The Greek Demands His Heir (The Notorious Greeks Book 1)

by Lynne Graham

  Leo’s friend was in private practice and her pregnancy test was processed at supersonic speed before the suave, smoothly spoken doctor gave her a brief physical check-up and the usual advice offered to pregnant women.

  Having satisfied Leo’s request, Grace was quiet when she slid back into his limousine and thinking about her baby. Possibly she had been a little too quick to consider the avenue of adoption, a solution that would enable her to continue her life after the birth as though she had never been pregnant. Obviously the idea of reclaiming normality had appeal but what sort of normality would it be when she had to live for ever after with the awareness that she had given up her baby? A cold chill clenched Grace’s spine at the prospect of that ultimate consequence. Adoption was final and could well sentence her to live with a secret heartbreak and sense of loss for the rest of her days. Suddenly, the chance to think at her leisure, while not having to worry about where or how she lived or what other people thought, shone like the most luxurious indulgence in front of her. Leo, she dimly appreciated, could talk a lot of good sense when it suited him to do so.

  When they arrived at the block of exclusive apartments where Leo lived, his guards and her luggage went in the service lift, imprisoning her with Leo in the opulent confines of a far smaller and less utilitarian lift. She met his stunning eyes once and her heart stuttered as she immediately turned her head away, only to be greeted with a mirrored reflection of him instead: the luxuriant blue-black hair she wanted to tousle with her fingers, the arrogant angle of his head and the firm jut of his jaw, the sheer blazing confidence that inexplicably drew her like a magnet. Her mouth drying, she swallowed with difficulty. She felt out of step with herself, challenged to recognise the stranger she became in Leo’s presence, a stranger with random, often inappropriate thoughts and no control over her own body.

  ‘Stop fighting it,’ Leo growled soft and low, his abrasive accent purring along the syllables.

  Grace glanced up. ‘Fighting what?’

  ‘This...’

  And he reached for her, pulling her up against his big powerful frame with easy strength. In unmistakeable contact with the long, hard length of his erection Grace’s tummy flipped and her knees turned to water. Dangerous heat shimmied between her legs.

  ‘It’s crazy—’

  ‘The most powerful craving I’ve ever felt,’ Leo sliced in. ‘I felt it the first time I saw you. I fought it to let you walk away. But I’m done being sensible.’

  Completely disconcerted by that blunt admission, Grace parted dry lips. ‘But—’

  ‘No...buts, meli mou,’ Leo husked against her cheek, his breath fanning her parted lips. ‘The words you’re looking for are Yes, Leo.’

  A strangled little sound of amusement escaped Grace. ‘I hope you’re the patient type?’

  ‘Not even remotely.’ Strong arms banding round her, Leo lifted her up against him and claimed her mouth with a voracious driving passion that curled her toes and made her nails dig into his shoulder. When she made a half-hearted attempt to evade him his arms merely clamped tighter round her while he delved deeper into her mouth to send a current of fire arrowing through her quivering length. He tasted spicy and sweet and so unbelievably good she couldn’t get enough of him. She was barely aware of the lift doors whirring open or of the momentary separation of their mouths as he cannoned into a doorway with a muffled Greek expletive. Indeed the entire experience was like a time out from her brain because a hunger she couldn’t fight had taken control.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  LEO LAID HER down on a wide bed. ‘I want you to know that I didn’t bring you here for this,’ he breathed rawly. ‘I didn’t plan it.’

  His lean, darkly handsome features were taut with hungry frustration and the strangest hint of vulnerability, and for a split second Grace almost raised her fingers to trace the compressed line of his lips. Instead she got a grip of herself and let her hand fall back from his shoulder to lie by her side. Her body was singing a very different message, all revved up like a racing car at the starting line. She was startlingly aware of every erogenous zone she possessed and his pronounced effect on her. Her breasts felt swollen while a hollow ache throbbed at the very centre of her. It was sexual need, plain sexual need, she repeated carefully to herself, as if by acknowledging that she could minimise the effects and suppress them.

