One Night to Risk It All

CHAPTER EIGHT


“SHOW-OFF,” SHE SAID, looking around the penthouse and walking toward the window, looking out at the ocean below.

The flight to Cannes had been quick and uneventful. The uneventful part he credited to the fact that Rachel had ignored him the entire time.

“What? The hotel room you put me up in was very nice. And the room service was excellent.”

Something flashed in her eyes that he didn’t like. Pain. Shame. “You aren’t authorized to joke about that night,” she said. “I don’t like the reminder that you used me.”

“No more than you used me. You were engaged to another man, after all. You were hardly blameless.”

“You knew, though. I didn’t trick you.”

“Can we not have this fight again? The one where you tell me all the things I did to wound you? I felt...guilty, after it happened, Rachel. That’s why I didn’t call. That’s why I didn’t storm your wedding. It’s why I came to see you and not him.”

She frowned. “You felt guilty.”

“It turns out that when you seek revenge on someone you hate...because of the way they treated women—the way they treated people in general—and you use someone in order to do it, you come out feeling a lot like the thing you despise.”

It was the truth. He’d never allowed himself to fully form the thought. To examine exactly why the whole incident with her left him feeling dirty. Empty. It was because it was another piece of evidence for the trial being conducted over his soul.

Innocent or guilty. Victim or predator. Which was he?

He didn’t even know the answer. And it burned.

“A conscience, huh?” she asked.

“I’m maybe not as bad as you think. I’m maybe not as good as I think, but...also perhaps I’m not completely amoral, either. Which is good to know.”

“Do you want to be...good?”

He frowned. “I don’t know. I know what I don’t want to be.”

“So you really... You really think you grew up in a brothel with Ajax.”

“I did,” he said, his chest tightening. “He wouldn’t remember me. I was a boy when he left. Maybe eight. But I remember him. And his father.”

A leaden weight settled in his chest. As it did whenever he thought too much about...everything. When he had moments of wanting to call Ajax’s father “my father.”

He swallowed past the bile that was rising in his throat. Bad blood, right? That’s the way it works.

It must. Except it didn’t seem to work that way for Ajax. Ajax, who’d acquired a family when he’d left the compound. Ajax, who’d had no trouble finding love.

He couldn’t think about it. It gave him a headache. It was too complicated. Too hard.

“He never told me about his life before he came to work for my family,” she said. “I mean...nothing. He never said a thing about it and now...now I think it’s a bit strange. But honestly, Alex, if you knew him...he’s so serious. He never does one thing out of line. I can’t even imagine the man you’re describing.”

“He was little better than a boy,” Alex said, his voice rough. “I suppose I imagined he hadn’t changed much as a man. That when I met you you would have stories of him in excess, and that he would be the same.”

“He doesn’t even drink. He’s the most outrageously decent man I’ve ever known, and no, he doesn’t inspire great passion in me. But he’s a friend. He’s not a bad person.”

“But he was,” Alex said, feeling the need to justify himself. “He was.”

“Or maybe he just had his moments? Like you said, what happened with me...it wasn’t your best.”

“No,” he said.

“It wasn’t mine, either. But I don’t think it was my worst. Well, it depends on how you look at it. It wasn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened to me. It was definitely the worst thing I’ve done. Because I didn’t keep my promises, and that was... That wasn’t right of me.”

“What was the worst thing?” he asked, his throat getting so tight he could scarcely breathe.

“I don’t want to talk about it. Actually, what I should do is run and check on Alana.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“You don’t need to.”

“I want to. I want to be a part of your life. And I’m frustrated because I’m not really sure how to accomplish that beyond lying to you.”

A crease dented her forehead. “What would you say?”

“What?”

“If you were going to lie to try and keep me in your life, what would you say?”

He looked at her, at her flawless face and the deep blue eyes that carried a wealth of depth and hurt behind them. Hurt he didn’t want to add to, even though he knew he already had.

“I would tell you that I loved you. That my life would be nothing without you. That I needed you. More than my next breath.”

Her blue eyes shimmered, tears pooling in them and he wished for a second that what he said could be true. But he didn’t know how to feel those things.

And even if he could...

He would never risk them.

For some reason that resolution pushed forward an image of a baby. A squalling, delicate newborn whose cries screamed need. Need for him.

It made his chest feel strange. Tight and heavy. A strange sort of helplessness crept around the edges. The kind he hadn’t felt since he was a boy, surrounded by evil he knew he could never combat.

And the people who should have been protecting them—protecting him—they were the monsters.

There was no hopelessness deeper than that. And he’d felt it every day, a feeling that had only intensified the day he’d learned the truth. The day he’d run.

And now you’re going to be a father.

The thought was enough to buckle his knees. To send him straight to the ground.


“Well,” she said, bursting through the haze of his thoughts, “that would certainly be dramatic.” She swallowed visibly. “And of course I wouldn’t believe you.”

“Wise. That’s what you call learning from your mistakes.”

She flinched. “I suppose so. Now, I’m going to go and deal with Alana’s crisis. Alone, actually. Yes, I’m going alone, so find something to amuse yourself.”

“Did you just tell me to amuse myself?”

“Yeah. I can give you some spending money if you like.”

He frowned. “You need it more than I do. But your attempts at flippancy over the past week have been amusing. If flawed.”

“As have been your attempts at being a decent human being. All right. I’m going.”

“Where is her shop?”

“I’ll text you.”

“And I’ll find it. When should I expect you back?” he asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

“When I’m back.”

“So I won’t know if you’ve been backed into an alley by the paparazzi or if you’re just running late? That doesn’t work for me. Estimate a time or at least give me your location.”

“Are you...worried about me?”

“The baby,” he bit out, the word making his stomach ache.

“Well, of course. That’s what I meant.”

“Yes,” he said.

“Thanks. I’m... Thank you. I’m going to go. I’ll be back here by seven. If I’m not, I’ll text you.”

He nodded and watched her walk back out of the room, his stomach flipping over itself. Maybe he should be thankful for her refusal to marry him. What did he know about being a father? What did he know about being a husband?

