Well, in that case I suggest you see this company I’ve found.’ He shuffled through a pile of papers on his desk. ‘They’re in London, but you’re flying there on business tomorrow for two weeks so we can easily fit a meeting into your schedule. They specialise in public image. Their results are outstanding and they’re discreet. I think you should at least talk to them.’
Zander studied him silently, battling with the intense and unwelcome emotions that had been stirred up at the mere mention of matrimony. He had buried those feelings deeply in the darkest corners of his soul and their sudden emergence, as new and fresh as ever, came as an unwelcome shock.
A wife was most certainly not a viable solution to his current problem.
Which left the option of changing his image.
He gritted his teeth. The prospect filled him with no small degree of impatience. He’d never cared about other people’s opinions. Until now. When his reputation was jeopardising the purchase of Blue Cove Island.
Nothing in his expression revealed just how important this deal was to him.
He wanted that island.
He’d wanted it for twenty-six years but he’d been biding his time, waiting for the right moment.
And that moment was now.
‘All right.’ He stood up with all the grace of a lethal jungle animal, his movements remarkably smooth for such a powerfully built man. ‘Let’s change my image.’
‘So we really know nothing about them? Not even the name of the company?’
Lauranne O’Neill flicked through some slides on her computer, checking her presentation one more time.
‘Nothing. They were very cagey.’ Mary, her PA, shot her an apologetic look and then cast her eyes over the meeting room one more time. ‘Intriguing, isn’t it? Maybe they’re royalty. The guy I spoke to just said that they wanted to talk to us and that it was highly confidential.’
Lauranne gave a wry smile. ‘So confidential that they can’t even tell us the company name?’
‘I don’t care what they’re called as long as they pay good money.’ Tom, her business partner, strode into the room briskly, a pile of corporate brochures under his arm in readiness. ‘They’re on their way up. Amanda just went to collect them from Reception.’
Lauranne looked at him with amusement. ‘Do you ever think about anything except the bottom line, Tom?’
‘No.’ He slapped the pile of reports on the table. ‘And that’s what keeps this company so healthy. You’re the conscience—I’m the cash register.’
Lauranne laughed and she was still smiling when Amanda, one of their junior executives, came into the room, her face bright with excitement.
Obviously the client was someone well known and very rich if Amanda’s reaction was anything to go by, Lauranne reflected wryly as she smoothed her silk skirt over her slim thighs and pinned a polite smile on her face.
It was a smile that turned to a shocked gasp as she caught her first glimpse of her prospective client.
Zander Volakis.
Staggeringly handsome and arrogantly male, he strolled into the room as if he owned it, closely followed by a team of suited men all keeping a respectful distance behind the boss.
Lauranne stood, welded to the spot, her body frozen. For a moment she thought she might have lost her ability to feel. And then her past exploded into her present and the pain shot through her. Intense, dark pain that should have lessened with time but instead seemed more acute than ever. Pain that ripped away the layers of protection she’d carefully built between her and the world. Pain that had been buried deep for five, long years.
She stared into that cold, handsome face and felt her insides lurch.
He hadn’t changed at all.
He was still impossibly good-looking and unashamedly Greek. Sleek dark hair swept back from a smooth, tanned brow, a straight, aristocratic nose, a hard jaw that was almost permanently darkened by stubble and a physique so powerfully masculine that it made women drool.
Intercepting her stunned gaze, those brilliant dark eyes lasered onto hers with all the lethal accuracy of a deadly weapon.
A shiver ran through her trembling body as she read the challenge in that dark gaze.
Zander the hunter.
Pursuing his prey with the same single-minded ruthlessness that he used to outmanoeuvre his competitors. This was a man who had never encountered failure. A man who took millions and turned them into billions.
A man who didn’t know the meaning of the word no.
But he was going to have to learn it, she told herself. Because there was absolutely no way she was ever saying yes to this man again.
And there was no way she would give him the satisfaction of seeing just how strongly he affected her.
She lifted her chin and returned his gaze full on. ‘Go to hell, Zander.’
There was an audible gasp from the team of people with him but Zander didn’t flinch, tension emanating from every inch of his powerful frame as he surveyed her with glittering dark eyes.
‘Are you going to make this personal?’
She lifted a hand to her throat, feeling her pulse pounding under the tips of her fingers. ‘You bet I am. How can it not be personal?’ After everything that had happened between them, how could it not be personal? ‘You have the sensitivity of an atomic bomb,’ she said hoarsely and their gazes locked in combat, neither of them even remotely aware of their audience.
Mary gave a tiny whimper of shock and exchanged horrified glances with Tom, who stood white-faced and silent in one corner of the room.
One of the men with Zander stepped forward, eyeing the two of them cautiously. ‘Miss O’Neill? I’m Alec Trevelyan. I’m a lawyer.’ The man tried a smile and then gave up, visibly discomforted by the scene playing out around him. ‘I work for Volakis Industries.’
‘Then I hope you keep your c.v. up to date,’ Lauranne said caustically, not even glancing in his direction, ‘because working for Volakis Industries is an extremely precarious form of employment.’
The lawyer, mystified and deprived of speech, looked at his boss for some sort of enlightenment. He didn’t receive any. Zander Volakis continued to stare at the woman in front of him, nothing in his handsome face giving the slightest clue as to his thoughts.
The lawyer turned back to Lauranne, a pained expression on his face. It was clear he’d never had to deal with this sort of reception before.
He cleared his throat awkwardly. ‘You do realise who—?’ He gestured to Zander, everything about his body language respectful to the point of being reverential. ‘I mean—Zander is—’
‘I know exactly who he is,’ Lauranne said clearly, her wide blue eyes fixed on that breathtakingly handsome face in blatant
