by Lynne Graham
They sat down to dinner. By that stage it was clear to Xan that Elvi had gone down like a prize trophy with his family because his mother was pumping her about her love of dogs, while the wretched untrained little beasts formed begging round their feet, and his sisters were chattering to Elvi as though she were one of the family. It was her friendly gene, Xan decided, only becoming perversely annoyed when Elvi disappeared off to see his mother’s latest craft project, which he knew would be an absolute disaster. Ariadne Ziakis might be the acclaimed author of several very weighty archaeology tomes and a professor in her university department, but she was not talented with her hands.
‘I was doing the stitch wrong!’ his mother proclaimed when she returned to the table to drink her coffee. ‘And this wonderful girl showed me how to do it and it was so easy when you know how...’
Ne...yes, Elvi went down with the family like award-winning chocolate.
Tobias, always timid, confided in Elvi about his latest relationship breakdown, when he could barely bring himself to acknowledge that he was gay to Xan’s face. Lukas pontificated happily about worldly indifference to the suffering of refugees and revealed that he had met the woman he hoped to marry. One sister revealed that she was pregnant again, another admitted to a serious boyfriend. Xan watched in silent astonishment while his family opened up to Elvi in a way they never did with him. Delphina related the entire story of her humdrum relationship with Takis in the kind of detail that would send most people to sleep, but Elvi listened as if she were hearing the most romantic story she had ever heard.
Maybe she genuinely did think that sort of stuff was romantic, Xan reflected in awe as not even a giggle escaped Elvi when she heard about Takis’s marriage proposal: harbour restaurant, family party, roses at the table, bended knee, so conventional Xan’s teeth hurt with saccharine overload just listening. Elvi was nice, he decided, in the most flexible interpretation of that overused word. People blossomed around her, drawn by her sincere interest, warmed by her kind and optimistic outlook on life. She was the absolute antithesis of him, Xan decided.
‘She’s adorable. Put a ring on her finger fast,’ his mother urged as she said goodnight to him.
‘She’s far too kind and caring for you,’ his eldest sister, the engineer, opined. ‘You’ll probably make her miserable.’
‘Oh, I just love Elvi.’ Delphina sighed blissfully, very much the lovestruck bride the night before her wedding.
‘Elvi would make a good wife,’ Lukas, the priest, told him staunchly. ‘She’s a godly woman.’
‘She’s a pet,’ Tobias pronounced with starry eyes as Xan identified Elvi by his mother’s side, down on her knees petting the scruffy dogs. ‘Such a good listener.’
Chilled by that amount of family enthusiasm, Xan accepted the accolades without comment and reclaimed Elvi from the pet contingent with difficulty. On the upper landing, she paused to study a portrait. ‘Is that your father?’
‘Yes,’ Xan confirmed, his attention locked to her rather than the painting. Her dress exposed her slender spine, where he already knew the soft, smooth skin felt like silk, and the fine fabric below her waist outlined the ripe, rounded swell of her bottom. His libido kicked in with lusty fervour and he coiled his hands into fists of restraint. Everything was going to be different this time, he assured himself. There would be no grabbing, no rushing, no cutting of sexual corners.
‘When did he die?’ she asked, still looking at the canvas.
‘Nine years ago.’
‘You do look very like him,’ Elvi conceded as she moved on, her heart skipping a beat as Xan closed his hand over hers, engulfing her smaller fingers.
‘Thankfully that resemblance is all we shared.’ Xan thrust wide the door of his bedroom and she brushed against him, her face turning up, her eyes blindingly blue and bright above her soft full mouth, and that view cut through his self-discipline like a knife through butter.
Xan ran his fingertips lightly down the bare line of her spine and she trembled, suddenly fiercely aware of him, her body involuntarily awakening to his touch. He edged her back against the wall and stroked her hair back from her flushed face. ‘Now tell me that you want me...’
Elvi dealt him a stubborn glance because only the champagne during the flight had forced that admission from her. ‘You don’t need the ego boost.’
