Bohze, she slayed him. He slid his hands along the length of her torso until he reached her chin and then he turned her face towards his so that his mouth could capture hers. It was a sweet kiss, almost tender after the wild sex. She wrapped her arms around his neck with such gleeful abandon he felt the knot in his chest tighten and chose to ignore it. For tonight, anyway.
‘Still cold, angel moy?’
‘Mmm … cold? I feel like I just flew into the sun.’
‘The feeling is mutual, I assure you.’
He moved off her, dealt with the condom and pulled his jeans up to cover himself before scooping her up into his arms.
‘Where are we going?’
‘My bed. That was just the first course.’
‘Well, if you’re half as good as your chef, I can’t wait for the next five.’
‘You realise you just signed the man’s termination papers,’ he muttered half seriously.
She punched his arm lightly. ‘I did not.’
Leo very nearly stumbled; it felt so nice to actually have someone play with him like this and he realised that he felt happy. The only times he’d ever felt like this had been during those rare times when his mother had been happy and Sasha had been alive.
He knew Lexi Somers was dangerous. Unfortunately, she was also addictive and he was nowhere near finished with her yet.
But after a week he would be. He didn’t doubt that for a second.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
‘STOP hovering. Go join Ty in the pool.’
Lexi released her tense shoulders and scowled down at Leo’s bent head, which was still damp from where he’d been playing with Ty in the water earlier. ‘You’ve been looking at the proposal for half an hour. Haven’t you finished yet?’
‘You’re going to dent my ego, angel, if you think I can rewrite a whole business proposal in half an hour.’
Lexi’s face fell and she tried not to cringe. ‘Is it that bad?’
‘Relax. It’s not bad at all. In fact, if you should ever find yourself out of a job I’d hire you in a heartbeat.’
‘Really?’
‘I don’t say things I don’t mean. From what I can see you’ve done your homework and there’s a definite need in the market. But explain this.’ He pointed to a row of figures in a graph. ‘It looks like you’re charging less than your current business, which seems fine while you build up your clientele, but it never evens out. Even taking into account the different demographic of the new centre, it seems low.’
‘The people using the childcare centre can’t really afford to pay more and there’s a lack of government funding in that zone, which would normally subsidise our income and which we’re hoping will change some way down the track.’
‘You can’t run a business on hope and if you’re not careful you’ll have to prop up this centre with your first, which will jeopardise both.’
‘I know, but if we put our prices up it defeats the purpose of what we’re offering.’
‘Can you cut back on staff?’
Lexi shook her head. ‘I won’t compromise quality of care for economic gain.’
Leo sighed. ‘I always knew you were a soft touch—I just didn’t realise how soft.’
Lexi glanced over at Ty and Carolina, splashing each other in the pool. They had all been playing similarly an hour earlier and Lexi’s heart still felt light at the memory of Leo interacting with his son. He still hadn’t told Ty he was his father and Lexi wondered when he intended to do that, but she had no doubt he would. Not that she should be thinking about that when she should be focused on work.
‘Is it so hopeless, then?’ she said, turning her mind back to business and trying to keep the despondency out of her voice.
Leo glanced at her, his eyes lingering on her mouth for so long she thought he might kiss her and her body started to tingle. Last night had been even more phenomenal than the first and now, even when she thought of Brandon, she couldn’t conjure up one ounce of insecurity.
‘You keep looking at me like that, I’ll drag you back to my lair and not let you out all day,’ he growled softly.
Her look at him!
Lexi’s eyes lifted from his mouth and the world receded. Then Ty squealed and the world returned with a thud.
‘Right.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Pull up a seat. You need a contingency plan.’
Lexi sat down and for the next hour became more and more overawed as he took her through one cost-saving idea after another.
‘Wow, I’m impressed. If I was a bank, I’d lend you a million dollars.’
His smile was wolfish. ‘How do you think I bought my first scaffolding company?’
‘Why scaffolding?’