  ‘I intended for us to sit down over a civilised dinner and talk,’ Leo grated impatiently, stepping back from the bed as if he didn’t trust himself that close to her. ‘But I can’t keep my hands off you!’

  He made Grace feel totally irresistible and she marvelled at the sensation and the new buoyancy it gave to her sadly depleted ego, battered by her aunt’s abuse, her cousin’s scorn and Matt’s heartfelt and apologetic, ‘How could you be so stupid?’ There Leo stood, breathtakingly beautiful, rich and charismatic and he still wanted her when she was sure he had to have many more lovely and laid-back female options.

  ‘I think it cuts both ways,’ she admitted not quite steadily, just looking at him and wanting him so much it almost hurt while telling herself that was entirely and unforgivably superficial.

  Leo came down on one knee on the edge of the bed. ‘You...think?’

  ‘Know,’ she conceded breathlessly, stinging arousal assailing her nipples as she collided with his spectacular dark golden eyes. She thought she would die if he didn’t touch her, told herself that she deserved to die if she let him, but she couldn’t lie about the overwhelming surge of hunger that lit her up like a firework.

  ‘I want you so much it’s driving me insane,’ Leo husked, coming down to her in one driven movement to seal her to the mattress with his weight. ‘I don’t like the feeling that I’m not in control...’

  Grace didn’t like it either and was taken aback that they could be so similar in outlook. Her fingers lifted involuntarily and laced through the blue-black hair falling across his brow. Rain lashed the window across the room and a smouldering silence fell indoors. Her heart was racing and against her breast she could feel the quickened thump of his. Dense black lashes lifted on his stunning eyes and she forgot to breathe, registering that somewhere along the way, and without ever pausing to think it through, she had begun developing feelings for Leos Zikos that went way beyond what she had once envisaged.

  For a split second fear grabbed her, fear of being hurt, humiliated and rejected, but she pushed the reactions away and buried them deep. Just for a few hours, she promised herself, she would live only for the moment in a little safe pool of non-judgemental peace because soon enough she would be forced to deal with the consequences of her accidental pregnancy.

  Leo smoothed a stray strand of red hair behind her ear, noting how small her ear was and that at their last encounter he had miscounted the freckles on her nose. There were five, not four, tiny brown speckles that only accentuated the clarity of her luminous porcelain skin. He sank his hands beneath her, lifting her up to peel off her sweater. She was pregnant, he reminded himself in a daze, for that awareness was still so new to him that it felt unreal. He would have to be careful and that would be a challenge when his raw need for her was threatening to explode out of restraint.

  ‘Is it all right for us to do this?’ he murmured a tad awkwardly.

  ‘Good grief, Leo, I’m as healthy as a carthorse!’ Grace countered, reddening hotly as his appreciative gaze dropped down to the bountiful swell of her breasts in a lace-cupped bra.

  ‘But infinitely more beautiful and sensual,’ Leo purred, fighting an impractical urge to stay welded to her and finally sliding off the bed to strip off his suit. ‘So delicate...and yet voluptuous.’

  A reluctant grin slanted Grace’s mouth. ‘You really do have the gift of the gab, as my Irish mother used to say. Women must drop like ninepins around you in receipt of all that flattery.’

  In Leo’s experience women were infini
tely more aggressive in their desire to catch his eye and share his bed. His sculpted mouth quirked at her innocence. He dropped his shirt on the floor, ropes of abdominal muscle flexing across his torso below her admiring gaze. Grace dragged her attention from him in embarrassment and shimmied out of her jeans, blushing at the schoolgirl knickers she sported beneath. She had never had the money to buy prettier underwear. That random thought took her brain off the disturbing truth that she was succumbing to Leo’s magnetism all over again. Was that wrong?

  She wanted him; she wanted him every bit as much as he seemed to want her. He was the father of the baby she carried and he was neither irresponsible nor uncaring and there was absolutely no reason why they should not be together again...was there? Did she have to be sensible Grace all the time? She recalled the end result of rebelling against her sensible self the night she had met Leo. But then that axe had already fallen, she reminded herself doggedly, quickly talking herself into staying exactly where she was.

