In the Greek's Bed: The Greek Tycoon's Wife / The Greek Millionaire's Marriage / The Greek Surgeon

The instant she was gone Katie snatched her tingling hand away and wiped it across her lap vigorously, as though she could wipe his touch away.

‘Was that charade really necessary?’ she enquired icily. It seemed he couldn’t resist any opportunity to provoke and embarrass her. Or maybe, she mused scornfully, he just couldn’t let the implied slur on his manhood stand. Yeah, that would be right.

‘So you’re not sleeping with Tom?’

Katie stiffened defensively as his question took her off guard. ‘That’s none of your business, but if I was,’ she added confidently, ‘I certainly wouldn’t be stupid enough to get pregnant.’

Though she wasn’t as a rule a judgmental person, she had always found it hard to understand how in a day and age when contraception was so readily available people still fell pregnant unintentionally—though the falling was part of the self-deception as far as she was concerned; there was nothing accidental about it.

‘Maybe, maybe not…people in the grip of passion do not always think logically.’

‘Rubbish.’ One dark brow lifted at her forceful denunciation. ‘There’s absolutely no excuse for neglecting to take basic precautions.’

Katie frowned to hear herself sound so self-righteous and dogmatic…it was the sort of uncharacteristic response he brought out in her. He said night and she was almost falling over herself to screech day.

An enigmatic half-smile touched the corners of Nikos’s wide, passionate mouth as he observed the flare of panic in her eyes.

‘So you don’t think that the dizzy heights of passion could make a person, could make you, forget?’ His heavy lids lifted and Katie found herself captured and as helpless as a butterfly caught on a cruel pin by his dark gaze. ‘Forget your own name, where you begin and your lover ends…?’ he persisted throatily.

His rough velvet voice was describing a situation that was beyond her understanding, but one that held a dangerous appeal. Just listening to his sweetly insidious drawl made her feel hot and cold at the same time, and increased that tight, achy feeling that had been a more or less constant presence low in her belly all night.

The way his knowledgeable eyes were scanning her face made Katie, bitterly ashamed of her body’s wanton response, shift uncomfortably in her seat.

‘Forget the most basic precautions? Do me a favour,’ she scoffed stubbornly.

‘You cannot visualise yourself in a situation like that?’

‘No!’ Katie gritted through clenched teeth as she tried very hard not to allow the images he spoke of to crystallise in her mind. Even though she tried very hard some images filtered through her mental block; they were of limbs entwined, warm brown skin gleaming with sweat, fractured gasps and soft moans. She was hard put not to moan herself.

Nikos was beginning to think that the favour that would most benefit her would come from someone who could wipe that smug look of superiority from her face—his narrowed gaze homed in on the soft contours of her full lips—and why should that person not be him?

The voice of reason in his head immediately provided at least half a dozen legitimate reasons why it should not. Despite this, the idea, however ill advised, lingered on.

‘No matter how sophisticated society becomes, mother nature has built in some very efficient safety systems into the human design that will ensure the continuation of the species despite our best attempts to foil her.’ In a voice that was all honeyed temptation and earthy suggestion, he expanded his theory into territory Katie found even more uncomfortable, yet despite this she found herself perversely hanging on his every word. ‘It is not by accident that we are intoxicated, that sense and reason are suspended in the heat of passion.

‘Men,’ he proclaimed confidently, ‘are programmed to impregnate and woman are programmed to bear children.’ He shrugged and studied her shocked face; it seemed to Katie that the silver flecks in his eyes glittered like stars in a night sky. ‘You can’t fight against basic instincts, pethumou.’

She tried to escape but her restless gaze was repeatedly drawn back to his; a stab of sexual longing so fierce it robbed her of breath lanced through her body.

Katie shook her head. ‘You can’t talk like that,’ she gasped in an agonised whisper. The men she knew didn’t casually discuss impregnation in hospital waiting rooms.

‘You find my frankness offensive? Such things make you squeamish?’

Offended? She was terrified.

‘I am not squeamish. I just don’t think this is the appropriate time or place for talking about such things,’ she told him repressively. Unfortunately Nikos was not so easily repressed.

‘Sex is not a subject for open discussion?’

‘Not between people who are virtually strangers.’

‘So if I was Tom you would feel comfortable discussing sex.’

Katie took a deep, infuriated breath. ‘Tom and I do not discuss sex,’ she yelled.

‘Mrs Lakis…?’

Katie spun around to find the radiographer standing there.

‘We’re ready for you now.’

Her ankle was declared a nasty sprain, which they strapped with a stretchy support bandage and advised her to keep elevated. The doctor said he was satisfied that she had not sustained any damage to her lungs, though he did suggest Katie might like to stay in overnight to be observed.

To her relief when she politely but firmly refused the invitation he wasn’t too perturbed.

‘The doctor should be finished with your husband in a few minutes,’ the nice nurse who had attended her promised, showing her to a waiting area.

I can hardly wait.

Katie had caught sight of her reflection in a plate-glass door so wasn’t surprised that on the way there she was the focus of a number of curious stares.

Not to put too fine a point on it, she looked scary!

It was hard to tell what the original colour of Sadie’s once lovely dress was and there were several rips in the long skirt that revealed more than was decent of her long, grubby legs. Though she’d had the opportunity to wash the worst of the dirt from her face and hands, what she longed for most was to soak in a lovely hot bath until the acrid smoky smell that seemed to have penetrated pore-deep was gone.

‘I feel awful for asking, but I don’t suppose you’ve got any change for the phone, have you? I didn’t exactly come prepared,’ she explained with a rueful glance down at her ruined outfit.

Katie waited until the helpful nurse was out of sight before she headed for the pay phone she’d spotted in the foyer. First she phoned Tom; he wasn’t at home and he wasn’t answering his cell phone. She was about to leave him a message, but thought better of it…there was nothing he could do and telling him about the fire would only alarm him unnecessarily.

Next she rang Sadie’s mobile number.

‘I was starting to think they were keeping you in,’ Sadie said, sounding tired but pretty upbeat, which in the circumstances said a great deal for her powers of endurance.

Sadie got the bad news over with first.

‘Your flat’s a write-off. The good news is they managed to contain the fire to the top floor. The rest of the house is all right, barring some smoke damage in the hall and down the stairs. I’m staying with the Jameses next door tonight, they said you’re quite welcome to kip down on their sofa. I’ve got the spare room.’

‘Say thanks to them from me, but actually I can’t face the journey back.’ The hospital was a fifteen-mile trip from the village and she was ready to drop; in fact, remaining upright was difficult. ‘I’m just going to get a taxi to the nearest hotel and sleep for a week.’

‘Fair enough, see you tomorrow?’

‘Definitely,’ Katie agreed. ‘Sadie…I’m really sorry,’ she added in a rush.

‘God, we don’t even know if it was your fault and I’m the one that didn’t get around to refitting the fire alarms after the painters finished last month. Besides, nobody was hurt, that’s the main thing, and I’m extremely well-insured,’ she added cheerfully. ‘So don’t beat yourself up about it.’

It wasn’t until she’d hung up that Katie realised she had no money for a taxi, hotel room or, for that matter, any more for the phone. Don’t panic, think about this calmly and logically, she told herself.

So logically she had no money, and calmly she had no transport, her head hurt and she was dressed in revealing rags—Katie reckoned she was entitled to panic a little and to feel mildly despondent.