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Eleanor gave a choked cry. She felt numb with shock and it was as if her lungs were being crushed in a vice, making it agony to breathe. Jace often called herpouláki mou,which in English meant ‘my little bird’. She had believed that his pet name for her was a sign of his affection. But he had compared her to a boring brown sparrow! As if that wasn’t hurtful enough, he evidently thought her sister Lissa was attractive.
The pain in Eleanor’s chest felt as though an arrow had pierced her heart. Jacelovedher, she assured herself frantically. Why else would he have asked her to marry him?
But he hadn’t actually said how he felt about her.
Doubt slid like a poisonous serpent into her head as she acknowledged that he had never uttered the three little words she longed to hear. When she had told him that she loved him, Jace had responded by drawing her into his arms and kissing her until she’d trembled with desire. But she had just heard him say that she was unremarkable.
She stared at her reflection in the full-length mirror on the wall and the scales fell from her eyes. Her new dress that she’d rushed out and bought when Jace had invited her to spend the weekend with him was a romantic froth of pink tulle, but it wasn’t glamorous. She had tied her long hair back with a matching pink ribbon. The dress’s sweetheart neckline was more daring than her usual restrained style, and before coming to meet Jace she had lost her nerve and covered up with a cardigan.
Compared to the elegant Parisian women Eleanor had noticed shopping on the Champs-Elysées, and who had no doubt caught Jace’s eye, she was neither sophisticated nor sexy. In truth, she had wondered why he was attracted to her. It turned out that he’d been lying to her all along. Nausea churned in the pit of Eleanor’s stomach. She had taken extra care putting on her make-up, but now tears spilled from her eyes and two black tracks of mascara ran down her cheeks.
She recalled that a few weeks after her grandfather had suffered a fatal heart attack, a man had come to Francine’s—the hotel in Oxford owned by Gilpin Leisure—and introduced himself as Takis Samaras, CEO of a Greek luxury hotel chain, Perseus. He had been very keen to buy the Pangalos, but she’d told him she had no intention of selling any of Gilpin Leisure’s assets.
Now she knew that Jace wanted the hotel and he did not care about her. She was devastated to discover what he really thought of her and she wanted to run away and hide like a wounded animal, but she forced herself to remain where she stood when he spoke again.
‘Marriage to Eleanor is the only way I can claim back the hotel that her grandfather took from my father. I have discovered that a clause in Kostas’s will stipulates that the Pangalos must remain within the family’s ownership.’ Jace swore. ‘The wily old fox must have gloated, believing he had prevented me from getting my hands on the hotel that by rights should be half mine. But I met his granddaughter and it was easy to make Eleanor fall in love with me.’
Jace pocketed his phone and strode across the balcony. He’d heard a faint sound from inside his suite and through the voile curtain he glimpsed a shadowy figure. There was the faint click of a door closing and when he stepped into the room there was no one there.
His frown cleared when he saw on the table a cake box with the name of a Greek bakery on the lid, and he guessed that one of the hotel’s staff had delivered it to his suite. He opened the box and smiled, certain that Eleanor was responsible for ordering the selection of sweet treats:baklava,loukoumadesand his particular favourite,kataifi—little pastries drenched in almond syrup.
Jace drank alcohol in moderation and he had never taken drugs, but he had confessed to Eleanor that he had a sweet tooth. It was typical of her to have remembered and arranged the thoughtful gift. He ran his hand over the stubble on his jaw and swore beneath his breath as he thought of his diffident fiancée.
Two months ago, Jace had decided on a whim to visit the Pangalos Beach Resort on Sithonia, a peninsular in the region of Halkidiki in northern Greece. It was the first time he had returned to the hotel since he was eleven years old, and he’d been swamped by bitter memories of how he and his parents had been forcibly evicted from the building by Kostas’s security staff.
The Pangalos had been extensively refurbished, and inside it was almost unrecognisable. But when Jace had stepped into the lobby he’d pictured his mother and father standing arm in arm, waiting to greet guests. It was the personal touches that made families return year after year, Jace’s father had insisted. Guests who stayed at the Pangorakis hotel, which had been its name back then, were made to feel as though they were part of a big, happy family.
But Kostas had been determined to attract a different class of clientele: the super-rich, who wanted five-star luxury and were prepared to pay for it. Arguments about the future direction of the hotel had led to a breakdown in the two men’s friendship, and Kostas, backed by money from his wealthy English wife and aided by influential Greek friends, had seized control of the Pangorakis, later changing its name to the Pangalos.
Six months ago Kostas had died suddenly and, to everyone’s surprise, he had left his granddaughter Eleanor in charge of Gilpin Leisure. The company owned an upmarket boutique hotel, Francine’s, in Oxford, and the Pangalos Beach Resort in Greece. By all accounts, Eleanor’s older brother, Mark Buchanan, had been furious at being overlooked by his grandfather. Eleanor had appointed him as General Manager of the Pangalos, but Jace had heard rumours that Mark was more interested in playing blackjack in the casino than managing the hotel.
