waiter had heard her, and paused in his progress across the room to glance at her questioningly.
‘Oh—sorry—nothing…’
She had to get a grip on herself, Sadie thought, managing an embarrassed half-smile. The stress of the day and anxiety about the evening ahead was getting to her and making her control of her tongue slip slightly. She needed to have her thoughts and her feelings totally under control.
But oh, how she wished that someone had taken charge of her younger self. That they had warned her not to trust Nikos, not to believe a word he said. Better that she should have faced the inevitable disillusionment then, before their affair had truly begun, rather than go through the whole terrible process of falling hopelessly and mindlessly in love and then being bitterly disappointed. The appalling sense of loss and betrayal had been all the worse because of the wonder and joy that had gone before.
But of course then she wouldn’t have believed anyone who had tried to convince her that Nikos was not what he seemed. She wouldn’t have listened to a single person—probably not even herself if she had managed to appear to give a warning message. At twenty years old she had been naive, gullible, and totally starry-eyed, and she would have thought that it would be well worth a broken heart at the end if she could only have that night.
She had never expected it to last anyway. She had only ever thought that she would have that one night, one date. At the end of the evening she had fully expected that Nikos would take her home, say goodnight, and that would be that. She had been overjoyed, and unable to quite believe it, when he had asked to see her again—and again.
‘Good evening, Sadie.’
Sadie had been so lost in her thoughts that she hadn’t noticed they had reached the booth. It was already occupied, she realised, as in the shadowy darkness Nikos rose to his full height and faced her across the table.
This was not the man she had confronted in his office earlier that day. This Nikos was not the sleek suited businessman who headed the Konstantos Corporation. Instead he was darkly devastating in a soft black shirt, open at the neck with no tie, and worn black denim jeans that hugged the lean hips, the narrow waist that was emphasised by a heavy leather belt.
And just what was the message he intended her to read into that? Or was she reading too much into it because she had spent so long worrying about what she should wear herself—opting for a pair of smart black trousers with a deep red shirt and loose jacket so that she neither looked as if she had dressed up or down for this meeting? She was too acutely sensitive to the hidden clues in what Nikos had chosen to wear.
‘Won’t you sit down?’
The pointed question brought home to her the fact that she had been standing, still and silent, staring at him as if she had never seen him before in her life while he waited with carefully controlled patience for her response.
‘Thank you.’
It was as she sank into the seat directly opposite him that she recalled how she had once been told that when eating out in a restaurant Greek men usually seated themselves with their backs to the wall, their guest facing them. That way the host could see everything that was going on, the coming and going in the main body of the restaurant, but their companion’s attention was forced to be concentrated solely on them.
Not that Nikos’s attention seemed to be anywhere else other than on her. Those bronze eyes were fixed on her face in a way that made the tiny hairs at the back of her neck lift in the uncomfortable reaction of a wary cat, faced with a threatening intruder into its space.
‘So you came,’ Nikos commented when the waiter had handed them menus and left them to decide on their meals.
‘Of course I came. As you knew I would have to. I had no other choice. Not unless I wanted to stay at home and pack, as you’d already ordered me to do.’
‘Not ordered. It was the logical next step if things stayed as they were,’ Nikos corrected softly, earning himself a sideways glare that Sadie hoped made it clear that she was not in the least convinced by the apparent conciliatory tone in his voice.
There was no way that he was here to do any peacemaking. Why should he when he held all the cards in his hands—and most of them were aces?
‘And I suppose you are going to claim that you didn’t order me to meet you here?’
‘I merely invited you. So, what would you like to eat?’
Nothing. Sadie felt that she would be unable to swallow a single mouthful. Besides…
‘Did you really invite me out for a meal?’
Nikos glanced up from his study of the menu, one black brow slightly lifted in mocking enquiry.
‘Why else would we be in a restaurant, with menus to choose from?’
Because he wanted to prove that he had so much power over her that he could say jump and she would ask how high. Because he wanted to emphasise, by choosing this particular restaurant, just how very different things were now from the way they had been in the past, when they had been here together before.
‘And why are we in this particular restaurant? Why here and nowhere else?’
‘Because I know you like it here.’
If she didn’t know better, she might almost believe in the innocence in his eyes, his voice. But she had no doubt that it was more than that. Nikos Konstantos never did anything without considering all possible outcomes and planning for the one that was exactly what he wanted.
‘I liked it once,’ she said coldly, pointedly. ‘My tastes have changed since then.’
‘Mine too,’ Nikos drawled cynically.
So how was she supposed to take that? Was he, like her, thinking of the first meal they had eaten here? She hadn’t known who he was then. Only that she had fallen for the most devastatingly handsome and attractive man she had ever met. If she had known would she have been more careful, more on her guard? Maybe even held back and never agreed to go out with him?
If she had then things would have been so much easier. She would never have become tangled up in Nikos’s schemes—and those of her father. She would never have become a pawn in their hateful feud, never been used by each of them against the other. Because that had been all she was to them. A weapon which they could use to inflict as much damage on the other as possible.
‘I understand that the calamari here is very good—unless you prefer—’
‘What I’d prefer…’ Sadie put in sharply, having foolishly let her eyes wander over the menu so that she spotted the delicious shrimp dish she had eaten that first time she had been here. She could almost taste it in her mouth, the memory was so clear and devastating. ‘What I’d prefer is that you tell me exactly why I’m here and what you want from me.’
‘Some wine first?’ Nikos returned imperturbably, lifting one hand to summon the waiter.
The response was immediate, as of course it always was with Nikos. He only had to make the slightest gesture, look as if he might need something, and there was always someone there, right at hand, ready to provide whatever he needed.
But the presence of the waiter
