Damon had shown her nothing but patience and incredible sensitivity but she had thrown it back in his face.
‘I have to go to Greece,’ she muttered dazedly. She didn’t know if it was love that Judith had seen in Damon’s eyes, but suddenly she didn’t care. The last three weeks without him had been so unutterably miserable that she was prepared to risk her pride by admitting how much she loved him.
Maybe he would always care for Eleni, but he couldn’t make love to a memory.
‘I’m sorry, Mum, but I can’t stop. I promise to return soon though. I have to go back to Damon and…’
‘And tell him you love him,’ her mother agreed gently. ‘I suppose it’s useless trying to persuade you to stay the night, so I’d better drive you to the airport.’
The offices of Kouvaris Construction were in the heart of Athens. Anna stepped out of the heat of the late-summer sunshine into the cool interior of the reception area. Her heart was beating in time with the staccato tap of her stiletto heels on the marble floor as she strode past the startled receptionist and into the lift.
She had already elicited from Damon’s sister that he was at work and that his office was on the top floor. Tina had also warned that her brother’s mood had been grim ever since he’d returned from Poros and suggested that Anna was the only person who could make him smile again.
Somehow that seemed unlikely, Anna brooded when the lift halted at the top floor. She had carefully planned what she wanted to say to him, but now the time was here and her confidence was draining away faster than water down a plug-hole.
Taking a deep breath, she smiled at the elegant woman who she guessed was Damon’s secretary, and marched briskly towards his office. The woman said something in Greek that probably translated to Damon did not want to be disturbed, but Anna ignored the warning and pushed open the door.
He looked tired and curiously dejected, with no sign of his usual wonderful arrogance, she noted when she stared greedily at him, feeling her body’s instinctive response to his raw masculinity. He must have heard the click of the door but did not bother to lift his head as he growled a terse comment in Greek.
‘Hello, Damon.’
She didn’t know what she had been expecting and was shocked at the look of savage pain in his eyes, before his thick lashes fell, concealing his emotions. For those few brief seconds she had looked into his heart and relief crashed over her, making her legs feel decidedly wobbly.
‘Anna. What a…pleasant surprise,’ he said coolly. ‘Why are you here?’
It was typical of Damon to ignore social niceties and go straight for the kill, Anna acknowledged ruefully. ‘Can’t you guess?’ she asked.
‘I gave up trying to fathom the intricacies of your mind long ago. Why don’t you just tell me and save time for both of us?’ He leaned back in his chair and surveyed her boldly, as if he were a sultan inspecting his latest concubine.
Once Anna would have felt self-conscious, but now she calmly met his gaze. Her skirt was shorter than she normally wore, revealing her long, slender legs in their sheer black hose. She watched in fascination the stain of colour that ran along Damon’s cheekbones when his eyes slid all the way down to her heels.
Desire, the fierce chemistry that had always existed between them, still glittered in his dark eyes. It was a start, she thought. Passion was as powerful an emotion as love and if necessary she would use it to tie him to her until he no longer knew where passion ended and love began.
She sauntered across the room, unfastening the buttons of her jacket as she went. ‘Perhaps this will give you some clue as to why I’m here,’ she murmured. She shrugged the jacket over her shoulders and let it slip to the floor. Beneath it she was wearing nothing but a black lacy bra that cupped the creamy swell of her breasts. She shook back her hair and heard Damon inhale sharply, although his expression remained impassive.
With slow deliberation she unzipped her skirt and wriggled her hips to ease its path down over her thighs. The whole concept of peeling off her layers of clothing was incredibly liberating. Damon had freed her from the belief that her body was somehow sinful. She was proud of her breasts and her narrow waist and her endlessly long legs, and from the heat in his gaze he appreciated every one of her feminine curves.
That appreciation was not mirrored in his voice. ‘Very nice,’ he drawled in a tone of supreme indifference. ‘Your Aussie lover is a lucky boy.’
