In Christofides' Keeping (2 page)

She couldn’t say anything. Her throat was too tight. She gathered up her things and left through the back kitchen door, stepping out into the dark and dank alleyway behind the exclusive restaurant.

Later that night Rico stood at the floor-to-ceiling window of his central London penthouse apartment, hands dug deep into his pockets. His pulse was still racing, and it had nothing to do with the beautiful woman he’d said a curt and sterile goodnight to—much to her obvious
disgust—and everything to do with a pretty waitress who had confounded him by doing a disappearing act.

She’d done a disappearing act the first time round, but he only had himself to blame for that. He grimaced; if he hadn’t panicked…It still rankled with him that he’d let her get under his guard so easily. He could remember watching her sleeping, sprawled across the bed, feeling seriously stunned at the depth of his desire,
still
, and the depth of his response to her.

It was that and the overwhelming feeling of possessiveness which had driven him from the room as if hounds were snapping at this heels. He
never
felt possessive of women. But this evening, the minute he’d recognised her, it had surged upwards again, as fresh as if no time had passed. And she’d run. And he had no idea why.

He pulled out a small piece of paper from his pocket. He’d got her name from the manager of the restaurant, and his men had made short work of tracking her down. He now had Gypsy Butler’s address—for apparently that
was
her name. He smiled grimly. He would soon find out what exactly he found so compelling about a woman he’d slept with for just one night, and why on earth she’d felt the need to run from him.

The following morning, as Gypsy walked home in drizzly rain from the local budget supermarket, pushing a sleeping Lola in her battered buggy, she was still reeling at what had happened the previous evening.

She’d seen Rico Christofides and she’d lost her job.

The two things she’d been most terrified of happening had happened in quick succession. She defended herself again: she’d had no choice but to leave last night—she’d have been in no fit state to work or deal with Rico
Christofides. Her legs felt momentarily weak when she recalled how he’d looked, and how instantaneous his effect on her had been.

He’d been tall and strong and devastatingly powerful. And still as bone-meltingly gorgeous as the first time she’d seen him across that crowded nightclub two years ago.

The night she’d met Rico had been a moment out of time—and most definitely a moment out of character. He’d caught her on the cusp of her new life, when she’d been letting go of a lot of pain. She’d been vulnerable and easy prey to the practised charm of someone like Rico Christofides. But she’d had no clue then just exactly who he was. A world-renowned tycoon and playboy.

Seeing him had made everything she’d ever known pale into insignificance. She knew if he’d been dressed like the other men in the club—in a natty shirt and blazer, pressed chinos—it would have been easy to dismiss him as being like all the rest. But he hadn’t been dressed like that. He’d been dressed in a T-shirt and faded denims which had fit lean hips and powerful legs so lovingly that it had been almost indecent. An air of dangerous sexuality had clung to his devastatingly dark good-looks in a way that had left everyone around him looking anaemic—and awestruck.

But that in itself would have just made him a spectacularly handsome guy; it had been more than that. It had been in the intensity of his gaze across that heaving chaotic club—
on her.
Dark and mesmerising, stopping Gypsy right where she’d been dancing alone on the dance floor.

The impulse to get out of her tangled head and engage in something physical had called to her as she’d passed the club doors and heard the heavy bass beat just a short
while before. It was a primal celebration of the fact that she was finally free of her late father and his corrupt and controlling legacy. When he’d died six months previously she’d felt more emptiness than grief for the man who had never shown her an ounce of genuine affection.

But when the gorgeous stranger had started to come towards her in the club, with singular intent, all tangled thoughts and memories had fled. He’d cleared an effortless path through the thronged crowd—and sanity had returned to Gypsy in a rush of panic. He was too handsome, too dark, too sexy…too much for someone like her. And the way he’d looked at her as he grew ever closer had scared the life out of her.

But, as if rooted to the spot by a magic spell, she hadn’t been able to move, and had just watched, dry-mouthed, as he came to stop right in front of her. Tall and forbidding. No easy sexy smile to make it easier. It was almost as if something elemental had passed between them and this man was claiming her as
his.
Which had been a ridiculous thing to feel on a banal Friday night in a club in central London.

