Книга - A Bride At His Bidding

A Bride At His Bidding
Michelle Smart


Hired by her enemyYet tempted to say ‘I do’…Billionaire Andreas Samaras is nobody’s fool. And his beautiful new employee Carrie Rivers—an undercover journalist—is playing a dangerous game. He’ll keep her at his command until he can expose her deception… But when her ruse is revealed there’s only one way to protect his spotless business reputation: blackmail innocent Carrie to the altar!







Hired by her enemy

Yet tempted to say “I do”...

Billionaire Andreas Samaras is nobody’s fool. And his beautiful new employee, Carrie Rivers—an undercover journalist—is playing a dangerous game. He’ll keep her at his command until he can expose her deception... But when her ruse is revealed, there’s only one way to protect his spotless business reputation: blackmail innocent Carrie to the altar!


MICHELLE SMART’s love affair with books started when she was a baby, and she would cuddle them in her cot. A voracious reader of all genres, she found her love of romance established when she stumbled across her first Mills & Boon book at the age of twelve. She’s been reading them—and writing them—ever since. Michelle lives in Northamptonshire, England, with her husband and two young Smarties.


Also by Michelle Smart

Married for the Greek’s Convenience

Once a Moretti Wife

The Kalliakis Crown miniseries

Talos Claims His Virgin

Theseus Discovers His Heir

Helios Crowns His Mistress

Bound to a Billionaire miniseries

Protecting His Defiant Innocent

Claiming His One-Night Baby

Buying His Bride of Convenience

Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


A Bride at His Bidding

Michelle Smart






www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


ISBN: 978-1-474-07170-3

A BRIDE AT HIS BIDDING

© 2018 Michelle Smart

Published in Great Britain 2018

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


Contents

Cover (#u7604dfd9-d058-5973-afd0-c6efd85e0779)

Back Cover Text (#u915a5cbf-0f2b-5242-9a6b-473c457f292c)

About the Author (#u9fdb69c4-feac-504e-985d-b50d4e8a51cd)

Booklist (#uf4a34741-6dac-5eac-9cd0-32ea57f444f2)

Title Page (#uced7d382-1037-56e8-8668-f9a7ec6a6068)

Copyright (#u710008a4-7e5e-568f-aca6-f3e55df4e6e1)

CHAPTER ONE (#u776bb808-d68a-5c30-bd04-168759e46282)

CHAPTER TWO (#u7f67c514-051a-55c8-8ee7-331b945f7489)

CHAPTER THREE (#u5dd2345e-8de9-5cce-bba4-1d7dc21b8df4)

CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)

EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)

Extract (#litres_trial_promo)


CHAPTER ONE (#udfb5fb59-acc0-5e71-82bc-16a75cae7fad)

ANDREAS SAMARAS POKED his head into the adjoining office to his own. Having spent the day on a multinational conference call, he needed to check in with his PA.

‘How is everything going?’

Debbie sighed. ‘The world is going to hell in a handcart.’

‘Quite.’ His PA’s theatrical tendencies were infamous throughout Samaras Fund Management. Andreas would find it wearing if she weren’t the best business PA he’d ever had. ‘Apart from that, is there anything I need to know? With regards to the business,’ he hastened to add in case she started harping on about polar bears and Arctic ice melt again.

‘Nothing important.’

‘Good. How did the interviews go? Have you come up with a shortlist for me?’ Rochelle, his domestic PA, had quit. The smitten fool was getting married and had decided that a job requiring a great deal of travel was not a good fit for domestic bliss. He’d offered to double her wages and increase her holidays but still she had said no. He’d dragged his heels for weeks about finding a replacement for her in the hope she would change her mind. She hadn’t and finally he had accepted defeat.

Debbie held up a stack of papers. ‘I’ve whittled the candidates down to five.’

Andreas stepped into the office. Debbie had been tasked with doing the preliminary interviews. She knew exactly what kind of person he was looking for to take on the role that basically entailed organising his domestic life. It was a live-in role that would see the successful candidate travel wherever he went, ensuring his domestic life ran as smoothly as his business. The person needed to be honest, loyal, unobtrusive and flexible, have impeccable references, a clean driving licence and no criminal record.

He took the papers from her hand and flipped through them. All had a square photograph of the candidate attached to the corner of their applications. It was a requirement he insisted on. Three candidates would make it to the shortlist and he liked to be familiar with their appearance before he met them for the final interview, which he would undertake personally.

By Debbie’s computer was a stack of the applicants she’d already rejected. The top one caught his eye. There was something familiar about the direct gaze staring back...

‘Why have you rejected this one?’ he asked, picking up the form and studying it. Dark hazel eyes stared right back at him. Dark hazel eyes he knew instinctively that he’d seen before.

Debbie peered at it with a frown. ‘Oh, her. Caroline Dunwoody. She interviewed well but there was something about her I didn’t trust. I don’t know what it was. A feeling, nothing more, but it made me check her references in more detail. One of them checks out okay but I’m suspicious of the other one. She says she worked as Head of Housekeeping at Hargate Manor for two years and has a letter in her file to that effect. I spoke to the gentleman who wrote the reference, the Manor’s butler, and he verified everything.’

‘Then what’s the problem?’

‘Hargate Manor doesn’t exist.’

His eyebrows rose. ‘Doesn’t exist?’

‘There is no Hargate Manor within fifty miles of this one’s supposed location.’

If Debbie said it didn’t exist then it didn’t exist. She was the most thorough person Andreas knew.

He looked more closely at Caroline Dunwoody’s photograph, racking his brain trying to remember where he could have met her. He usually had an excellent recall for faces but on this occasion he couldn’t put a finger on it. She had dark chestnut hair that fell in a neat line to her shoulders and pretty if angular features, a short straight nose, a top lip slightly fuller than the bottom and a cute heart-shaped chin. Yes, a pretty face but not one familiar to him.

But he had seen those eyes before.

Just as he opened his mouth to order Debbie to do some more digging into this woman, it suddenly came to him.

Digging. Journalists did lots of digging.

Caroline. The extended version of Carrie.

Carrie Rivers. The journalist sister of his niece’s old best friend.

The journalist for the Daily Times who had made a name for herself by exposing the illegal and often seedy practices of rich businessmen.

He doubted he would still remember their tenuous association were it not that her most recent undercover investigation into James Thomas, an old business acquaintance of his, had revealed James’s business to be a cover for drugs, arms and people trafficking. A month ago, Carrie’s meticulous work had seen James sentenced to fifteen years in prison. Andreas had read about the sentencing and silently cheered. He hoped he rotted in his cell.

With the feeling of a ball bearing pressing down on his guts, Andreas did an Internet search on his phone for her. There were no photographs of Carrie online. He supposed this wasn’t surprising given the nature of her work.

But it was her. He was certain of it.

