by Penny Jordan
Robert was staring at her. She had shocked him now, she recognised, but there was no triumph in the knowledge, only a dull, aching pain that told her how much she had wanted to believe what he had said to her…how much she had ached to believe that he cared about her.
‘Yes, that’s right,’ she repeated. ‘You said to George that you knew how to get rid of me…’
‘Not you… Oh, my God, how could you think…? Livvy, Livvy, I was talking about Sandra… That day—my secretary had rung me at the farmhouse; she had strict instructions not to get in touch with me unless it was absolutely urgent.
‘Gale had rung her demanding to talk to me about George. I already knew from you how angry she was, and apparently Sandra had been trying to make contact with me as well. I had to speak to George but I couldn’t do so with you around, so I drove into town to use the fax machine there.
‘When I eventually managed to make contact with George, I discovered that he had come to his senses where Sandra was concerned, but that she was trying to blackmail him over some letters he’d written to her.
‘When you heard me speaking to George later, it was Sandra I was talking about. Not you.’
Livvy looked at him. She could see that he was telling her the truth.
‘But that doesn’t alter the fact that you did lie to me about who you were,’ she told him shakily. ‘You say you love me…but how can I believe that when—?’
‘I lied to you because I was afraid, Livvy. You see, I knew the moment I set eyes on you how vulnerable I was to you, and the last thing I wanted in my life was that kind of vulnerability. When my first marriage broke up, I swore I’d never allow myself to get involved like that again. I didn’t love Claire and it was my pride that was hurt more than my emotions when I discovered the truth about her. My pride that made me determined never to let another woman get close to me.
‘I tried to convince myself that you were like her…to deny what I knew was happening to me; and then, when that didn’t work, I told myself it was just sex. Even then, though, I knew it wasn’t true. If it had been…
‘Well, work it out for yourself. If it had just been sex, would I have tried so hard to get you to leave? I knew then, you see. I knew that moment I touched you…held you…
‘And then, when it did happen. I didn’t even bother trying to fight it…I wanted you too much…’
He had closed the space between them and was reaching out to take her in his arms. Held close against his body, breathing in the wonderful, precious male scent of him, Livvy felt her anger starting to melt away.
‘But if I hadn’t come upstairs when I did…’
‘It wouldn’t have made any difference,’ he told her. ‘Sooner or later it would have happened between us…if not by accident…’
As she lifted her face to look up at him, he smiled at her and bent to whisper something in her ear that made her face flush slightly.
‘You see…I would never, never have let you get away from me…and once we had been lovers…
‘You do love me, don’t you?’ he whispered against her mouth, and beneath the words Livvy could hear the hesitancy and uncertainty. It swept away the last of her doubts.
‘Yes, I love you,’ she whispered back as she clung to him. ‘Like you, I didn’t want to.’
‘But, like me, you’ve discovered that there are some things, some emotions that we can’t control.’
She was still in his arms half an hour later when the telephone started to ring. Reluctantly pushing him away, she told him, ‘That will probably be Gale.’
‘Tell her you’re far too busy to talk to her now,’ Robert whispered against her throat. ‘Oh, and warn her that she’d better prepare herself for a wedding. A very early wedding…’
* * * * *
Now, read on for a tantalizing excerpt of USA Today bestselling author Carol Marinelli’s next book,
CLAIMING HIS HIDDEN HEIR
Seduced then dismissed by her demanding boss Luka, Cecelia’s hiding a secret—their daughter! But when Luka uncovers her deceit, there’s no escaping the consequences of her passionate surrender…
Keep reading to get a glimpse of
CLAIMING HIS HIDDEN HEIR
PROLOGUE
HE WOULD NOT be hiring Cecelia Andrews.
Property magnate Luka Kargas had already decided that Candidate Number Two would be his new personal assistant.
‘Ms Andrews is here for her interview,’ Hannah, his current PA, informed him.
‘There’s no need for me to meet her,’ Luka responded. ‘I’ve decided to go with Candidate Two.’
‘Luka!’ Hannah reproached, a little braver now that she was leaving. ‘At least have the decency to see her. She’s been through two extensive interviews with me, and as well as that it’s pouring outside. She had to come across London in the middle of a storm.’
‘Not interested,’ Luka said, because he didn’t buy into sob stories. ‘It’s a waste of my time.’
And a slice of Luka’s time was precious indeed.
But then Luka suddenly remembered that Ms Andrews had been personally recommended by Justin, a contact he wanted to keep onside.
‘Fine, send her in,’ Luka said, deciding to see her briefly but then to get rid of her as soon as he could.
Impatient fingers drummed the desk as he waited, and then Candidate Three was shown in.
