by Julia James
She could feel the rage. Feel the fury. Boiling up in her. Boiling over.
‘Don’t you dare call me that!’
He laughed. Harsh. Contemptuous. ‘You stand there, at this hour of the night, offering yourself to me to show your gratitude if I give you back that modelling job, and yet you deny that you are whoring yourself to me?’
Her face contorted, rage ripping from her. ‘It was you! You moved in on me!’
‘To teach you a lesson! That no woman makes use of me!’ His eyes skewered her, pinioning her on lasered points. ‘Get out of here. Now.’
Emotion boiled in her—rage, blind rage, at him. Saying that to her! Doing that to her! And then, like a punch in her guts, the other reality returned. The sick, terrifying reality of why she had come here …
Oh, God! Mike was still downstairs—waiting for her.
Waiting with his razor, his mad, drug-fuelled sickness.
Terror exploded in her. She flew at the man standing there, calling her such vile things, ripping from her the one thing that she was desperate for—desperate! Her face contorted, her fists pummelling impotently at the steel wall of his chest as she pounded at him with all her strength, fury and venom spitting from her.
‘You offered me that job!’ she hurled at him, ripping words from her twisting mouth. ‘The agency told me the offer was there! They told me the fee and the schedule and everything! And then you yanked it back again! What do you think you’re playing at, you arrogant jerk?’
He thrust her back as if she were nothing more than a rag doll. She stumbled backwards, impacting the sideboard, clutching at its surface to get her balance, lungs pounding, fury burning through her. Her hand closed over something—she didn’t know what, didn’t register it, registered only that in the intensity of her anger she was panting, breathless, her head a maelstrom of emotion.
‘You absolute bastard,’ she said in a shaking, vehement voice. ‘I crawled to you! And that’s what I got for it! To be called a whore!’
He cut her vicious diatribe with a single utterance, eyes black. ‘Get out, Kat—or I’ll get Security to do it.’
His voice was like ice. Annihilating her. Throwing her out—with nothing. Nothing to keep her safe from that sick psycho downstairs. Nothing to keep his razor from her face …
Her hands spasmed, terror convulsing her fingers, and as they did she felt the shape of what her right hand had closed over.
It was a watch.
Like some kind of nightmare replay, she heard Mike’s voice in her head. Just bring me the lot, OK? Cash, jewellery—whatever …
Slowly, without any conscious will, she tightened her grip on what she held. Time and reality slid away. Her mind wasn’t moving. Nothing was moving. Her chest felt as if it was going to explode, as if she could not draw breath.
As if from the bottom of a deep, deep well she watched Angelos Petrakos stride to the door and yank it open. And as he did so, she turned. She saw—her eyes not registering, her mind suddenly totally blank—saw her hand move, saw her other hand reach for her clutch bag further along the sideboard, saw herself slip the wristwatch inside—the wristwatch of a man so rich it must be valuable—closing the flap of the bag to conceal it.
‘Out—now.’
Angelos Petrakos’s voice knifed into her.
She turned back. She had stopped existing. Someone else had taken over. Someone who was walking towards the door blindly, unseeingly. It wasn’t her any more—not her clutching her bag to her chest, where it burned against her like a flaming brand, walking past Angelis Petrakos, who had turned her boneless with his touch and then called her a whore. It wasn’t her—it wasn’t her. It couldn’t be her. It couldn’t be …
It couldn’t be her walking across the silent, deserted corridor to step into the empty lift and plummet down, down, down, the weight of the bag clutched against her like a stone—it couldn’t be her …
Inside her head, a voice was yelling. Take it back! Say something—anything! But take it back. Or leave it here—in the lift!
But she couldn’t do that. The person who had taken the watch was telling her she couldn’t do that. She had to take it to Mike, waiting out in the street, the razor in his jacket pocket.