‘Why are you still fighting something so natural?’ Xan demanded, as if she was being thoroughly unreasonable.
‘It’s not natural to me,’ Elvi argued, struggling not to melt into the lean, powerful contours of his body as he penned her in by the wall. He was so warm and he smelt amazing, her nostrils flaring on the familiar scent of him. Her nipples prickled, swelling and tightening, and an edgy pulse beat between her thighs.
Xan could not credit how stubborn she could be. He could not fathom how a woman so seemingly soft and warm and eager to please those around her could then be so resistant when it came to pleasing him. ‘You’re only making this harder for yourself.’
Elvi was so tense as she fought her arousal that she was barely breathing, her small body stiff. ‘I don’t think so. This is who I am. If I changed that, I couldn’t respect myself any longer.’
‘Only you would care to think about such things,’ Xan intoned thickly. ‘This close to you, I can only think about how much I want you—’
He pushed closer, pressing her back against the wall, and even through their clothes she could feel the hard, insistent length of him against her stomach. A jolt of hungry need took her by storm, drying her mouth, stealing her breath, sending her heart hammering. ‘Xan...’ she heard herself whisper almost pleadingly.
‘Powerful, isn’t it?’ Xan husked, his hands bracing on either side of her head, his eyes a hot scorching gold enhanced by lush black lashes. ‘So powerful you can’t think of anything else.’
‘You’re teasing me,’ Elvi said breathlessly, her fingers splaying across his shirt front, the heat of his muscled chest encouraging her hand to flex and the fingers to spread in something very like a caress.
Xan pulled her hand down to where he really needed her attention and her fingers traced his bold length through the fabric of his trousers, her shy fascination powerfully erotic. He wanted to rip off his clothes there and then and teach her everything she didn’t know and, gripped by that image, he shed his jacket where he stood and yanked off his tie, unbuttoning his shirt with one hand, unzipping with the other.
It was as though Elvi’s heartbeat had extended to thump through her entire body. She felt giddy, overexcited despite her nerves. Recognising Xan’s feverish eagerness for her touch removed her fear of doing the wrong thing. That he could crave her caresses as much as she craved his was a revelation and a tremendous equaliser. She pushed down his boxers and found him, she glided her fingers up and down before she got down on her knees. He shuddered as she found him with her mouth and he arched his hips, groaning something hoarse in Greek. She swirled her tongue, tantalising, teasing while she stroked and cupped and savoured him. His hand tightened in her hair and then he yanked her back up to him, kissing her as though his life depended on that connection.
He cannoned off the corner of a dresser as he hauled her bodily over to the bed, stood her up, struggling with the backless dress and its complicated closure. There was a ripping sound as he simply lost patience and tore the fragile fabric down the middle. She looked up at him in shock.
‘I can’t wait...’ Xan confided fiercely, flipping her round to unfasten the bra that anchored at her waist. ‘What a strange contraption,’ he muttered, his hands rising to mould the full swell of her breasts, tugging at her straining nipples and then ravishing her mouth with his again, his tongue plunging deep, extracting a startled cry of urgency from her.
They landed on the bed with a bounce and she had no idea how they had got there from the door. Xan ripped off his shirt and flung it aside, yanking off w
hat remained of his clothing at the same time, his impatience unconcealed. He crawled up the bed like a lethal predator, golden eyes ablaze as he repositioned her to his satisfaction.
‘No, not this time,’ he censured when she tried to inch beneath the sheet. ‘No barriers, no boundaries, moli mou. You’re a work of art and I want to look at you.’
He was all male power and muscle sheathed in sun-kissed skin from his wide shoulders to his lean hips and strong thighs. The thrusting, potent proof of his arousal made damp heat rise at the heart of her.
‘I promise to drive you out of your mind with pleasure,’ Xan breathed with raw sensuality.
