‘In that case I suppose I’ll just have to content myself with overseeing your training.’ His calm, matter-of-fact voice shattered the spell he had cast over her and her eyes flew open to clash with his glinting gaze. Colour scalded her cheeks and she felt sick with humiliation when he released her and stepped away, his bland smile telling her he was aware of her disappointment. She had offered herself up like…like a sacrificial virgin, she acknowledged furiously, and he had rejected her.
‘I don’t need any help. I prefer to train on my own,’ she muttered, her voice thick with mortification. Spinning round on her heels, she set off at a pace that was impossible to maintain. She was going too fast, too soon, her coach would have advised her, but right now all she could think of was putting some space between her and the most infuriating man she had ever met. ‘Just go away, Damon, and leave me alone,’ she flung over her shoulder.
Damon watched her disappear along the track and felt the familiar ache in his groin as he admired her impossibly long, tanned legs and the tantalising sway of her derrière. If only it were that easy to let her go, he thought grimly.
He’d been intrigued from the first—drawn not just by her beauty, but by the woman herself. At first glance Anneliese Christiansen appeared every inch the glamorous, sophisticated supermodel who featured regularly in the gossip columns. But he was beginning to realise that the real Anna was a far more complex mixture of emotions.
For a start she was not as worldly as he had expected. She reminded him of a young colt, skittish and nervy, and ready to back away the minute he came near. Persuading her into his bed was not going to be as easy as he had first assumed. It would take time and patience to win her trust and he had a short supply of both.
Common sense told him to walk away. The world was full of stunning blondes and he preferred women who required little emotional maintenance. But for the past two months Anna had filled his mind to the exclusion of almost everything else, even business.
It was a new experience for him and one that he didn’t enjoy, which was why he had decided to make use of his time in England to take his desire for her to its logical conclusion. He hadn’t anticipated such a robust rebuttal, he acknowledged wryly, but Anna’s determination to ignore the chemistry between them only served to further his interest.
He wanted her. And whatever Damon Kouvaris wanted, he invariably got.
CHAPTER THREE
ANNA kept on running until her heart felt as though it would burst. Even then she pushed herself on, lap after lap, and every time she completed a circuit she glanced hopefully over to where she had left her kit bag by the side of the track, praying that Damon would have gone.
He was still there, sprawled on the grass, the sun gilding his bronzed shoulders and strong, muscular thighs revealed below the hem of his running shorts. Not that he had done much running, she noted irritably. He had simply sat there, sunning himself—a demigod in designer shades, watching her run until she was near to the point of collapse.
With a muttered oath she slowed her steps and headed across the track. If his presence as spectator was a battle of wills, she was ready to admit defeat. Her legs felt like jelly—a fact that had nothing to do with the sight of him, she assured herself when she reached the spot where she had dumped her bag.
Affecting an air of supreme uninterest, she ignored him and reached into her bag for her water bottle. The few mouthfuls of liquid remaining in the bottle did nothing to quench her thirst but the thought of walking back to the sports complex to refill it was beyond her and she sank to the ground, burying her face in the sweet-smelling grass.
‘If you intend to run at that pace for the whole race, you’ll never make it past the halfway mark,’ Damon commented idly.
‘Go to hell.’ The fact that he was right did nothing to improve her temper and she turned her head to glare at him, further incensed as she watched him drink from his own water canister. There was something innately earthy and sensual about the way he gulped thirstily and her eyes focused on the convulsive movement of his throat when he swallowed.
‘Here.’ He must have felt her eyes on him and handed her the canister. Desperation overcame pride and she sat up and took it from him, put it to her lips and drank. ‘You should bring more water with you; one small bottle isn’t enough in this heat. Although it defies common sense to train during the hottest part of the day anyway,’ he added, as if he were speaking to a small child.
