Chapter Two #2
The waiter handed the recognisably expensive bottle across, so Dante could curl his hands around the ice-cold neck and unfurl the metal. Alone once more, he was conscious of the way Charlotte’s eyes lingered on his hands as they worked, of the way she seemingly couldn’t look elsewhere.
‘Then if you’re not pregnant, why the sudden urge to get married?’
She rolled her eyes in a gesture he found ridiculously juvenile but also somehow appealing. He ground his teeth, momentarily put off by that.
When this whole thing started off, it was easy as pie.
They’d met through a charity function, hit it off and fallen into bed, despite the fact he’d been completely sexless since his divorce—hadn’t even felt a hint of attraction for another woman, in fact.
Charlotte had been different though. Beautiful, but impish and irreverent.
He’d found her fascinating and, for no specific reason, he’d wanted her, like a lightning bolt bursting through him.
A great night ensued, with absolutely no promises.
The only promise Dante felt he could ever give another woman was that he didn’t do promises.
But a week later, they’d bumped into one other at yet another event.
This time it was the birthday party of a mutual friend—though Dante used the term loosely as Howard Kernshaw was more of an associate than friend.
The same sparks that had ignited at their first meeting burst to life once more.
They hadn’t even made it back to his place—a broom closet at the venue had been pushed into service.
The next time, it had been the back of his limo, after leaving another charity event.
But after that, a month had stretched without a chance meeting and despite no shortage of options in the women-who’d-happily-jump-his-bones department, he’d found himself totally unmoved.
He just wanted another night with Charlotte.
And then another. Craving in a way that he’d taught himself not to crave, not to want. Not ever, ever to need again.
And so, before he’d weakened, he’d come up with some black and white rules to protect himself if they were going to get involved.
It had to be on his terms, but she had to know about them beforehand.
This wasn’t a relationship. It was sex. And so long as they both wanted that, both enjoyed it and had fun together, he had no problems with the uncomplicated nature of their relationship.
Knowing how black and white this was meant they could also do this sometimes, too. Go for dinner, share pleasantries, swap superficial stories about their lives, but it was always surface level, as one might entertain a prospective colleague or client.
This—what she was doing now—was getting messy. Personal.
He tapped his fingers against his knee, willing his hard-on to calm the hell down, because it didn’t matter that she was wearing that silky camisole top he adored the feel of, what she was doing now was moving the goal posts into what Dante considered an absolute danger zone—one he never, ever intended to enter again.
God knew the first time had almost killed him.
He still carried the wounds of that marriage, though he would never admit as much to another soul.
‘I’m going to tell you something that no one other than Jane and my mother know about me.’
Her tongue darted out and licked her lower lip in a gesture that spoke, plainly, of nervousness. And he’d never, ever seen Charlotte nervous before. Not when addressing a swanky crowd of thousands of would-be benefactors. Not when he’d first approached her. Not ever.
‘But before I do, I need you to promise me something.’
‘Why?’
She rolled her eyes again. His fingers itched with a desire to reach for her and pull her into his lap, to kiss her until her eyes were rolling back in her head for a whole other reason.
‘Because this is very, very confidential and needs to be handled sensitively.’ She glanced around furtively, as though a dozen reporters might be about to jump out with boom mics in their faces.
‘Okay, you have my word.’
‘You won’t tell anyone what I’m about to say?’
‘Cristo, Charlotte, did you assassinate JFK or something?’
‘Yeah, one of my little-known skills is an ability to time travel.’ She bit into her lower lip, clearly so unsettled now that he took pity on her.
He reached out and topped up her empty champagne flute. ‘I’m listening.’
She nodded, looked around once more, then started to speak. ‘This is about my father,’ she whispered, so softly he almost didn’t hear.
‘Your father?’ He relaxed a little. He’d never heard her mention her father.
He’d always presumed she didn’t have one.
Which was absurd, because everyone had both a mother and father in some form or another, but he’d presumed hers had died.
Or that she had no idea who he was. Actually, he hadn’t really put much time into thinking about it at all, or he might have asked.
Except, that would have been breaking one of his rules.
|So no, actually, he would never have asked.
She nodded once.
‘What about him?’
‘The thing is, I’ve never met him.’ Her throat shifted as she swallowed.
