Marriage at His Convenience

‘Shut up and listen to me.’ His hands tightened on her arms. ‘You’re screaming like a fish wife, and there is no need.’

His eyes were black but there was fire in them that mirrored the violent emotion in her own. ‘Need. What would you know about need? Everything is sex and money to you,’ she retorted, trying to pull free, but his grip tightened.

Suddenly aware of how close they were, she felt a trembling start deep in the pit of her stomach, and she stared at him in blazing, humiliating anger. ‘I am through listening to you,’ she said, feeling her hands clenching into fists at her sides. ‘I am leaving you. I never want to see you again. As for Spiro’s legacy, see my lawyer.’

His mouth curled in a chilling smile. ‘Very convincing but don’t pretend you’re leaving on my account. I heard you yesterday on the telephone talking to Clive, telling him not next week but soon. Three nights without sex too long for you, Amber?’ he asked with biting sarcasm.

Her hand flew out and slapped his face in blazing anger. His head jerked back and his eyes leaping with rage clashed with hers for a second, before he hauled her hard against him, his mouth crashing down on hers, kissing her with a raw, savage fury that left her with the taste of blood in her mouth.

She tried to struggle, but he was too strong, and when he finally lifted his head she stared at him with bitter, pain-filled eyes, tears burning at the back of her throat because his last crack had told her his opinion of her had never changed. She froze in his arms and pride alone made her tell him the truth.

‘I spoke to my father yesterday. He mentioned Clive had visited him, and as a friend asked if I was coming back for my birthday. A friend that is all Clive has ever been. But you,’ she said, her lips trembling, ‘you never saw me as anything but an easy lay. You have the mind of a sewer rat.’ The tears she had restrained for so long filled her eyes; she blinked furiously, but one escaped down the soft curve of her cheek. ‘And I am leaving you.’ She tried to push him away, the tears falling faster now as the trauma of the last few days, few months, finally caught up with her and Lucas’s callous comment had been the last straw.

‘Oh, hell, Amber.’ Lucas groaned, hauling her tight against him. ‘Don’t cry. I can’t bear to hear you cry.’ With one strong hand he stroked her back, while his other hand lifted to her face and his fingers smoothed the wetness from her cheeks.

She choked back a sob. ‘I am not crying,’ she murmured, but long shudders racked her slender frame.

Suddenly the door opened, and Lucas turned his head and said something violently to his poor secretary, but the interruption gave Amber the strength to break free from him, and, rubbing the moisture from her face, she fought to regain her self-control. She was not shedding another tear over the fiend, and on shaky legs she stepped towards the door.

‘No, Amber. Please.’ Lucas swept her up in his arms. ‘You have had your say, now it is my turn.’

‘What do you think you’re doing? Put me down,’ she demanded hoarsely.

‘What I should have done years ago, but never had the guts,’ Lucas admitted and, sitting down on the sofa, he held her fast in the cradle of his arms. His face was only inches away from hers, and the black eyes caught hers with brilliant intensity.

Even in her abject misery, to her horror, the scent, the heat of him invaded her senses, reawakening the familiar awareness she always felt in his presence. ‘Let me go, Lucas. Your secretary.’ She was grasping at any excuse; she had to get away.

‘No, I am going to keep you here until you hear me out,’ Lucas informed her bluntly. ‘Even a condemned man is allowed to speak.’ His features were harsh, brooding as he studied her tear-streaked face.

She nodded—she did not trust herself to speak. Better to hear him out and get out, before she broke down completely in front of him.

‘Forgive me for what I said about three days without sex. I didn’t mean it. But to hear the mention of Clive’s name is enough to drive me insane with jealousy.’

He was jealous, and it gave her hope.

‘But I believe you, I know you have to go back to London. You love your work, and I had every intention of taking you. I even got your father to purchase the old rectory for us in the village near his home. I thought we could split the year between Greece and England.’ And tilting her chin with one finger, he looked deep into her tear-washed eyes. ‘But I wanted it to be a surprise for your birthday.’

Surprised! She was amazed. ‘You bought a house?’ she murmured. He had been planning for their future together, including her career.

He nodded and continued. ‘But I don’t believe you meant what you said about Christina. Would you really wish her dead? Because that is what you implied.’

‘No, never.’ She found her voice. Horrified to think how callous she must have sounded. Then she remembered why she had behaved as she had. ‘But you lied.’

‘I never lied, Amber. That day in your office I told you my father had died, and Christina had gone the next year. Perhaps my grasp of English is at fault, but since when had gone meant the same as dead?’

‘Then why did you not tell me you were divorced?’ she demanded huskily.

‘What man wants to discuss the biggest mistake of his life,’ he said slowly, and she felt his muscular body lock with tension, ‘with the woman he loves?’

She was held in his pr

otective arms, with the warmth of him surrounding her, and for him to suggest he loved her was the cruellest cut of all to her bruised heart. ‘Please, Lucas, no more lies: you loved Christina, you told me so. You probably still do,’ she said sadly.

His dark eyes locked on hers as if they would see into her very soul. ‘No, I lied to you and myself, and I paid for it with the worst few years of my life.’ His dark eyes clouded with remembered pain. ‘It was my own fault, but the worst part is knowing in my arrogance I hurt you.’

He brushed her lips with his in a bittersweet tenderness that squeezed her heart. This was Lucas as she had never seen him before. ‘I got over it,’ she muttered.

‘You should not have had to.’ He eased her off his lap onto the sofa beside him as if she were the most fragile Dresden doll, and placed an arm around her shoulders, holding her turned towards him. ‘I need to explain why I behaved the way I did.’ His dark eyes clouded with painful memories. ‘My mother was a stunningly beautiful woman.’ Amber could believe that. Just look at her son!