The Greek's Acquisition (12 page)

She cringed when she remembered how years ago she had fallen into Dimitri’s hands like a ripe fruit ready for picking. In Paris, and again last night, she had fallen into his bed with embarrassing eagerness. Had she learned nothing? Where was her self-respect? she asked herself furiously.

Dimitri shook his head. ‘The relationship we had on Eirenne had nothing to do with your mother. I don’t know why Tina came out with all that rubbish about my motives, but I suspect it was because she disliked me as much as I disliked her and she was determined to turn you against me.’

‘You can’t deny you blamed her for your mother’s death,’ Louise said fiercely. ‘Or that you held her responsible for your estrangement from your father. When Tina accused
you of coming on to me because you wanted to get at her you admitted it. You said it was true. And then you …’ Her voice fractured. The agony she had felt seven years ago was as acute now as it had been then. ‘You walked away without speaking to me. You didn’t even look at me. But why would you? I had served my purpose. You had riled my mother, and that was all you cared about—you certainly never cared about me.’

‘I walked out because if I hadn’t there was a strong possibility that I would have done something I would later regret,’ Dimitri told her explosively. He took a deep breath. ‘Look at me,’ he commanded in a calmer tone.

When Louise refused, he slid one hand beneath her chin and forced her head up to meet his gaze.

‘I swear the only reason I made love to you on Eirenne was because I couldn’t help myself. I didn’t go there with the intention of seducing you.
Theos
—’ he made a harsh sound ‘—I went to the island to collect some of my mother’s things that were still at the old house. She died two months before, but whether she meant to take an overdose of her sleeping pills or it was an accident we will never know. Certainly she was devastated when my father divorced her, but she did not write a note, and I can’t believe she would have chosen to leave me and my sister.’

He lifted his other hand and brushed a stray curl back from Louise’s face. ‘When I saw you on the island my only thought was that you had transformed from a skinny kid into a gorgeous woman, and to be brutally honest I quickly became obsessed by my desire to take you to bed. The fact that you were the daughter of my father’s mistress was irrelevant, and when we spent time together and I got to know you better I realised that you were nothing like Tina.’

Louise stared at him in shocked silence.

‘After I stormed out of the Villa Aphrodite and my temper
had cooled it occurred to me that you might have misunderstood what I had said,’ he continued. ‘I went back to talk to you—only to find that you had gone. I tore down to the jetty to catch you, but you were already on the boat and you refused to wait and listen to me.’

Dimitri’s explanation of the events all those years ago sounded so reasonable, so believable, Louise thought shakily. Could she have been wrong and misjudged him? It was almost impossible to accept when she had spent so long thinking that he had cruelly used her. But he was staring at her now with a burning intensity in his eyes, as if he was determined to make her believe him—as if it mattered to him that she did.

She had been so young and unsure of herself, she remembered. At nineteen she’d had no experience of men, and until she’d started university she had led a sheltered life at a convent school buried deep in the English countryside.

She had been overawed by Dimitri’s stunning looks and easy charm, and amazed when he had shown an interest in her. Her lack of self-confidence had meant that it had been easy for her to believe her mother, and she had felt stupid for imagining that a gorgeous, sexy playboy could have desired
her
.

She was finding it hard to think straight when he was standing so close to her that she could feel the warmth of his body. The spicy scent of his aftershave teased her senses, and when she looked into his eyes and saw his gentle expression her heart ached. She longed to sink against him and have him wrap his strong arms around her.

‘How can I believe that what you’ve told me is the truth? That you didn’t con me into sleeping with you? I saw you on the jetty as I was leaving the island, but I was hurt and confused and I couldn’t bear to talk to you then. If I had mattered to you at all you could have contacted me. I’d told
you I was studying at Sheffield University, and you had my phone number. But when I phoned you a few weeks later you refused to take my call. Your secretary said you were unavailable. You must have instructed her to tell me that,’ she said accusingly.

Dimitri ran a hand through his dark hair. ‘My PA told you the truth. I
was
unavailable. I was in South America with my sister—who was fighting for her life in an intensive care unit.’

