PROLOGUE
SURROUNDED by fawning celebrity guests and reverential relations at his engagement party, Giannis Petrakos felt as claustrophobic as a lion in a circus ring. His great-grandmother was beckoning him. The old lady was famous for her forthright opinions, and he guessed that she was eager to tell him what she thought of his fiancée. Grim amusement assailed Giannis; as one of the richest men in the world, he had learned to prize the sheer rarity value of such honesty.
Tiny in stature, Dorkas Petrakos settled snapping black eyes on her darkly handsome great-grandson as he towered over her. ‘Krista is a very beautiful young woman. Every man here envies you.’
Giannis inclined his arrogant dark head in acknowledgement of the obvious, and waited for the axe to fall.
‘But what sort of mother will she make for your children?’ Dorkas enquired.
Giannis almost winced, for neither he nor Krista was ready to settle down to that extent. It had never occurred to him to consider his fiancée in the light of her maternal instincts. Perhaps in a few years they would have a child. But if that did not happen Giannis was prepared to choose a suitable successor to inherit his power and fortune from his extensive array of relatives. When it came to reproduction he had not a sentimental bone in his body.
‘You think that doesn’t matter. You think I’m out of date and out of touch,’ the old lady opined, with a hint of aggression. ‘But Krista is vain and selfish.’
His stubborn jawline tensed; such strong censure of his chosen bride was unwelcome. It struck him as unfortunate that just at that moment Krista should once again be visibly revelling in being the centre of attention. His fiancée could not pass a mirror or a camera without striking a pose. Blessed with turquoise eyes and white-blonde hair, Krista, with her stunning beauty, had attracted notice from the instant that she’d strolled into the public eye as a teenager. Heiress to the Spyridou electronics empire, and the only child of doting parents, Krista had been indulged from birth. How could his great-grandmother possibly understand her?
No two women could have had less in common. Born the daughter of a fisherman, Dorkas had grown up in grinding poverty and had held fast to her unpretentious values. Her refusal to conform to the ever more snobbish standards of her descendants and her blunt tongue had ensured that she was widely regarded by them as a social embarrassment. But there had always been a special bond between Dorkas and Giannis, formed most unexpectedly when he’d been a wildly rebellious teenager bent on self-destruction.
‘You say nothing. But if you lost all your money and your fine houses and cars and aeroplanes tomorrow, would Krista still be by your side?’ the old lady asked him drily. ‘I think she’d run so fast you couldn’t catch her!’
As he rose to leave his great-grandmother Giannis almost laughed out loud, for in such a scenario Krista would only be a burden, awash with self-pity and recrimination. She was, undeniably, the product of her rarefied luxury environment. Did Dorkas truly believe that it was possible for him to find a woman impervious to the draw of his fabulous wealth? But the implication that Krista, however affluent in her own right, had an eye to the main chance touched his ego like the sting of a tiny needle sliding below the skin.
With a nod to his security chief, Nemos, to protect his privacy, Giannis strolled out on to the roof terrace. He enjoyed the fresh air while he questioned the bleak edge that had overtaken his mood. After all, he had no doubts about marrying Krista Spyridou. How could he have? Everyone regarded her as the perfect match for him. She had a classy pedigree and she was a terrific hostess. They belonged to the same exclusive world and she understood the rules. No matter what happened there would not be a divorce. In that way the Petrakos power-base of wealth and influence would be protected for another generation.
Yet Giannis did not forget that at nineteen years old, to the horror of his family and hers, he had dated Krista Spyridou and dumped her. The most beautiful girl in the world, he had discovered, seemed to have little else to offer. Indeed, he had decided that she was as cold as charity in bed—and out of it.
‘Please don’t wreck my hair…’ That had been a favourite refrain.
‘I really, really need my beauty sleep…’
‘If you must…’
‘I hate getting sweaty…’
Krista would never set his bedsheets on fire with enthusiasm, Giannis reflected wryly. Her lack of passion had been a deal-breaker when he was an idealistic teenager, powered by Dorkas’s assurance that his perfect woman was out there, just waiting for him to find her. Well, nobody could say he hadn’t looked. In fact, Giannis had packed in more than a decade of riotous womanising before reaching certain cynical and unapologetically selfish conclusions: his perfect woman did not exist. Also, he now saw Krista’s flaws as positives that would ensure his marriage made the minimum possible impact on his lifestyle.
He was used to doing exactly as he liked when he liked. Marriage to Krista wouldn’t change that; she would not cling or inflict unreasonable expectations on him, nor would she throw screaming tantrums demanding attention, love or fidelity. She would never care enough to do so. And what better wife could be found for a workaholic male who thrived on the high-powered pressure of business than a wife happy for him to keep his sexual options open? Krista would be much too busy pampering and clothing her perfect body to feel neglected by her billionaire husband.
As soon as Giannis rejoined the party Krista sped to his side, to beg him to share another photo opportunity. Not an ounce of his impatience showed on his lean, aristocratic face. Although he detested publicity, he was prepared to allow her her way at their engagement celebration.
Relieved by his lack of objection, Krista tucked a hand over his arm and became chatty. ‘Is that horrid old crone in the corner from your tribe or mine?’ she asked with a giggle.
Giannis glanced across the exquisitely furnished room and his eyes stilled on the little old lady dressed in unrelieved black and sitting erect. Horrid old crone? As Dorkas seldom left the island of Libos she was rarely recognised outside the family circle. His brilliant but semi-veiled dark eyes flashed smouldering gold.
