CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FOUR
T HE ELEVATOR DOORS opened and Aristophanes stepped inside. He’d just finished up a meeting in his New York office in downtown Manhattan, and, according to his schedule, he had half an hour to get uptown to meet Claire, an astrophysicist who’d been working with CERN, and whom he’d been trying to match schedules with for the past week.
Or at least, his secretaries had been trying to match schedules. This was their third attempt to find an evening that suited both him and Claire, and, if this fell through, Aristophanes was thinking he might not bother at all. They’d met at a fundraiser and she’d been interesting, and there had been enough chemistry between them that he’d told her that if she’d wanted a liaison, he’d be happy to oblige. She had and so his secretarial team had swung into action.
Yet he was feeling restless and off kilter, and strangely enervated at the thought of sex with Claire. Almost as if he didn’t want her, which would be the fourth time this month that he hadn’t wanted a woman. It had been the same the month before that too.
If he really thought about it, he’d felt the same since he’d had that one night in Melbourne three months earlier, with the perfect little preschool teacher.
He didn’t like to think about that night. He didn’t like to think about what they’d done in her small bedroom in her small, cluttered flat. They hadn’t talked. They hadn’t had any kind of conversation at all; they’d let their bodies talk instead, their conversation wild and passionate, without boundaries or limits. They’d done everything and anything, and, for once in his life, his brain had gone quiet and still. Silenced by raw hunger and need.
He’d left her fast asleep the next morning, organising his doctor to give her a final check-up. Then he’d pushed her to the back of his mind as far as she would go. As far away from his consciousness as possible.
He’d been busy these past few months, flying between his offices in various countries, never staying too long anywhere, which was his preference. He’d paid a visit to Cesare Donati, a good friend—possibly his only friend—whom he’d known for years, and who was the owner of one of Italy’s largest private banks. Cesare had recently married a lovely Englishwoman called Lark, and had spent Aristophanes’ visit proudly showing off his little daughter, Maya, whom Aristophanes, who’d never had anything to do with children, found rather more interesting than he’d expected. The little girl had even lifted her arms to him, wanting to be picked up, so he had, then had felt oddly at a loss as to what to do next.
Maya had looked at him with big blue eyes, babbling on about something, and he, who knew many different languages and a lot of them fluently, hadn’t understood a word. He’d found himself staring at her in stunned silence, a nagging sensation in his chest that didn’t make any sense. The child was a mystery, and he loved a good mystery, a good, complicated puzzle, yet there was another part of him that wanted to put her down and get as far away from her as he could.
Having children of his own had never occurred to him and if he’d ever thought deeply about it, he would have said he didn’t want them. Children could not operate on his schedule, for a start, and he didn’t have enough time for them even if they could. They demanded too much, and he was a man who demanded of others. He did not meet their demands.
Still, he couldn’t deny that having Maya and Lark had changed Cesare’s life and for the better. His friend had found happiness, it was clear, and Aristophanes was pleased for him.
But family life was not and could not be for him.
He was a man of the mind, of the intellect, and it was cerebral topics that interested him, not home and hearth.
Aristophanes hit the button for the first floor and the elevator moved smoothly into life, descending through the sleek steel and glass skyscraper that housed the New York office of Katsaros International, and down into the vast, glass-ceilinged hall that was the foyer.
As Aristophanes stepped out, a gentle commotion at the imposing front desk caught his attention. A woman was standing on her tiptoes, her hands on the edges of the desk as she tried to make herself taller, leaning into it and saying something urgently to Karina, who managed the front desk.
A small woman. Wearing a voluminous black coat against the early spring New York weather, the shoulders of which were wet with rain. As was her auburn hair, hanging down her back in a thick braid.
Karina was shaking her head with emphasis, then she glanced over to the security guards near the entrance and gestured to them.
Aristophanes should have continued on. He should have walked right past the little woman making a fuss at his front desk. Many people wanted entrance to his building and many people were turned away. Certainly, if it was him they wanted to see then they were out of luck. His schedule was full for the next month.
