As Tino handed her the glass of champagne he lifted his own and tipped it towards her in a silent toast. She replied by walking away to perch on the edge of the room’s only straight-backed chair. She needed a moment to collect herself. This encounter was something new for her. In the past men had always been happy to follow her lead, which was hardly surprising since most of her relationships were conducted in her head—she didn’t have time or inclination for anything else. She liked her life the way it was—tidy, successful, and absolutely safe.
‘Are you sure you’re comfortable over there?’
In spite of all her good intentions, the look Tino gave her made Lisa’s heart pound. If nothing else Tino Zagorakis set new standards for her fantasies. ‘I’m fine, thank you.’
‘More champagne?’
‘Why not?’ She could handle it. She could handle him too.
As he crossed the room she noticed that his movements were fluid like the big cat she had first thought him. Moving on silent feet, he reached her side before she even had time to hold out her glass.
He left her alone after that, and they ate in silence seated at opposite ends of the room, which should have been a relief. But Lisa’s sensory self had taken over from the rational side of her being. The delicious food and wine slithered down her throat with dizzying speed, and the alcohol loosened her inhibitions. Some very primitive thoughts were entering her mind… just watching his mouth work as he ate was compulsive viewing; his teeth were so white and strong, his lips so firm, and mobile—
‘Lisa?’ He picked up on her stare. ‘Would you like something more?’
As Lisa’s eyes cleared she waved the bread basket away and she shook her head. ‘No, thank you… that was absolutely delicious, but I couldn’t eat another thing.’
‘Then I think it’s time we got to know each other a little better, don’t you?’
CHAPTER TWO
TINO took her plate, stacking it with his on a side table. Lisa watched warily as he came towards her, and almost flinched when he was close enough to touch. But then, instead of grabbing her, he snatched hold of his briefcase and dipped inside. Bringing out some financial reports, he spread them across the low table between them.
‘I think we both know you’ve got a few problems, Lisa—’
For a moment when his glance flicked up Lisa thought he was talking about something other than business, and blushed violently.
‘I’ve noticed a few discrepancies here and there,’ he continued. ‘All easily explained, I’m sure. No doubt our respective bean-counters will soon iron things out.’
It was a relief for her mind to click back into business mode.
‘Take a look at these.’ He passed her some sheets. ‘It’s only fair that you should have sight of all my findings.’
Fair? Tino was pointing up the fact that he had uncovered a whole clutch of Bond Steel skeletons in the shortest time imaginable, in order to prepare her for a much reduced offer price, Lisa suspected. ‘That’s very good of you, Tino.’
She was careful to sound noncommittal. She wanted to see exactly what he had found out before showing any reaction to it.
‘I’ll leave the rest of these for you.’ He closed his briefcase.
‘You’re going?’
‘Not if you don’t want me to.’
He had changed in a heartbeat from cold-blooded businessman to someone very different. Her pulse rate quickened in response. But this was wrong. Worse than wrong, it was dangerous.
Her gaze was drawn to his hand resting on the door… his strong, supple hand resting on the door. ‘I’ll see you out.’ Her voice sounded distant and undecided. It was as if she were looking down at herself, or rather at the woman she might have been if her life had been different. She didn’t want him to leave. The apartment would be so empty without him… She would be lonely again. Lonely but safe.
Tino had tossed a pebble into the pond and waited to see how far the ripples would travel. He had to admit he was surprised. She had capitulated rather sooner than he had imagined. Mixing business and pleasure was new to him, but for Lisa he would make an exception. He wanted Bond Steel, and he wanted Lisa Bond. Business was a game he always won, and she had become part of that game.
She thought herself strong and controlling. How strong? How controlling? He would test her boundaries and find out. His body ached for release. The thought of dominating Lisa held real appeal. It would be to her benefit too, of course. If she had the good sense to surrender he would give her the ride of her life.
As Tino caught hold of her arm Lisa snapped out of the trance. ‘That’s the second time you’ve done that,’ she told him angrily, ‘and I don’t like it.’
‘Really? Then you must forgive me,’ he said in a voice that managed to be both penitent and amused.
But he didn’t let her go.
And now they were close, too close, and their breath was mingling. There was no sound other than the two of them breathing. And then, perhaps by accident, the joint of his thumb brushed the side of her breast, and she sighed.
He felt her tense as he accidentally touched her when he shifted position, but that sigh was sending out a very different message. She didn’t try to pull away, and now he felt the tremor running through her. He could feel it coursing right up his arm.
She wasn’t jaded, and that pleased him. Her experience in the commune had only prepared her for him, heightened her capacity for pleasure… He allowed his gaze to slip to her breasts, to the full swell pressing urgently against her chaste white business shirt. He centred his attention on the taut nipples straining against the lace of her bra, and was gratified to see them harden still more beneath his interest. Lifting his head, he saw the pulse fluttering in her neck and the pink flush of desire tinting her skin. He understood her torment. He understood it and therefore would prolong it.
He was rewarded when the tip of her tongue crept out to moisten her lips. She fully expected him to kiss her. But instead he stared into her eyes, gauging her level of arousal. As he had anticipated they were almost black with desire, with just a faint rim of green remaining. She was breathing fast and the tiny gasps were making the fabric pull against the buttons on the front of her shirt. He longed to rip it off—but he wouldn’t do that, because he knew she would like it too much.
