A Tycoon to Be Reckoned With (Harlequin Presents) Read online

  Complicated was one word for it—risky was another.

  Philip was looking disconcerted. ‘Must I?’ he protested. ‘I’d love Bastiaan to know how wonderful and talented you really are.’ Admiration and ardent devotion shone in his eyes.

  Sarah gave a wry laugh. ‘Oh, Philip, that’s very sweet of you, but—’

  She got no further. Philip’s gaze had suddenly flicked past her. ‘That’s him,’ he announced. ‘Just coming over now—’

  Sarah craned her neck slightly—and froze.

  The tall figure threading its way towards their table was familiar. Unmistakably so.

  She just had time to ask a mental, What on earth? when he was upon them.

  Philip had jumped to his feet.

  ‘Bast! You made it! Great!’ he cried happily, sticking to the French he spoke with Sarah. He hugged his cousin exuberantly, and went on in Greek, ‘You’ve timed it perfectly—’

  ‘Have I?’ answered Bastiaan. He kept his voice studiedly neutral, but his eyes had gone to the woman seated at his cousin’s table. Multiple thoughts crowded in his head, struggling for predominance. But the one that won out was the last one he wanted.

  A jolt of insistent, unmistakable male response to the image she presented.

  The twenty-four hours since he’d accosted her in her dressing room had done nothing at all to lessen the impact she made on him. The same lush blond hair, deep eyes, rich mouth, and another gown that skimmed her shoulders and breasts, moulding the latter to perfection...

  He felt his body growl with raw, masculine satisfaction. The next moment he’d crushed it down. So here she was, the sultry chanteuse, making herself at home with Philip, and Philip’s eyes on her were like an adoring puppy’s.

  ‘Bastiaan, I want to introduce you to someone very special,’ Philip was saying. A slight flush mounted in the young man’s cheeks and his glance went from his cousin to Sarah and back again. ‘This...’ there was the slightest hesitation in his voice ‘...this is Sabine.’ He paused more discernibly this time. ‘Sabine,’ he said self-consciously, ‘this is my cousin Bastiaan—Bastiaan Karavalas.’

  Through the mesh of consternation in Sarah’s head one realisation was clear. It was time to call it, she knew. Make it clear to Philip—and to his cousin Bastiaan—that, actually, they were already ‘acquainted.’ She gave the word a deliberately biting sardonic inflection in her head.

  Her long fake lashes dipped down over her eyes and she found herself surreptitiously glancing at the dark-eyed, powerfully built man who had just sat down, dominating the space.

  Dominating her senses...

  Just as he had the night before, when he’d appeared in her dressing room.

  But it wasn’t this that concerned her. It was the way he seemed to be suddenly the only person in the entire universe, drawing her eyes to him as irretrievably as if he were the iron to her magnetic compass. She couldn’t look away—could only let her veiled glance fasten on him, feel again, as powerfully as she first had, the raw impact he had on her, that sense of power and attraction that she could not explain—did not want to explain.

  Call it. She heard the imperative in her head. Call it—say that you know him—that he has already sought you out...

  But she couldn’t do anything other than sit there and try to conjure up some explanation for why she couldn’t open her mouth.

  Into her head tumbled the overriding question—What the hell is going on here?

  Because something was—that was for sure. A man she’d never seen before in her life had turned up at the club, bribed a waiter to invite her to his table, then confronted her in her dressing room to ask her out... And then he reappeared as Philip’s cousin, unexpectedly arrived in France...

  But there was no time to think—no time for anything other than to realise that she had to cope with the situation as it was now and come up with answers later.

  ‘Mademoiselle...’

  The deep voice was as dark as she remembered it—accented in Greek, similar to Philip’s. But that was the only similarity. Philip’s voice was light, youthful, his tone usually admiring, often hesitant. But his cousin, in a single word, conveyed to Sarah a whole lot more.

  Assessing—guarded—sardonic. Not quite mocking but...

