Still, she needed a bit of space, first. She needed to recalibrate. Because she’d expected that her temper would be involved, and she’d known deep down that what he would ask of her would feel unbearable, but what she hadn’t expected was her response to him. That wildfire that raged in her still, and led to an insidious little voice inside wondering if really, it wouldn’t be too bad, would it?
She’d wanted to rail at Isabel. It wasn’t enough that Isabel had dragged her into the Skalases’ harsh and cruel, glittering diamond-edge of a world back then, but now she was forced to return to it. To hand herself over to the architect of her first and greatest despair.
You are entirely too full of yourself, Constantine, she had told him. No wonder you’re so easily dismissed when you don’t have a blackmail scheme in your back pocket.
You are welcome to dismiss me, if you like, he had said in return. He’d even sounded encouraging. My understanding is that you love that little house of yours in London. What a shame it would be if you were forced to sell it, to keep both you and your mother afloat in these uncertain times. He had smiled when she glared at him. Alternatively, you can return in two days’ time, ready and willing to begin our torrid affair.
She was still having trouble with that. An affair with Constantine when she’d barely survived a kiss? A torrid affair?
What would become of her?
“You’re awfully quiet,” Isabel said softly. She blew out a breath. “Is it that terrible?”
And Molly couldn’t do it. She couldn’t tear out another chunk of her mother’s heart. Because that was the trouble with Isabel. Yes, she was impetuous and ambitious and had always had ideas far above her station. It was tempting to think of it as thoughtlessness, but it wasn’t. It was that heart of hers. Big and foolish, and entirely too willing to think the best of terrible people.
Molly knew. She had the same one in her chest.
“No, Mum,” she said, and summoned up a smile. “It’s really not bad at all. Who could have guessed that in all these years since last we saw him, Constantine Skalas stumbled over conscience?”
“No one will believe that,” her mother replied dryly. “Least of all me.”
“Well, he has,” Molly lied. “You can rest easy. He needs me to play a role, that’s all.”
Isabel frowned. “If the man needs an actress, he has the whole of the West End at his disposal, to say nothing of his liking for all of those bland little Hollywood types. Why would he need you?”
“He’s far too well-known to go out and hire someone. This little spot of blackmail helps him save face, that’s all.”
Molly almost believed herself, she sounded so matter-of-fact. She smiled, then kept smiling, even though her mother’s gaze was entirely too knowing.
Maybe, if she just kept smiling, she would convince herself, too.
“And who knows?” she asked merrily. “It might even be fun.”
CHAPTER FOUR
IT WAS NOT until Molly reappeared at the house in Skiathos two days later that Constantine admitted to himself that he hadn’t actually known if she was coming back at all.
And he was not suited to uncertainty. Nor used to it.
Not since Demetrius had died, at any rate, taking with him his cruel reversals, endless judgments, and what Constantine had always thought was a truly sadistic delight in the art of the sucker punch, both literal and figurative.
He had not missed any of that since he and Balthazar had buried the old man with all the pomp and circumstance of a monarch, according to his typically narcissistic instructions. Constantine had stood in the famed Metropolitan Cathedral in Athens that surely should have crumbled around him at his entrance, to say nothing of his father’s many offenses against God and man, and had tried to look suitably grim and somber.
When all he’d been thinking was, good riddance, old man.
He did not appreciate the return to unpredictability. He resented any and all memories of his father as it was.
It was one more charge to lay at Molly’s feet.
Constantine had been forced to sit about in that odd old house he’d never cared for, waiting. He had felt so worldly at twenty that he’d thought having to leave his admittedly nonchalant studies in London at all was a personal attack. He had especially disliked having to spend that first year’s holidays marooned on this island with a new family he’d despised, as his father had demanded. This time around, as then, he passed the time by outlining all the ways he would take out his retribution on Molly and her mother. It was an exercise that had once filled him with what he’d assumed was joy. By a process of elimination.
Surely it should have done so again, especially given the fact that this time, he had a great deal more leverage. Yet as the two days he’d given Molly dragged by, he found himself far more invested in her return to Skiathos than he should have been.
Because it was only one of the options he had before him, as well he knew. He should have been equally invested in all of them. Forcing her to sell that charming little Mews house of hers would deliver a serious blow, for example. He knew that. He should have been moving on that angle while he waited.
The problem was that now, having seen her in person again, Constantine was far more interested in the angles that involved the flesh. Her flesh and his. He had always viewed sex as akin to the hotel buffets he’d observed in the properties he owned—readily available and very, very rarely worth the trouble. He had certainly never had to convince a woman to sleep with him.
In point of fact, he was far more often engaged in scraping lovers off, not obtaining them.
Yet Molly was different.
He told himself it was because of their history. Because of her déclassé mother and the fact they’d all been forced to share space—this space. That was what made her an obsession. That was why he sometimes felt haunted by her. And had for years.
But he had the taste of her in his mouth now and he couldn’t seem to get past it.
