Tycoon's Ring of Convenience

by Julia James

  ‘Are you mad?’ came from her.

  ‘Not in the least,’ was his unruffled reply. ‘This is what I propose.’ His mouth tightened a moment, then he went on. ‘I should make it clear immediately, however, that my relationship with Nadya Serensky is at an end. She was a woman I wanted two years ago—now I want something, and someone, quite different. You, Ms St Clair, suit my requirements perfectly. And I,’ he continued, ignoring the mounting look of disbelief on her face, ‘suit your requirements perfectly, too.’

  She opened her mouth to speak, to protest, but no words came. What words could possibly come in response to such a brazen, unbelievable announcement? He was continuing to talk in that same cool manner, as if he were discussing the weather, and she could only listen to what he said. Even while she stared at him blankly.

  ‘What I want now, at this stage of my life,’ he was saying—perfectly calmly, perfectly casually, ‘is a wife. Nadya was quite unsuitable for that role. You, however...’

  His dark eyes rested on her, unreadable and opaque, and yet somehow seeing right into her, she felt with a hollowing of her stomach.

  ‘You are perfect for that part. As I,’ he finished, ‘am perfect for you.’

  She could only stare, frozen with disbelief. And with another emotion that was trying to snake around her stunned mind.

  ‘We would each,’ he said, ‘provide the other with what we currently want.’ He glanced once more around the library, then back to her. ‘I want to be part of the world you inhabit—the world of country houses like this, and those who were born to them. Oh, I could quite easily buy such a house, but that would not serve my purpose. I would be an outsider. A parvenu.’

  His voice was edged, and he felt the familiar wash of bitterness in his veins, but she was simply staring at him, with a stunned expression on her beautiful face.

  ‘That will not do for me,’ he said. ‘What I want, therefore, is a wife from that world, who will make me a part of it by marrying her, so that I am accepted.’ Again, his voice tightened as he continued. ‘As for what you would gain...’ His expression changed. ‘I am easily able to afford the work that needs to be done to ensure the fabric of this magnificent edifice is repaired and restored to the condition it should enjoy. So you see...’ he gave his faint smile ‘...how suitable we are for each other?’

  She found her voice—belatedly—her words faint as she forced them out.

  ‘I cannot believe you are serious. We have met precisely twice. You’re a complete stranger to me. And I to you.’

  He gave the slightest shrug of his broad shoulders. ‘That can easily be remedied. I am perfectly prepared for our engagement to provide sufficient time to set you at your ease with me.’

  He reached to take up his coffee cup again, levelled his unreadable gaze on her.

  ‘I am not suggesting,’ he continued, ‘a lifetime together. Two years at the most—possibly less. Sufficient for each of us to get what we want from the other. That is, after all, one of the distinct advantages of our times—unlike your forebears, who might have made similar mutually advantageous matches, we are free to dissolve our marriage of our own volition and go our separate ways thereafter.’

  He took another draught of his coffee, finishing it and setting down the cup. He looked directly at her.

  ‘Well? What is your answer?’

  She swallowed. There was a maelstrom in her head: thoughts and counter-thoughts, conflicting emotions. Swirling about chaotically. This couldn’t be real, could it? This almost complete stranger, sitting here suggesting they marry?

  Marry so I can save Greymont—

  She felt a hollowing inside her. That had been exactly what she herself had contemplated—had told Gerald Langley that she would do. She had seriously contemplated it with Toby, then balked at making a life-long commitment to a man she would never otherwise have considered marrying.

  But Nikos Tramontes only wants two years.

  Two brief years of her life.

  Sharply, she looked at him.

  ‘You say no longer than two years?’

  He nodded, concealing an inner sense of triumph. That she had asked the question showed she was giving his offer serious consideration. That she was tempted.

  ‘I think that will suffice, don’t you?’

