The Mistress's Secret

He hated her.

She'd seen that hatred, seen it loud and clear and spearing from his eyes as if it were a knife to plunge deep into her heart. Hatred for what she had done to him, to his family…to his brother.

Another emotion flushed through her like acid eating her from the inside. She had tried to stop that emotion, too, but it was no use; it came flooding back, rocking her with the force of it.

Guilt.

Guilt over Nikos, who was dead because of her.

She forced her eyes open. Making the real world come back. Not the world that haunted her, the sickening memories of that terrible, deadly night when Leon Andreakos's brother had died.

Her eyes rested on the first thing they saw — that chicly dressed blonde who was reaching out her hand, fingering the fabric of the evening gown while she considered whether or not it would sufficiently adorn her beauty. Then, as Alanna's gaze rested on her, half-blind still, torn still between memory and reality, the woman's head turned. A smile lit her face. Of greeting, of pleasure…of satisfaction.

A man was walking into the department, walking with lean, long strides up to the beautiful blonde, who was smiling at him…and he was smiling at her. Smiling at the beautiful woman who was gracing his arm in the clothes he had bought her, gracing his bed in return for those clothes…

Faintness washed over Alanna. The room swam, and she felt her legs weaken, her whole body weaken.

It couldn't be…. But it was.

Blood drummed in her ears like a crashing tide.

For the first time in over four long, endless years she was looking at Leon Andreakos again.

Chapter Two

Alanna could not move. Not a muscle. She could only stand, paralyzed, while in front of her, Leon Andreakos walked up to the woman who was his current mistress.

Leon Andreakos, whom she had not set eyes on for nearly five long years, whose mistress she had once been in another lifetime, another existence….

The lush surroundings of the store's eveningwear department vanished. The years vanished. She was standing, once again, behind the counter of the gift shop in the lobby of the expensive west end hotel while the most fabulous man she had ever laid eyes on walked up to her.

He had come up to the counter and smiled at her. And in that moment, that single moment, she had felt her heart swoop like a bird plunging from the topmost branch of the tree. To abase herself at his feet in worship of his male perfection, his sensual, sexual potency.

"Would you gift wrap a scarf for me?" His eyes had flickered briefl

y to her and then moved to the flowing cascade of silk scarves that hung from a display at the end of the counter. Long fingers moved swiftly and then selected one patterned in muted grays and soft pinks. "This one, I think."

He removed it and draped it on the counter in front of her. His eyes came back to her. An eyebrow rose.

"If you please?"

The prompt had jolted her. Jolted her out of the total daze that had overcome her as she had stared, mesmerized at this most devastating-looking man. Tall, with dark, Mediterranean looks, dressed in a charcoal business suit that hugged every line of his lean body, and eyes…oh, eyes that made her heart swoop again — this time right up to the clouds, to the sky beyond…

"Yes — yes, of course, sir," she managed in a voice suddenly far too tight, too faint. "Um…do you want to have it delivered to your room, or do you wish to wait?"

How she had got out that second sentence she did not know. She didn't know anything suddenly, not a thing — only that she just wanted to stare and stare at the face of the man in front of her.

It was his eyes…no, his mouth…no, everything, just everything! Everything just made her want to gaze and gaze at him. His eyes were so dark, but they had fleck of light in them, and she wanted to drown in them. His mouth was sculpted, perfect, but there was a mobility to it that made her insides weak….

"I'll wait — if you don't take too long."

It was his voice! That's what it was, Alanna thought, desperate to try to make her brain work again, make it reason…when all it wanted to do was to dissolve into formless goo. His voice — deep, accented. What accent? She forced herself to think as she heard her own voice murmuring, "Of course, sir," as she reached under the counter for the silver tissue paper. She felt her hand fumbling and dragged her eyes away. She couldn't just stand here staring at this man…she had to gift wrap the scarf. It was what he was waiting for her to do.

How she managed it she did not know. The man did not move, simply stood there, immobile, his eyes resting on her bowed head as her fingers fumbled hopelessly with the task. Usually she was deft and nimble with gift wrapping; today she was hopeless. And it was because of him.

And all the while he said nothing, just waited, and she could hear his impatience mounting.

He glanced at his watch once, she could tell, saw from the corner of her eye the swift lift of his wrist, the faint flash of gold.