  ‘You’ve got that thinking-too-hard look on your face again,’ Leo chided, pulling her into his arms. ‘It makes you look incredibly serious.’

  His body was so hot against the faintly chilled coolness of her own, so hot in temperature and so deliciously different. He was rough where she was smooth, hard where she was soft. Desire snaked through her like a sharp-cutting knife, clenching low down in her pelvis. Her fingertips grazed across his muscular torso as he leant over her. The kiss he stole was explosive. He sucked and nibbled at her lower lip, all teasing and sex, stirring her up with the occasional plunge of his tongue.

  Grace scored her fingers down a powerful hair-roughened thigh and circled his throbbing hardness before pushing him back against the pillows with her free hand. Startled, Leo began to raise his shoulders off the pillows while Grace zeroed in on her objective. Her soft sultry mouth closed over him like a glove and any resistance he had faded fast. Dangling strands of red hair danced across his skin with her every movement.

  ‘OK?’ she said, looking up at him, her face as red as a ripe apple.

  ‘Better than...way better,’ Leo admitted unevenly, mesmerised by the way she was touching him, craving it more with every passing second.

  As she took him deep, his hand tangled in her tumbled hair and excitement filled her as he arched his hips up to her for more. A low groan sounded in his throat, an almost animalistic purr, while her fingers toyed with him and her tongue glided over him. Her pace quickened, her mouth moving over him faster and faster.

  ‘Bloody spectacular...’ Leo grated between clenched teeth as she took him up and over in the longest, hottest release of his life.

  Grace lay back, feeling vindicated, feeling empowered, no longer the shy, ignorant virgin in need of guidance or instruction. He had really enjoyed that and she knew it. Leo turned her flushed face towards him, dark eyes still tawny gold with arousal. ‘You always surprise me.’

  Her bra came adrift, his hands kneading her aching flesh while his thumbs skimmed her distended nipples. She closed her eyes, losing herself in a world of sensation while he licked his way down over her body, tugging her knickers out of his path to discover the warm, wet welcome already awaiting him because nothing had ever quite excited Grace as much as her view of Leo shedding his smooth sophistication and crying out from the pleasure she was giving him.

  With a hungry growl he eased over her, his recovery rate exceeding her expectations when the heated probe of his engorged shaft pushed against her most tender flesh. A surge of excitement made her inner muscles clench tightly round him. Her heart was hammering. She wanted this, she wanted him so much she was trembling and breathless, on a high of such joyful anticipation she could hardly contain it.

  ‘You feel amazing,’ Leo rasped, struggling for control as he worked his way gently into the depths of her glorious body when he didn’t feel remotely gentle.

  Grace tilted up her hips and locked her slim legs round him in acceptance. ‘I’m not made of eggshell,’ she whispered teasingly.

  With a groan of relief, Leo surrendered to the raw need riding him, easing out of her tight channel to slam back in again with a glorious sense of satisfaction.

  Grace couldn’t catch her breath as he moved with animalistic power, powering into her with a hard driven sensuality that filled her with splintering excitement. Her whole body was reaching for and craving the ultimate crest and when it reached it she soared high as heaven. The intense pleasure radiated through her in an astonishing crescendo of sensation that left her trembling with little aftershocks of delight for several minutes afterwards.

  On another level, she was conscious of Leo leaving the bed, doubtless to dispose of the contraception he had employed. She waited for him to return and then heard the shower running, slowly and unhappily realising that there would be no cosy togetherness in the aftermath of intimacy. That surprised her, for Leo was very prone to affectionate touching, not stand-offish in any way. Was he afraid of giving her the wrong message? Apprehensive that a little cuddle might make her assume that he felt more for her than he actually did?

