A Deal at the Altar

His dark eyes glittered gold with anger. ‘Of course not.’

Bee was frowning. ‘I’m trying to understand how you expect such a marriage to work. You surely can’t be suggesting that a woman of my age should accept a future in which any form of physical intimacy is against the rules?’ she quantified very stiffly, fighting her mortification every step of the way.

Put like that her objection sounded reasonable but Sergios could no more have accepted the prospect of an unfaithful wife than he could have cut off his right arm. Features taut and grim, his big powerful length rigid, he breathed with the clarity of strong feeling, ‘I could not agree to you taking lovers.’

‘That old hypocritical double standard,’ Bee murmured, strangely amused by his appalled reaction and not even grasping why she should feel that way. So what was good for the goose was not, in this case, good for the gander? Yet she could barely believe that she was even having such a discussion with him. After all, she was a twenty-four-year-old virgin, a piece of information that would no doubt shock him almost as much as the idea of a wife with an independent sexual appetite.

In response to that scornful comment, Sergios shot her a seething appraisal, his dark eyes flaming like hot coals. ‘Don’t speak to me in that tone …’

Lesson one, Bee noted, he has a very volatile temper. She breathed in deep, quelling her wicked stab of amusement at his incredulous reaction to the idea of an adulterous wife. ‘I asked you a reasonable question and you did not give me a reasonable answer. How long do you expect this marriage to last?’

‘At least until the children grow up.’

‘My youth,’ Bee remarked without any emotion, but it was true. By the time the children acquired independence her years of youth would be long gone.

Sergios was studying her, recalling those lush violin curves in the evening gown she had worn at their first meeting. Full pouting breasts, generous womanly hips. He was startled when that mental picture provoked the heavy tightness of arousal at his groin.

‘Then we make it a real marriage,’ Sergios fielded with sardonic bite, blanking out his physical response with male impatience. ‘That is the only other possible option on the table. If you want a man in your bed you will have me, no other.’

The flush in Bee’s cheeks swept up to her brow and her dismayed eyes skimmed away from the intrusion of his. ‘I don’t really wish to continue this discussion but I should say that while you have other women in your life I would not be willing to enter an intimate relationship with you.’

‘We’re wasting time with this nonsense and we’re adults. We will deal with such problems as and when they arise,’ Sergios delivered curtly. ‘There will be a pre-nuptial contract for you to sign—’

‘You mentioned your homes and your, er … mistress. What other conditions are you planning to impose?’

‘Nothing that I think need concern you. Our lawyers can deal with the contracts. If you choose to argue about terms you may do so through them,’ Sergios completed in a crushing tone of finality. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, I will have you driven home. I have business to take care of before I leave for New York.’

Bee, who had had a vague idea that he might invite her to stay to dinner, learned her mistake. She smoothed down her raincoat and rose slowly upright. ‘I have a condition as well. You would have to agree to be polite, respectful and considerate of my happiness at all times.’

As that unanticipated demand hit him Sergios froze halfway to the door, wondering if she was criticising his manners. Since he had reached eighteen years of age before appreciating that certain courtesies even existed, he was unusually sensitive to the suggestion. He turned back, brooding black eyes glittering below the lush fan of his lashes. ‘That would be a tall order. I’m selfish, quick-tempered and often curt. I expect my staff to adapt to my ways.’

‘If I marry you I won’t be a member of your staff. I’ll be somewhere between a wife and an employee. You will have to make allowances and changes.’ Bee studied him expectantly, for it would be disastrous if she allowed him to assume that he could have everything his way. She had no illusions about the fact that she was dealing with a very powerful personality, who would ride roughshod over her needs and wishes and ignore them altogether if it suited him to do so.

Sergios was taken aback at her nerve in challenging him, viewing him with those cool assessing green eyes as though he were an intellectual puzzle to be solved. His stubborn jaw line squared. ‘I may make some allowances but I will call the shots. If we’re going ahead with this arrangement, I want the wedding to take place soon so that you can move in here to be with the children.’

Consternation filled Bee’s face. ‘But I can’t leave my mother—’

‘You’re a teacher, good at talking but not at listening,’ Sergios chided with a curled lip. ‘Listen to what I tell you. Your mother will be taken care of in every possible way.’

‘In every possible way that facilitates what you want!’ Bee slammed back at him with angry emphasis.

He raised a brow, sardonic amusement in his intent dark gaze. ‘Would you really expect anything different from me?’