So he wasn’t sure why he stopped dead in his tracks, his gaze fixed on the woman at the desk. There was something familiar about her. Something familiar about the thick auburn hair hanging down her back. It reminded him of that night in Melbourne, of Nell, his Burne-Jones angel with her thick and silky hair that he’d gathered in his fist as he’d driven inside her from behind, making her bed shake...
The woman turned her head slightly and an arrow of desire so intense it stopped his breath pierced him.
It was her.
Nell.
She hadn’t seen him, still talking urgently to Karina, who was now shaking her head as a couple of security guards came over. Clearly they were on the point of escorting Nell from the building.
His thoughts seemed to stop in their tracks, overwhelmed utterly by the reality of her, and then, with the same abruptness, they began to move again and this time at lightning speed.
She was here. In New York. In his building. Which must mean she wanted to see him. Why? He’d told her it could only be one night and she’d agreed. He’d left her sleeping and she’d been as good as her word. He hadn’t heard from her since.
Something must have changed, something urgent enough that she’d come to see him herself. Something important enough that it required a face-to-face meeting and out of the blue.
For a second his brain furiously sorted through all the possibilities until there was only one left. One that made him go icy with shock.
He’d thought they’d been careful with protection that night. Every time, he’d used a condom. Also, she’d told him she’d been on the pill in preparation for giving herself to that pathetic, ungrateful boyfriend of hers.
But...now he thought about it, he couldn’t remember using protection that first time up against her bedroom door. He’d been so hungry for her, so desperate, so motivated by his own base instinct, he hadn’t even thought about it.
There was a failure rate for the pill. It was slim, but it was there, and it only took once...
The shock penetrated the whole way through his body and then something else seemed to ignite in his chest. Smouldering, leaping into flame, burning hot...
She must be pregnant. That was why she was there, that was the only reason he could think of, and it would certainly explain the urgency with which she was talking. And how she gripped onto the front desk with her fingers as one of his security guards took her arm, trying to urge her away, then pulling...
‘Stop,’ Aristophanes said coldly, his voice echoing in the vaulted spaces of the foyer.
Everyone standing at the front desk froze, then turned.
And the fierce burning in his chest shifted and changed as Nell Underwood’s dark eyes met his then widened, her creamy skin flushing with colour. His body hardened almost instantly, his brain no help at all as images of their night together began playing in his head.
Ruthlessly, he shoved them aside, ignored the demands of his body, and strode over to where Nell was standing, staring at him like a deer in the headlights of a car. ‘Leave this to me,’ he ordered to the security guards and Karina, who all obediently went back to their posts as if nothing had happened. Then he looked down into Nell’s beautiful face. ‘You,’ he said. ‘You’re coming with me.’
It wasn’t a question and he didn’t give her a chance to protest. He took her arm in an unbreakable grip and urged her over to the elevators.
‘I’m coming, I’m coming,’ she said irritably, though she didn’t resist him. ‘You don’t need to manhandle me. I was actually here to see you.’
‘I thought as much.’ He hit the button for his private elevator and, though every base instinct in his body was screaming at him to keep hold of her, he released his grip on her arm. ‘You didn’t have an appointment.’
The doors opened smoothly and he ushered her inside. As they shut, he pressed the button for his office and the elevator began to rise.
‘No, I didn’t.’ She’d taken a few steps away from him, as if she wanted to put some distance between them. It grated on his nerves for reasons he couldn’t have explained. Her hands moved restlessly, adjusting her coat and smoothing her damp hair. ‘That woman at the front desk told me it was impossible to see you,’ she said, her familiar voice clear as a bell. ‘That you were booked up for an entire month, and even if there was a space in your schedule, you wouldn’t be able to see me, because you were far too important.’
‘I am,’ he said without irony, because it was no less than the truth. ‘However, I find I have some time now.’ He didn’t, of course. Claire was waiting for him. Yet Claire seemed to be the least important thing to him in this moment.