The elevator doors sliced open. The hotel lobby yawned ahead of her. She walked out, shoes clipping on the marbled surface of the polished floor. It was late. The lobby was all but empty. The large, revolving doors of the exit were motionless. She went towards them, heart pounding inside her, skin blanched, muscles screaming with tension. She didn’t look to left or right. Didn’t see the concierge put down his phone, nod at someone at his side. Didn’t see the security guard walking towards her until, as she lifted her hand to push at the revolving door, he stepped up to her. Stopping her dead.
‘Excuse me, miss. Would you step this way?’ he said.
The police station was quiet at that time of night. Kat waited silently beside the officers who had come to the hotel to arrest her, summoned by the hotel’s security department. Angelos Petrakos, it seemed, had been swift to notice the absence of his watch—swifter still to phone down and have her intercepted before she could get out of the hotel. Now, she’d been impassively informed, he was on his way to the police station to make a formal identification—both of her and his watch … his custom-made platinum watch with its diamond face and handmade Swiss mechanism.
She knew she would be charged with its theft.
She would let herself be charged.
As she’d got into the police car outside the hotel she’d seen, across the road, Mike on his motorbike. And she had known, with sick terror, that if she walked out of the police station with nothing to give him she would be at his mercy. For a fleeting instant she wondered whether to tell the police officers about him. But they wouldn’t believe her—they would think she was saying it to divert them from her theft—and, anyway, what could they do?
At least in prison she would be safe—safe from Mike …
Hysteria beaded within her, but she crushed it down. Crushed down everything—all thought, all emotion. Everything was over. Everything was finished. Her life would be destroyed—just as her mother’s had been, her grandmother’s before her. There was no way out now—not from what she’d done.
Now she was answering the officer’s questions—name, date of birth, address—numbly, docilely. Because what else was there to do? Nothing could save her now. Only a miracle. And they didn’t happen. They never happened.
A policeman was walking into the station—yellow reflective coat on, boots and a helmet. A traffic cop. He walked up to the desk. Face sombre.
‘What’s up?’ asked the sergeant.
‘Nasty business—just happened,’ said the traffic cop, shaking his head. ‘Motorbike speeding—skidded and smashed head-first into a wall. Just round the corner from here. Rider dead on impact. The ambulance is there now, taking the body away.’
‘Any ID?’ asked the sergeant.
The traffic cop dropped a driving licence on to the desk. Kat’s eyes went to the photo. The world stopped moving. It was Mike.
For a timeless instant she could only stare. Not daring to believe.
Not daring to believe in miracles.
Then, as if an electric charge had jolted through her, she knew what she must do. What she had to do to save herself—to save herself from the pit of destruction that was opening beneath her feet.
There was a way to save herself—if she took it—if she snatched at it—snatched at the lie that glowed in front of her like a lifeline. She could use it to haul herself out of the pit that was swallowing her up even as she sat there, waiting to be charged with theft, to have her life ruined, destroyed—over. Her brain was working feverishly, desperately. She had to do this—she had to! It was her only chance.
She had to become the person she had been in that nightmare moment in the suite, when her hand had closed over the watch. Ruthless, desperate.
She took a breath—jagged in her thro
at—opened her mouth, touched the sleeve of the policeman taking down her details. Interrupting him.
She made her voice match the lie—the lie that might save her skin. Save herself from prison. From having her life destroyed.
‘Officer,’ she husked, ‘I need to speak to you … discreetly …’
Angelos’s mobile rang. He answered it immediately.
‘Yes?’ he barked. His limo was paused at traffic lights, the chauffeur revving the engine expectantly. The blue light of the police station was visible a short way beyond.
There was a pause. Then, ‘She’s saying what?’
The policemen, his voice impassive, repeated what he had just said. ‘Miss Jones is denying absolutely that she is in possession of stolen property. She is saying,’ he went on, his tone studiedly deadpan, ‘that you gave her the watch as a present, sir.’ He paused slightly, choosing his words with care. ‘A personal present. Following her visit to your suite this evening.’