‘Anything else?’ she drawled sarcastically. She lay back in the grass and allowed her eyes to drift shut. He was the most arrogant, overbearing man she had ever met and she wanted to tell him to get lost, but she was too exhausted to speak, and, anyway, she doubted he would listen.
The running track was set far back from the road and all she could hear was the piercingly sweet song of a skylark hovering high above. It was the sound of summer, she thought sleepily, turning her face to the sun, but as a shadow fell across her she opened her eyes again to find Damon leaning over her.
‘You shouldn’t lie out in the full glare of the sun without protection. I’m just making sure you don’t burn,’ he added equably when she frowned at the close proximity of his body next to hers.
He was lying on his side, propped up on one elbow so that his upper body shielded her from the sun. He had removed his sunglasses so that she could see the fine lines around his eyes, although his thoughts were concealed behind impossibly long black lashes. A lock of hair had fallen forwards onto his brow and she resisted the urge to reach up and run her fingers through the gleaming black silk.
He was too much, and right now she was too tired to do battle with him, she conceded weakly, dragging her eyes from the sight of his broad chest, barely covered by his black sleeveless sports vest. He must spend hours in the gym developing those biceps, she thought derisively, but somehow she couldn’t imagine him wasting his time lifting weights.
‘What kind of sport do you enjoy?’ she queried, blushing furiously at the wicked glint in his eyes. There was no doubting the form of physical exercise he liked best.
‘I like to play squash. I find it more challenging than tennis. Other than that I enjoy swimming in the pool at my villa back home, and when I was younger I belonged to a boxing club and was junior national champion for three years running,’ he told her on a note of quiet pride.
‘You enjoyed fighting?’ Anna wrinkled her nose. ‘I hate that kind of aggressive, contact sport.’
‘Actually boxing requires extreme discipline and mental agility, not just brute strength,’ he said with a smile. ‘It’s an excellent way for boys and young men to release the buildup of testosterone.’
‘I imagine you had more than your fair share of that,’ she muttered dryly. Even at an early age he must have attracted female attention like bees to honey. She could picture him as a swaggering, cocky youth, hell-bent on having his own way. ‘You must have driven your parents to distraction.’
‘Probably,’ he agreed cheerfully, ‘but my father curbed my excesses by sending me to work on building projects. I may have been the heir to a multimillion-pound fortune but he believed that I should start at the bottom and earn my place in Kouvaris Construction. He taught me a lot,’ he added softly and Kezia caught the note of affection and respect in his voice.
‘I’m sure your parents are very proud of you,’ she said, recalling a recent newspaper article detailing the astounding success of the Kouvaris Construction group under his directorship. ‘Where are they now—do they live near you in Greece?’
‘Sadly they’ve both passed away. My father died ten years ago and my mother followed soon after. He was her reason for living and she simply couldn’t bear to be without him,’ he added quietly.
‘I’m sorry.’ She sat up, feeling suddenly restless. Maybe it was the talk about happy families, she thought bleakly. Damon had spoken with such conviction of the love his parents had shared for each other, but she found it unsettling.
She would never award a man so muc
h power over her that he became her reason for living, she vowed fiercely. She had witnessed firsthand the damage such strong emotions could wreak. Her father had been the centre of her mother’s universe and his infidelities had almost destroyed her.
‘So, do you have any other family—brothers and sisters?’ she asked as curiosity won over her initial wariness of him.
‘One sister, Catalina.’ He rolled onto his back and tucked his arms behind his head so that Anna’s eyes were drawn unwittingly to the way his vest top had ridden up, revealing a sprinkling of black hairs that arrowed down over his taut stomach.
‘She was only eighteen when my parents died and we’re very close. In fact we share a villa just outside Athens. Fortunately a very large villa, which is divided into two separate homes now that Catalina is married and has her own family,’ he added with a laugh. ‘We frequently all meet up for meals in the communal courtyard, but I admit I like my own space.’
