he had assumed would be a simple task had turned into a marathon of endurance.
All he wanted to find was that one special musician, someone who could stroke a bow over the bridge of their violin and make his heart soar the way his grandmother had when she’d been alive. He would never claim to have a musical ear, but he was certain that when he heard it he would know.
The chosen violinist would be rewarded with the honour of playing his grandmother’s final composition, accompanied by his or her own orchestra, at his grandfather’s Jubilee Gala.
At that moment approximately a dozen Orchestre National de Paris violinists were lining up, ready to audition for him.
He just wanted it to be over.
The weak, impatient part of himself told him to settle on anyone. Everyone who had auditioned for him thus far had been professional, note-perfect, the sounds coming from their wooden instruments a delight to anyone’s ear. But they hadn’t been a delight to his heart, and for once in his life he knew he had to select the right person based on his heart, not his head.
For his grandfather’s Jubilee Gala he wouldn’t—couldn’t—accept anything or anyone but the best. His grandfather deserved no less. His grandmother’s memory deserved no less.
Flanked by the orchestra directors, an assistant and his own translator, they turned single file down a particularly narrow corridor. It was like being in an indoor, dank version of the glorious maze in the Agon palace gardens.
The violinists were lined up backstage; the rest of the musicians sat in the auditorium. He would already be seated at the front of the auditorium himself if roadworks hadn’t forced his driver to detour to the back of the theatre rather than drop him at the front.
His mind filled with the dozen other things he needed to be getting on with that he’d had to let slip these past two months. A qualified lawyer, he oversaw all sales, mergers and buyouts with regard to the business empire he’d forged with his two brothers. He didn’t always use his legal skills to get his own way.
Theseus, the middle Kalliakis brother, had identified an internet start-up seeking investment. If projections were correct, they would quadruple their investment in less than two months. Talos, though, had suspicions about the owners...
His thoughts about unscrupulous techies were cut away when a faint sound drifted out of a door to his left.
He paused, raising a hand in a request for silence.
His ears strained and he rested his head against the door.
There it was.
The only piece of classical music he knew by name.
A lump formed in his throat—a lump that grew with each passing beat.
Wanting to hear more clearly, but not wanting to disturb the violinist, he turned the handle carefully and pressed the door open.
An inch was enough to bring the solemn yet haunting music to life.
His chest filled, bittersweet memories engulfing him.
He’d been seven years old when his parents had died. The nights that had followed, before his brothers had been flown back from their English boarding school—he’d been only a year away from joining them there—had left him inconsolable.
Queen Rhea Kalliakis, the grandmother he’d adored, had soothed him the only way she knew how. She’d come into his room, sat on the edge of his bed and played the ‘Méditation’ from Jules Massenet’s Thaïs.
He hadn’t thought about this particular piece of music for over twenty-five years.
The tempo was different from the way his grandmother had played it, slower, but the effect was the same. Painful and yet soothing, like balm on a wound, seeping through his skin to heal him from the inside out.
This one had it—the special, elusive it.
‘That is the one,’ he said, addressing the orchestra directors collectively. His translator made the translation in French for them.
The sharp-faced woman to his left looked at him with a searching expression, as if judging whether he was serious, until her eyes lit up and, in her excitement, she flung the door open.
There, in the corner of the room, her violin still under her chin but her bow flailing in her right hand, stood a tall, lithe girl—woman. She had the distinct look of a rabbit caught in the headlights of a speeding car.
* * *
It was those eyes.
She had never seen anything like them before, nor such intensity.
The way they had fixed on her... Like lasers. Trapping her.
Amalie shivered to think of them.
She shivered again when she stepped out of the theatre exit and into the slushy car park. Keeping a firm grip on her violin case—she really needed to get the strap fixed—she tugged her red-and-grey striped beanie hat over her ears.
A long black car with darkened windows entered the car park and crunched its way through the snow to pull up beside her.
The back door opened and a giant got out.
It took a beat before her brain comprehended that it wasn’t a giant but Talos Kalliakis.
Intense, striking eyes—were they brown?—fixed on her for the second time in an hour. The effect was as terrifying and giddying the second time around. More so.
When the door of the practice room had swung open and she’d seen all those faces staring at her she’d wanted to shrink into a corner. She hadn’t signed up for the audition, but had been told to attend in case the orchestra as a whole was needed. She’d happily hidden away from the action in the room behind the auditorium; there, but not actually present.
Those eyes...
They had rested on her for so long she’d felt as if she’d been stuck in a time capsule. Then they had moved from her face and, without a bonjour or au revoir, he’d disappeared.
There hadn’t been time for her to appreciate the sheer size of the man.
She was tall for a woman—five foot eight. But Talos towered over her, a mass of height and muscle that not even his winter attire could hide.
Her mouth ran dry.
He wore his thick ebony hair slightly too long, messy at the front and curling over the collar of his long black trench coat. Dark stubble, also thick, abounded over his square jawline.
Despite the expensive cut of his clothing, right down to what were clearly handmade shoes, he had a feral air about him, as if he should be swinging through vines in a jungle whilst simultaneously banging his chest.
He looked dangerous. Wildly dangerous. The scar on his right eyebrow, which seemed to divide it into two, only added to this sense.
He also looked full of purpose.
He took the few steps towards her with long strides, an outstretched hand and an unsmiling face. ‘Amalie Cartwright, it is a pleasure to meet you,’ he said in perfect English.
How did he know she was bilingual?
God but the man was enormous. He had to be a good six and a half feet. Easily.
Swallowing frantically to moisten her mouth, Amalie switched her violin case to her left hand and extended her right to him. It was immediately engulfed in his strong, darkly bronzed hand. It was like being consumed by a giant paw. Even through the wool of her gloves she could feel the heat from his uncovered hand.
‘Monsieur Kalliakis,’ she murmured in response.
She tugged her hand free and hugged it around her violin case.
‘I require your attention. Please, get in the car,’ he said.
I