by Lynne Graham
Clutching her hand, Teddy chattered non-stop all the way to the park. It was toddler chatter in which only one word in ten was recognisable as an actual word. They had to walk slowly too, because Teddy loved to walk. But he had short legs and if she lost patience and put him in the buggy, he would throw a tantrum. ‘Not baby!’ he would scream, mortally offended by such a demeaning mode of transport.
He gave a shout of excitement once he saw the playground, tearing free of his mother’s grasp to race down the path in advance of her. Winnie broke into a run because Teddy’s fearless approach to life often put him at risk. By the time she caught up, he was climbing the steps to the slide. He had been as agile as a little monkey from an early age. He whooped as he went down the slide and she retreated to a concrete bench nearby, relieved to sit down because she was still tired from the night before.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket and she dug it out.
It was Vivi.
‘Nevrakis is coming to see you at the park,’ her sibling warned her. ‘I tried to put him off but he said he would stay and wait if I didn’t tell him where you were.’
Near panic engulfed Winnie, her jaw dropping at the thought of being cornered by Eros in a public place. But he wasn’t the type to make a scene, she reminded herself doggedly, and she couldn’t avoid him for ever. It was better to be sensible, she told herself bracingly, smoothing down her warm jacket, wishing she had put on a little make-up, telling herself off furiously for even caring how she might look while her nerves rattled about inside her like jumping beans. He had to know about Teddy, had to want to see him because there was no other reason for him to seek her out now. Her mind wanted to take her back to her very first meeting with Eros Nevrakis but she wouldn’t let it because memories would weaken her, tearing away the superficial calm she had learned to keep in place to make her sisters happy.
‘Oh, sure, I’m over him!’ she had taught herself to declare with a laugh for punctuation. ‘I’m not stupid!’
Two men lodged nearby below the trees, suited and smart. Her grandfather’s utterly superfluous bodyguards, whom Vivi had met the night before on the doorstep, Winnie suspected, and she ignored them. She would have to phone her grandfather about that unnecessary extravagance. Why on earth would she and her sisters need guarding when as yet nobody even knew they were related to Stam Fotakis?
In the distance she glimpsed a tall man striding down the path and her heart stuttered as though she’d received a shock, while breathing suddenly became a distinct challenge. Perspiration beaded her short upper lip, heat washing over her as she recalled what an absolute idiot she had been two years earlier...falling for her boss, sleeping with her boss.
Eros paused, all sleek, lithe and sexy elegance in a charcoal-grey suit and overcoat, a red silk scarf bright at his throat as he stood scanning the playground with the raw self-assurance of a highly successful tycoon. Winnie swallowed hard, her hands clenching together, nails biting into her tender palms. She had to force herself to stand upright to catch his attention because she wasn’t going to hide from him and refused to behave as if she feared him.
His brilliant gaze settled on her and she went even stiffer, turning her head away to check on Teddy, standing at the top of the slide shouting for her attention, for if there was one thing Teddy loved it was an audience. He was an irredeemable little extrovert, brimming with vitality. She moved closer to the slide, ignoring Eros to the best of her ability, even as she heard his steps sound behind her.
Teddy zoomed down the slide with a whoop, clambered off at the bottom and raced round to repeat the exercise.
‘Why didn’t you tell me about him?’ Eros breathed, soft and low and deadly.
Disconcertion turned Winnie’s head in his direction and she saw him in profile because his entire attention was studiously welded to her son. That classic bronzed profile made her heart give a sick thud inside her chest and she swallowed hard, close enough to smell the rich aromatic scent of his designer cologne, close enough to be dragged down screaming into the kind of memories she always suppressed, and she took a hasty step backwards, protecting herself from getting too close.
‘Why didn’t you tell me that you were married?’ Winnie parried quietly.
Eros gritted his even white teeth, incensed by that comeback. He turned to study her as involuntarily entranced by her tiny proportions as he had been the first time he saw her. She was a barely five-feet-tall brunette with delicate curves and a tiny waist, so small and light he could have scooped her up with one powerful hand. Of course, pregnancy could have changed her shape, he conceded, but he was challenged to picture Winnie pregnant and the loose jacket she wore concealed more than it revealed of her figure. The huge chocolate-brown eyes, sultry pink mouth and the lustrous dark mane of her hair, however, were unchanged. He tore his electrified gaze from her, angry enough to spit tacks, and concentrated his attention back on his son.
The little boy was definitely his son and he was of a much sturdier build than his mother. That tumble of black curls and those green eyes, the same green eyes that Eros had inherited from his late mother, unmistakeably marked Teddy out as a Nevrakis. Eros had done his homework and made his own enquiries since that meeting two days earlier with Stam Fotakis. His son was called Teddy. What sort of a name was that? His child had been named after a plush toy, he thought witheringly. But the biggest surprise of all for Eros at that moment was how looking at Teddy made him feel...
As though that little creature had been put on this earth purely for him to protect, he acknowledged in wonderment, watching as Teddy climbed the slide steps at speed and threw himself down it with dangerous enthusiasm and a noisy shout. Impelled by a response that bit too deep to withstand, Eros strode forward and swept the little boy upright again with careful hands. Teddy gave him a startled look and then a huge cheerful smile as Eros gently set him free again.