‘Ms Andrews.’ Luka stood and shook her right hand, noticing that on her left she wore an engagement ring.
Nothing would induce him to hire her, for she would have to have the most patient fiancé in the world to tolerate the ridiculous hours she would have to devote to him.
And everyone knew his reputation.
He just had to give her a few minutes of his time so he could tell Justin that he had interviewed her but gone with another candidate.
‘Please,’ he said. ‘Take a seat.’
Cecelia knew that although he had called her Ms Andrews he was awaiting correction and an invitation to call her by her first name.
There would be no such invitation to do so.
Ms Andrews would do just fine, Cecelia had decided.
She had read about him, thoroughly researched him, and even been told by his current PA during two prolonged interviews about his bad-boy ways.
‘You would have to deal with his girlfriends, or rather his exes,’ Hannah had explained. ‘It can be quite a juggling act at times. Luka works hard all week and then works just as hard breaking hearts at the weekend.’
Cecelia had seen it all before, and not just through her work. She abhorred the rich, debauched kind of lifestyle he led and with good reason—her mother, Harriet, had lived and died the same way.
Still, Luka Kargas’s morals were his own concern, not hers. Cecelia had her sights set on working for royalty and he was a step in the right direction, that was all.
‘He has a yacht, currently moored in Xanero,’ Hannah had said.
‘That’s where he’s from?’ Cecelia checked, although she had found that out in her research.
‘Yes, though you won’t be expected to travel there with him and you won’t be involved with the family business there. Luka keeps that strictly separate.’
She would not be falling for him, Cecelia had reassured both his incumbent PA and herself. The only thing the career-minded Cecelia wanted from Luka Kargas was his name on her résumé and the glowing reference that, after a year’s hard work, he would surely provide.
But now she had finally met him, and as his long olive fingers had closed around hers, the very sensible Cecelia’s conviction that she would not be attracted to him in the least had wavered somewhat.
‘Hannah said you got caught in the storm,’ Luka frowned.
The skies had darkened just over an hour ago.
Luka, from his vantage point of the fortieth floor, had watched the black clouds gather and roll over London.
Candidate Two had arrived drenched and had asked Hannah for a ten-minute delay
before proceeding with the interview.
Usually that would have been enough to ensure a black mark against her name but, having watched the storm himself, Luka had accepted the excuse and the rather bedraggled candidate.
Cecelia Andrews was far from bedraggled, though.
She wore a dark grey suit that was immaculate, her blonde hair, worn up, was sleek and smooth, while her make-up was both discreet and in place.
Hannah had insinuated that a drowned rat sat in the entrance yet the woman who sat before him was far from that.
‘I got caught up in the storm,’ Cecelia said, ‘but I wasn’t caught out—I heeded the warnings.’
And she might want to start heeding them now, she thought, for the impact of him on her senses was like nothing she had ever known.
He wore a dark suit and tie and his crisp white shirt accentuated his olive skin; he hadn’t shaved that morning.
The air in the room had changed, as if the charge that had lit the sky for the past hour had joined them.
Luka Kargas was everything her aunt had warned her about, and though she had told herself she could handle it, and that there was no way she could ever be attracted to someone like him, Cecelia hadn’t allowed for the impact of Luka close up.
They skipped through the formalities, both determined to get this over and done with and move on with the day.
‘Hannah will have explained that the hours are long,’ Luka said.
‘She did.’
‘Sixteen-hour days at times.’
‘Yes.’ Cecelia nodded.
‘And there’s an awful lot of travel,’ Luka said. ‘Though for all that the working week is hell, you do get every weekend off.’
She smiled a tight, slightly disbelieving smile.
‘You do,’ Luka said, as he read those full lips. ‘Come Friday night, the entire weekend is yours.’
‘Though I’m guessing I wouldn’t be out of here by five p.m.?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Usually around ten.’
So not really the entire weekend to herself, Cecelia thought as his black eyes scanned through her paperwork. ‘Why are you finishing up with Justin?’
‘Because I didn’t want to live in Dubai.’
‘I go there a lot,’ Luka said, ‘which would mean, by default, so would you.’
‘That’s fine. I just don’t want to live there,’ Cecelia said, and she knew, she just knew, he was alluding to the fact she had a fiancé whose needs would have impacted on her decision.
He was right.
Gordon wouldn’t consider it.
‘Do you speak Greek?’ he asked.
‘No,’ Cecelia said, suddenly hoping it was a prerequisite for the role and that this torture would therefore come to an end. It was torture because her stomach seemed to be folding in on itself and she all of a sudden could feel the weight of her breasts. She had never had such a violent reaction to another person, though of course it was one-sided.
Luka Kargas looked thoroughly bored.
