The Millionaire's Virgin

‘I thought not.’ He paused. ‘That was why I suggested that as Price was a friend of yours he should arrange this meeting.’

Paige absorbed this as the wine waiter poured some of the deliciously flavoured Chardonnay into her glass. But when they were alone again she exclaimed, ‘And Martin had no idea that—that we knew one another?’

‘I’m afraid not.’ Nikolas looked at her over the rim of his own glass. ‘Poor Paige. The men in your life do seem perfectly willing to throw you to the—wolves, do they not?’

Paige refused to let him provoke her. ‘Is that a warning, Kirie Petronides?’ she asked mockingly, and had the satisfaction of seeing his eyes darken accordingly.

But, ‘Maybe,’ was all he said, and it was Paige who felt every nerve in her body tingle at the veiled menace in his voice.

They didn’t speak again until the grilled salmon had been served and then it was Paige who felt compelled to break the uneasy silence that had fallen. ‘I—I would have expected Yanis to handle any employee recruitment,’ she murmured, aware that she had barely touched the mousse and was only making a paltry effort with the salmon. A morsel caught in her dry throat and she was forced to cough and resort to her wine before continuing, ‘He is still with you, I assume?’

Nikolas was not deceived by her attempt at casual conversation. ‘Yanis is still my assistant, ne,’ he conceded evenly. ‘But this is a rather—delicate affair.’

‘Why?’ Despite herself, Paige was puzzled. She couldn’t believe it was anything to do with her.

‘Because it is a personal matter,’ he replied, taking another mouthful of his wine. Then, because she was still looking at him enquiringly, he went on, ‘The job I have in mind concerns my ward. In such circumstances, it is not—suitable—to leave the decision in Yanis’s hands.’

Paige gasped. ‘Your ward?’ She looked stunned. ‘I didn’t know you had a ward.’

‘That is because I did not have a ward when we—knew one another,’ he told her. ‘Ariadne’s father was a close friend, and when he and his wife were killed three years ago I discovered they had appointed me their daughter’s guardian. She has no other close relatives, you understand? Oriste, I have a ward.’

‘I see.’ Paige moved her shoulders uncertainly. ‘That’s quite a responsibility. How old is she?’

‘Ariadne is seventeen years of age. Not too much of a responsibility, as you can see.’

‘Oh.’ Paige was surprised. ‘Then why—?’

‘I am looking for a young woman of good family to—how shall I put it?—keep her company for the summer. And to share with her all those womanly confidences she can no longer share with her mother.’

‘And you thought that I—?’

‘In the absence of any other offers, yes,’ he essayed mildly. ‘Why not?’

Paige gasped. ‘I couldn’t work for you.’

‘Do not be too hasty, aghapita.’ He speared her with a penetrating look. ‘The position carries a generous salary with all expenses found, and the hours would not be too arduous.’

‘I’m not for sale, Nikolas.’

‘No, but you are short of funds, are you not? And you said yourself that your sister is eager for you to find alternative accommodation, ne?’

Paige put down her fork. ‘This is a pointless conversation. I don’t speak Greek.’

‘Ariadne understands English. She is still at school, of course. But she has been educated to a very high standard.’

‘Then she’s probably perfectly capable of taking care of herself,’ said Paige, thinking of her own sister. Sophie would die if anyone suggested she needed a chaperon. ‘Besides, as you’ve just mentioned, I have a sister, who—who—’ Had been quite a handful since Paige had had to remove her from the expensive boarding school she’d been attending. ‘Who I couldn’t possibly leave on her own.’

Or with Aunt Ingrid, she appended ruefully. Ever since their father died, they’d been staying with their mother’s sister in her ‘bijou’ cottage, as she described it, in Islington. And it was only because Paige was there to keep the peace between them that Sophie and her aunt remained on speaking terms…

‘Then bring her with you,’ said Nikolas carelessly. ‘She will be on holiday, too, will she not? And I would prefer Ariadne to stay at my house on Skiapolis for the summer.’ He shrugged. ‘There is plenty of room, as you know, and your sister may befriend Ariadne. They are of a similar age.’

They were, but Paige could imagine Sophie’s reaction were she to drop this particular bombshell in her lap. Although her sister resented the circumstances in which they were now being forced to live, blaming their father for not making adequate provision for them during his lifetime, she would find the idea of leaving London for some unsophisticated island in the Aegean even more unacceptable. Besides, she’d just settled down at the local comprehensive; she’d made friends; and although Paige wasn’t altogether enthusiastic about the crowd Sophie was mixing with she had no desire to uproot her again.

‘I don’t think so,’ she said now, bestowing a slightly warmer smile on the waiter when he came to remove her barely touched plate. ‘No, it was fine,’ she assured him when he expressed his concern. Then, looking at Nikolas again, she said, ‘I’m afraid you’ve wasted your time.’

‘No time is ever wasted,’ he responded, his brooding expression giving the lie to his words. ‘At least think about it, Paige. I shall be in London for a few more days and you can always contact me via this number.’ He drew out a card and scrawled some figures on the back before pushing it across the table towards her. ‘Take it.’

Somewhat against her better judgement, Paige reached for the card, but as she did so Nikolas covered her hand with his, successfully imprisoning her fingers within his cool grasp. And, although she made a futile attempt to free herself, she knew she had no real chance of competing with his strength.

‘Think about it. Please,’ he begged softly, and Paige was overwhelmed by the sensual appeal in his voice.

