The Greek Tycoon's Secret Child (13 page)

‘I happen to know how sleeping bags function, Dominic.' Mattie folded her arms and perched on the sill of the impressive bay window so that she could look at him wryly. ‘I've spent many a holiday camping out, though I don't suppose
you
have.' Funny, but it was getting harder and harder to build their differences into the equation. Just as well the odd remark like that surfaced, so that she could be reminded of just how incompatible they were on the most fundamental level.

‘We'll have to get you some furniture,' was his response, as he continued to look around him. ‘You can't be expected to live like this. Why didn't you take a few more things from the house?' he demanded, finally settling his gaze on her.

‘Because none of it belonged to me? Because I could have been accused of theft?'

‘And he never offered you anything? Even though you were lovers and you spent years bailing him out of penury by paying the bills?' His mouth curled in disgust. ‘We can go to Harrods, get one or two things. Some chairs. A table. A tel—'

‘Hold it!' Did he think that he could somehow
buy
her? Because that was what it suddenly felt like. Lust was one thing. But having anything bought for her was out of the question. Those were things that related to a whole different world from the one they had agreed to
share. She had a dizzying feeling of wondering what it would be like to be given things out of love, and was momentarily frightened by the power it wove over her. Then she blinked and returned to normal.

‘You won't be
buying me
anything. If I want anything, then I'll do what the rest of the human race does. I'll save up.'

‘For heaven's sake, Mattie, I can affor—'

‘Forget it. I won't accept anything from you and I won't live thinking that you've somehow managed to buy me.'

Dominic saw the determined glint in her eyes and lowered his. He wouldn't allow himself to think of the potential mess that might be the result of his own creating. No. He would sort that out when the time was right. He had never had a problem sorting anything out in his life before.

‘OK,' he agreed, his expression changing to one of lazy sensuality. ‘Would lunch pass your pride test, in that case?'

Mattie felt herself smile slightly.

‘Followed by a housewarming party for two back here?'

How could she resist? She had been so strong when she had first met him. Had known that he was an alien from a different planet. When had he developed that talent for turning her brain to cotton wool? And how long, she wondered with a stirring of alarm, before she discovered that she had no immune system left when it came to him?

‘I
T'S
absolutely fantastic. Meeting prospective clients. Working with the advertising people on ways of making the apartments irresistible to professionals who would rather live north of the river. And have I told you about the ideas we were throwing around for renting out one of the rooms off the atrium as a restaurant? Maybe try wooing one of those celebrity chefs to set it up and get it running?'

No, she hadn't. Dominic pushed back his chair and looked at her with an amused and, he knew, proprietorial smile. This new Mattie was eager, self-confident. Only now and again did the defensive, wary creature rear her head. In about two hours she would be doing that because he would, as he always did, suggest that she stay the night with him instead of going back to her apartment even though, after three weeks, she had at least managed to get herself a bed, a functioning, very small fridge and a small pine table for the kitchen along with two chairs.

‘You're not listening to a word I'm saying,' Mattie grumbled. She stood up and began transferring plates and cutlery from table to sink. They now ate here, at his apartment, more often than not. Which, after a month, was still only three nights a week, but three nights that she now found herself looking forward to and expecting with craven anticipation.

‘I thought we might go to the country tomorrow. Spend the weekend there. I need to check up on my
house there anyway, make sure everything's ticking over.' Dominic clasped his hands behind his head and surveyed her through hooded eyes. How he enjoyed watching her! Watching the way her clothes swung around her, knowing that her body was for his enjoyment only, that with one touch he would feel her tremble for him. He thought about undoing the little pearl buttons of her shirt, softly parting it and then basking in the unsurpassed pleasure of scooping her breasts free of their lacy restraints. He forced himself away from the evocative image to find her staring at him and frowning, perched with her back to the sink.

‘There's no need to look at me like that,' he said irritably. ‘It's a simple enough suggestion. Get out of London for a weekend, have a break in the country. People do it all the time.' He pushed himself away from the table and went to where she was still standing in thoughtful silence.

‘What's there to think about?' He leant over her, hands on either side, propping himself up against the counter. Sheer frustration was beginning to set in. ‘This isn't a life or death choice.'

‘It wouldn't be a good idea.'

‘Why not?' Dominic demanded, frowning darkly. ‘I happen to think it's an exceptional idea. When was the last time you got out of London? Went anywhere?'

‘That's not the point, Dominic.' Mattie wasn't too sure what the point was but she knew that there was one. He was fond of getting his own way and had a variety of methods for doing just that. He could be as persuasive and as tempting as the devil, could argue her into silent acquiescence if she let him.

