lips twitched. “I can’t imagine he valued the input.”
“Not at all, but he values his business, and I’d be wrong to remain silent when so much is at stake. It could be such an incredible company—”
“It will be, once I’m completely in charge.”
“Are you removing my father as president and CEO?”
“He hasn’t actively managed the company in years. He knows I’ll be taking over after the honeymoon.” He shot her a swift side-glance. “Does that upset you?”
“I’m relieved, actually. Something has to be done. I just...” She sighed, shrugged. “Never mind.”
She turned away from him to stare out over the water and he used the moment to study her elegant profile. She truly was beautiful, with the regal features of a Greek goddess. “Tell me,” he said quietly. “Finish the thought. I want to hear it.”
She glanced at him, eyes bright, lips compressed. “If I was a son, he would have made room for me. I would have been an asset. Instead I was a daughter and nothing but a disappointment.”
Before he could reply, one of his stewards appeared with the champagne he’d requested twenty minutes ago and made a big production about opening the bottle and filling their flutes.
Damen checked his temper as the steward settled the champagne bottle into the ice bucket, rattling the ice as if he was doing the most important job in the world. Finally the steward was gone and Damen handed Kassiani a flute.
“We didn’t have a toast on our wedding night. So, stin yeia sou,” he said, lifting his glass. To your health.
“Yamas,” she answered, to our health, before clinking the rim of her goblet to his and lifting her flute to her lips.
Just watching her bring her glass to her full lips made him hard. He didn’t understand this fascination with her, or why he found it so hard to stay away from her. She was so naturally sensual that she had him in a constant state of arousal.
“What else have you told your father that he doesn’t want to hear?” Damen asked, determined to shift his attention from her luscious mouth to the topic they’d been discussing before the champagne had arrived.
“Dukas Shipping was worth so much more five years ago, when my father first approached you. He’s been cutting away into the principal. You’ve gotten a rotten deal. Instead of the Dukas beauty, you got the Ugly Duckling and a company teetering on bankruptcy.”
“You wanted to work for him.”
“Desperately.” She swallowed hard. “I have tried for years to get him to bring me on board. I even told him he didn’t have to pay me. I’d be an intern. Just let me go to the office and give me a chance to learn the ropes.”
“Is it true you studied business and international relations at Stanford?”
“It is true.”
“That couldn’t have been an easy course of study.”
“It was actually not that difficult. I read quickly, and have one of those memories that forget nothing.” Her lips quirked. “It’s a blessing and a curse.”
“So you’ve been out of school a couple years.”
“Four years end of this month. I started Stanford at sixteen and finished the dual major in three years.”
Very little surprised Damen, but she’d just caught him completely off guard. “Most Americans don’t start university until they’re what...eighteen?”
“I tend to do accelerated studies. I can take more classes than most students. The workload isn’t a problem for me.” She grimaced. “More of that blessing and a curse.”
“Have you ever been tested? Are you considered gifted?”
“I have, and I am. But I wish I wasn’t. My mother wasn’t particularly intellectual and she used to say that brainy women were objectionable as they tended to challenge the status quo, competing with men rather than allowing the man to feel like the man.”
“She wasn’t a feminist.”
“No.”
“Little wonder your father adored her. Greek men expect to be the center of the world.”
“Yes, I know.” She hesitated. “It’s why my aunt never married. She was brilliant, and smart, and strong, and her parents were traditional Greeks, and they didn’t know what to do with her.” She tapped the rim of her flute. “I think it’s why she created the trust for me. She recognized a kindred spirit and wanted to be sure I had...options.”
Her tone, and the bittersweet twist of her lips, made his chest tighten. Kassiani was a constant source of surprise. “What else did your mother teach you?”
“That beauty is a woman’s greatest strength and virtue, and a socially inept woman was nothing short of a failure.”
“Oh, dear.”
“Mmm. In my parents’ eyes, I’ve been a failure my entire life. Not attractive, and a social misfit. How could I be such a blight on the Dukas name?”
“Did you feel awkward at Stanford?”
“No. I loved being in school. I enjoy academia. I’m comfortable in certain environments, but hopeless in others. Like parties. I’m not comfortable at parties. I’m not good with chitchat. I’m the least fashionable woman you’ll ever meet—”
“Oh, now, I’m not sure you can claim that honor. My mother only wears smocks, and these slipper-like shoes, with socks. It’s terrible. Really. So, I think she has you beat.”
Kassiani gurgled with laughter and Damen was pleased. He’d meant to make her laugh, and was glad he’d succeeded. He’d hated the pain in her voice, her pain making his chest tighten, and his temper stir. How dare her father treat her so shabbily all these years? How dare her parents make her feel less than something when she was the greatest Dukas of them all?
“Besides,” he added after a moment, “fashion and parties are overrated. I would much rather have a brilliant wife than one who merely looked good in clothes.”
For a moment there was just silence and Kassiani stared out over the water, toward the island glittering with light. Damen congratulated himself for soothing Kassiani’s fears, and then she turned her head and looked him square in the eye. “Then why did you want Elexis in the first place? Why didn’t you want...me?”
Her voice was calm, her tone thoughtful. It took him a second to realize she wasn’t accusing him of anything, or trying to guilt him. She genuinely wanted to know.
Again his chest tightened and he felt a wave of remorse, and pain. She deserved so much better from all of them.
“You were never presented as an option,” he said at length. “I didn’t know enough about you to think to ask for you.”
“You
