The Greek Billionaire's Love-Child (14 page)

Ella’s heart thudded. He’d promised not to push the subject of marriage. ‘Nikos—’

‘You need to decide whether you want to go to the clothes, or whether you want the clothes to come to you.’

Ella gave a nervous giggle, relieved that he hadn’t been talking about marriage.
She wasn’t ready to tackle that subject again yet.
‘You mean you actually pick up the phone and someone delivers a load of clothes to your hotel suite? That happens in real life? You say, “She’s about the size of a baby elephant,” and they say, “We will bring you our finest selection suitable for baby elephants, sir.”’

‘You are not the size of a baby elephant.’ Nikos leaned forward and poured himself another cup of coffee. ‘And we can arrange for them to come here, if that is what you would prefer. But I thought you might enjoy choosing.’

‘Choosing what?’ Ella gave a helpless shrug. ‘What do I need, Nikos? I don’t go anywhere. And I don’t have the money to blow on clothes. I need to find somewhere new to live and it’s going to cost more than the canal boat and—’

‘Good decision. We’ll go out.’ Supremely confident, he stood up and gently pulled her to her feet.

‘I can’t spend your money.’

‘Then I’ll help you,’ he said calmly, a smile in his eyes. ‘With practice and a little encouragement, I’m sure you can manage it.’

‘I don’t need clothes. I don’t go anywhere.’

He hesitated and then took her face in his hands. ‘You are going to be my wife. And I’m not sure that you will enjoy everything that that entails. Yes, sometimes we can spend our evenings on the terrace, sharing a bottle of wine when the baby is asleep, but sometimes we have to attend social functions.’

‘What social functions?’

‘Elegant social functions.’

‘You mean like red-carpet stuff?’

‘Yes. Sometimes. I am a doctor, but I’m also the patron of several charities that are important to me. On top of that I have a duty to my family to play a part in the business.’

‘I’m not sure I’ll be any good at that sort of thing. Even with an unlimited budget I don’t think I can look elegant, Nikos. I’m a nurse.’ Thinking of the pictures she’d seen in glossy magazines, she felt a sudden lurch of insecurity. ‘I’m used to running round a hospital in scrubs, interacting with people who are usually under the age of ten.’

‘Then tonight will be a pleasant change for you,’ he said smoothly. ‘You are coming with me to a very glittery, high-profile charity ball.’

Ella felt a mixture of excitement and trepidation. ‘What if I let you down?’

‘You won’t let me down. You’ll enjoy it. It is a perfect opportunity to dress up. A very glamorous event.’

Ella quailed.
She was definitely going to embarrass him.
‘I don’t know how to be glamorous. Nikos, I work with children. My idea of smartening up is to put on a clean scrub suit.’

He stroked her hair away from her face. ‘You will be beautiful,
agape mou
. Stop worrying.’

‘What is the charity?’

Nikos described the work that the charity did in supporting families with sick children. ‘The aim is to build another centre, where the children can go on holiday.’

‘So the aim is to make money. I don’t understand how they make money from a ball. Are the tickets expensive?’

‘Very. But most of the fundraising goes on during the
evening. The organisers will auction prizes and generally find ways to persuade the guests to part with their money.’

‘What if people can’t afford much?’

‘Then they’re not invited,’ Nikos drawled, pulling her against him. ‘You will be spending my money,
agape mou
, not your own.’

‘Who did you take last year?’

‘My sister,’ he said dryly, ‘and we argued all evening. It is not an experience I intend to repeat.’

‘I’ve never been to a ball,’ Ella confessed. ‘They always do a ballot for the hospital ball and I’ve never won. Not that I could afford the ticket even if I did win. And I wouldn’t know what to do when I got there.’

Nikos gave her a curious look. ‘The general idea is to have a nice time,’ he said in a mild tone. ‘It’s considered entertainment. Along with the whole shoes, hair, dress thing that women seem to love so much. Enough talking.’

He took her to one of the top department stores and turned her over to the care of a sleek, groomed woman whose sole purpose in life seemed to be to drain Nikos’s bank account in a single shopping spree.

Trousers, dresses, jackets and shoes, shoes, shoes—shoes with high heels, shoes with ribbons and bows, pink shoes, gold shoes—silk bags and boxes lined the floor.

Ella tried on what felt like the entire contents of the store and after about five minutes the girl abandoned her stiff reserve and opened up.

‘So you’re going to the ball tonight,’ the girl murmured enviously, leaning forward to adjust the lie of a dress. ‘Lucky you.’

‘Do you think so?’ Ella turned sideways to look in the mirror. ‘What do you think of this?’

‘I think I envy you,’ the girl said dreamily. ‘I’d give just about anything for one night with Nikos Mariakos.’

Ella felt her stomach lurch. ‘You know him?’