All he knew was that he felt a need to be close to her. To protect her. And he knew, with a total certainty, that he would feel that way about the baby.

He meant to offer them protection. But he had no idea who would protect them from him. No, he would never harm them with his hands. But...

He had always pictured Ajax’s veins being filled with black poison. When he’d been a boy and he or Nikola would walk past him, it was a strong vision he’d had. That they were something different than men. That if you cut them, evil would pour out. They exuded it. How could it not be a physical thing beneath their skin?

And then he’d found out the truth.

If their blood was black, then his was, too.

Because it was the same blood.

Worse, he’d seen Ajax lose that legacy. Had seen him walk away and create a new life. He’d seen his mother, desperate to cling to the man she’d loved.

The men he’d always considered evil seemed to have no trouble binding people to them.

The same legacy had been coursing through his veins since birth, and yet no one had ever chosen to stay with him.

It made him fear that the only thing he’d inherited was the darkness.

* * *

The skin on Rachel’s arms prickled as a breeze blew across the water and over her. She and Alana had just closed up shop after assessing the damage, and Alana had gone with her boyfriend back to their apartment.

Rachel had just been standing out in front of the store, looking across the harbor at the yachts, at where blue sky met blue water, rich colors fading together.

She breathed in deep and the breeze set the hair on the back of her neck on end and brushed a tingling sensation over her, down to her fingertips. It wasn’t fear. But it was something she couldn’t ignore. Something urgent, little bursts of it popping through her until she turned her head.

And then it all made sense.

Alex was walking toward her, hands in his pockets. He was dressed casually, nothing like he’d been that day on the yacht, but still much more relaxed than Alex the Businessman. A pale blue shirt open at the collar and a pair of dark jeans.

“I’m glad to see you’ve not been buried beneath photographers.”

“Oh, well, thank heaven for the off-season. None of the locals would dare break their cool by raising an eyebrow at my presence, much less interrupt their day by setting the paparazzi on me.”

“Thank God for people far too blasé to care for a bit of scandal.”

She laughed. “I suppose.”

The moment was strange. Like that time a month ago in Greece playing over again. Different setting, different time. But the pull was there. Whether she wanted it to be or not, it was there. Engagement ring or not, it had been there. Conniving plot to seduce her to get revenge on Ajax or not, it had been there.

Even now, with the baby and all the baggage, it was there.

She knew he felt it, too. She could see it in those wicked blue eyes. He was thinking of sex and sin and all the wonderful things they’d done together. She didn’t know how she knew it, only that she did. Only that for some reason she had a connection with him that she couldn’t explain. One she didn’t want at all.

Why couldn’t he just be that jerk who’d seduced her? Or, if she couldn’t summon up the rage to think of him as a jerk, why couldn’t he just be the cause of her pregnancy? A distant figure until they had to work out a shared custody agreement? It’s not like he could do anything for her now anyway.

But there was more. She hated that there was more, but there was. This deep, sexual connection that somehow felt like...more. Why did it keep going with him? Why, no matter the depth of feeling she was willing to admit she had with him, did a small voice inside of her keep whispering it’s more?

Stupid small voice inside of her.

“Dinner?” he asked, another echo from the past.

“Yes.” She felt the yes slip off her lips and a deep ache slide down deep inside of her. Her body responding to the consent.

For dinner, you little hussy. Dinner. Down, girl.

He held his hand out, and she didn’t take it. Because if she did, she knew she was really, really sunk. She had no business touching him. No business even flirting with the idea of engaging in intimacy with him again.

The fact that he was a lying liar aside, they had too much going on to confuse it all with more sex.

As if things could get more confused, but whatever.

“Where are we having dinner?” she asked. Because it seemed to her they were just going back toward the hotel.

“I hate to see a perfectly good terrace wasted, so I thought we would dine at the suite.”

“You make it sound so fancy.”

“It is,” he said. “It’s very fancy. And dinner should be waiting for us already. And I will be having juice, along with you.”

“That’s...well, that’s awfully sensitive of you.”

“You sound surprised.”

“I am,” she said, walking next to him, acutely aware of the way they both held their arms at their sides as they walked. Acutely aware of how they weren’t touching when their fingertips were so close.

That wasn’t how it was supposed to work. She was supposed to not touch him and have all the attraction magically resolve. Her shell was supposed to protect her. All those years of self-denial. Of never letting her passion out. Learning to be risk-averse, learning to keep every emotion, every desire, every need shoved down deep and covered by a layer of smooth, impenetrable steel. All of that should have helped her now. Should have preserved her.

But it wasn’t and she couldn’t understand it. How eleven years of hard-won control had just suddenly melted as if it had never been there in the first place.


They walked into the hotel in total silence, then took the elevator to their floor. The double doors to the terrace were open, a wash of pink evening light painting the living area.

She walked through the suite and outside. The table was set for two, a bottle of sparkling grape juice in an ice bucket, wrapped in a linen towel as if it were fine champagne. And their plates were covered with a silver dome, everything set and ready.

As though Alex had wanted to make sure they weren’t disturbed.

“This is romantic,” she said, her tone about as dry as sand.

“Is it?” he looked around as though the notion surprised him. “I just asked for dinner for two and that we not be disturbed. For privacy’s sake, as we are discussing personal matters and you are a bit of a public figure. Romance never came into it.”

“Naturally not. Come to think of it, you aren’t much of a romantic, are you?”

He shook his head. “I’ve never had much practice with it. But I would like to think I romanced you that night we were together.”

“You seduced me. Completely different. I wasn’t looking for romance.”

“So you were looking for sex?”

“No,” she said. “But I think that’s why it worked.”

She sat down and grabbed the bottle out of the bucket, eyeing the cork warily. “It has a cork.”

“Yes.”

“These things freak me out. You do it.” She handed him the bottle and he took it, working the metal cage off the cork so that it popped up. She winced at the sound. “Gah. I always expect it to fly out and poke someone in the eye.”

He laughed. “Not likely. But then, caution isn’t a bad thing.”

“That’s certainly been my motto in life.”