‘Why not?’
‘His choice,’ she said. ‘And then, I suppose, mine. Not that he changed his mind, but even if he had, I would have taken great delight in screaming “hell, no” down the phone line.’ Her smile lacked humour. ‘But he didn’t change his mind. He didn’t ask. At least, not until recently.’
Dante’s frown deepened. That was interesting.
What might have occurred in a man’s life that he would decide, out of the blue, to reach out to his twenty-four-year-old daughter?
Then again, Charlotte was starting to make a name for herself on the charity circuit.
He knew—not from her—that some big corporates had been headhunting her for a while, offering eye watering salaries to have her come join them.
Maybe the dropkick dad thought he could get some money from his daughter?
The conversation was veering dangerously close to the ground they always assiduously avoided. Personal details were anathema to them. He wanted to remind her of that, even when he’d agreed to have this conversation.
‘I hate him, Dante.’
Dante tilted his head to the side, considering that.
His own parents had died in a helicopter crash—along with his grandfather—when he was eight years old.
He had loved them, as all children love their parents.
He wished he’d had a chance to know them better, but there hadn’t been the chance for that.
His grandmother had raised him from that point on.
‘I know that sounds harsh, but this guy...’
Charlotte was intelligent and fiercely determined when it came to the charities she championed, but there was a kindness to her that she worked hard to hide. For her to say she hated someone, he knew it was a big deal.
‘He ruined my mother’s life,’ she finished carefully. ‘And made it abundantly clear that he wished I’d never been born.’
Dante could only imagine living with that reality. It went some of the way to explaining why Charlotte had developed a tougher than nails exterior. She was a fighter. Evidently, she’d been fighting from birth.
‘But now he wants to meet you,’ Dante prompted.
‘His circumstances have changed. His wife passed away recently. She was the reason I was a big, dirty secret.’
She dipped her head a little, her cheeks flushed.
‘He had an affair with your mother?’
‘A very brief affair.’
‘I see.’
Charlotte shook her head. ‘My mother loved him. She thought it was mutual, but he lied to her.’
He nodded, even though she wasn’t looking at him. Her shoulders were hunched, and she seemed so small and fragile. Somehow, he felt the stirring to life of an ancient, protective instinct.
‘Anyway—’ as she glanced up at him, her green eyes had renewed focus and determination, ‘—he has this company and I can take control of it, but only if I’m married. So, I want to get married.’
Dante frowned, not following. ‘But why?’
‘Because it’s my birth right,’ she said carefully. ‘He denied me my place in his life. He ignored me. He ignored my mother. He made us conceal my connection to him. But now, there’s a way I can do something to fix that. No, not to fix it,’ she amended. ‘But to become impossible to ignore.’
Dante still wasn’t following. What kind of company would Charlotte be interested in? Would she really care about taking up the mantle of a business just to have a place in her father’s life?
‘It’s a valuable company,’ she said, reaching for her champagne and taking a sip. ‘I haven’t had long to work it all out, but I’d plan to break it up, selling off parts of it and using the money for the charities I support. It could be life changing to so many people.’
Now, it was beginning to make sense.
‘And it all starts with getting married.’
Dante’s gut dropped to the floor. The protective instinct was still there, but she was asking the impossible of him. ‘I’m never getting married again, Charlotte.’
There. He’d said it. It should have given him some relief, but all Dante felt was hollowed out, just like he had in the immediate aftermath of his divorce. For the first time in his life, Dante had had to face defeat and he hated it.
‘This wouldn’t be a real marriage, though,’ she insisted, imploring him to listen with those wide eyes and generously curved red lips. ‘I mean, it would be the best parts of a marriage. Sex and privacy.’
Despite the pervasive ache in his belly, a smile tugged at his lips, even as he was shaking his head. ‘It’s not going to happen, Shaw.’
She closed her eyes and expelled a breath. ‘What about your Nonna?’
He recognised her question for what it was: expert negotiating. Brutal and effective.
‘You told me about her,’ Charlotte reminded him and inwardly, Dante cursed. Because he had told her about Allegra San Marino. But it had been a brief conversation, months earlier. A rare lapse when it was Dante who’d briefly broken their rules. He was surprised she’d even remembered.