And he had expected that Molly, in person, would prove the rule that photography was a very specific kind of magic. He’d expected her to look sallow. To have terrible skin, lank hair, or both. To make it clear, up close, that she had good bones but that all those pictures of her were simply make-believe.
Instead, he’d been astonished—and furious, frankly—to discover that if anything, the camera was unkind to Molly Payne.
Because she was far more beautiful in person than she’d ever been on film.
Constantine had been tempted to throw away all his plotting, keep on kissing her, and to hell with their past.
Really, that alone should have had him calling off this whole thing and moving against Isabel a different way. Because clearly, he was unprepared for the reality of his former stepsister, and the fact that he didn’t wish to accept that didn’t make it any less true.
That he’d woken in the night, his body hard and aching for her, his head filled with intense images of the two of them together, had not helped.
He’d stood out on his balcony in the dark, too aware that he need not suffer through his own desire if he did not wish it. He could go down into Skiathos Town and have his choice of women to slake his lust. If he listened, he could almost hear the sound of the island’s nightlife on the breeze. And it had been a very long time since he’d had to control his own desires, if ever. He was not certain he had ever waited for a specific woman in his life. There was never a need for specificity when the world was filled with so many options.
Go, he had ordered himself. Get a woman and get a handle on this madness now.
But he hadn’t taken his own advice.
And he did not wish to acknowledge the sense of something far too close to relief he felt when his staff announced Molly’s arrival. Precisely two minutes before her two days were up.
It wasn’t relief, he told himself now. It was merely
a well-earned pleasure that his plan was continuing as it should, particularly now she’d returned.
He did not have her shown into his father’s wretched study this time. He had spent his morning dealing with any number of tedious business concerns and was now sitting out on one of the many terraces, taking in the sparkling blue of the cove below him. Still, he knew the moment she rounded the corner, taking the outside stair from the front of the house, draped in bougainvillea all the way. And this time, there was no click of high heels against the stones.
Constantine smiled, for he could only assume that meant the battle was on.
Sure enough, when Molly finally presented herself before him—clearly in no rush—she wore a black dress that had to be at least three sizes too large for her elegantly slender frame. Her long blond hair was pin straight and tucked behind her ears. She even wore trainers. She looked like what she was, a model dressing down, but if she was trying to make some kind of point about how unglamorous she was in the everyday, it was ruined by the simple fact that there was no disguising the simple perfection of her features.
A truth he had spent very little time acknowledging was that her features had always been perfect. She had been a distracting, arresting teenager, something he at twenty had noticed and then studiously ignored. Her mother’s beauty had been softer, more accessible. More common, he would have said. And had.
All of Molly’s features, taken separately, had seemed too bold or too full-on. Like that mouth of hers or her commanding height. Even back then, the way they’d all come together had always and only led to being found stunning, not pretty. For she was nothing so simple as pretty. She was nothing accessible or easy. Hers was a haunting beauty, and a shapeless black dress could do nothing at all to disguise it.
“I see you dressed up for this auspicious occasion,” he drawled, lounging in his chair as if he had spent the morning here, lazing the day away. He imagined she probably thought he had, and as ever, it amused him to let people think the worst of him.
“I thought you would appreciate the mourning attire,” she said, smiling. “It seemed appropriate.”
“You have no idea how much.” He was wearing his unofficial uniform when in the Greek islands, or forced aboard a yacht. Linen trousers that breathed in the heat and one of his favorite T-shirts, and he was aware that when he had not bothered to shave, as today, it made him look disreputable. All the better. “Have you come to mount more arguments? To see if you can somehow change my mind? You won’t, but it might be entertaining to hear you out.”
“What would I do?” she asked, widening her eyes a little, though he did not believe the innocent act for a moment. “Appeal to your better nature? Does such an animal exist?”
Constantine found himself grinning at that, which was not precisely how he had planned to conduct his great revenge. But what did it matter if they ended up in the same place? They would. He would see to it they did.
“Then dare I trust that you are here for the long haul?” he asked her, idly, as if whether or not she stayed was of little personal interest to him.
Because it should not have mattered.
“You already told me I have a martyr complex, Constantine.” She held her arms out at her side, as if she anticipated a crucifixion. “Here I am, ready and willing to be burned all nice and crispy on the pyre of your choosing.”
“I’m delighted to hear it.”
He stared at her for a long moment, taking in the mulish set of her chin and the way her clavicle presented itself from the wide neck of the dress she wore, begging for his mouth.
Oh yes, this was happening.
Finally.
“I’ll be honest with you, Constantine,” she was saying, her voice bright enough that she might have been at a cocktail party instead of her own doom. “You don’t look delighted. I would say rather that you look a little...dark.”
“You have no idea, hetaira. But enough small talk.” He settled back in his chair and let his smile go lazy. “Take off all your clothes.”
And she was not so mulish suddenly. She did not precisely jolt in surprise, but he thought he saw the hint of it, quickly repressed. Her eyes, that arresting, arctic blue, deepened into something that almost matched the Aegean Sea stretched out behind her.