He paused, as if he was about to say something else, and Anna waited expectantly, but then he shook his head. ‘That’s enough about me. Now it’s your turn.’ He stretched out a hand and caught hold of her long, pale gold plait. ‘I assume from your colouring and name that you were born in Scandinavia?’
‘No, my father is Swedish but my mother’s English and I was born here in London. I used to visit my grandparents in Stockholm when I was a child, but I haven’t seen them for a long time,’ she explained, adding quietly, ‘not since my parents split up. The divorce was acrimonious and caused a huge rift in the family.’
‘That’s a pity; you must miss them. Are you close to your parents?’
‘Not particularly.’ She jumped up and busied herself with collecting her water bottle and zipping up her bag. ‘I was sent away to boarding-school when I was thirteen and I didn’t see them that much.’ She gave him a brisk smile, indicating her desire to change the subject.
‘You didn’t enjoy living away from home, I take it?’ he asked softly, studying her closed expression speculatively.
‘On the contrary, I loved it. It taught me to be independent and stand on my own two feet. The most valuable lesson I’ve ever learned is never to rely on anyone else.’ She swung her bag over her shoulder and began to walk away from him. ‘I have to go now,’ she stated bluntly, her tone clearly indicating that she didn’t expect him to join her.
It was plain that even the most innocent enquiries about her personal life, and, in particular, her family, were off limits, Damon realised. He jumped to his feet and strolled after her. Beneath her bravado he had detected a note of real pain in her voice when she’d spoken of her parents’ divorce. Thirteen was a notoriously difficult age, particularly for girls, he mused, remembering his sister during her teenage years.
He had been lucky enough to enjoy an idyllic childhood, brought up in a happy and stable environment by parents whose love for each other and their children had never been in doubt. Perhaps Anna’s childhood experiences had caused real emotional damage and contributed towards her fiercely defended independence?
From the articles about her in the press, he had imagined her to be shallow and spoilt, exchanging one handsome actor boyfriend for another with startling regularity. Equality between the sexes suited him fine, he acceded, his eyes focusing on her endlessly long, slender legs as she marched on ahead of him. He was happy to admit that he wasn’t looking for the commitment of a long-term relationship.
Everything he’d read about Anna confirmed that she was a sophisticated woman of the world and he was impatient to take her to bed. But, meeting her again, he had glimpsed an air of vulnerability about her that was as disturbing as it was unexpected. Beneath her ice-cool beauty there lurked a deep well of emotions and to his astonishment he was aware of a tug of protectiveness of her.
‘So, are you an only child?’ he queried. ‘Or are there other, equally stunning Christiansens waiting to take the modelling world by storm?’
Anna paused fractionally, her impatient glare saying louder than words that her private life was none of his business. ‘I have a couple of stepsisters from my father’s second marriage, but we’re not close.’
She almost choked on the understatement. As a teenager she had hated the fact that her adored father preferred to live with his new wife’s children rather than her. Her jealousy had caused friction on her monthly visits to see him and had finally led Lars Christiansen to break off all but the most cursory contact. Her feeling of rejection had been unbearable, but it had been a salutary life lesson, she acknowledged grimly.
‘Do you still keep in contact with your father?’ Damon asked curiously.
‘Christmas cards, the occasional birthday card if he remembers,’ she replied shortly. ‘He lives in Sweden now and is currently going through his third divorce. My mother has recently married again for the third time, although I can’t imagine why. The whole concept of marriage leaves me cold.’
‘Perhaps your parents’ experiences are the reason why none of your relationships last longer than a few weeks,’ Damon mused. ‘Your childhood has left you with a fear of commitment. Is that why you flit from one partner to another?’
They had reached the entrance to the sports centre and Anna swung round, almost incandescent with fury. She balanced on the top step, her eyes glinting with temper. Once again his blithe assumption that the tabloid reports concerning her love life were true hurt more that it should. Why should she give a damn what he thought? And why should she listen to his amateur psychobabble about the effects of her childhood?