Nell’s dark gaze was wary, but that little chin of hers was stubborn. He remembered taking it in his fingers, remembered how warm her skin had been and how silky it had felt. ‘Why now?’ she asked.
‘Because you are here.’ He met her gaze head-on. ‘I thought I told you that you weren’t to contact me again.’
‘You did.’ She made another nervous adjustment to her coat. ‘And believe me, I wouldn’t have done so. But...’ A breath escaped her and she swallowed. ‘I need to tell you something.’
He could smell her scent, sweet and tantalising, and the fire in his chest seemed to burn brighter, hotter. He was going to be so late for Claire, but, now that he was here in this elevator with Nell, he couldn’t think of anything he wanted less than to leave and find a different woman. A woman who wasn’t Nell.
Remember why she’s here.
Ah, yes. There was that.
‘Yes,’ Aristophanes said. ‘You’re here to tell me you’re pregnant.’
Nell had no idea how he’d guessed. She was too busy trying to get some air into her lungs, an impossible task when Aristophanes seemed to take up every square inch of the extremely small space of the elevator. And not only with his tall, muscular body, but also with the electrical charge of his magnetic presence.
He was so very intense.
She hadn’t forgotten how beautiful he was, but she had forgotten how physically devastating he was in the flesh. She could almost feel her body readying itself for him, which was disconcerting in the extreme, especially since it had been three months since she’d last seen him. Apparently, though, it didn’t matter how long it had been. She still wanted him with the same hunger as she had back then.
The past six weeks had been such a roller coaster. First there had been the shock of discovering she was pregnant and then a barrage of appointments to make sure everything was looking as it should. Then there had been the nausea and exhaustion of early pregnancy, as well as the uncertainty of what she was going to do about the baby.
That she was going to keep it had never been in doubt—she’d always wanted children and, despite the timing being horrendous, she desperately wanted to keep this one. However, she felt very strongly that a child should have two parents. She’d lost hers so early and it was a constant grief to her, and she couldn’t imagine her own child not having them.
It made letting Aristophanes know he was going to be a father imperative. She’d decided to wait until after the twelve-week mark just to be sure, but after emails, phone calls and requests to speak with him had all fallen through, she’d eventually booked a ticket to New York since that was where he apparently was for the next month. She hadn’t had much in the way of savings, but it had been enough for a flight and some cheap accommodation, which wasn’t very cheap because it was New York.
She’d debated about how to tell him, because he’d been very clear he didn’t want to see her again and likely wouldn’t welcome the news he was going to be a father. But that was too bad. She didn’t want his money; she wanted only his presence in their child’s life. That was all.
So all the way on that long, interminable flight from Melbourne to JFK, she’d gone over and over in her head what she was going to say to him. How she was going to tell him. Then, in the end, he’d taken the words straight out of her mouth.
The pedantic fool.
She stood in her damp coat, in the too-small space of the elevator, staring into his silver eyes. Conscious once again of his physical beauty. He was even taller than she remembered, his magnificent physique clad in what had to be a handmade suit of dark grey wool that seemed to highlight every inch of his broad shoulders and wide chest. His pristine black shirt was offset with a silver silk tie the exact colour of his eyes, and she wished she’d chosen something better to wear than the cheap rust-red dress she’d bought at a chain store because it was stretchy and would go over the little bump that was beginning to show.
Sadly, it was too late for that. She hadn’t had the money to buy anything decent anyway, not after the extortionate flight had been paid for.
She shivered as his intense silver gaze scanned her from the top of her damp head to the wet black leather of her pumps, and back up again. The elevator seemed to get smaller and smaller, the air in it thicker and thicker.
‘Thanks for completely ruining my announcement,’ she said, unable to hide her irritation. She hadn’t been in his presence more than a minute and already he was getting under her skin. How he managed to do that, she couldn’t fathom.