‘Why have you stopped dancing?’ he’d asked innocuously, his deep voice pitched to carry across the deafening beat, but even so she’d heard the unmistakably subtle accent.

He was foreign. As if his dark looks wouldn’t have told her that anyway. A frisson of awareness had made her tremble all over when she’d noted his steely grey eyes, their colour stark against his olive skin. She’d shaken her head, as if to clear it of this madness, but just then someone had jostled her, heaving her forward and straight into the man’s arms, into hands which held her protectively against his hard body.

Instantaneous heat had exploded throughout Gypsy’s
body at the sheer physicality of him. She’d looked up, utterly perplexed, and had sensed real fear…Not fear for her safety, but an irrational fear for her
sanity.
On a rising wave of panic she’d used her hands to push against his chest and stepped back, answering tightly, ‘I was just leaving, actually…’

His big hands had tightened on her arms—bare because she was wearing a sleeveless vest. Her light jacket was tied about her waist, her bag slung across her chest. ‘You just got here.’

He’d been watching her from the moment she’d arrived.
Gypsy had felt weakness pervade her limbs to think of how she’d been dancing: as if no one was watching.

And then he’d said, ‘If you insist on leaving, then I’m coming with you.’

Gypsy had gasped at his cool and arrogant nerve. ‘But you can’t—you don’t even know me.’

His jaw had been hard and implacable. Stern. ‘Then dance with me and I’ll let you go…’ The fact that he hadn’t been cajoling, hadn’t been drunkenly flirting, had imbued his words with something too compelling to resist.

Gypsy’s focus came back to grim and grey reality as she was forced to stop by the traffic lights. She didn’t need to recall the pitifully pathetic attempt she’d put up to resist before agreeing—ostensibly to make him let her go.

But it had had completely the opposite effect. After dancing with her so closely that her body had been dewed with sweat and heat and lust, he’d bent low to whisper against her ear. ‘Do you still want to leave alone?’ To her ongoing shame and mortification, she’d shaken her head, slowly and fatefully, her eyes glued to his in some
kind of sick fascination. She’d wanted him with a hunger the like of which she’d never experienced in her life.

She’d let him take her by the hand and lead her out of the club, seeing him as somehow symbolic of the cataclysmic events of the day that had just passed, during which she’d finally let go of everything that had bound her to her father.

She’d allowed herself to be seduced…and then summarily dumped like a piece of trash the following morning. She remembered seeing the curt note he’d left, and how cheap she’d felt—as if all that was missing was a bundle of cash on the dresser.

With an inarticulate sound of disgust at herself to be thinking of this
now
, the fact that she’d let a man like him—a powerful man
just like her father
—seduce her, Gypsy strode on across the road once the traffic had stopped. With any luck Rico Christofides would have become distracted by the vision of perfection he’d been dining with last night and forgotten all about her.
But he remembered you…
She realised that any other woman would be feeling an intensely feminine satisfaction that a man like him hadn’t forgotten her, but
she
just felt panicky.
Why
on earth did a man like him remember someone like her?

A familiar sense of despair gripped Gypsy as she turned into her road, full of boarded-up houses and disaffected-looking youths loitering on steps. As much as she’d relished her freedom after her father’s death, and as much as she wouldn’t have minded living somewhere like this if she’d only had herself to worry about, it did bother her that her daughter’s first home was in such a decrepit part of London. Even the nearby children’s playground was vandalised beyond use, with just one pathetic swing left.

She sighed heavily, very aware of the irony that, but for her hot-headedness and determination to dissociate herself from her father, she might have been living in much more upmarket surroundings. But then she knew she could never have lived off her father’s money—and she’d never have dreamed that she’d become pregnant after a one-night stand with a ruthlessly seductive—

Gypsy’s heart stopped stone-cold dead in her chest—and it had nothing to do with the faintly menacing-looking youths crowded around the steps of a nearby house and everything to do with the stunning car they were eyeing up.

The gleaming black luxury vehicle with tinted windows should have belonged to one of the gangsters that had a stranglehold on the area, but Gypsy knew immediately it was a world apart from their cars. The gangsters around here could only
wish
to own a car like this.

