Conveniently His Omnibus(40)
As the limousine pulled up at the address she had given the driver Athena examined her reflection in the neat mirrors fitted into the Rolls’s interior. That discreet nip and tuck she had had last year had been well worth the prince’s ransom she had paid the American plastic surgeon. She could quite easily pass for a woman in her early thirties now.
Her jet-black hair had been cut and styled by one of the world’s top hairdressers, her skin glowed from the expensive creams lavished on it, her make-up was immaculate and emphasised the slanting darkness of her eyes, her toe and fingernails gleamed richly with dark red polish.
A smile of satisfaction curved her mouth. No, there was no way Andreas’s dreary little fiancée—an office girl, someone he had supposedly fallen in love with during the negotiations to buy out the hotel chain—could compete with her. Athena’s eyes hardened. This girl, whoever she was, would soon learn what a mistake she had made in trying to lay claim on the man Athena wanted. What a very, very big mistake!
As she left the limousine the perfume she had especially blended for her in Paris moved with her, a heavy, musky cloud of sexuality.
Her teenage daughters loathed it, and were constantly begging her to change it, but she had no intention of doing so. It was her signature, the essence of herself as a woman. Andreas’s English fiancée no doubt wore something dull and insipid such as lavender water!
* * *
‘I’LL LEAVE THE CAR here,’ Andreas told Saskia as he swung the Mercedes into a multi-storey car park right in the centre of the city. Saskia’s eyes widened as she saw the tariff pinned up by the barrier. She would never have dreamed of paying so much to park a car, but the rich, as they said, were different.
Just how different she came to realise during the course of the afternoon, as Andreas guided her into a series of shops the like of which Saskia had never imagined existed. And in each one the very aura of his presence seemed to draw from the sales assistants the kind of reverential reaction that made Saskia tighten her lips. She could see the female admiration and speculation in their eyes as a series of outfits was produced for his inspection. For his inspection—not hers, Saskia recognised and her sense of helpless frustration and resentment grew with each shop they visited.
‘I’m not a doll or a child,’ she exploded outside one of them, when she had flatly refused to even try on the cream trouser suit the salesgirl had gushingly declared would be perfect for her.
‘No? Well, you’re certainly giving a wonderful imitation of behaving like one,’ Andreas responded grimly. ‘That suit was—’
‘That suit was over one thousand pounds,’ Saskia interrupted him grittily. ‘There’s no way I would ever pay that kind of money for an outfit...not even my wedding dress!’
When Andreas started to laugh she glared furiously at him, demanding, ‘What’s so funny?’
‘You are,’ he told her uncompromisingly. ‘My dear Saskia, have you really any idea of the kind of wedding dress you would get for under a thousand pounds?’
‘No, I haven’t,’ Saskia admitted. ‘But I do know that I’d never feel comfortable wearing clothes the cost of which would feed a small country, and neither is an expensive wedding dress any guarantee of a good marriage.’
‘Oh, spare me the right-on lectures,’ Andreas broke in in exasperation. ‘Have you ever thought of how many people would be without jobs if everyone went around wearing sackcloth and ashes, as you obviously would have them do?’
‘That’s not fair,’ Saskia defended herself. She was, after all, feminine enough to like good clothes and to want to look her best, and in that trouser suit she would undeniably have looked good, she admitted inwardly. But she was acutely conscious of the fact that every penny Andreas spent on her she would have to repay.
‘I don’t know why you’re insisting on doing this,’ she told Andreas rebelliously. ‘I don’t need any clothes; I’ve already told you that. And there’s certainly no need for you to throw your money around to impress me.’
‘You or anyone else,’ Andreas cut in sharply, dark bands of colour burning across his cheekbones in a visual warning to her that she had angered him.
‘I am a businessman, Saskia. Throwing money around for any reason is not something I do, least of all in an attempt to impress a woman who could easily be bought for less than half the price of that trouser suit. Oh, no, you don’t,’ he cautioned her softly, reaching out to catch hold of the hand she had automatically lifted.