‘Who?’ Anna stared at him, plainly bemused.
‘Midge, or whatever he calls himself. The insect with the long hair and bug eyes.’
‘You mean Mitch Travis, lead singer of Australia’s biggest pop group.’ Anna shook her head as realisation dawned. ‘You’re jealous!’
Damon did not deign to reply but the fury in his gaze should have sent her running for cover.
‘For your information, I happened to be standing next to Mitch at a film première and the press immediately concocted the story that we’re having an affair. In my world, it happens all the time.’
‘I do not like your world,’ Damon growled, sounding very Greek.
‘Nothing happened,’ she assured him as joy bubbled within her. He was jealous. That had to mean something. ‘The only man I’ll ever want is you.’
She leaned forwards, caught hold of his tie and pulled him towards her, seeking his mouth with newfound confidence. For a few nerve-racking seconds he remained stiff and un-yielding before he wrapped his arms around her and dragged her down onto his knee.
‘Anna mou, I don’t think I can take much more of this,’ he groaned when he finally lifted his head to stare at her softly swollen mouth and the slumberous desire in her eyes. ‘I love you—’ the words were wrenched from his soul ‘—more than I believed it possible to love another human being. But my need for you is tearing me apart.’
His face twisted with emotion and Anna traced a shaky hand over his jaw. ‘But I thought…’ She broke off as joy unfurled within her like the petals of a flower opening to the sun. ‘Oh, Damon, I love you, too. With all my heart,’ she vowed fiercely, her eyes glistening with the emotions she no longer had to hide.
‘Then why did you leave me?’ he groaned. ‘That night on Poros when Ianthe was frightened by the spider, you were so cold and distant and I knew then that I was losing you. But I can’t change the fact that I have a child.’
‘I love Ianthe almost as much as I love you,’ Anna assured him softly. She flushed shamefacedly. ‘I could never resent her, but I found it hard to deal with the fact that you’re still in love with her mother.
‘Ianthe told me that night that you had spent your honeymoon at the farmhouse on Poros,’ she added.
‘Did she?’ Damon frowned. ‘It’s true that I took Eleni to Poros, but we stayed at a friend’s villa on the other side of the island. I only bought the farmhouse a couple of years ago as somewhere to take Ianthe and I told her about the honeymoon because I think it’s important for her to know as many details as possible about her mother.’
‘Eleni died a long time ago,’ he said quietly. ‘For Ianthe’s sake I will always remember her, which is why I have all her artwork on display in the villa. I loved her, yes,’ he agreed, tightening his arms around Anna to foil her bid for escape. ‘She was a sweet girl. We met soon after the death of my parents and I suppose I wanted to recreate a sense of family. But my sadness was for the loss of a young life and when I think of her now, it is with affection. You are the love of my life, pedhaki mou. Together with Ianthe you are my reason for living.’
He sought her mouth with tender passion that quickly developed to an inferno of desire. The last three weeks without him had been purgatory, Anna thought as she wound her arms around his neck and parted her lips to savour the wicked sorcery of his tongue.
‘I am a man of action rather than words,’ Damon growled as his glorious arrogance bounced back. ‘I need to show you how much you mean to me before I explode!’
He stood and carried her over to a door on the other s
ide of his office. ‘Sometimes if I’ve been working late, I sleep here,’ he told her when he nudged the door open with his shoulder and strode over to the bed. The room was functional rather than decorative and he gave her a rueful glance. ‘It’s not the most romantic venue for your first time, pedhaki mou. If you prefer, we could check into a hotel.’
‘No time,’ Anna muttered feverishly as she fumbled with his shirt buttons. ‘I want you to make love to me now. I can’t wait. And I have no intention of lying here admiring the décor.’
The undisguised hunger in her eyes was all the encouragement Damon needed to strip down to his boxers with record speed. He hesitated for a moment and trapped her gaze while his hand moved to the waistband.
‘Please, I want to see you,’ she whispered, wetting her dry lips with the tip of her tongue.