‘Of course. He’s rich, eligible and gorgeous. His brother shops here, and his sister. That dress is too tight at the waist.’ She frowned for a moment and then looked at Ella with dawning understanding. ‘Are you…?’

‘Eating too many doughnuts,’ Ella said quickly, sensing that Nikos wouldn’t want her pregnancy confirmed.

‘Right, well, that sort of waist isn’t going to work on you, but I think I have something else. It has two tiny straps made from crystals—not cheap, but that’s not going to bother anyone with Mariakos as their surname.’

In the end Ella came away with an entire new wardrobe and although she tried to apologise frantically for the amount she’d spent, Nikos didn’t seem remotely interested in the details.

‘Did you find something to wear tonight?’

Thinking of the gorgeous dress that she’d fallen in love with, Ella smiled. ‘Yes.’ And she was excited about wearing it. And the shoes. And then she remembered the girl. ‘I think she guessed I was pregnant. I tried saying that I’d just put on some weight but she didn’t look convinced.’

Nikos’s mouth tightened. ‘
Theos mou
, it hadn’t occurred to me that she might notice. It will upset my family greatly if news of your pregnancy reaches the press before news of our engagement.’

‘Are you sure they’d care?’ It was an alien concept for Ella. He looked at her thoughtfully.

‘They would care. They are very old-fashioned. And very eager to meet you.’

‘They know about me?’ Ella shrank at the thought. ‘You’ve told them about the baby?’

‘Of course. I am going to be a father. Naturally, this is something that I would share with my family. It is a cause for celebration, not apology.’ He frowned and drew her towards him. ‘Why would you be surprised about that?’

‘I don’t know. I suppose I didn’t realise that you’re that close to your family.’ It was an alien concept to her.

‘We’re Greek,’ he said, as if that explained everything. ‘Greeks argue and interfere with each other, but families stick together.’

Ella thought of her own brief experience of family life. She thought of her fractured, twisted, grossly dysfunctional family unit.

It was so different from the model he described.

She found herself thinking about the picture he’d painted of a noisy, interfering extended family and wondering what it would be like to be part of something like that.

She really had no idea.

N
IKOS
paced the length of the suite, waiting for Ella to come out of the room. She’d been in there for hours, he thought grimly, glancing at his watch. What the hell was she doing? He’d arranged for the hairdresser to come to the suite so she hadn’t had to do that herself.

How long did it take to pull on a dress?

It crossed his mind that she might have tied the sheets together and escaped out of the window.

With a flash of exasperation he rubbed the tips of his fingers over his forehead.

Tonight he was going to break down those barriers, he promised himself. By the end of the evening, she was going to be wearing his ring.

‘Nikos?’ Her voice was hesitant and he turned sharply to see her standing there, barely recognisable as the sweet, competent nurse he was used to seeing dressed in theatre scrubs or faded jeans.

Her blonde hair had been swept up in a modern style and a sheath of silver fell from two glittering straps to pool on the floor.

Feeling an explosion of sexual attraction, Nikos trailed his eyes down her trembling frame, fully intending to scru
tinise every shimmering centimetre of her lush body. But his eyes refused to move from the creamy curves of her breasts, partially revealed by the gentle dip at the front of the dress.

Contemplating the full glory of her amazing body, Nikos almost swallowed his tongue.

‘Can you please say something nice?’ She gave an awkward shrug as she looked down at herself. ‘You’re making me nervous. You hate it, right? I look like something that fell off a Christmas tree. It isn’t me, is it? I should have just chosen something that was plain black and safe…’

Nikos tried to answer, but every neurone in his brain appeared to have fused.

The only coherent thought in his head was that they were going to miss the ball.

‘Nikos?’

He gave up on speech. Instead, he crossed the room in two strides, hauled her hard against his ferociously aroused body and brought his mouth down on hers.

Her lips parted under the pressure of his and she gasped with shock as he backed her against the wall, his hands sliding the silver dress up her thighs.

His hand encountered bare, silken flesh all the way up to a pair of skimpy panties. In the grip of a fierce, primitive need, Nikos dispensed with this flimsy barrier with an uncharacteristic lack of subtlety, his entire focus channelled towards one thing alone.
Being inside her.
He touched her first, his fingers sliding deep, his breathing shallow as he gently tortured them both with this intimate prelude of what was to come.

She sobbed into his mouth, her pelvis moving against the stroke of his hand in an unspoken plea for more.

‘
Theos mou
, you feel fantastic,’ Nikos groaned hoarsely,
releasing the agonising throb of his erection before closing his hands round her trembling thighs and lifting her. His muscles were screaming with tension, every part of his body primed and ready for this woman.

He took her mouth again just seconds before he took her body.

Devoured by a primitive urgency to claim this woman, he thrust deep into her slick, quivering flesh, feeling her sweet tightness close around him like a velvet fist.