‘Honestly, I wanted to avenge my uncle by closing down the company that had been responsible for his senseless death. Then one night, after I got into yet another fight I was sitting in the hospital waiting room nursing a broken nose when the richest man in Russia came on the news. There was something about the way he stood and the way others treated him … I wanted to be him. So I changed tack. Bought the company, sacked the incompetent management team and the rest, as they say, is history.’
‘How old were you?’
‘Eighteen.’
‘Eighteen!’ She frowned. ‘So you never went to university either?’
Leo looked up from the laptop and realised what he’d just said. He couldn’t remember ever suffering from a loose tongue before but, ever since he’d told her his ‘charming’ childhood story, he could feel that he had become less guarded around her. Which wasn’t great because he didn’t want to slip up and tell her about Sasha and the selfish part he had played in his death.
He thought about the email from Amanda and wondered why it no longer angered him as much as it had last night. The circumstances were still the same and yet he felt different. Tossing the ball with Ty and Lexi in the pool this morning hadn’t been as hard as he had thought it would be. In fact it hadn’t been a hardship at all.
Lexi’s conviction that he wasn’t like his father—that he had a choice—played over in his head. Was she right? Logically it made sense, and he certainly didn’t feel like he could physically hurt Ty, but could he take that risk and look after him full time on his own? No. It was too great a responsibility and if he got it wrong—the outcome could be fatal.
With past memories forcibly tamping down on his previous enjoyment of working alongside Lexi, he closed the lid of her laptop.
‘No,’ he said curtly. ‘And now I have a hotel to view on Santorini.’ He stood up. ‘I think you’ll find what we did this morning helpful.’
He was about to walk off when he made the mistake of glancing down at her. She wasn’t looking at him but he could see that his churlishness had hurt her and something twisted in his gut. It was because of last night. It was because some bastard had hurt her and he didn’t want to add to the damage he had done to her self-confidence. In fact last night he’d gone out of his way to make her feel cherished. Hardly a hardship, given how turned on she made him feel. But she also made him feel other things he’d rather not name, let alone face.
‘Why don’t you come with me?’ The words were out of his mouth before he’d fully formed the thought and she looked at him with surprise.
‘Seriously?’ The smile she shot at him was beyond beautiful.
‘I don’t see why not. It’s a tourist destination. You’ve never been. You can look around while I work.’ He made it sound like a no-brainer but he was questioning his own sanity in making the offer.
‘Okay. Great.’
‘Meet me at the tender in twenty minutes,’ he said sharply.
Fifteen minutes later, Leo marched towards the lower deck, snapping instructions into his phone, and stopped dead as he saw Ty bouncing up and down on the white leather seat of the tender. His eyes flew to Lexi’s and he blanked out his moment of disquiet. When he’d extended the invitation he had meant it to be just for her.
‘I hope it’s ok
ay if Ty comes along,’ she said.
‘Of course.’ He inclined his head, remembering at the last minute that his agreement was to spend time with his son.
But he’d already put in an hour today.
The skin on his forehead pulled tight. If he wasn’t careful he’d be spending every minute of every day with both of them. And why didn’t that thought fill him with as much dread as it would have a week ago?
‘No. Absolutely not.’
‘But why not?’ Lexi persisted. ‘You’ve finished looking at the hotel and the beach is straight down that path. Have you ever been to a black sand beach?’
‘No, and I don’t want to.’
Lexi put her hands on her hips and stared straight into Leo’s aviator glasses. She knew he didn’t want to go to the beach and she hadn’t missed the look on his face when he’d approached the tender earlier and spotted Ty seated beside her. She knew he didn’t really want him here either but he’d made a promise to her yesterday that he would spend time with his son and she didn’t want to think that his promises were as hollow as her father’s.
Leo’s phone rang and he turned away to answer it and Lexi rolled her eyes.
‘Look, Lexi—horsies.’
Lexi followed Ty’s line of vision to a row of sturdy grey donkeys, resplendent in their multicoloured rugs and faded leather saddlery. Ty started towards them and Lexi grabbed his hand.