  Grace shifted uneasily in the bed, her brain now clear of the overwhelming pleasure that had left her mindless. She was painfully aware that she was developing feelings for Leo Zikos, far beyond the boundaries of those she had first envisaged. Considering how insanely attractive Leo was, she supposed her reaction to him was fairly normal and naturally there was something even more attractive about his insatiable desire for her ordinary self, never mind the fact that he was the father of her baby. Obviously she didn’t want to get hurt by falling for someone who didn’t feel the same way. But then, nobody wanted to get their heart broken and this was not only a time for her to consider her future as a mother, but also a time in which they could get to know each other better and explore their feelings.

  By the time Leo came back to bed, Grace was sound asleep. Around dawn she shifted up against Leo and the sheer novelty value of being in bed with another person was probably what awakened him. In the darkness, he lay still, listening to Grace’s even breathing. He frowned and very gently removed the arm he had inexplicably draped round Grace before quietly easing out of the bed to pull on jeans and a shirt. He padded through to the vast expanse of the main reception room and checked his phone for messages.

  There was a text from his father: Anatole would be in London on Saturday and wanted to know if Leo would still be around. Leo almost groaned out loud. He would be on the other side of the world by then but he now needed to move Grace to another location because the London apartment was used by both his father and his brother. Leaving Grace in residence would entail explanations that Leo was not yet ready to make.

  He raked impatient fingers through his tousled black hair. What was he playing at? What the hell had he been playing at when he took Grace back to bed again? That was no answer to the mess they were both in and had probably only complicated everything more. He was maddened by his sudden unprecedented loss of restraint and discipline the night before and exasperated by what he saw as his own irrational behaviour.

  Sex had always been a purely physical exercise for Leo. Anything even one step beyond simple sex was dangerous in his view because it could open him up to the risk of destructive attachments and desires. He had not had to worry about that before because he had never connected in any more lasting way with a woman he had been intimate with.

  He swore under his breath, grasping that it was a little late in the day to acknowledge that he was getting in too deep with Grace Donovan. Hadn’t they enough of a connection in the child she had conceived? Getting involved in an affair with Grace would be foolish because when it finished relations would inevitably sour between them and potentially damage his future relationship with his child. Why hadn’t he thought about that reality? Why hadn’t he thought about what he would be encouraging if he had sex with her again? Most probably raising expectations he was highly unli
kely to fulfil?

  As Leo poured himself a whiskey from a crystal decanter it seemed to him that his libido had been doing all his thinking for him. That shook him inside out. In fact he broke out in a cold sweat at that knowledge while he paced the pale limestone floor. He drained his glass and set it down with a definitive snap. Was he more like his father than he had ever suspected? Too weak and selfish to behave honourably? More likely than most men to succumb to a sexual obsession? After all, Anatole Zikos had promised repeatedly to end his relationship with Bastien’s mother but somehow he had always ended up drifting back to Athene while coming up with one excuse after another. In truth Anatole had been too obsessed with Athene to ever give her up and her death had devastated him.

  Leo was all too well aware that he was the son of almost neurotically volatile parents, who had remained locked in an emotional triangle of high drama throughout their marriage. His home life had been a nightmare and when he had visited his friends’ homes he had marvelled at the quiet normality that they took for granted. When it came to what he viewed as his dodgy genes, Leo had always been relieved that he appeared to have skipped that over-emotional inheritance and was far too cold-blooded and logical to become obsessed with any woman. Indeed since his troubled childhood had taught him to mask his feelings and rigorously suppress or avoid any more intense reactions he had struggled to deal with any strong emotion.

  But that approach wasn’t likely to work for a male who had conceived a child with another woman in the run-up to his own wedding, Leo conceded bleakly. Everyone concerned had a right to strong emotions in a scenario like that. He had made the same mistake his father had—he had got the wrong woman pregnant. Wilfully or accidentally—did it matter which? Unlike his father, however, he would not compound his error by marrying a different woman and dragging her into the same shameful chaos. He had some tough decisions to make, he acknowledged grimly. It was no longer a matter of something as self-indulgent as what he wanted, but more a matter of honour. Such an old-fashioned word, that, Leo conceded ruefully, but if it meant that he accepted the need to put logic and fairness at the top of his list, it perfectly encapsulated his duty. And unlike his father, Leo planned to put his child first and foremost.