Modern Romance September 2018 Books 1-4. Кейт Хьюит
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that he had successfully killed that. An air of nervous uncertainty lay in her small restive movements. He hadn’t discussed the pregnancy risk. It wasn’t the moment, he told himself squarely, because she hadn’t noticed that contraceptive mishap. Why worry her about something so unlikely? What were the chances after one encounter? Slim, to none, he reasoned, and he offered up his first inner prayer since childhood in support of that hope. Wasn’t he already feeling guilty enough? Surely that ultimate axe would not also fall on him?
Elvi met Xan’s dazzling amber eyes and it was as though a mental ping of recognition sounded somewhere deep within her own brain. He was upset about something. She didn’t know how she knew that but somehow she did, belatedly recognising that nobody could be quite as detached from the rest of humanity as he liked to appear. And such beautiful eyes he had, lushly enclosed between black velvet lashes, such an amazing colour and surprisingly eloquent. Her body reacted with shocking intensity, her breasts tightening while a sensation of awareness purred between her thighs.
‘H-how long will we be in Greece?’ she asked abruptly, battling that awareness with fierce discomfiture.
‘Five days,’ Xan said in a roughened undertone, wondering how the hell he was going to keep his hands off her when she could turn him on so fast she made him feel like an animal.
Not that that was so very far from the truth concerning their single encounter, Xan reminded himself with gritted teeth as he strode into the lift, refusing to allow himself to linger, thoroughly distrusting, indeed loathing, the powerful sexual urges pulling at him. He had already fallen on Elvi once with all the refinement of a sex-starved teenager, so out of himself that he had forgotten protection and had failed to note that he had hurt her. Scarcely a stellar show of sophistication or skill. No way was he about to repeat that idiocy.
Determined to get every change made instantly, Xan contacted the concierge company to organise the removal of Elvi’s possessions from the apartment and the sale of it. He was still issuing instructions when he climbed into the limousine and was absently aware of Dmitri’s frowning face. What the hell was up with his head of security? Dmitri Pallas had been with Xan for years. A former inspector in the Greek police force, he was very efficient in his field. But of recent, crucially the placing of Elvi’s letter in the cause of Sally Cartwright, Dmitri’s behaviour had been strange.
Already feeling unusually hassled, Xan shelved the acknowledgement as something else to deal with at a more opportune time. Maybe Dmitri had family problems or something. Maybe he knew more about that theft business than he had been willing to share. Whatever, Xan was in no mood to delve into anything that could verge on the personal. It was a direction he never went in with his staff because he valued his own privacy too highly. And the day when he blew his own cherished privacy sky-high was not a day when he felt prompted to break down barriers with others.
A woman in his apartment, even if it was only for one night, was a major departure from the norm for him. Should he have put her in a hotel? No, that would’ve been shabby, he decided, and his behaviour had been shabby enough for one day, hadn’t it?
While Xan was contemplating the challenge of sharing his space for even one night, Elvi was on the way home for a visit, unable to sit alone in the empty apartment even though she knew she would either have to lie or evade the truth as the price of that family visit. The knowledge made her sad but the dropping of the theft charge was, in her opinion, a worthwhile return, regardless of the dishonesty it had involved her in.
She was startled when she got home to find her mother actually turning out cupboards and packing the contents into boxes.
‘What on earth are you doing?’ she asked her mother from the kitchen doorway.
Sally smiled up at her daughter from her position on her knees on the floor.
‘We’re moving to Oxford in a few days...’
Elvi’s brow furrowed, her eyes uncomprehending. ‘I don’t understand—’
Sally picked herself up. ‘I’ll make us a cup of tea and explain,’ she said, visibly in a far better state of mind than she had been the last time Elvi actually saw her, with something of her usual bustling energy back in her step and voice.
‘Dmitri Pallas...the head of Mr Ziakis’s security team...is a good friend of mine,’ Sally advanced with a slight deepening of colour. ‘He’s come to our rescue...’
Her brow furrowing, Elvi sank down at the table while her mother brewed the tea. ‘You’ve never mentioned him before,’ she pointed out uncomfortably.
‘Didn’t see the need because I used to see him every day at work,’ Sally Cartwright told her wryly. ‘And no, there’s no romance there, nothing but friendship, and I don’t know if there ever could be but I do like him very much.’
‘Nothing wrong with that,’ Elvi said gently, disconcerted by her mother’s fluctuating colour and embarrassment. No romance, yeah, as if she was going to believe that with that look on the older woman’s face! She thought of the man whom she had met so briefly, the warm concern she had seen in his eyes over that letter. She thought of Sally’s lost years and of how in all the time since she’d lost her husband her mother had had not a single man in her life...and then she thought of how wonderful it would be if her parent could finally have something nice in her life, something for her rather than the children she adored.
‘Well, Dmitri has a little house in Oxford because he has family living in the area,’ Sally proffered. ‘He knows how we’re fixed financially and, now that I’ve lost my job...well, he’s found me another one there with a connection of his. Waitressing, a step up from cleaning, I think—’
‘Yes,’ Elvi agreed.
‘We’re to stay in Dmitri’s house initially and then, when we get on our feet again, we can move on to somewhere of our own. He doesn’t live there...ever,’ Sally added stiltedly. ‘Mr Ziakis travels abroad a lot and Dmitri travels with him. Dmitri buys property as an investment for when he retires.’
‘You’ll be in Oxford for the beginning of Daniel’s classes,’ Elvi remarked approvingly.
‘Yes...’ Sally smiled suddenly, all her natural warmth on display as she hugged her daughter’s shoulders where she sat. ‘Isn’t it amazing how life can just suddenly take a turn for the better?’
‘Amazing,’ Elvi agreed.
‘My only concern is that I’m going to see less of you.’ Sally sighed.
‘Can’t have everything,’ Elvi quipped. ‘And I can still visit.’
‘Can I ask you just one question?’ Sally prompted anxiously. ‘Why can’t we meet this boyfriend of yours?’
Elvi tried and failed to fit Xan Ziakis into the boyfriend category and reddened. ‘It’s...er...too soon,’ she mumbled uncomfortably.
‘So, it has been one of those “love at first sight” efforts, then,’ Sally assumed, seeming to relax at that idea. ‘He hasn’t been around long—’
‘And it could end as quickly as it started,’ Elvi dared to add.
Sally grimaced as she made the tea. ‘I won’t wish that on you...but it would mean you could move to Oxford and join us.’
‘Probably,’ Elvi allowed, cupping her hands round the warm mug, her turmoil over Xan soothed by her mother’s restored spirits.
And why did she even feel that she was in turmoil over him? she questioned with self-loathing. They had had sex and that was all. There was nothing more to them. They were not a couple in a relationship. And if she was learning things she would sooner not have known, well, that was part of growing up, she told herself impatiently. The first lesson had been that she could enjoy intimacy without the finer feelings getting involved, and she hadn’t been proud of that until Xan’s detachment in the aftermath had wounded her, teaching her that while she might tell herself that she expected nothing more, she was still somehow programmed