Well, it was now or never, she told herself, and felt real trepidation clutch at her chest as she stepped in front of the heavy oak door.
Was she really certain she wanted to do this?
No, she wasn’t any longer, but to turn away now, she knew she would regret it for the rest of her life because she would never find the courage to do this a second time.
On that stark piece of counselling, Mia reached out and gripped the old-fashioned bell pull and gave it a wary tug, her fingers lowering to her side again where they curled into her palms as she waited for someone to answer the door.
Nothing in her entire life had ever felt as frightening as this did.
Nothing had ever been as important to her as this.
Tense, trembling, eyes wide and wary as she watched the door start to open, the very last person she expected to see appear in its aperture was Oscar Balfour himself.
Taller and so much more dauntingly striking than she had envisaged him with his snow-white hair and neat goatee beard. When he frowned down he looked so terribly grim and austere she almost turned and ran. If he asked her if she was the new housekeeper she would run—she would, she decided.
But he didn’t say it. He said, ‘Hello, young lady,’ and offered her a smile.
It was a nice smile, a kind smile which reached deep into the blue of his eyes.
Eyes the same colour blue as her own.
Eyes to which Mia clung. ‘Bon…bon giorno, s-signor…’ Too nervous to stop herself from greeting him in Italian, she gulped and switched to stammering English. ‘I don’t know if y-you know about m-me but my name is Mia Bianchi? I have been told that you are my father…’
Chapter One
FOR the first time in three long hard-travelled months, Nikos Theakis strode in through the doors belonging to his London offices and instantly claimed the full attention of every person present in the slick modern granite-and-glass foyer.
Tall and dark, blessed with the kind of lean, hard, powerful body of a peak trained athlete, the air around him positively vibrated with excess energy as he moved, bringing forth a flurry of, ‘Good morning, Nikos,’ that sounded breathless and charged.
That he had the same effect everywhere he went said a lot about the man’s personality. He was sharp, smooth, determined and driven. Working for him was like catching a ride on a rocket ship to the stars. Exciting, breathtaking, teeth-chatteringly scary sometimes because he took major risks others shied right away from. He was committed and focused and famously never, ever wrong.
Today he was frowning, the two straight black bars of his eyebrows drawn together across the bridge of his arrogantly straight nose. The lean golden cut of his classical Greek features locked in concentration on the conversation he was involved in via his mobile telephone. His acknowledgement to the greetings therefore consisted of a series of distracted nods of his glossy dark head as his long stride took him across the foyer and into one of the waiting lifts.
‘In the name of Theos, Oscar,’ he swore softly, ‘What kind of game are you trying to set me up with here?’
‘No game,’ Oscar Balfour insisted. ‘I’ve thought this through carefully, now I am asking you for your support.’
‘Asking?’ Nikos pounced on the word with lethal satire.
‘Unless you’re too big and important now to help out an old friend…’
Stabbing a long finger at the top-floor button, Nikos shrugged back the brilliant white shirt cuff so he could check the time on his wafer-thin multifunction platinum watch, then bit back the desire to curse. He had been back in the country for less than an hour after spending weeks flying around the world like a damn satellite, putting together a rescue package for a crisis-embattled multiconglomerate which did not deserve to go under because its international investors had turned chicken and pulled the plug on their loans. He was tired, hungry and seriously jet-lagged but upstairs in his boardroom awaited a group of anxious people desperate to hear the final results of his toils.
‘Stop trying to pull my strings,’ he flicked out impatiently.
‘I’m flattered that you think I still can,’ Oscar drawled.
‘And stick to the point,’ he added, well aware that Oscar was the ruthless, cunning cut-throat king of manipulation so using that kind of invert flattery on him was wasted. ‘Instead, tell me what in hell’s name you expect me to do with one of your spoiled-to-death daughters?’
‘Not bed her anyway.’
About to stride out of the lift into the hushed luxury of the top-floor corridor, that short cool evenly delivered statement froze Nikos to the spot for a second, the acid-bite affront hoisting up his proud dark head.
‘That was not even remotely funny,’ he denounced with icy cold dignity. ‘I have never rested so much as a suggestive finger on any one of your daughters. It would be—’
‘Disrespectful to me—?’
‘Yes!’ Nikos incised, for no one knew better than Nikos himself how much he owed to Oscar for turning him into the person he was today. Maintaining a respectful distance between himself and Oscar’s beautiful daughters was a simple matter of paying honour to that debt.
‘Thank you,’ Oscar murmured.
‘I don’t want your thanks,’ Nikos dismissed, and started moving again, covering the length of the corridor with the elegant grace of his long restless stride. ‘And neither do I want one of your decorative daughters cluttering up my offices pretending to be a proficient PA just to please you,’ he tagged on. ‘Why this sudden decision to put them to work anyway?’ he asked curiously as he pushed open the door to his own suite of offices.
His secretary, Fiona, glanced up from her computer screen and beamed him a welcome-back smile. Indicating to his mobile, Nikos gave a series of instructions via a long-fingered hand which the experienced Fiona showed she understood with a nod of her curly blonde head, leaving him free to shut himself inside his own office knowing the group of people waiting for him in the boardroom would be informed of his delay.
It was only as he shut the door behind him that he picked up the silence hanging heavy on the phone. It made him frown again because Oscar Balfour possessed a brain which functioned at the speed of light so silences of any nature were unusual enough to cause Nikos a pang of concern.
‘Are you all right, Oscar?’ he questioned cautiously.
The older man released a sigh, ‘Actually, I feel like hell,’ he admitted. ‘I have started to wonder what the past thirty years of my life have been about.’
Picturing this big tough larger-than-life investment tycoon with his snow-white hair and neat goatee beard and the pride of his long aristocratic heritage stamped onto every facet of him—
‘You’re missing Lillian,’ Nikos murmured.
‘Every minute of every hour of every day,’ Oscar confirmed. ‘I go to sleep thinking about her and spend the night dreaming about her, and I wake up in the morning searching for her warm body next to mine in the bed.’
‘I’m—sorry.’ It was a grossly inadequate response to offer, Nikos knew that, for Oscar Balfour was still grieving the recent loss of his wife. ‘It’s been a tough time for all of you…’
‘With one death and two raging scandals following hard on the back of a world financial crisis which threatened to turn us all into beggars?’ Oscar let out a dry laugh. ‘Tough doesn’t