He began to read her the story of the Beast, but now, the tale of ‘forever love’ took on a whole new meaning.
As she fell asleep, her exhaustion too strong in the end to fight, he stopped reading. “I will take you to the ruins of the Beast,” he said quietly, a hand resting on her forehead. “And I will show you that love is everlasting.”
“I already know that to be the case.”
And as sleep claimed the new mother, carrying her away to another realm, she knew that she was right. Their love was as inherent to the land of Ras el Kida as the desert or the palace. She was a part of this great land, of its myths and its people, of its lineage and its destiny, and there was nowhere else on earth she’d rather be.
THE END
Following is an excerpt from BOOK TWO in THE EVERMORE SERIES, THE GREEK’S VIRGIN CAPTIVE.
Prologue
THE GUSHING OF HER pulse was so loud that Eleanor could barely think straight.
Of course, she’d known he would be here. Apollo Heranedes was, after all, the brother of the Sheikha, and this was the halitham for the much-wanted heir to Ras el Kida.
She’d known he’d be here and she’d taken on this assignment regardless.
Regardless?
In spite of more like.
She kept her head dipped forward, but her eyes lifted up from beneath thick, black lashes. She could pick him out of the crowd easily – and not just because they’d spent six blissful weeks together. Not just because they’d sat up late talking about anything and everything, laughing, sharing food and secrets as though their lives depended on it.
Her stomach rolled and she tamped down on the visceral emotional response.
Guilt. Grief.
She’d betrayed him – there was no arguing with that. She’d lied to him from the moment they’d met, and the more time they’d spent together, the more she’d come to love him. She’d known he was falling for her, too, and the lie became worse and worse, until it was threatening to swallow her whole.
He’d been right to cut her from his life.
And yet… it still hurt. The ease with which he’d walked away from her, refusing to let her explain, refusing to see her. He’d cut her from his life and replaced her almost instantly, if the tabloids were to be believed.
And now, three years later, they were in the same room, breathing the same air, and she was powerless to speak to him.
All she could do was stare.
The ceremony droned on, but Eleanor paid scant attention despite the fact she was supposed to be working.
The royal couple were the new guard of leadership in this ancient Kingdom. They were smart and relatable, and everything she’d been expected: beautiful, young, vital, elegant. They were, also, obviously very much in love. Not that they were overt about it, such gestures of affection would be inappropriate, but Eleanor was an investigative journalist and that gave her a talent for reading body language. She saw what passed between them in each look, each hint of a smile about their lips – and in the way they both stared at their baby – a tiny little packet of cherubic pink cheeks and a shock of dark hair.
Apollo was focused on the ceremony, which left Eleanor free to observe him unnoticed. He had an autocratic profile, too symmetrical, perhaps, to be considered traditionally handsome, and yet he was the most dynamic and charismatic man Eleanor had ever known.
A kaleidoscope of butterflies rampaged her insides as she scraped her gaze from his brow to his nose, to those lips – and a thousand memories of his kisses battered against her, so that she was weak at her knees suddenly.
Their first kiss had been perfection – a stolen moment, when she’d got her keys tangled in the strap of her handbag. She’d made a sound of intense impatience and stomped her foot but when she’d looked up at Apollo, their eyes had met and he’d smiled and before she’d known what was happening, his lips had taken hers. Gently, so gently, but she’d known herself to be lost in that moment. It had been like catching a butterfly. A flick, a twist, a snare.
Eleanor closed her eyes against the intensity of the memory; it didn’t help. Her heart was hurting in a way she hadn’t thought it still could.
It had been three years. Three years and so much had happened since then. She wasn’t the same woman who had fallen hard for this man. And even if she were – even if she still loved him as fiercely as she had back then – what would be the point?
He’d hated her when he learned the truth. Then the article had been published, and twenty four hours later, the subject of her investigate piece – Stavros Heranedes – had died of a heart attack.
She’d killed Apollo’s father, and he’d never forgive her for that.
Apollo wasn’t why she’d taken this assignment on. Or maybe he was. Maybe there was a small part of Eleanor that needed to prove to herself that she was completely over Apollo – that he no longer wielded the same intense power he once had.
And she was off to a flying start. In the twenty four hours since arriving in Ras el Kida and posing as a lowly household assistant, she’d seen Apollo three times, all from a distance, and all encounters had almost knocked her to her feet.
He couldn’t recognize her – she had made a point of keeping her head bent, the fine, gauze scarf she wore around her glossy brown hair providing an added shield. She knew it would be a disaster if he were to pick her out of the crowd, but in that moment, watching the ceremony, how she wished he would look her way! How she ached for his head to turn, for his eyes to scan the crowd and land on her face. For him to see her and her to see him, and for Eleanor to once more feel that heady throb of acknowledgement that had always raged between them.
It was absurd.
She was in Ras el Kida to get what information she could and get out. The political article would focus on the Sheikh and his heirs – one acknowledged, one not.
The crowd stood, and Eleanor blinked. The ceremony had come to a close – it was over. She flashed her gaze at the royal couple for a brief moment before returning her eyes to their original resting place, homing in on Apollo as though her every breath was dependent on seeing him.