‘Swing, Mama,’ Teddy demanded, setting off in that direction.
‘He’s bossy like you,’ Winnie said drily.
Eros ignored her. He had a great deal to say to Winnie but none of it could be safely voiced where they could be overheard.
Winnie lifted Teddy into one of the baby swings and gave him a push before standing back.
‘How old is he?’ Eros demanded in a driven undertone.
‘Eighteen months. He’s tall for his age,’ Winnie muttered.
‘And in all that time you didn’t once think of contacting me?’ Eros intoned through clenched teeth of restraint.
‘You were married,’ Winnie reminded him with a lift of her chin.
‘That’s irrelevant,’ Eros countered with ferocious bite. ‘It’s not an excuse.’
‘I’m not making excuses. I don’t regret not telling you,’ Winnie responded, outraged by his lack of guilt.
‘But you will,’ Eros murmured, soft as a cat padding round her on velvet paws of menace. ‘You will learn to regret it.’
A faint chill stiffened Winnie’s already rigid spine but she squared her slight shoulders, rebelling against that sense of threat. Eros couldn’t push her around; he couldn’t do anything to her. Teddy was hers and she didn’t work for Eros any more or indeed depend on him in any way.
Her defiance infuriated Eros. Evidently he had underestimated Winnie when he had deemed her to be a quiet, restful sort of young woman; the type who would never cause waves in his life. He had trusted her as far as he trusted any woman, had believed he knew her inside out, had only registered how mistaken such an assumption could be after she had vanished into thin air. His wide sensual mouth compressed into a grim line.
Winnie glanced at him and her tension zoomed to a new high, her eyes lingering against her will on his lean, powerful length, her breath catching in her throat. With an effort she tore her attention away again but her senses were humming, her heart was pounding, teaching her that she had yet to attain the level of indifference sh
e needed to be safe around him. Instead she was mesmerised by that stormy, striking male beauty of his, the honed, flawless angles of his high cheekbones, the definitive shape of his nose and the unforgettably stunning impact of those jewelled green eyes, once seen, never forgotten. She shifted her feet, fighting off her susceptibility, hating herself for noticing afresh just how gorgeous he was.
‘My only regret is that I ever met you,’ she declared stonily.
‘A little late in the day,’ Eros purred, impervious to the insult. ‘I will take you to my apartment, where we will talk about where we go from here.’
‘No,’ Winnie argued. ‘I’m going home. Teddy needs his nap.’
To Eros’s mind, Teddy looked more as if he was good to go for another few hours as he gripped the swing and kicked up his legs with excitement.
‘We can’t talk with your sisters present,’ Eros countered very drily.
‘My sisters will have left for work.’ Rigid with resentment that he was somehow contriving to force her into a discussion she didn’t want as well as granting him access to her home, Winnie slung him a look of loathing, big brown eyes awash with annoyance.
She hated Eros Nevrakis. She had never hated anyone before but she hated him for a whole host of reasons. But she had to find out what he wanted, had to remember that he was Teddy’s father and should for the present be handled with tact, she reminded herself quellingly. This time running away wasn’t an option because she would only leave a bigger mess behind her. Her soft full lips compressed, she lifted her son out of the swing, ignoring his bitter wail of complaint. He looked up at her with green eyes swimming with tears and her heart clenched as she set him down to walk beside her.
‘We’ll use my limo,’ Eros informed her.
‘No, Teddy and I will walk back. I’ll meet you there,’ Winnie told him without hesitation and she turned on her heel, needing the time alone and the peace to regroup and calm down.
Teddy dragged his heels all the way, tired now and cross, but Winnie barely noticed because all the memories she had buried were flooding her to drowning point.
Fresh from catering college and a variety of jobs in which she’d picked up experience, she had secured a sous chef position in a small family-owned Greek restaurant. When a virus had put the head chef in bed, the responsibility for providing dinner for a large party of Greek businessmen being entertained by Eros had fallen on Winnie’s shoulders. At the end of the meal she had been invited to meet the client, and she could still recall getting into a panic at the prospect and dragging off her chef’s hat and tidying her hair for the sort of public appearance that had never come her way before.
Eros had complimented her with flattering enthusiasm on the meal she had prepared. She had hovered there with bright red cheeks, trying not to gawp at the best-looking man she had ever met, wondering how anyone could have such extraordinarily green eyes, intense as polished tourmalines in that lean, darkly handsome face of his. He had passed her his business card, telling her that he was looking for a personal chef for his London home and that when she was free she should ring him for an interview.
She had been quite happy where she was working, but she didn’t see much of her sisters because she worked such awkward hours and that more than anything had persuaded her to make that phone call. When she had been offered a salary far beyond her current earnings and accommodation in central London to boot, she had accepted, reasoning that working as a billionaire’s private chef would offer her even more exciting opportunities to advance herself. With two sisters who were still students, invariably broke and in need of clothes, the ability to earn a decent wage had been very important back then.
