Constantinou's Mistress (8 page)

‘You won't,' Lucy said with a bland smile in return.

No, he didn't think that he would. Lucy would never indulge in excessive drinking, so hangovers would never be a problem for her.

But when nine-thirty rolled round the following morning he edgily began to wonder whether he had underestimated his secretary. He had never known her to arrive this late. And she had looked absolutely fine when she had left the restaurant. He knew because he had watched her every single step of the way as she had
allowed Robert to help her on with her jacket, then linked her arm through his as they weaved a path through the jumble of people.

Her call came through when he was about to dial her mobile phone himself.

‘I'm sorry. I won't be coming in to work today, Nick.'

‘You won't be coming in to work. And may I ask why not?' It was her first day off sick and he attempted to sound sympathetic but it was a struggle.

‘I feel pretty awful. I think I've come down with something.'

He could well imagine what and the thought did not predispose him to feel a shred of compassion.

‘You seemed well enough last night.'

‘I did feel absolutely fine last night…'

‘Just can't seem to drag yourself out of bed this morning, is that it?'

‘That's right.'

He heard the note of relief in her voice and frowned in irritation. ‘There are a couple of important things I need you to do here.'

‘And I'll be in tomorrow.'

How to get around to what he really wanted to find out? Whether she was ill or whether a night of rampant passion had exhausted her to the point where she just couldn't face the trek in to work. There was only one way.

‘Sure.' White limbs writhing on a rumpled bed, entwined with Robert's. He was probably there right now sending her little secret smiles of conspiracy that she had taken the day off to spend it with him. In bed. Making love. He gritted his teeth together. ‘Just rest. Take some medicine and call me if you cannot make it in tomorrow.'

Saying all the right things. But instead of immediately getting hold of someone to cover for her he stood up, not bothering to sling on his jacket, and strode out of the office, only pausing to pay a fleeting visit to Personnel so that he could get the information he needed. Her address.

Her flat was easy enough to find, although the traffic in London turned the simple half-hour trip into an hour and a quarter of intensely frustrating crawl.

Once out of the city, though, he managed to clear the West End, and the traffic heading up towards north London was less dense. He could finally put his foot down on the accelerator and build up some speed.

If she was taking time off work to be with her lover then he wanted to catch her at it. No warning. Just the surprise of seeing him there, on her doorstep. No chance for Robert to hide or escape through the back door.

As it turned out, he was forced to announce his arrival because her flat was on the third floor of a Victorian house and entry was only possible through an intercom system.

‘Nick here. Could you let me in?'

‘Nick?' There was a fleeting silence during which he could half hear her surprised intake of breath. ‘What on earth are you doing here?'

‘Just let me in, Lucy. I won't be long.' There was no way she could argue with a flat command and he pushed open the door when she obediently pressed the buzzer, taking the steps two at a time until he could see her waiting for him at the door of her flat, with a pale blue bathrobe pulled tightly around her.

Why wasn't she dressed? It was the middle of the morning! He ran up the remaining stairs and paused in
front of her, taking her in with one brief glance before letting his eyes drift to the small hallway behind her.

‘What are you doing here?' She repeated the question, this time with a slight frown of puzzlement in her voice.

‘Files.' He held out one hand and the convenient excuse he had brought with him.

‘Couldn't this have waited until tomorrow?'

‘You might not be in tomorrow. You might be worse, and there's no point asking anyone else to handle this. You have all the information. Perhaps I had better come in.' His hand snaked out to rest on the door, which, he couldn't fail to notice, had only been partially opened. Lucy had not expected him and she certainly did not want him to enter her flat. With grim determination he brought a little more pressure to bear on the door.

‘I really don't feel very well, Nick…'

‘And you might well be worse tomorrow, like I said. At any rate, you can take your time with these. And it might be helpful having someone around if you're not well. To fetch and carry.'

‘To fetch and carry
what
?'

‘Cups of tea.' He shrugged impatiently. ‘Sandwiches. Bowls of soup.'

Lucy skitted a glance over her shoulder. The last thing she needed was Nick Constantinou in her flat, filling it with his domineering masculine presence. But he wasn't going to go away and she was in no mood to prolong the debate, dressed as she was in a bathrobe with absolutely nothing underneath.

‘I'll take the files.'

‘Wish I could just hand them over, but there are one or two things I need to go through with you.'

Lucy all but groaned in despair as he pushed back the door and swept past her into the flat, his quick, dark
eyes darting around him, taking in the small dining and sitting room to the right and the spacious bathroom to the left, the door of which was slightly ajar. Thank God she had had the wit to close her bedroom door. It was her private space—and the thought of those shrewd eyes taking in the crumpled bed and her other personal belongings made her feel ill.

‘I'll make you a quick cup of coffee,' she suggested, reluctantly shutting the door behind her and following him to the kitchen, which he proceeded to inspect in depth.

Nick swung round to look at her, his eyes narrowing. The bedroom door had been shut. Purposefully? he wondered.

‘No, no. You sit and let me make the coffee.'

‘You don't know where anything is.'

‘I doubt I will need a map to find anything in here,' he commented drily. ‘Whoever designed this flat could not have made a kitchen any smaller if they had tried.'

‘It's perfectly fine for me!'

‘How is it that you cannot afford anything better when you are paid so well?' he asked bluntly, and Lucy flushed, seeing the flat through his discriminating eyes. The kitchen was poky, with a small table, big enough for two at a push, squashed against one wall. The fridge was small enough to be virtually useless and the paint on the cupboards, as on the walls, was grimy and in dire need of a coat of paint.

‘I'm saving up to buy a place of my own,' Lucy mumbled. Of course, there would be no need if she accepted Robert's proposal. He had already called her and, having clucked sympathetically down the line for a few minutes, gently asked her if she was remembering to give his offer some thought.