And by the hand of fate, for no reason that Eleanor could offer, Apollo’s head turned at precisely that moment and his eyes, as green as a stormy ocean, landed directly on Eleanor’s face.
The butterfly inside her burst to life – she’d been discovered.
Chapter One
“WHAT THE HELL ARE you doing here?” He demanded, and though the words were said quietly, there was no point pretending she hadn’t heard. Nor that she didn’t know he was addressing her.
With a heart that was hammering so hard and fast she thought her ribs might splinter, Eleanor turned, her skin pale, her eyes on the alert. “Apollo,” she said, the very name on her lips a lash of desire that should have been long-dead.
The ceremony was over but there were people everywhere, and already Eleanor could feel eyes turning towards them. Dressed as she was, in the traditional robes of a palace servant, it was highly irregular for her to be conversing with a guest – particularly the honored brother of the Sheikha.
“Please,” she implored softly. “People are looking.”
His eyes knit closer together and his handsome face formed a dark scowl. “Yes, of course they are.” He put a hand beneath her elbow and steered her away from the crowd, through the assembly room and into a wide hallway with tall, vaulted ceilings and so many floral arrangements that the air was thick with the sweet fragrance of outside.
“What are you doing here?” He demanded once more, when they had slightly more privacy. He didn’t stop walking though, frog-marching her through the palace as though she were a criminal. Which, she supposed, in his eyes she was.
“Apollo, please, this has nothing to do with you.” Her eyes, honeyed caramel in colour and shaped like a cat’s slanted to him in time to catch his harsh intake of breath.
“You are here in Ras el Kida, dressed as a palace staffer, on the occasion of my sister’s son’s naming d
ay. You who single-handedly sought to destroy my father and the empire he built… and yet you don’t think I have a right to concern myself with your presence?”
Eleanor’s step faltered for a moment, but she covered it quickly. “I’m sorry about the article…”
“Don’t.” He increased his speed, so that she almost had to jog to keep up with him. The corridor came to an end with large windows overlooking a lush garden and then the desert beyond, but there was a hallway to the left, and one to the right. He took the latter, not pausing to allow her breath, let alone to enjoy the spectacular view that fell away from them.
“You think you can simply apologise after three years?”
“You wouldn’t speak to me,” she reminded him stiffly, but it was with a vocal rigidity that hid her trembling emotions.
“I was a little busy,” he muttered, subjecting her to the full force of his mocking glare. “My father died, you might recall, shortly after your filthy exposé hit the news.”
Eleanor’s stomach rolled and without even trying, she mentally conjured the article. She could see the headline: BILLIONAIRE LOTHARIO and the picture that had accompanied it – a rather unflattering long-lens photo of Stavros Heranedes clearly inebriated with a young, half-naked woman sitting in his lap.
It had been awful. Gutter press at its worst. Her part in that still had the power to fill her with shame.
“I was sorry to hear about Stavros --,”
Now Apollo stopped walking and the look he reserved for Eleanor was brimming with contempt. “You do not get to use his name to me,” Apollo said darkly. “You do not deserve to speak of him, to think of him.” He raked his cold, hateful gaze over her body, landing with utter disgust on her pale face. He resumed walking, and she didn’t think about not going with him.
But every step forward had her stomach dropping lower and lower, so that, by the time he came to a stop at the top of a spiraling marble staircase, she was almost nauseous with guilt.
She’d messed up. She’d known it from almost the first moment they met, certainly as they got more and more involved. When he started telling her things: secrets, private matters about his family, she knew she should have bailed. Or at least had the decency not to write them down.
But her journalistic training had been hard-fought and completely-ingrained. What harm could come from taking notes, in any case?
What harm, indeed!
“It was a mistake,” she blurted out. “The whole thing. I shouldn’t have done it.”
“No, Eleanor. You shouldn’t.” His lips were a grim slash in his stony face. “But you did. So? What now? I presume this is another ruse?” He gestured to the outfit she wore and heat suffused her face.
“I…”
“Yes?” He crossed his arms over his chest, drawing her attention to his broadly muscled physique.
She’d never seen him naked – their relationship had been surprisingly old-fashioned, and she’d liked that. She’d liked that he had wanted to cosset and adore her. He’d made her feel like the most precious item in all the universe. And she’d become addicted to that feeling, so she could no longer think straight.
“I’m working,” she said, turning her face away.
“You’re writing another article,” he muttered, and when she didn’t answer, he seemed to grow at least another inch. “Tell me the damned truth, Eleanor.”
She winced at his harsh tone. “I did.”
“No, you’re being deliberately evasive.”
“I’m working. I have credentials.” She reached into her pocket, curling her fingers around the laminated card that had granted her access into the palace. It was her photo, though the name on it was her mother’s maiden name – a precaution she always used when on assignment.
Apollo took it and gave it a cursory glance, before jamming it into his own pocket. “And if I look here?” He pressed his palm to her hip, his eyes holding hers as he felt confirmation of what he’d suspected. “A voice recorder?”