He arched a brow as he poured her a glass of the sparkling juice.

“It has been. For...a while. Because...because bad things happen to you when you put yourself out there, you know?”

He nodded slowly. “No,” he said, the words at odds with the gesture. “I don’t. Because I never put myself out there.”

“So you never have girlfriends, do you?”

“No. One-night-stand stuff. Sometimes women who hang around for a couple of weekends. Nothing more than that.”

Strangely, it didn’t really bother her to hear him say that. She would have been more disturbed in some ways if there had been a woman in his life that he loved.

And she really didn’t want to know why that was.

Silly since she’d been in love before. Even if it had turned out badly. Sillier still because she didn’t love Alex and she didn’t want him to love her, either. But nothing about her feelings for him were logic-centered. None at all.

“That seems smart,” she said. “I mean, in some ways. It wouldn’t really work for me, I bet, because the guys would go to the press.” She hadn’t meant to tread that close to the truth of her past.

“It must be inconvenient. For my part, as rich as I am, only financial magazines seem to care.”

“It surprises me because your face would sell magazines.”

“I’m content out of the spotlight.”

Her heart bumped into her breastbone. “If you’re seen with me...I mean, when people find out...you’ll be in the spotlight. You know that, right? Your anonymity is sort of over.”

“I can deal with that,” he said, pulling the covers off of their dinner to reveal some sort of fish dish. It had crispy skin. And a head. Oh, Lord, it had a head. She didn’t mind fish, usually, but after spending so much time in Greece and then on his island, she was concerned she was going to grow gills.

“I love the sea,” she said. “I’m underwhelmed by seafood, to be honest.” She poked at it with her fork. “Daaaaang. It has a head.”

He laughed at her, then bent across the table and took her plate, and his, and put them back by a nearby tray. “Hold that thought.”

He went back into the hotel room and she couldn’t help but watch his butt as he went. She looked away and back down into her drink and she didn’t realize he’d returned until he spoke. “I ordered a pizza. What’s the point of all this pretension?”

She laughed. “A pizza?”

“I was promised it would be here in ten minutes.”

“Tell me there are no anchovies on it, because if there are, we haven’t solved any of my problems.”

“No anchovies. Promise.”

“Good. What did you get?”

“Pineapple.”

“I love!”

“Me, too.”

A strange sort of calm settled between them, and it felt more disturbing than the tension from earlier. This wasn’t like it had been a month ago. Not entirely. There was an edge of comfort, of domesticity to this that hit a nerve in her.

They tried to make clumsy small talk until they heard the knock at the door and he went off for the pizza, setting the box on their table.

She laughed. “So much for romance.”

He shrugged. “This is better. It’s real, anyway.”

“True.” She flipped up the lid on the box and took out a piece of pizza, chewing through the burn of the first bite. Worth the pain to get the cheese at the optimum point. “So,” she said, after she swallowed. “Do you get pizza often?”

He looked down, then back up, and she was hit, once again, with the full impact of his beauty. “Do you want to know a secret?” he asked.

“Yes.”

He leaned in, the look in his eyes intent. “After I left my...the compound, I didn’t have any money. So I slept where I could and ate what I could, and I still felt better about it because I wasn’t a part of that horrible place.”

“I can understand that.”

“But once I started making money, and I got my own apartment...I didn’t want to buy filet mignon or lobster. I’d had all that. Living in that house... It was the darkest pieces of glamor and excess. Junkies throwing up in the halls, people having sex in public. But then we’d sit down to some formal dinner like this insane family or something. Anyway, I never wanted to revisit that. I’d never just had a pizza. I ordered it almost every night for a...a long time.”

He looked down and took a bite of pizza, the gestures and expressions boyish now. It was strange; sometimes he seemed so young. Sometimes he seemed about a thousand years old. And she could relate, because sometimes that was exactly how she felt, too. Too young, too old and never just right.

“What did you have on the first one?”

“The pizza?”

“Yeah,” she said, her stomach tight. “I’m sure you remember.”

The left corner of his mouth quirked upward. “Yeah. Pepperoni. Black olives. It was New York style. Of course, at the time I’d only dreamed of New York. I live there now. The pizza’s much better than this.”

She laughed. “Yeah, I know. I spent at least half my childhood there. Most of my adult life. I’ve been fortunate to travel a lot from an early age.”

“I barely left the Kouklakis compound until I was fourteen.”

“What?”

“There was...nowhere else to go. And they didn’t really want anyone talking to us. Questioning us. There weren’t very many children. The ones that were there had to be careful. Careful to try and go unnoticed by anyone who might want to use us, people who came for parties and things. Careful about what we said. The wrong words could set the police down on Nikola and that would have been unforgivable. Death for certain.”


“He would have killed...children?”

“He would never have gotten his own hands that dirty. But he would have used someone else’s. I always knew that my life was in a tenuous place as long as I was there. I always knew.” He took another bite of pizza. “But I got free. I got pizza. It has a happy ending, yes?”

“Does it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, it’s not over yet. Right now we’re just sitting here eating pizza. It’s not going to fade to black or anything.”

“True.”

“There are a lot of potential outcomes for all of this. And I’m not sure if any of them are wildly happy.”

He grunted, a short, frustrated sound seated in the back of his throat. “Because you’re looking for something I can’t give you. You could be happy if you just—”

“If I what?”

“—compromised. You were willing to do it for Ajax and you didn’t even want him. You weren’t having his baby. Well, you are having my baby, and you do want me, so I don’t see any reason that you shouldn’t want to marry me instead of him. What changed?”

She looked down. “I think I did. Or maybe I didn’t change, maybe I just became more afraid of what might happen if I kept living my life as someone else, someone safe, and less afraid of what might happen if I made an effort to find some happiness.”

“I think I made you pretty happy for extended periods of time in bed,” he said.

She coughed. “Well, there’s that.”

“I want you, Rachel.”

“What...now?” She looked around them, at the blue-tinged air slowly falling darker as the sun sank below the horizon line.