Intense pleasure shut down his mind.

He felt the bite of her nails through the fabric of his dress shirt. He felt the tension in her slim frame as she urged him to move—
urged him to release them both from this wickedly sensual torture
. But he’d anchored her hard and all the control was his.

He knew she was frantic. He could feel it in the tiny tremors that shook her, he could taste it in the soft sweetness of her mouth. He knew she was as desperate for release as he was. But for a moment—
just for a moment
—he held them there, the powerful force of their passion held ruthlessly in check while the sexual tension screamed between them.

Prolonging the moment, he withdrew slightly and drove into her again, and her whimper of desperation was almost animal in quality. She was trying to move her pelvis, her lips and tongue licking at his mouth as she begged him with every gasp and every trembling muscle in her over-excited body.

And he lost it.

Beyond rational thought, he drove into her, his passion an unstoppable force, his fingers biting into her soft flesh as he abandoned himself to the fierce burn of erotic sensation that exploded through his body.

The heat was incredible. She felt impossibly tight, her body closing around his, drawing him deeper, and he knew nothing except an explosive need to possess her in the most basic way possible.

It was primal, primitive—no finesse, no gentle seduction. He took her hard and fast, slaking his need with rhythmic force.

And when she came, he came too, the spasms of her body drawing him deeper until they were spinning together into a vortex of pleasure, both consumed by the same agonising starburst of ecstasy.

His final fluid thrust brought a shower of sensation that reached every single part of his body and his mouth was still on hers, savouring every single one of her agonised gasps.

As light gradually cooled the red-hot madness, he lifted his mouth from hers, his breathing uneven as he sought to replenish the oxygen levels in his starving brain.

Gently he withdrew from her body and lowered her. Her hands closed around his arms for support and he knew she was worried that her legs wouldn’t hold her.

Unable to find the words in English, he said what he wanted to say in Greek, relieved that she couldn’t understand him. Then he allowed her dress to slide back down her body and looked into her eyes.

Her small pink tongue moistened her swollen lips. ‘So I guess the answer was a yes,’ she said huskily, and he looked at her blankly, his mind still working at only a fraction of its normal speed.

She gave a slow, womanly smile. ‘You liked the dress.’

Nikos gave an embarrassed laugh, shocked by the degree to which he’d lost control.

Never before…

Miraculously the exotic silver creation appeared to have survived such rough handling and his eyes dropped to her cleavage.

She gave a strangled laugh and pushed his chin up, forcing his eyes to meet hers. ‘Should I wear a coat?’ Her eyes and voice teased him. ‘I think you’d better keep your eyes above my neckline this evening.’

Incredulous, Nikos lifted an eyebrow. ‘You still want to go out?’

‘Of course.’ She gave him a little push. ‘Nikos, I’m all dressed up. I have this fabulous dress that made you lose every last scrap of that iron self-control of yours. I want to wear it in public.’

‘Why?’ Hot jealousy poured through him at the thought of other men having the same opportunity to admire her body. ‘We could have dinner here. We could stay in.’

‘I want to walk down a red carpet.’ Her hands on her hips, she adjusted the fall of the dress with a sensual movement of her hips that sent the blood rushing away from his brain to a completely different organ of his body.

‘It’s just a carpet,’ he gritted, and she gave a light smile.

‘Nikos, you were the one telling me that I need to enjoy myself.’

‘We’re too late.’

‘No, we’re not. Just give me five minutes in the bathroom.’

‘Change the dress,’ he growled, stabbing his fingers through his hair, his tension mounting at the thought of just how many men were going to be looking at her.

In less than five minutes she emerged from the palatial bathroom. Her tangled, ruined hairstyle had been redone in a more haphazard fashion by her own hands, but
somehow the lack of finesse made her seem sexier than ever. Her mouth glistened from a fresh sweep of gloss and her cheeks were pink from their love-making.

Nikos wanted to take her straight to bed.

And so would every other man who looked at her.

‘Stop glaring.’ Ella slid her arm through his. ‘I’m going to enjoy myself. Isn’t that what you wanted?’

‘What I want is for you to keep my ring on your finger. Marry me,’ he said roughly. ‘You know it’s the right thing to do.’

She paused and lifted her eyes to his and he saw the uncertainty there. Uncertainty and something else.

Fear?

‘You said you weren’t going to mention it again.’

‘Ella…’ He felt frustration pour through him. ‘After what we just shared, how can you say no?’

‘What we just shared was sex, Nikos.’ She stepped away from him, her eyes wary. ‘I thought you said we’re going to be late.’

Never had Nikos been less enthusiastic about attending a high-profile, red-carpet charity function. Instead, he was gripped by a sudden urge to take her back to the canal boat where their relationship had been insulated from the outside world.

