Bridal Bargains (24 page)

Nell blinked then blushed at his thinking behind that revealing comment. He thought it was Marcel who’d taught her to kiss as she’d just done! Her kiss-numb lips parted to speak a denial then closed again. Let his primitive side twist his gut, she thought angrily, lowering her gaze from the piercing hardness of his. Let him learn what it felt like to imagine her locked in naked passion with another man as she had spent the last year imagining him with Vanessa the tramp!

‘I will be away for the next few days but will be back in time to collect you from here on Saturday.’

This final piece of news brought her eyes flickering up again as he opened the door and left without another word, allowing whoever had knocked on the door earlier to come into the room.

It was one of his personal bodyguards, his polite greeting spoiled by the tough look on his face. He placed something down on the bedside cupboard. ‘Mr Pascalis gave his permission for you to have these,’ he said, then went to leave the room.

‘H-how long have you been standing out there?’ she asked, horrified that he might have heard or—worse—seen what had been going on in here through the little window in the door!

‘Since you arrived in this hospital,’ Jake Mather replied.

Nell stared at the door closing behind Jake Mather’s bulky frame. She’d been under guard without even knowing it. She was in prison. She had been completely surrounded and isolated from the outside world. A shiver shot through her. It was like being back at Rosemere only worse.

Mr Pascalis gave his permission … She turned her head to look at what Xander had kindly given his permission to.

It was a neat stack of papers—tabloids—broadsheets—magazines. Reaching out to pick the top one of the stack, she let it unfold so she could see the front page in all its damning glory. ‘Greek tycoon’s wife tries to kill herself after he flaunts his mistress.’

No wonder he saw no threat in a scandal—it was already here!

She plucked up another paper and another, swapped them for the magazines. Scandal galore was splashed across the pages. There were even photographs of her wrecked car! She turned the page on those pictures quickly as nausea swam up inside.

But there was no mention of Marcel anywhere, which told her exactly what Xander was doing. Her imprisonment here had nothing to do with contracts or primitive demonstrations
of ownership—but with damage control, pure and simple damage control!

He didn’t want it reported that his wife had been leaving him for another man when she crashed her car!

He would rather they report that she was attempting to kill herself. What did that say about the size of his ego?

Kill herself? Where had they dragged up that big lie from?

Had Xander himself put it out there?

She hated him. Oh, God, she hated him. No wonder she was being so thoroughly isolated. He didn’t want her retaliating with the truth!

Leaving him for another man … Oh, how she wished she’d managed to go through with it. She would have written her own headline. ‘Wife of philandering Greek tycoon leaves him for Frenchman!’

S
TANDING
unnoticed in the doorway, Xander watched Nell’s trembling fingers grapple with the intricacies of fastening the tiny pearl buttons on the silky white blouse he’d had delivered to her along with a blue linen suit that did amazing things for her slender shape.

Someone had fixed her hair for her and it lay in a thick, shining, sandstorm braid to halfway down her back. She looked very pale, though the bruising on her face had almost disappeared. But it was clear to him that even the simplest of tasks still came as an effort.

She was not recovered, though the doctors had assured him that she was fit to travel and for now that was all he cared about: getting her away from here and to a place void of tabloid gossip—and the temptation to contact her lover the first opportunity she was handed.

His blood began to boil when he thought about the elusive Marcel Dubois. The Frenchman had disappeared into the ether like the scarlet pimpernel, and maybe showed some sense in doing so—sense being something he had not shown when he’d decided to make his play for the wife of Alexander Pascalis.

Wife … He could almost laugh at the title but laughing was not what was lurking inside him. His hooded eyes took on a murderous glitter as he watched Nell struggle with those tiny pearl buttons. Had his wife in name only lain with her Frenchman and allowed him to touch what Xander had not touched? Had Dubois seen power in her soft, willing body and those little confidences a woman like the love-vulnerable Nell would reveal to a lover about the emptiness of her marriage?

She turned then and noticed him standing there. His libido instantly kicked in to join the murderous feelings as her eyes
began to make their rise up from his shoes to the casual black brushed-cotton chinos covering his legs and the plain white T-shirt moulding his chest. No other woman had ever looked at him the way Nell looked at him, with a slow, verdant absorption that drenched him in hellishly erotic self-awareness. She could not help herself, he knew that, which made the idea of her giving those looks to another man all the more potent. When she reached his shoulders, covered by the casual black linen jacket he was wearing, he could not halt the small recognising shift of muscle that sent a shower of pleasurable static rushing through his blood.

One day soon he was going to give this awareness true substance, he promised. He was going to wipe out all memory of her other man and introduce her to his power with all its naked, hot passion.

He was no neanderthal; he did not need a woman to be a virgin to enjoy her. But this one, this beautiful freak of modern living with her innocence steeped in womanly desire for him that she still did not have the tools to hide whatever the Frenchman had taught her, was going to open up like a chrysalis under his guidance and fly with him into ecstasy. She owed him that much.