‘They’re donkeys, sweets, and we can’t go that way. Have a look at these colourful rocks instead.’
She didn’t think he was going to cooperate but then he acquiesced and moved towards the various-sized volcanic rocks lining the ancient path. She watched him squat down on the side of the path and saw one of Leo’s security team move into place nearby. The four men who seemed to follow Leo everywhere were so discreet she actually forgot they were even there.
Lexi cast her eyes around the arid landscape that was so unlike anything she had ever seen before. Tiny cobbled streets full of chatty tourists, incredibly beautiful views of a pristine blue sea from the various rocky outcrops and the quaint white cubed buildings, some with brilliant blue trim, tripping down the cliff faces.
But, as riveting as the scenery was Lexi still found her eyes drawn to Leo in his familiar crisp white shirt and suit trousers. Her eyes stripped away those clothes and she could so easily picture his wide shoulders and lean torso, his long, muscular legs. She knew he swam as a form of exercise but the cut of his body also came from centuries of strong alpha males who had fought the land, and each other, for their very survival.
To stop herself staring at him like an adoring fan she walked to the edge of the path and glanced down the winding red-dirt track to the beach below. It would be a shame to come all this way and not see the black sand but—
‘Ten minutes.’
‘Sorry?’ Lexi turned as Leo came up behind her.
‘Ten minutes and not a minute longer.’
Lexi beamed a smile at him when she realised he was relenting about going to the beach. ‘And, angel, don’t make me regret it.’ The words were gruff, but a smile tugged at the corners of his mouth and she felt gloriously happy.
‘Okay. But can we ride the donkey down?’
He shook his head as if she were a lost cause and set off down the path.
As they breasted the row of little donkeys Ty’s face lit up and she saw a resigned expression flicker across Leo’s. When he stopped to converse with the elderly white-haired guide with a bandanna tied around his neck and a blue beret shielding his head she hid her smile beneath the wide brim of her own hat.
She watched as he picked Ty up and perched him atop his chosen steed and felt as light as a bubble as he then proceeded to walk protectively beside him as the donkey set off at a snail’s pace down the hill.
He might not realise it, but he was slowly starting to build a connection with Ty and, once he did, she felt sure he wouldn’t be able to help falling in love with him. In fact, she sensed that he already was. The only thing she was really having trouble sensing was what was happening between the two of them.
She knew why she had slept with him last night of course. She had felt emboldened by his obvious desire for her and empowered by her renewed sense of self. He had made her feel sexy. Sensual. And it was proving a hard thing to give up, even though she knew he wasn’t interested in anything permanent. But that was okay, she reminded herself. Hadn’t she decided last night to stop worrying so much about the future and just live in the here and now?
And the here and now was scorching. Both the sun above her straw hat and the man walking alongside a donkey with his son balanced precariously on top.
To stop herself daydreaming, she let her eyes wander to the family of four ahead. The husband had his arm slung over his wife’s shoulders while their two girls giggled exuberantly and clung to their donkeys, the leather saddles creaking at each ungainly step the donkeys took.
The couple looked so relaxed and happy—comfortable in each other’s space—that it pierced Lexi to the core. This was what she had wanted for her own parents.
This was what she wanted for herself.
She glanced at Leo and realised he was watching the family as well. Then he turned, his eyes snagging with hers. Lexi felt as if she had her heart in her mouth and forced a nonchalant smile to her lips.
Yes, she might want this for herself one day but she wasn’t silly enough to think she would get it with him even if she wished it otherwise.
So much for not daydreaming.
Surprisingly, Leo found he was enjoying himself. He had walked the stinking donkey all the way down the hillside and was now standing on the pebbled black beach holding a fistful of colourful shells and rocks that Lexi and Ty had insisted on collecting along the shoreline. Lexi had rolled up her lightweight trousers, which clung like a second skin to her sexy bottom, and was holding Ty’s hand as the waves gently lapped at her ankles.