CHAPTER THREE

LIFE as Bee knew it began to change very soon after that thought-provoking parting from Sergios.

Indeed Bee came home from school the very next day to find her mother troubled by the fact that her father had made an angry phone call to her that same afternoon.

‘Monty told me that you’re getting married,’ Emilia Blake recounted with a look of frank disbelief. ‘But I told him that you weren’t even seeing anyone.’

Bee went pink. ‘I didn’t tell you but—’

Her mother stared at her with wide, startled eyes. ‘My goodness, there is someone! But you only go out twice a week to your exercise classes—’

Bee grimaced and reached for her mother’s frail hands. Not for anything would she have told the older woman any truth that might upset her. Indeed when it came to her mother’s peace of mind, Bee was more than ready to lie. ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t more honest with you. I do want you to be happy for me.’

‘So, obviously you weren’t at classes all those evenings,’ Emilia assumed in some amusement while she studied her blushing daughter with fond pride in her shadowed eyes. ‘I’m so pleased. Your father and I haven’t set you a very good example and I know you haven’t had the same choices as other girls your age—’

‘You still haven’t told me what my father was angry about,’ Bee cut in anxiously.

‘Some business deal he’s involved in with your future husband hasn’t gone the way he hoped,’ Emilia responded in a dismissive tone. ‘What on earth does he expect you to do about it? Take my advice, don’t get involved.’

Dismayed by her explanation, Bee had tensed. ‘Exactly what did Dad say?’

‘You know how moody he can be when things don’t go his way. Tell me about Sergios—isn’t he the man you met at that dinner your father invited you to a couple of months ago?’

‘Yes.’ So, although the marriage was going ahead, it seemed that her father was not to profit as richly as he had expected from the deal. Clearly that was why the older man was angry, but Bee thought there was a rare justice to the news that her sacrifice was unlikely to enrich her father: threats did not deserve a reward.

‘My word, you’ve been having a genuine whirlwind romance,’ Emilia gathered with a blossoming smile of approval. ‘Are you sure that this Sergios is the man for you, Bee?’

Bee recalled Sergios Demonides’s assurance that she would never again have to look to her father to support her mother. She remembered the fearless impact of those shrewd dark eyes and although she was apprehensive about the future she had signed up for she did believe that Sergios would stand by his word. ‘Yes, Mum. Yes, I’m sure.’

Sergios phoned that evening to tell her that a member of his personal staff would be liaising with her over the wedding arrangements. He suggested that she hand in her notice immediately. His impatience came as a surprise when he had seemingly been content to wait several months before taking her sister Zara to the altar. He then followed that bombshell up with the news that he expected her to move to Greece after the wedding.

‘But you have a house here,’ Bee protested.

‘I will visit London regularly but Greece is my home.’

‘When you were planning to marry Zara—’

‘Stop there—you and I will reach our own arrangements,’ Sergios cut in deflatingly.

‘I don’t want to leave my mother alone in London.’

‘Your mother will accompany us to Greece—but only after we have enjoyed a suitable newly married period of togetherness. I have already issued instructions to have appropriate accommodation organised for her. Have you heard from your father yet?’

In shock at the news that he was already making plans for her mother to accompany them to Greece, Bee was in a complete daze, her every expectation blown apart. On every issue he seemed to be one step ahead of her. ‘I believe he was annoyed about something when he was talking to my mother today,’ she admitted reluctantly.

‘Your father did not get the deal he wanted,’ Sergios informed her bluntly. ‘But that is nothing to do with you and so I told him on your behalf.’

‘Did you indeed?’ Bee questioned with a frown, her hackles rising at the increasingly authoritarian note in his explanations. Acting as chief spokesperson for the women in his life evidently came very naturally to Sergios. If she wasn’t careful to keep his controlling streak within bounds, Bee thought darkly, he would soon have her behaving with all the self-will of a glove puppet.

‘You are the woman I’m going to marry. It is not appropriate for your father to speak of either you or your mother with disrespect and I have warned him in that regard.’

Bee’s blood ran cold in her veins, for she could picture the scene and the warning with Monty Blake raging recklessly and Sergios cold as ice and equally precise in his razor-sharp cutting edge. Her father was outspoken in temper but Sergios was altogether a more guarded and astute individual.

‘How soon can you move into my London house?’ Sergios pressed. ‘It would please me if you could make that move this week.’