by Fiona Murphy
He checked his watch. Where the hell was she? He demanded a scotch from the attendant and stalked the luxury Learjet until he heard the car pull up outside. He informed the pilot they would be ready in five minutes. Elise entered the plane breathless from her run up the stairs and he forced himself to sit before he pulled her into his arms then and there. His instructions were clipped and he focused on the window.
Ellie was beginning to wonder if she had made Dmitri Markhoff angry somehow. He had barely looked at her and when he spoke, he was short and direct. Later, as she hurried to keep up with him, Ellie made a face at his strong back. The conference room she entered went from buzzing to dead silence at the sight of Dmitri Markhoff. He seated her at his right and the man who had been standing beside the chair moved to the back of the room. What followed over the next half hour opened her eyes to the raw power Dmitri Markhoff had.
She did her best to focus on taking notes of what was said but she kept getting caught up in the lethal intelligence of Dmitri Markhoff and his unwavering control. She was so fascinated by the display, it took a moment after he stood and walked out for her to follow. He waited by the elevator with a heated glare as she rushed to his side. He didn’t say a word on the way down to the waiting car and Ellie swallowed the dozens of questions that floated through her head over what had happened in the conference room. Instead, she wrote them down before she could forget them. Later, when he didn’t look like he wished he’d left her in Alexandria, she would ask him.
When she was finished, he pulled the pad from her hand and studied her writing. Her palms began to sweat as he read through them. He handed it back to her with the smallest tip up of the edge of his beautifully molded lips.
“Good questions Elise, keep writing them down and when I think you’re ready I’ll answer them.” He turned back to the window and she was so relieved she almost let it go but couldn’t.
“Ellie, not Elise, I go by Ellie.” Her voice came out sharper than she intended. The hair on the back of her neck stood up in reaction to the way he said her name. The way he said it, his accent caressing the word, made it sound devastatingly sexy.
He turned to face her, his face gave nothing away. “Ellie is childish and does not connote the woman you are.”
He went back to the window and Ellie fumed. Dmitri Markhoff had taken over the company she worked for, not her. “You can’t just change someone’s name like that. I don’t want to go by Elise.”
“Tell me, when was the first time someone called you Ellie.” His attention was back on her.
She swallowed hard, his eyes met hers, and just as she had that morning, she couldn’t understand why her body vibrated with anticipation. Anticipation of what, her mind fought to understand. “Greg... my great-aunt was the housekeeper for him and his father, Jasper. They were very kind, when she took me in; they welcomed me into their home as well.” Remembering that first meeting when she fell in love with Greg. and he ruffled her hair, called her Ellie teasingly, and had done so ever since. It was easier to remember and think of Greg. Greg was safe.
He was studying her intently and Ellie felt trapped in his gaze, wishing she had kept her mouth shut.
“How old were you?”
“Sixteen.”
“So, for sixteen years you were Elise, until a boy happened along and changed that. Greg Turner is gone and out of your life. I refuse to call you Ellie, it isn’t going to happen.” She wanted to argue but there was a fire burning in his eyes that scared her. The fire began to sink into her and through her. She was hot, her clothes too tight, her skin too tight. What was happening to her? His cell phone rang and she had never been so relieved in her entire life as she was when he finally took his eyes off her and answered the call.
Sucking in air in a rush and struggling to get her body under control, Ellie stared blindly out the window. She wondered what she had gotten herself into and if she would get out of it whole and intact. As she studied Dmitri below her lashes, she didn’t think it was likely.
Chapter Two
Ellie fumbled with the coffee maker and cursed as she splashed coffee over her suit and along the front of her. Instantly, Dmitri was in the tiny kitchenette to see what had happened. She blushed as his eyes roamed over her.
“I told you to order down for coffee.”
Daring to argue with him was stupid, she knew she would never win but she felt safer when she kept him at a distance with an argument. “There’s a coffee maker right here, it seems silly. But now my suit needs to be cleaned, and I don’t have any others that are clean. I sent them down yesterday and they haven’t been delivered.”
“They won’t be returned, I had them thrown away. Change into a pair of jeans and tee shirt for now. We have two hours until our flight is due to leave. I’ll send that down to be cleaned and you can wear it to the meeting we have in Chicago this afternoon. When the meeting is over we’ll go shopping.” He made the announcement as he walked back to the desk set up in the sitting room of the hotel room they had been staying in Miami for the last week.
“What? You had them throw my clothes away! Why would you do something like that? I thought we weren’t leaving until the Hopper deal was done.”
Dmitri sipped the remnants of his coffee and ordered down for more coffee before answering her. “Hopper has played his last hand, he’s bluffing and I’m moving on. Your clothes are awful. Do I seem the kind of man to dress in frumpy, baggy and ill-fitting clothes?”
“N-No.” She stuttered as she fought for control of her anger.
“Then neither will you. You are with me now, and when you are seen with me, you are an extension of me.”
“I’m not with you! I work for you and that’s all!” His words caused her body to riot; no, she didn’t want this.