Eleanor’s eyes swept shut. “It’s not what you think.”
“I think you’ll find you have no credibility with me, but give it a try, Eleanor. Explain what you’re doing here with a fake identification tag, and a spy device. Tell me why you’re in a top-security location at an event that is most firmly invitation-only?”
“I’m not writing a gossip piece,” she said, her throat thick with shame. How mortifying the whole exposé story had been! She should never have taken the job with that particular paper, but she’d been desperate. She’d needed the money.
She still did. Her sister was counting on her, and everything Eleanor did was for Elizabeth’s sake. She would walk through fire to make sure her twin didn’t have to worry about her future: a risky pregnancy had been hard enough, and Eleanor had done what she could to help. Now that ‘pregnancy’ was an adorable two year old, and the father was still conspicuously absent, it was up to Eleanor to help. And she wanted to help. She worked herself tirelessly, writing articles for magazines, newspapers, anything she could, she did.
And this piece had been no different – except in one way. The pay was much better than usual. The inherent risk of going undercover in a middle eastern kingdom had meant the promised fee would cover their rent for almost a month. But she had to finish the damned thing!
“It’s not gossip,” she said again, clearing her throat. “This is a proper political piece. That’s what I write now.”
Apollo’s expression grew grimmer by the moment. “So you’ve come to Ras el Kida, somehow obtained a false identification tag, posed as a servant, and all so you can snoop around my sister and her husband who, by the way, happens to be King?”
Eleanor swept her eyes shut. “It’s not snooping. I’m a journalist.”
“Semantics,” Apollo disputed. “You are looking to prize open doors that have been pulled closed for a reason.”
“This is just politics,” she said, knowing she had no right to claim the moral high-ground but clinging to it in any case. “And you can’t just drag me out of a crowded room to berate and interrogate me.”
His harsh laugh was a contradiction in and of itself. None the less, he responded with a soft and dangerous denouncement. “You are very lucky I dragged you from that room rather than alerting my brother-in-law to your presence.”
At this, Eleanor froze, her heart throbbing painfully inside her chest. “You would have no reason to do that.”
“No reason? You wrote an article that directly led to my father’s death and you dare come within a hundred yards of my family? Of my sister? Her son? And on a day such as this?”
“I told you, I’m not looking to cause trouble…”
“Looking for it or not, the result is the same. Give me the tape recorder.”
She shook her head mutinously, thinking of the deep background research she’d been doing for a fortnight, the documents she’d uncovered, all of which were notarized on the digital machine in her pocket.
“No. You’re angry about the article and I get that; I was too. That’s not the article I wanted to write--,”
“It had your name on it,” he interrupted, with a skeptically raised brow.
“I’m aware of that.”
He lowered his head, so his eyes were close enough that she could see flecks of gold in amongst the green. “There were things in that article that only I knew – things that I told you in confidence, having never revealed them to another soul. I confided in you, I trusted you…”
Her guilt cracked wide open, flooding her with pain and angry recriminations. “I know.” It was just a husky whisper.
“I suppose I should be grateful to you, in a way.”
“Why?” She blinked up at him, and made the foolish mistake of sucking in a deep breath. She’d hoped it would calm her fluttering nerves but instead she caught a hint of his masculine fragrance and her knees almost buckled underneath her.
“I don’t trust easily. I never have before, anyway.” He pressed his th
umb and forefinger to the flesh beneath her chin, lifting her face to his so their eyes were locked. “And yet…”
The words tapered off and it was as if all the air had been sucked out of the palace. They were floating in a vacuum, darkness, past, misunderstanding and pain, and yet the same magnetic tug held them in its thrall.
“You were a mistake,” he said finally, breaking the spell and dropping his hand. “Trusting you was the worst error in judgement I’ve ever made. I was blinded by your beauty – what a fool. As if I hadn’t been with beautiful women before! What was it about you, Eleanor? Why did I feel like you were different?”
Her pulse was thick and fast in her veins. “Maybe I was different.”
“Yes.” He said with a touch of fury. “You’re by far the most manipulative, dishonest bitch of a woman I’ve ever had the misfortune of meeting.”
She stumbled backwards at the furious epithet, until her back connected with the cold stone wall. But he wasn’t done.
“You lied to me with every breath you took and then you used what I’d told you to destroy my father’s life and legacy. That article will forever be associated with him – never mind all the good he achieved in his lifetime. Your stupid, invasive article will be on every internet search for anyone who chooses to type his name. You wrote an article for the sake of amusement and titillation and you destroyed an old man in the process. You damned well nearly destroyed his business too. And now you think you can come here and what? Do exactly the same to my sister? Or to the Sheikh – who happens to be one of my best friends?”
Eleanor could barely catch her breath. “This piece will be restricted to political observations.”
His snort was scathing.
“I mean it! I’m reporting on the importance of the royal heir…”
“My nephew.”
She bit down on her lip, something about the phrase so utterly humanizing that she saw a glimpse of Apollo as he’d been before. As he’d been three years ago when they were falling in love and everything had seemed so much simpler.
Loving the Enemy Page 37