here—as fast as he could.

‘Are you done yet?’ he demanded.

He didn’t mean to sound curt, but impatience drove him. He was desperate to be on his way to the airport, to leave this place. He had to get to Hong Kong, then maybe Shanghai. He would do business there—profitable business. Because doing profitable business was what he did with his life, wasn’t it? He made money. At first it had all been to bring down Grantham, but now it would be for its own sake. It was what he was good at, after all.

A sense of emptiness gaped in him. He’d achieved his goal—now what? What was he going to do with his life? What purpose was going to drive him now? There was nothing there for him. Nothing.

I thought I’d found what I was going to do with the rest of my life. And then she left me. Again.

Even though he’d been appalled to discover she was Grantham’s daughter, dismayed by her taste in design, despite all that he’d come to terms with it. He’d made himself accept it because of the way he felt about her.

And she still rejected me.

Fernando was closing the lid of the large suitcase, fastening it securely. Then he straightened. ‘What are your instructions in respect of the bracelet left in Miss Talia’s room?’ he enquired blandly.

Luke started. ‘What do you mean?’ he demanded. ‘What bracelet?’

‘I believe it is the one you had delivered yesterday,’ Fernando elucidated.

Luke stared. ‘The ruby bracelet?’

Fernando nodded in his stately fashion.

Luke frowned. ‘She left it here?’

Again Fernando nodded.

Luke’s face hardened. ‘Send it on to her,’ he said tersely.

He walked out of the bedroom, heading downstairs with a heavy tread. He had no idea why she’d left it—to make a point, perhaps? But what point? Why was she angry at him?

Perhaps it was insufficiently valuable?

His mouth twisted, his mood becoming blacker than black as he stalked out of the room, heading downstairs to the car waiting to take him to the airport. To take him anywhere in the world that was not this island where, for a brief space of time, he had thought he had found happiness.

What a fool he had been.

Well, never again. Never again.

* * *

Talia walked around the villa for the last time. It was empty now of all their possessions, right down to the kitchenware. Everything of value had been sold to raise some much-needed cash to tide them over. All Talia and her mother were taking with them were the bare necessities. It was all they could afford.

As she gazed about her Talia still could not believe what had happened since she had collapsed into desperate sobs on her mother’s lap. When she’d finally stilled, the sorry tale told, her mother had been very quiet. At the edge of exhaustion—emotional, physical and mental—Talia had known, though she hadn’t been able to face it, that she would have to cope with another complete collapse from her beleaguered mother.

Yet what had happened had been the complete opposite.

Maxine had finally patted her daughter’s shoulder, and got to her feet. ‘We,’ she’d announced, ‘are leaving. The moment we can. I will not stay for a day longer than it takes us to move out in any place owned by a man who has broken my daughter’s heart. Nobody does that to my daughter. Nobody!’

That was all Maxine had said, but not all that she had done. She had conferred with Maria, returning to announce, with a straightening of her thin shoulders and an air of firm resolution, that Maria had come up with a wonderful solution to their dilemma.

‘Her brother runs a café bar—not here in Marbella, down the coast in one of those tourist places. He needs someone to run it since he opened another one last month. And,’ she continued triumphantly, ‘it comes with an apartment above! We’ll move in the minute we can.’

Talia had stared disbelievingly. This was not the mother she had known all her life. Nervy, brittle, and totally dependent on her daughter and husband.

‘Mum, are you...are you sure you could cope?’