He’d only met Carrie once, three years ago. It had been such a fleeting moment that it was no surprise he’d struggled to remember. Three years ago, she had been blonde with rounded cheeks.

Her eyes were the only thing about her that hadn’t changed. Their gazes had met as he’d left the headmistress’s office of his niece’s boarding school. Carrie and her sister Violet had been sat in the corridor waiting for their turn to be admitted. Violet had hung her head in shame when she’d seen him. Carrie should have hung her head too.

Neither had known it would be the last time they would be admitted into the headmistress’s office. Violet was to be expelled with immediate effect.

Three years on and Carrie was applying for a domestic job with him under a different name and supplying fake references in the process. This did not bode well and his brain groped for reasons as to why she might now be targeting him. Andreas ran a clean business. He paid all his taxes, both personal and corporation, in all the relevant jurisdictions. He followed and exceeded local employment law. His romantic affairs over the years had been consensual and discreet, guilt and responsibility for his family overriding the urge to bed as many beautiful women as possible, something he intended to rectify now all the burdens had been lifted from his shoulders.

One thing Andreas had learned over his thirty-seven years was that when problems cropped up, the only thing to do was keep a clear head and deal with them immediately, stopping the problems escalating into catastrophe.

A plan quickly formed in his mind. He inhaled deeply then smiled. ‘Debbie, I want you to call Miss Dunwoody and invite her back for a second interview.’

Debbie looked at him as if he’d sprouted blossom from his head.

‘Back it up with a letter. This is what I want you to say...’

* * *

Carrie sat in the spacious reception room of Samaras Fund Management’s London headquarters and tried to get air into lungs that seemed to have forgotten how to breathe. Her heart was beating erratically, the thuds loud in her ears, and she had to keep wiping her clammy palms on her thighs.

She’d woken from fractured sleep with her stomach churning so hard she’d had to force her coffee down. Food had been unthinkable.

She had never known nerves like it, although calling this sensation nerves was like calling a river a small trickle of water. Soon she would be taken through to Andreas Samaras’s office and she had to contain these mixed and virulent emotions that threatened to crush her.

She hadn’t suffered any nerves while going undercover and investigating James Thomas. She’d been ice-cool and focussed as she’d systematically gathered the evidence needed to prove his heinous crimes and expose him, using the same mind-set she used on her regular investigations, her focus never swaying. The day James had been sentenced had been the brightest spot of the last three nightmarish years.

Andreas might not have fed her sister the drugs that had destroyed her young fragile body but his contribution to Violet’s descent into hell had been every bit as lethal as James’s and far more personal, and now it was his turn for justice. Carrie could not allow her nerves or conscience to blow it for her...but this time it was different.

It had been common knowledge that James Thomas was a shady figure deserving of proper investigation. Getting permission and backing to go undercover in his workforce had been easy—the whole of the Daily Times had wanted that scumbag brought down.

Andreas Samaras, Greek billionaire investor and owner of Samaras Fund Management, was a different kettle of fish. There was nothing in his past or on the rumour mill to suggest he was anything other than clean. Only Carrie knew differently, and when she’d seen the advertisement for a Domestic PA mere days after James had been sentenced, she had known Andreas’s time had come. She knew infiltrating his personal life carried a much greater risk than investigating him as an employee in his business life but it was a risk she was willing to take.

Three years ago she had written two names on a piece of paper. She had since struck James’s name off. Now it was time to strike Andreas’s off too.

To get her newspaper’s backing to go undercover though, she’d had to tell a little white lie... A few surprised eyebrows had been raised but the go-ahead had been given. No one had disbelieved her.

As the clock ticked down to the moment she would be taken to see Andreas, the ramifications of her lie rang loudly in her head. If the truth that Carrie was undertaking a personal vendetta was revealed her career would be over. The Daily Times was no shady tabloid. It was a highbrow publication that had made it through the trials and tribulations all the British press had been through over the past decade with its reputation largely intact. It was a good employer too.

If they could print only a fraction of what was suspected about some of the world’s most powerful people the public would need vodka spiked into the water system to help them get over the shock. The rich and powerful threw money into silencing the press and making problems disappear. They forced their staff to sign cast-iron non-disclosure agreements and were ruthless about enforcing them. Super-injunctions were de rigueur.

If Carrie got the job with Andreas she would be thrown directly into his personal world. She would be closer to her target than on any of her prior investigations. Who knew what she would find? When she’d first gone undercover with James in his accounts department she’d known he was a drug-abuser with a predilection for teenage girls but had had no idea of his involvement with people trafficking or arms. Andreas was that criminal’s friend. Who knew what he was involved with?

She’d known the odds of getting the job with Andreas were slim, even with her rigged CV and falsified references. On paper, they’d made her the perfect candidate for the role but it had been a rushed job, hurried to meet the application deadline. She couldn’t help worrying that there was a giant hole or two in it.

She hadn’t thought the preliminary interview with his PA had gone well and had left the building certain she’d messed up. When she’d received the call inviting her to a second interview, she was so shocked a mere breeze would have knocked her over.

And now, as that ticking clock echoed louder in her ears, all she could see when she closed her eyes was the burning hatred Andreas had thrown her way the one time their eyes had met.

* * *

‘Miss Dunwoody?’

Carrie blinked and looked up to find the superior young receptionist staring at her quizzically.

She’d gone under the name of Rivers for so long it had become a part of herself. Hearing her real name sounded foreign. She’d been known by the surname of Rivers since her mother had remarried when she’d been four and had thought it wise to continue using it when she embarked on her career in investigative journalism. There were a lot of sickos out there. In this instance, that decision had been fortuitous. She’d never legally changed her name. People in her world knew her as Carrie Rivers. Her birth certificate, driving licence and passport had her as Caroline Dunwoody. The advert for the job had explicitly stated it involved lots of travelling.

Falsifying references was one thing. Trying to fake a passport was a whole different ballpark.

‘Mr Samaras is ready to see you now.’

He’d kept her waiting for an hour.

Swallowing back a sudden violent burst of nausea, Carrie tightly clutched the strap of her handbag and followed the receptionist down a wide corridor lined with modern artwork.

It had taken her ages to find the perfect outfit for this interview. She’d wanted to look professional but not as if she were applying for a job within Samaras Fund Management itself. She’d settled on a cream high-necked cashmere top with a dozen small buttons running the length, a pair of smart grey trousers and simple black heels that gave her a little extra height for confidence but which she could comfortably walk in. Now she felt as if she’d dressed in a smothering straightjacket, the heels a hindrance to her unsteady feet.

A door opened and Carrie was admitted into an office twice the size of the one she shared with the rest of the crime team and a hundred times plusher.

There, behind an enormous oak desk, working on one of three computers, sat Andreas Samaras.

Her heart slammed against her chest then thudded painfully and for one frightening moment Carrie thought she really was going to vomit.