‘So, how did you get into cooking?’ Eros had enquired, strolling informally into the kitchen on her first night while she’d been preparing his evening meal, his every fluid movement attracting her attention, particularly to the fabric defining his long, powerful thighs.
‘My mother was a cook and she started teaching me when I was five,’ Winnie had confided as she’d struggled not to look back in the same direction, perplexed by her random thoughts and embarrassing impulses in his presence. ‘Both my parents were Greek, although my mother’s family had been living here for years when she met my father—’
‘Yet you don’t speak our language,’ Eros had remarked in surprise.
Winnie had tensed, her eyes shadowing. ‘My parents died when I was eight and I’ve forgotten most of the Greek words I knew. I’ve always meant to go to classes but I’m too busy. Some day I’ll take it up again.’
‘So, what are you making me tonight?’ Eros had asked with a lazy smile, his accented drawl smooth as silk in her ears.
‘I put a little menu on the dining table for you.’
‘Cute,’ Eros had commented with lancing amusement.
‘Just tell me what you want and I’ll provide it,’ she had urged, eager to please for he had been paying generously for her services and she’d wanted him to feel that she was worth her salary.
An ebony brow had skated up. ‘Anything?’ he had pressed, laughter sparkling in his spectacular eyes, his wide sensual mouth lifting at the corners.
‘Pretty much anything,’ Winnie had muttered, belatedly grasping the double entendre she had accidentally made, her colour rising accordingly. ‘And if I don’t know how to make it, I can soon find out.’
‘Is your accommodation adequate?’ Eros had prompted.
‘It’s lovely. Your housekeeper was very helpful,’ Winnie had told him cheerfully, even though it had been something of a shock to enter a household where virtually no one had spoken any English and where she’d known she would be a little lonely. There had been few staff because Eros had been the only resident and had frequently been away from home. Only the housekeeper, Karena, had lived in and she had been near retirement age, besides having only a very basic grasp of English.
Karena’s entry into the kitchen that evening had concluded that conversation with Eros, for the housekeeper had usually served the meals, but a couple of nights later when Winnie had noticed how very tired the older woman had looked, she had urged her to return to her flat for the night and leave her to serve the meal. It had been a strategic error to expose herself to greater contact with Eros but at the time she had felt guilty about the fat salary she earned and the reality that she worked much shorter hours than Karena, who had been on duty from dawn to dusk and busy even when Eros had been abroad because she’d overseen the cleaning and maintenance of the house. When Karena had fallen victim to a sprained wrist, that serving arrangement had become permanent with Karena departing to her flat every evening before Eros’s return.
Only a few evenings had passed before Eros had suggested she join him and, although she had demurred in surprise and discomfiture the first time, the second time he had asked she had told herself that it would be rude to refuse again and she had sat down and shared a glass of wine with him. She had asked him about his day and his foreign travels and had listened while he’d talked, sipping her wine, answering the occasional query while becoming maddeningly aware of the intensity of his beautiful eyes on her. Just sitting there she had felt all hot and tingly, flattered by his interest, his apparent desire for her company when he could’ve had so many more glamorous women eagerly filling the same role.
Back then Winnie had been a retiring mixture of naivety and insecurity when men were around. Keen to climb the career ladder, she hadn’t dated much, and as soon as her sisters had begun looking to her as a role model, dating had become even more of a challenge. A couple of unsavoury experiences with men who had wanted much more than she’d wanted to give had kept her a virgin. Working long, unsocial hours hadn’t helped, so the thrill of being in Eros’s company and the sole focus of his attention had rather gone to her head. The first kiss... No, she didn’t want to remember that which loomed large in her memory as her first major mistake. Squashing that unt
imely recollection, she walked past the opulent vehicle that she assumed was Eros’s limousine and was unlocking the front door of the house when she heard him behind her.
‘An elegant location,’ he remarked, making her jump as she hurriedly crossed the threshold.
‘Yes, thanks to Grandad. The house belongs to him.’ Hurriedly doffing her coat, Winnie hung it up in the alcove and showed him into the lounge. ‘You can wait in here while I feed Teddy and put him down for his nap...’
‘Why did you choose to call him Teddy?’ he queried.
‘Officially it’s Theodore, my father’s middle name,’ she proffered stiffly. ‘But it was too big a name for a baby and he ended up Teddy instead.’
Uninvited, Eros followed her into the kitchen, where she strapped Teddy into his booster seat at the table and whipped between fridge and microwave, warming her son’s lunch while studiously ignoring Eros’s silent presence by the door.
Teddy grasped his spoon and ate, making more of a mess than usual, showing off because a stranger was present.
‘I assume your sisters look after him while you’re at work?’ Eros prompted.
‘Yes...’ Winnie glanced worriedly at him. ‘They’re very good with him.’
‘A father would have been even better.’
Breathing in deep and slow to restrain her temper, Winnie concentrated on cleaning up Teddy and the table, unstrapping him to lift him.
‘Allow me...’ Disconcertingly, Eros stepped right into her path and simply scooped her son out of her hold. ‘Where to now?’
‘Upstairs,’ Winnie said thinly, reluctantly leading the way.