‘Why?’
‘She actually asked me if I could cook. Hello!’ Krista rolled her eyes with the supreme scorn of a young woman accustomed to being waited on hand and foot. ‘Then she asked if I would be waiting for you when you got back from the office! As if…’ she mocked. ‘Someone should’ve left that old biddy at home. She embarrassed me. I do hope she won’t be at our wedding.’
‘If she isn’t, I won’t be either.’ His response was smooth as silk.
Giannis watched his fiancée take a few seconds to comprehend what he was telling her. Shaken, Krista gave him an appalled look. Her long manicured nails dug into his sleeve in a panic before he could walk away. ‘Giannis, I—’
‘That old lady is my great-grandmother, and worthy of your deepest respect,’ Giannis delivered with cold emphasis.
Aghast at having offended him, Krista grovelled. To the list of her flaws he added the sins of vulgarity and insincerity.
CHAPTER ONE
IN THE best of moods, and ready for her second day temping at Petrakos Industries, Maddie bounced on to the bathroom scales and stilled to look hopefully down at the gauge. She winced at the reading. Possibly it hadn’t been a good idea to jump on them. She got off again. Shedding her nightdress and her watch, she reset the weighing machine and stepped on as lightly as possible. Disappointingly, the weight was identical.
‘You can’t keep body and soul together on that salad stuff,’ old Mrs Evans who lived on the ground floor had opined, when Maddie had joined her and her daughter for a delicious three-course Sunday lunch, complete with all the trimmings, just a couple of days earlier.
Perhaps the ‘salad stuff’ would have been safer? Or possibly the bar of chocolate she had eaten on the way home from the supermarket the night before had been an over-indulgence too far? Could extra weight go on that fast? In truth, the long hours she worked just to pay the rent raised her healthy appetite to starvation proportions, and she still did not earn enough to eat well. Her despondent green eyes travelled across the expanse of her full-breasted, generous-hipped reflection. Generous mouth tightening, she looped impatient fingers through her torrent of long red hair, then anchored it back with a clip and got dressed at speed.
The black jeans and white blouse had a closer fit than she liked over her opulent curves, and she frowned. When a fire had broken out at her last address she had lost almost everything she possessed. Although she was trying to build up a new wardrobe by buying from charity shops, it wasn’t easy on a low income. As she turned away from the mirror her attention fell on the photo of her late sister by her bed, and she scolded herself for being so precious about her appearance when she was lucky to have her health.
‘Look on the bright side,’ had been her grandmother’s most constant refrain while she was growing up.
‘Every cloud has a silver lining,’ her grandfather had often chipped in with determination.
Yet Maddie and her grandparents had known a lot of heartbreak in their lives. Suzy, Maddie’s beloved twin, had been diagnosed with leukaemia soon after the girls’ eighth birthday. The stress of coping with Suzy’s illness had destroyed their parents’ marriage. Their paternal grandparents had taken charge, supporting Suzy through her gruelling treatment, her period of remission, and finally the last stages of her life. And ultimately it had been Suzy’s fierce determination to get the most out of the time she’d had left that had taught Maddie the importance of hanging on to a cheerful outlook.
As she waited at the bus stop Maddie was struggling to subdue a juvenile tingle of excitement while she wondered if this would be the day she caught a glimpse of the legendary Giannis Petrakos again. Honestly, when she thought about him she felt more like a schoolgirl than a twenty-three-year-old grown-up! It was embarrassing to recall that she had once cherished a newspaper photo of the startlingly handsome Greek shipping tycoon. But she had been a teenager, and she’d developed a hopeless crush on him.
‘Why aren’t you serving?’ someone hissed in her ear.
Maddie unfroze, and jerked as though she had been slapped. As she reached for the first cup and saucer Giannis Petrakos glanced at her, and she stilled again. Her tummy flipped and her heart began to thump, making it hard for her to breathe. For the space of a heartbeat her surroundings vanished. All she was conscious of was the unfamiliar heaviness of her breasts, the dryness of her mouth, and the almost painful little twist of sensation making its presence felt low in her pelvis. She lowered her lashes in an instant of genuine confusion. It shook her that it took an almost physical effort to force her attention back to her task.
Coffee—strong, black, sweet, she reminded herself, while she wondered what on earth had come over her. And then, guessing, she felt a giant wave of shamed pink colour spreading up from her throat all the way over her dismayed face to her hairline. My goodness, she would never dare to look at him again! Dragging in a jerky breath, she poured his coffee, almost absentmindedly added four heaped spoonfuls of sugar, stirred it, and forced her feet in his direction.
Giannis had been bored, but now his ennui had fled. Had he not seen her again, he was sure he would not have thought of her. But her presence a scant twenty feet away put paid to that possibility. In a fluid movement he sat down at the table. Was she a private caterer? Or a member of the caterer’s staff? Looking at her, he speedily lost interest in the finer details of her identity. Although she was decidedly pocket-sized in the height department, she had a gorgeous face, and the lushness of her full pink lips was a fitting match for the striking symmetry of her abundant curves. Her eyes were the colour of the green glass he had collected as a kid from the seashore. His shapely mouth curled as he recalled his exquisite mother’s ridicule at receiving such a childish gift, but when he read the tiny curvaceous redhead’s reverent gaze that unpleasant recollection of his disturbing childhood totally vanished.