He didn’t look up from what he was doing.

‘One minute please,’ he said in the deep, quick, sharply staccato voice she remembered from their one telephone conversation instigated by Andreas five years ago.

Carrie’s sister and Andreas’s niece had been weekly boarders and roommates at school together. Their friendship had deepened and soon they had wanted to spend weekends and holidays together too. Andreas had phoned Carrie to agree on some ground rules. They had found much to agree on. It helped that they had both been in the same position, both of them the sole carers of their vulnerable teenage charges. After that one conversation, they would text message each other to confirm if Natalia was due at Carrie’s for the weekend or if Violet was due at Andreas’s. It had become a rhythm in Carrie’s life, right until Andreas had engineered Violet’s expulsion.

Finally, he looked up from his computer, pushed his chair back and got to his feet. The sheer size and power of the man was as starkly apparent as it had been when he had swept past her three years ago.

‘It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Dunwoody.’

She stared at the huge hand extending towards her and forced herself to lean forward and take it. Large, warm tapered fingers covered hers as he shook her hand briskly before letting go.

‘Take a seat,’ he commanded amicably, sitting back down and picking up a thin pile of papers from his desk.

The skin on her hand buzzed where he’d clasped it and she fought the urge to rub it against her thigh as she took the seat he’d directed her to, and expelled the tiniest sigh of relief.

There had been only a teeny ounce of doubt he wouldn’t recognise her. Physically she’d changed a lot since that one fleeting glance three years ago outside the headmistress’s office, when his light brown eyes had lasered her with such ferocity she had recoiled. Stress alone had made her lose three stone since then, which had altered her facial features as well as her body shape. She’d long stopped her quest for the perfect shade of blonde hair and reverted to her natural brown colour.

If Andreas had the slightest idea of who she really was, she would not be there. She wouldn’t have got past the initial application.

It hadn’t seemed feasible that he would recognise her or her name but she had learned through five years of her job to take nothing for granted.

Light brown thoughtful eyes studied her rather than the paperwork in his hand, which she guessed was a copy of her job application, and she fought hard against the flush of colour crawling over her skin. When she finally forced herself to meet his gaze, the raw masculinity staring back at her intensified the flush, enflaming her bones, taking her so unawares that for a moment her mind emptied of everything but the rapid tattoo of her heart reverberating in her ears.

Carrie swallowed, desperate for moisture in her parched throat, desperate to suck air into lungs that had closed in on themselves. Whatever kind of a man Andreas was, there was no denying that he was divine to look at. He had thick dark brown hair sun-kissed on the tips, barely tamed to flop onto a gently lined forehead, cheekbones you could ski down, a chiselled square jaw already dark with stubble and a sharp nose with a slight bend on the bridge. Deeply tanned and weather-beaten, he looked every one of his thirty-seven years.

He was the most overtly virile and handsome man she’d ever laid eyes on.

Then he gave her a crooked grin.

It was like being smiled at by the big bad wolf the moment before he ate Grandma.

‘Congratulations on making it to the final shortlist,’ he said in his impeccable English. Carrie knew, as she knew so much about this man, that he’d learned English at school in his Greek homeland and then perfected it at his American university. He spoke the language with true fluency, firing the words out so quickly his accent sounded like a musical cadence to her ears. ‘I will be honest and tell you that you are my preferred candidate.’

She was taken aback. ‘I am?’

His eyes sparkled. ‘Before I go into more detail about my requirements, there are things I wish to know about you.’

She attempted to hide her fear with a smile that didn’t want to form on her frozen cheeks.

Had he spotted the holes in her résumé?

After a moment of silence that seemed to echo between them she got her paper-dry throat to work. ‘What do you want to know?’

‘References and application forms only give a narrow perspective on a person. If I give you the job then we will spend a lot of time together. You will be my right hand in my domestic life. You will be privy to my most intimate secrets. So, Miss Dunwoody...may I call you Caroline?’

She nodded faintly. The only person who had ever called her Caroline had been her mother but she hadn’t made her name sing as Andreas did. Even as it occurred to her, that struck Carrie as an odd thought to have.

‘Caroline. If I give you the job I need to trust you and trust that we’ll be able to work well together.’ His relaxed frame, the musical staccato of his voice and the amusement enlivening his handsome features all worked together to reassure her that her ruse had worked but the scent of danger still lingered.

Her instincts were telling her to take her bag and coat and leave this office right now.

‘Are you married or do you have a partner?’ he continued. ‘I ask because if you do, you should know you will be spending a lot of time apart from them. Your personal life must be conducted in your own time and you won’t have much of that.’

‘I have no significant other.’ She never had and never would. Men could not be trusted. She’d learned that before she’d reached double digits.

‘Children?’

She shook her head, immediately thinking of Violet, who she loved as much as if she’d given birth to her.

‘Any other dependants? Dogs, cats, goldfish?’

‘No.’

‘Good. I make no apologies. I am a demanding employer and this job is a twenty-four-seven one. What did Debbie tell you about it in the preliminary interview?’

‘That it entails the day-to-day running of your homes.’

His head tilted and his face grew thoughtful. ‘That is how the job is advertised but you should know it is more about the day-to-day running of me. My domestic PA does oversee the running of my homes but they’re not expected to do any of the manual chores themselves—I employ other domestic staff for that. I work long and demanding hours. When I am at home I like to live in comfort and I want all my needs and comforts met by someone who is capable of turning their hand to anything, without argument. I need someone on hand to tend to all my personal needs—pour my drinks, prepare my clothing for me, make sure a towel is on hand if I do any physical activity, that kind of thing.’

It wasn’t a domestic PA the man wanted, Carrie thought in mute outrage as she listened to his seductive voice, it was a slave.

‘In return, I offer a very generous salary.’ He mentioned a figure that made her blink, it being four times what she earned at the newspaper.

She imagined that any genuine applicant would bite his hand off for it. It was an extortionate amount of money for what was essentially nothing more than being Andreas’s dogsbody.

Now he put a forearm on his desk and leaned forward to stare at her with an intensity that made her stomach do a strange flip.

The more she looked into his eyes, the more startling she found them, the light brown having a translucent quality that still contained real depth.

If he gave her the job she would have to tread carefully for as long as she lived under his roof. This man was dangerous.

‘Now, Caroline,’ he said, the tempo of his speech finally slowing down a notch, ‘I do have one more requirement from the person I give this role to.’

‘Which is?’

‘I require someone who has a cheerful disposition.’

She might as well leave, then. How could she be cheerful around the man who’d caused such damage?

‘What I mean by that is that I get enough stress in my work life. When I come home I like to be welcomed with a smile and not be bothered by petty gripes. Can you smile?’

He framed the question with such faux earnestness that Carrie found her facial muscles softening and the smile she’d been trying to produce since she’d stepped into his office breaking out of its own accord.

