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‘I am not offering anything.’
‘Hmm...pity. Well, in that case I suggest you sit back and enjoy the ride. Because you and I, Mrs Kate O’Connor-Nikoladis, are about to go on honeymoon.’
CHAPTER FIVE
PARIS. KATE GAZED wistfully at the city spread out before her. The city of love. The ultimate destination for a romantic honeymoon.
She had always longed to visit Paris. That fateful summer when she had set off on her European tour it had been one of her must-see destinations. But she had never made it. Circumstances had overtaken her—Nikos had happened.
Back then, if someone had told her she would be here now, married to Nikos, honeymooning in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, she would have thought it was the fairy tale ending. The start of her happy-ever-after.
Now it felt like a mockery—a travesty. As if they were disrespecting the institution of marriage and insulting the city with their bogus relationship. Despoiling the streets for the real lovers who walked innocently hand in hand, soaking up the atmosphere.
They had been here for four days, every minute of which had been choreographed by Nikos with military precision. The Eiffel Tower—tick. Notre Dame—tick. The Louvre, the Arc de Triomphe—tick, tick. Their days had been a whirlwind of sightseeing, a blur of art and architecture and history, all captured by the paparazzi in carefully orchestrated photo opportunities.
Just to add to the mockery, the boutique hotel they were staying in was called L’Hôtel d’Amour. Considering the whole time they’d been here she and Nikos had scarcely spent five minutes alone together, they should have been thrown out as imposters. After days of seeing the sights, their evenings were spent dining with business acquaintances of Nikos. And as for the nights... Those were very firmly spent apart.
Their artfully designed rooms on the top floor might be side by side, but they might as well be a million miles apart. And when they stood outside their respective doors at the end of the evening they didn’t exchange so much as a peck on the cheek.
It upset Kate far more than it should have. Nikos’s demeanour was polite but cool, his attitude perfectly civil but businesslike. So why did it feel like salt poured into an open wound? His flirtatious goading back in New York had wound her up tighter than a sprung coil, made the blood thunder through her veins, made her want to slap his arrogant face—hard. But it had also made her feel alive.
Somehow this stiff, sterile politeness was far worse. His total lack of interest in her was sapping her confidence, curling her heart into a prickly ball.
Turning away from the window, she reluctantly started to get ready for another dinner date. Tonight, apparently, they were going to the famous Moulin Rouge to watch a cabaret show. It should be fun—the perfect antidote to all the culture she had been force-fed these past few days. But the thought of spending another evening with a group of overweight businessmen, with the cold, looming spectre of Nikos across the other side of the table, watching her every move, filled her with dread.
Nikos had insisted that these endless meals in fancy restaurants were for her own benefit—or at least for the benefit of Kandy Kate. That these men—and they were all men—were highly influential, some of them with contacts in the confectionery trade. If Kandy Kate was to stand any chance of breaking into the European market these were the kind of people who could make it happen.
Kate hadn’t bothered to argue. Up until then she had never even considered the European market. Kandy Kate had always been an all-American brand. But maybe Nikos was right—maybe she should be looking further afield. It wouldn’t hurt to explore the idea. Now she had Nikos’s investment behind her she could start to think big. And besides, sharing a table with noisy French businessmen had to be better than the forced intimacy of a table for two with Nikos.
Though how those guys ever actually got any business done, in between their long lunches and even longer dinners, and the copious amounts of red wine they consumed, followed by the cigars and the brandy, was a mystery to Kate. Most of them were around the same age as her father—her hardworking, virtually teetotal father—who had always watched his diet, kept fit. It didn’t seem fair that they were still here when he was dead.