He let the words sink in, then resumed. ‘In the circumstances, therefore, Mr Petrakos, we would advise you that we will not be charging Miss Jones. It would, after all, be your word against hers. Especially considering that as I understand it she has a witness in a hotel employee who saw she was there with your consent, and that you were offering her hospitality. Moreover, Miss Jones says she appreciates you may have changed your mind about making her such a generous gift, and has returned it. We have therefore discharged Miss Jones, and your watch is now in safe custody, awaiting collection.’
Angelos’s grip tightened. The beds of his fingernails were white. White the lines around his mouth.
Then, ‘Thank you, officer,’ he said. ‘I will be there shortly.’
There was nothing in his voice. Nothing at all.
As the limo glided smoothly forward, approaching the police station, he could see a tall, slim figure pause at the entrance, start to walk down the steps. The limo pulled into the car park.
He was out of the car before she had set foot on the pavement. Blocking her way. He seized her arm. It was as if an iron claw had closed around it. She stared blindly up into Angelos Petrakos’s murderous face.
For one endless moment he just stared down at her.
Then slowly, each word dragged from him, he spoke.
‘You try and sell me your body, and when I don’t buy, you dare—you dare—to steal from me! And then you slime your way out of it by lying about me! No one—no one—steals from me and lies their way out of it by slandering me, accusing me of paying for sex!’ His eyes sliced her, sharper than a razorblade. ‘Enjoy this moment—it’s all you’ll have. You’re finished.’
Then he thrust her away from him and she fell—down, down, down, into the pit he’d opened beneath her feet.
CHAPTER FIVE
THE destruction had been systematic and ruthless. The power of Angelos Petrakos had seen to that. Her contract with the agency had been cancelled, and no other London modelling agency would take her on—unwilling to risk the wrath of so rich and powerful a man. He’d had her evicted from her bedsit, sacked from her day job. Everything Kat had achieved by sweat, hard work, and dogged willpower was gone.
He’d left her with nothing.
Nothing but her will.
And the memory of what he had done to her.
And now, five long years later, the memory burned with a livid, coruscating flame in her head, giving her the strength she needed now to defy him. Because defiance was all she would ever feel towards him! She had refused to stay beaten—refused to go back down into the pit. Though he’d ripped her life to shreds she’d climbed back up, hand over hand, out of the pit.
And when she’d emerged she had no longer been Kat Jones. She would never be Kat Jones again …
Whatever Angelos Petrakos threatened her with.
Her eyes were steely, meeting his head-on, unflinching.
‘Get out of my flat,’ she said. Her voice was level, even if below the surface she was fracturing into tiny pieces.
‘You haven’t answered my question.’ Angelos’s voice was implacable. ‘What does your fiancé—’ he made the word mocking ‘—think about Kat Jones?’
Her silence was tangible. That and the whitening along her cheekbones revealed everything to him he needed to know. His eyes glittered darkly.
‘You haven’t told him.’
It was not a question.
For an endless moment his eyes simply hooked hers in their talons. She tried to tear them away, but could not—could only stand there while he eviscerated her with his eyes. With his words.
‘You deceitful, manipulative little liar,’ he said softly. ‘You were going to marry him, weren’t you? Knowing he was getting a mirage, a fake? Weren’t you?’
The fury was naked in his voice, icing through her. She couldn’t move—couldn’t speak. Dread filled her.
And something more than dread. Something worse.
She could feel the adrenaline leap in her body and tried to crush it down. Not because it fed her anger—she didn’t care about her anger, she welcomed it, needed it—but because it fed a quite different emotion. One that was deadly to her. Lethal. One she could not, could not, allow herself to feel.
She straightened her spine. ‘Get out,’ she said again. She could feel the pulse in her throat throb. It was loathing—that was all. Loathing that it was signalling. Nothing else. She wouldn’t allow it to be anything else.
He didn’t move. Stayed right where he was, occupying her sofa. Invading her space. Her life. Forcing her nightmare past into the present she had made for herself—into the future she so desperately wanted with Giles.