  It would for him—he was confident of that. Not just because when they parted he would be secure in the social position that marriage to her would give him, but because he knew from his liaison with Nadya that he was unlikely to be bored with the woman in his life before then. For two years, therefore, having Diana St Clair in his life, his bed, would be perfectly acceptable.

  He let his gaze rest on her, absorbing her pristine beauty, the pallor in her cheeks from her reaction to his proposition. She was still looking dazed, but no longer outraged. Again, triumph surged in him. He knew he was most definitely drawing her in.

  ‘Well?’ he prompted.

  ‘I need time,’ she said weakly. ‘I can’t just—’ She broke off, unable to say more, feeling as if a tornado had just scooped her up and whirled her about.

  ‘Of course,’ Nikos conceded smoothly.

  He got to his feet. His six-foot-plus height seemed to overpower her.

  ‘Think it over. I’m flying to Zurich tomorrow, but I will be back in the UK at the end of next week. You can give me your answer then. In the meantime, if you have any further questions feel free to text or email me.’

  She watched him extract a business card and lay it on her father’s desk before turning back to her.

  Suddenly, he smiled. ‘Don’t look so shocked, Diana. It could work perfectly for both of us. A marriage of convenience—people made them all the time in the past. They still do, even if they don’t admit it.’

  He turned on his heel, leaving her sitting staring after him as he left the room. She heard his swift footsteps, the front door opening and closing again. The sound of a car starting. Her heart was pounding like a hammer inside her. And it wasn’t just because of the bombshell he’d dropped in her lap.

  When he smiles and calls me by my name...

  She felt her pulse give a quiver, and deep inside her she felt danger roil. For reasons she could not understand Nikos Tramontes, of all the men she had ever known, seemed to possess an ability to...to disturb her. To make her hyper-aware of his masculinity. Of her own femininity. She didn’t know where it was coming from, or why—she only knew it was dangerous.

  I don’t want to react to him like that—I don’t want to!

  Her features contorted. Nikos Tramontes had walked into her life out of nowhere and put down in front of her what could be the best hope she had of getting exactly what she wanted—the means to save Greymont. As easily and as painlessly as it was possible to do so outside of a lottery win.

  Yes, he was a complete stranger—but, as he’d said, they could get to know each other during their engagement. Yes, his announcement had initially shocked her. But, as he’d also said, such marriages for mutual advantage had been perfectly unexceptional to her ancestors. And theirs would be brief—a year or two at most. Not the life-long commitment that Toby would have required...

  And yet for all that she heard a voice wail in her head.

  Why can’t he look like Toby? Overweight and pug-faced! That would be so, so much better! So much safer.

  So much safer than the dangerous quickening of her blood that came whenever she thought of Nikos Tramontes.

  Deliberately, she silenced her fear. Dismissing it. There was no need for such anxieties. None! That quickening of her blood was irrelevant—completely irrelevant. It had nothing to do with what Nikos Tramontes was offering her.

  The formality of a marriage of convenience, for outward show only—a dispassionate, temporary union to provide him with an assured entrée into her world and her with the means to preserve her inheritance. Nothing else—nothing that had anything to do with that quickening of her pulse.

  It was because she owned Greymont and came
with the social position and connections he wanted to acquire that he was interested in her. Nothing more than that. Oh, he would want her to grace his arm, be an ornament for him—that was understandable. But that would be in public. In private their relationship would be cordial, but fundamentally, she reassured herself, it would be little more than a business arrangement at heart. He got a society wife—she got Greymont restored. Mutually beneficial.

  We would be associates. That’s a good word for it.

  With a little start she realised she was giving his extraordinary proposition serious consideration.

  Her mind reeled again.

  Could she really do this? Accept his offer—use it to save Greymont?

  It was all she could think about as the days went by. Days spent in visits from the architect, and from the specialist companies that would undertake the careful restoration and conservation work on Greymont that would have to be carried out in accordance to the strict building regulations for historic listed buildings, adding to the complexity—and the cost.