And as she drew closer, and saw the back door swing open, her heart picked up speed, so that it was nearly leaping from her chest as she watched a tall, dark and powerfully built figure uncoil like a panther stretching lazily in the sun.

As if she didn’t already know who it was, he turned to face her. Just feet away, and right outside her front door. No escape.

Rico Christofides.

G
YPSY
knew she couldn’t run. The very thought was futile—as evidenced by Rico Christofides’ clear determination to find her.
Why
was he so intent? All Gypsy had to do was picture the woman from last night and the contrast between them was laughable.

Today she was in her habitual uniform of too baggy jeans bought from a local charity shop, layers of threadbare jumpers to block out the January cold, sneakers, a secondhand parka and a woolly hat pulled down low over her ears and too wild hair.
He
, on the other hand, looked every inch the successful tycoon, in a long, black and expensive-looking coat, with the hint of a pristine suit underneath.

She saw his slaty grey eyes narrow on her as she approached. No doubt he was regretting his impetuous decision to find her. And then her skin prickled as she saw his gaze drop to the pram she pushed, with a sleeping Lola inside, obscured by the rainshield.

His daughter—oh, God—could he know?

Gypsy immediately reassured herself there was no way he could know. Why would he assume for a second that Lola was his? She just had to take advantage of the undoubted regret he’d already be feeling at seeking her
out and get rid of him. As soon as possible—before he could see Lola and guess.

Even if he didn’t guess she knew that once she told him about Lola he’d move heaven and earth to prove that she wasn’t his—which was what she’d seen him do before. And then, when paternity was proved, he’d set out to control his daughter utterly. Exactly as her father had done to her once
he’d
had no choice but to accept her.

She knew this because Rico came from her father’s world of powerful men who thrived on being ruthless. Men who dominated those around them.

As soon as she’d heard his name she hadn’t been able to believe she hadn’t recognised him. She even recalled overhearing her father speaking bitterly of Rico Christofides on more than one occasion:
‘If you think I’m ruthless then don’t ever cross Rico Christofides. The man is a cold machine. If I could beat him I would, but the bastard wouldn’t rest until he’d resurrected himself from the dead and ruined me in the process. Some fights just aren’t worth it, but I’d give anything to see his arrogance smashed
…’

Her father had been obsessive, and the memory of that almost grudging admiration had blasted away any chance that she might have contacted Rico Christofides before today.

The best that Gypsy could hope for was that that day wasn’t going to be today, and that perhaps she could escape with Lola—go somewhere new, away from London—until such time as she could get her wits about her again and decide what was best for them both.

She was glad now of her plain and dowdy appearance. Rico Christofides must already be forming some escape route of his own. She’d help him along, agree with him
that he must have the wrong person, and then he’d get back into his luxury car and be off, out of her life, until such time as she invited him back in, when she was ready to deal with him. With that assurance, she steeled herself and walked forward.

Rico watched the woman come towards him. For a second he faltered. Was this
her
? The woman approaching slowly looked impossibly plain from a distance, bare of any make-up or artifice. Pale. And her body was all but swamped in clothes that looked as if they’d just been dragged out of a skip.

And she had a child.
Something which felt suspiciously like disappointment sent his brain reeling, and he clamped down on that emotion hard. A child was a complication. She came closer, and as he lifted his gaze back to her face he was already trying to come up with some excuse for having come all this way to find her, still doubting that it might be her. Perhaps he had been completely mistaken. Perhaps the name was a freak coincidence.

But then she drew closer, and all thoughts of children and complications fled as his body reacted with a helpless lurch of desire. It
was
her.

Despite her appearance, he could see the intensity of those huge green eyes now, framed with long black lashes, the delicate bone structure, her lush mouth. And her hair, with its irrepressible curls trailing out from under the tatty hat over her shoulders. It reminded him of the moment he’d first set eyes on her in that club. He’d been cursing himself for having gone at all, hating that he’d given in to weak restlessness, and then
she’d
walked in. Dressed in snug jeans and a vest top, completely at odds with the glitter of the too coiffed women who’d
thronged the place. The expression on her face had been intense, as if she was being driven by inner demons, and it had resonated within Rico.