Sliding down the bed and parting her thighs to feast on her with his mouth, he took her entirely by surprise. She gasped, yanked unavailingly at his black hair, and then finally surrendered to wild sensation. He teased her with his skill, and her frantic tension grew and grew while the hollow ache between her legs became unbearable. She tossed and she turned and then she writhed, lost in the excitement until she soared to a glorious peak and the world splintered into a multicoloured shower of fireworks.
Xan grinned down at her bemused face and sank into her with one powerful thrust. His groan of sheer unalloyed pleasure made her feel even hotter. This time her body craved him and she was much more relaxed and there wasn’t even a hint of discomfort, only the wonderful rolling tide of exquisite sensation as his every movement sent smouldering pleasure winging through her.
‘Don’t stop,’ she gasped at the height of another peak, every nerve straining greedily for more.
And Xan laughed with pure unashamed enjoyment, pulling back from her briefly to flip her over onto her knees to continue, driving deeper into her receptive body with every cry he wrenched from her until finally Elvi reached the highest summit of rapturous excitement and a seething rush of convulsive delight sent paroxysms of electrifying pleasure travelling through her exhausted length.
‘Please don’t make me move until tomorrow,’ she mumbled, face down on the bed.
‘I thought you were into cuddling.’
‘Are you hot and sweaty?’ she asked prosaically.
‘You want me to shower first?’
Elvi turned back over and laughed with helpless appreciation. ‘Only joking!’
Xan closed an arm round her and pulled her close. It wasn’t a hug or a cuddle but it was more of a connection than he had offered before and it soothed her racing thoughts and the anxiety she was holding at bay.
‘You used a condom, didn’t you?’ she checked worriedly.
‘Of course. Are you still worrying about that?’ he said in surprise.
‘Worrying comes naturally to me,’ she admitted.
‘Worrying is a waste of energy that can be better employed. I want to have you again,’ Xan confided, pressing a kiss to a sensitive pulse point below her ear, making her squirm.
‘Already?’ she gasped, huge blue eyes lifting to his lean, darkly handsome face, instantly rejoicing in the sleek dark beauty of him laced with the wilder elements of his tousled hair and stubble.
Xan nodded very seriously. ‘I’ve got a major backlog of Elvi hunger to clear. I’m going to be very demanding, moli mou...’
A little flame of anticipation kindled wickedly low in her pelvis at that news. For the first time Elvi acknowledged just how much she revelled in Xan Ziakis, clothed or unclothed. It didn’t matter how much he infuriated her, it didn’t stop her craving him with every fibre of her being. It was only physical attraction, nothing more serious, she told herself with determination, telling herself to move with the times and stop judging herself for a situation she couldn’t change. After all, their arrangement wouldn’t last for ever and the real world would reclaim her soon enough.
Before she’d met Xan, she had sunk into a rut and stopped thinking about her own future, she acknowledged ruefully. Perhaps Joel had had a point when he’d criticised her for her absorption in her family. When Xan moved on, she decided that she would change her attitude. She would seek a more challenging job or even training that would enable her to be more ambitious. Her mother and brother were finding their own feet now and would no longer need to rely on her to the same extent.
When Xan emerged from the bathroom, Elvi was fast asleep. He had to fight the temptation to wake her while he studied her with brooding disquiet. Sex had never been so intense for him and his voracious desire to have her again disturbed him. He wasn’t treating her the way he normally treated a mistress. He didn’t know what it was about her that got to him deep down where he had sworn never to let a woman go again.
And inexplicably and unnervingly, she made him keep on changing his mind. What had happened to his determination not to touch her until she invited him to do so? What had happened to his decision to let her go free in five days?
Even worse, Elvi made him want more and he liked that even less.
Was it the fact that he was her first lover? Did he somehow feel responsible for her now? He reminded himself that he had wronged her and that he had deliberately set out to redress that damage. But that didn’t explain why he hadn’t just let her go or why he was tempted to put his arms around her when she was asleep and there was no chance of sex. Thee mou...that urge was freaking him out! He was even more unsettled by the tangle of clothing untidily littering the bedroom floor. That wasn’t like him either. He was quick to remove the evidence of his lack of patience and control, but throughout the exercise he was acknowledging that he should not allow any woman to affect him the way she did and he was urging himself to walk away fast.