‘You told me she’s desperate for you to get married. That she’s getting old and frail. That you wish you could give that to her.’
His eyes narrowed as the conversation replayed through his mind. ‘And you told me I was barking up the wrong tree if I expected you to marry me. You told me you never planned to marry either.’
Charlotte nodded. ‘Things change.’
‘Not this. Not for me.’
‘Dante, I don’t know what happened between you and your wife—,’
Visions of his ex, Jamie, flooded his brain.
Jamie when he’d first met her, so beautiful and innocent, Jamie on their wedding day, Jamie pregnant, Jamie losing the baby, Jamie pregnant again, another loss, another pregnancy, another loss.
The endless round of doctors’ appointments, of tests or hormone injections, of bed rest, of grief and a sense of failure and, finally, his refusal to try ever again because he couldn’t—wouldn’t—go through it or put her through it.
‘What happened isn’t relevant,’ he said, curtly. Harshly. He couldn’t help it. His failed marriage struck a nerve. It always would.
‘Okay, that’s fine. I can respect that. But I’m going to go out on a limb and say you’ve got some baggage around it. I get it. Which is why I’m making it abundantly clear to you that I don’t want either of us to think of this as a marriage. It would just be...a mutually beneficial arrangement.’
‘No.’
She pouted, lost in thought. He felt a groan building in the pit of his gut. He didn’t want to have this conversation with Charlotte. He wanted to take her home, to his bed, and kiss her senseless then make love to her all night long. That’s what they were. That’s what made sense.
But if she kept insisting on this damned marriage, he knew it would be the end.
The whole premise of this was uncomplicated—and she was going ahead and complicating it in a way he really resented.
‘Let me ask you this. How can you be sure your father is being honest?’
She furrowed her brow.
‘You clearly don’t like the guy. And he obviously hasn’t had your best interests at heart all this time. So why do you think the whole “get married and I’ll give you the business thing” is for real?’
‘It wasn’t my father who told me about the clause; it was his lawyers.’
Dante shrugged. ‘So?’
‘They’re not going to risk their licences by lying to me.’
‘I cannot think of any company that would have marriage as a prerequisite to ownership.’
‘It’s a very old company.’
He shook his head, dismissing that. Something about this wasn’t adding up, and Dante didn’t like things that didn’t make sense.
‘Look, Dante, I need to know you won’t say anything.’
His nostrils flared with indignation. Did she take him for a gossip? ‘I’ve already given you my word.’
She lifted one hand placatingly.
‘My father—that is to say, my biological father—is,’ she glanced around, making sure no one was close. ‘Aristotle Papandreo.’
He shook his head in a natural reaction to that. Aristotle Papandreo was Charlotte’s father?
‘I see you’ve heard of him.’
Who hadn’t?
‘I’ve met his son,’ Dante said, slowly, connecting the dots then nodding once. ‘In fact, I’ve met your father, too.’
Charlotte looked hurt. Wounded. Like an animal being hunted. She covered it quickly, but not before he saw the look of betrayal in her eyes.
She shrugged though, like it didn’t matter.
‘Are you telling me you can take control of the Papandreo Group just by getting married?’
She bit into her lower lip. ‘Getting married before Zeus Papandreo does.’
Aristotle’s brows shot upwards. ‘Well, that shouldn’t be a problem. The man’s hardly known for his interest in commitment.’
‘But he’s obsessed with that company. He’ll do whatever it takes to keep hold of it.’
Dante grunted. It was a lot to take in—the kind of curve ball he could have had no way of predicting.
Before Jamie, he might have tried to help Charlotte. In fact, he knew he would have. Before Jamie, he’d been a completely different person. But now, Dante knew better than to even start trying to fix things.
‘I’m sorry, Charlotte,’ he said, and he really meant it. ‘There is one thing I know for absolute certain. I’m never getting married again.’
He stood up, ignoring the dull, twisting of regret deep in his core, because this was—and had to be—the end for them. It had just been sex—easily replaceable, in theory—yet he didn’t relish the idea of never seeing her again. Which was all the more reason to get the hell out of there.
He reached down and tilted her chin, meeting her eyes. ‘Good luck, cara. I hope you find what you’re looking for.’
And then, he walked out, because it was the right—and only—thing he could do.