Purchased for Passion: Shackled by Diamonds / A Mistress for the Taking / His Bought Mistress

He repeated it, shaking out a white damask napkin on his lap and lifting his plate.

She took a mouthful of chicken, which melted in her mouth. ‘I’ve known Jenny for several years, but this is the first time I’ve worked with Kate and Vanessa.’

‘Which one is the redhead?’ Leo Makarios asked.

‘That would be Vanessa,’ Anna replied with exaggerated politeness. ‘The one with the big boobs, in case you need another way of identifying her.’ Her voice was acid.

Dark eyes flicked over her.

‘You really do need to lose that attitude,’ Leo Makarios murmured.

‘So do you,’ she bit back. ‘Models do have names, as well as bodies.’

She forked up a large amount of salad with unnecessary vigour.

‘You take offence where none is intended—I merely had not yet managed to distinguish the four of you by name, only hair colour,’ he replied coolly. The eyes rested on her momentarily. She thought she saw irritation in them.

Was that supposed to be a reprimand? Anna wondered. If so, no sale.

She gave an indifferent shrug. ‘Why do you ask about Vanessa?’ she prompted. She was both relieved that he was not here for the reason she had assumed and warily curious as to why he was asking about his cousin’s girlfriend. Maybe, she thought suddenly, Leo Makarios was in poaching mode. Not, however, that Vanessa had eyes for anyone other than this guy’s cousin. Talk about stars in her eyes…the girl had it bad. Anna only hoped she wouldn’t get hurt—but she wasn’t taking bets on it.

He took a mouthful of wine.

‘If you do not know her well, my enquiry will mean little,’ he answered.

‘Yes, well, what little I do know of her is that she’s a nice girl.’ Anna replied all the same—pointedly. ‘Nice, if dumb,’ she added.

Leo Makarios’s eyebrows pulled together, making him look forbidding somehow.

‘Dumb?’ There was a bite in his voice she’d have been deaf not to hear.

‘Dumb enough to fall for your cousin, I mean,’ she elucidated.

The forbidding look suddenly became even more intense.

Anna gave him an old-fashioned look. ‘Oh, come on—your fancy cousin hardly looks like a down-on-one-knee kind of guy! Vanessa’s going to get burned—big-time. It’s totally obvious.’

‘My cousin is very generous to his mistresses,’ Leo Makarios informed her. There was hauteur in his face now, and a repressive note in his voice.

A choking sound escaped Anna.

‘Mistresses? Last time I looked, crinolines were definitely out of fashion!’

He frowned again.

‘I do not understand your reference.’

‘It means mistresses went out with Queen Victoria. Mistresses—kept women—rich protectors, you know.’

A cynical curve indented his mouth.

‘You think women no longer like to take rich men as their lovers, and thereby live in a style that they could not afford for themselves?’

Her eyes hardened. He was right, damn it—her exposure to the realities of life in the fashion world had taught her that a long time ago.

‘If they do, then ‘mistress’ is not the term I’d use for them,’ she riposted.

‘What would you use then?’

‘One unfit for mixed company.’ She gave her acid-sweet smile again. ‘And, by the way, no—I do not count Vanessa as one of them!’

‘You are so sure of that?’ The cynical note was back in his voice.

Anna glared at him.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I am. I just hope she’s got a best friend to mop her up when your cousin gets bored with being adored and moves on to his next squeeze.’

The dark eyebrows drew together again.

‘I have already told you that Markos has no reason not to be generous to her when he ends their affair.’

Anna gave up. There was clearly no point discussing the matter. Vanessa was going to get hurt, and if good old Markos was anything like his lovely cousin then it was going to be tears after bedtime for sure.

‘You can’t dry your eyes on diamonds,’ she contented herself with answering dryly.

‘She is a very beautiful woman—she will soon find another lover.’

The indifference in his voice raised her hackles.

‘Oh, good—that’s all right, then.’ Anna bestowed another acid smile on him.

But Leo Makarios was frowning again—and then a different expression was on his face.

‘What you say is disturbing,’ he said slowly. ‘You believe she has ambitions for marriage?’

‘Ambitions?’ Anna sat back. Her chicken and salad were gone, and she wasn’t about to help herself to any more. The pangs had been stilled, and it was time to get rid of Mr Money-Bags Makarios—and his delightful views on female venality. ‘I’d say she probably has some fairy-tale vision of wafting down an aisle to a heavenly choir towards your cousin suddenly transformed into Prince Charming with a halo, but she can’t possibly be idiotic enough to think a man like your cousin is going to marry her!’

Leo Makarios’s mouth tightened.

‘Perhaps you could ensure,’ he said, resting his eyes on her, ‘that she understands that that is indeed the case. She must harbour no ambitions to entrap Markos into marriage.’

Anna reached for the water. ‘I’ll be sure to pass the message on,’ she said dryly.

‘A naïve woman can be even more dangerous than a clever one,’ he rejoined darkly.

Dangerous. Suddenly Anna wished he hadn’t used that particular word. It was the one that had been haunting her about him ever since she’d set eyes on him.

Of their own volition her eyes swept across to him.