“Every moment since the first time I saw you. And that’s not me lying to keep you here, that’s me telling you the truth. That’s me confessing. Frankly, I know this isn’t going to get me anywhere with you so you have to believe that it’s honest. Because I know that it doesn’t mean anything to you that the moment I saw you, I forgot Ajax’s name, and every thought I ever had about revenge. Because all I could think about was getting you naked then and there. Not romantic, maybe. But all I know is that it didn’t matter then who you were. I mean...not in the sense of who you were to Ajax, or the media, or what your marriage had to do with him acquiring Holt. It only mattered...who you were. Which I know sounds stupid, but in my head it made sense.”

Rachel’s heart was pounding hard, echoing in her head. She leaned forward, grabbed his collar and tugged him to her, kissing him on the mouth. She didn’t know what she was doing or why. Only that she couldn’t stop.

And along with her heartbeat, his words reverberated through her. It only mattered who you were.

He cupped the back of her head and pulled her in harder, taking the kiss deeper, his tongue sliding against hers, sending a wave of lust down through her body. Nothing was settled. And she shouldn’t be kissing him. Shouldn’t be making things confusing by throwing a match on their simmering physical chemistry.

But he’d said he wanted her. And everything in her responded to that. It fought to break free, to push past the boundaries she’d placed around herself, a neat little fence that kept her safe and hidden.

Because he wanted that part of her. He didn’t want her to hide it. Didn’t want her to keep it behind a locked door. Didn’t want her to keep her passion from him. And she wanted to give him that. Wanted to give it to herself, this moment of freedom. Another chance to grab it. To try and feel something.

She’d spent so long not feeling. This was like coming to the surface of the water and breathing in air, filling her aching lungs when she hadn’t even realized what she’d been missing.

She hadn’t realized how much pain had been caused by holding herself under. Because it had been a slow-growing pain, easier to deal with than the idea of having herself exposed to the media, of being used by a man she’d thought she loved.

Still, it hurt. And she was only now seeing just how much.

“I have garlic breath,” she said when they parted, breathing hard and hoping it wasn’t too offensive.

“I probably do, too.”

“Well, I didn’t notice so I guess we’re good.”

“Stop talking, Rachel.”

She nodded. “It would be for the best.”

She moved away from him and away from the table so it wasn’t between them anymore. He rounded it, pulled her to him and kissed her like he was starving. She wrapped her arms around his neck, clung to him.

He tightened his hold on her, propelling her backward until she was pressed up against the rough stone wall of the hotel. “I need you,” he said, kissing her cheek, her neck, her collarbone. “Rachel. Theos, how have I survived this long without touching you?”

She wanted to cry, and she wanted to come, and she couldn’t figure out, in the end, which need would win out. It all felt too big for her, too much. Too much for a girl who was used to hiding in her shell, to feel stripped and exposed like this.

But she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t.

She pulled his shirt open, not caring that it scattered buttons everywhere, not caring that she could hear the sounds of traffic below, that they had nothing to cover them. She pushed his shirt off his shoulders and ran her hands over his chest, the hard muscles, the rough hair.

“You’re so hot,” she said.

“We’ve had this conversation before.”

“I know, but I have to say it again because it’s all I can think about when I see you. When I touch you. You make me... Alex, I don’t understand this. I didn’t think this was how I was. Not anymore. I thought it was gone.”

He dipped low and kissed her, forcing her head against the wall, the hard surface behind her the only thing keeping her from melting into a puddle on the ground. One of his hands slid low, down to her thigh. His fingers dug into her skin, his grip tightening as he lifted her leg and held it up over his lower back, bracing her with his hand and the wall behind them.

He moved against her, the hard ridge of his arousal hitting her in just the right spot. She tightened her grip on him and moved with him, amping it up, pushing herself closer and closer to the edge.

He pressed a kiss to the center of her breasts, his tongue tracing a line down to the edge of the fabric of her dress. Then he continued down, still holding her leg as he lowered himself, draping her thigh over his shoulder as he settled onto his knees.

He pushed the skirt of her dress up, exposing her to him. “Remember, I told you I liked foreplay, but that first time...I took you too fast. I need to make up for it now.”

“I... Oh.” He slid his finger beneath her panties and stroked her where she was slick and so very ready for him.

She could feel his breath against her skin, hot and tantalizing. He ran his finger over her flesh, leaving a trail of fire in its wake. “Good, baby?” he asked.

“You told me not to talk,” she said. “And now I can’t. So don’t ask questions. It’s not fair.”

“What’s not fair is the fact that I’m shaking,” he said, tugging her panties to the side, leaning in closer. “You do that to me, you know?”

She’d suddenly forgotten how to do anything but lean against that wall. “I didn’t... I—”

Then his lips made contact with her bare skin and she couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, and she definitely couldn’t speak.


His tongue slid over her slick flesh, teasing her *oris, sliding down deep inside of her. She flattened her hands against the wall, trying to find something to hold on to. Her fingers scraped against the stone, the rough surface biting her knuckles.

He moved his hand, his large palm cupping her butt, pulling her harder against his mouth as he intensified his attention on her body, his lips and tongue working dark magic on her, driving her closer and closer to the edge.

She put her hands on his shoulders, clinging to him, in an attempt to keep herself anchored to the earth.

He slid a finger deep inside of her and she tilted her head back, the stars in the darkening sky blurring, then he added a second and everything seemed to combust, the bright lights overhead bursting into a million fireworks.

He released her then stood, his body pressed against hers as he kissed her deeply, the evidence of her own desire on his lips. “Inside,” he growled.

She turned away from him and fumbled for the door into the room. He slid it open and he walked in behind her, sweeping her hair over her shoulder, his lips on the back of her neck as they walked inside.

Then he gripped her shoulders and turned her to face him, kissing her lips. “Can’t wait,” he said, tugging at her dress until he slipped it from her body, then pulling her panties down her legs, while she worked on the closure to his jeans. He stripped them off, along with his underwear, leaving him blessedly naked.

He gripped her thighs and tugged her up so that her legs were wrapped around his waist before lowering them both to the carpet. The door was still open, the traffic noise and ocean breeze coming into the suite, but she didn’t care.

