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Alec watched him nervously. ‘I’ll find another PR company.’
Zander scowled, struggling with feelings that were totally unfamiliar. ‘Why?’
Alec looked flustered. ‘Because you—well, it was clear that you—the pair of you—hated each other,’ he finished lamely and Zander frowned.
Totally unaccustomed to examining his emotions in any great depth, he was uncomfortably baffled as to exactly what he was feeling at the moment.
Hate?
He’d felt many emotions for Lauranne O’Neill, all of them shockingly basic and intense. Hatred definitely wasn’t one of them.
Alec watched him, stiff and awkward. ‘How long were you—er—married?’
‘Four weeks, three days and six hours.’ Zander gave a cynical laugh and yanked the nearest chair away from the table. ‘Until then my father held the family record for the shortest marriage. Now the trophy is mine.’
‘But technically you’re still married,’ Alec commented. ‘Why did you never get a divorce?’
‘Because a divorce is only necessary if you intend to marry another woman,’ Zander replied grimly, sitting down and stretching long legs out in front of him, ‘and I am not in the habit of repeating my mistakes.’
And because he’d pushed the whole disastrous episode firmly to the back of his mind.
Alec stared at his boss’s hard expression and cleared his throat. ‘Right. So presumably that’s what Kouropoulos was referring to when he said that you showed no commitment to family life.’
‘Four weeks, three days and six hours certainly doesn’t constitute an impressive track record,’ Zander agreed smoothly and Alec frowned.
‘Well, it’s a pity that we can’t work with Phoenix PR. Ex-wife or not, Lauranne O’Neill is supposed to be the best. If anyone can persuade Kouropoulos that you’re a caring guy, she can. At the moment we can’t even get him to agree to a meeting.’
Zander stared at Alec broodingly, lean, strong fingers tapping a steady rhythm on the polished wood of the table as he digested that piece of information.
‘He still won’t agree to a meeting?’
Alec shook his head, frustration evident as he flicked through a pile of papers. ‘It doesn’t help that last week you were photographed with a model and a ballet dancer. The problem is that you don’t date the same woman two nights in a row.’
Considering the question superfluous, Zander gave a sardonic smile. ‘Why would I want to?’
Alec ran a hand through his hair in a gesture of exasperation. ‘Because we need to convince Kouropoulos that your womanising is merely the mark of a desperate man searching frantically for the right woman with whom to spend the rest of his life…except that you’re married so none of that works…’ His voice trailed off as he caught the look in his boss’s eyes.
‘I’ve never met a romantic lawyer before,’ Zander observed softly. ‘I pay you to deal with facts, not fiction.’
Alec gave a sigh and slumped in his chair. ‘Well, in this case the facts aren’t helping. I think this is one deal we’re going to have to give up on,’ he said wearily, pushing the papers away from him and dropping his pen on top. ‘Trying to make you look like a good boy is the hardest job I’ve ever been given. Just when I think I’m making progress with our friend Kouropoulos, someone somewhere publishes something scandalous about you and if the old guy knows you’re still married then it’s no wonder he’s not impressed. This is a guy who’s been with the same woman since he was twenty.’
‘Presumably that’s why he chooses to live on an island,’ Zander s
aid silkily. ‘It restricts the opportunities for straying.
He didn’t believe that any woman was capable of being faithful. If his father’s experiences hadn’t offered him sufficient proof, then his own certainly had.
Zander rose to his feet in a fluid movement and started pacing again.
He stopped pacing, every trace of amusement gone from his lean, handsome face. ‘Be clear on one thing, Alec. I’m not giving up on this deal.’
He wouldn’t rest until Blue Cove Island was his.
Alec sighed. ‘There’s no obvious solution.’
‘Then find a less obvious one,’ Zander suggested pleasantly, striding over to the window and staring down at the streets below. ‘If I need a new image, then I’ll get one.’ He kept his back to his lawyer. ‘And my wife is the woman to do it.’
There was a shocked silence.