It was back... that hot glare she remembered from the car that first day. In the week since they had been in Miami she had often felt his eyes roam over her, leaving fire everywhere they touched. Yet, he hadn’t allowed his gaze to get as hot as it had that first day. Four times he had touched her in a week, and she could list the time and date and where they were when it happened, as every single touch had scorched her skin. Slowly, his eyes melded to her with every step as he came back to her. “You wear the clothes I buy you, or you wear nothing at all.”
It was a threat and a promise and Ellie wasn’t sure which one thrilled her more. She told herself she didn’t want this but her body ignored her, all she knew was a slow fire began low in her body and she swayed toward him. The knock at the door followed by the announcement of room service pulled her from his spell, and she flushed at her reaction to him.
“Go get changed so room service can take them.” It was an order and she fled.
Dmitri watched Elise go as if she was being chased, and he sighed as he was relieved she had finally figured out she was. His cock was hard and he fought to get himself back under control. Room service knocked again and he let the woman into the room. By the time she was finished setting up the coffee and pouring, Elise was back, wrapped in a bathrobe and handing her clothes over. He watched with a smile as she ran back to her room without looking his way.
It had been a very long week, cold showers were becoming the norm and hot, wet dreams were how he awoke. A week ago, he thought he would have her in his bed by now, it was killing him but he was determined to go slow. A week ago, he believed he was getting a beautiful woman hiding her sexuality behind frumpy clothes and ugly glasses. What he got was someone who had no idea at all about her sexuality; she was untouched. The realization in the car that first day had stunned him, and made his cock so hard he still didn’t know how he had managed not to blow his load right there in the car.
It had been there, in her face, as she relayed meeting Greg Turner for the first time at sixteen. She believed she had fallen in love at first sight and there had been no one else who existed for her. It had been there in the confusion over her attraction to him. The little arguments and biting comments she attempted
to push him away with. She had no idea what real sexual longing was. So, when she wanted him, she struck out, the need she felt coming out as the lovely little bits of fire she felt inside. It was delicious to watch her try to put him at a distance, and not understand why it didn’t work. While there was a very slight chance there had been someone before Greg Turner, who simply hadn’t been able to bring her to climax, he didn’t think it was likely. Elise Shaw was untouched, he would be the first, and that thrilled him as much as it horrified him.
He knew he should send her out of his reach. He was too old for her, he had far too much experience and he had no idea what he wanted from her beyond to have her beneath him, moaning his name. Even as he thought it, he discounted it. His would be the first cock inside her, his would be the first name she cried out in ecstasy, no one else but him. She entered the room again in jeans that were faded and torn. Her shirt was old and three sizes too big. She was ignoring him and he allowed it, for now. Soon he would have his way.
Ellie sighed as the meeting came to an end, and went over her notes to make sure she hadn’t missed anything. She felt Dmitri’s eyes on her and pretended she didn’t, it was getting harder. It had been only six hours since the moment in the hotel room in Miami when it had finally clicked inside her. He wanted her. As she looked back over the last week, it shouldn’t have surprised her but it did. Ellie had no experience with a man wanting her. Only now could she also admit she wanted him too, wanted him so badly her body ached with it. The tension and unease were because she had no idea what it was she wanted. She had dreamed of sweet kisses and gentle caresses with Greg. Dmitri made her want to grab, cling and melt into him. Those were things, longings, she had never felt before and was having the hardest time understanding.
For seven years, her mind had been fixed on one thing, Greg. Since meeting him at sixteen he had been the one and only thing she ever wanted. When her aunt passed away the year Ellie turned eighteen, she had just graduated from high school. Without plans for after high school, Ellie slipped right into her aunt’s place as the housekeeper for Jasper and Greg. She had been content in her place, happy to see Greg every day, waiting for the day he would finally turn to look at her with love in his eyes. The idea of college never crossed her mind, why would she need it when all she wanted was to be a wife and mother? It had only been when Greg’s secretary had left for another position and Greg suggested Ellie step in, until he found someone else, that she had thought of a world outside Greg and Jaspar’s home.
She had been a few weeks shy of her twentieth birthday when she became Greg’s assistant. She had been open to the new experience but her learning curve had been steep. Embarrassed by her lack of knowledge of the company, and even how to type a letter, she had spent hours late at the office learning everything she could. Soaking it up like a sponge, it had been so interesting; it hadn’t felt like work at all. They had several Hispanic workers in the factory and they worked with a German distributor. Ellie had jumped at the chance to learn a new language to effectively communicate and understand how the company did business. The languages had come easily to her with the help of the workers who had appreciated her attempt to learn. A German assistant, her own counterpart had been so helpful with pronunciation and learning of slang and they had struck up a light friendship, until the woman had left last year to have a baby.
Pam was back after having gone off to college, but since her parents were upset because she had failed out of college, she begged Ellie to share an apartment. Ellie hadn’t wanted to, but Pam had begged and pleaded until she had given in. She barely saw Greg at home anyway, and as long as she was still working with him through the day, she was content to move in with Pam. Still, her world felt small with just Pam, Jasper, Greg and Steeltech the focus of it.
