Tara Pammi - A Deal with Demakis

Pink flooded her cheeks and she averted her gaze from him as though she had just realized what she had blurted out. He had a feeling she did that at lot—spoke without thinking it through.

Scooting to the edge of the couch, she pointed a finger in his direction, her little body shaking. “Just a month ago, you had two giant brutes pick me up like I was a sack of garbage and had them throw me out, and I mean, they literally dropped me on that concrete road outside your estate in the Hamptons.”

She had no idea how much he regretted that decision. By the time Venetia had dropped her bombshell at that very party, announcing that she and Tyler were engaged, Lexi Nelson had already been thrown out.

“You somehow bypassed security, broke into my estate and almost ruined the party, Ms. Nelson. It seems your colorful past is not as completely behind you as you would believe,” he said lazily, and her color rose again. “You’re lucky I didn’t have you arrested for trespassing.”

Her chin tilted up stubbornly. “I meant no harm. All I wanted was to see Tyler, even then.”

“Ah, yes. The wonderful Tyler. For whom you will risk anything, it seems.” He bent forward, leaning his elbows on his knees. “The fact that he didn’t answer your million calls on his cell phone didn’t alert you that he wanted to have nothing to do with you? Because you don’t strike me as the particularly stupid kind,” he added, more than a whisper of curiosity niggling him.

A shadow darkened her blue gaze, and he knew she was remembering her conversation with Tyler. “He was angry with me, yes. But I didn’t want him to make a mistake.”

“You don’t really believe that even now, do you? Because that would make you the most pathetic woman on the planet.”

Her blue gaze widened. “Wow, you really don’t believe in pulling your punches.”

“Because hearing the actual truth instead of your own romantic version sticks in your throat?” he said, a burst of caustic anger filling him. He ran a shaking hand through his hair, annoyed by the strength of his own reaction. Telling this woman that her love for that boy had turned her into a fool was not his responsibility. But making sure his sister didn’t fall into the same mold was. “You’re right. I don’t care why you went to see him. All I care about now is that you take care of him.”

“Why go there? Why not just bring him back here, back to New York? As you’ve already learned from that file, Tyler and I have lived here our whole lives. I’m sure being in a new country amidst strangers doesn’t help.”

“The answer to that question is one word, Ms. Nelson. Venetia. Believe me when I say that it’s better for all parties involved if we do this there.”

She nodded and stood up.

He studied her, her calm demeanor not sitting well with him. She was ready to abandon the sense she was born with for the man she loved, even if he had kicked her to the curb. Was all that fire he had spied in her just a sham? And why did he care when that’s what he needed to happen? “I have already arranged for you to leave immediately with your boss at Vibe.”

She met his gaze then, a quick flash of anger in hers. “Of course you have.” She pulled her bag over her head and adjusted it over her breasts.

Coming to a halt at the door, she tugged it open, and leveled that steady gaze at him again. “I find it really curious. Why would you think you needed all that information on me?”

Nikos shrugged. “Let’s just say I wanted to make sure you accepted my...proposal.”

She didn’t even blink. “And yet you were also very confident that I would come. Please tell me.”

If she wanted to hear what he found so distasteful about her coming here, so be it. “I was standing in the corridor with Venetia when you managed to sneak into the party that night. I heard what he said to you.”

She flinched, her tight grip on the doorknob turning her knuckles white. He couldn’t contain the disdain that crept into his words nor did he want to. And the way she stared at him, focused, every muscle in her face stiff and tense, she heard it, too. “He called me a selfish bitch who couldn’t stand the fact that he had found love with someone else and moved on, that I couldn’t be happy for him,” she recited, as though she was reading lines from a play.

“He conveniently turned his head and walked away while you were thrown on the street,” he continued, refusing to lay off.

“And you thought no self-respecting woman would agree to help him after that.”

He nodded. “I thought I would need some additional...leverage to persuade you. Obviously I don’t.”

She raised an eyebrow, her chin tilting up. “No?”

“You’re here, aren’t you?” he said, standing up. Lexi Nelson was the epitome of everything that had gone wrong in his life in the name of love. He felt a tight churning in his stomach, a memory of the grief and rage that he had propelled into the need to survive, for his sister’s and his sake. “One call and barely an hour later, you come running back for him, your heart in your throat, and you walked up nineteen floors. Why ask so many questions, Ms. Nelson? Why pretend as though there’s even a doubt as to whether you will drop everything to take care of him?”

Lexi struggled to remind herself that Nikos Demakis didn’t know her, that his opinion didn’t matter. But the incredible arrogance in his words that she had fallen into his plans exactly as he had intended chafed her raw.

How she wished she could turn around, throw his disdain back in his face.

But this wasn’t about the infuriating man in front of her. This was about her friend, her family, the one person in the entire world who had always cared about her. After Tyler’s caustic words, after this last fight, she had finally accepted that whatever had been between them had never stood a chance. And she had no idea why.

It would hurt to see Venetia Demakis with him for sure. The young heiress was everything Lexi wasn’t. Rich, sophisticated and exceptionally beautiful.

But what if she was being given another chance to right things between her and Tyler, to have her friend back? He had been there every time she had needed him. Now it was her turn.

The scorn of the man in front of her, however, was a bitter pill to swallow. She was going to say yes, but it didn’t mean she had to do it on his conditions.

She leveled her gaze at him, stubbornly reminding herself that Nikos Demakis needed her just as much as she needed to see Tyler. And she couldn’t let him forget that, couldn’t let him think for one moment that he had the upper hand. “You have made a miscalculation, Mr. Demakis. I have no wish to help you or your sister.”

His dark brown gaze gleaming, he neared her before she could blink.

She stood her ground, but she was too much of a chicken to wait and hear what he would threaten her with. “Not without a price.”

“What is it that you want, Ms. Nelson?”

“Money,” she said, satisfaction pouring through her at the surprise in his eyes. She smiled for the first time in more than a month. Her heart thundering inside her chest, she closed the door and leaned back against it. “You have oodles of it and I have none.”

The dark browns of his eyes flared with something akin to admiration. Lexi frowned. She had meant to anger him, needle him, at least. She had uttered the first thing that had come to her mind. Instead, the edge of his contempt, which had been a tangible thing until now, was blunted.

“Quite the little opportunist, aren’t you?” he said, gazing at her with intense interest.

There was no rancor in his words. Struggling to keep her confusion out of her face, she smiled with as much fake confidence as she could muster. “I have to protect my interests, don’t I? You’re asking me to put my life here on hold and place my trust in someone like you.”