Page 9 of Forgotten Greek Proposal
But she’d been real.
She’d strolled—althoughbouncedwould be a more accurate description—into the hotel bar wearing a loose-fitting, sleeveless black dress patterned with blood-red roses that fell to her knees. On her feet had been a pair of calf-length clumpy black boots. Her hair had been worn loose, cascades of curls springing in all directions. She’d looked like a cross between a modern-day Bride of Frankenstein and an ethereally beautiful elf. Except elves were supposed to have big, pointy ears and he’d been unable to see anything of her ears through the mass of curls.
Lucie, a beam on her face and expectation shining in eyes as black as her hair, had stepped to Thanasis with arms outstretched as if expecting an embrace.
Up close, her beauty had shone as much as the shine in her black eyes, and there had been a beat when he’d been powerless to do anything but soak in the oversized eyes and pretty little nose and full heart-shaped lips, all set on a flawless golden heart-shaped canvas.
His heart thumping hard enough to rattle his ribs, he’d pointedly held his hand out.
It was her hesitation before slipping her tiny hand into his that had confirmed in his mind that she too remembered that brief moment of connection from six years earlier, but it was the jolt of electricity that had powered through him at the connection of their skin that had made his jaw clench.
‘Nice boots,’ he’d said acidly, pulling his hand from her clasp.
The shine in her eyes had dimmed into confusion before her little heart-shaped chin had defiantly lifted. ‘It’s lovely to meet you too.’
If not hugely aware that time had been ticking to save his company, Thanasis would have called a halt to the agreement there and then.
He’d been fully prepared to marry someone he despised, prepared to spend a few years swallowing his loathing for the good of everything that mattered in his world: his mother, who’d always shaken her head at her husband’s rivalry with Georgios Tsaliki, his father, who for all his faults had been a loving father and husband, his sister, who’d become increasingly gaunt and withdrawn since the extent of the rivalry between Antoniadis and Tsaliki had been made public, and the thousands and thousands of people Antoniadis Shipping employed.
What he’d not been prepared for was attraction. Not to someone who’d spent her life in the Tsaliki nest and who considered Georgios Tsaliki a father figure.
Attraction was the last thing he’d expected or wanted, and that he should feel it so powerfully for the captivatingly beautiful Lucie Burton had been additional nails in the coffin of his loathing for her.
By the time she’d screeched away in his Porsche, she’d hated him as much as he hated her, and now he had to remind himself of the expectant shine in her eyes when she’d bounced into that hotel bar all those long weeks ago. There had been hope in that shine too, a hope he’d scotched with his first words to her.
Lucie’s amnesia had granted him a reset, a means to play things differently, and he had no intention of screwing it up again.
Speaking steadily, he captured a curl in a manner that could only be interpreted as affectionate. ‘Every part of you is too precious for me to risk your health.’
She gave a sigh as soft as the curl in his fingers. ‘I’ll do everything I can to get the memories back.’
Exactly what he didn’t want to hear.
‘Just concentrate on healing,matia mou, and let the memories take care of themselves.’ And then, because he knew he must, he bowed his head, held his breath, and pressed a kiss so chaste to Lucie’s mouth he barely felt the pressure of it.
It wasn’t chaste enough to stop his heart pumping harder and faster, and it took even more control not to recoil into retreat.
With unhurried movements, he got to his feet, but his escape was thwarted when she caught his hand.
Black eyes gazing up at him with a solemnity he’d never seen in them before, she quietly said, ‘I was raised to despise your family. It was instilled in all of us that the Antoniadises were spawns of the devil. The loyalty and affection I feel towards Georgios means I would have agreed to marry you even if I had believed the indoctrination. I would have married the devil himself if it had meant saving Tsaliki Shipping. But I never did believe it, not really, and now you’ve proved I was right not to.’ There was an almost imperceptible catch in her husky voice. ‘Thank you for being here for me.’
Thanasis’s throat had closed so tightly it was an effort to speak.‘Parakalo,’he whispered hoarsely.
He left the room with his lips still abuzz from the barely-there pressure of Lucie’s mouth, and with the skin of his hand burning as if her touch had marked it.
CHAPTER THREE
BACK HOME INhis Athens apartment, Thanasis set everything in motion so all Lucie’s medical needs would be taken care of upon her discharge. That done, he checked in with the chief wedding planner, uncaring that the sleepiness in Griselda’s voice meant he’d woken her. The extortionate price he was paying for her services meant she was on call twenty-four-seven.
The call finished with reassurances that Lucie was recovering well, and then Thanasis headed up to his room for a shower, passing Lucie’s room as he went. He’d get a member of the staff to pack her belongings. He would need them to pack a smaller case with clothes for her to choose from for when she was discharged too. It was inconceivable that he’d bring Lucie back here to supervise the packing of her possessions. If anything was going to trigger her memories, it would be this apartment, home to virtually every bitter exchange between them.
As per the detailed plan drawn up between himself and Alexis, she’d moved in a couple of weeks after the announcement of their engagement.
He’d installed her in the guest room furthest from his own but it hadn’t been far enough. The few public appearances they’d made together up to that point had been hell. Holding her hand without flinching and forcing his features into something that resembled that of a loving fiancé had taken acting skills he hadn’t known he possessed.
It had been Lucie who, off the cuff, had murmured to a cynical journalist that they’d fallen for each other during peace talks between the two families. A stroke of genius he hadn’t wanted to admire her for. He didn’t want to admire anything about her.
He could not bear to be enclosed in the same walls as her.
