A Fling with the Greek Billionaire (4 page)

From the corner of her eye, Daria spotted a fairly empty alley and instinctively took a detour. Three steps in, and a hand suddenly curled around her waist, making her jerk in a combination of fear and excitement.

A second later, and she was being whirled around, her gasp cut off by Nik’s mouth slamming against hers.

“I should punish you,” he gritted against her lips.

“You…should.” Two words, and she felt like it took her forever to think of what to say. Nik’s presence was as drugging as ever, and this near, with his hard body pressed against hers, there was no escaping its debilitating effects.

For one moment, she tried – she really did try to pull away. She tried to think clearly and not let her trouble-making impulses get the better of her.
 

For once in her life, she waited and gave the tiny, sensible voice inside her head a chance to issue its warning about frogs. She had dated and had her heart broken by twenty-eight men, and that voice had issued warnings about each and every one of them. That voice had told her they were all frogs, and they wouldn’t change – they’d stay frogs – even if she kissed them, but she hadn’t listened to it. Not once.

So where was it
now
? Why wasn’t it warning her?
 

Nik’s lips left her all of a sudden, and Daria had to swallow back a moan of protest. While she wasn’t shy about showing her affections, Daria also knew she had to at least try not to crowd him. At the end of the day, she and Nik still barely knew each other. While she was almost 100% sure about his place in her life, she had to take it easy on the poor guy and not terrify Nik with how much she, well, liked him.

“We should go.” Nik’s tightly spoken words drew Daria’s attention back to him. He was breathing hard, fierce hunger glittering in his dark eyes as he stared at her. Even so, it was just as evident Nik was determined not to let his desire take control.

And that’s probably why there weren’t any frog alerts,
Daria thought dizzily. Aside from being the only man who hadn’t assumed she would be an easy lay just because she liked to flirt, Nik was also the man she had asked God for.

She knew the reason would sound silly to most people, but Daria believed in it with her whole heart. She had sincerely asked God for someone He thought was good for her, never mind what Daria thought she wanted, and He had given her Nik.

And sure, their first meeting hadn’t exactly screamed serendipity – in fact, Nik had initially thought she was mental for throwing a Gatorade bottle at his head,
twice
– but who cared about that?
 

God works in mysterious ways,
Daria told herself. That their first meeting was more like grounds for a lawsuit shouldn’t and didn’t matter.
 

As Daria raised her gaze to Nik, something inside her turn warm, soft, and gooey when his gaze immediately captured hers like it was his right to have her stare at him all the time.
 

This was what mattered
, she thought feverishly. This feeling that she had been waiting for him all her life—

This.

Something that she shied away from labeling just yet, mostly because in her own mind, she was scared saying it out loud would make her seem crazy. People didn’t feel
this
so soon, and
this
happening at first sight could only be make-believe but—

Daria mentally shook her head.
None of that mattered
, she reminded herself. She could leave it unnamed for now, and it wouldn’t make a difference. What she should concentrate right now instead was—

Nik stiffened at the look in Daria’s gray eyes. “
No,”
he rejected in a clipped voice. Whatever she was planning, it was certain to be a bad idea.

But it only made Daria plant her hands on his shoulders, and stiffening even more, he demanded, “What the hell are you doing?”

She didn’t seem to hear him, too busy looking around them, and Nik found himself doing the same. The empty alley, a narrow sanded pathway, led straight to the island’s tourism office behind them. It was closed for the weekend, but there were posters on its windows, encouraging guests to download the office’s free app.

That was interesting to know
, Nik thought with a frown, but what did that have to do with them? He turned his head back to Daria to ask, but the moment he did, Daria rose to her toes and, clutching his shoulders more tightly, covered his mouth with hers.

Nik froze.

His entire adult life, he had only two important rules.
 

Never mix business with pleasure.

Never let pleasure rule him.
 

Nik had seen how sex – often masquerading as love – ruined the people he had foolishly trusted. His own foster mother, one whom he had lived with for years and thought of as his own parent, had turned on him in the end, and all because she had supposedly lost her heart to a greedy con artist.

He had never allowed anyone to be close to him since then, had never allowed himself to be in a situation where he was not fully in control, and yet with the woman in his arms – the woman trying to seduce him with fake, innocent kisses
and
succeeding –
 

Nik had ended up violating almost all of the rules he stood for, and he had no damn idea why.

Forcibly ending the kiss, Nik shook his head at Daria. “This isn’t the time or place—”

Most would have quaked at the forbidding note in his voice, but it only made Daria laugh and shower tiny and arousing kisses all over his face as she whispered, “Of course it is.” More kisses. “We’re alone. I checked.”

Ah.
So that was why she had looked around. Even so, he didn’t do stuff like this, and Nik struggled not to let the seductive trail of Daria’s kisses sway him. “It does not matter if we are alone. We must stop—” But instead it was Nik who stopped talking as Daria sucked on his lower lip.

A vision of Daria sucking on his cock teased his mind.

His imagination ran wild, and he found himself releasing her hair so he could hold her by the nape and keep her in place.

Sensing Nik’s control was starting to slip, Daria kissed the corner of his mouth, wanting to destroy it completely. “I’m only going to stop if you can say that like you mean it,” she said throatily.