‘Well, sit down. You are not well.' He felt an uncomfortable twinge of guilt that his words of commiseration were utterly meaningless in the face of his behaviour, namely showing up unannounced on her doorstep on the pretext of having to give her work to do when he knew full well that every single item of so-called pressing importance he had brought with him could happily wait.

‘No…I…I'll just go and change into something…else. The coffee's in the cupboard, the milk's in the fridge and the kettle usually works, although it can be a little eccentric at times.'

She fled. This was the first time he had ever been to her flat and she didn't like it. It was as intensely and painfully disconcerting as it had been on the dance floor, when his arms had been wrapped around her and the heat from his body had seemed to fuse with hers.

She kept her robe on for as long as possible while she rummaged in a drawer for a pair of jeans and a T-shirt.

She would just have to get rid of him quickly—and not because she was feeling under the weather. In fact, she was too aware of him to feel ill. She would just flick through the files, take a few notes and show him to the door. It was her flat, after all, and if she told him to leave then what choice did he have?

She dressed quickly, and just as she opened her bedroom door she was alarmed to find Nick standing just the other side of it.

He had had to follow her, to get a glimpse of what she was concealing behind the closed bedroom door. He could feel her
frisson
of shock as he took two easy steps into the room, his eyes drawn to her breasts rising and falling as she breathed quickly in dismay.

‘Please go back into the living room.' Her voice was muffled but imperious enough to halt him in his tracks.
When she turned around to look at him her cheeks were bright red.

‘Now!'

Ignoring her order for him to leave, he strolled further into the room so that he could check all possible hiding places. There weren't many. The bedroom was only marginally bigger than the kitchen, with a double bed consuming most of the free space and what was left divided equally into battered dressing table and an ancient two-door wardrobe. There was just enough room for a small circular rug next to the bed and space sufficient to weave a path of sorts from one item of furniture to another.

‘I'm already dressed and ready,' Lucy informed him through gritted teeth. ‘So if you don't
mind
…'

‘Of course.' He shot her a lazy smile and stuck his hands in his pockets. So small, so cute and so immensely flustered by his presence. He doubted Robert could do that to her, for all that she had said in the past about her attraction to nice, reliable, predictable, dull men.

He was waiting for her in the tiny living room when she emerged a few minutes later, her colour back to normal.

‘You do look a bit peaky,' he commented, indicating her cup of coffee with one finger and waiting until she had perched herself on the sofa next to him.

He would have to take things slowly. No fast moves, no obvious indication of underhand motives. The dull dissatisfaction that had been plaguing him for the past eight months had lifted and now all he could feel was the tantalising thrill of the chase, a gut-deep craving to have her again.

‘Right.' He leant towards the table to rest his cup on some free space, brushing her thigh with his in passing.
‘The files. Just three of them, but the Rawlings one is the most urgent.'

‘What was the outcome of your meeting yesterday?' Lucy asked, edging slightly away from him. She was finding it hard to focus. Had he been about to barge into her room? She had been in such a panicked frame of mind, having him invade the privacy of her small flat, that her thoughts had been whirling and it was quite possible that he had knocked and she just hadn't heard. And, in all fairness, he had not seemed the slightest bit disconcerted by her response. He certainly hadn't displayed any signs of being sexually aware of her.

Thank goodness, she thought, frowning at the papers in front of her and trying to ignore the chemistry emanating from the man sitting inches away from her.

‘Tried phoning the damned man,' Nick grated, ‘who was unavailable, as usual. But I did speak to his underling and, from what we gather, there seems to be certain discrepancies with the allocation of money. Business has been pretty healthy so where the hell is the money going?'

He reached for his cup and then sat back against the sofa so that he could watch her as she flicked through the pile of letters in the file.

‘Embezzlement?'

‘Distasteful thought but it very well could be.'

‘What will you do about it?' With her elbows on her thighs, Lucy turned her head to look at him.

‘Get proof and then have him sacked if that's the case.' His black eyes were brooding as they met hers and Lucy hurriedly looked away.

‘So what do you want me to do?'

‘We need to work on a letter that's cleverly phrased. Nothing threatening, but enough for Rawlings to know
that we're on his back now and we're not going to get off until we have answers.' His eyes drifted to the vulnerable nape of her neck. With just the smallest of efforts he could have reached out and grasped it and drawn her against him so that he could taste the delicate contours of her face. Her T-shirt camouflaged the curve of her breasts but his imagination, he found, could easily supply the missing details. The thought of large, rosy nipples made him harden in dramatic response. God, he would have to drive back to his place once he left here and have a cold shower before he went back into the office.

‘If he's embezzling money,' Nick continued, every word perfectly assured although his mind had taken flight and was basking in the giddy anticipation of cupping those breasts, licking them, feeling her writhe with pleasure, ‘we do not want to frighten him away. We want to catch him with his hand in the till. Tell me your suggestions.'

She had a beautiful face, a face that had no need for thick make-up. It was expressive and artlessly transparent, and as he sat back and watched her concentrate on the problem he had posed he idly compared it to the faces of the women he had been seeing over the past few months. Not one of those would ever have dreamed of stepping foot out of the house without a full covering of warpaint and at least two would go nowhere near a pool if it entailed getting their faces wet.

‘Well?'

‘Well what?' Nick blinked and realised that she had been asking him something while he had been busy speculating.

‘Haven't you been listening to a word I've just said?' Lucy snapped irritably. ‘You've barged in here with
armfuls of work, and the least you could do is pay some attention to me when I'm talking to you.' She scowled, knowing full well what had been going on in that beautiful head of his. Lingering memories of the brunette who had adorned his arm the night before, she thought sourly.