Louise caught her breath. ‘What happened?’

‘Ianthe had gone on an adventure holiday in Peru and had been thrown from her horse on a mountain path, miles from civilisation. It took three days to transport her to the nearest city, and by then she had slipped into a coma. She had multiple injuries, including a broken neck.’

‘Oh, Dimitri! Is she okay now?’

‘Thankfully she made a full recovery, but it took a long time, and for a while the doctors feared she would not walk again. I lived at the hospital for weeks, sitting by her bed and talking to her. They said the sound of my voice might rouse her.’

Dimitri’s expression became shuttered as he recalled the agonising wait and his desperate prayers that Ianthe would wake up and be well again. It had seemed unbearable that his beautiful, sport-mad sister might be confined to a wheelchair, and he was not ashamed to admit he had wept when she had eventually emerged from the coma and the doctors had confirmed that her spinal cord had not been damaged.

‘I put my life on hold during that time. Your name was on the list of people my PA said had called me, and I did try to phone you from Peru, but to be honest all I could think about was my sister. My relationship with my father was still strained, but I spoke to him to update him on Ianthe.
He mentioned that you were doing well at university and I thought …’ He shrugged. ‘You were obviously getting on with your life. It seemed fairer to leave you alone—especially when I didn’t know how long I would have to stay in South America.’

Louise cast her mind back to those dark days after she had lost the baby. Dimitri
had
called her and left a brief message with the number of his cell phone, but she had not tried to contact him again. In retrospect it was probably for the best that she hadn’t, she thought heavily. He’d had enough to worry about with his sister. The news that she had miscarried his child would have been a shock when he had not even known that she was pregnant.

She ran her mind over everything he had told her. According to him he hadn’t had an ulterior motive seven years ago but had genuinely been attracted to her. The tight knot of tension inside her loosened a little. If he hadn’t played her for a fool, as she had thought all this time, was it possible that their brief affair had meant something to him after all?

‘Louise, it was never my intention to hurt you. I can’t pretend that I will ever feel anything but contempt for Tina,’ Dimitri said harshly. ‘I saw from the start of her affair with my father what kind of woman she is. But you are not responsible for her actions. I blamed her for breaking my mother’s heart, but I blamed my father equally.’ He sighed. ‘We were both caught up in our parents’ relationship and the fall-out from it, but it had no bearing on how I felt about you seven years ago.’

Louise’s heart missed a beat. ‘How
did
you feel about me?’

He gave her a rueful smile. ‘That you were very lovely, and probably too young for me. After you left the island I couldn’t get you out of my mind. But then Ianthe was injured
and my place was with her. She needed me, and I was prepared to take care of her for the rest of her life if necessary. Seven years ago the time wasn’t right for us to have a relationship. But now fate has conspired to make us meet again,’ he murmured.

He was curious about the identity of this person Louise had told him she cared about. Evidently he or she meant a lot to her if she was prepared to go to the lengths she had to raise money for them. But was this person her lover? He couldn’t believe it, Dimitri brooded. The way she responded to him made him certain that he was the only male in her life.

He wished she trusted him—but it was hardly surprising that she didn’t after the lies her damned mother had told about him years ago. Trust was something that grew slowly as a relationship developed. But did he want a relationship with Louise that was based on any more than simply great sex?

‘When you walked into my office a week ago I felt like I’d been poleaxed,’ he told her roughly. ‘You looked stunning, and if I’d followed my first instinct I’d have made love to you there and then on my desk. I couldn’t forget you, and I used my interest in buying the island as an excuse to find you in Paris.’

Louise could not drag her eyes from Dimitri’s face. His voice was so soft that it seemed to whisper across her skin like a velvet cloak, enfolding her and drawing her to him. Her heart thudded as his head slowly lowered.

‘I’m glad you’re here with me,’ he said, and kissed her.

It was a slow, drugging kiss that stirred her soul. She could not resist him and parted her lips so that he could slide his tongue between them and explore the interior of her mouth until she trembled with need for him.