  With every passing day she could feel the temptation to accept what Nikos was offering her coiling itself like a serpent around her. Tightening its grip with every coil.

  * * *

  Nikos settled himself into a seat in first class. His mood was good—very good. His decision to select Diana St Clair as the means of achieving his life’s second imperative goal might have been made impulsively, but he’d always trusted his instincts. They’d never failed him in business yet, enabling his rise to riches to be as meteoric as it had been steep.

  A faint frown furrowed his brow as he accepted a glass of champagne from the attentive stewardess.

  But marriage is not a business decision...

  He shook the thought from him. His liaison with Nadya hadn’t been a business decision, but it had proved highly beneficial to both of them while it had lasted, with each of them gaining substantially from it. There was no reason why his time with Diana St Clair should not do likewise. As well as gaining the restoration of her home, she would gain an attentive husband and a very attentive lover.

  What more could she—or he—want?

  Certainly not love.

  His mouth twisted. Love was of no interest to him. He’d never known it, did not want it. And nor, clearly, did Diana St Clair, or she would have sent him packing when he’d set out his proposal in front of her. But she hadn’t—and she would accept it, he knew, his expression changing to one of confident assurance.

  What he was offering suited her perfectly. And not just as the means to save her home. On a much more personal level too. Oh, she might not yet realise that her inner ice maiden had finally met a challenge it could not freeze off, but when the time came—and come it would!—she would accept from him all the exquisite sensual pleasure that he would ensure she experienced, all the pleasure that he was so hotly anticipating for himself.

  It would be his gift to her—opening the door for her to accept the admiration and desire of men at last. Frozen as she was within, he would ignite within her that flare of sensual awareness he’d seen so briefly, so revealingly in her eyes when he’d first looked upon her.

  He would not hurry her—he would give her time to get used to him—but in the end... His smile deepened and he took a mouthful of champagne, easing his shoulders as an image of her pale, exquisite beauty formed in his mind’s eye, lingering over the fine-boned features, the silken line of her mouth.

  In the end she would thaw.

  And melt into his waiting arms.

  * * *

  Diana stared at the vast bouquet of exotic, highly scented lilies that sat on the Boule table in the hall, fragrancing the air. Then she stared down at the cheque she was holding in her slightly shaking hands, and the note accompanying it.

  An advance, sent in good faith.

  She stared at the numbers on the cheque. A quarter of a million pounds. She felt her lungs tighten. So much money—

  With a stifled noise in her throat she marched back into her office. But the scent of the lilies was in her nostrils still. Beguiling. Enticing.

  Can I do it? Marry Nikos Tramontes?

  The cheque in her hand demanded an answer. Accept or reject it. Accept or reject the man who’d signed it.

  The phone on her desk rang, startling her. It was her architect, politely, tactfully enquiring whether she was yet in a position to set a start date for the work that needed to be done. Work that could not start without Nikos to pay for it.

  Her hand clenched, her signet ring with the St Clair crest on her little finger catching on the mahogany surface of the desk. Emotion bit into her, forcing a decision. The decision she had to make now. Could postpone no longer. If she did not restore Greymont it would decay into ruins or she would have to sell. Either way, it would be lost.

  I can’t be the St Clair who loses Greymont. I can’t betray my father’s devotion and sacrifice. I can’t!

  The offer that Nikos Tramontes had put in front of her was the best she could ever hope to find. It was a gift from heaven.

  Nothing else can save Greymont.

  She could feel her heart thumping in her chest, her mouth drying, suddenly, at the enormity of what she was doing.

  It will be all right—it will be all right...

  She heard the words in her head, calming her, and she clung to them urgently.

  Slowly—very, very slowly—she breathed out. Then she spoke. ‘Yes,’ she said to her architect. ‘I think we can now make a start.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THE WEDDING VENUE WAS the ballroom of an historic London hotel, with impeccable upper-crust ambience and timelessly stylish art deco décor, and it was packed with people.

