Blackmailed by the Greek's Vows Read online

  Pleasure was a fork in her spine, setting fire along her nerves. She could feel that thick rigidness inside her, could see the tight control etched onto his features as he moved inside her. She craved the softening of his gaze, the few moments of the real Kairos, tender and caring, that she used to glimpse after he found his release.

  And she still wanted that man. Like a puppy that had been kicked but still came back for more.

  His mouth was at her cheekbone and his stubble chafed her lips. A wet, open kiss at her pulse. “I have other uses for you, wife...along with a few more months in my bed.” His hands moved to cup her buttocks and pulled her against his hardness.

  His mouth trailed lazily along her jawline, heading for her lips—the depth of her want, the fire along her skin—and she could taste the release in her fevered muscles.

  “Admit defeat, Valentina. You can pretend all you want but your best bet is to be a rich man’s trophy wife. It is not a bad role for you. Accept your limitations. Adjust your expectations. Just as I did when your brother Luca stood in the way of the Conti board CEO position. I want nothing more from a wife, and who knows? You can maybe even persuade me to give this marriage another try.”

  He was angry she had walked out.

  No, not angry, she realized, running shaking hands through her hair.

  He was furious with an icy, cold edge to it. Every word and caress of his was meant to provoke her with its cruelty. She’d never seen him like that.

  It was more temper than she’d seen of him in all of their relationship so far—and, by God, she’d done every awful thing she could think of to provoke it.

  But he wasn’t asking her back. He didn’t want to give their marriage another chance. He didn’t want to give her a chance.

  No, all he wanted was a sop to his male ego. All he wanted was to punish her for daring to leave him, for calling him out on his ruthless ambition.

  That pain gave her a rope with which to climb out of the sensual haze. To deny herself what she’d never been able to before—his touch.

  “Please, Kairos, release me.”

  The moment the words were out of her mouth, he let her go. Pupils drenched with lust, he stared at her as if he couldn’t believe she could put a stop to it.

  Shaking but determined to hold herself up, she met his gaze. “What do I have to do to get you to agree to a divorce? To get you to leave me alone?”

  He looked taken aback but recovered fast. “Three months as my wife.”

  “Why? Why do you need me now? Other than because you want to punish me for walking out on you?”

  “I have a debt to pay to Theseus.”

  “The man who brought you home from the streets, the one who adopted you?”

  “Ne.”

  “And for this, you need to have a wife?”

  “Yes. His daughter Helena—”

  “Is causing trouble between you and him? You want me to take her on? I don’t understand how your wife’s presence will help...” The words trailed away from her lips as she saw his closed off expression. A mocking laugh rose. “Non, I’ve got it, I think. The daughter wants you and you want to say no without hurting anyone’s feelings. How noble of you, Kairos.”

  His brow cleared, relief dawning in his eyes. “Theseus deserves nothing less from me.”

  The depth of his sincerity shook Tina. She had never seen Kairos feel that strongly about anyone or anything. Except wealth and power and the amassing of it.

  “This is the only way you get your divorce, Valentina.”

  “You cannot drag me back into that life against my will.”

  “But I can fight the divorce proceedings. Make your life into the media circus that you suddenly appear to abhor. And even worse, one wrong word or move from me toward you will bring forth your brothers’ fury upon me and their interference in your life...if you truly intend to make it on your own, that would be hell.”

  Tina stared at him, amazed despite the anger pouring through her. He was calling her bluff about all this—the new direction she wanted to take in life.

  She was damned if she answered it, damned if she didn’t. She didn’t want to spend another moment with him and yet he had left her no choice.

  She sighed. “You will release me when things are clarified?”

  “When things are clarified to my satisfaction, yes. No sooner. I’m warning you, Valentina, I want a perfect wife. No tantrums. No reckless escapades. You could even leave with the fat settlement the divorce will award you with the satisfaction that you’ve truly earned it. A novel feeling, I assure you.”