His eyes gleamed in response. ‘Much better.’ Then he sat back and folded his arms across his chest. The cuffs of his sleeves moved with the motion revealing a tantalising glimpse of fine dark hair.

He nodded slowly. ‘Yes. I think you’re going to suit me very well. The job is yours if you want it.’

She blinked her gaze away from his arms as his words sank in. ‘It is?’

She hadn’t expected it to be this easy...

Her heart started to thunder beneath her ribs.

This was too easy.

Andreas was one of the richest men in the world. He was highly intelligent—unverified reports placed his IQ in the world’s top one per cent and he had the street smarts to match it. In short, he was no fool, and this job that he was giving her after less than fifteen minutes in his company would take her straight into the heart of his life.

‘Do you want it?’ he challenged, breaking the silence that had fallen.

‘Yes.’ She nodded for emphasis, trying to muster her enthusiasm, and forced another smile to her face. ‘Yes, I do, definitely. Thank you.’

‘Good.’ His teeth flashed wolfishly. ‘Did you bring your passport?’

‘Yes.’ The letter discussing the second interview had been specific about it. She assumed it was needed for him to photocopy as proof of her identity.

Andreas rose to his feet. ‘Then let us go. We have a flight slot to fill.’

Carrie stared at him blankly. ‘Go?’

‘The letter you were sent clearly explained that the successful candidate for the job would start immediately.’

‘It did...’ But she hadn’t thought immediately meant this immediately. ‘Are we going abroad now?’

That gleam she was beginning to seriously distrust flashed in his eyes again. ‘Yes. Right now. Do you have a problem with that?’

‘No problem.’ She hurried to stand. The job was hers and she wouldn’t give him reason to change his mind. She would practise smiling as soon as she found a mirror. ‘It’s just that I have no change of clothes with me.’

‘You will be provided with everything you need when we get there. Give Debbie your dress size as we leave.’

‘Where are we going?’

‘To one of my homes where it isn’t raining.’ And with that he opened his office door and ushered her through it.


CHAPTER TWO (#udfb5fb59-acc0-5e71-82bc-16a75cae7fad)

ANDREAS SAT AT his desk on his private jet with his laptop open before him. Barely ten feet away, Carrie was at the dining table reading through the thick folder that contained the working details of all his properties. He had no doubt she would find it excruciatingly tedious to read through.

All his properties were listed except one—the one they were flying to.

‘Which one should I concentrate on?’ she’d asked when he’d given it to her, subtly letting him know he hadn’t given her their final destination.

‘All of them.’ He’d smiled. ‘I’ll give you a test when we arrive.’

‘Which will be when?’

He’d looked at his watch. ‘In approximately eleven hours.’

Her eyes had flickered but she’d made no further comment. He’d seen her thoughts racing and had enjoyed watching her bite the questions back.

He’d enjoyed himself enormously throughout their meeting too, far more than he’d expected. The knowledge that he’d rumbled her before she’d even set foot in his office had bubbled away inside him, satisfying enough to smother the anger that had fought for an outlet.

Anger clouded logical thinking and he needed to keep his mind clear if he was to continue outwitting this viper.

He’d determined that getting her out of England and as far from her home and true employment as he could and as quickly as he could was the best way to proceed. Disorientate her. Put her at the disadvantage without her even realising it and then, when he had her in his private home, unable to escape or communicate with the outside world, he would demand answers. He wanted to know everything—why she was investigating him, what she expected to find and who had put her up to it. He’d made his own discreet enquiries amongst his media contacts but had come up blank. No one was aware of even a hint of a brewing scandal about him.

Instinct told him that Carrie’s reasons for being here were at least partly personal. The coincidence was too great to be explained any other way.

He would discover her reasons in due course but rather than question her immediately, he decided he’d have some fun with her first. Let her suffer a little. It was the least she deserved.

Did Carrie really think him such a useless human being that he required someone to live by his side pouring his drinks and mopping his brow? Andreas liked his creature comforts but he was no man-child and he’d seen the flicker of surprise in her eyes when he’d outlined the duties expected of her, duties he’d made up on the spur of the moment just to see what her reaction would be.

For the next few days he would embrace the man-child role and make her wait on him hand and foot. She would hate every minute of it.

Excellent.

He would enjoy every minute of it.

He watched her put aside the notepad she’d been scribbling on as she’d read through the folder and remove her phone from her handbag. She angled her body away from him and switched it on. A few moments later her shoulders rose and she tugged at her hair.

Andreas grinned, enjoying her silent frustration to find it not working. He dealt with highly sensitive information. To get onto his jet’s network required a password. He wondered how long it would be before she cracked and asked for it.

It took her three hours, an impressive length of time he thought, before she lifted her head, cleared her throat, and said, ‘Would it be possible for me to have the Wi-Fi password?’

‘I didn’t think you had anybody to check in with,’ he commented idly, enjoying the flush of colour that crawled up her slender neck.

‘I don’t,’ she said with only the smallest of hesitation. ‘I just wanted to check my emails.’

‘Expecting anything important?’

She shook her head, her whole neck now aflame. ‘Don’t worry about it. I’ll check them later.’

Carrie Rivers, Caroline Dunwoody, whatever her real name was, had a beautiful neck. He’d seen by her photograph that she was pretty but in the flesh she was so much more, her features softer, her skin dewy and golden. She was beautiful.

He thought back to the slightly plump woman he’d caught that momentary glimpse of three years back. Her eyes had been striking enough for him to remember but at the time he’d been too angry to think properly let alone remember any other detail about her. He’d been angrier than he’d ever been. The previous evening, he’d come home early from a rare evening out to find his niece and her best friend off their heads on drink and drugs. What had followed later that night had been almost as bad.

Taking guardianship of an orphaned teenage girl had never been easy but that weekend had been the hardest of his life, harder even than the night he’d received the call telling him his sister and brother-in-law had been found dead or the day he’d learned his parents faced financial ruin.

Where was the manual that gave step-by-step guidance on how to handle the discovery that your niece, your responsibility, was creeping towards drug addiction, or how to handle waking to find your niece’s sixteen-year-old best friend naked in your bedroom intent on seducing you? Where had Violet learned that kind of behaviour? From her older sister? Was the seemingly prim and proper woman sitting just feet away from him as wanton and reckless as her sister had been?

Despite his best attempts, he’d been unable to discover anything significant about Carrie. Her page on the Daily Times website listed her awards and achievements but nothing of a personal nature. He only knew her age because of their old personal links. Twenty-six. An incredibly young age to have achieved so much in her career. That took real commitment and dedication, something he would have admired had those traits not now been aimed at him. But unlike the men—and they had all been men—she’d brought down before him, Andreas had nothing to hide. His business was clean. So why had she set her sights on him? Why was the award-winning investigative journalist Carrie Rivers after him? Was this personal?

