The Greek Tycoon's Virgin Mistress Read online

  This was dangerous, her brain warned when he lifted his head almost immediately and stared into her eyes. This was the very scenario she had hoped to avoid, and the reason she had wanted to dine in a restaurant rather than in Damon’s private suite. Her experiences with her stepfather had taught her to avoid situations where she could be at risk, but, although she was alone with Damon, it wasn’t fear that made her tremble.

  She surveyed him warily when he slid his hand to her nape and released the clip that secured her chignon. Her hair fell in a heavy swathe of pale gold silk around her shoulders and she heard his low murmur of appreciation as he threaded his fingers through the silky strands. Far from terrifying her, the burning heat of his gaze filled her with a wild sense of excitement, and when he lowered his head once more she parted her lips to welcome the gentle exploration of his tongue.

  It was soft and sensuous, but it wasn’t enough. For the first time in her life she wanted more and she urged closer, winding her arms around his neck in the desperate hope that he would deepen the kiss.

  Damon hesitated fractionally, afraid that he was rushing her, but the tentative stroke of her tongue against his lips shattered the remnants of his self-control and he increased the pressure of his mouth on hers to a level that was flagrantly erotic. He was aware of the slight tremor that ran through her and half expected her to draw back, but she leaned into him, one hand sliding down to rest over his heart thudding painfully in his chest.

  She could hardly fail to realise the effect she was having on him, he acknowledged derisively. Not when his arousal was a throbbing, burgeoning force pushing against her hip. He needed to exert control over his rampaging hormones, but she had tormented his every waking thought for the past couple of months, invaded his dreams so that he’d woken hard and hot and as frustrated as hell. Who could blame him for seizing the sudden glimpse of heaven she was now offering?

  Anna offered no resistance when Damon wrapped his arms around her and hauled her up against the hard wall of his chest. Desire was a potent force, she acknowledged with the tiny part of her brain still capable of conscious thought. She was overwhelmed by the feelings flooding through her. After so many years of imposing a rigid control over her emotions, it was a relief to discover that she was a normal woman, with normal sexual urges, although rather more disturbing to realise that it was only Damon who was able to arouse them.

  When his hand skimmed her ribcage and then gently cupped her breast, heat flooded her and she closed her eyes, blotting out everything but the feel of his mouth on hers. The stroke of his thumb pad across her nipple caused an exquisite sensation that was new and wondrous and made her long for him to slide her dress from her shoulders. She wanted to feel him, skin on skin, his mouth to follow the path of his hands, and with a little murmur of frustration she cupped his face and kissed him with all the pent up passion that she had tried so hard to deny.

  She had been created for this, she thought wildly when he eased one strap of her dress down her arm, lower and lower until her small, creamy breast was fully exposed to his gaze. Amazingly she felt neither fear nor revulsion, just a languorous ache deep inside. The feel of his palm against her naked flesh sent a quiver through her and she held her breath when he gently stroked the dusky pink nipple so that it hardened to a throbbing peak.

  As she stared at his head, bent low over her breast, she wondered what he would say if she admitted that this was the first time she had allowed any man to touch her so intimately? Undoubtedly he would be shocked, possibly disbelieving. He assumed that the press rumours about her active love life were true and presumably expected her to be sexually experienced.

  Only she knew that nothing could be further from the truth.

  Damon’s breath was warm on her skin and she trembled as he trailed his lips from her collar-bone, down over the soft swell of her breast. With infinite care he stroked his tongue around the darker skin of her aureole, painting moist circles as he edged ever closer to the sensitive tip.

  ‘You don’t know how often I’ve fantasised about doing this,’ he murmured before his mouth closed fully around her nipple. Sensation arrowed through her, so intense that it seemed to rip through her entire body, and she arched and clung to him while his words slowly penetrated the sensual haze that enveloped her.

  ‘I want to make love to you, my sweet Annie.’

  ‘Don’t!’ Her reaction was instant and violent as she jerked out of his arms. ‘Don’t ever call me that.’