  “And if I sleep with you to earn it, you will have truly made me a whore, si, Kairos? Will your dented ego be repaired then? Because, hear me out, Kairos. My body might be willing but my heart is not.”

  The growl he swallowed down filled her with vicious satisfaction.

  Valentina smiled for the first time in nine months.

  Now all she’d have to do was convince herself of what she had told him.

  CHAPTER THREE

  WHAT DO I have to do to get you to leave me alone?

  She truly wanted out of their marriage.

  The realization moved through Kairos like an earthquake as he stared down at her sleeping form in the rear cabin of his private jet.

  He’d only thought of how he would punish her when he found her. How good she would feel under him once again. How he would provoke her temper until she came at him all explosive fury and uncontained passion.

  But she’d done nothing of the sort.

  Oh, she’d lost control a couple of times and given him back as much as he’d deserved, but that was nothing to the Valentina he had known.

  It was as if he was looking at a stranger.

  If I sleep with you to earn it, you will have truly made me a whore.

  Christos, only she could find such an appalling twist to what he had suggested.

  But then since he was blackmailing her into his bed, was it any wonder that she had fought dirty?

  He should have been impervious to her passionate, fiery declarations after ten months of living with her and her infamous tempers. Should have been unaffected by the sounds of her moans, the slide of her lithe body against his when he touched her.

  That he wasn’t, disconcerted him on a level he didn’t understand.

  His physical need for her and only her, and the fact that neither the sweet Stella nor any of the women who had readily offered him a place in their bed in the nine months since Valentina had walked out on him had remotely even tempted him, he could still somehow explain.

  Like she had so crudely pointed out, Valentina was explosive in bed. He had been more than surprised when he’d discovered her virginity on their wedding night.

  Valentina, as he’d quickly learned to his tremendous satisfaction, was an utterly sensual creature. Whatever he had taught her in bed, she’d not only taken to it enthusiastically but her innate curiosity for his body, her relentless eagerness to return every pleasure he had shown her. That she had remained untouched had been a shock.

  She possessed a quick temper and an even quicker sexual trigger, and Christos, he’d reveled in making her explode to his slightest caresses. Tender and drawn-out, or explosive and fast, her passion had matched his own.

  No man could be blamed for becoming obsessed like he had.

  He needed Valentina with a fervor he didn’t care or need to understand, and he would have her.

  But the hurt in her eyes as he had dealt one cruel statement after the other, hoping to get her temper to rise, festered like an unhealed wound in the hours since he’d arranged for them to travel to Greece.

  He should be grateful that the blinders were torn from her eyes. That she would not look at him anymore as if he were her knight in shining armor. Or the man who’d fulfilled all her romantic fantasies.

  Whether they divorced or not, it was a good thing she had finally learned the truth.

  He had no familiarity or place in his life fo
r tender feelings or love. They demanded a price he couldn’t afford, however wealthy he had become.

  But the sight of her huge brown eyes as he’d torn her into shreds with his words wouldn’t leave him alone. He hadn’t pulled any of his punches and she had taken them as if they were her due.

  He didn’t believe for a second that Valentina would stick to her chosen path or that she had what it took to succeed in her career.

  She was just too undisciplined, too impulsive, too spoilt for the hard work it entailed. But still, for the first time in his life, Kairos felt as if he had stood up to the title that had haunted him all his childhood.

  Bastard.

  He was a bastard.

  For even knowing that she would end up in his bed, even acknowledging that something intrinsic had changed in Valentina and he was the one who had caused it, knowing that he would hurt her, he still couldn’t walk away from her.

  Neither would he keep her.

  For all that she’d professed her love for him, she had proved that she was like the rest—using love as manipulation, and then breaking her word.

  No one was important enough for him to risk that, to forget the lesson he had already learned.

  Love was nothing but a game.

  * * *

  For all your avowals, you left. You proved how little your words mean.

