Penniless and Purchased. Julia James

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СКАЧАТЬ ‘And I am having a martini—very dry. It is an…acquired taste.’

      ‘Sophie, you’d hate it, believe me,’ said her father from the drinks cabinet.

      ‘A sweet martini can be very palatable,’ suggested Nikos.

      She smiled. ‘Perfect!’ she said. ‘There you go, Daddy. A sweet martini for me, please!’

      Oh, damn, she’d said ‘Daddy’ again, and again her gaze flicked to Nikos Kazandros—no, Nikos, she amended, and felt a little thrill, as if of triumph—to see whether he thought her childish. But the veiled look was back on his face. She wondered at it, but at the same time realised she was glad of it, too, because it seemed to give her the opportunity to look at him, as she wanted to, without actually falling headfirst into his gaze, because his eyes were not quite meeting hers.

      But they were on her face, though. And more than her face.

      They’d flicked downwards, she could see—only for an instant, but it was enough. Enough to tell her, again with a little thrill of triumph, that she had not pulled out all the stops in vain.

      The peach-coloured cocktail dress she wore was one of her very favourites. There was something about the colour that just absolutely suited her skin tone and her hair. The material was so light it skimmed her body, but outlined it, as well. It wasn’t at all overtly revealing—but somehow it seemed to indicate an awful lot. The hem was a little way above her knees, yet it lengthened the line of her legs incredibly. The bodice was not tight, but she knew it gave her a very flattering bust, and made her waist look even more slender than it was.

      It had been incredibly expensive, even for her budget, but because she loved it so she got good value from it, wearing it over and over again.

      But never so gratefully as now.

      Now, as Nikos Kazandros’s experienced eyes flicked over her—how many women had he looked over to judge whether they were good enough to interest him?—she knew, with every ingrained feminine instinct, that what he saw he liked.

      Liked a lot.

      Her lips parted, and her smile was one of mingled gladness—and relief.

       I want him to like me.

      He was a world away from her. Not just because she was still a student, and he was a man old enough to be doing business with her father, but because, for all her more-than-comfortable existence, it was obvious just from looking at him that Nikos Kazandros’s stalking ground was the kind of glamorous watering holes that littered the Mediterranean and the Caribbean, the Alps and the Indian Ocean islands. Fashionable clubs in fashionable cities, with the kind of exclusive membership that filtered out anyone not sufficiently rich, sufficiently sophisticated. The world of serious money and serious spending. That was the world Nikos Kazandros belonged to.

      For a moment she felt dismay fill her, knowing the distance between them was too great.

      Then his eyes flicked back up to meet hers again.

      The veil was gone. And in its place—

      Sophie’s breath stilled in her body. Completely. As if oxygen were no longer necessary to her survival.

      Because it wasn’t. The only thing necessary to her survival at this moment was the look that Nikos Kazandros was pouring into her eyes.

      She had heard the expression ‘the world stopped turning’—now she and knew what it meant. For one incredible, timeless moment she just gazed back at him. Feeling everything stop.

      Then, from a long way away, she heard her father’s voice.

      ‘Sophie?’

      She blinked. The world started again. Her father was there, holding out her sweet martini to her. She took it and dipped her head, wanting only to take a large gulp of the drink.

      There was heat in her throat, and not from the alcohol. From a different source of intoxication. Far, far more powerful.

      Powerful enough to sweep her away, for ever, into a different world, from which she knew, with a strange, vague sense of fatality, she might never, never return.

      And from which she knew she would never want to.

      Slowly, she raised the glass to her lips, as if toasting that fate. Her eyes went back to his. They were veiled again, but she knew why now. Didn’t mind. She smiled, lips parting over pearled teeth.

      

      Nikos took a mouthful of his own dry martini. He could do with it. Self-control was slamming down hard over him and he needed to regain it, urgently.

      Hell, if he’d thought Sophie Granton a peach when he’d first seen her, with her hair flying and almond blossom drifting on her gypsy clothes, now he couldn’t even begin to find the right description for her.

      Except—knockout.

      But not in the way the women in his world usually earned that soubriquet. Not from wearing the kind of gown that stunned male libidos a kilometre wide. Sophie Granton’s impact as she’d stood in the doorway a few minutes ago had been quite different. Hitting him in a quite different place. One where he’d never been hit before.

      And in one he had, as well.

      That dress she was wearing and the sleek, groomed fall of hair had hit a spot that was very, very familiar to him. The spot that had, right over the top of it, a great big D for Desire.

      He knew he shouldn’t even begin to indulge it, but that was easier said than done. Hell, it was impossible to do! The way she stood there, with her perfect figure, perfect face, perfect hair. Now, with make-up on, she looked older, he realised, and realised too that he was glad of it.

      Because maybe this peach of a girl wasn’t out of bounds, after all?

      A reality check crashed through his brain. He wasn’t here to run around with Edward Granton’s knockout daughter, he was here to find out whether Granton plc would be worth the trouble and risk rescuing it entailed. That was all.

      And yet—

      Well, he was here for dinner and he would make the most of it. Make the most of appreciating this beautiful golden girl.

      The discussion with Edward Granton had not been easy. The numbers did not look as if they were going to crunch well—the only question was, did it put the company out of play or not? It would be a tricky call to make.

      Granton himself was looking strained. That in itself was a bad sign, a revealing one. He knew that his financial survival depended on a rescue. Of course Granton might have other white knights in the offing, but any intimation that he had could also be a bluff and a gamble. Nikos’s father had taught him about the business world well, and that any mistake could cost him dearly. His father had raised him never to be a rich man’s son, thinking money came easily. No matter how large and financially sound Kazandros Corp was now, it could always be lost…No, whatever happened, he would make the right call about Granton plc—his father was trusting him to do that.

      And he certainly trusted him enough not to get diverted by anything other than the task he’d been sent to London to do.

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