  She felt a shiver go down her spine. A shiver she should not be feeling. Should have no need of feeling. Was he daring her to admit they’d already encountered one another?

  ‘M’sieu...’ She kept her voice cool. Totally neutral.

  A waiter glided up, seeing a new guest had arrived. The business of Bastiaan Karavalas ordering a drink—a dry martini, Sarah noted absently—gave her precious time to try and grab some composure back.

  She was in urgent need of it—whatever Bastiaan Karavalas was playing at, it was his physical presence that was dominating her senses, overwhelming her with his raw, physical impact just the way it had last night in her dressing room. Dragging her gaze to him set her heart quickening, her pulse surging. What was it about him? That sense of presence, of power—of dark, magnetic attraction? The veiled eyes, the sensual mouth...?

  Never had she been so aware of a man. Never had her body reacted like this.

  ‘For you, mademoiselle?’ the deep, accented voice was addressing her, clearly enquiring what she would like to drink.

  She gave a quick shake of her head. ‘Thank you—no. I stick to water between sets.’

  He dismissed the waiter with an absent lift of his hand and the man scurried off to do his bidding.

  ‘Sets?’ Bastiaan enquired.

  His thoughts were busy. He’d wanted to see whether she would disclose his approach to her the previous evening, and now he was assessing the implications of her not doing so.

  He was, he knew, assessing a great deal about her... Predominantly her physical impact on him. Even though that was the thing least relevant to the situation.

  Or was it?

  The thought was in his head before he could stop it. So, too, was the one that followed hard upon its heels.

  Her reaction to him blazed from her like a beacon. Satisfaction—stabbing through him—seared in his veins. That, oh, that, indeed, was something he could use...

  He quelled the thought—this was not the time. She had taken the first trick at that first encounter, turning down the invitation he’d so expected her to take. But the game, Mademoiselle Sabine, is only just begun...

  And he would be holding the winning hand!

  ‘Sa...Sabine’s a singer,’ Philip was saying, his eyes alight and sweeping admiringly over the chanteuse who had him in her coils.

  Bastiaan sat back, his eyes flickering over the slinkily dressed and highly made-up figure next to his cousin. ‘Indeed?’

  It was his turn to use the French language to his advantage—allowing the ironic inflection to work to her discomfiture...as though he doubted the veracity of his cousin’s claim.

  ‘Indeed, m’sieu,’ echoed Sarah. The ironic inflection had not been lost on her and she repaid it herself, in a light, indifferent tone.

  He didn’t like that, she could see. There was something about the way his dark brows drew a fraction closer to each other, the way the sensual mouth tightened minutely.

  ‘And what do you...sing?’ he retaliated, and one dark brow lifted with slight interrogation.

  ‘Chansons d’amour,’ Sarah murmured. ‘What else?’ She gave a smile—just a little one. Light and mocking.

  Philip spoke again. ‘You’ve just missed Sabine’s first set,’ he told Bastiaan.

  His glance went to her, as if for reassurance—or perhaps, thought Bastiaan, it was simply because the boy couldn’t take his eyes from the woman.

  And nor can I—

  ‘But you’ll catch her second set!’ Philip exclaimed enthusiastically.

  ‘I wouldn’t miss it for the world,’ he said dryly. Again, his gaze slid to the chanteuse.

  A new reaction was visible, and it caught his attention. Was he mistaken, or was th
ere, somewhere beneath the make-up, colour suffusing her cheekbones?

  Had she taken what he’d said as sarcasm?

  If she had, she repaid him in the same coin.

  ‘You are too kind, m’sieu,’ she said.

  And Bastiaan could see, even in the dim light, how her deep-set eyes, so ludicrously enhanced by false eyelashes and heavy kohled lids, flashed fleetingly to green.

  A little jolt of sexual electricity fired in him. He wanted to see more of that green flash...

  It would come if I kissed her—

  ‘Sa...Sabine’s voice is wonderful.’

  Philip cut across his heated thoughts. Absently, Bastiaan found himself wondering why his cousin seemed to stammer over the singer’s name.

