AMANDA BROWNING - Savage Destiny

She groaned out loud. It was a bitter irony that the only person who possessed both of her requirements was her ex-husband. She didn’t want to do business with him, because she knew in her bones that the price would be high. Last time it had been her grandfather who had suffered. It might not have been worth much, but the Petrakos shipping line had been his pride. Losing it had killed him, not directly, but in the long run.

Though her gaze still remained on the world outside, it was another scene she was visualising on the projection screen of her mind. The Petrakos shipping line. Five years ago she hadn’t even known of its existence, but it was something she could never forget—as she would never forget that day when she had first heard it from the lips of Pierce Martineau...

* * *

The sound of the apartment door opening and closing, followed by the muffled but recognisable tones of her husband, brought Alix’s head up from her knees. She turned startled eyes on the clock, amazed to see that it was after seven in the evening. The time had passed her by as she sat curled up in a chair by the window, locked in a limbo where her senses were blessedly numb. She had been waiting for Pierce to come home. She hadn’t left, as her pride had told her to, because she knew she had to face him one more time. He had killed her love for him. He had used her without thought for her feelings, and she needed to know why. If she deserved nothing else, she at least deserved to be told the truth, however painful it might be.

Alix rose stiffly to her feet. Her body felt as if it was one big ache, and although earlier she had put on jeans and a Guernsey sweater she still felt cold. She knew it was reaction; she only hoped that nothing showed when she saw Pierce. He knew he had hurt her, for he had deliberately set out to do so, but she’d be damned if she’d let him see just how much. Facing him again now wouldn’t be easy. Perhaps it was the hardest thing she had ever done. Only anger could give her the strength she needed.

The apartment was large, and all she knew of its layout was the dining-room and the bedroom. She had looked forward to exploring, but somehow this morning she just hadn’t felt like it! The wry humour lodged in her throat and, standing in the hallway, she quickly looked around. To her left a door stood ajar and light spilled from it. If Pierce was anywhere, then she might as well start her search there.

Alix found herself in a spacious modern lounge. Velvet curtains covered most of one wall, which meant it was probably all window. Elegant couches and armchairs made seating areas around low coffee-tables, the carpet muffled even the heaviest footstep, and the paintings on the walls were originals. At any other time she would have found it a charming room, but she was far too tense for anything so facile. There was a fireplace opposite, and although nothing burned there she crossed to it, soft-footed, as if by association her icy fingers would warm.

The chink of ice on glass brought her head shooting round. Pierce was standing by a drinks trolley watching her through hooded eyes.

‘Would you like a drink before dinner?’

The matter-of-fact question was like a slap in the face. How could he be so calm after what had happened this morning? It was almost as if nothing had happened! Her anger grew. ‘No, thank you,’ she ground out through her teeth, watching him walk towards her with the economical stride which was part of his animal magnetism, and which had once made her shiver in anticipation.

There was a mocking twist to his lips as he came into the circle of light thrown out by the lamp on the sofa table. ‘You’ve gone into mourning, I see.’

Alix glanced down at her clothes, realising for the first time that they were black. It hadn’t been intentional, merely the first things that came to hand. Yet it was bitingly apt. She worked at her throat, saying thickly, ‘Something died today, Pierce, and I still don’t know why.’

Pierce came closer, resting one arm along the mantelpiece. ‘Mrs Ransome tells me you spent the day in our bedroom.’

Alix found his closeness almost intolerable, yet she forced herself to make no move away from him, lest he believe he had her on the run. ‘I’m asking you to tell me why you’ve done this. What you meant about my grandfather.’

For a moment he merely stared down at her, as if gauging whether her ignorance was real or not. Then he shrugged carelessly. ‘You and I have Greek blood in our veins, my dear Alix. An oath is not to be taken lightly, and I’m keeping a promise I made,’ he enlightened her smoothly. ‘As for where Yannis Petrakos comes into the picture, I’ll be only too happy to tell you, in my own good time.’

His arrogance sickened her, and the only way to keep her hands from his handsome face was to ball them into fists at her sides. ‘I want to know now,’ she insisted angrily.

Blue eyes ran over her stiff figure with lazy insolence. ‘After dinner.’

How easily he made her feel like the pawn he thought her to be. ‘Oh, God, I hate you!’ The words were almost a sob, and she pressed her lips together tightly so as not to let another escape.

However, she could have screamed and he would only have looked amused, just as he did now. ‘Do you? Only yesterday you loved me.’

Gasping at that studied cruelty, she stared into his eyes and murder was in her heart. ‘Why didn’t you challenge me when we met if this oath of yours was so important?’

‘Haven’t you worked that out for yourself? You’ve had all day. Because I needed you to be my wife. Without that, you could have walked away scot-free.’

Her heart felt as if it was being squeezed in a vice. He was shredding her, leaving her with nothing. Nothing except a fierce pride, which lifted her chin a fraction. ‘I can still do that now. Or are you saying I’m your prisoner?’

A small chilling smile curved his lips. ‘You can go any time you want to. I don’t need you as a hostage,’ he confirmed easily. ‘All I needed was you as my wife. And you are that, aren’t you, Alix? In name and in the flesh.’

Alix felt what little colour she had drain away. ‘Are you telling me you slept with me just to consummate the marriage?’

One eyebrow lifted disdainfully. ‘Could you be foolish enough to imagine I’d leave any loopholes? Fulfilling the oath depended on it.’

Nearly choking on an upsurge of nausea, she shook her head in appalled disbelief. ‘How could I have been foolish enough to think I loved you?’

Lids lowered over blue eyes as Pierce reached out to run the knuckles of his hand down her cheek. ‘Can you be so sure that you don’t now?’

There was something in his touch that seemed to tug at her heart, and, hating herself for it, Alix curled her lip in contempt. ‘There’s no love left for you, only hate.’

His lips parted on a short bark of mocking laughter. ‘Maybe not love, but what about desire? Shall we put that to the test?’

His callousness took her breath away. He had just told her he had made love to her because he had to, not because he wanted to, and now he wanted to prove that she was still his any time he wanted her. ‘Don’t you dare touch me!’

Suddenly there was the strangest look in his eyes. ‘Never dare me, Alix, that’s the worst thing you could do,’ he declared huskily, and caught her as she turned to flee, pulling her back, struggling, against his chest, pinning her arms with his and forcing her head still with a hand clamped in her hair. There was a moment when their eyes locked, hers spitting loathing and his carrying that odd expression she couldn’t interpret, then his head dropped and Alix prepared herself for the assault.

Only it didn’t turn out like that. His lips were gentle and warm, dropping kisses now here, now there, until she couldn’t bear it. Her heart was wrenched apart as she suffered an embrace that seemed to encompass a world of loving, and yet was a mockery of the very word. Sobbing, she tried to pull away, but all he did was deepen the kiss, using tongue and lips to seduce her. He knew her so well. He knew the precise moment when she would stop fighting and start kissing him back, and there was nothing she could do about it.