‘You think I was born into this? You think I had it handed to me?’ His voice held a raw, rough edge that increased her tension. ‘My father worked for an engineering company. A badly managed engineering company. When he was made redundant, he was so ashamed that he’d let his family down that every morning he kissed my mother goodbye and left to go to work. Only instead of going to work he used to sit in the library and hunt for jobs. But there weren’t any.’
Shocked into silence by that unexpected revelation, Polly simply stared at him. When she finally managed to say something it came out as a croak. ‘D-did he get another job?’
‘No. My father was Greek. Proud. Not being able to provide for his family was the ultimate failure. Overwhelmed with the responsibility of it, he drove his car off a bridge.’ The words were emotionless and matter of fact. ‘I was waiting for them to come home when the police knocked on the door.’
Polly couldn’t breathe. ‘Them?’
‘My mother was in the car, too. No one understood why he did it. Whether he lost all hope and decided to take her with him—whether she even knew what he intended—’ His eyes were blank as he stared over the city. ‘Do you know the worst thing? The redundancies weren’t necessary. I found that out a few years later when I’d learned a few sharp lessons about business. It was all down to bad decisions and I decided right then that I was never going to work for anyone else. I was never going to let someone else control my destiny.’
It explained so much. His ruthless approach. The rigid control with which he managed his business.
Polly realised that her impression of him was as false as his was of her.
It was as if the pieces of a jigsaw had been thrown in the air and, on landing, had created a different picture.
‘You were left to raise your sister.’
‘She was six.’ He gave a wry smile. ‘I was sixteen years old and the only skill I had was with computers. I was always in trouble at school for hacking, so I decided there had to be a way of turning that to my advantage. I developed a way of analysing data that every company wanted.’ He shrugged. ‘Right place, right time. I was lucky.’
‘But your business isn’t computers now—’
‘Something else I learned—diversify. That way if one part of the business is in trouble, another part may be performing well.’
He’d thought it all through. Done everything he could to provide security for his sister.
Feeling a strange ache behind her ribcage, Polly turned away. She shouldn’t envy someone who had suffered such a tragic loss, but she did. Even without parents, they’d been a family. Everything he’d done, everything he’d achieved, had been driven by his love for Arianna. Protecting her had been his priority from the moment she’d been left in his care.
‘It must have been very hard losing both your parents like that.’
‘Life can be hard. It happens.’ He glanced towards her, his expression unreadable. ‘What happened to your mother? Presumably she was divorce number one?’
The ache behind her ribs didn’t fade. ‘She walked out when I was a toddler. Being a mother didn’t suit her. Or maybe I was just hard work. Whichever—my dad hated being on his own. Whenever a relationship fell apart, he moved onto the next woman.’
Even now, at twenty-four, she found her father’s behaviour still had the power to embarrass her and she hated that. She hated the mixed-up feelings that came with every new relationship he started.
‘The women are always younger?’
Hearing the judgement in his voice, Polly felt her face heat and wanted to fall through the floor. ‘Mostly.’
‘Is that embarrassing?’
‘Hideous.’ In the face of his startling honesty about his own background there didn’t seem any point in lying about her feelings.
He let out a long breath. ‘So you don’t approve of his relationship with Ana?’
‘You didn’t ask me if I approved. You asked me if I found it embarrassing. The answer to that is yes. As for whether or not I approve—’ She broke off, wondering why on earth she was sharing her deepest thoughts with this man whose opinion of her was so low. He couldn’t possibly understand, could he? ‘He’s my dad and I love him. I just want him to be happy. Isn’t that what you want for Arianna?’
‘Yes, which is why I don’t approve of this relationship.’
‘I think all relationships are complicated and I’m not sure age makes any difference to that.’
‘When you see a twenty-four-year old girl with a fifty-four year old man, don’t you ask yourself why they’re together?’
Polly chewed her lip, wondering whether to confess that the entire relationship merry-go-round terrified her. The whole thing seemed designed to wreck lives. ‘This is the twenty-first century. Age of same-sex marriages, the toyboy and the cougar. Relationships don’t always conform to rigid tradition any more. Why does it bother you? You’re too big and tough to care what people think.’ But Damon Doukakis was rigidly traditional. Greek. If she’d learned anything about him over the past twenty-four hours it was that family was the most important thing to him.
‘I don’t care what people think. I do care that Ana will be hurt. Let’s face it, your father doesn’t have a great track record when it comes to commitment.’
Polly made a weak attempt to defend him. ‘You’re not exactly famed for long-term commitment.’
‘That’s different.’
‘You move from one woman to the next. Apart from the obvious—prenuptial agreements, huge payouts to lawyers etc—what’s the difference?’
‘Marriage is a responsibility and I have more than enough responsibilities.’ He took a deep breath as if the mere thought of it was enough to unsettle him. ‘In my relationships there are no broken promises. No one gets hurt.’
‘For a woman not to care when a relationship ends, the man in question has either got to be incredibly boring or a real bastard. What I’m saying is that I’m pretty sure plenty of women get hurt when you dump them. They probably just don’t show it. Pride and all that. And I don’t really see the difference between your serial relationships and my father’s. Not every relationship has to be about marriage.’ But the fact that he felt so strongly about responsibility and commitment made her feel strange inside. It was so different from her father’s approach.
‘If you’re about to say my sister’s relationship with your father is about sex then don’t,’ he advised in a thickened tone. ‘I don’t want to think about that.’
‘That makes two of us. He’s my dad and no one wants to think about their parents having sex. Yuck.’ Polly gave a dramatic shudder. ‘But you have to admit that Arianna is an adult. My father hasn’t kidnapped her against her will. They enjoy each other’s company.’
His brow lifted in a cynical arch. ‘Are you about to use the word “love”?
She didn’t tell