There was nothing but this. Nothing but Alex.

“Please, Alex,” she said. “I need you.”

He positioned himself and slid inside of her, filling her, stretching her. She felt right for the first time in weeks. Or maybe more truthfully, she felt right for the first time in eleven years. More herself.

And then it was all wiped away as she gave up emotion for pleasure. There was nothing but their fractured breathing, Alex saying rough, coarse things in her ear. In English, in Greek. Words she’d never heard before. Words that sent a shiver of illicit longing through her, that heightened her desire, amped up her arousal.

After the orgasm he gave her outside, she was shocked that she had another one building already. But with each stroke, each rough, whispered word, he pushed her higher, faster.

He put his hand beneath her lower back, lifted her hips off of the ground and thrust harder into her, the sound of skin on skin overtaking the traffic noise from the street below.

He thrust into her one last time, a hoarse sound rising in his throat as he came. The sound, his loss of control, the look of tortured pleasure on his face, was so intense that she felt it as it echoed through her, grabbed hold of her own pleasure and expanded it, pushed her over the edge, their orgasms blending into one until she couldn’t tell where hers began and ended, until she felt like they’d genuinely become one.

When it was over, the traffic noise came back into her consciousness. He rolled away from her, lying on his back on the carpet. A breeze blew through the door, chilling her bare, sweat-slicked skin.

“Well,” she said.

“Yes.” She looked over at him. He was on his back, his arms up, hands beneath his head.

“I suppose that was inevitable,” she said, sitting up, drawing her knees to her chest.

“Clearly it was,” he said.

“Obviously. Because it happened.”

He turned and rose up, cupping her cheek. “Yes, it did.”

“It didn’t fix anything,” she said, a cold feeling stealing into her chest.

“No, but I don’t suppose sex ever stood a chance of fixing anything.”

“I thought we might...” She stopped talking, because she didn’t know what she’d thought. That it would steal the mystery? Break the bond? That it would bond them? Answer the questions and reservations she’d had?

No, she hadn’t thought any of that. She’d thought of nothing but need. Her need to have him, the way he’d looked at her. The way he’d wanted her.

Not the fa?ade, but her.

But now, with the haze of orgasm fading slowly into the background, she was acutely aware of the fact that she was, yet again, naked with a man she didn’t know. Yet again, she was exposed with him.

This time she’d gone and shown just how needy she was. For some kind of acceptance. It made her cringe. She knew better than to show this much of herself. Than to be anything more than self-contained.

Her mother had been that way. So perfect. So gracious. And she’d tried. Rachel had always tried, and never quite lived up to it all. She’d failed eleven years ago, on purpose and with blazing, spectacular glory because at the time it had seemed better than trying so hard and still not measuring up.

And she’d failed again with Alex.

“I think I need...”

“A cigarette?” he asked.

She laughed. “No. Oh, man...I haven’t had a cigarette in...more than a decade.”

“But you’ve had one? I’m shocked.”

She took a deep breath. “I think you’re too easily shocked. Everyone has a past, you know.”

“Oh, believe me,” he said. “I know about pasts.”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“You seem far too...good, to have a past,” he said, frowning.

“I seem good? After that? I need to work on my moves.”

“I just mean...you were a virgin. You’ve never had your name in the paper for anything even remotely scandalous.”

“By design. All of it. Anyway, since when does virginity equal goodness? Mine’s certainly not a reflection of that. It was...fear, mostly.”

“You didn’t seem afraid that night with me. Though you did tremble a bit.”

“I hate you.”

He stood up, naked still and entirely unconcerned.

“I’ll bet the people in the building across the way are getting a show.”

He turned and waved. “Probably.”

“Good grief, Alex, have you no shame?”

“No. A product of my upbringing, I’m afraid. Hard to have shame raised in the environment I was.”

“But the people across from us might have shame.”

He grinned and bent, grabbing his black underwear and tugging them back on. “There, how’s that?”

“Better for some,” she said.

“Not you?”

She felt her face get hot. “Not really.”

“How is it you kept all this passion hidden for so long?”

“I hid it so well, I even hid it from me,” she said, hoping to redirect the subject. Away from things like this. Away from drunken parties and stupid decisions. “Plus... Look, I’ve made some crappy decisions, okay? And I almost got burned seriously and permanently because of it. Who am I kidding? I did get burned just...privately. I learned my lesson, though. I learned that you can’t just do things without consequences catching up with you.”

“Do you have lung problems from all your smoking?” he asked, his tone dry.

“If only that were the case.”

They looked at each other for a second. She was still naked. And he was mostly naked. And she realized they knew so little about each other.

She knew about his past, but the only thing that felt real, the only thing that had seemed as if it was connected to a real emotion and not just a cold, hard fact about the way he’d grown up, was his honesty about the pizza.


They didn’t know each other. He didn’t know her. But then, as he’d already pointed out, no one really did.

And here she was, having just shared herself with him in the most intimate way, pregnant with his baby, no less, holding tight to shame that was so deeply embedded in her, trapped beneath that layer of steel.

“Do you know what I used to love?” she asked, because she was naked anyway, so there was no reason not to say it.

“What?” he asked.

“Driving really fast. I was...such a jerk behind the wheel. Really dangerous. Alana and I used to cruise around a lot when we were in Greece. We didn’t really get the chance to drive in the city so when we were here...? All bets were off. I had this great car. It was red and sleek, and it went...well, it went fast, let’s just say that. And we’d cruise with the top down and flirt with guys at stoplights. It made me feel like I wasn’t Rachel Holt, this big disappointment to her mother. I hated all the things she wanted me to do. I just wanted to do something I wanted. And for a while, I just wanted to...forget that I cared and...drive fast.”

“That’s normal...isn’t it? I don’t really know since I didn’t have what you’d call traditional teenage years, but even so, I think I’ve seen things like that in movies.”