Then he spoke. ‘You have a choice.’ His words cut like a knife through flesh. Her flesh. ‘I will not allow you to inflict your deceit upon that hapless fool you’ve got in your toils. Either you tell him about Kat—or I will.’
‘No!’ The word broke from her—instinctive, urgent. Kat Jones was gone—gone for ever! She would never allow her back—never!
He smiled. The smile of a predator who had seen his prey trip and fall.
‘Oh, yes, Kat. You’ll tell him. Or I will do it for you. Do you really think—’ his dark eyes rested on her with implacable condemnation ‘—I won’t?’
No. She didn’t think that. She knew exactly what Angelos Petrakos would do. He always did what he promised he would do—she knew that … Oh, how she knew that!
Dread and rage surged in her. But there was something else as well—something that forced its way to the fore, cutting through both those turgidly swirling emotions.
She could never tell Giles what Angelos was demanding. Never! Because she knew that for Giles it would make no difference. Hollowness emptied her. Giles would abide by the code of his class, and nothing on earth would make him abandon it! Whatever she told him, he would say that he had asked her to marry him and no power could make him retract that! He would stand by her even knowing what she had told him, despite all that …
And she couldn’t do it to him! She couldn’t!
‘Which is it to be, Kat?’ Angelos’s voice pierced her. ‘You or I to tell that deluded English lordling of yours that you’re a thief, a liar and a whore?’
‘I never offered myself to you! Never! And you got your watch back!’ she gritted. ‘You got it back!’
A harsh rasp escaped him. Black rage showed in his face. ‘You claimed it as payment. Painted me as a man who pays for sex. You stole from me, Kat, and you lied about me. And you thought you could get away with it!’
Her hands were clenched. Heart hammering in her chest.
‘You destroyed me! You took everything—everything from me! You took my livelihood, my career, even the lousy flea-pit I lived in! You took everything! You told me you’d finish me, and you did!’
Long lashes dipped down over his eyes. His voice was edged like a sharpened blade. ‘But you didn’t stay finished, did you, Kat? You’ve crawled back. And you’re more ambitious than ever! But I won’t permit you t
o make a fool of that poor, hapless sap of yours! He deserves the truth about you!’
‘No.’ Her rejection was absolute. She could not do it to Giles—could not condemn him to marry a woman like Kat, knowing her to be Kat, knowing what she was, where she came from, what she had done …
And even though she would—must!—refuse to marry him, she could not bear to see the expression in his eyes when he realised how she had deceived him.
‘No,’ she said again, her voice tight as wire, garroting her.
Heaviness crushed her. Truth, insistent and brutal, forced itself upon her. Like blows on her head. Reality slammed into her and hatred burned in her eyes for Angelos Petrakos. Hatred not just for him, but for what he was forcing on her—making her accept, bitterly, reluctantly. She could not deceive poor Giles, could not use him the way she had—for what else could it ever have been to let him marry a woman not knowing what she once had been?
The garrote tightened around her neck, choking her.
Angelos could see her expression, see her horror, her fury. Something shifted in his eyes again, curved the thinned line of his mouth.
‘Or you can have one more choice, Kat,’ he said. His eyes glittered darkly with black fire. ‘I’ll let you keep the fiction you’ve created about yourself, but if you haven’t the guts to tell him that you’re really Kat Jones then you can release him from your toils another way.’ The malevolent glitter of his eyes speared her. ‘Tell him you’ve changed your mind about marrying him.’
‘Why would he believe me?’ She forced the words from her narrowed throat.
He smiled, his mouth mocking, obsidian eyes alight with an unholy light. ‘Why? Because, Kat, the love of your life has just walked back into it …’
She could only stare. ‘You’re insane,’ she breathed.
‘An effective fiction—and it will serve the purpose I intend. To convince him, Kat, and to remove yourself from his vicinity after you’ve told him that—alas—you can no longer marry him, you’ll come to me. Spend the night at my hotel.’
‘I will never do that—never!’ Her face and her voice were stark.