Whatever the reasons, he would learn them and nip whatever trouble was brewing in the bud. The old maxim of keep your friends close but your enemies closer stood the test of time.

Until he learned the truth, he would keep Carrie very close to him and then...

And then, unless he could think of a better plan than the one formulating in his head, Carrie would be kept close by his side for the foreseeable future.

* * *

It was dark when they landed. The early spring storms London had been dealing with were but a distant memory as Carrie disembarked Andreas’s jet and found herself engulfed in a heat the like of which she had only ever read about. She removed her jacket and looked up to find a cloudless black sky glittering with stars.

‘Where are we?’ She’d diligently read the folder Andreas had given her, pored over the location of all his homes and, as time had extended on their flight, convinced herself they were going to Tokyo.

‘The Seychelles.’ Andreas stood beside her. ‘Welcome to Mahe, the largest island of the Seychelles Granitic Archipelago.’

Her mind turned frantically. How could she have missed a home in the Seychelles? She’d read his property folder from cover to cover three times, and there had been nothing about a home there in any of her prior investigations into him.

‘It’s the most private of my properties,’ he said in a low voice close to her ear. The tangy freshness of his expensive cologne swirled around her.

Carrie casually sidestepped away from him and swallowed the sudden rush of moisture filling her mouth. ‘What time is it?’

‘One in the morning. We have a short flight on my helicopter before we reach my home.’

They were whisked through security and within twenty minutes of landing were climbing into a sparkling helicopter.

‘Have you been in a helicopter before?’ Andreas asked as he strapped himself in beside her.

There were six seats to choose from and he had to sit right next to her?

Carrie shook her head and determinedly did not look at the thigh resting so close to her own she could feel its warmth on her skin.

‘It’s an enjoyable experience and the quickest way to my island.’

‘Your island?’

He pulled a thoughtful face. ‘It’s more of a peninsular off another island but the peninsular belongs in its entirety to me.’

Carrie silently swore as, under the heavy noise of the rotors twirling, the helicopter lifted off the ground.

She hadn’t had an inkling about any of this. What else had she missed in her research on him?

Whose name had this property and accompanying land been bought in? Was it a secret shell company? She would get digging into it as soon as she had some privacy and a decent Internet signal. She needed to check in with her editor and let him know where she was too. But after she’d had a shower and, hopefully, some sleep. She’d been in the same clothes for almost a whole day, not having dreamt when she dressed that morning that she would end the day in the famed wedding and honeymoon spot of the Seychelles.

By contrast, Andreas had showered an hour before landing and changed from his suit into a fresh, crisp white shirt and light grey tailored trousers.

She dragged her attention away from the powerful body brushing so close against her own and the tangy scent playing under her nose by envisaging the shower she would have when they reached his home. She wouldn’t have the temperature scalding as she usually did. To rid herself of the stickiness clinging to her pores she would lather herself under refreshingly cool water.

Her thoughts dissolved as a particularly sharp movement from the pilot caused Andreas’s thigh and arm to compact against hers. An immediate shock of awareness crashed through her, so acute and so sudden and so totally unexpected that she froze.

It felt as if she’d been tasered.

For long moments she couldn’t breathe.

A large hand covered hers and squeezed.

‘It’s nothing to worry about,’ he murmured. ‘Just a little turbulence.’

Carrie swallowed and forced a nod, trying desperately to get a coherent thought into her scrambled brain, her lungs finally opening back up again when he let go of her hand.

She was just tired, she assured herself, digging her nails into her palms.

Better he think she’d been frightened by the sudden turbulence they’d flown into than know of the turbulence that had exploded inside her at the feel of him pressed so tightly against her.

She looked out of the window and made an effort to relax her frame.

Come on, Carrie. You’ve always wanted to fly in a helicopter. At least try and enjoy it.

Violet had always wanted to fly in a helicopter too. She remembered how excited her sister would get during sunny days when their mother was still alive and they would go out for walks and spot helicopters zooming overhead. Her chubby little arms would wave frantically and she was always convinced the pilots waved back.

What was Violet doing at that moment? Her sister had been in California for three months now, her recovery from addiction and all her other issues a slow, fragile process. Carrie had called her a couple of days ago, their weekly conversation as stilted and awkward as they had been since Violet had woken from her coma and it was spelled out how close to death she had come. Whenever she spoke to her sister now it was like talking to a stranger. The little girl whose first word had been ‘Cawwie,’ and who had followed Carrie like a shadow from the moment she could crawl was gone. In truth, she’d been gone for a long time and it tore at Carrie’s heart to remember the sweetness that had once been there.

Blinking away hot tears at all that had been lost, Carrie continued to gaze out of the window. The moon was bright, allowing her to see the small landmass they were approaching in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Soon they flew directly over a beach gleaming white under the moonlight, the form of a large house emerging from the shadows as the pilot brought the helicopter down.

Andreas got out first then held out his hand to assist her, his eyes holding hers with a look that made her stomach knot in on itself.

Knowing she didn’t have any choice, she took the hand. His fingers tightened as they wrapped around hers, solid and warm, keeping her steady as her feet reached for the ground.

‘Thank you,’ she muttered, glad the darkness cloaked her flaming cheeks from his probing gaze.

‘My pleasure.’ His fingertips swept gently over hers as he released his hold and then he climbed back inside to speak to his pilot.

Alone for a moment, Carrie inhaled deeply and found her senses filled with the heady scent of unseen flowers. The breeze of the ocean had cleared the humidity away, a fresh warmth brushing over her skin. It was all she could do not to close her eyes and savour the feeling.

Savouring the feeling would have to wait as suddenly lights came on and Andreas’s house—villa—mansion—which the pilot had landed in the back garden of, was revealed.

It was breathtaking.

Only two storeys high, what it lacked in height it made up for in width, looking like a white stonewashed Buddhist temple surrounded by a deep red wraparound veranda. Matching deep red roof tiles gave what could easily have been an imposing building a welcoming air.

Andreas had rejoined her. She could feel his eyes on her and knew he was looking for a reaction.

What kind of reaction would a true employee give?

She opted for a truthful one.

‘It’s lovely.’

‘Isn’t it?’ he agreed. ‘Wait until you see it in the daylight. I fell in love with it from a photograph. I was looking for a holiday home and here I’ve found the perfect place. I can get away from the world but there’s people and nightlife only a short flight or boat ride away.’

‘This is your holiday home?’

‘Of course,’ he said with mild surprise. ‘Who would want to conduct business on a paradise like this?’

‘How long will we be here?’

‘Why? Is there somewhere you have to be?’

‘No, it’s just...’ She felt herself getting flustered.

‘Relax. I’m teasing you. I know you have no commitment you have to rush back for or you would have disclosed it on your application form. We’ll stay here for a while. I haven’t had a proper holiday in some time and need to recharge my batteries.’

She hadn’t had a holiday in some time either. At least a decade, two or three years before her mother had died.