The first few weeks after their night together, she’d pushed him firmly to the back of her mind, because he’d said they’d never see each other again, and she’d agreed. Then after she’d discovered she was pregnant, the night they’d spent together had flooded back into her consciousness and had been taunting her ever since.
She’d thought she wouldn’t want him again. She’d thought that one night was enough. Yet here she was, cold and jet-lagged and irritable, and all she could think about was putting her hands on his broad chest and pulling the buttons of his shirt open, pressing her mouth to his skin, tasting him...
Aristophanes tilted his head, the silver in his eyes glittering brighter as his gaze roved hungrily over her. And yes, it was hungry. The three months since she’d last seen him might as well not have existed. He might have been standing once again in the hallway of her small flat, staring at her as though he wanted to eat her alive.
Nell swallowed, her irritation turning into something more intense yet no less unsettling, her heartbeat thumping loudly in her ears.
The tension filling the elevator car felt almost unbearable.
‘Mr Katsaros,’ she began determinedly.
Abruptly and without a word, he dropped the briefcase he was carrying and took two steps towards her, forcing her back against the rail that ran around the interior of the elevator at waist height.
The look in his eyes burned, making an intense burst of wild excitement flood through her in response, an excitement she’d only ever felt once before: in his arms.
Oh, Lord, he wanted her and badly.
Slowly and with intent, he put one hand on the rail next to her, then the other hand, caging her against it the way he’d caged her against the door back in her Melbourne flat. And now, as then, she was acutely conscious of his warmth, of the musky spice of his aftershave.
It was intoxicating. She hadn’t realised how cold she’d been until he was here.
He didn’t move, only stared at her, his gaze searching her face as if looking for something. She couldn’t get enough air, the only sound her heartbeat thumping crazily in her ears.
‘Don’t,’ she breathed shakily, even though he hadn’t said anything or moved another inch. She only knew if he did, she’d be lost, and she didn’t want to be lost, not with this baby literally between them. Also, they needed to talk, not do... this .
‘Don’t?’ he echoed, a thread of heat running through his deep, dark voice like fire in a coal seam. ‘Don’t what?’
Her breathing was getting faster and faster, the physical electricity he was throwing off making it difficult to think. He was standing so close, the gap between them mere inches.
‘This,’ she breathed, her voice husky. ‘Don’t do...this.’
Again, he didn’t move closer, only lifted a hand and took her chin in his large, warm fingers, tilting her head back to look at him. His gaze burned so brightly she couldn’t look away.
‘Three months,’ he murmured, his attention dropping to her mouth and then back up again. ‘That’s how long it’s been since I’ve had a woman. And that’s all your fault.’
Something inside her dropped away.
He hadn’t slept with anyone in three months? Was he serious? There really had been no one since her?
‘M-my fault?’ she said unsteadily.
‘Yes, yours.’ His thumb stroked over her bottom lip, making her tremble. ‘Every woman I have tried to spend time with hasn’t interested me, and I thought it was because I’ve been working too hard. I thought it was because I was tired.’ He paused, a flame in his eyes. ‘Then you suddenly appear in my goddamn building, and now all I can think about is how to get you naked as quickly as humanly possible.’
The warmth of his touch was radiating through her entire body, chasing away the cold and the irritation, and somehow the jet lag too. She felt like a sunflower starved of light, turning towards the sun.
You didn’t come here for sex, remember? You came here to talk.
That was true, but she’d felt nothing but uncertain for weeks and weeks. She’d been physically sick and anxious, and afraid of what would happen with the baby, what her life would look like after it was born. And now he was here and he wanted her with the same fierceness as he’d wanted her three months earlier. He’d made her feel so good, so beautiful and sexy, and desirable, and she wanted more of that; she couldn’t deny it.
So why couldn’t she have it? Have one more good experience before reality hit. A few more moments of pleasure, before her child arrived and took over her world.
He was still a stranger to her as much as he had been that night, but she didn’t care. She hadn’t realised how badly she’d been craving his touch until now.
