The Kalliakis Crown: Talos Claims His Virgin

‘There were a lot of reasons.’

‘Do you run it?’

‘I employ a manager. Enough questions—eat before your food gets cold.’

‘Okay, but do me a favour and never tell my mother what I’m about to eat.’

His brow furrowed. ‘Why? Would she disapprove?’

Amalie had already bitten into a chip, possibly the crispest and yet fluffiest chip she had ever tasted. She chewed, then swallowed it down with some Coke before answering. ‘My mother is a gastronomy snob. She considers any food with English or American origin to be tantamount to eating out of a rubbish bin.’

‘Yet she married an Englishman.’

‘That’s true,’ she agreed, casting her eyes down. Her parents had been divorced for half her lifetime, yet the guilt still had the power to catch her unawares.

Talos picked up on an inflection in her tone. ‘Was it a bad divorce?’

‘Not at all. It was very civilised.’

‘But traumatic for you?’

‘It wasn’t the easiest of experiences,’ she conceded, before picking up her burger and taking a small bite.

It was with some satisfaction that he saw her eyes widen and her nod of approval.

‘That is good,’ she enthused when her mouth was clear.

‘Maybe not the gastronomical heights your mother would approve of, but still high-quality,’ he agreed.

‘I think this might be the best burger I’ve ever had.’

‘You mean you’ve eaten a burger before?’ he asked, feigning surprise. ‘Your mother will be shocked.’

‘I hide all my convenience food when I know she’s coming over.’

He grinned and took another bite of his burger. The workout had clearly done Amalie the world of good; most of her primness had been sweated out of her. She almost looked relaxed.

They ate in silence for a few minutes. It gratified him to see her eat so heartily; he had imagined from her slender frame and self-confessed lack of exercise that she would eat like a sparrow.

He tried to imagine eating with another woman here and came up blank.

In normal life this gym was his sanctuary—not somewhere he would bring a date, even if his date liked to work out. For the same reason he refused to make overtures to any of the women who worked here. Regardless of the fact that most of his female staff were, like the majority of his employees, teenagers, and so automatically off limits, he didn’t want the messiness that inevitably came about when he ended a relationship to spill into his sanctuary.

Melina, his kickboxing instructor, had blatantly flirted with him when she’d first started work here and—despite her being in her mid-twenties, and attractive to boot—he’d frozen out all her innuendoes until she’d got the message.

The endorphins released during a vigorous workout always made him crave sex, but he disciplined himself with the iron will Kalliakis men were famed for. Except for his father. The Kalliakis iron will had skipped a generation with Lelantos... Lelantos had been weak and venal—a man who had allowed his strong libido and equally great temper to control him.

It killed Talos to know that of the three Kalliakis Princes, he was the most like their father.

The difference was that he had learned to control his appetites and the volatile temperament that came with it. Boxing had taught him to harness it.

Tonight, though, the endorphins seemed to have exploded within him, and the primal urge to sate himself in a willing woman’s arms was stronger than ever. And not just any woman. This woman.

Theos, just watching Amalie eat made him feel like throwing her over his shoulder, carrying her to the nearest empty room and taking her wildly.

‘Do you consider yourself French or English?’ he asked, wrenching his mind away from matters carnal. He needed to concentrate on getting her mentally fit to play at his grandfather’s gala, not be imagining ripping her clothes off with his teeth.

‘Both. Why?’

‘You speak English with a slight accent. It made me curious.’

‘I suppose French is my first language. I grew up bilingual, but I’ve never lived full-time in England. My father’s always kept a home there, but when I was a child we used it more for holidays and parties than anything else.’

‘Was that because of your mother’s influence?’

‘I assume so. My mother definitely wore the trousers in that marriage.’ A slight smile, almost sad, played at the corners of her lips.

‘I have heard that she’s a forceful woman.’

He’d heard many stories about Colette Barthez, not many of them complimentary. It was strange to think that the woman before him—a woman who tried desperately to fade into the background—was a child from the loins of the biggest diva on the planet. He had to assume she took after her father who, he’d learned, was regarded as a quintessential Englishman, with a dry humour and calm manner.

Amalie chewed on a chip, disliking the implication in his words and the way he’d delivered them. She, better than anyone, knew just how ‘forceful’ her mother could be in getting her own way, but that didn’t stop her loving her and despising the people who would put her down.

‘You don’t become the most successful and famous mezzo-soprano in the world without having a strong will and a thick hide. If she were a man she would be celebrated.’

The scarred eyebrow rose in question.

She shook her head and pushed her plate to the side. ‘She sold out Carnegie Hall and the Royal Albert Hall three nights in a row last year, but every article written about those concerts just had to mention her three ex-husbands, numerous lovers and so-called diva demands.’

The black scarred brow drew forward. ‘That must be very hurtful for her to read,’ he said, his tone careful.

‘If it was the French media it would devastate her, but in France she’s revered and treated as a national icon. With the rest of the world’s press, so long as they aren’t criticising her voice or performance, she doesn’t care—she truly does have the hide of a rhinoceros.’

But not when it came to love. When it came to affairs of the heart, her mother felt things deeply. Bored lovers had the power to shatter her.

‘But they upset you?’ he said, a shrewdness in his eyes.

‘No one wants to read salacious stories about their mother,’ she muttered, reaching for one more chip and popping it in her mouth before she could unloosen her tongue any further.

Her family and personal life were none of his concern, but she felt so protective when it came to her mother, who was passionate, funny, loving, predatory, egotistical and a complete one-off. She drove her up the wall, but Amalie adored her.

‘That is true,’ Talos agreed. ‘My family also live under the spotlight. There are occasions when it can burn.’

She leaned back in her chair and stared at him through narrowed eyes. ‘If you know how much the spotlight can burn, why would you push me back under it when you know it hurts me so much?’

‘Because you were born to play under it,’ he replied, his deep bass voice no-nonsense.

And yet she detected a whisper of warmth in those light brown eyes she hadn’t seen before.