  The words and the sentiment behind them stung Tina as she lathered up in the small shower cubicle.

  Had there been an infinitesimal thread of complaint in Kairos’s tone? Was she just reading too much when there was nothing again?

  She had, at every available moment and opportunity, prostrated her feelings at his feet. Made a spectacle of herself.

  How dare he think she’d given in too easily?

  She wrapped a towel around herself, and stepped out.

  Designer-label bags in every size and color covered the bed.

  Mothership to Valentina... Calling now.

  A soft sigh emerged from her lips.

  She lasted nineteen seconds before she pulled the soft tissue out of the first bag and discovered a black cold-shoulder blouse and white capri pants. More casual pants and blouses. She counted four dresses ranging from a cocktail dress to a pale pink ball gown that would show off her tan beautifully.

  Small, silky tissue bags of underwear and everything in her size. Makeup bags with her favorite lipsticks and perfumes with designer labels.

  The bras were from the designer label she loved and sinfully expensive—two of them she had discovered recently would pay for her food for a month. And of the push-up kind she’d always preferred to make the most of her nonexistent boobage.

  Sliding to the bed in her towel, Tina fingered the butter-soft cushioning of a push-up bra. In some throwaway remark he had made once when they’d watched an old Hollywood movie, she’d realized her husband had a thing for big breasts.

  And hers were meager at best. So, like an idiot female, she’d gone on a rampage with lingerie, bras especially, and in the end there had been more cushioning and padding in her bra than flesh on her body.

  One evening, she’d gone with an extreme push-up bra to a party—her boobs, exposed by a low neckline, almost kissing her chin and barely covering her nipples. Kairos had blown his top and called her entire outfit trampy—the first time in their marriage that he’d lost it.

  He’d said, in clipped tones, that her need for every man’s attention made her the shallowest woman he’d ever met. And then he’d walked out for the night.

  She frowned.

  For all his smarts, hadn’t Kairos realized that she’d gone from one outrageous outfit to the next to get a rise out of him? To make up for what she thought she was lacking, for him? That from the moment Leandro had introduced her to him, she hadn’t thought of another man ever again?

  Why did she have to go to such extremes to please him?

  Why was she even now, making such a big deal about the fact that he’d remembered the size of her underwear, of all things?

  Kairos had a mind like a super computer, remembering every small detail that went in. It had no significance.

  “A starved dog would look at meat scraps with less hunger,” said a dry voice from the doorway.

  Tina stood up and tugged the towel up.

  He had also changed—a gray V-necked sweater that hugged his biceps and chest and dark jeans that caressed his muscular thighs. She had to swallow the feminine sigh of appreciation that wanted to come out.

  “Old dogs can learn new tricks,” she said repressively.

  His laughter pervaded the small cabin. Grooves etched in his cheeks, his eyes alight with humor. “I think the saying says the opposite.”

  “I don’t want the clothes.”

  “No choice. My wife, the fashionista of Milan, can’t dress in trashy clothes that better suit a street walker or...” he picked up the worn-out denim shorts and loose T-shirt that she had put out “...hand-me-downs. Wow, you have really taken this role to heart, ne? You would have turned your nose up at these a few months ago.”

  “I would have, si. But it is not a joke, Kairos. Those are clothes that I could afford on what I made.”

  He threw the shirt carelessly aside. “You have to look the part, Valentina. Believe me, you’re going to need the armor.”

  She frowned at the thoughtful look in his eyes. Armor for what? She’d been so caught up in staying strong against his onslaught she hadn’t delved too much into the details. “I want to discuss this after I dress.”

  A brow raised, Kairos stared at her leisurely. Water drops clinging to her skin should burn and singe for the lazy intensity of his gaze. “Still so modest, Valentina? I have seen, touched, licked, sucked every part of you, ne?”

  She glared at him. “I was willing then. Not anymore.”