  ‘You don’t know how often I fantasise about you, Annie—shall I tell you what I’d like to do to you?’

  She stumbled to her feet and wrenched the strap of her dress back over her shoulder, so forcefully that her nails left angry weals on her skin. Her stepfather’s mocking voice sounded in her head and for a moment it was not Damon sitting on the sofa, but Philip Stone, laughing at her as she struggled to ignore his taunts and get on with her homework.

  ‘My name is Anna; do you hear me?’

  ‘I hear, but I sure as hell don’t understand,’ Damon growled, his bewilderment and frustration clearly visible on his face. ‘What’s the matter with you? Theos, one minute you are warm and willing in my arms, and the next you’re a spitting she-cat—with razor sharp claws,’ he added slowly when he caught sight of the self-inflicted scratches on her arm. ‘Tell me, Anna,’ he pleaded huskily, ‘what did I do wrong? If I offended you…’

  ‘You didn’t…you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s me—’ She broke off and shook her head as the feeling of nausea gradually lessened. ‘I’m no good at all this,’ she muttered, waving her hand expressively towards the sofa, where minutes before she had responded to his kisses with such fervour.

  ‘You seemed pretty good to me,’ he ventured wryly. ‘You wanted me, Anna. The desire was not all on one side.’ He made a move towards her and then lifted his hands placatingly when she shied away from him. ‘Something frightened you,’ he said broodingly, ‘but I can’t help you if you won’t confide in me, pedhaki mou.’

  ‘I don’t need help!’ She glared at him, her cheeks burning as she acknowledged that he was probably right. He must believe her to be a head-case. Maybe she was. Her reaction to his lovemaking certainly wasn’t normal and yet for a few moments in his arms she had gloried in the pleasurable sensations his caresses evoked.

  The strident, repetitive sound of his cell-phone shattered the fragile silence and she frowned when he made no move to answer it.

  ‘Shouldn’t you get that?’

  ‘It can wait. This is more important. You and me,’ he elaborated grimly, the determination in his eyes filling her with panic.

  ‘There is no you and me. Can’t you understand, Damon? I don’t want you.’ His phone had finally stopped ringing and her voice sounded painfully shrill and over-loud to her ears.

  ‘That’s not the message your body was sending out.’

  ‘Well, it’s been outvoted. I’m not in the market for casual sex.’

  Damon’s jaw tightened as he fought to control his anger and Anna quailed at the coldness in his eyes.

  ‘Not from what I’ve heard,’ he commented silkily.

  His scathing taunt tore at her already brittle emotions and she couldn’t stifle her gasp of distress. His phone rang again but this time she welcomed its intrusion as she forced her arms into her jacket with jerky, uncoordinated movements.

  ‘I have to go,’ she muttered numbly.

  ‘Anna…forgive me—that was uncalled for.’

  ‘Forget it.’ She clawed back a little of her self-possession and swung away from him. ‘And for pity’s sake answer your phone and put whoever is so desperate to speak to you out of their misery.’

  ‘We need to talk.’ As he spoke Damon snatched up his phone, intent on switching it off, but he glanced at the caller display and hesitated. ‘I’m sorry, but I have to take this.’

  ‘I’d like to use the bathroom,’ she mumbled.

  ‘Through there,’ he indicated the door at the far end of
the sitting room, and, without awarding him another glance, Anna hurried across the room.

  The door led to his bedroom and she carried on into the en suite bathroom where she filled the sink and splashed her face with ice-cold water. Dear God, what was happening to her? She stared into the mirror, looking for answers, but the face looking back at her was ravaged, her eyes full of shadows.

  What must Damon think of her? She closed her eyes briefly as if she could somehow shut out her thoughts. She didn’t want to think, she just wanted to go home to the safe cocoon of her flat and hide away until she had reassembled her defences.

