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His words cut through the fog of shock clouding her brain and she fumbled to secure the belt with hands that were all fingers and thumbs.
She retaliated in a sharp voice. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
Andreas expertly negotiated the car into the stream of traffic. It was so smooth it felt as if they were gliding above the ground. It had been long months since Siena had been in such luxurious confines, and the soft leather seat moulded around her body, cupping it in a way that was almost sensual. Her hands curled into fists on her lap against the sensation and her jaw was taut.
She unclenched it. ‘Stop the car and let me out, please. I can make my own way home. I got in purely to stop you causing a scene.’
‘I’ve spent six months looking for you, Siena, so I’m not about to let you go that easily.’
Six months ago her father had disappeared, leaving his entire fortune in tatters, and leaving Siena and Serena to stand among the ashes and take the opprobrium that had come their way in their father’s cowardly absence. Siena looked at Andreas with horror on her face and something much more ambiguous in her belly. Tonight hadn’t been an awful coincidence?
Shakily she said, ‘You’ve been looking for me?’
His mouth tightened and he confirmed it. ‘Since the news of your father’s disappearance and the collapse of your fortune.’
He glanced at her and she held herself tightly, wanting to shiver at the thought of his determination to find her again. To punish her? Why else? a small voice crowed.
Softly, lethally, he said, ‘We have unfinished business, wouldn’t you agree?’
Panic constricted Siena’s throat. She wasn’t ready for a reckoning with this man. ‘No, I wouldn’t. Now, why don’t you just stop the car and let me out?’
Andreas ignored her entreaty and drawled easily, ‘Your address, Siena…or we’ll spend the night driving around London.’
Siena’s jaw clenched again. She saw the way his long-fingered hand rested on the steering wheel. For all of his nonchalance she suddenly had the impression that he was actually far more intractable than her father had ever been. He’d certainly proved that he had a ruthless nose when it came to business.
Siena had on more than one occasion closeted herself in her father’s study to follow Andreas’s progress online. She’d read about him shutting down ailing hotels with impunity, his refusing to comment on rumours that he didn’t care about putting hundreds out of work just to increase his own growing portfolio. In the same searches she’d seen acres of newsprint devoted to his love-life, which appeared to be hectic and peopled with only the most beautiful women in the world. Siena didn’t like to admit how she’d noticed that they were all lustrous brunettes or redheads. Evidently blondes weren’t his type any more.
Suspecting now that he would indeed drive around all night if she didn’t tell him, Siena finally rapped out her address.
‘See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?’
Siena scowled and looked right ahead.
There was silence for a few minutes, thickening the tension, and then he said, ‘So, where did you get Mancini from?’
Siena looked at him. ‘How did you know?’ Then she remembered and breathed out shakily. ‘My boss must have mentioned it.’
‘Well?’ he asked, as if he had all the time in the world to wait for an answer.
Tightly, Siena eventually replied, ‘It was my maternal grandmother’s maiden name. I didn’t want to risk anyone recognising me.’
‘No,’ the man beside her responded dryly, ‘I can imagine why not.’
Anger at his insouciance, and the ease with which he’d just turned up to humiliate her, made Siena snap, ‘You really shouldn’t have followed me, you know.’
He replied all too easily. ‘Look on it as a concerned friend merely wishing to see how you’re doing.’
Siena snorted scathingly but her heart was thumping, ‘Friend? Somehow I doubt you’ve ever put yourself in that category where I’m concerned.’ It was more likely to be a definite foe.
Andreas Xenakis shot her a look then, and Siena recoiled back in her seat. It was so…so carnal and censorious.
He growled softly, ‘You’re right. We were closer to lovers. And friends don’t, after all, cry rape when it suits them to save face.’
Siena blanched. ‘I never used that word.’
Andreas’s jaw clenched hard. ‘As good as. You accused me of attacking you when we both know that only seconds before your father arrived you were begging me to—’
‘Stop!’ cried Siena, her breathing becoming agitated.
