Claimed For His Duty (Greek Tycoons Tamed Book 1)(24)

His hair was unkempt and his pallor a ghostly white under that olive skin. His nostrils flared as he saw her at the steps; something slithered across his face but he held her gaze, almost as if willing her to only see him, as if making her oblivious to the rest of the world.

And he was such a commanding figure that it almost worked.

Except she had lived half her life with moments like this, with that gut-twisting fear that something always went wrong when she found happiness.

Nausea pushed its way up her throat.

She gripped the balustrade so tight that her knuckles turned pale against the dark sheen but she forced herself to break his gaze and look beyond him.

Dmitri emerged from her grandfather’s room, his features ravaged. A half-empty bottle of scotch dangled from his hand, and his eyes were bloodshot. He looked at her, blinked, and then walked away without another glance.

He looked like he was coming apart at the seams, the complete contrast to Stavros’s frozen withdrawal, to the tight ropes with which he held himself.

“What happened?” Her words were loud, almost a scream in that dignifiedly morbid silence. She flew off the steps when he didn’t answer.

Launched herself at Stavros like a crazy dog. Like an immovable wall, he absorbed all her rage, all her blows as she pummeled at him. “What happened, Stavros? Tell me or I will—”

Pulling her into him so hard that the breath was knocked out of her, Stavros hugged her. Hugged her so tight her chest hurt with the effort to breathe, her head was dizzy...until all she could focus on was getting air into her collapsing lungs.

Only then did he loosen his hold on her. Tucking a finger under her chin he pushed it up to meet his gaze. “I’m sorry, pethi mou. Giannis is gone, Leah.”

Leah flopped onto him, the words stealing into her with a sickening thud. “No...” she whispered, futile tears filling her eyes.

“Look at me, galika mou,” he pleaded with such tenderness that she did.

Clasping her cheeks, he looked into her eyes. “He passed with a smile on his lips, Leah. He said he loved you, that he...he was so happy that you spent the past few days with him. I have never seen such peace in his eyes in all the years I have known him. You brought such joy to him.”

“Why didn’t you wake me? Why didn’t you at least let me say goodbye?” She pushed away from him, bitterness and anger and pain all roping together. “He was my grandfather. You and Dmitri...I had just as much right to be with him.”

The pads of his thumbs caught her spilled tears. “He insisted that I did not disturb you, Leah. Said you were not fond of goodbyes.”

A sob rising through her, Leah ran back upstairs without another glance at Stavros.

He had known. Her perceptive grandfather had known how scared she had been, he had known what it had cost her to reject him again and again...

In just a few weeks, Giannis had become such a huge part of her life and now, he was gone...Leaving her alone again to mourn him.

And for once in her life, Leah didn’t want to be alone, didn’t want to be ruled by fear. For once, she wanted to reach for the man she desperately needed. She wanted to lean on his strength, she wanted to take everything he would give of himself, everything she had always been too scared to ask.

* * *

It was almost evening when Stavros entered Giannis’s house again that day. He came to a halt in the vast foyer, the image of Leah standing at that last step, her expression of such fear and pain, the first thing he saw.

He had never seen her like that. Never heard that desperation in her tone. Over the last couple of weeks, he had accepted the fact that he had been wrong about Leah on so many levels. Yet he realized tonight that he had been no closer to truly understanding her.

She had desperately wanted him to say anything other than what he had, he knew. And the force of his own need, of his own desire to offer her anything but the hard truth, it had knocked him where he stood.

He wanted to wipe away those tears, he wanted to protect her from that grief, he wanted to...and all of it, it had nothing to do with duty.

The silence tonight was so different from all the other nights. He had done everything he possibly could to do all that Giannis had asked of him. All the arrangements had been put in place for the funeral to happen in a few days.

He was about to call for his housekeeper, instruct her to check up on Leah when she emerged from his office, rubbing her eyes. The yellow top that had looked so bright this morning was rumpled. Her hair was tangled all around her and dark circles hung under her eyes.

“Leah, were you waiting for me?”