  Her head fell forwards to lean against the mirror and she took several deep breaths in an effort to compose herself before she crossed Damon’s bedroom once more. The door leading to the sitting room was slightly ajar and she could hear the deep resonance of his voice as he spoke into his cell-phone. He was speaking in his native tongue; she could pick out the odd Greek word and she wondered who had been so eager to talk to him.

  From her view of him through the gap in the door, she guessed that the caller was someone with whom he shared a close relationship. His voice was soft and intimate and his body language was relaxed, in stark contrast to the tension that had gripped him a few minutes earlier.

  Did he have a mistress back in Greece? she wondered bleakly. Doubtless some dark-eyed, curvaceous beauty who offered uncomplicated sex and wasn’t besieged with hang-ups.

  Tears stung her eyes and she blinked fiercely as her gaze fell on the vast king-sized bed that dominated the room. If things had been different, if she had been different, would Damon have made love to her on that bed? Would he have peeled her dress from her body, laid her down on the sheets and continued his devastating exploration of every sensitive curve and pulse point?

  More than anything she wished that she could be the woman he wanted her to be. Cool, confident Anneliese Christiansen—style icon and experienced seductress who would match him, caress, for caress, and send him wild with desire. She longed to be a teasing temptress but her stepfather had inflicted irreparable damage to her self-esteem and with it her chance of a normal, loving relationship.

  Swallowing the sudden lump in her throat, she peered round the door. Damon was still talking, but any minute now he would finish his call and he had every right to demand an explanation for her behaviour. The thought of a post-mortem was unbearable and she crossed swiftly to the other door that she prayed led straight from his bedroom, out to the main corridor.

  Minutes later she stepped out of the lift and hurried over to the reception desk where she requested a taxi. There was no point in prolonging her misery and certainly no point in hoping for some sort of relationship with him when she’d just proved that she was incapable of responding to him like a normal, sexually confident woman.

  As she raced down the hotel steps she half expected to turn and see Damon striding across the foyer after her. Only when the taxi sped off through the rain did she finally release her breath. She was unaware that he had arrived downstairs seconds too late and could do nothing but watch her go.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘WHY do you have to go to New York, Papa?’

  Damon lifted his gaze from the report that he had been vainly trying to concentrate on for the past half-hour and glanced at his daughter.

  Ianthe was sitting on the opposite side of his desk and had covered his once-neat piles of paperwork with her books and a collection of unlikely coloured plastic horses.

  ‘Business, I’m afraid—nothing very exciting.’ Which did not explain why his stomach lurched at the thought of the imminent trip, he acknowledged derisively.

  The little girl had drawn a picture and was now busy colouring it in. To Damon’s technical eye, the pencilled lines of her house were alarmingly crooked but he wisely refrained from pointing it out and watched as she carefully blocked in the roof with a crayon.

  ‘How long will you be away?’

  ‘A week—ten days at the most. Aunt Tina will take care of you as usual.’

  There was no pause in the movement of her crayon and he smiled at the sight of her tongue peeping out while she concentrated on keeping the colour within the outline of her drawing.

  ‘Will you be back for my birthday?’

  ‘You think I would miss the most important event of the year?’

  Now she looked up and awarded him a grin that spoke of her absolute confidence that he would be there for her special day.

  ‘Remember, I’m going to be nine.’

  ‘I haven’t forgotten, agapetikos.’ Although it seemed hard to believe. His daughter’s birth was an event that would be imprinted on his brain for ever. He would never forget his feeling of awe when he had first held her in his arms and looked down at her tiny, screwed-up face.

  Eleni had been equally overjoyed at the birth of their first baby—unaware that Ianthe would be her only child. Thankfully they’d had no inkling of the tragedy that would befall ten months later.

  Throughout the dark days after Eleni’s death, Ianthe had provided his only motivation to get out of bed each day, and now here she was, all pansy-brown eyes and velvet curls, about to celebrate nine years that, despite the loss of her mother, had been filled with happiness.

