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Only for Annabel.
‘Yes, I’m alone,’ she finally answered, her voice little more than a croak. She tried to gather her scattered wits and failed. She hadn’t expected this reaction—treacherous, molten, overwhelming.
Real.
This was not part of her plan.
‘You are?’ He sounded surprised, and his gaze flicked over the crowd before coming to rest on her face with penetrating intensity. ‘A holiday alone?’ he clarified, and Rhiannon’s blush deepened.
She really did sound pathetic. If he were flirting with her it had to be out of boredom or pity or both.
Except it didn’t feel that way.
‘Yes, although…’ Now was the time to state her purpose. To mention Annabel.
Why was it the last thing she wanted to do?
‘Although…?’ he prompted. The matron on his right had left with a loud sniff, and Rhiannon could feel the speculative stares from the people around them.
They were wondering how a bourgeois bit-piece like her had captured Lukas Petrakides’s attention. She couldn’t blame them—even if she didn’t appreciate the contempt that was drawing like a palpable shroud around her. She was wondering the same thing herself.
‘Nothing.’ Coward.
‘Ah.’ There was a moment of silence, pregnant with possibility, heavy with intent. Rhiannon waited, too overwhelmed to speak, too affected to formulate more than a hazy thought…a need.
She didn’t want him to go.
She wanted him.
It was ridiculous; it was real. Something pulsed to life between them—something Rhiannon couldn’t even understand.
Lukas’s mouth twisted in a smile, and he took a sip of wine. He looked undecided for a moment, vulnerably uncertain, and then resolve hardened his eyes, his face, his voice. ‘It was nice chatting with you,’ he said, and Rhiannon knew it was a dismissal.
For a moment she thought she saw regret shadow his eyes, but it was replaced with a formal cursory courtesy that she suspected was the expression with which he greeted everyone in the room.
If they’d shared a real moment, a connection, it was gone.
And so was her chance.
‘Wait.’ Lukas had already turned away, and Rhiannon was forced to scrabble at his sleeve. ‘I need to say something to you.’
He turned. Hope lit his eyes for one wonderful moment. Rhiannon took a breath.
‘I have something you need to hear.’
He stilled. The blank look returned, and suddenly it seemed dangerous.
‘What would that be?’
Rhiannon took a breath. The desire she’d felt, the warmth, the connection, were distant memories. All she felt now was uncertainty. Fear. The cold, metallic tang was on her tongue. She was handling this wrong. She knew she was. But if Lukas would only listen to her, then he would understand.
He would accept, and he would be glad. She had to believe that.
‘I think it would be better said in private.’
She spoke in a low voice, but still heard the shocked indrawn breaths from the gossipy vultures around her.
‘You do?’ His voice was soft, musing, but his eyes were as hard as steel.
She kept saying the wrong thing. She saw it in the way he looked at her now, with derision and dislike. What had happened? She didn’t understand this world—its politics, its hidden agendas. She just wanted to tell him about his daughter.
‘Yes…it is important, I promise. You need to know…’ She trailed off uncertainly. She felt tension thrum in the air, in her body. In his.
There was a connection, but it wasn’t a good one.
It felt very bad.
‘I cannot imagine,’ Lukas replied in a voice of lethal quiet, ‘that you have anything to say to me that I need to know, Miss…?’
‘Davies—Rhiannon Davies. And please believe me—I do. I only need a moment of your time…’ And then a lifetime. But there would—please, God—be other opportunities to discuss their future. Annabel’s future.
‘I’m afraid I don’t have a moment…for you,’ Lukas said, his tone chillingly soft.
‘No…No…Just wait…’ She flung one hand out in appeal; it was ignored. ‘You don’t understand. Someone else is involved. We have a mutual friend.’ Her words came out stilted, strained. Awful. Why hadn’t she thought of a better way to handle this?
‘I don’t think we’ve ever met,’ Lukas said after a tiny pause. ‘And I doubt we have any mutual friends.’
They were from different worlds; it was glaringly obvious. He was accustomed to wealth, privilege, power—light years away from her small suburban existence in Wales.
He had power; she had nothing.
Except Annabel. The realisation gave her a much-needed boost of courage.
‘No, we haven’t met,’ she agreed, meeting his gaze unflinchingly. ‘But there is someone we both know—both care about. A friend…’ Although, according to Leanne, she and Lukas had been a lot more than friendly.
For a moment Rhiannon’s mind dwelt on that strangely unwelcome possibility—Lukas and Leanne, bodies entwined, fused. Lips, hips, shoulders, thighs. Passion created, enjoyed, shared. They’d made a child together.
She shook her head. She didn’t want to think about it. Hadn’t even asked Leanne about the details. A weekend of passion, Leanne had said with a sigh, before naming the father.
Take care of her for me. Don’t let her down.
Love her.
That was what this was about. That was why she had come.
Annabel needed love. Real love. The love of her father.
‘Someone we both care about?’ Lukas repeated, and this time Rhiannon heard more of the steel. The incredulity. Her heart rate sped up, doubled. She nodded.
‘Yes…And if you’d just give me a moment in private, I could explain. It would be…worth your while.’
He froze, and Rhiannon felt as if her heart had frozen as well. For a moment everything seemed suspended, still, that terrible moment before the storm hit and the lightning struck.
‘Worth my while?’ he repeated. It was a simple statement, yet it held a wealth of unpleasant meaning. Alarm prickled along Rhiannon’s spine, tingling up her nape as Lukas made eye contact with someone over her shoulder. Something was happening. Something bad.
He gave a brief, almost indiscernible nod, then his icy gaze snapped back to her—unyielding, unmerciful.
She suppressed a shiver.
Had she actually thought this was a gentle man?
‘I’m just trying to be polite,’ she explained. ‘By requesting some privacy—’
‘I can be polite,’ he replied with silky, lethal intent. ‘As a courtesy, I’m letting you know that you have five seconds before my security guards escort you from this room and this resort.’
Shock shot through her, followed by scathing disbelief and, worse, hurt. She should have expected this, but she hadn’t. After that first moment she’d thought he might be kind.
Different.
She’d believed what the tabloids said—the image of the man they exalted.
She was a fool.