She was quivering with frustration. She had never been so aroused. She had never been aroused by a man before… She could control most things, all things—so why not this? And why wouldn’t he kiss her? One kiss was all she wanted, and then she would kick him out. She licked her lips, and saw his attention drawn to the full swell of her bottom lip.
Her lips were moist where she had touched them with her tongue… swollen with desire. He recognised all the signs, and, though he planned it to be this way, the sight was nearly too much for him. Dragging her close, he held her so their lips were almost touching, raising the danger level for them both.
She responded, and white-hot passion flared between them, but at the very point when he intended to pull back and teach her a lesson she stiffened and made an angry sound low in her throat. She strained against him—not with passion now, but with absolute determination to break free. He released her at once.
‘Get out.’ Her voice was barely above a whisper, but it contained more venom than he had ever heard. She didn’t look at him. She remained frozen in place, with the back of her hand covering her mouth as if she wanted to hide it from him, wanted to hide the signs of her arousal from him. And she had been aroused, but then so had he.
‘Get out,’ she repeated, snapping the words at him.
In place of his surprise, Tino felt his anger beginning to rise. ‘Why?’ he said. ‘Because I almost kissed you before you could kiss me?’
‘Is that what you think?’ She looked at him incredulously.
His pride was all over the place. He had never misjudged a situation so badly. ‘Don’t tell me you didn’t want that?’
She rallied then, straighteni
ng up to confront him, her face drained of colour. ‘You’ll be telling me I deserved it next.’
‘What? You think passion between a man and a woman is some form of punishment?’ He grasped the back of his neck with his hand, and the look on his face told Lisa she was wrong about him—horribly wrong.
Straightening up, he stared at her coldly. ‘I don’t need these mind games, Lisa.’
‘Then get out!’ She made an angry gesture. ‘What are you waiting for?’
‘When are you going to learn that not everyone wants to dance to your tune?’
‘Or yours?’ Her eyes were blazing. She thought she heard him murmur something more. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said, you’re nothing but a control freak, Lisa.’ He stared straight at her so there could be no mistake.
Lisa didn’t show by even a flicker that he had come closer than any man alive to proving that a lie. ‘I think you’d better leave now.’
‘That’s the first thing you’ve said this evening that makes any sense.’
‘What do you mean, she didn’t make the meeting?’
Shifting the satellite phone to his other shoulder, Tino stared out at the clouds above Stellamaris, his private island, barely seeing the beloved contours of lush greenery, sugar sand and rock as he listened to what his right hand man was trying to tell him.
‘They said she was sick—’
‘Sick?’
‘I don’t know, Tino. I couldn’t find out any more. I don’t think it’s serious, headache perhaps, women’s problems— who the hell knows?’
‘Find out for me, will you? And get back to me right away.’
‘I’ll do the best I can.’
Tino’s voice hardened. ‘That’s not good enough, Andreas.’
‘OK, leave it with me.’
‘And, Andreas…’
‘Yes?’
‘Start making overtures to Clifton Steel, will you?’
‘Clifton? But I thought you wanted Bond—’
Tino’s voice was uncompromising. ‘Just do as I ask, Andreas.’
‘Yes, boss.’
He couldn’t afford to feel like this about anyone, let alone Lisa Bond. Have her occupy his thoughts to the exclusion of everything else? Was he mad? After what had happened between them, professionally, he’d bury her. He would buy out Clifton and Bond. That would solve the problem—permanently. By the time he had finished with her she would never want to hear his name again.
Cutting the connection, Tino eased back in the leather armchair he used when he wasn’t flying the jet himself. His eyes narrowed as he thought over the events of the past forty-eight hours. He had never met anyone like Lisa Bond. She had blind-sided him, slipped beneath his control. She had led him on, and then pulled back at the last moment.
But she was a woman in her late twenties, and grown women didn’t behave that way. The signals they gave off were always clear. Why were Lisa’s signals so misleading? Her behaviour puzzled him, and he didn’t like puzzles. She was acting like a kid, a virgin, even, rather than the ball- breaking bitch everyone said she was.
And why was he still thinking about her at all? Had Lisa Bond turned his shrew-capping tactic on its head, and squirrelled her way into his limited bank of caring instincts? He had always imagined those instincts had been beaten out of him in his youth, but she had made him look at her as more than a business adversary.
He couldn’t afford to go soft. With a gust of exasperation, Tino released his seat belt before the jet touched down. He was impatient to breathe the fresh clean air of Stellamaris. When Lisa Bond came back into his life he would be ready for her. And she would come back, they all did. She wanted the same thing everyone else did—his money. It always came down to that in the end.
* * *
‘What do you mean, he didn’t turn up?’ Lisa demanded, rolling over onto her stomach in bed so that she could rest her chin on her hand.
‘Just that,’ Mike, her PA, assured her. ‘Everyone else was here, of course—just you two were missing.’
