Life Of Lies. Sharon Sala

back in a black leather chair, which gleamed like the thick hair that curled against his neck. But his half-smile held no trace of humour—it was nothing but an icy assessment which seemed to hit her like a chill wind. His eyes bored through her and for a moment Jessica felt as if she was going to faint, and part of her wondered if that might not be a good thing. Because if she crumpled to the floor, wouldn’t that give her a let-out clause? Wouldn’t it force him to ring for medical assistance, so that his potency would be diluted by the presence of other people?

      But the feeling quickly passed and a lifetime of hiding her emotions meant she was able to look around the room with nothing but curiosity on her face and say almost casually, ‘Where’s the assistant who’s usually here?’

      A flicker of irritation passed across his face as he leaned forward. ‘Eight years,’ he said softly. ‘Eight long years since we’ve seen each other—and all you can do is ask me some banal question about a member of staff?’

      His confidence unnerved her almost as much as his appearance, because the brashness of yesteryear seemed to have disappeared—along with the beaten-up leather jacket and faded jeans. Yet even in his made-to-measure suit, he still exuded a carnal sexuality which nothing could disguise. Was that why the almost forgotten aching had started deep inside her? Why she suddenly found herself remembering the burn of his lips pressing down on hers and the impatience of his fingers as he pushed up her little tennis skirt and...and...

      ‘What are you doing here?’ she questioned, only suddenly she didn’t sound quite so calm and she wondered if he’d picked up on that.

      ‘Why don’t you take off your coat and sit down, Jess?’ he suggested silkily. ‘Your face has gone very white.’

      She wanted to tell him that she’d stay standing, but the shock of seeing him again really had affected her equilibrium. And maybe fainting wasn’t such a good idea after all. She would only find herself horizontal—and imagine just how disconcerting it would be to find Loukas bending over her. Bending over her as if he wanted to kiss her...when the reality was that he was looking at her as if she’d recently crawled out from beneath a stone.

      She walked over to the chair he’d indicated and sank down, letting her leather bag slide noiselessly to the ground as she lifted her gaze towards the empty blackness of his. ‘This is a...surprise,’ she said lightly.

      ‘I imagine it must be. Tell me...’ his eyes gleamed ‘...how it felt to walk into the room and realise it was me?’

      She lifted her shoulders as if there were no words to answer that particular question, and even if there were she wasn’t sure she’d want him to hear them. ‘I suppose there must be some sort of...explanation?’

      He looked at her unhelpfully. ‘To what, Jess? Perhaps you could be a little more specific.’

      ‘To you sitting here and behaving as if—’

      That half-smile again. ‘As if I own the place?’

      She swallowed, thinking how arrogant he sounded. ‘Well, yes.’

      ‘Because I do own it,’ he said, suddenly impatient. ‘I’ve bought the company, Jess—I should have thought that much was obvious. I now own every one of the Lulu outlets, in cities and airports and cruise ships all over the world.’

      Shock rippled over her skin. Stay focused, she told herself. You can do it. You were trained in the art of staying focused.

      She kept her voice casual. ‘I didn’t realise—’

      ‘That I was rich enough?’

      ‘Well, there’s that, of course.’ Her smile felt as if it were slicing her face in two. ‘Or that you had an interest in jewellery and watches.’

      Loukas touched the tips of his fingers together and stared into eyes which were the exact colour of aquamarines. As always, not a single strand of her blonde hair was out of place and he remembered that even after the most strenuous sex, it always seemed to fall back into a neat and shiny curtain. He looked at the pink gleam of her lips and something dark and nebulous whispered over his skin. Jessica Cartwright. The one woman he’d never been able to forget. The woman who had unravelled him and then tied him up in knots. His pale and unexpected nemesis. He expelled a slow breath and let his gaze travel over her at a leisurely pace—because surely he had earned the right to study her as he would any other thing of beauty which he’d just purchased.

      As usual, her style was understated. Classy and cool. A streamlined body, which left the observer in no doubt about her athletic background. She’d never been into revealing clothes or heavy make-up—her look had always been scrubbed and fairly natural and that hadn’t changed. He had been attracted to her in a way which had taken him by surprise and he’d never been able to work out why. He noticed how her white shirt hugged those neat little breasts and the subtle gleam of pearls at her ears. With her pale hair pulled back in a ponytail, which emphasised her high cheekbones, he thought how remote she seemed. How untouchable. And it was all a lie. Because behind the false ice-maiden image, wasn’t there a woman as shallow and as grasping as all the others? Someone who would take what they wanted from you and then just leave you—gasping like a fish which had been tossed from the water.

      ‘There’s plenty you don’t know about me.’ His mouth hardened and he felt the delicious rush of blood to his groin. And plenty she was about to find out.

      ‘I don’t understand...’ She shrugged her shoulders and now her aquamarine eyes were wide with question. ‘The last time I saw you, you were a bodyguard. You worked for that Russian oligarch.’ She frowned as if she was trying to remember. ‘Dimitri Makarov. That was his name, wasn’t it?’

      ‘Neh. That was his name.’ Loukas nodded. ‘I was the guy with the gun inside his jacket. The guy who knew no fear. The wall of muscle who could smash through a plank with a single blow.’ He paused and flicked her a look because he remembered the way she used to run those long fingers over the hard bulge of his muscles, cooing her satisfaction as she touched his iron-hard flesh. ‘But one day I decided to start using my brains instead of just my brawn. I realised that a life spent protecting others has a very limited timescale and that I needed to look towards the future. And, of course, some women consider such men to be little more than savages—don’t they, Jess?’

      She flinched. He could see the whitening of her knuckles in her lap and her reaction gave him a rush of pleasure. Because he wanted to see her react. He wanted to see her coolness melt and to watch her squirm.

      ‘You know I never said that.’ Her voice was trembling.

      ‘No,’ he agreed grimly. ‘But your father said it and you just stood there and agreed with every damned word, didn’t you, Jess? You were complicit in your silence. The little princess, agreeing with Daddy. Shall I remind you of some of the other things he said?’

      ‘No!’ Her hand had flown to her neck, as if her fingers could disguise the little pulse which was working frantically there.

      ‘He called me a thug. He said I would drag you down to the gutter where I came from, if you stayed with me. Do you remember that, Jess?’

      She shook her head. ‘Wh—why are we sitting here talking about the past?’ she questioned and suddenly her voice didn’t sound so cool. ‘I dated you when I was a teenager and, yes, my father reacted badly when he found out we were...’

      ‘Lovers,’ he put in silkily.

      She swallowed. ‘Lovers,’ she repeated, as if it hurt her to say it. ‘But it all happened such a long time ago and none of it matters any more. I’ve...well, I’ve moved on and I expect you have, too.’

      Loukas might have laughed if he hadn’t felt the cold twist of rage. She had humiliated him as no woman had ever dared try. She had trampled on his foolish dreams—and she thought that none of it mattered? Well, he was about to show her that it did. That if you betrayed someone then sooner or later it would come back to haunt you.

      He picked up a