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Throughout the evening she had caught glimpses of him as he met and spoke with everyone present, celebrity and charity member alike. She’d tried to ignore the way that every adoring female gaze followed him—not that she could blame them. He was simply stunning—magnetic even as each woman present seemed to be drawn towards him consciously or otherwise. Célia had tried to block out how tactile he was, always touching someone on the arm, leaning forward into space Célia considered far more personal than not. But what she really marvelled at was how unconscious it seemed to be for him. He just...did that. For a person who shrank back into the shadows at every opportunity, Célia found herself oddly jealous at the ease with which he interacted with others.
‘That’s very kind of you to say, Mr Sideris.’
Célia jumped at the sudden and shocking proximity of the man she had just been thinking of. An action painfully visible to both men. She felt the blush rising on her cheeks and cursed her pale skin tones. Loukis speared her with an odd expression—one of either confusion, disdain, or even quite possibly both—before turning back to Estía’s CEO.
‘I very much look forward to doing business with you again,’ he said, grasping Sideris’ hand in his own.
‘Likewise, Mr Liordis. Likewise,’ returned the CEO, before departing with the wife that had been waiting patiently in the background.
Célia retrieved her phone from her trouser pocket, most definitely a benefit of her attire that evening, and clicked through the security pin code to retrieve the web browser she had found earlier.
‘One roaring success, Mr Liordis.’
He took the phone from her hand, using the tips of his fingers as if not wanting to make physical contact with her. It made her plunge her hand into her pocket. It made her feel...hurt having seen him be so open with all the other guests present that evening.
‘What am I looking at?’
‘The online results for this evening’s events,’ she said, the excitement at their achievement that evening cutting through any preceding thoughts. ‘With over two hundred and fifty thousand unique visitors to Estía’s website in the last four hours—’
‘Two hundred and fifty thousand? That doesn’t seem that much.’
‘Loukis, you’re incredible. Truly. But you’re not a Kardashian. It’s great, trust me.’
‘For who, Estía or me?’
‘For both,’ she replied, feeling like growling. ‘If it helps at all, then the majority of those visitors’ page impressions were to your bio on the site. But perhaps you’ll be happier with the fact that you’re currently across nearly every social media site, four international news agency websites and you’ll be on the front cover of the early morning edition of The Times. In five different countries.’
‘What about the American press?’
She was going to kill him. She was really going to kill him. His inquisition seemed solely focused on his own ego and it was destroying any sense of pride and accomplishment she felt at having not only pulled the whole event off—in little less than a month—but also ensuring it was actually a success, despite what Liordis apparently thought. She snatched her phone from his hands, unable to avoid that irritating zing that served only to fuel her ire, and walked away.
‘Is it going to be in the American press?’ he called after her.
‘Why does it matter?’ she tossed over her shoulder.
‘It just does, Célia.’
He was using that tone again. The one that she instinctively knew was more him than anything else he’d said. It caused her to pull up short. Again. She didn’t need to check her phone for the answer. ‘Yes,’ she said, finally turning back to him. ‘Happy now?’
‘Nai.’
He didn’t look happy. He looked more determined and more than a little...triumphant? It was an odd expression. It was...utterly devastating. Her heart began to pound in her chest and she wanted to run. To get away from him as fast as possible.
‘Where are you going?’ he demanded.
‘Back to my hotel. I have an early morning flight back to Paris.’
‘I’ll take you.’
‘I can find my own—’
‘I’ll take you, Célia.’
She shivered, hating the effect of his words on her already overly sensitised thoughts. For a moment, the promise hung on the air between them—as if he, too, realised the double entendre. Purposefully sidestepping that thought, she wondered how she would get back to her hotel. Exhausted and not speaking Greek, she decided Loukis’s offer was the easiest and quickest solution.
‘Fine.’
‘Then you are going the wrong way. My car is waiting in a side street. Best to avoid any further press.’