‘Well? When?'

That, she had learnt to recognise, was another of his
tactics. To simply ignore objections and pursue his own line of questioning until he got what he wanted.

‘I can't remember,' Mattie sighed. ‘Go and sit back down. I can't think straight when you're looming over me like this.'

‘Good. I don't want you thinking straight when you're with me.'

‘You're acting like a spoiled child.'

‘What…?' Dominic gaped at her in real incredulity.
A spoiled child?
Never before had that accusation been thrown at him. Ever. He clicked his fingers and people snapped to attention. It had always been that way, or for as long as he could remember anyway. For heaven's sake, he hardly ever raised his voice, never mind behaving like a spoiled child!

‘Because you want something, doesn't mean it's automatically going to work that way. I thought you would have realised that by now.' Convincing words, but Mattie had to keep her eyes very firmly glued to his. If they so much as wandered a little lower, to his beautiful mouth, there was a very good chance she would be lost, and she had to stand up for herself or end up drowning in this so-called no-strings-attached affair that was not destined to last beyond a few months at the most.

He had made that perfectly clear from the beginning and it didn't take a rocket scientist to work out that he would stick to his guns, his conscience clear when things finally and inevitably ended because hadn't he warned her from the outset that he wasn't interested in commitment on any level?

Never did they project plans that spanned into the future. They saw one another, enjoyed one another, planned something maybe a couple of days down the line, but anything further was out of bounds.

Mattie regularly told herself that his concentration on the present was just what she needed. She had spent years living in some never-never future. First with Frankie and all his dreams about being rich and famous, then with the course, always working hard towards something hovering on the distant horizon.

She knew that it was a breath of fresh air just doing what all other girls her age would be doing. Taking life one day at a time.

‘We need to talk about this,' Dominic growled, pushing himself away and striding purposefully into the open-plan sitting area, where he took up fulminating residence on the long, low sofa.

Mattie reluctantly followed.

‘I have too much to do to go away for a weekend,' she opened, sitting towards the end of the sofa, one leg lazily tucked under her, the other hanging over the side.

‘What?'

‘I want to go and have a look for a television. Just a portable thing.'

‘You don't need to buy a television,' Dominic asserted arrogantly. ‘There are two in this apartment. If you want to watch TV, you can always come here.'

‘Now you're being ridiculous.'

‘Or you could just take one of mine. OK,
borrow
one of mine. Whatever. That can wait for the duration of one weekend.' He found the thought of visiting his country house without her by his side strangely unappealing. Far from holding the promise of two days of pleasurable solitude, as it normally did, it offered the prospect of unwelcome isolation.

And he really had to go up and check it out. Sylvia, his old retainer, who shared the upkeep of the place with her husband and lived on the premises, had called him
two days previously and, having spent five minutes apologising for interrupting him, informed him that there had been a serious leak in one of the downstairs rooms. The plumber had been but there was the question of insurance to sort out, part of the wooden floor had been ruined and the offending radiator would have to be replaced.

‘I thought you
liked
going up there on your own.'

‘Did I say that?'

‘Yes. You told me that it was the one place in the world where you could escape the mad pace and just relax with a book. In fact, you said that you never even went there with your laptop because it was a complete getaway.'

Dominic flushed darkly and scowled. ‘I just wanted to give you a break,' he said. He looked down, closing her out for a second, then back at her. ‘You can't accuse me of not thinking of you.'

Mattie's heart seemed to halt in mid-beat, then race forward at frantic speed. This was the closest he had ever got to suggesting that what she thought and said and did affected him in any way, and stupidly she found herself clinging to his passing comment until she told herself to just get control of her badly behaved mind.

‘OK. I won't.'

For some reason, Dominic felt unreasonably riled at that quick, placating response and his expression darkened.

‘Remind me never to suggest something as complicated as a holiday with you,' he intoned tautly. ‘You might just go into a coma at the thought of it.'

‘A holiday?' she couldn't help saying a little numbly.

‘Something that people occasionally go on, usually when they want to spend some time together.' He knew he should retreat while he was ahead but for some reason
he wanted to plough on. Yes, so he could turn her on like a light bulb. It was no more than she could achieve with him! Their bodies were made for one another!

But what else? he wondered.

‘I know what a holiday is.' Mattie laughed, making light of their conversation.

‘Had a lot of them, have you?'

‘You know I haven't.'

‘Oh, yes. I'd forgotten you worked while studying to make sure the bills got paid while lover boy lazed around, criticised you and drank whatever money was left.'

