The Greek's Acquisition

by Chantelle Shaw

  Madeleine stared at her reproachfully when she let her- self into the apartment, and showed her disapproval by remaining regally on her cushion on the windowsill.

  ‘I know, I know.’ Louise groaned. ‘I must have taken leave of my senses. But it won’t happen again.’

  Dimitri would be back in Athens in a few hours. If—as she hoped and prayed—he agreed to buy Eirenne, the sale would be dealt with by their respective lawyers and there was no reason why they should ever meet again.

  She headed straight for the shower and stood beneath the spray for ages, as if she could wash the touch of his hands from her skin. Images kept pushing into her mind of the way he had made love to her—with the consummate skill of a renowned playboy but also with an unexpected gentleness. It made her heart ache when she recalled the soft endearments he had whispered in Greek as she had lain spent and utterly sated in his arms …

  A message on her answer-machine drove Dimitri and every other thought from her head. The consultant in charge of her mother’s care was voicing his concerns that Tina’s condition had worsened, and he suggested that Louise should meet with him as soon as possible.

  The hospital was in a suburb of Paris. She found her mother dozing when she slipped into her private room, and as she sat by the bed she noted with a pang of dread that Tina had lost more weight and her skin was ashen. The scarf tied around her head hid the fact that she had lost her hair after chemotherapy. Tears stung Louise’s eyes as she remembered Tina’s blond beehive hairstyle. How cruel was this disease that had robbed her mother of her looks and seemed intent on stealing her life.

  ‘Loulou?’ Tina’s eyes fluttered open.

  ‘I’m here.’ She wished she could call her mother ‘Mum’, but Tina had always insisted that Louise should use her Christian name.

  ‘It makes me seem old to have a teenager address me as Mum,’ Tina had complained.

  For years she had lied about her age and told her lovers that she was twenty-eight.

  Louise sighed and curled her fingers around Tina’s bony hand. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t visit yesterday. I worked until late, and then I …’ She faltered when she thought of what she had done after work. ‘I went out to dinner.’

  A gleam of curiosity flickered in her mother’s eyes. ‘With a boyfriend?’ She studied Louise. ‘I’m glad you’ve started to make more effort with your appearance. The suit you’re wearing is gorgeous. You’ve got a great figure and it’s about time you started to show it off. That’s the only way to attract a man.’

  Louise gave a wry smile, but did not explain that she was wearing one of Benoit’s designs because she knew her mother liked her to dress well. ‘I’m not trying to attract a man,’ she murmured. ‘I’m too involved with my job. Did I tell you I’ve applied for a position as an assistant curator in the Department of Paintings at the Louvre?’

  Tina had closed her eyes, but after a moment she opened them again. ‘I’m pleased you’ve got a good career. I always hoped you would. Not like me—I never trained in anything.’

  Talking seemed to tire her and she fell silent for a few minutes. Louise was just about to tiptoe from the room when Tina spoke again.

  ‘Kostas was in love with me, and I cared about him. He was the only one. All the others just wanted me for one thing. It boosted their egos to have a mistress, but they never thought about me as a person and after a while I stopped hoping they would. I used them like they used me.’

  Louise swallowed the lump in her throat. She had never realised before that her mother had been looking for love with all those different men. In the end she had found it with Kostas Kalakos, but their relationship had hurt so many other people—especially Kostas’s wife and family. She understood why Dimitri despised Tina, she thought bleakly.

  ‘The tumour is growing quicker than we had expected,’ explained Alain Duval, the cancer specialist who was caring for Tina, after he’d invited Louise into his office. ‘I can’t guarantee that the pioneering treatment offered at our associate hospital in Massachusetts would be successful, but it is your mother’s only chance. Soon the opportunity for that chance will be lost,’ he added quietly.

  ‘How long does she have before time runs out for her to have the treatment?’ Louise asked tensely.

  ‘A few weeks at most. Ideally she needs to start the newly developed form of radiation therapy immediately. I appreciate that medical costs in the United States are high, and that your mother does not have health insurance that would cover the costs. But if there is any way at all that you could raise the money I suggest you do so without delay.’