‘I...’ She couldn’t stop looking at his mouth, remembering how it had felt on her skin. Remembering its softness and the dark taste of him. ‘I...don’t think this is a good idea.’
‘I disagree.’ His head dipped, his mouth inches from hers. ‘Did you know I was on my way to see someone else tonight when you turned up?’
‘No.’ The word escaped her on a sigh, the only thing of any importance his mouth so close to hers. ‘I didn’t know.’
‘Woman, this is the second time you’ve ruined my evening plans.’
Nell wanted him to kiss her more than she’d wanted anything in her entire life. ‘Perhaps it’s fate,’ she breathed.
‘I don’t care what it is.’ His voice had deepened into that low growl that stroked over her skin like a hand. ‘But if you don’t want to have sex in this elevator, I suggest you tell me now.’
It was the raw note in the words that got her. The desperation that turned her inside out. She hadn’t been able to resist his hunger for her all those months ago and she couldn’t resist it now. She lifted her hands, took his face between them and pulled his mouth down on hers.
The kiss was blinding, a fire that once ignited couldn’t be put out and it blazed high.
He made a rough sound in the back of his throat and abruptly his hands were on her hips, lifting her effortlessly onto the rail at her back. Then he glanced down, touching the little bump of her stomach almost in greeting, before pushing up her dress and spreading her knees wide so he could stand between them.
She gasped as he caressed the outside of her thighs then shuddered as his fingers slid inward, seeking more sensitive parts of her. A harsh sound of male satisfaction broke from him as he pulled aside her underwear and stroked over the slick heat of her sex, discovering how wet she was already for him.
She liked that sound. It thrilled her, as did the pleasure flooding through her, saturating every cell, making her arch back against the wall, glorying in his touch.
He bent his head then and kissed her again, devouring her utterly as his fingers teased and caressed her slick flesh, making her shift and move against his hand, desperate for more.
‘Tell me where you want me,’ he demanded, low and rough against her mouth. ‘Tell me exactly.’
Nell was trembling, remembering how he’d demanded similar things from her that night they’d spent together and how she’d given them to him. Every single thing.
She wanted to do the same now.
‘I want you inside me,’ she said huskily, unable to hide the desperation in her voice.
He lifted his head, silver eyes burning. ‘Now? Here?’
‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Now. Here. Please...’
He didn’t wait.
Almost in one movement, he turned, hit the stop button on the elevator, then turned back to her, tearing open his trousers and freeing himself. Then he gripped her hips and pushed hard and deep inside her, making her groan at the delicious burn and stretch of him.
It was too good. Too perfect. He made all her jet lag and cold and exhaustion just disappear and she didn’t know how, but she didn’t question it. She felt better than she had for months and she wanted more.
He’d paused, deep inside her, and she didn’t look away as he stared at her, letting him know how good he was making her feel without words. Then she lifted her hand and touched his face, her fingers trembling, mesmerised by the feel of his skin. Warm and smooth, and yet some parts of it rough with whiskers.
He’d been beautiful back in Melbourne and he was still beautiful now.
He began to move, a slow rhythm that made her twist and arch against him, the fever beginning to build inside her until she had no idea where she was or even who she was. She only knew the pleasure growing wider, deeper, vaster than space.
‘You,’ she whispered to him, falling headlong into the melted silver of his eyes. ‘What are you doing to me?’
‘Only what you’re doing to me.’ He took her mouth again in a raw, demanding kiss that sent every last remaining thought from her head.
There was nothing after that. Nothing except the bonfire of pleasure they built between them, the flames leaping high. Then a final blaze into the sky with a wild rush of sparks before falling back, leaving both of them nothing but glowing embers.
She rested her forehead against his shoulder, panting as her heartbeat began to slow, the aftershocks still rocking her. He didn’t move, a warm wall of hard muscle for her to rest against, and so she did.
She didn’t want to think about what would happen next.
She didn’t want to think at all.
She’d just had sex with the father of her child within minutes of meeting him for the second time. And she had no idea at all what she was going to do with that.