Dione faced the little Greek woman with compassion in her eyes. ‘It looks as though I have no choice.’
And when they went back to the hospital to tell her father Dione was glad that she’d made the decision. He looked if possible even more sallow and ill than earlier. He lay in his bed, his breathing laboured, but as soon as he heard her news he smiled and a light appeared in his eyes.
‘Thank you, Dione. Thank you from the bottom of my rotten heart.’ And he took her hands and squeezed them.
Dione took a deep breath as she stood outside the door and prepared to face the legendary Theo Tsardikos.
Her father’s life depended on her succeeding.
But how easy would it be, when they were total enemies?
CHAPTER TWO
THEO looked with interest at the woman standing in front of him. He was aware that Yannis Keristari had a daughter but he had never met her and was pleasantly surprised.
She was tall and slender and very fine looking, somewhere in her twenties, he imagined. She wore a grey jacket with a matching pencil-slim skirt and high-heeled shoes. The jacket was fastened to just above her breasts and a gold pendant dangled enticingly close to her cleavage. He couldn’t help wondering why she had chosen to fasten it so demurely on such a warm day, and it amused him to assume that she wore nothing beneath.
Her eyes were dark and sloe-shaped with a fan of thick lashes, her nose straight and small, and her mouth—was delicious. He forced himself to look from it. She was nothing like her father, which came as something of a surprise. And totally unlike any other Greek woman he’d met. He was fascinated. Even more so than with the reason she was here.
Which had yet to be revealed.
Clearly Keristari had sent her. Theo had heard through the grapevine that Yannis Keristari’s business was in trouble. Had his daughter’s visit anything to do with it? Perhaps he was offering to sell him his restaurants?
He showed his visitor to a seat, not once taking his eyes off her, and waited for her to speak. She was graceful in her movements and smelled like a dream.
‘Mr Tsardikos.’
‘Please, call me Theo.’
‘This isn’t a social visit,’ she declared with a delightful toss of her head that revealed a long, slender neck simply begging to be kissed. Theo sat down behind his desk to stop himself from advancing towards her. ‘Maybe,’ he growled. ‘But there’s no need for formalities, especially when you’re the daughter of an old…acquaintance of mine.’ He’d been about to say enemy, but realised that this could get her back up before she’d even given her reason for being here. ‘Would you like coffee? I can get someone to—’
‘No!’
It was an instant decision. She was clearly on a mission and wanted to get it over with. ‘So how can I help you?’ He folded his arms, allowing his eyes to half close as he studied her intently. He could feel a stirring in his groin that shocked him to the core. This was the daughter of a man he hadn’t the faintest admiration for. He should be totally indifferent to her. So why wasn’t he?
‘My father needs money.’
He felt quite sure she hadn’t intended to blurt it out like that because a tell-tale colouring to her skin belied her cool outer image. But he was glad that she had because he now knew where he stood. His mind had run to the fact that her father could be offering him first refusal on the business. But money! How much had it cost Keristari to send her here?
‘Is that so?’ he asked with cool indifference. He had no intention in the world of helping this man out.
Dione nodded. ‘He believes that you might be able to help him.’
Theo wanted to tell her straight away that he wouldn’t. Keristari was a bully of the highest order and most definitely not a man to do business with.
But he didn’t want to let Dione go yet. He was fascinated. She was quite the sexiest woman he had met in a long time. There was something refreshingly different about her. It was as though she had no idea of her own sexuality. How he would like to introduce her to it.
‘Why ask me?’ he asked, leaning back in his chair, his hands linked behind his head. ‘Why not his bank?’
‘I think he’s in too deep for that,’ admitted Dione. ‘He says you’re his only hope. He’s counting on it.’
Dione saw the disbelief on Theo Tsardikos’ face, the hint of anger quickly suppressed, and knew that her mission was doomed to failure. But she still needed to try. The image of her father lying helpless in hospital flashed in front of her mind’s eye. Much as she feared him, much as she sometimes despised him, she couldn’t bear to see him so ill and worried.
‘He’s counting on it!’ repeated Theo disbelievingly, dragging dark brows together over velvety brown eyes. ‘Why would he ask me, the man he probably hates more than anyone else in the world, for money? Unless, of course, he’s exhausted all his other options.’
‘I don’t know,’ said Dione, her eyes steady on this tall, undeniably handsome man with a shock of dark hair that looked as though he constantly ran his fingers through it. ‘I didn’t know anything about it until yesterday. I’ve been visiting my mother in England.’
‘So Phrosini isn’t your birth mother?’ he enquired, sharp interest on his face.
Dione shook her head. She wished he wasn’t quite so good-looking. She wished his eyes wouldn’t rake over her as though he wanted to take her to bed.
‘That explains why you look nothing like either of your parents.’
‘Which has nothing to do with the reason I’m here,’ declared Dione heatedly. She certainly wasn’t here to discuss her parentage.
He allowed himself to smile and his very even white teeth looked predatory in her heightened state. Like a wolf about to pounce, she thought. This was a man she had to watch closely. He looked relaxed leaning back in his chair, his shirt collar undone, but his mind was as sharp as a razor.
‘Your father’s using you, you do know that?’ he pointed out. ‘Like he uses everyone he comes into contact with. The best thing you can do, Dione—do you mind if I call you Dione?—is to go right back and tell him the answer’s no.’
Dione drew in a pained breath. What a heartless brute the man was. ‘You haven’t even asked how much he wants,’ she retorted, her back stiff, her eyes sparking resentment.
‘It’s immaterial,’ he said. ‘I wouldn’t lend your father one euro, let alone thousands of them, which I presume is the kind of amount he’d want. What’s happened?’
Dione shrugged. ‘All I know is that he’s nearly bankrupt.’
‘Bad management,’ drawled Theo uncaringly.
‘So that’s your final answer?’ she snapped, her heart dipping so low it almost touched her shoes.
Theo leaned back in