  Apart from the guests who were Nikos’s business acquaintances, Diana had rounded up everyone from her own circles whom Nikos Tramontes was marrying her in order to meet: those people who represented upper-class English society, based on centuries of land ownership and ‘old money’, who had all gone to school together, intermarried over the years, and would socialise together for ever. It was a closed club, open only to those born into it. Or to those who, like her new husband, had married into it.

  She was glad so many had accepted her invitation—it made her feel she was definitely keeping her side of the bargain she’d struck with the man she was marrying. He wanted a society wife—she was making sure he got one, in return for funding the repairs now actively underway at Greymont.

  The ongoing work had been her main preoccupation during the three months of their engagement, but she had made time to meet up with Nikos whenever he was in London, including attending a lavish engagement party at his newly purchased town house in Knightsbridge. The fact that his business affairs seemed to require his continuous travel around the globe suited her fine.

  All the same, he’d taken pains to allow her to get used to him, to come to terms with being his fiancée, just as he’d promised he would. He’d taken her out and about to dinner, to the theatre and the opera, and to meet some of her friends or his business acquaintances.

  He was no longer a stranger by any means. And, although she had been unable to banish that unwanted hyperawareness of his compelling masculinity that made her so constantly self-conscious about him, she had, nevertheless, become far easier in his company. More comfortable being with him. His manners were polished, his conversation intelligent, and there was nothing about him to make her regret her decision to accept marriage to him as a solution for Greymont.

  Becoming engaged to Nikos had proved a lot more easy than she had feared. He’d certainly set aside her lingering disquiet that her disturbing awareness of his sexual magnetism might cause a problem. He seemed oblivious to it, and she was grateful. It would be embarrassing, after all, if a man to whom she was making a hard-headed marriage of convenience were to be inconvenienced by a fiancée who trembled at his touch.

  Not that he did touch her. Apart from socially conventional contact, such as taking her arm or guiding her forw
ard, which she was studiously trying to inoculate herself against, he never laid a finger on her. Not even a peck on the cheek.

  It was ironic, she thought wryly, that her friends all assumed her sudden engagement was a coup de foudre...

  She’d let Toby Masterson think so, out of kindness for him, and he’d said sadly, ‘I could tell you were smitten, from the off,’ before he wished her well.

  The only dissenting voice against her engagement had come from Gerald, the St Clair family lawyer.

  ‘Diana, are you sure this is what you want to do?’ he’d asked warningly.

  ‘Yes,’ she’d said decisively, ‘it is.’

  As she’d answered that old saying had come into her head. ‘Take what you want,’ says God. ‘Take it and pay for it.’

  She’d shaken it from her. All she was paying was two years of her life. She could afford that price. Two years in which to grace the arm of Nikos Tramontes in their marriage of convenience, a perfectly civil and civilised arrangement. She had no problem with that.

  And no problem with standing in the receiving line beside him now, greeting their guests as his wife. She stood there smiling, saying all that was proper for the occasion, and continued to smile throughout the reception.

  Only when, finally, she sank back into the plush seat of the vintage car that was to take them to the airport, from where they would fly off on their honeymoon in the Gulf—where Nikos had business affairs to see to—did she feel as if she’d come offstage after a bravura performance.

  She could finally relax.

  ‘Relieved it’s all over?’

  Nikos’s deep voice at her side, made her glance at him.

  ‘Yes.’ She nodded decisively. ‘And I’m glad it all went flawlessly.’

  He smiled at her. ‘But then, you were flawless yourself.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, acknowledging his compliment.

  She was getting used to his smiles now. Making herself get used to them. Just as she would make herself get used to the fact that he was her husband for the time being. Theirs might be a marriage of convenience, but it could be perfectly amiable for all that. Indeed, there was no reason why it shouldn’t be. The more time she spent with him, the easier it would get.