He was holding her wrist in such a tight grip that Saskia could actually see her fingers going white, but her pride wouldn’t allow her to tell him that he was hurting her. It also wouldn’t allow her to acknowledge that she had momentarily let her feelings get out of control, and it was only when she suddenly started to sway, white-faced with pain and shock, that Andreas realised what was happening. He released her wrist with a muffled curse and then started to chafe life back into her hand.
‘Why didn’t you tell me I was hurting you so much?’ he grated. ‘You have bones as fragile as a bird’s.’
Even now, with his dark head bent over her tingling hand whilst he massaged it expertly to bring the blood stinging back into her veins, Saskia couldn’t allow herself to weaken and claim his compassion.
‘I didn’t want to spoil your fun,’ she told him sharply. ‘You were obviously enjoying hurting me.’
She tensed when she heard the oath he gave as he released her completely, and tensed again at the sternness in his voice, one look of grim determination in his eyes as he said, ‘This has gone far enough. You are behaving like a child. First a harlot and now a child. There is only one role I want to see you play from now on, Saskia, and that is the one we have already agreed upon. I’ll warn you now. If you do or say anything to make my family suspect that ours is not a true love match I shall make you very sorry for it. Do you understand me?’
‘Yes, I understand you,’ Saskia agreed woodenly.
‘I mean what I say,’ Andreas warned her. ‘And it won’t just be the Demetrios chain you won’t be able to work for. If you flout me, Saskia, I’ll see to it that you will never be able to work anywhere again. An accountant who can’t be trusted and who has been dismissed on suspicion of stealing is not one that anyone will want to employ.’
‘You can’t do that,’ Saskia whispered, white-faced, but she knew all too well that he could.
She hated him now...really hated him, and when in the next shop he marched her into she saw the salesgirl’s eyes widening in breathless sexual interest, she reflected mentally that the other girl was welcome to him...more than welcome!
* * *
IT WAS LATE IN THE afternoon before Andreas finally decided that Saskia had a wardrobe suitable for his fiancée.
At their last port of call he had called upon the services of the store’s personal shopper who, with relentless efficiency, had provided Saskia with the kind of clothes that she had previously only ever seen in glossy magazines.
She had tried to reject everything the shopper had produced, but on each occasion apart from one Andreas had overruled her. The only time they had been in accord had been when the shopper had brought out a bikini which she had announced was perfect for Saskia’s colouring and destination. The minuteness of the triangles which were supposed to cover her modesty had made Saskia’s eyes widen in disbelief—and they had widened even more when she had discreetly managed to study the price tag.
‘I couldn’t possibly swim in that,’ she had blurt-ed out.
‘Swim in it?’ The other woman had looked stunned. ‘Good heavens, no, of course not. This isn’t for swimming in. And, look, this is the wrap that goes with it. Isn’t it divine?’ she had purred, producing a length of silky fragile fabric embellished with sequins.
As she’d seen the four-figure price on the wrap Saskia had thought she might actually faint with disbelief, but to her relief and surprise Andreas had also shaken his head.
‘That is not the kind of outfit I would wish my fiancée to wear,’ he had told the shopper bluntly, adding, just in case she had not fully understood him, ‘Saskia’s body is eye-catching enough without her needing to embellish it with an outfit more suitable for a call girl.’
The shopper diplomatically had not pressed the issue, but instead had gone away, returning with several swimsuits.
Saskia had picked the cheapest of them, unwillingly allowing Andreas to add a matching wrap.
Whilst he’d been settling the bill and making arrangements for everything to be delivered to his riverside apartment Saskia had drunk the coffee the personal shopper had organised for her.
Perhaps it was because she hadn’t really eaten anything all day that she was feeling so lightheaded and anxious, she decided. It couldn’t surely be because she and Andreas were now going to go to his apartment, where they would be alone—could it?
‘There’s an excellent restaurant close to the apartment block,’ Andreas informed Saskia, once they were in the car and he was driving her towards the dockland area where his apartment was situated. ‘I’ll arrange to have a meal sent in and...’