  ‘Even when she’s only singing chan—’

  Sarah’s voice cut across Philip’s. ‘So, M’sieu Karavalas, you have come to visit Philip? I believe the villa is yours, is it not?’

  She couldn’t care less what he was doing here, or whether he owned a villa on Cap Pierre or anywhere else. She’d only spoken to stop Philip saying something she could see he was dying to say, despite her earlier plea to him—

  Even when she’s only singing chansons in a place like this.

  I don’t want him to mention anything about what I really sing—that I’m not really Sabine!

  Urgency filled her. And now it had nothing to do with not wanting Bastiaan Karavalas to know that Sarah Fareham moonlighted as Sabine Sablon. No, it was for a quite different reason—one that right now seemed far more crucial.

  I can’t handle him as Sarah. I need to be Sabine. Sabine can cope with this—Sabine can cope with a man like him. Sabine is the kind of sophisticated, worldly-wise female who can deal with such a man.

  With the kind of man who coolly hit on a woman who’d taken his eye and aroused his sexual interest, arrogantly assuming she would comply without demur. The kind of man who rested assessing, heavy-lidded eyes on her, drawing no veil over what he saw in her, knowing exactly what impact his assessment of her was having.

  That kind of man...

  Philip’s enthusiastic voice was a relief to her.

  ‘You ought to spend some time at the villa, Bast! It really is a beautiful place. Paulette says you’re hardly ever there.’

  Bastiaan flicked his eyes to his cousin. ‘Well, maybe I should move across from Monaco and stay awhile with you. Keep you on the straight and narrow.’

  He smiled at Philip, and as he did so Sarah suddenly saw a revelation. Utterly unexpected. Gone—totally vanished—was the Bastiaan Karavalas she’d been exposed to, with his coolly assessing regard and his blatant appraisal, and the sense of leashed power that emanated from him. Now, as he looked across at Philip, his smile carved deep lines around his mouth and lightened his expression, made him suddenly seem... different.

  She felt something change inside her—uncoil as if a knot had been loosened...

  If he ever smiled at me like that I would be putty in his hands.

  But she sheered her mind away. Bastiaan Karavalas was unsettling enough, without throwing such a smile her way.

  ‘Make me write all my wretched essays, you mean—don’t you, Bast?’ Philip answered, making a face.

  But Sarah could see the communication running between them, the easy affection. It seemed to make Bastiaan far less formidable. But that, she knew with a clenching of her muscles, had a power of its own. A power she must not acknowledge. Not even as Sabine.

  ‘It’s what you came here for,’ Bastiaan reminded him. ‘And to escape, of course.’

  His dark eyes flickered back to Sarah and the warmth she’d seen so fleetingly as he’d smiled at his young cousin drained out of them. It was replaced by something new. Something that made her eyes narrow minutely as she tried to work out what it was.

  ‘I offered the villa to Philip as a refuge,’ he informed Sarah in a casual voice. ‘He was being plagued by a particularly persistent female. She made a real nuisance of herself, didn’t she?’ His glance went back to his cousin.

  Philip made another face. ‘Elena Constantis was a pain,’ he said feelingly. ‘Honestly, she’s got boys buzzing all over her, but she still wanted to add me to her stupid collection. She’s so immature,’ he finished loftily.

  A tiny smile hovered at Sarah’s lips, dispelling her momentary unease. Immaturity was a relative term, after all. For a second—the briefest second—she caught a similar smile just tugging at Bastiaan Karavalas’s well-shaped mouth, lifting it the way his smile at Philip had done a moment ago.

  Almost, almost she felt herself starting to meet his eyes, ready to exchange glances with him—two people so much more mature than sweet, young Philip...

  Then the intention was wiped from her consciousness. Its tempting potency gone. Philip’s gaze had gone to her. ‘She couldn’t be more different from you,’ he said. The warmth in his voice could have lit a fire.

