Chapter One #2
‘Ah, yes, I remember now.’
Suddenly Hope saw a hand in between them, emerging from a pristine white cuff under his jacket. She caught a glimpse of gold cufflinks. His hand was big and masculine. Long fingers, short blunt nails. Not soft from doing no work.
George sprang into action. ‘This is Hope Smith, Sara’s replacement.’
Hope felt a moment of absolute panic engendered by George’s warnings. Did she look up? Did she acknowledge him? Did she shake his hand?
But then she felt a distinct nudge and was galvanised into action. She stuck her hand into his and said quickly, ‘Very nice to meet you.’
His hand closed around hers and completely dwarfed it. Hope felt a strange kind of breathlessness and a zinging awareness through her body. She couldn’t help it—she looked up and her mouth dropped open.
He wasn’t human. She’d never seen anyone so beautiful in her life. Dark olive skin, thick black hair brushed back from a face so savagely handsome and perfect that she thought she might actually be having some kind of a vision.
His eyes were the colour of dark gold under long lashes and dark slashing brows.
Defined cheekbones. Strong jaw. His mouth was full and beautifully shaped, and looking at it made that strange feeling of something twisting inside her even tighter.
He was saying something but she couldn’t hear him.
It was as if her eyes were so overloaded with his sheer gorgeousness, her other senses had gone into cardiac arrest and stopped functioning.
Somehow she managed to pull herself together. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that.’
He was looking at her now as if she had two heads. ‘I said, it’s nice to meet you, Hope. Welcome to the team.’
‘I, OK, yes, thanks, me too.’ Hope shut her mouth.
She almost said Your Highness. Because this guy made her think of royalty.
He was seriously intimidating. He was also huge, at least a foot taller than her—not hard, she was on the small side of average—but he was broad and unmistakably ripped. Mere clothes couldn’t hide that.
He let her hand go and Hope put hers behind her back, curling it into a fist. He walked into the cabin now. He was carrying what looked like a slim laptop in a sleek case and, sure enough, when he sat down he pulled it out and opened it and started to work, a little frown between his eyebrows.
‘Hope…’
He should have looked overdressed in his three-piece suit but he didn’t. He looked—
‘Hope,’ George hissed beside her. She snapped out of her trance and looked away from the vision.
‘Yes.’
‘Get Mr Drakos’s coffee ready and then prepare for take-off.’
Hope scurried off before she could be fired before they’d even left the ground.
* * *
Axel did not like feeling distracted. It was a sign of weakness, not being able to focus with one hundred per cent of his attention. And usually, if there was a distraction he got rid of it. But that was not possible cruising at thirty-five thousand feet in the air, flying over mainland Europe.
And not when the distraction was about five feet three, and every one of those inches petite and slim.
He could span her waist with his hand. He could still recall the jolt that had gone through his system when she’d looked up at him from under that cap of bright, shining, short, curly blonde hair and revealed huge electric-blue eyes with long lashes, staring up at him as if she’d never seen a man before.
Her mouth, though, had been the most distracting thing. Wide and generous. A plump lower lip and a cupid’s bow upper lip.
Women didn’t usually impact Axel on such a gut-punch level. He liked sex but he pursued only women he found attractive and after careful consideration. The ones he could depend on knowing how the game worked.
A game of zero commitment on either side.
It had simply never occurred to him that a woman would feature in his life except to fulfil the role of being his wife and the function of mothering his heirs, so lovers were discreet and temporary.
He, unlike his ex-fiancée, had always been considerate of that public perception.
Axel also had a type. Tall. Slim. Elegant. Beautiful. Not short and built like some fey creature with eyes big enough to swallow him whole.
He shook his head at himself. He was discombobulated after Callista’s very inconveniently timed indiscretion.
That was all. He’d got complacent with their arrangement as it had been in place for so long but.
while it had been known within their sphere of peers and Greek society, it wasn’t more widely known.
He could take advantage of that now to find a suitable woman to date for the Baros event, someone who would be happy to make a temporary liaison look suitably serious until his team could find him a new wife with the right background—after the deal with Baros had been signed, sealed and delivered.
* * *
‘You’ll have to serve Mr Drakos lunch. This migraine is kicking in.’