* * *
Elvi drifted slowly out of a deep sleep to greet the dawn. Light was filtering through the curtains and she was too warm. She muttered a complaint and the sheet was tossed back, Xan’s fingers returning to the place which made her writhe and heat up even more. A slight gasp escaped her as he shifted against her, all power and potency and temptation and then he was where she needed him to be, sinking into her welcoming body with urgent force. But then the tempo changed to sensually slow and her tension ramped up accordingly, heart hammering with frantic longing, her body gripped by fierce, needy impatience. She pushed back against him, wanting, needing, and with a husky sound of appreciation, he speeded up, delivering what her body was programmed to crave in a heart-stopping, blood-stirring storm of sensation that peaked and then left her floating.
‘I ordered breakfast in bed for you,’ Xan murmured lazily. ‘I have some work to catch up on before I have to walk Delphina into the church.’
‘It’ll take me all my time to get ready for the wedding,’ Elvi sighed, feeling like a hot sweaty mess even while her whole body purred with little aftershocks of pleasure.
Xan strode out of the shower and she watched him dress, her brow furrowing while she ate. He seemed very preoccupied, his dark classic profile taut, his stunning eyes veiled. Something had changed, she grasped on a level she didn’t quite understand: there was something different about Xan. A distance she hadn’t noticed the night before? The first hint that their arrangement was already heading towards its natural end? Was he getting bored with her? It was what she wanted, what she needed. She had to pick herself back up and get her life back on track. Unfortunately, that did not clarify why her skin chilled and her tummy succumbed to a nauseous lurch at the thought of their parting.
There was no way she was becoming attached to Xan, she reasoned with firm conviction. She wasn’t that foolish or that quick to allow her feelings to control her. At heart she was sensible and practical and a stranger to the kind of dangerous emotions that were likely to upset her. For goodness’ sake, she had only been with him a few days, long enough to learn that sexual pleasure was a lot more seductive than she had ever dreamt but nowhere near long enough to start thinking too warmly of a man she disliked.
And she did dislike him, she thoroughly disliked him, Elvi reminded herself with satisfaction. Xa
n was immoral and unscrupulous and he expected the whole world to revolve around him and his needs and wants. All he cared about was making money and maintaining a stress-free sex life. They weren’t even in a relationship. Everything Xan did and said spelled out that message because he didn’t want her to misinterpret an intimacy that was not destined to last.
The sooner it was over between them, the better it would be for her, she told herself staunchly. She had changed as well. She would never be so naïve or trusting again. But that made her stronger rather than weaker...didn’t it?
Two hours later, Elvi was garbed in an elegant dark green dress and accompanying Xan’s eldest sister, Hana, and her family to the village church. A former monastery, the large church sat at the heart of a very picturesque little village overlooking the harbour. The pews were packed, even though Hana had said that Delphina had wanted a very small wedding attended only by relatives. Elvi’s attention was fully engaged taking in the wonderful painted ceiling and icons that made the candlelit church interior so colourful and warm. And then beside her, Hana said something abrupt in Greek and turned her head to look at the woman smilingly taking what appeared to be the last available seat in the row in front of them.
Hana’s husband put his finger to his lips to silence the speech that was visibly brimming on his wife’s lips as her dark eyes hardened with annoyance.
It wasn’t the time or the place to ask who the woman was. She was certainly eye-catching, Elvi conceded admiringly, and evidently not bound by the tradition that suggested that only brides should wear white at a wedding. The brunette in the shimmering white dress was very tall, very slim and graceful and she had the face of an angel with big dark eyes, flawless features and a sultry pink mouth.
Elvi watched a sort of selective shimmy take place amongst the guests, heads turning as much as they dared, all eyes skimming in the direction of the late arrival, a low buzz of comment following. Clearly, whoever the woman was, her attendance was unexpected and food for a good gossip.