He thought of the couple he had seen walking their two girls on donkeys ahead of Ty’s and brooded. For a minute he had wanted to sling his arm over Lexi’s shoulders and draw her close but her cool smile told him he would be way off base in doing so and it had brought him to his senses. He might be still flummoxed with what it was about this woman that attracted him so much but he wasn’t going to be an idiot about it. And while he’d presumed that the attraction would start to wane after he’d had her, it was still early days yet. Give him a week with her in his bed and he’d see things differently.
‘Take your shoes off and come in,’ Lexi called out to him from the shoreline. ‘The water is amazingly warm and silky.’
Like her skin.
‘No.’ He cleared his throat. ‘I’m good.’
The bright smile she’d worn ever since he’d given in and agreed to take them to the beach dimmed a little and he felt like the world’s biggest spoilsport. He could enjoy a beach as much as the next person, damn it.
With that in mind, he pulled out his phone and called the tender to come and pick them up directly from the beach. If she wanted to enjoy a beach he’d take her to a real one that wasn’t crowded with noisy holidaymakers like this one.
Lexi closed her eyes and turned her face up to the sun and let another fistful of sugar-soft sand sift through her fingers as she lay on the beach chair Leo had organised to be delivered from the nearby yacht. The beach was privately owned and, since they were the only ones on it, it almost felt as if they were shipwrecked. Shipwrecked with an icebox full of treats and drinks, a beach umbrella to ward off the sun’s rays, since there were no actual trees on the island to speak of, and a mega-yacht anchored a little way out at sea with every conceivable luxury known to mankind. She smiled and nearly pinched herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming.
The only sound around her was the sound of Ty and Leo building a sandcastle by the water’s edge and the whisper of the gentle waves as they rolled on and off the beach.
This was so far removed from her real life it was like entering a
fantastic dream. She just had to keep reminding herself of that every time her mind started trying to build its own sandcastles in the air!
‘So what do you think of this beach?’ Leo’s deep voice rumbled from somewhere overhead and interrupted her happy thoughts.
Lexi squinted up at his dark outline and smiled. ‘It’s okay if you like this sort of thing,’ she mused as if she wasn’t sure if she did.
His eyes trailed over her and her nipples peaked. ‘It seems to me this is exactly the sort of thing you like.’
‘Well, the sand is very soft.’
‘And hot. Like you. And now me.’
‘You could always take a dip in the ocean to cool off.’
‘I do plan to take a dip,’ he said suggestively, ‘but it’s not in the ocean. Have you had enough of this beach for one day?’
Lexi felt a zing of excitement deep inside her as his brilliant blue eyes lingered on her lips. She had now. ‘Yes. You?’
‘No need to ask, angel.’
Leo quickly organised the tender to head over and pick them up and, after a shower and a light dinner, Lexi returned to her room and wrapped herself in an oversized cotton cardigan before wandering outside to her private balcony. She had thought about heading up onto one of the main decks for a relaxing drink but she was tired from all the sun and lack of sleep the night before, and didn’t want to appear as if she was deliberately seeking Leo out. Their relationship had shifted gear in a big way today and she didn’t know what to make of it or how to ask what he was thinking without appearing needy and insecure.
She knew he still had secrets and she didn’t feel as if she could truly let herself relax with him until she found out more about him. She was desperate to know who Sasha was for one, and why Leo’s dreams were so tormented. She’d been wrong about how he felt about Amanda and she didn’t want to make up stories in her head about Sasha either, but that seemed impossible for her not to do.
‘Is Ty asleep?’
Lexi felt Leo’s presence just before he spoke and looked over her shoulder, her heart skipping a beat at the sight of him, fresh from the shower in T-shirt and jeans. There was something about seeing him in casual gear that reached out to her. He looked like someone who was accessible and not the out of reach Russian oligarch that he really was. ‘Yes. He went out like a light half an hour ago.’
His Last Chance at Redemption Page 14