She’d reached his face at last and Xander lost the murderous look to give her the benefit of a slow, easy smile, which she dealt with by flicking her eyes away. Nell was no fool. The last time he was here he had thrown down the sexual gauntlet and the smile was to remind her of it.

‘Ready to come with me?’ he enquired with the kind of soft challenge that had her breath feathering a quiver across the thrust of her breasts.

‘I have no make-up,’ she complained. ‘You forgot to send it.’

‘You don’t need make-up. Your beautiful skin does not need it.’

‘That’s a matter of opinion.’ Her chin lifted, eyes pinning him with an arctic green look. ‘I’ve seen the waiting Press out there,’ she said with a flick of a hand towards the window.
‘Witnessing me leaving here looking black and blue won’t help your cause, Xander.’

‘And what cause is that?’ The sexy smile was beginning to fade, Nell noticed.

‘Damage control,’ she replied. ‘I presumed you would want me to look utterly love-blind and radiant for the cameras.’

‘Your tongue is developing an aspish tone that does not suit it,’ he drawled, moving further into the room with his graceful stride. ‘Can you manage that last button on your blouse or do you need assistance?’

‘I can manage.’ Her chin dipped, her fingers moving to quickly close the button. ‘The fact that I’m unhinged and suicidal does not make me totally useless.’

Xander hooked up her jacket from where it lay on the bed. ‘You must admit, Nell, it made hilarious reading.’

‘You think it’s a big joke?’

‘You clearly don’t.’

Neither did he by the look on his grim face. The jacket arrived around her slender shoulders, held out absolutely perfectly for her to slide her arms into the sleeves without needing to strain herself.

‘They presented me as a spiritless fool.’

‘And me as the ruthless womaniser.’

‘Better that than a man that cannot keep his wife happy—hmm?’

Nell turned to face him with that aspish challenge, but it was the first time she’d actually stood in front of him in goodness knew how long and it came as a shock to be reminded of his overpowering six feet two inches of pure masculinity compared to her own five feet five inches’ more diminutive build.

Black eyes glinted narrowly down at her. ‘Are you deliberately goading me into proving you wrong?’

Remembering the kiss of a few days ago, she felt her stomach muscles give a hectic quiver. ‘No,’ she denied and lowered her eyes in an attempt to block him out as his long fingers smoothed the jacket fabric into place.

‘Then take my advice and hold back on the barbs until we can achieve guaranteed privacy.’

As if on cue, the door swung open and the doctor who’d been overseeing her recovery strode into the room. He and Xander shook hands like old friends then proceeded to discuss her as if she wasn’t standing right beside them.

So what was new there? Nell asked herself as she stood with her eyes lowered and said not a word. From the moment he’d stepped into it, Xander had been arranging her life for her as if she wasn’t a part of it. Their very odd courtship, the contract he had discussed with her father but not with her that she didn’t bother to read. The marriage that had taken place in her local church but was put together by his efficient team with very little input from her. So why bother to make a fuss that he was discussing her health with the doctor he’d probably hand-picked to go with the private hospital he’d moved her to without her approval?

The only time he’d ever really listened to her was on their wedding night, when she’d refused to make their marriage real. She might have been upset, angry—hysterical enough to be a turn-off for any man, but she also knew that when he agreed to leave her alone, the final decision had been his. He could have changed her mind. He could have seduced her into weakening to him.

But no, what Xander had done was walk away—easily. Nell cringed inside as she thought it. He’d gone back to his life as if she was not in it, other than for those few token visits aimed to keep up appearances.

As the discussion about her needs went on around her Nell began to feel just a little light-headed because she’d been standing up for longer than she’d done since the accident. Her legs felt shaky and the solid prospect of the nearby chair was almost too tempting to resist. But if she showed signs of weakness now they might decide to keep her here and the risk of being incarcerated for another single hour was enough to keep her stubbornly on her feet.

By the time the doctor turned to say his farewell to her, her
fixed smile was wavering though. Xander reached out to take her arm, had to feel the fine tremors shaking her and abruptly cut the goodbyes short.

Two minutes later she was walking down the corridor with his grip like a vice and his grim silence ominous. They entered a lift, the doors closed behind them. Xander propped her up against the wall then remained standing over her as they shot downwards, his grim face strapped by tension. The moment the doors slid open again, he was taking her arm and guiding her out of the lift.

Nell showed a brief start of surprise when she realised they had not arrived in the hospital foyer but in a basement car park and she had never felt so relieved about anything. Not only had Xander pre-empted the Press pack but his black Bentley stood parked right there in front of them with Jake Mather standing to attention by the open rear door.

Nell sank with trembling relief into soft leather. The door closed as another opened. Xander arrived at her side and within seconds they were on the move.