When Jace had strolled across the pool terrace he’d taken scant notice of a young woman sitting on a sun lounger, her head bowed over a book. But he’d overheard a waiter who had brought her a drink saying, ‘Will that be all, Miss Buchanan?’
The name had caught Jace’s attention and he’d recognised Eleanor from a newspaper photo when her grandfather’s death had been announced. Nondescript was his first opinion of her. Dark blonde hair pulled back from an unprepossessing face. Pale skin, turning pink on her shoulders from the sun. Good legs, he’d noted, before skimming his eyes over her shapely figure.
She was wearing a one-piece swimsuit that covered her body from neck to thigh but nevertheless did not disguise the gentle curves of her hips and the firm swell of her breasts. Oddly, Jace had found her modest costume more alluring than the skimpy bikinis worn by other women sunbathing by the pool. In his opinion, the unknown was intriguing, rather like a birthday present that was still wrapped.
There had been no plan in his head when he’d sat down on a vacant sun lounger next to Eleanor. He had flirted with women since he was a teenager and discovered that his dark good looks and muscular physique commanded female attention. With consummate skill he had drawn Eleanor into conversation. He’d watched her closely when he had introduced himself, but she had shown no reaction to his name.
To his surprise, Kostas’s granddaughter was charming, if a little too serious. Eliciting one of her rare smiles became a challenge, and the upward curve of her wide mouth had an unexpected effect on Jace’s libido. He had decided that it might be useful to get to know her better, but marriage had not been in his mind when he’d joined her on a cruise around the islands of Thasos and Lemnos.
During the trip, Eleanor had confided that she felt overwhelmed by the responsibility that had been thrust on her by her grandfather. ‘I want to fulfil Pappoús’s expectations, and I hope he would be proud of me,’ she’d told Jace. ‘He established the Pangalos hotel and made it a success without help from anyone.’
Jace had gritted his teeth at hearing how Kostas had rewritten the hotel’s history without crediting the hard work and sacrifice his father had made. But it was clear that Eleanor had loved her grandfather, and Jace had held back from telling her the truth—that Kostas had ruthlessly conned Dimitri out of his share of the business that the two men had started together.
Jace had been fifteen when he’d found his father’s body at the bottom of a cliff. Incredibly, Dimitri had still been alive and with his last breaths he had entreated Jace to take back the family’s share of the hotel on Sithonia for his mother’s sake. For twenty years Jace had been driven by his hatred of Kostas and his determination to honour his father’s dying plea. Eleanor was his chance, he’d realised. Marriage to her would allow him to claim part-ownership of the Pangalos hotel, and there was the added satisfaction of knowing that Kostas would turn in his grave.
The plan was perfect and yet so simple, Jace thought now as he walked over to the bar and poured a generous measure of single malt whisky into a glass. He checked his watch. Two minutes to seven. Eleanor would be here soon. In fact, he was surprised that she hadn’t arrived early for their celebratory dinner. Her infatuation with him had made it easy for him to seduce her.
He frowned as he recalled the look of stunned joy in Eleanor’s hazel eyes when he’d asked her to marry him. Obviously, he had not told her the real reason why he had asked her to be his wife. His ultimate goal was to seize absolute ownership of the Pangalos. Kostas had ruined his father, and so he would ruin Kostas’s legacy. Marriage was the price he was prepared to pay to get his hands on the hotel.
Jace sipped his whisky and brooded that marriage was a fool’s game. Several of his friends had been stung with expensive divorce settlements. He was thankful that Katerina had turned him down years ago. Hell, it had hurt at the time, and for a while he’d nursed a broken heart. But her rejection had emphasised the life lesson he’d learned from Kostas’s betrayal of his father. Loyalty counted for nothing and money was everything. Except that in this instance, even though Jace was a self-made multi-millionaire, he was prevented from buying the Pangalos by a clause in Kostas’s will.
So he would marry Eleanor Buchanan and it would be a sweet victory to finally avenge his father’s destruction. The only pity was that Kostas would never know he had lost. As for his blushing bride, Jace’s body tightened in anticipation of taking Eleanor to bed later tonight. He knew she wanted him. Her ardent response when he kissed her had been a pleasant surprise. Rather more surprising was his urgency to make love to her. He sensed that her reserved nature hid a sensuality which he was looking forward to awakening.
As Takis had pointed out, Eleanor was not in the league of the sexually confident women Jace usually chose for his lovers. He kept his life free from emotional entanglements and he planned to do the same when he married. When Eleanor was his wife he would provide her with a luxurious lifestyle for the duration of their marriage, and he would give her a generous divorce settlement. He dismissed a twinge of guilt that he was involving her in a feud which she was unaware of.
Deeply satisfied with the way things had worked out, he drank the rest of his whisky and checked his watch again. One of the things he liked about his fiancée was her punctuality. He had left nothing to chance, and had wooed Eleanor diligently for the past couple of months, flying over to England most weekends to see her. Every time he’d collected her to take her out to dinner she had been waiting on the doorstep and hadn’t disguised her pleasure at seeing him. Thinking of Eleanor’s eagerness evoked another pang of guilt as Jace acknowledged that he would never love her.
