the decisions no one else would.
He didn’t care if this woman liked him, either—but he found himself hoping she wouldn’t go away just yet.
“It is on my schedule,” he said.
“Of course it is.” She pulled in a deep breath and turned away from the painting as if she had made a final decision to slice herself off from the allure of it. “Tell me about you, Christos. Where did you grow up? What did you like to do as a child?”
Her questions punched him in the gut. He never talked about his childhood. It was too painful. Too dark and disgusting. Compared to hers, even with an absent mother, his was hell on earth.
“I grew up in Greece. I had a happy life, I got an education and I went to work. What else is there to know?” The lies flowed easily from his tongue these days. He’d had years to practice them, after all.
She was staring at him. “Where in Greece? Near the sea? Inland?”
Ice formed in his veins. He did not like it when people pried. “Everywhere in Greece is near the sea.”
“That’s a very vague answer.”
He shrugged as if it were nothing to him. “We are not friends, Lucilla. There is no point in engaging in idle chitchat. You do not care about my childhood, nor I yours. You care about what I am doing to your precious company, and I care about returning the Chatsfield name and all it stands for to its former glory. We are not on opposite sides, no matter how you wish to view it. And we don’t need to engage in polite banter in order to pretend we like each other.”
Her eyes had narrowed considerably. And her color was high. The flush over her breasts was intriguing. He wanted to slip her gown off her shoulder and press his mouth just above her heart.
“With an attitude like that, no wonder you don’t have any friends. You refuse to let anyone get close enough to be a friend.”
He snorted. “And do you really want to be my friend, Lucilla? Or is there something more to this query?”
She tilted her chin up. “No, I don’t want to be your friend. But I was trying to be polite. I thought maybe life would be easier if we at least pretended to like each other.”
He took a step closer to her, watched the thrum of her pulse kick up in her neck. He had to admire that she did not back away. She stood her ground, though she had to tilt her head back to look up at him since he towered over her.
“I am quite willing to pretend, Lucilla mou. I find myself utterly intrigued by the cut of that gown and the mystery of what lies beneath. If you wish, we can leave together and pretend to like each other in my bed.”
Her eyes grew as wide as saucers. The color in her cheeks bloomed redder than before. And then she looked completely furious, as if he’d tricked her somehow. He didn’t have time to figure it out because she poked him in the chest with a manicured finger.
“You are not serious, Christos, and this isn’t funny.”
“I was not trying to be funny.”
She poked him again, harder this time. “I saw you come in and I know who you’re with. Don’t insult me by pretending you find me more appealing than you do your supermodel girlfriend.” She dropped her finger and straightened her shoulders. “I am not that desperate or that stupid and I resent you thinking I am.”
LUCILLA’S HEART BEAT hard and fast as she met Christos’s icy blue gaze. She knew her color was high, and she knew the hue of her gown didn’t help matters in the least. Why had she chosen red for tonight?
Because she knew he would be here.
No, that was not it at all.
She’d chosen the sexiest, boldest dress she owned because she liked to look and feel pretty, not because Christos Giatrakos would be here with yet another model on his arm. Since he’d arrived at the Chatsfield, he’d often been seen at their various events with beautiful women—a different one every time, in fact.
And now he was making fun of her. Taunting her with the idea of them being together, of tangled limbs and heated skin, when she knew it was the furthest thing from his mind. It was his aim to fluster her. It infuriated her that she could even be flustered—damn her stupid hormones—but she refused to let him know it was working.
She tilted her chin up and gave him her best glare. It had often worked on her siblings when they were growing up and she needed to get them in line.
Christos smirked. And then his gaze slid from hers, down over her neck, her collarbone, her chest …
Her skin burned everywhere he looked, as if it were his hands gliding over her body rather than his eyes. “I assure you I am most serious, Lucilla mou. If you care to test me, take my hand and follow me.”
She curled her free hand into a fist to prevent her from doing just that. Not that she seriously wanted to get naked with Christos, but she was damn tempted to call his bluff. Because he was baiting her. He wasn’t serious, and they both knew it. And she would love nothing more than to make him admit it.
“Is this your famous seduction technique? I find it lacking in subtlety and quite amateurish indeed.”
His gaze glittered. “You prove my point with your refusal. You are a coward, Lucilla. This is why you cannot run the Chatsfield Hotels. You are not willing to take chances.”
A fresh wave of anger buffeted her. “Goading me will not get you anywhere. I can see through you, Christos. You want to prod me into doing something stupid. It would give you no greater pleasure than to make me look like an idiot.”
“You do that quite well on your own.”
She nearly choked on her own tongue. “How dare you.”
He arched an eyebrow, mocking her. “I dare because you will not. Because you are frightened, Lucilla. A spoiled little girl who cannot make the hard choices in life. I can, and I will, best you every time.”
“I hate you,” she whispered, her heart hammering hard.
“I am aware of this. And I am certain it can only make this flame between us burn hotter.”
“There is no flame. You’re deluded.” And yet her body was being eaten alive by excitement and anger and the very powerful urge to kiss this man, to see if she would incinerate with that single touch.
How had this … this weakness happened? One minute she was staring at her mother’s portrait and the next he was there and she was burning up inside. She told herself it was because she’d been feeling sad and vulnerable and she hadn’t yet gotten her defenses back up. That was the only way Christos could get to her like this.
He took a step closer to her, until there was hardly a breath separating them. “It is time to stop lying to yourself. You feel it the same as I do. You have felt it from the first moment, the same as I have. Let us burn together, Lucilla, and get this inconvenient attraction out of the way. We’ll work together much better once it’s done.”
She couldn’t breathe. He was taking up all the air, all the space, and she ached with his nearness. It was the final straw for her. She took a step backward, out of his orbit, and sucked in a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Christos, but I think you’ve got it all wrong. There is no attraction, at least not on my part. I can’t stand you and I certainly don’t want you. Now if you will excuse me, I have an event to supervise.”
“You can tell yourself that, but we both know it’s not true.”
“You don’t know anything about me,” she said tightly.
“Run away, Lucilla. But this isn’t over.”
She sucked in an angry breath. “I