The Greek Billionaire's Innocent Princess (11 page)

contemplating agreeing to his offer. ‘I suppose the wedding will have to be in the next few

months?’ Before she grew big with his child and everyone guessed the real reason for their

marriage.

‘Sooner than that,’ Nikos corrected her. ‘Sebastian has pencilled the eleventh of July into his

diary, and cancelled all other state events.’

Kitty did a hurried mental calculation. ‘That’s three weeks from now!’ Panic engulfed her and

she shook her head wildly. ‘I can’t go through with it, Nikos.’

‘Yes, you can,’ he told her grimly, the cold determination in his eyes freezing her blood,

‘because to be frank, Kitty, you have no choice.’

THEfollowing three weeks passed in a blur, and Kitty felt increasingly detached from her life

and the preparations for the wedding that were going on around her. She could almost believe

she was caught up in a dream, and fully expected to wake up and find that she had never met a

man called Nikos Angelaki, let alone become pregnant with his baby. But when she opened her

eyes on the morning of her wedding and saw her bridal gown hanging against the wardrobe she

was forced to make a reality check. This was real; in a few hours from now she would be his

wife, and for the sake of the child developing inside her she could not escape the fate that

awaited her.

‘I told you all brides look beautiful on their wedding day,’ Liss said later as she smoothed a

crease from the full skirt of Kitty’s white silk wedding dress. ‘You look breathtaking. The dress

shows off your figure perfectly. Don’t you dare go back to wearing those ghastly, shapeless

sweatshirts you’re so fond of! Not that Nikos will allow you to,’ Liss added breezily. ‘He leads a

hectic social life and I bet he’ll insist on buying you loads of gorgeous, sexy clothes for all the

parties you’ll be going to in Greece.’

Kitty felt a heavy weight settle around her heart as she contemplated her future life away from

Aristo. ‘You know I don’t like parties,’ she said dismally. ‘In a few months from now I’ll be

huge, and I definitely won’t look sexy—just fat. I’ve already gained weight, especially on my

bust. Do you think I’m showing too much cleavage?’ she asked worriedly, studying the dress’s

exquisite bodice, beaded with tiny pearls and crystals, and the firm swell of her breasts that

appeared in imminent danger of spilling over the sweetheart neckline.

‘Nikos’s eyes will be on stalks,’ Liss assured her cheerfully. ‘I’m glad you decided to wear your

hair down. It’s a much softer style than when you pull it back off your face.’

‘I suppose so, but it’s not very practical.’ Kitty’s silky, dark chestnut hair was naturally wavy

and it rippled down her back almost to her waist. At Liss’s persuasion she had left it loose, and

instead of a tiara and veil she had chosen a circlet of white roses for her headdress. Her sister had insisted on doing her make-up, but had kept it light, emphasising her brown eyes with a taupe

shadow and adding a rose-pink gloss to her lips.

The finished effect was startling, and Kitty couldn’t quite believe the woman in the mirror was

her. Because of one night, and a few moments of uncharacteristic madness, her life had changed

for ever. Her hand moved instinctively to her stomach, and she took a deep breath. She was

marrying Nikos for the same reason that he was marrying her—for the sake of the child they had

created—and there was no point in feeling emotional or fooled by the romance of the occasion.

‘You’re not supposed to look
practical
,’ Liss argued, casting her eyes heavenwards. ‘This is your wedding day, you’re about to marry one of the sexiest men on the planet,
and
he sent you these… Gaea,’ she called to the maid, ‘bring in the flowers Mr Angelaki sent.’

The maid hurried out to the corridor and reappeared carrying an exquisite bouquet of pink and

white rosebuds mixed with delicate fronds of gypsophila, which she handed to Kitty.

‘I know you keep telling me this is a marriage of convenience, but there’s obviously something

between you and Nikos,’ Liss said archly. ‘I saw the glances he kept giving you at dinner last

night—as if he couldn’t wait to take you to bed.’ Her eyes gleamed with amusement when Kitty

blushed scarlet. ‘And he phoned me from New York a few days ago to ask my advice on your

favourite flowers.’