“Sure, I suppose it’s normal. But that doesn’t make it smart or safe. Especially not when you’ve been drinking. Which...we did. It was stupid. I was stupid and I...I don’t know what I was doing. Rebelling against a life that was too...sedate, I suppose. A life I didn’t feel like I was excelling at. I just wanted to feel something. Something exciting and dangerous. The wind in my hair, bubbles fizzing through my blood... I liked to flirt, too.”

“You were an innocent, so it’s not like—”

“There is a lot of ground between innocence and not having had intercourse, Alex. I would think a man like you would realize that,” she said tightly.

“Oh.” He looked...unhappy with that.

“Does that bother you? That you aren’t the first man I’ve been intimate with? Though I’m not really sure you can call a quick blow job in the back of a car intimate. But I make very poor decisions under the influence of drugs and alcohol, let’s put it that way.”

“This has never been in the papers. Everyone talks about you—”

“Like I’m the sainted Holt Heiress who spends her days sitting on a cloud playing a harp? I know. And it’s not by accident. My father... He covered for me. He paid off every cop that pulled me over, he bought any incriminating club photos. He kept me from being exposed. And then...” Her throat tightened, a sick sense of shame pouring through her, choking her. “I did something...really stupid. That seems to be the only descriptor I have for that year of my life. One year, Alex. Out of...twenty-eight. I acted out and I almost lost everything. I almost changed the way people saw me forever. I...I know I did change the way my mother and father saw me.”

“What happened?” he asked, his posture suddenly stiff, something in his stance deceptively, unnaturally still. As though energy were building in him, coiling tightly beneath the surface of his skin, ready to pounce at any moment on an imagined enemy.

Too bad the only enemy was her. The things, the desires, in her.

“Everything kind of came to a head—bad choice of words, you’ll see why in a second—when I met this guy at a club. Colin. I really liked him. We met up and danced a couple of weekends in a row and he asked if I wanted to ‘get out of here,’ which, you know, means that a guy wants something from you. I was drunk and feeling like giving it because he was hot and I liked him. A lot. He was handsome, and he had a nice smile. He thought I was pretty.” She rolled her eyes then looked down at her hands. She didn’t want to look at Alex right now.

This reminded her of standing in her father’s office, sweating and shaking, about to embarrass herself fatally, because she didn’t know what else to do. Because if she didn’t expose herself to her father, she would be exposing herself to the whole world.

“Anyway, I ended up in the backseat of the car with him. Which... You know what that means. We parked at the beach. At least it wasn’t a back parking lot somewhere—that makes it less sordid. Kind of. He got out his video camera. Pre the days of cell phone recordings, and thank God because the whole thing was much more concrete back then, not this nebulous digital web that could have had it in a thousand places immediately.”

“What did he do?”

“He filmed me. He asked and I thought, why not? I thought it was hot that he wanted to commemorate the event. I was drunk. I was seventeen. And right when he asked me to do it I thought maybe I even loved him, because being drunk and seventeen is basically all it takes to feel like you love someone. He wanted me, and I... Well, what I really loved was being wanted. For me, you know. Because, clearly, my blow job skills were the essence of me as a woman.”

“He videotaped you...”

“Going down on him. Yes. And the next morning I woke up with a raging headache and very little memory of it. Until he came around the villa the following evening looking for things to go further. I said no because...I didn’t feel ready for sex yet. Which maybe doesn’t make a lot of sense but...I just knew I wasn’t. He got mad and he threatened me. Because he had the video and he was going to send it out. To the media, to the internet. And I was...so afraid that he would. That...that would be out there. Me...doing that. Thinking about it makes me panic even now. I just...can’t imagine anything more exposing or humiliating. Though telling my father about it and begging him to bail me out was a close second.”

“And what happened?”

“He made it all go away. He protected me, because that’s what he’s always done. But he...he was so disappointed, I could tell. And that was when he told me he wasn’t protecting me anymore. He told me that anything could have happened to me. Driving drunk, going off with strange men... He said I was going to get myself killed and he wouldn’t watch while I did it. He wouldn’t enable it. No more help. No more money. No more family. He said I had to behave myself, or lose everything. And...I have. Until now. Probably I’m cut off, I suppose, but...but...”

“That’s why you aren’t calling home.”

She nodded silently. “I don’t want to know.” Her eyes stung, but still, there were no tears. “I don’t want to see him look at me that way ever again. Like I’m a...lost cause. I don’t know why I did all that stuff, not really. But I know why I stopped. Because I wanted more out of my life than what I was going to get partying until my brain fell out of my ear.”

“And that more was marrying a man you didn’t love or even want to sleep with?”

His words hit her, cold and hard in the chest.

“Apparently, what I was really waiting for was to meet a stranger and have a one-night stand with him and get pregnant with his baby. My goals were much loftier than a mere loveless marriage.”

He cleared his throat and looked out the window. “Did your father tell you what a worthless a*shole that man was?”

“What?”

“Did he tell you what a horrible person that man was? Because it seems to me that all of this was about the situation you put yourself in, and while I get that there were poor decisions on your part—and I’m the proud owner of many poor decisions so I’m not throwing stones—he was the one determined to take a private encounter public. He was the one who was threatening to expose you.”


“I... He wasn’t there to be lectured, I was.”

“And you were the one who had to change.”

“I really did though, Alex. I was trying to take a long walk off a short pier.”

“I agree with that in terms of the substance abuse. Drugs mess things up, Rachel, in ways I’m sure you never saw in a club. But you’re clean now, I assume.”

She nodded. “Yes. I was never a heavy user. Mainly I drank too much alcohol. But I have a one-glass limit on wine now. And a no-glass limit at the moment.”

“What were you trying to fix?”

“What?” she asked.

“Everyone I’ve ever known that’s been on drugs or who partied till they couldn’t think—and I’ve known a lot of them, considering my background—has been running from something. Medicating for some reason. What was yours?”

“I don’t... I...” She blinked rapidly and looked away from him. “I didn’t worry so much about being good enough when I was doing all that. I felt...happy. I felt good.”

“And since you stopped?”

She lifted one shoulder. “Until recently, I knew I was good. Feelings didn’t really matter.”

“So you exchanged one form of denying your feelings for another? New solution—don’t change your feelings, just don’t have them?”