  His daughter was the most important person in his life, Damon acknowledged. Ianthe had no recollection of her mother but she was a confident, well-adjusted child, which was due in no small part to the devotion of his sister. Catalina had willingly stepped in to provide her little niece with a mother figure and even now, despite her marriage and the birth of three children in quick succession, she still treated Ianthe as if she were her own child.

  Ianthe finished her artwork and surveyed him solemnly. ‘Will you come swimming with me, or are you too busy?’ she asked with a theatrical sigh.

  Nine years old and already she was adept at winding him around her little finger, Damon thought wryly as he switched off his computer. ‘I’m never too busy for you, Ianthe mou. Last one in the pool has to swim ten lengths.’

  Ianthe sped from the room, squealing with laughter. It was a familiar sound that brought joy to Damon’s heart. His daughter laughed a lot and once again he congratulated himself for ensuring that her childhood had not been complicated by a succession of ‘aunts’.

  He kept his love life strictly separate from his family, fearing that Ianthe might form an attachment to whoever he happened to be dating and be left disappointed when the affair ended. He’d never felt the need to provide her with a stepmother and purposefully avoided telling his various mistresses that he had a child.

  Call him a cynic, but he’d learned early on that any mention of the fact that he was a single father encouraged most women in the belief that he must be looking for a replacement wife, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth.

  The arrangement worked well and he could see no reason to change it, he brooded as he headed out to the pool. After the disastrous dinner date with Anna, he had returned to Greece determined to forget her. But he was incensed to find that he could not dismiss her from his thoughts. She intrigued him more than any woman he had ever met and, despite her rejection of him, his desire for her was as fierce as ever.

  The timing of his business trip to New York was more than a happy coincidence. He was still desperate to discover if the chemistry between them could develop into an affair. But did that necessitate revealing that he had a child?

  It was not as if he was planning a long-term relationship with Anna, he reminded himself. He wanted her in his bed, that was all—a series of mutually enjoyable sexual encounters whenever their schedules happened to coincide. But he couldn’t forget the visible torment on her face when he had last seen her in London.

  She had been pale and tense, her beautiful blue eyes inexplicably full of fear, yet only moments before she had responded to him with a degree of passion that had fuelled his hunger. What the hell had caused her to retreat from him in such panic? And did she respond in similar fa
shion to the other men she dated, or was he the only man to evoke such an intense reaction?

  He didn’t even know what he wanted any more, he thought savagely. She’d got him so wound up that he couldn’t think straight. With a muttered oath he plunged into the pool and surfaced to find Ianthe bobbing next to him.

  ‘I beat you!’ she told him gleefully. ‘Never mind, Papa, you’ll just have to try harder next time.’

  Valuable advice from the mouth of a child, he acknowledged wrily. But as far as Anna was concerned, it was his wisest course of action.

  London might be her favourite city in the world, but New York came a close second, Anna decided as she stared out of her hotel window and absorbed the noise and bustle of Times Square. She was a city girl at heart and loved the frenetic pace of the metropolis that never slept.

  Since her arrival a week ago, she had lived a punishing schedule of photo shoots and publicity events to mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of the cosmetic house she represented, culminating in last night’s lavish party. She’d arrived back at her hotel in the early hours, slept until late and spent an enjoyable afternoon shopping on 5th Avenue.

  Not that she needed another pair of shoes, but retail therapy provided her with a much-needed distraction from a certain charismatic Greek who invaded her thoughts with disturbing regularity.

  Don’t go there, she told herself fiercely and sought to banish the image of Damon’s ruggedly handsome face. It had been two weeks since their disastrous date at his London hotel. Two weeks, three days and eighteen hours she amended dismally. She hadn’t heard from him in that time and in all honesty could hardly have expected to. Since her hysterical outburst when he’d attempted to make love to her, followed by her ignominious departure, he had doubtless lost all patience with her.

  She’d tried telling herself she didn’t care. Why on earth would she want an arrogant, overbearing, alpha male in her life? Never mind that he was also a gorgeous Greek demigod. But she hadn’t expected to miss him so much that it was a constant, nagging ache around her heart.