But this wasn’t a holiday for her. She was here to work. Her job was to ensure the smooth running of this beautiful mansion and take care of the whims of its owner while secretly undertaking her own work of discovering its owner’s darkest secrets. What kind of secrets she would find in Andreas’s holiday home was anyone’s guess. Chances were she would have to wait until they moved on to one of his other homes where he actually conducted business before she discovered anything useful.

Expecting a member of his staff to greet them—all his homes had at least three permanent live-in employees—Carrie was a little disconcerted to step inside and find the house shrouded in silence. Yes, it was the middle of the night, but surely the staff wouldn’t retire for the night before their boss’s arrival?

‘I’ll give you a quick tour before I show you to our bedrooms,’ Andreas said, leading the way. He headed through an arched doorway without a door and said, ‘Here’s the living area.’

Her misgivings were put to one side as she slowly took in the beauty of Andreas’s house, a home that managed to be both luxurious and yet welcoming. High ceilings and white walls were given colour by an intricate tiled mosaic that covered the floor wherever they stepped, including the large, airy dining room dominated by a large, highly polished mahogany table.

The kitchen was the size of an entire floor of her home.

‘This is Brendan’s domain,’ he informed her.

‘Brendan’s your chef?’

‘Yes. If you’re hungry I can call him and he’ll make something for you.’

‘I’m fine, thank you.’ Regular meals, which she’d had to force down into her cramped stomach, had been provided throughout the flight by Andreas’s cabin crew.

He shrugged. ‘If you need anything before morning I’m sure you won’t have any trouble finding it. I assume the kitchen functions as a normal kitchen.’

‘You assume?’

He pulled a face. ‘I employ staff so I don’t have to do these chores for myself.’

‘When was the last time you used a kitchen?’ she asked before she could stop herself. Somehow, she doubted Andreas welcomed his domestic employees questioning him.

Her doubt proved wrong.

‘In my university days in America—I studied at MIT—I discovered I was a terrible cook so I got a job working as a waiter in an Italian restaurant where they were always happy to feed me. I’ve not cooked for myself since.’

‘An Italian restaurant?’

‘There were no decent Greek restaurants where I lived then. There was a tapas bar but they didn’t do breakfast so I opted for the Italian one.’

His long legs powered on gracefully up the cantilevered stairs to the first floor. Carrie hurried behind him, smothering a yawn. All the travelling on top of minimal sleep had exhausted her.

‘My room.’ Andreas pushed open a door to reveal a bedroom equal in size to the kitchen, containing everything a spoiled billionaire could need. Carrie hung back, reluctant to enter until he beckoned her inside with the crook of his finger and the hint of a gleam in his piercing light brown eyes. ‘Don’t be shy, Caroline. You need to become familiar with my room.’

Familiar with it? All she could see was the enormous carved bed heaped with pillows, and her imagination immediately stripped Andreas bare and pictured him sliding with that masculine grace she’d never seen on another man between the navy satin sheets.

She clenched her teeth together, trying to blink the image away and pretend the rush of blood she could feel pumping around her was not connected to it.

She’d never imagined a man naked before and it disturbed her that she should have such unwelcome thoughts about this particular man.

There was such a sensuous potency about him. It was there in his every move, his every breath, his every word, and all it did was add to her growing sense of danger.

Sheesh, she really, really needed some sleep.

‘What other staff work here?’ she asked. Once she knew where everyone was she would stop feeling as if she’d been trapped in a gilded cage that only Andreas had the key to.

Everything had happened so quickly and smoothly that day that there hadn’t been time for her misgivings to do more than squeak at her but now, here, standing in Andreas’s bedroom in his secret home in the middle of the night, those misgivings were shouting loudly.

‘I inherited most of the staff from the previous owners. The grounds are managed by Enrique and his eldest son. Enrique’s wife Sheryl and a couple of her friends take care of all the cleaning. Between them they know everything there is to know about the house and the peninsular and the Seychelles itself.’

‘Where are the staff quarters?’

‘There aren’t any. Brendan and his assistant live in a cottage on the grounds but the others all live on the main island.’

Another chime of alarm rang in her ears. ‘So who actually lives in the house?’

Surely she had misunderstood something. Surely she wouldn’t be the only person living under this roof with him while they were there?

‘We do. You and me.’

‘Just you and me?’

‘Yes.’ His eyes seemed to do more than merely sparkle. They smouldered. His nostrils flared as he added, ‘While we’re on this beautiful spot of paradise, the night time belongs to you and me alone.’


CHAPTER THREE (#udfb5fb59-acc0-5e71-82bc-16a75cae7fad)

ANDREAS ENJOYED CARRIE’S attempt to hide her horror at this clearly unwelcome revelation.

‘I bought this place as a getaway from the world so it’s run in a more relaxed way than my other homes,’ he said. ‘As long as I have someone close at hand to take care of my needs, I don’t need much else and that, matia mou, is why you are here. Consider it an easy breaking-in for you. The house runs itself so you can dedicate your time here to me and we can get to know each other properly in the process.’

The colour drained from her face, her hazel eyes widening.

Understandable, he thought lazily. Carrie wouldn’t want him delving into her life with probing questions that would put her on the spot. She wouldn’t want to trip herself up with easily forgotten lies.

He admired that, through the tumult of emotions flickering through her eyes, her composure didn’t waver. If he were ignorant of her true identity he doubted he would have noticed anything amiss. If he didn’t know the truth he would assume she was a naturally quiet, self-contained woman.

He looked forward to seeing how far he could push her before she cracked and the real Carrie emerged.

‘Now for your room. You will find it adequately appointed.’ But not as adequately as Rochelle’s had been. She was being put in a much different room from the one his former Domestic PA had enjoyed. Rochelle’s room had been located at the other end of the house so she could have her privacy.

He didn’t intend for Carrie, this cuckoo in his nest, this spy, to have any privacy during her interlude in his life. Her duties would be of the kind he would never dream of imposing on a proper employee.

Andreas turned the handle of a door in the middle of the left-hand wall of his room. It opened into a much smaller, adjoining room.

He spread a hand out. ‘See? You have everything you need. A bed, a dressing table, wardrobe and your own bathroom.’ But no television or other form of entertainment. Andreas intended to be Carrie’s only source of entertainment while she was here.

The colour that stained her cheeks this time was definitely of the angry variety but she kept it in check to ask with only the slightest tremor, ‘My room adjoins yours?’

‘How would you take care of my needs if you were on the other side of the house? The previous owners used this room as a nursery. I admit it’s rather small—it was designed for a small child before they went into a proper room of their own—but I can assure you it’s perfectly adequate.’ Adequate for a baby or toddler. Barely adequate for a fully grown woman, even one as slender as Carrie. He’d intended to turn it into another dressing room and was glad he hadn’t got around to organising it.