Almost.
“You don’t waste any time, do you?” she asked, still staring back at him.
“I like to start as I aim to go on,” he replied. “And, Molly. You are stalling.”
He saw her gather herself, and he wondered if she would balk now. It wouldn’t surprise him. After all, she was clearly a proud creature, or she could never speak to him the way that she did. Constantine, too, knew something of pride, and could not imagine any scenario in which he would subject himself to another’s will in this way.
But even as that notion bloomed in him, he brushed it aside. They were nothing alike. He had no idea why he’d thought such a thing in the first place.
“And what happens if I can’t go through with this?” Molly asked quietly.
“No one is forcing you,” Constantine reminded her. He made a small show out of a shrug. “There is no gun to your head. You are not imprisoned here. The doors are open, the gate is unlocked, and you may leave whenever you wish.”
“How generous.” Her eyes glittered. “Yet if I do leave, you will ruin my mother. Possibly permanently. And who knows if you’ll stop there. You might also take my house. Then make it difficult for me to work, I’m assuming. And probably, in the end, ruin me, too. Is that right? That has to be the goal or why bother?”
Constantine sighed as if pained. “It is a pity. But in life, there are consequences.”
“This is how you sleep at night?”
He laughed. “Oh, hetaira, I have never had a night of troubled sleep in my life.”
“Why would you? That requires a conscience.”
“Now you’re boring me.” He shook his head. “Make your choice. Stay or go, as it please you. But if you stay, you heard my instruction. I would suggest you follow it.”
“What a lovely invitation,” Molly said, through her teeth. “How can I possibly refuse?”
Neither one of them pointed out that, of course, she couldn’t.
Then, with a notable surliness he almost applauded, because she made so little attempt to hide it, she toed off her trainers. One, then the next. Then, with the level of sensuality Constantine would expect to see in a doctor’s surgery, she pulled off the dress, tossing it onto one of the chairs nearby. Then she stood there before him in nothing but a pair of thong panties.
God help him.
And he could see that she had shifted into her work mode, as he liked to call it. She’d become the other version of herself. Magda. Her gaze became haughtier, sharper. The way she stood changed—to encourage, not touching, but looking. A fierce stance that commanded attention. She was suddenly imperious as she stared at him, almost as if she was challenging him. Did he dare to come before her without a camera to begin worshipping her with its lens, as most did when they beheld her?
And why not? Molly was a masterpiece.
She was all long, elegant lines and surprising curves. Two perfect breasts sat high on her chest, the nipples tightening as he looked at them. If Molly noticed, and Constantine was sure she did, she gave no sign.
Instead, Molly continued to hold his stare in that challenging manner of hers as she bent, stripped off her thong, and tossed it to the side as well.
Then she stood again, looking utterly at her ease. Her hands by her sides, her weight shifted to put her at her best advantage, and how could he not appreciate the view? He more than appreciated it.
“Well?” she asked, and not in the tone of one who had any doubts about what she was presenting.
“You have a very strange take on the idea of servitude,” Constantine pointed out. “I find this amazing,
given your mother’s initial profession.”
“Yes, cleaning a house is like brown eyes,” Molly agreed, her tone like a lash. “Passed down generation after generation, by genetics. I was personally born with a broom in one hand.”
“Here are the rules,” Constantine said, ignoring that. “As you are well aware, this is the house where my father always insisted we live without a full staff. I assume because it gave him pleasure to make your mother do the housekeeping. I will not do the same.”
“Whyever not? I was sweeping up before I could walk. A family trait.”
“My assistant stays in the guesthouse and is rarely here in the main house. And never without advance warning. There are guards at the gate, as I’m sure you saw, but they do not venture within. I tell you this to forestall the inevitable argument you’re going to attempt to have with me when I tell you that while we are here, unless I specifically tell you otherwise, you will be naked.”
“Naked,” Molly repeated. “I’ll just be wandering about, draping myself on the furniture, naked. That doesn’t sound hygienic.”
“Do you have a medical issue that should be taken up with a doctor?” he asked, silk and menace and entirely too much delight. “Do I need to bring in a medical team?”
“I’m sadly all too healthy and not about to die from a stroke, which is a tragedy.” She glared at him. “But in case you’ve forgotten, I sunburn very easily.”
“That will not suit me at all,” Constantine assured her. “But no need to fear.” He nodded toward the table beside the chair where she’d tossed her clothes. “I brought you some sunscreen. Bring it to me, please. I’ll apply it.”
Then he watched, fascinated, as she looked from the tube of sunscreen to him, then back again, clearly fighting with herself.
He sat back and enjoyed the show.
And, if he was honest with himself, enjoyed the moment or two to pull himself together, because he had not quite anticipated the effect this would have on him.
Constantine had seen more beautiful women naked than he could begin to count, but this was different. She was different.
Her Deal With The Greek Devil (Mills & Boon Modern) (Rich, Ruthless & Greek, Book 2) - Caitlin Crews Page 5