it wasn’t, and he knew it. He had been fighting a hot sexual curiosity about Natasha Moyles from the first time he’d met her at her and Rico’s betrothal party. Her sister had been there, claiming centre stage and wowing everyone with her shimmering star quality, wearing a flimsy flesh-coloured dress exclusively designed for her to show off her stem-like figure and her big hairstyle that floated all around her exquisite face, accentuating her sparkling baby-blue eyes.
This sister had worn classic black. It had shocked him at the time because it was supposed to be Natasha’s party yet she’d chosen to wear the colour of mourning. He remembered remarking on it to her at the time.
One of his shoulders gave a small shrug. Maybe he should not have made the comment. Maybe he should have kept his sardonic opinion to himself, because if he had done it to get a rise out of her, then he’d certainly got one—of buttoned-lipped, cold-eyed ice.
They’d exchanged barely a civil word since then.
So, she’d taken an instant dislike to him, Leo acknowledged with a grimace that wavered towards wry. Natasha didn’t like tall, dark Greeks with a blunt, outspoken manner. He didn’t like loud pop-chicks with stick figures and big hair.
He preferred his woman with more softness and shape.
Rico didn’t.
Natasha had both.
Leo frowned as he drove them across the river. So what the hell had Rico been doing with Natasha, then? Had the stupid fool started out by playing a game with one sister to get him access to the other one, only to find he’d got himself embroiled too deep? Natasha wasn’t the type you messed around with. She just would not understand. Had his bone-selfish stepbrother discovered a conscience somewhere between hitting on Natasha and asking her to marry him within a few weeks?
If so, the bad conscience had not stretched far enough to make him leave the other sister alone, he mused grimly as he shot them through a set of lights on amber and spun the car into a screeching left turn.
‘Where are you going?’ Natasha burst out sharply.
‘My place,’ he answered.
‘But I don’t want—’
‘You prefer it if I drop you off at your apartment?’ Leo flicked at her. ‘You prefer to sit nice and neat on a chair with the bag on your lap waiting for them to appear and beg you to forgive?’
His English was failing, Leo noticed—but not enough to mask the sarcasm from his voice that managed to shock even him.
‘No,’ she quivered out.
‘Because they will appear,’ he persisted nonetheless. ‘She needs you to keep her life running smoothly while she struts about playing the pop-chick with angst. And Rico needs you to keep his mama happy because Angelina likes you, and she sees you as her precious boy’s saviour from a life of wild women and booze.’
Was that it? Had Rico been using her to appease his old-fashioned mother who’d taken a liking to her on sight? Natasha felt hot tears fill her eyes as she replayed the relieved smile Angelina had sent her when they’d happened to bump into her at a restaurant one night. ‘Such a nice girl,’ Angelina had said later.
Was that the moment when Rico decided that it might be a good idea to make her his wife? He’d asked her to marry him only a few days later. Like a fully paid-up idiot, she had jumped at the chance. They’d barely shared a proper kiss by then!
And no wonder. She wasn’t Rico’s type, she was his mother’s type. Cindy was Rico’s type.
Her heart hurt as she stared out of the car window. Beside her, Leo felt the truth hit him hard in the gut.
He had his answer as to what had made Rico want to marry this sister while lusting after the other one. He was keeping his mother happy because Angelina had been making stern warning noises about his lifestyle and Rico saw his loving mama as his main artery source to the Christakis coffers—next to Leo himself, of course.
Which made Natasha Rico’s love stooge as much as Leo was his family stooge. From the day eight years ago when his father had brought Angelina home as his new bride with her eighteen-year-old son in tow, Leo’s life had become round after round of making Rico feel part of the family because Angelina was so hypersensitive to the differences between the two sons. And his father would do anything to keep Angelina happy and content. When Lukas died so suddenly, Leo continued to keep Angelina, via Rico, happy because she’d been so clearly in love with his father and naturally devastated by his death.
Well, not any longer, he vowed heavily. It was time for both Angelina and Rico to take control of their own lives. He was sick and tired of sorting out their problems.
And that included the money Rico had stolen from him, Leo determined, a black frown bringing his eyebrows together across the top of his nose because he’d allowed himself to forget the reason he’d gone into Rico’s office in the first place.
Natasha was yet another of Rico’s problems, he recognised, winging another swift, frowning glance her way. She was sitting there with her face turned the colour of parchment, looking as if she might be going to throw up in his car.
What, this woman? he then cruelly mocked. This ultra-composed creature would rather choke on her own bile than to allow herself to do anything so crass as to throw up on his Moroccan tan leather.
Which then brought back the question—what had such a dignified thing seen in a shallow piece of manhood like Rico?
Fresh anger tried to rip a hole in his chest.
‘Think about it,’ he gritted, wishing he could keep his mouth shut, but finding out he could not. ‘They are more suited to each other than you and Rico. He famously likes them like your sister—surely you must have known that, heard some of his history with women? He’s been playing the high-rolling playboy right across fashionable Europe for long enough. Did you never stop to ask yourself what it was he actually saw in you that made you stand out from the flock?’
The hurt tears gathered all the stronger at his ruthless barrage. Feeling as if she’d just been knocked over by a bus then kicked for daring to let it happen, ‘I thought he loved me,’ Natasha managed to push out.
‘Which is why he was enjoying your sister over his desk when he should have been attending my board meeting, defending himself.’
‘Defending?’ she picked up.
Leo didn’t answer. Clamping his lips together, he climbed out of the car, annoyed with himself for wanting to beat her up for Rico’s sins. Rounding the car bonnet, he opened her door, then reached in to take hold of one of her wrists so he could tug her out, even though he knew she didn’t want to get out. Her phone started ringing again, distracting her long enough for him to get her into his house.
He pulled her into the living room and pushed her down into a chair then strode off to the drinks cabinet to pour her a stiff drink.
His hands were trembling, he noticed, and frowned as he splashed neat brandy into a glass. When he walked back to Natasha, he saw that she was sitting on the edge of the chair, all neat and prim with the bag on her lap as he’d predicted she would do.
Fresh anger ripped at him. ‘Here.’ He handed her the glass. ‘Drink that, it