“I’m sorry, Alex, but this is something you couldn’t possibly know anything about.”

“Is that right?”

“Yes. I don’t mean to be cruel, but who has any expectation of you? When I found out who you were I knew I’d been used because your name is synonymous with epic bastardry. You’d already tried to ruin Ajax with those tax fraud allegations.”

He quirked his lips into a half smile. “And the odds that they were true seemed high. They would have been with many corporations.”

“Sadly for you, Ajax does things so by the book it’s almost unreal.”

“A surprise, considering.”

She suddenly felt even more naked than she had a moment ago. She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. She should get her clothes, but she had a feeling that they wouldn’t make her any warmer. Any less exposed. He knew now. He knew the worst of her.

And she knew...what he thought was the worst of Ajax. And she knew about the pizza. But she didn’t know him.

“Tell me something about you,” she said. “What are you ashamed of?”

He looked away from her. “I’m not ashamed of anything. I don’t have shame.”

He looked back at her, their eyes meeting, his expression fierce. “I’ve seen too many things...done too many things. And I don’t regret them. Because they’ve made me who I am.”

“That’s such a line. We all regret things. I regret getting into the car with Colin. I regret drinking that much. I regret letting him videotape me.”

“And it changes nothing, so why bother with it?”

“Because it did change something. It changed me.”

“Ah, yes, and you’re so happy and well-adjusted now?”

“No. I’ve proven, yet again, that when you follow your...emotions and hormones and...things that aren’t logical, stupid things happen.”

“Is that how you see the baby? As something stupid?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You said stupid things happen.”

“Are we going to stand here and pretend I made a stellar decision in sleeping with you when I was engaged to someone else? I don’t have it in me to lie like that.”

“Just to omit the truth when it suits you.”

“Shut up, Alex.”

“You just asked me to share about myself.”

“Then do that. But don’t throw stones at me. I can’t take it right now. I just...spilled my guts to you and I can’t take your criticism on top of it.”

Silence fell between them. A thick blanket that offered no warmth or comfort. Just a heavy awkwardness that made her skin break out into goose bumps.

He shook his head. “Sorry, I’m not overly shocked by your revelations since I used to catch live performances of what you did in that video in the halls of...of the Kouklakis compound. When I was a child,” he finished, the word hard and bitter. “I was protected, but only to a degree. You want me to tell you about things I’m ashamed of? I don’t even know what shame looks like.”

He turned away from her, his posture rigid, the defined muscles in his back standing out, tension radiating from him. “I’ve seen my own mother on her knees in front of a man. I’ve seen her beg and cry and offer favors for a chance to stay.” He turned back to her. “To take care of me, I thought. Because of love, I thought. But that wasn’t it. At least it wasn’t because she loved me. It was because she loved heroin and the man who owned it all. It was never for me. Fine, do you want to know what shame really feels like? Finding out your own mother loves drugs and sex more than she loves you. That’s shame. That burns, Rachel, in a way you can’t possibly imagine. You want to know what I know about family? There you are.”

“Alex...”

“Don’t,” he bit out, crossing to her. “I don’t need your pity. I am not that boy. I am not a victim. I got out by the skin of my teeth—I scraped my knuckles raw climbing out of that prison. I didn’t escape clean, but I escaped.”

“Is that why you hate Ajax so much? Because he got out and he’s done well for himself? Because he’s unaffected?”

“Of course that’s part of why I hate him.”

Because Ajax was so normal. And Alex was so broken. He didn’t say the words but she felt them between them. And she believed him.

“What happened when you left?”

He reached out, cupping the back of her head and pulling her forward. “I do not want to talk anymore.”

“Alex—”

He kissed her, his lips hard, crushing against hers.

“Don’t be afraid with me, Rachel,” he said, his hands skimming over her curves. “Don’t hide from me.”

“Alex,” she said again, his name a plea this time. For what, she wasn’t sure. For freedom? For a moment unleashed from the cage she’d locked herself in.

“There’s no shame with me,” he said against her lips. “None at all.”

His words pulled at something inside of her, at a need she’d been denying for so long. Rooted out the guilt that had been tangled around her soul like a creeping vine.

“You want me,” he said, kissing her neck, her collarbone. “Tell me that you want me.”

“I can’t...”

“Tell me what you want,” he said, his voice firm as he lowered his head and sucked her nipple deep into his mouth.

“We just did this, like, a half an hour ago,” she said, gasping, her head falling back.

“Yes. I know. And you want me again already. Because you’re passionate, Rachel, no matter what you think. Because you have desire. So much. And it’s beautiful.”

Her throat closed, something shifting in her chest. She took a sharp breath, trying to hold back the sudden, unexpected rush of emotion. She didn’t have time for it. Not now. Not when Alex was kissing her like this. Not when he was taking that old memory she’d just shared and twisting it, changing the way she felt about it. Changing the way she felt about herself.


“Tell me what you want,” he growled.

“You,” she said.

“Tell me how I make you feel,” he said, raising his head, his teeth scraping against her neck before he sucked the gentle curve hard, drawing away the sting.

“I...I want you, Alex.”

“Like no one else?”

“No one else.”

He put his hand between her thighs, his thumb sliding over her *oris while he pushed a finger deep inside of her. “Tell me,” he said again, a ragged edge to his voice that told her there would be no arguing with him. That told her she had to obey.

“I—” The words stuck in her throat, embarrassment, and self-protection slamming down and keeping her from saying anything.

“Tell me,” he said, “or you don’t get to come.”

“Alex,” she said, trying to be exasperated while his hands were working magic on her body. While he was holding her apart from paradise.

“I don’t have time for you to hide, agape. You want me, or you don’t. But you have to tell me.” He added a second finger, amped up the movements, pushing her closer but still not taking her there. And he knew it.

“I...I want you inside of me.”

He smiled, wicked, naughty. Thrilling. “I am inside of you.”

She shook her head. “That’s not what I mean.”

“Say what you mean.”

“I don’t...”

“You want my cock?” She nodded, biting her lip hard. “Then tell me.”