‘Where’s the lock?’

‘There isn’t one so it will be nice and easy for you to come and go between our rooms.’ He winked. ‘But do not worry. I am a gentleman and only enter a lady’s bedroom when invited.’

And should she be tempted to enter his room without invitation, which she undoubtedly would seeing as her whole purpose for being here was to snoop, then the microscopic cameras he’d had installed in his bedroom and throughout the house would monitor her every movement.

He’d intended to bug her room too with voice-activated cameras but had talked himself out of it. There was a line a person should never cross and bugging a lady’s bedroom, even a journalistic spy like this one, was firmly on the wrong side of it. Now that he’d spent the day in such close confines to her, he was doubly glad he hadn’t crossed that line.

Carrie had an allure about her that played to his senses like a finely tuned violin.

She also had eyes that looked bruised from exhaustion.

‘I can see you’re tired. Is there anything you wanted to ask before we retire for the night?’

She shook her head, those soft, plump lips drawing in together. The situation had clearly overwhelmed her. He could sympathise. When she had walked into his offices in the heart of London’s financial district that morning she could not have guessed she’d finish the day cut off from everything she was familiar with in the paradise that was the Seychelles. No doubt she was feeling vulnerable.

Good.

He could sympathise but he would not. Carrie was a vulture. A beautiful vulture for sure, but a vulture nonetheless.

She deserved nothing less than what was coming for her.

‘In that case, I bid you goodnight. The clothes I promised you were flown in while we were travelling. Sheryl has put them away for you. You will find them imminently suitable. And remember...’

A pretty brow rose cautiously. ‘Remember?’

He winked. ‘I like to be welcomed with a smile.’

As he closed the interconnecting door he smiled himself to imagine her reaction to the clothing selected for her.

His fun with Carrie was only just beginning.

* * *

Carrie threw the entire contents of her new wardrobe onto the narrow excuse of a bed and rifled through them with increasing anxiety.

She’d expected to be given outfits akin to what chambermaids in hotels wore, not clothing like this.

Her wardrobe and dresser had been filled with soft, floaty summer dresses, vest tops, shorts that put the meaning into the word ‘short’, bikinis and sarongs. There was underwear too, all of the black, lacy variety.

Every item had a designer label.

Her skin had never felt so heated as when she’d picked up a pair of knickers and wondered if Andreas had chosen them personally.

But how could he have done? She hadn’t left his side since she’d stepped into his office. It must have been his PA, Debbie, who she’d been certain hadn’t liked her in the initial interview and who she’d had to give her vital statistics to as Andreas had whisked her out of his building.

Carrie tugged at her hair with a mixture of consternation and fear.

Whoever had chosen the items, which included beach paraphernalia along with all the clothing, this was not right, not by any stretch of the imagination. To make matters worse there was no Internet she could connect to and her phone signal seemed to be non-existent. The text message she’d written to her editor forty minutes ago was still trying to send.

Who knew she was here? Andreas and his PA Debbie, his flight crew and his Seychellois domestic staff. No one from her own life knew she was in the Seychelles, only people employed by Andreas.

Rubbing her eyes, she told herself she was probably worrying over nothing. It had been an incredibly long day and she was sleep deprived. Sleep deprivation did funny things to the brain.

The letter inviting her to the second interview had stated the successful applicant would be expected to start the job immediately. It was her own fault that she hadn’t taken the letter literally enough.

She was exactly where she wanted to be, with greater access to the man than in her wildest dreams.

But he also had access to her, and she eyed the adjoining unlocked door with nerves fluttering in her chest.

There was no way she would trust his word that he wouldn’t enter her room uninvited.

The way he looked at her... Did he look at all his employees with that same intensity? Did he leave the rest of his employees feeling that he was stripping them bare with a glance?

Or was it just her guilty conscience playing at her and making her see things that weren’t there?

Movement from the adjoining room made her catch her breath.

Andreas was still awake. They were connected to each other’s rooms and she couldn’t even lock herself away from him.

She forced herself to breathe.

She needed to take a shower but had been holding it off until she could be reasonably sure he’d gone to sleep. An hour after he’d left her in this tiny bedroom, there was nothing to suggest he was ready to turn in.

What was he going to do? she chided herself. Walk in on her while she showered?

Sexual foibles were the easiest secrets to uncover. Andreas Samaras might be many things but a sex pest was not something that had been flagged up about him, not even on the secret grapevine from which she and other journalists like her got so many of their stories. He rarely dated and when he did it was discreetly. If there was anything along those lines she had to worry about she would already know about them.

She was being over-cautious when she didn’t need to be.

Carefully putting the expensive clothing back into its rightful place, she realised what her real problem with it was. These were the sort of clothes a man bestowed on his lover for a holiday, not his employee.

* * *

Carrie awoke in the unfamiliar tiny room minutes before the digital alarm clock on her bedside table went off. It had been set for her by some faceless person that she would no doubt meet shortly, a person with whom she would have to pretend to be someone she was not.

Lying on an investigation had never bothered her before. The few she had done before, though, had been office-based. Offices were places where everyone wore a mask. She’d fitted in without any problems and without any guilt, knowing she was working for a good cause.

This was different. This was Andreas’s home. She had told herself over and over that this was an opportunity that had been gift-wrapped for her but she still felt as if she’d breached an invisible line.

He deserves it, she told herself grimly, focussing her mind on Violet’s scarred, emaciated body and its root cause. He deserves everything he gets.

She checked her phone and sighed to see the message to her editor still pending. Her room must be in a black spot.

After a quick shower under the disappointing trickle of water in her private bathroom, only mitigated by the expensive, wonderfully scented toiletries provided for her, it was time to select an outfit to wear.

After rifling through her new clothing for the dozenth time she chose a dark blue dress covered in tiny white dots. It was made of the sheerest material, had the thinnest of spaghetti straps and fell to mid-thigh but at least it covered her cleavage. And, she had to admit, it was pretty.

Scrabbling through her handbag, she found a hairband wedged in the bottom and tied her hair into a loose bun at the nape of her neck. She had no make-up with her. Usually that didn’t matter as she rarely wore it but today she felt she could do with some camouflage.

Dressed and feeling much more alert, she pulled the floor-length curtains open and gasped.

The sight that greeted her could have come from a postcard.

If she’d peeked through the curtains during the night she would have seen her room had its own private balcony. She stepped out onto it now, heart thumping, the sun kissing her skin good morning.

She closed her eyes to savour the feeling then opened them again, hand on her throat, staring in stunned awe at the deep blue sky unmarred by so much as a solitary cloud and at the stunning azure ocean that lapped gently onto the finest white sand imaginable, the cove’s shore lined with palm trees. A short distance ahead sat an isolated green landmass that looked, from her dazed estimation, close enough that she might tread through water to it. An artist couldn’t have painted a more perfect scene.