‘Did he?’ Kitty strove to sound casual and told herself not to read too much into Liss’s words,

but her heart gave a little lurch when she buried her face in the blooms and inhaled their delicate

perfume. No man had ever sent her flowers before, and the fact that Nikos had gone to some

effort to ensure she had a bridal bouquet filled her with hope that this marriage was not as

doomed to failure as she’d convinced herself. The roses were a talisman of hope, and tears

glistened in her eyes when she stared at her reflection again and saw that Liss wasn’t lying, and

that by some miracle she really did look beautiful.

‘Thank you for helping me with my dress,’ she murmured. ‘You know I’m hopeless with

clothes, but thanks to your advice, and the designer’s skill, my wedding dress is everything I

could have hoped for.’

‘No problem.’ Liss shrugged her shoulders and gave a cursory glance in the mirror at her pale

pink silk bridesmaid dress. ‘I can’t wait for everyone’s reaction when they see you,’ she said

with a wide smile, ‘especially Nikos’s.’

Her smile faded when she glimpsed Kitty’s over-bright eyes. ‘I hope it works out for you,’ Liss

said softly. ‘I know the baby was unplanned, and you’ve been pushed into getting married. I

detect that Nikos is just as high-handed and determined to have his own way as Sebastian, and

between the two of them, and the queen’s stipulation that duty comes before everything, I bet

you didn’t stand a chance of refusing. But you must know that Seb and Mama and the rest of the

family have your best interests at heart, and I’m sure that marrying Nikos is the right thing for

you to do.’

‘I hope so,’ Kitty replied, unable to disguise the tremor in her voice. In the three weeks since

their engagement had been announced to the media Nikos had only visited the palace twice

before he had flown to America, and on both occasions they had spent no time alone. He had

been polite and charming, and had completely won over Queen Tia, but to Kitty he had seemed

remote and unapproachable and she hadn’t known how to talk to him. Even when he had phoned

from the States, their conversations had been limited to how she was feeling in the first stages of

her pregnancy, and whether she was eating enough.

She had been able to reassure him on that point, Kitty thought gloomily. Apart from a couple of

mornings when she’d felt nauseous, she was fit and healthy and had an appetite like a horse. Her

mother said she was obviously one of those women who looked pregnant from early on, and that

she was blooming, but she wasn’t sure what Nikos’s reaction would be to her body that was

already filling out with his child.

More to the point, was he even going to see her body? she wondered. The wild passion they had

shared in the cave seemed like a distant dream, and if it weren’t for the fact that she was carrying his child she could almost believe she had imagined the pleasure of his mouth on hers and the

touch of his hands on her breasts.

Would Nikos expect her to share his bed tonight—their wedding night? Kitty stared at her

reflection as her face flooded with colour, and beneath her dress her breasts suddenly felt full and heavy. They had not discussed that aspect of their marriage, but Nikos was a supremely virile

male and she guessed he would not want to live a life without sex. But he had given no

indication, either on the day he had asked her to marry him, or the occasions she had seen him

since, that he still desired her.

There had been virtually no physical contact between them since the one time he had made love

to her. Even when they had posed for the official photographs to mark their engagement, Nikos

had pressed his lips lightly to her hand, but hadn’t kissed her properly on the mouth as she had

longed for him to do. And when a member of the press had asked if he was in love, he had

replied with some flippant remark that had made the journalists laugh but had emphasised to

Kitty that she meant nothing to him.

Liss glanced at the clock. ‘We’d better go. Are you ready?’

Was she? How ready could you be when you were about to leap into the unknown? Kitty took a

deep breath and nodded. ‘As ready as I’ll ever be,’ she murmured. Her heart was beating

painfully fast when she walked over to the door, and as she turned and glanced around the room

that had been her bedroom for twenty-six years she felt a sharp pang of sadness that after today

the palace would no longer be her home. From now on home would be Athens, with Nikos, and

she could only pray that her decision to marry him was the right one.

