CHAPTER TWO
YOU COULDN’T BEmore wrong.
A string of impassioned words meant to sway him. To alter his goals, perhaps view the chessboard from her angle.
Not blood relatives… Loving and generous…
Something thick, noxious and near-terrifying locked in his throat, roared in his ears and hazed his eyes. For a full minute he couldn’t see, feel or hear anything but those words.
He’d never once in his life felt as if he could hyperventilate into unconsciousness, not even when he’d been cornered by thugs and terrified out of his mind as a weak, malnourished boy of thirteen. And yet, standing there, stark-naked with his towel at his feet, Nelios wagered that he might be as close to doing so as he’d ever been. Because every cell in his body was locked in bitterness and acute disbelief…
He couldn’t be more right.Because he’d lived that torturous reality. He knew down to his very marrow how it felt to have his every last hope dashed, his world turn to ash just for the hell of it. No, not for the hell of it. For thirty pieces of silver; a loftier position in life. To elevate oneself regardless of how it affected others. Oh yes, in his case it had been all of the above for the two people who’d callously tossed him away. Sure they’d debated the toss for a handful of days but it’d been more a circling of wagons than opting for a different path—a path that didn’t involve the ruthless abandonment of their only child.
He sensed her behind him, wondering if and why her words had turned him into a seething mass of ice at the side of amountain, waiting for the smallest trigger to unleash the raging avalanche he could feel just beneath the surface.
He owed her neither his agita nor his explanation. But with every breath he took, those handful of words reverberated through him, demanding a response, an outlet.
This afternoon he’d seen the evidence of what she’d so passionately proclaimed. At first, he hadn’t wanted to believe it. He’d thought his eyes were playing tricks on him. But then he’d caught the warm, fond smile Agnes Adamis had slanted her and had wondered whether she’d received the same from Tolis when he was alive.
He’d seen the wide, encouraging smile Vayle had returned and he’d marvelled athow a monster could smile. How the woman who’d given him life, then turned her back on him, could projectfondness. He had indeed skated to the edge of that abyss he’d stared into many times in years gone by and wondered ifhewas problem. If he’d sinned so egregiously in a past life that he’d deserved to be punished in this one.
Then he’d reminded himself that evenhesmiled on occasion. Usually right before he crushed his enemies beneath his polished Italian leather shoes. Certainly he and Andreas had smiled over the years as they’d bested every single person who’d wronged them. And, with each billion they’d added to their bank account, he’dmarvelledandsmiledthrough being screamed at and being cursed and cajoled for mercy, usually by the very people who were the epitome of mercilessness.
So, yes, he had put that smile between Agnes and Vayle out of his mind. But now, to hear Vayle putting her spin on it, urging him to believe it was for other reasons besides being utterly monstrous… The sheer gall of that was the abomination, not him.
‘Say something.’ Her husky entreaty chiselled the tiniest crack in the dense ice.
His emotions, locked down tightly and buried beneath the filthy alleys somewhere back in Athens, groaned beneath the weight of it. Fingers convulsed around the forgotten scrap of fabric he’d grabbed, he turned back round.
Her eyes, wide and luminous with a flurry of emotions, frantically searched his face. Then, her cheeks growing pinker by the second, those eyes dropped down his naked body to his chest, his abs, his groin…
And, to add absolute insult to injury, there in the cabin that she’d invaded with her unwanted presence, her loathsome views and unfounded judgements, Nelios felt his traitorous body react to her nonplussed, wide-eyed scrutiny. He felt the stirrings that had begun in the conference room this afternoon, and had risen to a low simmer as he’d waited for her to sneak onto his plane, then spark into an unconscionable blaze, stunning the hell out of him.
A growl built in his throat as he shook out the boxers he clutched and, daring her with his eyes to utter one word at his blatant erection, he yanked on his underwear.
Her cheeks puffed with the strength of her audible exhale as he once again pivoted to drag a pair of chinos and a T-shirt from his wardrobe.
Finally dressed, after what felt like hours after he’d first exited his bathroom, Nelios faced her once more.
Say something,she’d said. He approached, arms folded across his chest, his eyes pinned on her so there would be no mistaking his words.
‘You want me to say something? I know exactly who she is, what kind of man my father was before he died—and, yes, Iwillspeak ill of the dead. I know the evil they’re capable of. You may have been fooled into putting on those rose-tinted glasses you’re proudly wearing but know this: that woman will throw youaway like unwanted garbage the second something better comes along.’
His mouth twisted and he chuckled past the constriction in his throat. ‘What am I talking about? She already has! She’s thrown you at me, at my mercy, without a second thought to what I would do to you when I discovered your intentions.’
‘No…no she hasn’t. She didn’t. Coming here was—’
‘Of your own free will? Or were you manipulated? Perhaps even cajoled with a well-timed tear or two? An entreaty that you were a last hope and therefore needed to do the right thing?’
He watched her pale, her expression spout suspicion right before she vehemently shook her head. ‘No. If you’d just let me speak, I’d tell you it’s not like that. This was my idea and mine alone. In case you haven’t noticed, mine is the name on the hotel. I have a horse in this race too. As for Agnes, she’s kind and decent, no matter how much you want to think otherwise. Look, I don’t know what happened between you and your mother, but—’
Another growl rose and her head snapped up, her apprehension gone.
‘You won’t trick me into denying what I know to be true. Besides, how would you know?’ she challenged. ‘Your own parents rarely mentioned you in all the years I’ve known them. And you haven’t been interested in them in return. You weren’t even at Tolis’s funeral. And yet, in the past year, you’ve been intent on tearing up our lives from the comfort of your plane, or your mansion or wherever monsters like you ooze from. So where’s your proof that you know them at all?’
He stalked towards her, aware his teeth were bared. That years of locked emotions strained to explode from him. He wasn’t at all surprised when she shrank back onto her elbows, her breathing choppy as he stopped mere feet from her. Yes, he was monstrous. But then wasn’t he a product of monsters?
His arms dropped to his sides, his fists curling. ‘Where is my evidence? Open your eyes. Take a good look, Miss Lancaster. I was theirs too, once. But, unlike you, I was the child Apostolis and Agnes Adamis actually conceived. The son they reared from birth until I was twelve years old. The child they tolerated like a low-priority pet. Until a shiny new prospect was offered to them. And then, with neither kindness nor consideration, they threw me away. So, yes.’ His fist slammed his chest in an act far too emotionally reminiscent of thestasimonhe wished to be done with, but no matter. ‘I am living, breathing proof of exactly what I’m talking about.’