Cinderella
, he thought dryly as they walked down the red carpet a little while later, wishing he hadn’t done quite such an effective job in transforming her from shy nurse to sexy socialite.

On the other hand, it was possible that the transformation would affect her in other ways.

Perhaps she would realise that they could be good together.

He watched as she smiled her way through a million
introductions, ate the banquet and danced until her feet ached.

He hadn’t seen her so happy since those first few months they’d spent together, when their whole lives had been focused on their work and each other.

She sat by his side, her eyes wide as the charity auction started and some of the bids ran into the hundreds of thousands.

When one of the prizes was announced, she turned to him. ‘Seven nights at the Mariakos Spa Hotel in Greece? Did you donate that prize?’

‘Of course.’

Her eyes twinkled. ‘So—if someone wants it, they just offer money, yes?’

‘That’s right.’

‘And all the money goes to the charity, so it’s for a good cause? Are you going to bid for something?’

‘Of course.’

At that moment the huge screen at the back of the room flashed up pictures of the hotel. The camera lingered on an exclusive private villa within the extensive grounds of the hotel, an oasis of serene tranquillity opening onto a private infinity pool. The turquoise water appeared to blend with the sea beyond and there were a few wistful sighs in the room. A yacht sped across a sparkling sea, dolphins played in the blue depths of the bay and behind were mountains.

‘I want to go there,’ Ella whispered dreamily. ‘I want you to bid for that.’

Nikos shot her an amused look. ‘You want me to bid for a chance to stay in my own hotel?’

‘Yes.’ She gave him a pleading look. ‘Can we? It looks fabulous. Is it smart?’

‘Extremely exclusive,’ he drawled, his mind thinking of a way in which he might be able to turn this to his advantage. ‘Why not? A week of sun, sea and sex sounds good to me.’

Colour touched her cheeks and her glance was suddenly shy. ‘I wouldn’t be able to get the time off work.’

‘Ella, you have been working without a break for the past four months,’ he murmured, raising his hand to include himself in the bidding. ‘You’re due a holiday.’

‘They won’t be able to spare you.’

Indifferent to the fact that most of the room were looking at him as if he’d gone mad, Nikos raised his bid. ‘I will find them a replacement. I have a friend working in London who owes me a favour. He might be able to step in.’

‘Seriously?’ Her face was alive with excitement. ‘So we might be able to go some time?’

Bored with the game of bidding, Nikos offered an astronomical amount that drew gasps and then stunned silence from the audience.

‘It’s for a good cause,’ he told Ella, lowering his head to plant a gentle kiss on her open mouth. ‘So—we now have seven days staying in one of my own hotels. It will be an interesting experience. I’ve never actually stayed in one of my hotels as a guest before.’

Ella was giggling. ‘I can’t believe you just did that.’ She leaned across and hugged him impulsively. ‘Thank you. I’m so excited.’

As she pulled away, Nikos caught her face in his hands and stared into her eyes, trying to read her expression.

‘Let’s go back to the hotel,’ he said huskily. ‘I want you to myself.’

Within minutes of arriving back in the hotel they were in bed again and this time, as he dragged every last drop
of response from her quivering body, he took her face in his hands.

‘Marry me,’ he demanded in a hoarse voice and she gave a moan, so shockingly aroused that she couldn’t think straight.

‘Don’t do this to me, Nikos,’ she gasped, ‘not now. I just—I need—Please…’

It was a moment of exquisite intimacy, so intensely personal that there was nowhere for her to hide, and in that single moment as she lifted her dazed eyes to his Nikos gritted his teeth with the effort to hold back.

He lost the battle, his driving thrusts tipping her over the edge into an erotic sensual paradise, their passion carrying them along on a tidal wave of pure ecstasy.

Afterwards, he kissed her damp forehead and smoothed her tangled hair away from her face. ‘Talk to me,’ he murmured, and she gave a faint smile.

‘You expect me to talk after that?’ She pressed her lips to the base of his throat but he shifted away, wanting to look at her.

What was going on in her head?

Why was she still refusing him?

And when was she going to say what he wanted to hear?

Ella woke early the next morning, a feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach because she knew that tonight she’d be sleeping in the house again.

‘What are you thinking?’ Nikos asked, coming into the room, frowning down at her as she lay staring up at the ceiling.

‘That I’ve really enjoyed this weekend,’ she said softly. ‘It felt as though—I don’t know. We were somewhere else. It was good. What time do we have to leave?’

‘Right now.’ Nikos drew her up to him. ‘We’ll shower, change and then we can make an early start.’

And she was supposed to be pleased about that?

Feeling sicker by the minute, Ella followed him into the shower but this time when he made love to her, she started to cry.

‘
Theos mou
, what is wrong?’ Nikos switched off the shower and smoothed her damp hair away from her face with a gentle hand. ‘Have I hurt you?’