Dear God, she thought, dragging her eyes away from his to gaze unsteadily at the powerful fist encasing hers. A fiery warmth was spreading up her arm and invading every quivering pore of her slender frame, and no matter how she tried to rationalise her reaction she knew her body hadn’t forgotten anything about this man. It remembered; her skin remembered; and that was something she had never expected.

Eventually, he was obliged to let her draw her hand away and she cradled it in her lap, as if it had been abused. That was what it felt like, she thought shakily, the vibration his touch had evoked still rippling through her veins. She just prayed he wasn’t aware of her upheaval.

Somehow she got through the next few minutes. Although she didn’t want it, she agreed to coffee in lieu of a pudding, and endeavoured to come to terms with the fact that she had more than one reason for refusing his offer. Even if it was the only offer that came her way, she couldn’t work for him. Apart from anything else, she didn’t want to be hurt again, and Nikolas Petronides would have no qualms about recovering what he saw as his pound of flesh…

CHAPTER TWO (#ua9b7c717-4c9f-5101-b7c0-8b5e3d4851cd)

PAIGE caught the Underground back to Islington. At this time of the afternoon, the trains weren’t busy, and after finding herself a seat she reflected how quickly she’d adapted to using the Tube instead of taking taxis everywhere.

All the same, it had been raining when she’d left the restaurant, and she’d had to resist Nikolas’s offer to get a taxi for her. Although it was June, the weather was still unseasonably cold, and the pretty cream Chanel suit she’d worn to impress Martin was now dotted with damp patches.

She just hoped it didn’t pick up any dirt on the way home. She and Sophie were having to conserve what clothes they had, and it had been quite a drain on their meagre resources outfitting her sister with clothes for her new school.

She sighed. If only their father were still alive, she thought wistfully, but Parker Tennant had died as he’d lived: without making any provision for the future. He’d left his daughters with a mountain of debt besides, and the unhappy task of having to salvage what little they could from his possessions. Not that there had been much. The beautiful home they’d had in Surrey had been mortgaged twice over, and even their mother’s jewels had had to be sold to satisfy their creditors.

Paige thought it was just as well their mother hadn’t lived to see it. Annabel Tennant had died of an obscure form of cancer when Paige was seventeen and Sophie only ten, and she’d sometimes wondered whether that was when her father had started taking such enormous risks with his clients’ money. It was as if his wife’s death had persuaded him that there was no point in planning for a future that might never happen, and there was no doubt that losing her mother had affected him badly.

It was why Paige had left school without finishing her education; why she’d appointed herself his protector. She’d been there when he needed her, taking care of him when he didn’t, and somehow getting him through those first awful months after Annabel died.

It had taken a toll on her, too, but she’d never considered herself. She’d been happy making him happy, and until she’d been introduced to Nikolas Petronides she’d cared little for the fact that the only men she’d dated had been men her father had had dealings with.

Of course, he’d approved of Nikolas, too—at least to begin with. It was only when he’d discovered that the Greek had had no intention of investing money with him that he’d turned against him. And Paige had had no doubts where her loyalties lay…

Which was why there was no way she could accept Nikolas’s offer now. Apart from the fact that they had once known one another too well, she wanted nothing from him. In his own way, he was like Martin: he was using her situation to humiliate her, and however attractive the prospect of a summer in Greece might be—not to mention the generous salary he’d tried to bribe her with—she needed a real job with someone who wasn’t out for revenge.

But she didn’t want to think about that now. It was four years since her relationship with Nikolas had foundered and since then she’d insisted on taking charge of her own life. She sighed. Not that she’d been any more successful, she conceded wryly. Her association with Martin Price had hardly been a success. But then, she hadn’t been aware that the handsome young accountant had been more interested in furthering his own career, and in paying court to Parker Tennant’s daughter he had envisaged a partnership in her father’s investment brokerage firm as his reward. Of course, when Parker Tennant died in such inauspicious circumstances, he’d quickly amended his plans. In a very short time, Paige had found her engagement had only been as secure as her father’s bank balance, and although Martin had made some excuse about finding someone else she’d known exactly what he really meant.

She stared dully out of the window. That was why she’d felt so mortified when she’d learned that Martin had arranged for her to see Nikolas Petronides. It was galling to think that his prime concern was to put some distance between them, and she half wished she could tell him exactly what she and Nikolas had once been to one another. Would he be jealous? She doubted it. Of Nikolas’s wealth, perhaps, but nothing else.

The train pulled into her station and, leaving her seat, she discovered to her relief that it had stopped raining. Which was just as well, as she had a ten-minute walk to Claremont Avenue, and no umbrella.

Aunt Ingrid’s cottage was about halfway down the avenue, and Paige approached the house with some relief. It had been quite a day, one way and another, and she was looking forward to changing into shorts and a T-shirt and spending some time weeding her aunt’s pocket-sized garden. It was what she needed, she thought: mindless physical exercise, with nothing more momentous to think about than what the soil was doing to her nails.

She heard her aunt’s and her sister’s voices before she’d even opened the front gate. The windows of the cottage were open and their raised tones rang with unpleasantly familiar resonance on the still air. Several of her aunt’s neighbours were taking advantage of the break in the weather to catch up on outdoor jobs, and they could hear them, too, and Paige offered the elderly couple next door an apologetic smile as she hurried up the path.

What now? she wondered wearily. She glanced at her watch. It was barely three o’clock. Sophie shouldn’t even be home from school yet. For heaven’s sake, didn’t she have enough to worry about as it was?