The firm swell of her breasts had been clearly outlined against the thin material of her top, and he’d watched, entranced, as she’d walked straight to the middle of the dance floor and started to dance with completely uninhibited grace. He’d seen plenty more beautiful women in his time, clothed and unclothed, but something about her lithe little figure, with its hint of sensual plumpness, had been more enticing than any gazelle-like beauty he’d ever known. With her tawny curly hair she’d looked wild, and free, and it had called to him on a base level too urgent to ignore…

She’d been exquisite. She
was
exquisite. Even though he could see at a glance now that she’d lost weight. Relief flooded him in a way that made him very nervous as she came to a standstill where he blocked the path. And along with the relief came irrational anger to find her living in such an obviously dangerous area. The anger surprised him; women didn’t normally arouse feelings of protectiveness within him. He’d noted the local thugs with distaste after he’d knocked and got no answer from her door, and retreated to his car to wait. They’d tried to intimidate him, but after one quelling look they’d recognised the danger within him and maintained a respectful distance.

Right at that moment he’d completely forgotten that he’d just considered making his excuses and leaving. That was now the last thing on his mind.

Gypsy decided to pretend that she didn’t know who he was, that she hadn’t just seen him again last night. It was cowardly, she knew, but she was counting on him
wanting to make his escape from someone who looked like a bag lady.

‘Excuse me—you’re blocking my way.’

He didn’t move aside. Those penetrating grey eyes were fixed on her with unnerving intensity, and Gypsy could feel a flush of response rise up through her body as it reacted with dismaying helplessness to his proximity. As it was she was battling to keep back the images that threatened to burst free. Images of sweat-slicked bodies moving in desperate tandem, straining to reach the pinnacle…

‘Why did you run last night?’

His deep voice cut through those disturbing images. Her lie fell out with an ease that would have had her horrorstruck in any normal circumstance. ‘My daughter…I had to get home to my daughter.’ And then she cursed herself. She hadn’t denied that she’d
run.

At that moment the rain started to fall more heavily, scattering the local teens around them. Rico Christofides gestured to her door, which was up a few steps. ‘Let me help you with the pram.’

Panic rose. Gypsy protested, not wanting him anywhere near her place or Lola. ‘No, really, I can manage…’ But even as she spoke Rico Christofides took hold of the pram and lifted it bodily against him, as if it weighed no more than a bag of sugar. She had to let go or it would have become a tug of war. The irony that Lola could become an object of a tug of war was not lost on Gypsy at that moment.

The rain was teeming down now, flattening his black hair against his skull. Gypsy could feel drops of water falling down her back. When he gestured with his head, she had no choice but to precede him up the steps to the front door. In the manoeuvring that was done to open
the door and get Lola inside, with Rico Christofides hanging onto the buggy relentlessly, he was in her tiny one-bedroomed apartment before she knew what was happening or could stop it.

He placed the buggy back down in the pitiful excuse for a sitting room with a gentleness that momentarily disarmed Gypsy. She was a little stunned. With a brusque economy of movement he shut the main front door and came back to shut her ground-floor apartment door. Now he was looking around, and asked, ‘Have you got a towel?’

‘A towel?’ Gypsy repeated stupidly, knowing on some level that she was going into shock.

‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘A towel…You’re soaked through and so am I.’

‘A towel,’ she repeated again, and then, as if jolted by a stun gun, she came out of her shocked inertia. ‘A towel—of course.’
Get the towel, let him dry off and he’ll be gone.

Gypsy walked on stiff legs to the tiny bedroom she shared with Lola and opened the cupboard to take out a towel. Coming back, she handed it to Rico Christofides, trying not to notice how huge he appeared to be in the small room.

Immediately he frowned and handed the towel back to her. ‘You first—you’re soaked. Surely you have more than one?’

Gypsy looked at it stupidly, and then gabbled, ‘Of course.’ She gestured jerkily. ‘You take that one. I’ll get another.’ She tried not to let the mounting impatience she felt be heard in her voice. Why wouldn’t he just
leave
?

Coming back to the sitting room, she saw him drying his hair roughly with big hands. He’d taken off his coat to drape it over a threadbare chair, and his impeccable
suit was moulded to his strong frame, making her throat dry at recalling the body underneath.

