From Dirt to Diamonds. Julia James

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СКАЧАТЬ had risen from his damnable earth-filled coffin like that last night!

      He can do nothing—nothing! He’s powerless! And so what if he’s here in London? If he recognised me? I should be glad—triumphant! Because how galling for him to see how I’ve ended up despite everything he did to me …

      She used the defiant, bombastic words deliberately, to rally herself. To give her strength—resolution and determination. The way she always had. The way she’d always had no option but to do … scraping herself off the floor, out of the abyss into which she had been thrust back.

      By one man.

      The man who, last night, had appeared like a spectre. But the past was gone. She was in the future now. The future she had hungered for all her life. Angelos Petrakos could do nothing do her.

      Ever again.

      Angelos sat at his vast mahogany desk and drummed his fingers slowly, contemplatively, along its patina. His expression was unreadable, the darkness of his eyes veiled.

      Across from him his British PA sat, pencil poised, waiting instructions. He seldom visited London, preferring to run the Petrakos empire from across the Channel, and she was allowing herself the rare opportunity of looking covertly at him. Six foot plus, with broad shoulders and lean hips superbly sheathed in a hand-tailored business suit, strongly planed, ultra-masculine features, and, most compelling of all, dark, veiled, unreadable eyes that sent a kind of shiver through her. What that shiver was, she didn’t like to think about too much. Nor about the way his mouth could curve with a harsh, yet sensual edge …

      ‘No other calls while I was in Dublin yesterday? You’re certain?’

      His PA jumped mentally, summoning back her focus on her work. ‘No, sir. Only those I’ve listed.’

      She saw his mouth tighten. Obviously he’d been expecting a call that hadn’t come. Fleetingly, his PA felt a pang of sympathy for whoever it was who hadn’t phoned when clearly they should have.

      Few who failed to do what Angelos Petrakos wanted of them enjoyed his reaction.

      * * *

      Thea walked with brisk purpose along the pavement, heading back to her flat from the local library in the still-light evening of early summer. She was calmer now. Giles was coming back to London tomorrow—she had nothing to fear, nothing to worry about. Relief and gratitude were the only emotions she would allow herself.

      As she approached her apartment block, a sleek limo on the other side of the road dimly impinged on her consciousness, but she paid it no notice. This close to the Opera House it would be a chauffeur, waiting for his employer at the theatre. She paused by the block’s main entrance, key already out of her bag. There was a second’s warning, a footfall behind her. Then a man was standing there, closing her in to the doorway.

      ‘No fuss, please, miss,’ said the man.

      He pressed the door open, pushed her inside into the entrance lobby. It was done in a second, and for that second Thea was paralysed. Then gut instinct, rising up from the depths, cracked in. She twisted round, knee jerking upwards. There was a grunt from the man, but even as she started to knife back with her elbow, fisting her other hand, ready to stamp down with her heel, there was someone else there—someone who thrust her back powerfully, effortlessly.

      Dark, hard eyes looked down at her. She pulled back against the stone wall, eyes distending.

      Shock. Panic. Fear.

      And far more powerful than any of those—loathing. Black, virulent loathing.

      Something moved in his eyes. Then he spoke.

      ‘Still the street rat,’ said Angelos Petrakos. He glanced briefly behind him. ‘I’ll take it from here,’ he said dismissively to the bodyguard, who was still catching his breath from the unexpected blow inflicted upon him.

      Angelos turned his attention back to the woman against the wall, her eyes narrowed like a cat’s. He could see the pulse hammering in her neck. Immobile she might be, but she had adrenaline kicking through her system.

      Well, so did he.

      ‘Upstairs,’ he said.

      Her eyes narrowed even more. ‘Go to hell.’ Deliberately, never taking her eyes from him, she reached for her mobile. ‘I’m phoning the police,’ she said.

      ‘Do it,’ he said pleasantly. ‘It should make interesting reading in tomorrow’s papers. Especially in Yorkshire.’

      Her hand hovered, then fell. Her heart was pounding, adrenaline surging round her body in huge, sickening waves. She had to beat it down, get control of herself—of the situation. She straightened herself away from the wall, lengthening her spine, bringing her body into a pose. Regaining the illusion, if nothing else, of composure.

      ‘Why the house call?’ she asked. She kept her voice light, incurious.

      ‘I told you to phone me.’ His voice was terse. Grating.

      She raised delicate eyebrows. ‘Whatever for?’

      She could see his eyes darken. ‘We’ll go upstairs and discuss it.’ He saw her hesitate. ‘It’s in your interest to do so,’ he said.

      Nothing more. He didn’t need it. And he knew she knew that.

      Oh, yes, he knew she knew, all right …

      Loathing flashed in her eyes, but for all that she turned and walked towards the staircase. He knew why. Even though her flat was on the penultimate floor she would not risk the confinement of the lift. He let her go up first, let his eyes take in the graceful line of her body. She was casually dressed, in a belted sweater dress over leggings and ankle boots, but the dress was cashmere, and the boots the finest soft leather. She wore the outfit with an elegance that might have been natural but which he knew was not. It had been acquired—just as the rest of her image had been acquired. From the sleek fall of her thick blonde hair, caught back in a jewelled grip, to the cultured tones in which she’d told him to go to hell.

      But it was all only an illusion—a lie. And now he would be stripping the illusion from her, exposing the lie.

      She let him into her flat, setting down her shoulder bag. ‘So. Talk.’ Her voice came—terse and tense. She was standing hands on hips, chin lifted. Defiance—belligerence—open in her eyes.

      For a long moment Angelos simply kept his eyes levelled on her, taking in her new appearance. She hadn’t just transformed her image, she’d matured—like a fine vintage wine. Become a woman in the fullness of her beauty. No longer coltish, but slender, graceful. Her beauty luminescent.

      He felt an emotion spear within him, but the emotion, like her beauty, was at this moment irrelevant. It was obvious what she was doing. Attacking so she could avoid having to defend herself. He knew why—because she had no defence. Had that street-sharp mind of hers realised that already? He’d shown his hand downstairs, when he’d mentioned Yorkshire—she’d picked it up straight away. Did she realise that the concession she’d made then—not phoning the police—had only proved to him just how absolutely defenceless she was?

      Not that that would stop her fighting—defending the indefensible.

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