Her words inflamed him, but bitterness also ate at Nik because of it. “For someone who only had sex once in her life,” he said tightly, “you’re certainly too good at this.”

“Only because of you,” Daria answered honestly, too lost in the heated feel of Nik’s presence to notice the emotion underlining his words. Even though she had a long dating history behind her, none of those frogs had ever seen her naked. None of them had made her want to see any of
them
naked, and none of them had certainly managed to make her interested in going beyond kissing…

Until now.

Until Nik.

Until she felt…
this.

As soon as the thought of
this
occurred, she deliberately pushed it away, knowing it just wasn’t yet time. Instead, she concentrated on the desire that licked her entire body, and it was a fairly easy task. She only had to remember the first night she had spent in Nik’s arms—

Up, down, up, down, up—

Trying not to melt at Nik’s intense gaze, she told him with mocking gravity, “You’re absolutely wrong.”

Nik tensed.

“I didn’t have sex once in my life.”

His face turned expressionless at Daria’s words. Did this mean she’d confess the truth about her past now?
And if she did
, he asked himself tautly,
what then?

Chapter Two

Nik’s question turned out to be moot. Daria, her arms still around his neck, her breasts rubbing tantalizingly against his chest with every breath she took, only cocked her head to the side, an impish smile on her face as she murmured, “I had sex with just
one
man in my life, but we made love
four times
.”

Goddamn. Beautiful. Liar.
 

Nik was torn between pushing Daria away and kissing her punishingly until she wasn’t able to think of more lies to feed him. How the hell could someone look so innocent – she even
felt
innocent, dammit, despite her provocative manners – and yet be so used to acting with deceit?

The first time they had met, Daria had told him she had never been with anyone else. And yet when he had gotten his security team to check her background, he had learned that Daria was nothing but a money-grubbing witch with a talent for toying with rich men.

In front of him, Daria flashed Nik a seductive smile as she said huskily, “That’s where all my experience comes from.”

Self-loathing burned deep inside him as his body reacted to Daria’s voice, his desire only growing stronger even as she uttered another blatant lie.

Nik strove to bury his anger deep inside him. Allowing the rage to fester would make him more prone to mistakes, might even make Daria realize he was on to her, and he was determined to avoid that at all costs.
 

Nik’s plans for revenge depended on making Daria fall in love with him – someone she thought was a poor local, ideal for a summer fling but one she would undoubtedly discard upon leaving the island.

Daria’s smile wavered a little when she thought she glimpsed a hard light in Nik’s eyes. It was almost like he hated…
her.
The unexpected thought had her blinking, but when she looked at his eyes again, it was gone. Even so, she asked hesitantly, “Is something wrong?”

Nik forced his lips to curve into a mocking smile. “Nothing’s wrong.” He leveled a look at her. “Except for the fact that you seem hell-bent on seducing me in public.”

His deadpan tone had her relaxing, and all her worries fled. “Oh, you realized?” she teased. Tiptoeing again, she brushed her lips against his. “I really want you.”

The way she started rubbing himself against him had his cock throbbing. His teeth gnashed. “Daria—”

She responded by pushing her body closer to his, causing Nik to bite back an expletive. “Does the word ‘public’ not mean anything to you?” he grated at her even as his hold on Daria tightened and he found himself torn between arousal and self-disgust at how goddamn weak he was against her.

Daria only gave him a solemn nod. “It does.” Her eyes twinkled. “It means the chances of getting caught…” Her voice turned sultry. “—are going to make things more exciting—”

 
His control snapped.

A gasp escaped Daria as Nik hauled her to him, but the sound soon turned into a breathless laugh as he swept her up in his arms.

Carrying her, Nik walked further down the alley, and when they rounded the corner, she instinctively wrapped her legs around Nik’s waist as he pushed her against the wall. The new position hid her from view but allowed Nik to see anyone coming through the alley.
 

Nik’s hooded eyes captured hers. “You make me do the craziest things.” His voice was rough with desire, but there was also an odd note in it, and the sound tugged at her heartstrings.

He was so serious,
she thought.
Did he ever laugh?
That she had to wonder made her heart squeeze even more painfully, for him, and she unthinkingly reached up to touch his face, whispering, “Once in a while, crazy is good.”

His body stirred at the words, but the tender light in her gaze made Nik’s chest tighten in a way he didn’t like.
 

Disturbed and distrustful, Nik sought to eliminate everything except the fiery need between them. Instead of answering her, he caught her lips in a kiss, his tongue thrusting inside her mouth without preliminaries.
 

She kissed him back, her hunger matching his. It was the only true thing about her, Nik’s sexual experience recognizing Daria’s genuine desire for him.
And that,
Nik thought grimly,
was what he’d use to teach her a lesson she would never forget
.

Lowering Daria back to her feet, he swiftly worked on getting her bikini bottom out of the way, stuffing the tiny triangle into his pocket. When she was up in his arms again, her back against the wall, her eyes wide on his, he didn’t waste any time, his fingers immediately finding her sex, which was already slick and wet.
 

Daria moaned at the first stroke of his fingers, and her hands moved over his shoulder. She clawed his back, and the pain made his cock throb harder. Another stroke, and she let out a keening cry, forcing him to cover her mouth with his.