‘I’m glad too.’ The words slipped out before she could
stop them. But it was the truth, Louise acknowledged as Dimitri scooped her into his arms and laid her on the sun-lounger.

He knelt over her and she wound her arms around his neck to pull his mouth down to hers. This was the only place she wanted to be, and he was the only man she had ever wanted to be with.

The kiss became fierce and hungry as passion quickly took control. His hands shook as he untied the straps of her bikini top and pulled it down to bare her breasts.

‘I want you,
glikia mou
,’ he said thickly. ‘I don’t think I’ll ever have enough of you.’

She watched him pull off his shirt and shorts and her mouth went dry as she stared at his naked bronzed body. He was a work of art—as perfect as a Michelangelo sculpture. Her eyes traced the dark hair that arrowed down over his powerful abdominal muscles and grew thickly at the base of his manhood. The size of his arousal made her catch her breath, and molten heat flooded between her legs when she saw the fierce intent in his eyes as he straddled her.

Soon he would be inside her. She arched her hips, impatient for his possession, but he smiled and shook his head.

‘Not yet. Not until you are ready.’

He could arouse her simply with a look, with one of his sexy smiles, but the feel of his lips closing around one nipple and then its twin was so exquisite that she gave herself up to the mindless pleasure he was eliciting with his hands and mouth. Her heart thundered when he trailed kisses down her body. What he was doing seemed shockingly decadent when they were out in the open, with the hot sun beating down on them. But he slipped his hand between her thighs and gently parted her to explore her with his fingers and then his tongue, and the world disappeared as she became a slave to sensation.

‘Louise …’ Dimitri groaned when she reached for him and stroked the swollen length of his erection. ‘It has to be now.’

Sweat glistened on the bunched muscles of his shoulders as he positioned himself over her. He had never felt like this before—so out of control. He wasn’t sure he liked the feeling. He was used to being in command of himself and everyone around him. But when Louise smiled at him as she was doing now, with her eyes as well as her mouth, he felt—he felt that nothing in the world was more important than making her happy.

‘Dimitri …’ His name left her lips on a soft sigh and she looked into his eyes and saw the tiny gold specks dancing like flames. And then he thrust into her so powerfully that she gasped. But it was pleasure not pain that made her cry out, and as he withdrew almost fully and then thrust again she arched her back and welcomed each forceful stroke that took her higher and higher.

His
woman.
His
woman. The drumbeat thundered in Dimitri’s head and matched the rhythm of his movements as he quickened his pace. He was out of control, driven by a primitive need for this woman and only her.

Faster, harder … with each thrust Dimitri filled her—and Louise loved the way he moved inside her, making their two bodies one. She belonged to him—heart and soul. The thought floated into her mind as unobtrusive yet as tangible as a feather carried on a breeze.

And then he thrust the deepest yet and she stopped thinking, her entire being focused on the explosion of pleasure that detonated within her and sent shockwaves of sensation hurtling to every nerve-ending in a mind-blowing orgasm.

He came almost simultaneously. For a few seconds he fought it, but the intensity of pleasure caused by her internal muscles convulsing around him could not be borne for
long, and he gave a savage groan as the tidal wave crashed over him and he felt the sweet flood of release pump from his body.

For a long time afterwards Dimitri could not move. He felt utterly relaxed, with his head pillowed on Louise’s breasts, and he was reluctant to withdraw from her and break the bond between them. He hadn’t had sex that good since—well, he couldn’t remember when.
Maybe never
, whispered the little voice inside him. But it was still just good sex. There was no reason to think that the wildfire passion he had just experienced with Louise was anything more profound.

No reason at all, he reminded himself as he lifted his head from her neck and saw the sparkle of tears on her lashes.

‘Pedhaki
, are you all right? Why are you crying?’

Louise swallowed the tears that clogged her throat. She felt stupidly emotional and utterly overwhelmed. ‘It’s just … it was beautiful.’

Dimitri nodded. Beautiful was a perfect description. He couldn’t have put it better.