So what came next? she wondered wearily when, a short minute later, Xander was on his mobile phone, lean dark profile wearing its power mask as he talked in smooth, liquid Italian then switched to rich, sensual Greek for the second call he made.

Uttering a small sigh, she closed her eyes and just let the sound of his voice wash over her—only to open them again with a start when her door came open and she found herself blinking owlishly at Xander, who was leaning into the car and unlocking her seat belt.

She must have fallen asleep. As she was too disoriented to do more than let him help her out of the car, it took a few more seconds for her brain to register that she was not standing outside Rosemere.

‘What’s going on?’ she questioned.

‘Nothing.’ With a coolness that belied the alarm that was beginning to erupt inside her, he turned her round so she could
see the sleek white private jet standing on tarmac a few yards away. ‘We are going home, that’s all.’

‘By air?’ She blinked again as he drew her across those few yards towards the waiting flight steps. ‘But it’s only an hour by car back to Rose—’

‘Greece,’ he corrected. ‘I need to be in Athens on Monday morning, and if you think I am leaving you alone at Rosemere to plot assignations with your Frenchman then think again.’

Greece, Nell repeated and stopped dead at the entrance to the plane. Her heart gave a punch against her sore ribs. ‘No,’ she refused. ‘I don’t want to go—’

‘Don’t make a fuss,
agapita
.’ The flat of his hand at the base of her spine gave her a gentle push forward. Before she knew it, she’d been hustled inside the plane and the door was being closed.

Staring bemusedly at her luxury surroundings, she turned suddenly to make a protest and cannoned right into Xander’s chest. The breath left her body on a tense little whoosh and she tried to take a defensive step back, but his arms came around her, strong and supportive. It was like being surrounded by the enemy, frightening and suffocating.

She breathed in anxious protest. ‘Please …’

‘Please what?’

His voice had deepened and roughened. Glancing up, Nell saw the dark, simmering spark in his eyes and tried one final breathless, ‘No …’

But his mouth found hers anyway, moulding her lips and prising them apart to allow his tongue to make that slow, sensual slide against moist inner tissue that made her breath quiver as her senses tingled with pleasure. She wanted to pull away but instead her mouth crushed in closer. She wanted to deny this was happening at all but once again her mind was not in control. He murmured something, she didn’t know what. But his tongue when it delved deeper sent her hands up to clutch at his chest and, as strong male muscle rippled beneath her fingers, he eased her even closer to him.

His thighs pressed against her thighs, the solid evidence of
his desire pushing against the tense flatness of her lower stomach. Damp heat sprang out all over her and on a very masculine growl he deepened the kiss some more. Dizzily she clung to him, her breathing coming faster as the intensity of the kiss increased. Her head tilted backwards, arching her breasts into the solid wall of his chest. Her nipples sharpened like stinging arrows against him and she could feel the uneven thump of his heart and the fine tremor attacking him as he used long fingers to draw her more tightly against the sensual movements he was making with his hips. It was all so sexual, so overwhelmingly physical and exciting. A shimmering, quivering shower of desire dragged at inner muscles that seemed to scoop out the strength from her legs.

Then the plane’s engines gave a sudden roar, breaking them apart with an abruptness that left Nell staring dizzily up at his face. She saw the tension there, heat streaking across his cheekbones, the flaring nostrils, the predatory burn in his eyes, and quivered out a constricted gasp.

He dipped his dark head and caught the sound, burnt this kiss onto her pulsing lips—then without warning took hold of her shoulders, turned and dumped her unceremoniously into the nearest seat then spun away in an odd jerky movement that kept her eyes fixed on him in giddy fascination.

He really wanted her. Badly. Now. The knowledge ploughed a deep furrow of heat down her front and held her utterly, breathlessly entrapped. When he suddenly twisted back round to look at her his eyes were so black she didn’t even try to look for the brown. That one glance at her expression and he was growling out some kind of harsh self-aimed curse and coming down on his haunches to grimly belt her in. Her eyes clung to his taut features as he did so. She didn’t even breathe when he moved away to take a seat on the other side of the aisle and strapped himself into it.

Nothing going on inside was making any sense to her any more; everything was just too new. The plane engines gave another roar then they were shooting forward with rocket propulsion
that only helped to heighten the awareness pulsing back and forth.

‘If you ever let another man touch you again I will kill you,’ he rasped into the charged atmosphere.

Kill her—kill Marcel. The primitive man in him was beginning to take on a life of his own. Is this what untrammelled lust did to men—turned them all into angry, murderous, primeval beasts?

‘Speak!’ Xander lashed out, stopping her thought processes stone dead as he seared a blistering look across the aisle.

He wanted her to retaliate. To spit something back at him about Vanessa so he could shoot her down with some cruel remark. It was all to do with a need to finding an alternative release for all of this tension, but she turned her face away and refused to respond.

Couldn’t respond; she was too locked up inside with what she was feeling herself.