happened. Should he ever contrive to regain ownership of the island, Eros planned to open an upmarket resort on the coast that would generate jobs and rejuvenate the local economy. The old man, however, had done nothing with Trilis but hadn’t seemed interested in selling it either.
So, what had changed? Eros ruminated, irritated that he was unable to answer that question. He preferred to know what motivated his competitors and opponents because ignorance of such revealing details was always risky. Going in blind wasn’t smart, especially when Fotakis was too rich to be tempted by money. Eros turned the question around, considering it shrewdly from another angle. What did he currently have that Fotakis wanted? Eros asked himself then, reckoning that that was likely to be a far more accurate reading of the situation. Bull Fotakis was notoriously crafty and devious.
At the same time, Eros was uncomfortably aware that he would pay just about any price to regain the island of Trilis because it was the sole possession his father had truly regretted losing.
‘It is our family place and if you lose family, you lose everything. I learned that the hard way,’ his father had rasped painfully on his deathbed. ‘Promise me that if you do well in the future, you’ll do everything you can to buy Trilis back. It’s the Nevrakis home and your ancestors and mine are buried there.’
Eros compressed his sensual mouth, shying away from such sentimental recollections from the past. He had learned from his father’s mistakes. A man had to be hard in business and in his private life, not soft, not easily led or seduced. And a man forced to deal with a Greek icon of achievement like Bull Fotakis had to be even tougher.
‘Mr Fotakis will see you now...’
Stam’s gaze was hard when it zeroed in on Eros Nevrakis. A good-looking louse, he conceded grudgingly, exactly the type calculated to turn a young and naive woman’s head. Nevrakis hadn’t told Winnie that he was married. Stam had drilled every relevant fact out of his reluctant granddaughter. He had recognised her shame, gasping in relief that, despite his initial troubling assumptions about her character, her morals were in the right place. Winnie would never have knowingly slept with another woman’s husband. Nevrakis had lied to her, conning her into a demeaning living arrangement before hanging her out to dry without a single regret.
Eros saw a small stocky bearded man with eyes as sharp as tacks set in a weathered face. His hair and his neat little beard were white as snow but there was no suggestion of Santa Claus about him. Eros took a seat and refused refreshment, keen to get down to business once the usual pleasantries had been aired.
‘You want Trilis back,’ Stam remarked, startling Eros with that candid opening and the complete lack of any social chit-chat. ‘But I want something else.’
Eros leant back in his chair, long powerful legs carefully relaxed in pose. ‘I assumed as much,’ he quipped.
‘I believe that you’re divorced now.’
So random did that remark seem that Eros was disconcerted. He blinked, lashes longer than a girl’s, Stam noted in disgust, while wondering simultaneously how he was going to tolerate the lying rat as a grandson-in-law. Unfortunately, little Teddy couldn’t get his father’s name without his mother also getting a wedding ring, so choice didn’t come into it. Stam refused to stand back and allow his sole great-grandchild to remain illegitimate. He knew that was an old-fashioned outlook, but he didn’t care because he hadn’t got to the top of the ladder by bending his principles to suit other people’s and he had no plans to change.
‘I can’t imagine why you would remark on that fact,’ Eros drawled softly. ‘But it is true. I was divorced last year.’
Stam gritted his teeth. ‘Was that because you were thinking of marrying your mistress?’
‘I have no idea where this strange conversation is heading,’ Eros retorted crisply, lifting his strong chin in a challenging move of quiet strength. ‘However, I can tell you that I’ve never had a mistress, but if I did have one, I seriously doubt that I would marry her.’
Stam went rigid with offence until he reminded himself that Nevrakis had no idea that he could be causing offence because he was not aware that Winnie was Stam’s granddaughter and would undoubtedly never have dared to lay a single finger on her had he known that salient fact. He then chose to entertain himself by approaching his goal in a roundabout manner.
‘My granddaughter is a single parent who needs a husband. That is my price for the island of Trilis. If you agree to marry her, no cash need change hands.’
Stunned by that bald assurance, Eros straightened in his seat. ‘You want me to marry your granddaughter?’ he exclaimed, so taken aback by the idea that he could not even hide his consternation. ‘I didn’t know you had one. I’m sure I read somewhere that you had no relatives left alive...’
‘Until recently, I thought that too,’ Stam admitted equably. ‘But then, surprises are the joy of life, don’t you think?’
Still in the dark as to why Bull Fotakis should offer him such a staggering proposition, Eros could only think that he had always hated surprises. Surprises had, after all, marked some of the worst moments of his life since childhood, starting with the one when his father had killed Christmas by dropping in with his youthful girlfriend on his arm to announce that he was divorcing Eros’s mother for making him feel old. Eros might have been only eight years of age at the time, but he had been old enough to feel every ounce of his mother’s agonised pain and humiliation that the man she loved had fallen out of love with her. That experience had given him an inbuilt hatred of broken marriages and divorce, most especially because he could date the origins of his father’s financial downfall from that same moment.
‘I’m not sure I agree,’ Eros sidestepped quietly. ‘I’m certain you could offer your granddaughter to any one of a dozen wealthy, successful men and create an enthusiastic stampede... Why me?’
‘You’re not a fool,’ Stam conceded, his weathered face grim at that grudging acknowledgement because he wasn’t sure he wanted a grandson-in-law strong enough to stand up to him.
‘I hope not,’ Eros said in a calmer tone, but his brain was working at supersonic speed in an effort to work out the mystery of Fotakis’s interest in him as a potential grandson-in-law. ‘A single parent, you said...’ he added, playing for time.
‘Ne... Yes, a handsome little boy, my great-grandson.’ Stam could not hide the possessive note in his voice or the pride because both his sons were dead and the sight of that little boy had softened his tough old heart. ‘He needs a father figure, for who can tell how many years I have left?’
‘You seem hale and hearty to me,’ Eros murmured drily. ‘But you still haven’t explained why you have chosen me for this role.’
‘And you still haven’t explained how much you’re willing to sacrifice to regain that island,’ Stam countered smoothly. ‘But I can assure you that if you fail to marry my granddaughter, I will ensure that you never reclaim Trilis.’
‘Then we would appear to have reached the end of our meeting,’ Eros retorted levelly, vaulting upright with the fluid grace of an athlete. ‘I have no desire to remarry, and while I would like to reclaim Trilis, the loss of my freedom would be too high a price to pay.’
Stam loosed a sardonic laugh. ‘Even if my great-grandson is also...your son?’
Those two words halted Eros in his tracks. His handsome dark head turned back, an expression of sheer incredulity etched in his lean bronzed features. ‘Impossible!’ he grated. ‘I have no children!’
Stam surveyed him with loathing, as yet unconvinced that Eros was entirely unaware that Winnie had been pregnant when she had left his country house. ‘Two more words: Winnie Mardas... Of course, you may not remember her?’
‘Winnie?’ Eros Nevrakis echoed in raw disbelief. ‘She’s your granddaughter?’
‘Surprise...surprise,’