  If only Dimitri would agree to buy Eirenne. She could not give him any more time to make up his mind, Louise thought frantically. She prayed he had not left Paris. As soon as she had finished at the hospital she would go back to his hotel and plead with him to give her an answer.

  Her mind whirled. If he refused to buy the island she would instruct the estate agent to advertise for a buyer. In the meantime she would try to arrange a temporary loan. But she had already asked the bank once and her request had been refused. Panic churned in her stomach.

  ‘I’m in the process of selling some assets to cover the medical expenses,’ she explained to the consultant. ‘The money should be available soon. But I want my mother to begin the treatment right away.’

  ‘I can make arrangements for her to be transferred to the U.S. But I have to advise you that the hospital in Massachusetts is unlikely to start Madame Hobbs’s treatment until they have assurance that all her medical costs can be covered,’ Alain Duval explained gently. ‘You will also need to pay for your mother’s flight on an air ambulance.’ He checked his computer screen and scribbled down a figure. ‘This is the amount you’ll need to find initially.’

  There was only one other way she could raise any kind of capital.

  Louise nodded resolutely. ‘I’ll organise it now.’

  Her grandmother Céline would have approved, she told herself a few hours later when she walked out of the jeweller’s shop. The jeweller had honoured the price that he had originally valued the diamond fleur-de-lis, and had also bought the last few pieces of Tina’s jewellery. Louise hoped her mother would forgive her. Tina adored her jewels, but life was more valuable than a few baubles.

  Having delivered a cheque to Alain Duval, and learned that Tina would be flown to Massachusetts once the hospital had received assurance that her medical costs would be met, Louise felt as if her emotions had been put through a mangle. She had phoned Dimitri’s hotel and learned that he had not yet checked out, but was unavailable to speak to her.

  The prospect of meeting him again made her heart sink. But she had to get an answer from him. First, though, she decided to go back to her flat to feed Madeleine and try and drum up some courage before she paid him a visit.

  The lift in the apartment block only went as far as the fifth floor. Louise trudged up the narrow flight of stairs leading to the eaves of the building, feeling utterly drained. Reaction to the events of the past twenty-four hours had set in. She was still trying to come to terms with the fact that she had slept with Dimitri, and she was desperately worried about her mother.

  The sound of footsteps from above warned her that one of her neighbours was coming down the stairs, and she shrank against the wall to allow them to pass.

  ‘Where in hell’s name have you been all day?’

  Dimitri came round the bend in the staircase and strode towards her, his face furious and beautiful, with his olivegold skin stretched taut across his slashing cheekbones, his green eyes spitting fire.

  The shock of his appearance was the last straw. Louise stared at him wordlessly.

  ‘Why did you shoot off like that this morning?’ The question had been bugging Dimitri all day. ‘I tried ringing you a dozen times but you didn’t answer.’

  ‘I switched off my phone at the.’ Just in time she stopped herself from saying hospital, and coloured guiltily. ‘I went to see a … friend, and turned my ph
one off.’

  ‘I assumed you had left early to go to the museum, but when I couldn’t get hold of you I checked at the Louvre and was told that you weren’t scheduled to work today.’ Dimitri’s eyes narrowed when Louise refused to meet his gaze. ‘You ran, didn’t you? What was it?’ he queried sardonically. ‘Self-recrimination after the night before?’

  She flushed. ‘You told me you were returning to Athens today. It just seemed easier to avoid any awkwardness. I mean …’ She bit her lip. ‘We both know last night didn’t mean anything.’

  ‘Do we?’ His face was unreadable.

  What friend had she rushed off to visit? Dimitri wondered. She seemed cagey. Had she gone to see a lover—perhaps to give an excuse for where she had spent the previous night? And how was it that she was wearing another Benoit Besson outfit?

