The Fallen Greek Bride. Jane Porter

will release my father this time?” Her gaze lifted, met his. “Who is to say that they will ever release him? Who is to say that he’s even … he’s even …” Her voice drifted off, and she gazed at him, unable to finish the thought.

      But she didn’t have to finish the thought. “You’re afraid he might not be alive,” Drakon said, brutally blunt.

      She nodded, eyes stinging. “What if he isn’t?”

      “That’s a good question.”

      “So you see why I need you. I’ve already given them three million. I can’t give them another six without proof, but they refuse to let me speak to him, and I don’t know what to do. I’m frightened, Drakon. And overwhelmed. I’ve been trying to keep it together, but I don’t know how to do this—”

      “You and your father sing the same tune, don’t you?”

      She just stared at him, confused. “What does that mean?”

      “The only time I hear from you, or your father, is when one of the Copelands needs money. But I’m not a bank, or an ATM machine, and I’m tired of being used.”

      Morgan struggled to speak. “I never meant to use you, Drakon. And I certainly didn’t marry you for money, and I’m ashamed my father asked you to invest in his company, ashamed that he’d put you in that position. I didn’t agree with it then, and I’m shattered now that he lost so much of your personal wealth, but he is my father, and I can’t leave him in Somalia. It might be acceptable … even fiscally responsible, but it’s not morally responsible, not to me. And so I’m here, begging for your help because you are the only one who can help me.”

      She paused, swallowed, her gaze searching his face, trying to see a hint of softening on his part. “You might not want to hear this right now, Drakon, but you’d do the same if it were your family. I know you … I know who you are, and I know you’d sacrifice everything if you had to.”

      Drakon looked at her hard, his features harsh, expression shuttered, and then turned away, and walked to the window where he put his hand on the glass, his gaze fixed on the blue horizon. Silence stretched. Morgan waited for him to speak, not wanting to say more, or rush him to a decision, because she knew in her heart, he couldn’t tell her no … it’d go against his values, go against his ethics as a man, and a protective Greek male.

      But it was hard to wait, and her jaw ached from biting down so hard, and her stomach churned and her head throbbed, but she had to wait. The ball was in Drakon’s court now.

      It was a long time before he spoke, and when he did, his voice was pitched so low she had to strain to hear. “I have sacrificed everything for my family,” he said roughly. “And it taught me that no good deed goes unpunished.”

      Her eyes burned, gritty, and her chest squeezed tight with hot emotion. “Please tell me I wasn’t the one who taught you that!”

      His hand turned into a fist on the window.

      Morgan closed her eyes, held her breath, her heart livid with pain. She had loved him … so much … too much….

      “I need to think, and want some time,” Drakon said, still staring out the window, after another long, tense silence. “Go downstairs. Wait for me there.”