‘Don’t bracket me with that man. I have no idea where Constantine Zagorakis is, but, I can assure you, he’s not here with me. Make certain everyone else knows that too, will you, Mike?’
‘So, what’s up? You never take time off.’
That was true. Like her father, only a stretcher carting her off to hospital could get in the way of her work. Mike knew that as well as she did. But her one-to-one with Tino had left Lisa more shaken than she had expected.
‘Lisa, what’s happened?’
She refocused. ‘Don’t worry, Mike. I have a sore throat, that’s all.’
‘A sore throat?’ He sounded unconvinced. ‘I’m sorry.’
Lisa had known Mike since they were at school together. She hated lying to him. He had already brought her up to speed with what she’d missed at the meeting, and yet she felt he was holding something back. ‘So, what’s the gossip on the street?’
‘It’s more than gossip. But there’s good news as well as bad.’
‘Just give me the bad.’ She steeled herself.
‘I got a call.’
All the humour had just leached from Mike’s voice, Lisa realised. ‘Go on,’ she pressed grimly.
‘From my pal at Clifton.’
‘Clifton Steel?’ Mike’s silence confirmed it. ‘And?’
‘Zagorakis Inc have asked for an initial meeting with Clifton. Apparently they’re considering—’
‘Their small engineering plant?’ Lisa’s stomach clenched with dread as she cut across him.
‘No, Lisa, the whole of Clifton—’
She went cold. ‘But they can’t—’ This time Zagorakis had really caught her out. How could anyone move that fast? ‘But what about our deal with Zagorakis Inc?’
‘Word is Zagorakis has gone cold on our small works. It’s all or nothing for him. I heard in the last hour that he’s asked his people to start courting Clifton… and, Lisa…’
‘Yes?’ Lisa tensed, wondering what else there could be.
‘He’s after us too—’
‘No,’ Lisa exploded, sitting bolt upright. It was everything she had been dreading. ‘Bond Steel isn’t for sale, Mike. I only need to sell the small works. The cash injection that will bring is all we need to set us back on our feet.’
‘It may be too late.’
‘We’re not going to give up, and throw Bond Steel to the lions.’
‘To one lion in particular, you mean?’
‘Get Zagorakis on the phone.’
‘Who do you want to speak to?’
‘Tino, of course.’
‘He doesn’t speak to anyone directly.’
‘He’ll speak to me.’
‘What if he won’t?’
‘Do anything you have to do to get his private number, Mike,’ Lisa pressed grimly.
‘It won’t help you.’
‘What do you mean it won’t help me?
‘He took off at dawn to fly to his private island in Greece. There’s no way anyone can contact him there— even his staff aren’t allowed to do that. They have to wait for Zagorakis to ring them.’
‘But that’s ridiculous.’
‘Maybe. But that’s the way it is.’
‘Are you sure about this?’
‘Totally. I’ve got a friend at Clifton.’
Lisa’s mind raced. ‘The financial director? That tall, good-looking blond guy?’
‘We’re seeing each other, Lisa.’
‘I guessed.’ A faint smile broke through Lisa’s tension. ‘I hope you’ll both be very happy.’ That explained how Mike had learned everything so fast, and also confirmed that everything he had told her was one-hundred-per-cent accurate. And without the cash from the sale of the small works to Zagorakis Inc, she was in serious trouble.
‘Shall I give you the good news now?’
‘Good news? I can’t believe you can have anything good to tell me after that.’
‘You are fit to fly.�
��
‘Anything but a joke.’
‘This is no joke. The Bond Steel company jet has just been signed off. It’s ready to go when you are.’
‘Mike, that’s not good news—or had you forgotten the purpose behind selling the engineering works? We can’t stand more expense right now. If things get any worse than they are the jet will be the first thing that has to go.’
‘Sell it by all means—but not yet, Lisa,’ Mike insisted. ‘Zagorakis’s island is quite small. The landing strip can’t take commercial airliners.’
Lisa’s tense face softened abruptly. ‘Mike, you’re an angel! I need one clear day to prepare,’ she added, thinking aloud. ‘So, make sure the jet is fully fuelled and ready to fly on Sunday. Have the pilot file a flight plan for Stellamaris—’
‘So, you’re chasing Zagorakis?’
Mike was smart—that was why she had hired him in the first place. But after what he had told her, she was going to Stellamaris, not just to save the deal, but to nail Zagorakis to the mast. ‘No, Mike,’ she assured him, ‘I’m chasing business.’
* * *
Stellamaris was beautiful. So beautiful, it made Lisa want to cry. And she never cried. Well, not since she was a child. Never in her adult life had she ever shed a tear—except on Friday morning after Mike’s phone call. But those had been very different tears—Mike would have said she was having a tantrum and he would have been right. Everything within reach had been thrown at the wall. And then she had wasted another hour clearing up the mess. She never lost control. She never would again after that. What a time-wasting loss of energy that had been. Sore throat? Sore head was closer to the truth. Did Tino Zagorakis really think he could direct events that, not only affected her own life, but the lives of people she cared about, from his private island?
‘We’re nearly there, Thespinis Bond. When I turn the next corner, you will be able to see the villa.’
The Millionaire's Virgin (Mills & Boon By Request) Page 3