Her plea almost sent him over the edge and when he shrugged out of his underwear the solid length of his arousal jutted proudly forwards.
‘You are so beautiful,’ Anna whispered, her faint apprehension fading as she absorbed the latent power of his muscle bound body. He was her Greek god and she was impatient to feel him inside her. Already she could feel the flood of warmth between her thighs and when he stretched out beside her she drew his head down and initiated a kiss that stirred his soul.
He removed her bra with fingers that shook slightly and cradled her breasts with gentle reverence before lowering his head to anoint each nipple with his lips. Anna moaned and arched her back, silently pleading for more. She felt him skim his hand over her flat stomach to the tiny triangle of black lace and lifted her hips so that he could remove her knickers.
Her slender body was naked except for the sheer black stockings that contrasted starkly against her pale flesh. Damon muttered a harsh imprecation and traced the wide band of lace at the junction between her thighs before pushing her legs apart with an edge of roughness that warned of his urgent desire to push deep inside her.
Anna felt no fear, only pleasure when he stroked her and then gently eased his fingers into her to perform an erotic dance that made her tremble. Only when he was sure that she was completely relaxed did he slide his hands beneath her bottom to angle her in readiness to receive him. She felt his hard length rub against the opening to her vagina and stretched her legs wider, eager to be one with the one man who had captured her heart.
‘I love you, Anna mou.’ The words were torn from him as he slowly entered her and then paused when he felt the fragile barrier of her virginity. ‘I don’t want to hurt you,’ he muttered hoarsely, his face a rigid mask as he sought to retain control.
‘You won’t. I trust you, my love,’ she whispered and lifted her hips towards him, tensed for a second and dug her nails into his shoulders as her muscles stretched around him, then relaxed when he eased in deep and filled her.
He claimed her lips with the same tender passion with which he had claimed her body and began to move, slowly at first and then, when she learned his rhythm, faster, deeper so that the sensations he aroused in her grew ever more intense.
‘Damon!’ She called his name as the waves of pleasure built inexorably, taking her higher and higher until she was poised at the edge of some magical place that she had never known existed. The agonising tension that gripped her was suddenly and shatteringly released in a tumultuous wave of pleasure that seemed impossible to withstand.
In the recesses of her mind she heard Damon cry out, a harsh, feral sound so that she instinctively clung to him as his big body shuddered and he drove into her one last time.
Breathing hard, he rested his forehead against hers and felt the wetness on her cheeks. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked desperately.
‘I love you.’ She placed a finger over his lips and blinked away her tears.
‘You know I’ll never let you go? You’ll have to marry me, agape mou. Please,’ he added huskily when she stared at him with wide, stunned eyes. ‘Make me the happiest man in the world? I know your career is important to you and I respect your choice to work, but perhaps you could be based in Athens rather than England. I admit that I’ll hate it when you’re away on assignments,’ he added honestly, ‘but I’ll be waiting for you every time you come home.’
The last of Anna’s lingering doubts disappeared and with it her old fear of not being financially dependent and she smiled at him. ‘You didn’t use protection, did you?’
‘No,’ he said slowly, frowning at the sudden change in conversation.
‘And I’m not on the pill, so technically I could already be pregnant.’
‘Technically I suppose you could.’
The glow of love in her eyes made him catch his breath.
‘I think we should give Ianthe a little brother or sister as soon as possible, don’t you?’ she murmured, sliding her hand down to where their bodies were still joined. ‘And if you leave me any spare time outside of the bedroom, I could always model maternity wear.’
‘Be warned, agape mou,’ he told her, his eyes darkening with desire as he stirred deliciously within her, ‘I shall ensure that you have very little spare time!’
ISBN: 978-1-4268-1661-1
THE GREEK TYCOON’S VIRGIN MISTRESS
First North American Publication 2008.
Copyright © 2007 by Chantelle Shaw.
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The Greek Tycoon's Virgin Mistress Page 17