Pam had often pushed her to go out with other men, to experiment. Although, she had heard Pam bring one man or another back to their apartment, Ellie had never once been curious. Naïve, childish, dreams of kisses with Greg were all she had. All her romance novels were sweet and faded to black and she was content with that. She wanted Greg to show her what he wanted and be the first person to introduce her to lovemaking.
Dmitri Markhoff was not interested in lovemaking, he wanted sex. The source of her turbulent thoughts pulled her up from the conference table and guided her out of the room with a hand at her back. Those touches set off butterflies in her stomach, so big they might as well have been hummingbirds. She didn’t want this but she couldn’t deny that her body loved his touch. Her breasts peaked and hardened just from the feel of his eyes on her. Her body longed for him to touch her more than his so far casual touches, but how, she wasn’t even sure. How could she want him when she wasn’t even sure what she wanted? Ellie wasn’t stupid, she knew the mechanics of sex, but she’d never even seen a man naked before. When she had been very young and her body was changing, she had touched herself, there, but only a few times. The feelings had been so strong they scared her. She never had since, too scared of getting caught by her mother and then her aunt, too scared at how out of control it made her feel. Shame burned through her as she admitted that the hot glare he had flashed her in the back of the car in Miami had flooded her body with hot, sticky need she hadn’t felt since she was thirteen.
Ellie had no idea how to handle the situation, the idea of just sex with Dmitri should have filled her with loathing, but it didn’t. It filled her with a hungry need she could only work to stamp down. She had no idea how she could tell him no. She wasn’t a good liar. He would see through her and be mad at her for being one of those women who said no when they meant yes.
Screeching tires pulled her from her thoughts, and she looked up to see the chauffer had the back door open, waiting for her. Startled, she exited to find herself on a busy street and Dmitri waiting for her at the door of an exclusive looking boutique. She looked back at the car but he said her name with a husky command and she went to him. His hand was against her back again as they entered the boutique.
One of the two women, a tight faced, anorexic looking bottle-blonde gave a limp smile and her name as Tanya. The other woman had jet-black hair and moved like a model. A shining smile of welcome made her that much prettier and she introduced herself as Jackie. Jackie moved to the front of the boutique and changed the sign to closed and turned off the outside lights. “I have pulled several items, Mr. Markhoff. Tanya, please show Elise back to the dressing room and make her comfortable. Mr. Markhoff, please look over the items on the bar and give me your thoughts. Once you’ve found things you approve of we can have Elise try them on.”
Ellie smiled nervously at Tanya as she followed the woman, “I’m so sorry you’re here past your closing time.”
Tanya rolled her eyes, “We aren’t supposed to close for another hour. We just closed the shop for your boyfriend. Trust me, I’m not staying late for some fat chick with a rich boyfriend. I wouldn’t work late, because I don’t get overtime.” With that ugly remark, the woman left Ellie alone in the large dressing room.
The callous words shocked Ellie and she folded onto the chaise lounge in the dressing room. She told herself not to cry, that it was stupid to cry. Ellie had been called fat before and she would not get upset when someone told her the truth—that would be stupid. She was a size fourteen, and despite constant dieting, she had never gone below a size ten. For Tanya and most of the fashion world, a size fourteen is fat. Ellie had never been able to shrug off the word, simply pretending not to hear them. But Tanya had been brutally unkind. Closing her eyes against the tears didn’t help, they rolled down her cheeks and the more she tried to fight them, the harder they came. A tap on the door was the only warning she had before Jackie was there with several hangers of clothes. Ellie shook her head, “I’m not trying anything on, give me a minute and I’m leaving.”
Dmitri was reviewing the items Jackie had picked out and was happy with most of the selection, picking out those he didn’t like, when Jackie told him what Elise had said. Damn it,
he thought this had been resolved. He heard her sniffling before he opened the door but the sight of her in tears was a blow to his chest that caught him completely by surprise.
When the door flew open, Ellie was up from the chaise, hoping to make it out the door before Dmitri caught her. He was on her before she took two steps. His hand enclosed her wrist in an unbreakable grip. His accent was stronger than she had ever heard it before. “Why are you crying?”
She shook her head, she couldn’t look at him, but he wouldn’t let her go and his other hand was around her arm, pulling her to him. Her body came alive and it terrified her. “It doesn’t matter.” She managed to sputter.
“The hell it doesn’t matter. Tell me, right now.”
“She called me fat, and she’s right. I shouldn’t cry about it, it’s stupid to cry about it.”
His grip went tighter and his words were ice. “Who told you that? Which one of them said that?”
“Tanya.”
His hand came up under chin and tugged her face up to his. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped under her eyes. “That bitch has no idea what she’s talking about. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He tucked the handkerchief away and his other hand threaded through her hair and pulled the clip out that contained her hair in a sloppy bun. His hand went back into her hair and his grasp was a fraction below punishing. “You are beautiful. Every feature on your face fits perfectly and is achingly sweet. Your body isn’t a stick figure with a lollipop head. You have curves that are dangerous to my peace of mind.” His hands slid down her neck leaving a trail of fire and goose bumps. He pushed the jacket from her shoulders, a finger went up to the top of her plain grey blouse and then both hands were there, ripping it open.