  He was annoyed that he had felt concerned when he’d been unable to contact her. She was not a child, and certainly not his responsibility, he reminded himself. His irritation increased when he felt his body’s predictable reaction as he raked his eyes over her champagne-coloured pencil skirt and the matching jacket with its nipped-in waist that emphasised the firm swell of her breasts. Her hair was swept into a chignon and her face discreetly made-up. The combination of cool elegance and simmering sensuality that she projected heated his blood to boiling point. No woman had ever run out on him before, and if he was honest his ego had been dented by Louise’s abrupt departure from his bed that morning, he acknowledged grimly.

  Louise could not define Dimitri’s expression and she was too weary to try. ‘What are you doing here, anyway?’ she muttered.

  He looked dangerously seductive in casual clothes that bore the hallmarks of superb tailoring. His black polo shirt clung to the hard ridges of his abdominal muscles and his dark hair brushed the collar of his tan leather jacket. For a crazy moment she almost gave in to the temptation to fling herself against his broad chest and absorb some of his strength.

  A thought hit her and she drew a sharp breath. ‘Have you made a decision about the island?’

  ‘I have, but a public stairway is not the place to discuss it. I believe your apartment is on the top floor?’

  Her legs were shaking, Louise discovered as she led the way up the stairs and along the hallway to her flat. A sense of dread settled like a lead weight in her stomach. Dimitri did not know it, but he held her mother’s life in his hands.

  ‘Please—come in.’ She opened the front door and ushered him into her home, hating her body’s involuntary reaction when he brushed against her. Why him? she thought bitterly. Why was he the only man she had ever met who could turn her brain to mush and make her feel like a hormonal adolescent instead of the intelligent woman she knew was?

  Entering Louise’s flat was like stepping into a doll’s house, Dimitri thought as he was forced to duck to avoid bumping his head on the doorframe. An estate agent would probably describe the apartment as a bijou residence, but that was a euphemism for small. It occurred to him that if Louise did live with some rich lover he must be a midget.

  He followed her into the living room and saw no signs of a male influence in the pretty but decidedly feminine décor. A door led into what he could see was an equally tiny bedroom. The apartment was functional but hardly luxurious, and he felt certain that Louise lived alone.

  Not completely alone, he amended as his eyes settled on the exotic-looking cat which was regarding him suspiciously from the windowsill.

  ‘That’s Madeleine,’ Louise told him, following his gaze. ‘I got her from the cat rescue centre and she’s wary of strangers.’

  He glanced around the room. The colour scheme of white and powder-blue was charming, but nothing could disguise the fact that the apartment was no bigger than a shoebox.

  ‘It’s not what I was expecting,’ he said, frowning. When Louise had told him she lived in the centre of Paris he had envisaged a grand, opulent apartment. ‘I thought you would live somewhere bigger and more expensive, frankly.’

  ‘I can’t afford the rent on a bigger place. This is fine for me and Madeleine.’

  ‘Surely your mother could contribute towards the costs of renting or even buying a larger apartment? After all, she inherited a sizeable fortune from my father.’

  ‘I have never touched a penny of Kostas’s money,’ Louise said sharply.

  She had caught the note of bitterness in Dimitri’s voice and in all fairness could not blame him for it. Her mother’s affair with his father hovered like a spectre between them. She dared not reveal that the reason she was so anxious for him to buy Eirenne was because Tina had frittered away the inheritance Kostas had left her.

  She twisted her hands together, unaware that Dimitri had noticed the betraying gesture. ‘You said you had made a decision,’ she reminded him.

  Why was she so tense? he wondered. It was obvious she was desperate for him to agree to a deal on Eirenne, but he still did not know why she needed the money so urgently. The explanation she’d given about wanting to pay off her student loan wasn’t believable, and once again he came back to the idea that she was in debt. Her mother had been facing bankruptcy just before she had met his father, he remembered. Tina had not been a good role model when it came to financial matters—or personal integrity, he thought grimly. Was it any surprise that Louise seemed to be following in her mother’s footsteps?

  But what did it matter? Dimitri asked himself. He wanted Eirenne and he wanted Louise, and he was determined to have both. One night with her had not satisfied his desire and he had decided that the only way to get her out of his system was to make her his mistress until his fascination with her faded. He had a short attention span where women were concerned, and he was sure it would not take long before he was bored of her.

