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Her whole body grew furnace hot. ‘So I’m not an actress. You knew that when we agreed to this.’
‘But now that I know you can do so much better, I must insist that you step up.’
‘What are you saying?’
‘That I want nothing less than what you showed me two months ago.’
She shook her head, wishing with every fibre in her body she’d left the subject alone. Walked out. She had a million things to be getting on with. And yet, she stayed put as he sauntered back towards her.
‘Are you serious? I just said it was a mistake,’ she insisted in a voice that wasn’t as firm as she wished it.
His lips compressed. ‘Regardless, you exhibited a side to yourself that put your previous performances to shame. Take it from me that Costas will notice anything less than a stellar delivery.’
The need to distance herself from this unnerving subject had her balling her hands behind her back, her chin coming up in challenge despite the quivering in her belly. ‘You want your money’s worth? Don’t worry, sir. I’ll deliver. I always do, don’t I?’
The question lay between them, silence he seemed content to let develop growing heavy in the room.
The jarring ringing of his phone made her jump, while he barely blinked at the intrusion. Knowing she’d called him sir because she’d secretly wanted to rile him held her in place, wondering if she’d taken leave of her senses. Again.
‘You’ve not let me down...so far. Let’s not start now by keeping important clients waiting, shall we?’ The drawl drew her attention to her stasis.
Sucking in a much-needed breath, she went to his desk and snatched up the phone as Christos settled into his chair, his fingers steepled against his lips as he watched her.
Alexis grew intently aware of the stretch of fabric over her breasts as she leaned against the desk, the wool blend of her skirt as it tightened over her bottom, the rush of air-conditioned air over her calves.
‘Drakakis Law Group, how may I help you?’
She breathed through the client’s brisk demand to speak to Christos, her grip on the phone easing as she held it out to her boss.
He took the receiver from her but didn’t answer it immediately, his eyes pinning her in place. ‘The whole team is working late, including you. So cancel any plans you have.’
Without waiting for her answer, he swung his chair away from her.
And just like that she was released from his force field; the phone call a half-time whistle giving her a much-needed reprieve. But as she exited his office, settled behind her desk and attempted to get her thoughts back to briefs and law reports and away from entangled bodies and heated kisses, Alexis couldn’t help but wonder just how she’d damned herself by giving in to temptation that night on her boss’s sofa.
* * *
The first few days after it happened, she’d spent every second on tenterhooks, wondering how they were going to continue working together.
The mishap had been inexcusable, one she’d vowed never to allow after that one, heart-stopping, never-to-be-repeated instant the first time she’d laid eyes on him. Then, she’d been struck dumb by the visceral potency of his presence. Having worked in a midsize law firm previously, with more than half the workforce being men with large egos who believed themselves top of the food chain, she’d thought she knew every facet of the male dynamic.
Christos Drakakis rising to his feet and watching her with his hawklike eyes and predatory stillness the moment she entered his boardroom had put paid to every preconception she’d had. To her everlasting shame, she’d stopped in her tracks, her reaction to his aura a solid punch to her solar plexus. But also in that moment, she’d wondered if she was looking at yet another downfall; whether she shouldn’t cut her losses and run in the opposite direction, lest she be taken in by another callous smooth-talker.
Luckily, she’d come to her senses, her common sense further shored by her best friend, Sophie, who’d made it her business to find out everything there was to know about Alexis’s potential new boss to prevent her making the same Adrian-shaped mistake again; going one step better to equip Alexis with dire stories of what had befallen Christos’s previous assistants.
Stories Alexis had discovered soon after accepting the role as Christos Drakakis’s assistant, and in the three years of rigid and clinical professionalism since, were absolutely true.
She’d stayed. And she’d summoned previously unmined control to withstand the sight of Christos leaning over her desk, hands planted on either side of her computer with his thick brawny forearms exposed and chiselled face filling up her vision while he grilled her about a task, using that deep, faintly accented Greek voice. She’d withstood the effect of his fiercely evocative leathery aftershave that made her want to lean up into that space between his square jaw and his collar and take a deep whiff of vibrant skin and man, the way she’d fantasised far more than was healthy.
She’d had to because, despite the outward show of calm in the face of emotional chaos, the scar tissue inside that had never healed post-Adrian still felt raw and stung deep enough to keep her awake at night, years later. Only pride and the need to draw a conclusive line between her and the greatest mistake of her life had been the catalyst that had pushed her into overcoming temptation.
She’d succeeded. For the most part.
Except in moments like five minutes ago, when Christos stared a moment too long and too deeply into her eyes, and she feared he’d seen something other than the impeccable assistant she’d striven to be. Each time he relented she felt as if she’d been saved from the jaws of death. Alexis wished those were just fanciful thoughts.
They weren’t.
Up until that twenty-minute trip to the registrar’s office when he’d slid a wedding ring on her finger, her position had granted her a front-row seat to his past relationships, more specifically, the fervid highs each of his new liaisons experienced when he first turned his intense grey eyes on them; the hope that blazed in their eyes that they would be the one to turn the commitment-phobic divorce lawyer into the matrimonial triumph of the decad