‘Do you speak any other languages?’ he asked.
‘Some French,’ Cecelia said, even though she spoke it very well and had both lived and worked in France for a year.
Anyway, he didn’t want her French, whether a little or a lot of it, for he screwed up his nose.
Good, because Cecelia had now decided that she did not want this job.
She liked safe, and for very good reasons.
Cecelia liked her world ordered, and ten minutes alone with Luka Kargas had just rocked hers.
His black eyes were mesmerising and his brusque indifference had her re-crossing her legs.
Until this moment, sex had been a perfectly pleasant experience, if sometimes a bit of a chore.
Now, though, she sat across from a man who made her think of it.
Actually sit and think about torrid, impromptu sex at two p.m. on a Monday afternoon, and that could never do.
‘Ms Andrews…’
‘Cecelia,’ she corrected, but only because she didn’t want to sound like some uptight spinster.
And she wasn’t.
She was engaged to be married, and right now she found herself desperately trying to hold onto that thought.
Oh, this really would never do!
‘Cecelia.’ He nodded. ‘I see that you don’t have any real experience in the hospitality industry.’
‘No, I don’t,’ Cecelia said. ‘Not a jot.’
‘A jot?’ His black eyes looked up and met her green ones and she saw that his were not actually black but the deepest of browns.
‘I don’t have any experience in the hospitality industry, none at all.’
‘And I note that you wear an engagement ring.’
‘Excuse me…’ Cecelia frowned ‘…but you can’t comment on that.’
He waved his hand dismissively.
Luka read her emergency contact and saw that it wasn’t her fiancé but, in fact, her aunt.
And she intrigued him a touch. ‘Are you engaged?’
‘Yes.’ Cecelia bristled. ‘Not that it’s any of your business.’
‘Cecelia, if you are considering working for me, then you might as well know from the outset that I am not known for my political correctness. I’ll tell it to you straight—I don’t want a PA who is in the throes of planning a big wedding, neither I don’t want someone who is going to have to dash off at six because her fiancé is sulking.’
Cecelia’s jaw tightened because at times Gordon did just that.
‘Mr Kargas, my personal life is not your concern and, let me assure you, it never will be.’
Never, because she was not taking the job!
He heard the double meaning behind her words and almost smiled but then checked himself.
‘Come over here,’ he said, and stood up and headed to the floor-to-ceiling windows.
It was like no interview she had ever experienced before, Cecelia thought as she stood and walked over to join him.
Gosh, he was tall.
And he smelt as if he had bathed in bergamot with a testosterone undertone.
‘See the view,’ Luka said.
‘It’s amazing.’ Cecelia nodded, looking out across a gleaming, wet and shiny London. The grey skies were starting to clear and black clouds were lined with silver but there was no rainbow that she could see.
‘It’s all yours,’ Luka said, and Cecelia frowned. ‘When you finish on a Friday, right up to Monday morning the world out there is your oyster.’ Then he looked over at her. ‘But when you’re here…’
He expected devotion. Cecelia got his meaning.
‘When can you start?’ Luka asked.
Before she declined, Cecelia took a deep breath and thought of the perks of this job—a salary that was almost twice her current one, endless travel and the Kargas name on her résumé for ever.
And then she thought of the pitfalls.
Sixty-hour weeks spent beside this stunning man.
Her attraction to him was as unexpected as it was unsettling.
She actually didn’t know what to do.
‘I’d like some time to think about it,’ Cecelia said in response to his offer.
‘Well, I’m looking for someone who trusts their own instincts and can make prompt decisions.’
Luka now wanted her working for him.
She had impressed him when he had not expected to be impressed, yet something told him that if she walked out of the door Cecelia Andrews would not be coming back.
He could feel her hesitation.
And because he was Luka Kargas he knew when to push, and how. ‘So, I’ll ask again, when can you start, Cecelia?’
Never! Her instincts screamed.
Yet she had so badly wanted this job and the challenge it would bring and, though he was undoubtedly attractive, Cecelia knew herself well enough to be certain she would never get involved with anyone at work.
‘Now,’ Cecelia said, shocked at her own decision. ‘I can start now.’
&nbs
p; ‘Then welcome aboard,’
And as he shook her hand, Cecelia told herself she could handle it.
Copyright © 2017 by Carol Marinelli
Don’t miss
CLAIMING HIS HIDDEN HEIR
by USA Today bestselling author
Carol Marinelli,
available May 2018 wherever
Harlequin Books and ebooks are sold.
www.Harlequin.com
ISBN-13: 978-1-488-09995-3
Vacation with a Commanding Stranger
First published in 1994 as FRENCH LEAVE
This edition published in 2018
Copyright © 1994 by Penny Jordan.
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