The private chapel in the grounds of the palace was packed with guests. When Kitty stepped

through the arched doorway a murmur of excited voices seemed to echo around the nave, heads

turned and she was conscious of the faint gasp that rippled through the crowd as they caught

sight of her in her bridal gown. But her eyes were fixed straight ahead, on the tall, broad-

shouldered man in a charcoal-grey suit who was standing at the altar.

Nikos must have known from the reaction of the guests that she had arrived, but he remained

unmoving and did not even give a cursory glance over his shoulder towards his bride. His lack of

curiosity, and his obvious reluctance to face the woman he felt obliged to marry, hit Kitty as

painfully as if he had physically struck her, and trepidation knotted in her stomach. For a

moment blind panic swept through her, and she could not restrain a shiver as she faced the reality

of what she was about to do.

‘Are you all right?’ Sebastian whispered as he linked his arm with hers and stared down at her

paper-white face. ‘
Theos
, Kitty, you’re not going to faint, are you?’

The deep, pure notes of the organ music swirled up to the roof of the chapel and seemed to

resound through Kitty’s body. She stumbled, and for a few seconds the urge to turn and flee from

the church, from Nikos, and the loveless future that awaited her, was overwhelming. But then

she saw the anxiety in her brother’s eyes, and the lesson that had been ingrained in her

throughout her life— that adherence to duty was paramount—came to her rescue. She gripped

her bouquet of roses and forced a smile for Sebastian, trying to disguise the fact that she felt as

cold as if she had been carved from ice. ‘I’m fine,’ she assured him.

The journey down the aisle seemed to take for ever and when she finally reached Nikos’s side

she lifted her eyes warily to him and met his expressionless gaze. He made his responses in a

cool, clear tone devoid of any emotion, but the constriction in Kitty’s throat meant that her voice

emerged as little more than a whisper, and she felt a deep sense of sadness that they had both lied

when they had vowed to love and honour each other until death parted them. Tears stung her

eyes when he slid a plain gold band onto her finger, and she could not stifle a shocked gasp when

he followed her wedding ring with a spectacular diamond cluster that sparkled like teardrops in

the sunlight that streamed down on them through the high windows.

When the priest murmured that Nikos could kiss his bride, Kitty turned her head, expecting a

perfunctory brush of his lips, but as she lifted her face to him she was startled by the sudden

blaze of heat in his eyes. Her heart thudded erratically in her chest when he drew her into his

arms and she felt his strong, hard body pressed against hers. To her amazement he was no longer

cold and remote, and she made no attempt to deny him when he lowered his head and claimed

her mouth with undisguised hunger.

She had been starved of him for so long that she was unable to control her response to him. She

kissed him back with equal fervour, welcoming the masterful sweep of his tongue between her

lips and feeling a quiver of sexual excitement run through her at his low growl of frustration

when the priest’s polite cough reminded them that their display of passion was being watched by

two hundred guests.

Their marriage was one of convenience, and a far cry from the love match she had dreamed of,

Kitty acknowledged when they walked together back down the aisle and stepped out of the

chapel into the bright sunshine. But for better or worse she was Nikos Angelaki’s, wife and it

was time she banished her romantic fantasies and accepted that she had married a man who

would never love her but, for now at least it seemed, desired her.

‘You look beautiful in your wedding dress,’ he startled her by saying later at the reception, when

the wedding lunch, speeches and champagne toasts were finally finished, and she had told him

that she was going to get changed before they left for Athens. ‘Don’t take too long,
agape
. It will be another hour at least before we make it onto the helicopter and early evening by the time we

land in Athens, and I am impatient to be alone with my bride.’

The sultry gleam in Nikos’s eyes filled Kitty with nervous apprehension, and she hurried up to

her room to change into her going-away outfit, desperate to spend a few minutes away from his