Greek Bachelors: The Ultimate Seduction: The Petrakos Bride / One Night...Nine-Month Scandal / One Night to Risk it All. Sarah Morgan
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her head in incomprehension at that bold statement. The conversation had already knocked her off balance, since he was not reacting as she had assumed he would. He was not apologising, he was not making excuses. Indeed, he was not even owning up to his fault.
‘I want you to take the time to consider the fact that what I have with Krista is quite separate from what I have with you.’
A mortified laugh that carried no humour fell jarringly from Maddie’s dry lips. ‘I hardly need to be told that. I may not be very sophisticated, but even I can tell the difference between an engagement ring and the equivalent of a dirty weekend!’
His big powerful body tensed. ‘That is not how it has been between us.’
‘How would I know how it’s been when I’ve been in the dark ever since the first day?’ Maddie demanded feverishly. ‘Why did you involve me in this horrible situation? And why did you bother getting engaged if you don’t intend to be faithful?’
‘Perhaps fidelity is not as important to some people as it is to you,’ Giannis delivered. ‘I will only say that my conscience is clear as far as my engagement is concerned.’
‘Well, bully for you…so your fiancée was desperate enough to take you on those terms? Presumably she made that choice.’ Maddie watched his lean strong face tighten with hauteur and marvelled at his self-assurance, his stubborn refusal to acknowledge that he had done wrong. ‘But I didn’t get that opportunity. You lied to me—’
‘I have told no lies,’ Giannis asserted.
‘You lied to me by omission.’ Angry patches of colour had blossomed in Maddie’s cheeks. ‘Last night you knew I didn’t know you were engaged when I said I wouldn’t be with you if you weren’t single. But you chose not to tell me the truth.’
‘We had already slept together. I didn’t see the point of upsetting you when you were away from home.’
That was the precise point at which Maddie lost her temper, for it seemed to her that he had the hide of a rhinoceros. ‘In other words, you put your own comfort first and decided that it was fine to leave me in ignorance. It didn’t matter to you that I was betraying my values in getting involved with a man who’s planning to marry another woman. Or that the knowledge that our relationship is not an exclusive one makes me feel physically sick!’
His lean, dark face hardened, his strong jawline squaring. ‘Of course it matters to me. But one cannot live one’s whole life by rigid rules—’
‘Particularly not when they conflict with what Giannis Petrakos wants?’ Maddie dared. ‘There are good reasons for the rules I live by.’
Giannis studied her with glittering golden eyes. ‘I want you more than I’ve wanted any woman for a very long time. Walking away wasn’t an option.’
‘Let’s not exaggerate my supposed attraction,’ Maddie cut in rawly, a pain as sharp as a knife twisting through her. ‘Obviously it’s only sex, because my personal appeal won’t prevent you from marrying someone else. Yet you talked about me not knowing how to behave? Don’t you think I had the right to know I was just a casual fling? A little bit on the side of the main event? If you had had any respect for me at all, you wouldn’t have treated me like this!’
‘You’re wrong about that. There was an explosive attraction. Nor do I think that self-denial makes anyone a better person.’ With that ringing rejoinder, Giannis went into the dressing room and pulled out fresh clothing. ‘We’ll discuss this when you’ve calmed down. I consider arguments a waste of valuable energy.’
‘And walking out the ultimate escape hatch,’ Maddie told him tightly.
That incendiary comment brought Giannis back into view, his tailored chinos still unbuttoned at his lean waist, his bronzed hair-roughened chest still bare. He refused to consider the rights and wrongs. What was done was done. But he was determined not to lose her. ‘I don’t do escape hatches.’
‘It doesn’t matter. Just arrange for me to get home as soon as possible.’ She tilted up her chin and drew on every ounce of her pride to hide her pain. ‘I don’t mind having to sit around the airport for hours and wait for a flight either.’
‘This is crazy. Why should you leave? It’s nonsense to say that what we have is casual,’ Giannis insisted forcefully. ‘I want you in my life—’
‘Well, I think I can safely say that this is one of those very rare occasions when you don’t get what you want.’ Green eyes glittering with furious condemnation, Maddie surveyed him.
‘I won’t let you leave.’
‘You have no choice.’ Maddie yanked out her overnight bag and devoted her attention to packing the few items she had brought from London. She hated him, but she was terrified that the agony of picturing him in another woman’s arms would still kill her by inches. She had to keep busy. Activity and the need to think of practicalities were the only things capable of keeping her sane.
Giannis watched her piling her possessions into an untidy heap. He did not do emotional confrontations, he reminded himself doggedly. He did not do emotions, full-stop. He had never been into love and promises or, for that matter, stories of happily-ever-after. But he knew that she believed in all of those things, and that he had hurt her. He would give her the time and the space to quieten down. He did not believe that she would just walk away from him.
An hour later, Hamid informed him that Maddie was in the salon with her luggage. Giannis stared at the computer screen and realised that he had done no work during that time.
Clad in a simple white shirt and denim skirt, with her glorious hair confined by a band at the nape of her neck, she was standing by the window.
‘I realise that you’re upset, but there is such a thing as the art of compromise,’ Giannis drawled softly.
‘Giannis…’ Maddie whispered in jagged interruption. ‘Compromise would only be another word for you using me, and I’m not a glutton for punishment. But I have decided that everything that’s happened isn’t entirely your fault. I have to take a share of the blame too.’
His ebony brows pleated. ‘Meaning?’
Maddie wanted to tell him about Suzy, because she was convinced that this would be the last time she ever saw him. ‘For you to understand, I have to go back nine years in time to when I first saw you. I was fourteen years old.’
Giannis was intrigued. ‘The first time? How? Where?’
‘You visited my twin sister in a children’s hospice.’
Disconcertion made him frown. ‘A hospice?’
Her generous mouth compressed. ‘Her name was Suzy…and, no, you didn’t notice me on either visit. I was just one of the admiring crowd round the tea trolley. My sister had leukaemia and not much time left. A fortnight later you returned and brought her favourite pop pin-up to visit her. She was overjoyed. He was her hero, and that day you became mine for doing it for her.’
Giannis was astonished by what she was telling him. He too had lost a sibling as a teenager, but that was something he never discussed. Furthermore, what she said had cut through even his tough shell and drawn blood. He was her hero and that day you became mine. Ten words, and every one the equivalent of a spear in the guts, Giannis conceded grimly. ‘Your sister—Suzy—died?’
Her beautiful green eyes sad, Maddie nodded.
‘I’m sorry. Over the years I’ve visited hundreds of children. I’m afraid I don’t remember her,’ he admitted.
‘It’s long time ago. I didn’t expect you to. I just wanted you to know that, even though everything has gone wrong between us on a personal level, I’ll always be grateful for the fact that you made my sister so happy.’
‘I don’t want you to be grateful, pedhi mou,’ Giannis breathed in a roughened undertone. ‘Gratitude in that