hope entirely, it finally rang.
One of Xan Ziakis’s staff invited her to a meeting late that afternoon. Distracted by what lay ahead of her, she pleaded a dental appointment with her employer to finish early and worked over her usual lunch break instead. She got through her working hours on autopilot while anxiously rehearsing speeches in the back of her brain, only to discard them again when she tried to picture herself saying such things to a stranger. She would have to be lucid and brief, she told herself, because Xan Ziakis was unlikely to give her more than ten minutes of his time.
Seated in the plush quiet waiting area on the top floor of Ziakis Finance, Elvi was a bundle of nerves. How likely was it that he would even consider dropping the theft charge? Very unlikely, she reckoned, because what would be in that for him? But he could be a really good person, a little voice whispered. What were the chances? her brain scoffed, unimpressed by such wishful thinking. Xan was a merciless financier renowned for his profit margins. Every single thing he did during his working day was focused on gaining an advantage...and what did she have to offer?
She plucked a piece of tapestry wool off a black-trousered knee and shed her jacket to reveal the long-sleeved blue tee below because she was too warm. It was a waste of time approaching the wretched man when she was already virtually drowning in a sense of defeat, she told herself furiously. He was a rich, privileged guy, who lived a life far beyond the imagination of other, more ordinary mortals. He would not understand where she was coming from unless he had a reformed alcoholic in his own family circle. He would not appreciate the challenges Sally Cartwright had already overcome in her efforts to rebuild her life, nor could he even begin to imagine the misery of the ‘lost’ years that Elvi and Daniel had lived through with their mother.
Stop it, stop with the negative inner talk, she urged herself just as the svelte receptionist uttered her name in the same low-pitched tone that everyone who worked on the top floor seemed to use. Elvi rose stiffly from her seat, full of apprehension but struggling to appear composed because she knew that that was necessary. She couldn’t afford to get emotional with such a self-disciplined man.
In his office, Xan was on a high because he was finally getting to meet her. The woman he had wanted, the only woman he had wanted in years that he couldn’t have, but now that her mother was no longer his employee, and that connection was at an end, he no longer had to consider that aspect. That was done, dusted, in the past as far as he was concerned. Now he could move forward freely. Admittedly she was still of much lower status than he or her predecessors in his life had been but did he really have to be so particular about the women he took to his bed? He straightened his jacket and leant back against his designer desk as the door opened.
The office was the size of a football pitch, probably supposed to intimidate, Elvi decided, inching in from the doorway like a mouse trying to evade a hungry cat before she threw back her shoulders, straightened her back and lifted her chin, determined not to appear either weak or too humble.
‘I’m Elvi, Sally Cartwright’s daughter,’ she declared quietly, battling to stand her ground as Xan Ziakis angled up his arrogant dark head, his classic nose as high as his perfect cheekbones to look directly at her.
Behind her the door closed, locking them into uneasy silence. Involuntarily Elvi connected with dazzling amber-gold eyes screened by criminally long and distinctive lush black lashes. She had never been close enough to him to see those eyes before, nor had she realised quite how tall he was, while even his formal business suit failed to conceal the power in his wide shoulders and muscular torso, not to mention the virile strength of his long thighs as he stood braced against his desk. He was drop-dead beautiful and at that moment she wasn’t at all surprised that for a little while she had succumbed to a pathetically juvenile crush on him. She’d been far from being a teenager, and that crush had mortified her pride.
‘Xander Ziakis,’ he matched, extending an elegant lean brown hand.
At least he had manners, Elvi conceded feebly as she advanced to shake that hand, finding his grasp warm and her own cold with nerves, goose flesh erupting beneath her top as nervous tension threatened again. That close to him she could hardly breathe as a faint tang of some exotic designer cologne infiltrated her nostrils.
‘Take a seat, Elvi,’ he instructed, angling his head in the direction of the chair in front of him.
‘I don’t think I would be comfortable sitting down while you’re still standing,’ Elvi confided, stepping back but avoiding the chair, wondering if he was always as domineering, deciding he very probably was when she caught the flash of surprise in his gaze before he cloaked it. She reckoned everyone did exactly what they were told in his radius.
Disconcertingly and with a gleam of humour lightening his dark eyes, for he was rarely challenged, Xan slid back behind his desk and waited for her to sit down as he had told her to do.
Outmanoeuvred, Elvi took a seat and rested her bag on her lap to hide her trembling hands.
‘Would you like a drink? Tea? Coffee? Water?’ Xan proffered politely.
‘Some water if it’s not too much trouble,’ Elvi framed, watching as he pressed a button and gave an order to some employee. Thirty seconds later, a moisture-beaded tumbler of water was clutched between her restive hands and she sipped, wetting her dry lips.
Xan studied her in fascination, because she was much more controlled than he had expected and possibly ten times more attractive close up than he had forecast. In reality he had been prepared for disappointment, having only seen her so fleetingly in the past. But there she was in front of him with skin that had the natural lustre of a pearl, eyes as blue as the Greek sky, dainty features and white-blonde hair falling like a cloak to her waist. And then there were the fabulous hourglass curves with that tiny waist, the amazing feminine bounty at breast and hip she had hidden beneath that awful coat. Not overweight, glorious, Xan decided hungrily, wondering if it would even occur to her that he had been forced to sit down because her body made him hot as hell. He thought not, for there was nothing even slightly flirtatious or inviting about either her clothing or her attitude, and he wasn’t accustomed to that lack of interest in the women he met. This one hadn’t even bothered to put on make-up, he registered in mounting surprise.
‘Why do you think I offered you this appointment?’ Xan enquired with innate ruthlessness, because he doubted his reading of her character from her appearance and behaviour. He didn’t trust women. He had learned not to trust women through the experience of growing up with several unpleasant stepmothers and the conviction had been rubber-stamped by his first love’s change of heart the instant she realised his family fortune was gone.
‘I don’t know, which is why I am here,’ Elvi said truthfully. ‘Obviously you read my letter—’
Xan lounged back in his chair and lightly shifted an eloquent brown hand as if in dismissal of the letter. ‘Why would I want to do anything for a woman who stole from me?’ he asked bluntly.
In receipt of that acerbic enquiry, Elvi lost colour. ‘Well, maybe not want—’
‘That’s the problem,’ Xan interposed before she could even finish speaking. ‘I don’t want to help her because I believe that those who break the law should be punished—’
‘Yes, but—’ Elvi began afresh, thrown on the back foot because before her mother had been charged with theft she would have agreed with him on that score.
‘There is no saving exception in my book,’ Xan Ziakis sliced in again. ‘I felt more sorry for you growing up with an alcoholic parent than I feel sorry for her.’
Elvi’s