‘Good morning, Caroline.’

The deep, cheerful voice startled her and she gripped the balustrade before turning her head.

So mind-blown had she been by the view before her, she hadn’t noticed her balcony was far too wide to be hers alone.

Hair damp and wearing nothing but a pair of low-slung black shorts, Andreas strolled to stand beside her and grinned. ‘What did I tell you about the view in daylight—takes the breath away, doesn’t it?’

Her grip on the balustrade tightening, she stared back out at the view and nodded. ‘It’s stunning.’

But it was the view standing feet away from her that had truly stolen her breath and, though she tried her hardest to keep her attention on what lay in front of her, her senses were leaping to what stood beside her.

His body was even better than her imagination had allowed her to believe. Broad shouldered, muscular without being overdone and deeply tanned, this was a body kept fit by plenty of swimming and enjoyment of the outside life, not by lifting weights or working on a treadmill. This wasn’t a body that had been sculptured out of vanity.

‘Sleep well?’ he murmured, resting his arms on the balustrade.

She inhaled and gave a sharp nod, intensely aware of his penetrative gaze on her.

So much for sleep curing her inexplicable awareness of him.

‘Fine, thank you.’

‘Good. Ready to start work?’

She nodded again.

‘Then let’s introduce you to the others and get some breakfast. I don’t know about you but I’m starving.’

‘Okay.’ She turned to go back into her room.

‘Caroline?’

She met his sparkling gaze. ‘Yes?’

‘Have you forgotten my most basic requirement?’

She furrowed her brow as she tried to clear her mind of his semi-nakedness enough to think, pretended her insides hadn’t just clenched and heated to see the fine dark hair that lightly covered his chest snaked down and over his hard abdomen to where his shorts rested low...

He shook his head in amusement. ‘Where is my smile?’

‘Still waking up,’ she replied without thinking.

His grin was wide enough to eclipse the rising sun. ‘Ah, you do have a sense of humour. I did wonder. Now let’s get some breakfast.’

And with that, he strolled back into his room.

Carrie was on the brink of laughter for reasons she couldn’t begin to understand, although she suspected it would have a hysterical quality to it if it came out, when clarity suddenly came to her.

She was here.

She’d got the job.

Everything was in place to allow her to do what she’d spent the last three years dreaming of doing. The last thing she wanted was to blow the opportunity by not performing as required and getting sacked before she’d properly started.

Whatever strange reactions Andreas provoked inside her, she had to ignore them and do her job.

He’d made his requirements crystal clear. She was to be good humoured and cater to all his whims. Well, she would do just that. She would do everything he required of her and she would make darned sure to keep a smile on her face while she did it. She would inveigle her way into his confidence and uncover the secrets Andreas Samaras kept hidden from the world.

And then she would expose them.

And then, finally, she would find some peace of mind. Violet would have been avenged and both the men who’d destroyed her life would, in a much different way, be destroyed too.

With that happy thought in her head, she hurried to join him.

* * *

Breakfast had been laid out on the sunny veranda, an array of breads, pastries, fruits, condiments and yogurt.

‘I take my coffee black without sugar,’ Andreas said as he took his seat.

He’d introduced Carrie to his staff but had kept it quick. He’d taken Enrique and Sheryl into his confidence and they’d been outraged to discover an investigative journalist was trying to infiltrate his life. They were honest, upstanding people who he knew would struggle to hide their true feelings towards her for any length of time.

He liked to think he was an honest man too, but dealing with the shysters and scumbags that littered the financial world he inhabited like the dregs of a pot of coffee had taught him how to play the game that the people he employed on this island could never understand.

Carrie, still standing, poured his coffee for him. She even poured it with a smile.

‘I will have honeydew melon and yogurt,’ he told her.

She took a bowl and, with another smile, spooned chunks of melon into it. ‘Tell me when to stop.’

Her disposition since he’d startled her on the balcony had changed considerably, and very much for the better. He would bet her new, cheerful disposition was external only.

He waited until the bowl was full before raising a hand. He noticed her own hand was incredibly slim, the nails long and nicely shaped. If Carrie were to look at the hands of any of his domestic staff she would see none of them had nails as well maintained as hers. She would see her nails were a dead giveaway that her life had not been spent undertaking domestic work.

‘Four spoonfuls of yogurt,’ he commanded amiably.

Again, she obeyed. ‘Can I get you anything else to go with it?’

Tempted though he was to ask her to spoon it into his mouth, just to see if the smile fixed on her face cracked, he resisted. ‘That will do for the moment. I will let you know when I want anything else.’

She nodded and folded her hands together over her belly.

Andreas put a spoonful into his mouth and took the opportunity to cast his eyes over her again in an appreciative open manner he would never dream of doing with an ordinary employee.

She was a little smaller than the average woman, the modest dress she’d selected showcasing the lithe legs of a model and breasts he would never have guessed could be so full on so slight a person. The morning sunlight beamed on her face highlighting the soft dewiness of her skin, reflecting off her complexion in glimmering waves.

Carrie didn’t need make-up. She was stunning exactly as she was.

It was fortuitous that she wasn’t a proper employee of his, he thought, as a thick heaviness pooled in his loins. Boss-employee relationships were disasters waiting to happen and he steered well clear of them, just as he avoided anything that could harm his business and personal reputation. In today’s climate, where sexual harassment charges were a mere compliment about a pretty outfit away, he was too conscious of his position and power to risk his reputation.

Carrie would be a challenge to his self-imposed ideals. If he had to work with her in a close environment for real he knew he would find it a challenge to keep their relationship on a professional footing, a notion he found faintly disturbing.

Here and under these unique circumstances, his personal ethics could be safely pushed aside. She wasn’t his employee. She was a snake. A beautiful, beguiling, incredibly sexy snake who wanted to destroy him.

‘Are you not going to sit down?’ he asked once he’d swallowed his mouthful.

Her hazel eyes flickered, her brow furrowed slightly, but the smile stayed in place.

‘Are you not intending to eat?’

Now the furrow in her brow deepened.

‘I dislike eating alone, matia mou. While we’re here it is my wish that you dine with me, so, please, sit. Pour yourself a drink and eat something.’

As she complied with his request, he couldn’t resist adding, ‘Also, if you dine with me, it makes it easier for you to wait on me.’

‘Whatever makes your life easier,’ she said demurely and with only a hint of teeth being ground together. ‘I am here to serve you.’

‘That you are,’ he agreed. ‘And you look beautiful doing it. Are you happy with the clothes selected for you?’

Her spoon, which had been adding a little yogurt into the bowl she’d taken for herself, hovered in her hand. ‘Yes. Thank you. Although... I thought I would be given more...practical clothing.’

Poor Carrie. How disconcerting it must have been for her to open her wardrobe and find there was no uniform to hide behind, no means to slip unobtrusively into the shadows of his life.





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