Heat flooded her face—embarrassment and arousal. So silly when she was being so intimate with him. When they’d done even more only a half hour ago, why couldn’t she say what she wanted? Why was it so hard to be honest? With him? With herself?

“I want your cock inside of me,” she said, the words coming out in a rush.

He cupped her chin, held her face steady while he kissed her deep. He withdrew his fingers from her and lifted her up into his arms, carrying her into the bedroom and depositing her on the center of the bed, pushing his underwear down his legs and coming to join her.

He parted her thighs and gripped his thick erection, pressing himself to the entrance of her body, guiding himself in slowly.

She arched, a harsh cry escaping her lips as he filled her. Stretched her. She felt so close, so needy—incredibly, considering what had happened earlier. But she couldn’t get enough of him.

She’d been waiting for this, for him, all of her life.

As soon as she had the thought, she pushed it away. She pushed everything away. The barrier she kept between herself and the world.

She forgot to feel shame. She forgot to curb her emotions. She forgot to be quiet and dignified. Instead she clung to his shoulders, dug her nails into his skin and wrapped her legs around his hips.

Instead she bit his neck and cried out her pleasure, riding the wave of pleasure to ecstasy. He pounded hard into her body until he stiffened, a hoarse cry on his lips as he found his own pleasure, as he poured himself into her.

Afterward she lay there, shaking. Feeling vulnerable and exposed. Like a creature that had been dragged out of its den and forced into the sunlight, uncovered, unprotected.

And she started retreating as quickly as possible. Did her best to try and rebuild her defense system.

But his arms were around her and he was kissing her neck, her shoulder, the curve of her breast. It made it impossible to retreat fully. Because he was holding her captive.

“You can’t possibly want to do that again,” she said. “I’m completely spent.”

“That’s one of the perks of younger men,” he said, pinching her nipple lightly. “We can go all night.”

“I can’t. I’m exhausted.” Physically, she could have him again. She already wanted him. How could she ever get tired of a man like him?

But emotionally? She didn’t have the strength. Because he’d done something to her. It was more than unleashing a wild part of herself she hadn’t known existed. It was more than just sex. She was stripped naked, down to her soul, and there was no way she could go through any more just yet.

It was all starting to catch up with her. The reality of her actions, from the moment she’d met him until she’d told him so bluntly what she’d wanted from him.

She looked at him, their eyes clashing. He was so beautiful. A man built to tempt even the most righteous of women. And she’d never been all that righteous. She’d only been pretending.

This man was the father of her baby.

Her stomach lurched, the thought butting up hard against her compromised defenses. Oh, good Lord, the baby...

She shivered, a dry sob in her throat. But still there were no tears.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I don’t know...I...I was thinking about the baby.”

He froze behind her, then his hand drifted from her breast down to her stomach. “How are you feeling about it?”

Scared. “Okay. I mean...it’s a lot to deal with.”

“Naturally. And what are your plans?” he asked. “If you don’t marry me, what do you think we’ll do?”

“I don’t want to talk about this right now.” She felt scrubbed raw, and she didn’t think she could even handle thinking about the pregnancy in terms of it producing an actual baby at the end, much less how Alex and her relationship with him would squeeze in around that.

“Then when, Rachel? You’re pregnant with my child. You continue to end up in my bed. Marriage is—”

“Is that what this is about?”

“What?”

“You...putting the moves on me. Is it just so I’ll agree to this...marriage thing?”

“This marriage thing,” he said, moving away from her and getting off of the bed, “is the best chance our child has at a normal life.”

“Oh! So we’re normal? What in all the world makes you think that?”

“I didn’t say we were, but a normal family structure is the best chance this child has.”

“And you want to prove something to Ajax?”

“This has nothing to do with Ajax! When I went to that wedding, I went for you. You could have been marrying my very best friend and I would have come to take you. Because you’re mine. It’s that simple.”

“I’m yours? Why?”

“Because,” he said, his words tight. “Because you’re having my baby.”

“You didn’t know I was.”

“And because I want you.”

“To be who you want. To do what you want.”

His lips curled. “I asked what you wanted. And you told me. Oh, baby, did you tell me.”

“Shut up, Alex,” she said, turning away from him, those words starting to become familiar.

“Because you still want to pretend that you’re a cyborg?”

“Because I can’t deal with all of this right now!” she said, exploding. “With the baby. And with you...and...and my family... I can’t.” She got out of bed and started hunting for her clothes.

“We have to deal with it sometime.”

She had that feeling again. As if the pressure was too much. As if she was too full of...everything and as if there was no release on the horizon. As if she was drowning inside of herself.

“Not right now,” she said. She looked around and realized her clothes were in the living room. “Crap.”

She pulled the blankets off the bed and gathered them around her body, covering up her curves. “I’m going to bed,” she said.


“Fine.”

“And I’m not marrying you.”

“Yet,” he said, his blue eyes boring into hers. Oh, those eyes...

“Why does it matter to you? You don’t know anything about normal. You said yourself your experience with family is...is horrible, so why would you care?”

“Because I will give better than that for my child. I can’t fix anything that happened to me. I can’t...make it go away. But I can make sure no son or daughter of mine is exposed to what I was. That they’ll always know who their mother and father are. That we’ll both be there for them. If that’s not what you want...perhaps you should give custody of the child to me.”

Her entire body recoiled at the thought. “No. I would never give up my baby.”

“You said yourself you aren’t sure how you feel about it.”

“Because I’m afraid. Because I know what a huge responsibility it is! Because I don’t want to...raise a child who grows up like me and I don’t know how not to do that. How to protect a child without smothering them. How to guide them without making them feel like their choices are all bad....how to protect them when they genuinely are being an idiot. I don’t even know who I am, Alex. How am I supposed to deal with the life of another human being?”

“With me,” he said, his voice rough.

“No offense, but I’m not sure adding screwed up to screwed up is going to equal anything more than a mess.”

She turned and walked out of the room, her chest swollen, her body aching.

She didn’t know how to fix this. She didn’t know what she wanted. Right now she could hardly remember how to breathe.