  “But I can see you if I close my eyes.” He closed his eyes, leaning against the wall. A wicked smile dancing around his lips. “The mole on the curve of your right buttock. The mark you have on your knee from skinning it. The silky folds of—”

  She pressed her palm to his mouth and whispered, “Stop, please.”

  Unholy humor glinted in his silver eyes. “That’s not all. I have the sounds you make, the way you thrust your hips up when I’m deep inside you, I have them all in my head.” He tapped his temple, his nostrils flaring. “They’re the first things I recall in the morning when I wake up with—”

  She drew her hand back, burned. But even beneath the sensual web around them, it was the humor in his eyes that threw her. “You’re shameless.”

  His eyes followed a drop of water from her neck to the tight cinch of her towel. A devilish smile glinted around his mouth. “You know how I get in the morning, ne? You left me with no recourse.” He pulled up her left hand and frowned. “Where are your rings?”

  “In my bag.”

  With purposeful movements, he looked through her bag. Stalking back to her, he pushed the rings on her finger. Another sleek box appeared from somewhere.

  Her heart thundered as he pulled out a simple gold chain with a diamond pendant.

  The pendant was a thumbnail sized V in delicately twisted platinum and gold with tiny diamonds lining up the branches. She had seen it at a jewelry store once—on one rare occasion when they’d been out shopping together to buy a gift for her niece Izzie. Buying it with her credit card—against Kairos’s dictate that she stop spending Leandro’s money—would have been easy.

  But already...something had changed in her back then.

  Clothes and shoes and jewelry had begun to lose their allure. Because none of those, she had realized, made a difference in how her reserved husband saw her.

  And yet he’d noticed her watching it.

  She met his eyes over the fragile chain dangling in his fingers. “I... I have a lot of funky jewelry to dress the part. I can’t stand the thought of fake gifts.”

  “I bought it for you. We might as well use it.” With one hand, he pushed the swathe of her hair a
side, then his hands were gentle around her neck. His warm breath feathered over her face, his arms a languorous weight over her shoulders. “Throw it away after we’re done with this for all I care.”

  The pendant was cold against her bare skin. Tina licked her lips, warmth pooling in her chest. “When?”

  His fingers lingered over the nape of her neck, straightening the chain, but still her heart went thud against her ribcage. “When what?”

  “When did you buy it?”

  “When you were waiting outside, in the car. I meant to give it to you on—” he laughed, and yet beneath the mockery Tina sensed self-deprecation, even anger “—the ten-month anniversary of our wedding. I feel like a fool even saying that.”

  “Then why did you buy it?” Her tummy rolled at his proximity, at the revelation. “You called me a sentimental little fool when I bought you gifts on that date. A child who celebrates every little thing.”

  “Maybe you finally wore me down. But then you left two days after that shopping trip, so maybe it’s a good thing I didn’t change too much for you, ne?” he said, looking away.

  This time, there was no doubt that he was angry, even bitter that she had left him. That she had given up on their marriage. She must have changed him a little if he had truly thought of giving her a gift on that date. Maybe just a little.

  But still, he hadn’t acted on that anger. He had simply written her off, like a bad asset. He had only come for her when he decided he needed her. She had to remember that.

  “The clothes, the shoes, everything will stay.” He walked away, a faint tension radiating from him. “I want the classy, stylish Valentina. The adoring, loving wife.”

  “I can’t force the last part.”

  “Pretend then. For months, you did just that anyway. Do you need anything else?”

  “Underwear. Bras, to be exact,” she said the first thing that came to her lips while her mind whirled. Had he cared about her just a little? Had he bought her the necklace to make her happy?

  Did his humiliating proposal that she could persuade him to try again hold a hint of what he wanted?

  “The ones I have are plain cotton and will show—”

  “Things I’d rather not have anyone but me see in those slinky dresses,” he finished for her, possessiveness ringing in his tone. He frowned and looked at the reams of new bras. “I had my PA order those from the boutique you spend a fortune in.”