  He glanced at her and felt a white-hot surge of lust as he imagined stripping off the elegant suit and the lace-edged camisole visible beneath her jacket. Was she wearing a bra? No matter—he would quickly remove it so that he could cup her voluptuous breasts in his hands. Then he would kiss her nipples, lick them and tease them with his tongue, until they hardened and she whimpered and begged him to make love to her as she had done last night.

  His nostrils flared as he inhaled sharply. He turned towards the window and pretended to study the view of Paris rooftops while he endeavoured to bring his body under control.

  ‘I am prepared to pay your asking price of one million pounds for Eirenne.’

  ‘Thank God!’

  She spoke the words beneath her breath but Dimitri heard her, heard the raw emotion in her voice, and he flicked his head round to see her sink down onto the sofa as if her legs would not support her.

  ‘That’s … great news.’ Louise frantically fought for composure as relief flooded through her. The one thought pounding in her head was that now she could phone Alain Duval and tell him to arrange for her mother to be flown to America to begin the treatment immediately.

  ‘There is a condition.’

  Dimitri’s clipped statement seemed to reverberate off the walls. Louise shot him a lightning glance, and something about his calculating expression unnerved her. She licked her dry lips.

  ‘What … condition?’

  ‘You will return to Athens with me.’

  Why was her heart thudding so erratically beneath her ribs? she wondered. After all, Dimitri had not made an unreasonable request.

  She stood up and faced him across her tiny sitting room.

  ‘I suppose it will be necessary for me to sign a sales contract. Of course I will fly to Athens when the paperwork has been prepared,’ she assured him. ‘But I imagine it will take at least a few days before your lawyers are ready to finalise the deal.’

  He shrugged. ‘Probably. But that’s not what I meant.’ He walked towards her, his intent gaze holding her prisoner. ‘I want you, Louise—to share my bed every night until I have sated my desire for you. Let’s say for a couple of weeks.’ His smile was deeply cynical. ‘I have a low boredom threshold
, and experience tells me that my interest will wane fairly quickly when you are available around the clock.’

  ‘Available?’ she choked furiously. His suggestion was so shockingly outrageous that she almost thought he was joking—but the hard gleam in his eyes warned her he was deadly serious. ‘Do you really expect me to play the role of your … your concubine? Always on hand to serve you and satisfy your sexual demands?’

  She paused to drag oxygen into her lungs, and opened her mouth to tell him in succinct terms just what she thought of his suggestion. He cut her off before she could speak.

  ‘If you want me to buy Eirenne then, yes, that’s exactly what I expect.’

  Stunned by the finality of his words, she felt her defiance crumble. ‘That’s blackmail,’ she whispered.

  He gave her an impatient look. ‘Oh, come on, glikia. It’s a little too late to play the innocent. You were a wildcat last night and you know damn well you’re as hungry as I am.’

  Before she had time to guess his intention Dimitri shot out a hand and unfastened the single button on her jacket, before flicking the material aside to reveal the sheer camisole she was wearing beneath it.

  ‘Even if you want to deny it, your body betrays you—see?’ he taunted, a sardonic smile lifting the corners of his mouth as he deliberately trailed a finger down one breast and over the pebble-hard nipple jutting provocatively against its silk covering. ‘Why do you wear a bra when your breasts are so firm? While you are my mistress I demand that you will go braless.’

  ‘You can go to hell!’ The soft mockery in Dimitri’s voice released Louise from the sexual spell he had cast on her. She despised him, but she despised herself more for her shameful inability to resist him. ‘I refuse to be any man’s mistress, and I’d rather sell my soul to the devil than agree to your despicable suggestion.’

  ‘Then the deal is off,’ he said calmly, regarding her flushed face and anger-bright eyes with a detached air that caused Louise to clench her fists. ‘I wish you well in finding another buyer for Eirenne.’

  ‘You don’t mean that. You’re calling my bluff,’ she blurted, panic rising inside her when he strolled towards the door. ‘Dimitri … please! There has to be a way we can reach an agreement.’