Grabbing her hair away from her face, she pulled it tightly at the back. “Yes.”

The innocent action thrust her breasts up and he swallowed his hunger.

Cristo, this was not the time for his control to shred. He was literally shivering with need.

It had been easy to offer comfort this morning. Yet now, he couldn’t move, couldn’t form a coherent thought. The shock of losing the one man who had ever tried to understand him, who had tried to care for him hit him hard in that moment. And he felt curiously weak, as if a strong gust of wind could knock him down.

He must have swayed because suddenly Leah was almost bowed back trying to support his weight. Her breasts rubbed against his side, her scent kicked him in the gut.

Her eyes were molten pools of concern and vulnerability as she held onto him. “You look like you are ready to fall apart. Have you sat down for a minute since last night?”

Putting her away from him, Stavros searched for his fragmented willpower. “I just need some sleep. What did you want?”

Would she ask to leave tonight? What would he do if she did?

The three months were almost up. After seeing her with Giannis these past two weeks, after talking to her about Calista, he had questions about himself.

He was drowning and he so desperately needed the very woman he had doubted.

“Nothing important. Come, I’ll walk you to your room.”

He smiled then, the weight on his chest lightening. “You, pethi mou?” She looked so lovely that his eyes hurt. “You will break in two if I so much as lean on you.”

Her hands on her hips, she mock-glared at him. “I’m not as weak as I look, Stavros. If your studly, macho ego rails at accepting help from me, that’s fine. But when was the last time you had something to eat? I can make something if you like.”

“You’re offering to cook for me?”

“Well, I can’t make a three-course meal but I can manage a grilled cheese sandwich.”

It was a tempting offer. Everything about her was tempting. And tonight, he was hanging on by the end of his rope.

“I’m not hungry,” he said morosely, unbuttoning his shirt. She followed the movement with such wide eyes that his fingers slipped on the damn buttons. Rubbing a hand over his gritty eyes, he gave up on it. “Go to bed, Leah.”

“I don’t think I could sleep tonight.” A shudder racked her. “I never do on such nights.” The resignation in her words brought his head up. For someone so young, she had seen too much death, he realized with a pang.

They both had, a perverse thing to have in common.

She looked so vulnerable, right then, her oval face small. The urge to take her in his arms was so strong that he had to fist his hands. “There’s nothing I can do for you tonight, Leah.”

“No, I don’t want anything, I...I didn’t see you again all day and whenever I called, I was told you were busy.”

Because he had instructed his secretary to not put her calls through. “I had too many things to take care of.”

Wrapping her arms around herself, she nodded. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay, Stavros. And to apologize.”

“Why?”

“I’m sorry for going off at you like that this morning. I’m sorry for always attacking you.”

He forced a smile. “I can take it, Leah.”

“It’s just that...I forgot how much Giannis meant to you too.”

Raising his hand, he stopped her. “Leah, it’s not needed.”

“Yeah?” she said with a depth of sadness. “Okay. Anyway, once I stopped crying and managed a shower, I went looking for you. Dmitri came back and wouldn’t leave even though I promised I was okay. You sent him, didn’t you?”

Today of all days, he didn’t trust himself to be near her. That pain of hers, it had unlocked something inside him. And until he understood what, she was better left alone.

When he shrugged, she continued. “Dmitri said you hadn’t said a word all night. And that you probably won’t over the next few days or maybe even months. That your silence...it was the most nauseating thing in the world. That for months after Calista died, the only words he had heard from your mouth were the vows you made to me that day.”

Anger roared out of him. “Bloody Dmitri needs to learn to keep his mouth shut.”

“You’d rather I continue to think you as unfeeling as you make out to be, Stavros?”

“This is not your burden to bear, Leah. I have no expectations of you—”

Hurt etched into her mouth. “You will turn my life upside down because I need to be protected, but I can’t even wonder what’s going on with you?”

“I do not need to be protected, Leah.”

“You have never wished you could unburden yourself with someone, that you could share your joy or pain or...”