He turned to face her, taking his hands down, leaving his short hair sexily dishevelled. He glowed with vitality and health, making Gypsy feel pale and wan.

He frowned down at her. ‘You should take off your coat and hat…’ He looked around. ‘Do you have a heater in here?’

Reluctantly she pulled off her hat and started to undo her coat, knowing he was right; the last thing she needed was to get ill. She shook her head when those grey eyes settled on her again, expecting an answer, and flushed when they dropped imperceptibly to take in her shabby clothes as her coat slid off. She was very aware of her hair, which now curled in wild abandon around her shoulders, and could just imagine how frizzy it would be from the rain. She wanted to pull it back and tie it up. And she hated that he was making her aware of herself like that.

‘Our heater broke this morning. The storage heating will come on in a couple of hours.’

Rico Christofides looked comically shocked. ‘You’ve no
heat
? But you have a child—it’s freezing outside.’

Gypsy flushed with a mother’s guilt. ‘This is the first day it’s been broken. We’ll manage until we can get a replacement…’ She trailed off, suddenly thinking of the fact that now she was out of work her meagre savings wouldn’t be stretching to cover a new heater. As if she could explain she’d lost her job because of him. How irresponsible was she?

She looked at Rico Christofides and recognised his wide-legged stance with dismay. He wasn’t going anywhere any time soon. With extreme reluctance she finally said, ‘Can I get you tea or coffee?’

His eyes narrowed on her once again. The barest hint of a smile tipped up one corner of his wickedly sensual mouth as he recognised her capitulation. ‘I’d love a coffee, please. Black, no sugar.’

Stark, with no sweetener—just like him, Gypsy thought churlishly as she went into the kitchen to put on the kettle. All she could hope for now was that Lola wouldn’t wake up and Rico Christofides would satisfy whatever bizarre lingering curiosity he had about her and leave. Soon.

Rico looked around the bare apartment as Gypsy moved about the kitchen and he suppressed a shudder of distaste. Without her presence right in front of him his brain seemed to clear slightly. Once again he questioned his sanity in pursuing her here, especially when his eyes fell on the battered-looking buggy which sat just feet away against the wall. His sane impulse was to come up with some plausible excuse—even just ask her why she seemed to be determined to pretend she didn’t know him—but a greater overriding impulse was urging him to stay. Even if there was a child in the picture.

He could only make out the fact that her daughter was quite small, so therefore she must have had her since she’d been with him. And even though Rico knew he had no right to feel a surge of anger at that,
he did.

Even just watching her pull off that damned unflattering hat and coat had scrambled his brain and made him almost forget the presence of the child. The quick movement of her small hands had reminded him of how they’d felt on him, stroking along the most sensitive part of his anatomy until he’d had to beg her to stop…He frowned.
Why
was she so intent on denying she knew him? And that night? Even if he had left the way he
had, he knew it had been as cataclysmic for her too. The shocked look of awe on her face just after she’d exploded around him had told him that.

With no false pride he knew he was a good lover, but what he’d experienced that night with Gypsy had gone beyond anything he’d ever known before.
Or since.
It had shaken him out of his complacency. Was that why he needed to see her again? To recapture that moment? To see if it had been his imagination or something…more? He balked at that. He never wanted anything
more
with any woman. But that night with Gypsy had touched him on a level that had left him feeling an ache of dissatisfaction, and it had only grown since then, pervading everything around him and tainting the few liaisons he’d had with women in the interim.

He knew seeing her last night had thrown the fact that he’d been trying to recapture that fleeting transcendence he’d experienced with her into sharp relief. With that thought reverberating through his mind he heard Gypsy re-enter the room. He turned to face her and took the coffee she held out. She was avoiding his eyes.

Gypsy escaped Rico’s gaze and occupied herself by going to peek in at Lola who, to her relief, was still sleeping peacefully, her cheeks pink and her rosebud mouth in a little moue. Long black lashes rested against plump baby cheeks. Gypsy’s heart swelled, as it did every time she looked at her daughter, and at that moment she felt an overwhelming surge of guilt at knowing she was denying Lola’s father knowledge of her when he stood only feet away.