‘You’re hardly one to talk about commitment, Damon,’ she snapped scathingly. ‘Your reputation as a playboy is well documented—a multimillionaire womaniser with the morals of an alley cat, or so I’ve heard,’ she added, ignoring the flash of anger in his dark eyes. ‘Rumour has it that you take what you want and who you want with a ruthless disregard for other people’s emotions, but I warn you now, you’re not having me!’
She spun on her heels and marched across the foyer towards the changing rooms before he had time to reply. Damon’s expression of stunned surprise was almost comical—she doubted he had ever been spoken to with such brutal honesty before, but she had never felt less like laughing. He had practically accused her of being a tart, she remembered when she stood beneath the shower and allowed her angry tears to fall.
As one of the world’s most photographed women, she had grown used to the constant gossip and speculation that surrounded her private life. It was a side to her job that she loathed and occasionally her legal team would demand a retraction from the press or threaten to sue over a particularly scurrilous article.
But for the most part she had learned to live with the fact that, in the media’s eyes, she was public property and she treated their intrusion with an air of cool disdain. Hiding her true feelings had become a matter of pride and she couldn’t understand why Damon’s opinion, of all people, mattered so much.
After showering, she slipped into slim fitting jeans and white T-shirt, donned a pair of strappy sandals and combed her hair loose so that it could dry naturally. She strolled through the foyer and paused to inspect the day’s menu displayed on the blackboard outside the cafeteria despite her awareness of the mountain of paperwork awaiting her at home. Fortunately there was no sight of Damon and as her tension eased she was aware that she was starving.
‘Anna, are you going to eat with us today?’
She turned at the sound of the distinctive Italian accent and smiled at Roberto, the manager of the cafeteria. Under his directorship, the cafeteria had developed into an innovative restaurant with an excellent reputation for fresh, beautifully prepared food. In the summer she often ate her lunch outside on the terrace, close to the stream that meandered through the grounds of the sports complex.
‘I admit I’m tempted,’ she replied, discarding the idea of a sandwich back at her flat in favour of one of Roberto’s delicacies.
‘I’ve prepared your favourite—Salade Niçoise,’ Roberto informe
d her with a grin. ‘Your friend is already waiting at your usual table.’
‘Oh, is he.’ Her appetite instantly vanished, to be replaced with simmering annoyance, but she liked Roberto and had no option but to follow him out onto the terrace.
Damon was sitting at the table beside the stream. Her table, she noted irritably, her smile slipping the moment Roberto had gone. ‘Why are you here? I thought I’d made it plain that I didn’t want to see you again,’ she snapped, mindful of the other guests who were enjoying lunch alfresco.
‘You need to eat properly after all that exercise,’ Damon replied calmly, seemingly unperturbed by the storm brewing in her navy blue eyes. ‘And I don’t mean just a snatched sandwich while you’re catching up on your paperwork.’
Was the man a mind-reader? She sincerely hoped not, Anna thought darkly as she absorbed the impact of him in cream chinos and a black polo shirt, unfastened at the neck to reveal the tanned column of his throat. He was seriously sexy but she would rather die than give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he affected her.
‘I don’t want to have lunch with you,’ she muttered fiercely, placing her hands on her hips and glaring at him. Damon seemed determined to challenge her and she felt like stamping her foot in temper.
‘Are you always so childish?’ he queried mildly.
‘Are you always so pigheaded?’
They seemed to have reached checkmate, but as she stood, glowering at him, Roberto appeared, his face beaming as he brought out their lunch.
‘You’re causing a scene. For your friend’s sake why don’t you be a good girl and sit down?’ Damon instructed, the hint of steel beneath his indolent tone causing her to subside into a chair.
‘That wasn’t a scene—trust me, I can do much better than that,’ she growled warningly before pinning a smile on her face to greet Roberto. ‘That looks divine, Roberto—as usual,’ she complimented approvingly when the chef set her meal before her.
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