Mattie chose to disregard his remarks about Frankie. She sometimes wondered how someone could be so thoroughly a part of her past and yet still rear his head at the most unlikely moments.

‘I used to go to Cornwall when I was a child,' she confided a little wistfully. She drew her knees up and looked at him with faraway eyes. ‘Two weeks over summer to a caravan site. One of those places where the caravans stay in the same place from year to year. You know?'

‘Not really.'

‘No, I don't suppose you do. I can't picture you in one anyway.' She tried to and failed.

‘And I can't much picture you in one either,' Dominic said wryly. ‘No, I picture you more on a beach somewhere. White sand, clear warm water, just a whisper of a breeze…an island made for two. And a house with all the trappings. Old wooden floors, mosquito nets over the bed, big windows sprawling open to let the night air waft through…'

Mattie could see it all in her mind's eye and her mouth fell open at the imaginary scenario.

‘Holed up with enough food to last the duration, but a little boat moored on the jetty just in case we needed something on the mainland…'

It was the
we
that snapped her back to the present and away from the land of fiction he was leading her confidently into.

‘And did you take Rosalind there?' she asked, dipping her eyes.

‘Never even crossed my mind,' Dominic said truthfully. What he could have added was that holidaying with women was not something he had ever practised. He had been skiing as a group, in which his current girlfriend might be included, but beyond that his holidays had mostly centred around returning to Greece to see his family. He just worked too damn hard to afford the time off to relax somewhere exotic and remote.

As he had said to her, his weekends in the country were his only real retreats from his working life.

‘How come?'

‘To start with, because I couldn't take the time off work. And then, later, I wouldn't have wanted to anyway.' He shrugged. ‘I don't like talking to you when you're sitting all the way over there,' he said in a husky, coaxing voice. ‘Come over here.' He patted the space right by him and Mattie crawled over and collapsed in front of him, her back to his chest, her head finding the hollow between his neck and shoulder.

There was something possessive and familiar about the way he slung his arm around her, the way she slotted so neatly between his legs. She wanted to purr with feline pleasure.

‘A man like you should never plan holidays with women,' Mattie said a little ruefully.

‘And why would that be?'

‘Because by the time the holiday came round, there'd be a good chance that you would have gone off the woman in question.'

‘Which brings me back to a weekend in the country. I can guarantee that by tomorrow I won't have gone off you.' He began undoing the little pearl buttons, taking his time. ‘Shirts like this should only be worn by confirmed spinsters,' he muttered, and her smile somehow managed to transfer itself to him even though he couldn't see her face.

‘And why would that be?'

‘Because, my darling, no one would be interested in getting into them.'

Mattie felt a surge of pure, honeyed warmth seep through her and she squirmed against him, tempted to hurry up the whole process of getting undressed by undoing the tricky little buttons herself.

‘Say you'll come with me tomorrow,' he murmured into her ear and Mattie reached up to clasp her hands behind his head, her breasts jutting forward with the movement.

Dominic groaned and fumbled with the last stubborn button, almost ripping it off in frustration in the process. Then he unhooked her bra from behind and shoved it up and over the creamy orbs with their pouting pink nipples.

Mattie didn't answer. When he touched her like this, she always found that she couldn't think properly. He was massaging her breasts with both his big hands. She looked down and saw them on her body, the tensile strength of his fingers as they played over her. When he shifted his weight so that he could reach further down and undo the button of her black trousers, quickly followed by the zip, Mattie almost gasped.

Her legs parted automatically. With him, she had no inhibitions. She closed her eyes as his fingers slipped beneath her underwear to slide along that throbbing crease that was wetly awaiting his touch.

He stopped and she nearly groaned in frustration. ‘Mattie, look at me.'

She swivelled reluctantly around so that she was looking right at him.

‘I want you to come with me this weekend and I don't understand what you're so reluctant about.' He inclined down to deliver a chaste kiss to her lips before straightening back into position.

‘We've never slept together.'

‘
Never slept together?
Good heavens, woman, what have we been doing with glorious abandon for weeks?'

‘No, I meant we've never spent the night together. You know what I mean. Fallen asleep and woken up the following morning in the same bed, next to one another.'

‘Not for want of me trying.'

‘I just don't think it's such a good idea.'

‘You can't make statements like that without benefit of an explanation.' Like a dog with a bone, he wanted her to try and tell him what her reservations were, simply because he knew that he would be able to repudiate them. Naturally this was a relationship based on freedom and mutual attraction, but still, he felt driven to have her do more with him than she seemed willing to do. Why he felt his way, he had no idea. He could only put it down to some hitherto unknown stubborn streak in him that was compelled to gain entry to what appeared out of bounds.