  Sarah’s long, fake eyelashes dipped again. Bastiaan Karavalas’s dark gaze had switched to her, and she was conscious of it—burningly conscious of it. Conscious, too, of what must have accounted for the studiedly casual remark he’d made that had got them on to this subject.

  Surely he can’t think I don’t realise that Philip is smitten with me?

  Bastiaan was speaking again. ‘Sabine is certainly much older,’ he observed.

  The dark eyes had flicked back to her face—watching, she could tell, for her reaction to his blunt remark. Had he intended to warn her? To show her how real his cousin’s infatuation with her was?

  How best to respond...? ‘Oh, I’m ancient, indeed!’ she riposted lightly. ‘Positively creaking.’

  ‘You’re not old!’ Philip objected immediately, aghast at the very idea. Adoration shone in his eyes. Then his gaze shifted to the dance floor in front of the stage, where couples had started to congregate. His face lit. ‘Oh! Sabine—will you dance with me? Please say yes!’

  Indecision filled her. She never danced with Philip or did anything to encourage him. But right now it would get her away from the disturbing, overpowering impact of Bastiaan Karavalas.

  ‘If you like,’ she replied, and got to her feet as he leapt eagerly to his and walked her happily out on to the dance floor.

  Thankfully, the music was neither very fast—fast dancing would have been impossible in her tight gown—nor so slow that it would require any kind of smoochy embrace. But since most of the couples were in a traditional ballroom-style hold with each other, that was the hold she glided into.

  Philip, bless him, clearly wasn’t too au fait with so formal a dancing style, but he manfully did his best. ‘I’ve got two left feet!’ he exclaimed ruefully.

  ‘You’re doing fine,’ she answered encouragingly, making sure she was holding him literally at arm’s length.

  It seemed an age until the number finally ended.

  ‘Well done,’ she said lightly.

  ‘I won’t be so clumsy next time,’ he promised her.

  She let her hand fall from his shoulder and indicated that he should let go of her too—which he did, with clear reluctance. But Philip’s crush on her was not uppermost in her mind right now.

  She was just about to murmur something about her next set, and this time make sure she headed off, when a deep voice sounded close by.

  ‘Mademoiselle Sabine? I trust you will give me equal pleasure?’

  She started, her head twisting. Bastiaan Karavalas was bearing down on them as the music moved on to another number. A distinctly slower number.

  He gave her no chance to refuse. An amused nod of dismissal at his cousin and then, before she could take the slightest evasive action, Sarah’s hand had been taken, her body was drawn towards his by the placing of his large, strong hand at her waist, and she was forced to lift her other hand and let it rest as lightly as she could on his shoulder. Then he was moving her into the dance—his thigh pressing blatantly against hers to impel her to move.

  Instinctively Sarah tried to pres
erve her composure, though her heart was pounding in her ribcage. Her body was as stiff as a board, her muscles straining away from him as if she could increase the narrow gap between their bodies. His answer was to curve his fingers into her waist, and with effortless strength secure his hold on her again.

  He smiled down at her.

  It was a smile of pure possession.

  Sarah could feel her blood surging in her body, quickening in every vein, heating her from within as she moved against his possessive clasp.

  ‘So, mademoiselle, on what shall we converse?’

  His smile had given way to a question in which both irony and amusement were mingled. And something else too—something she could not give a name to, but which seemed to send yet another quiver of excruciating physical awareness of his closeness to her.

  Yet again she found herself clinging to the persona of Sabine. Sabine could cope with this—Sabine could let the potently powerful Bastiaan Karavalas sweep her off and yet keep her cool about it. Keep her composure. So what would Sabine do...say...?

  ‘The choice is yours, m’sieu,’ she answered, managing to keep her tone somewhere between insouciant and indifferent. Social...civil...just this side of courteous. She made herself meet his gaze, the way Sabine undoubtedly would—for what would Sabine be overset by in those dark, sensual eyes? And Sabine’s ridiculously long fake lashes helped, Sarah thought with gratitude, because their length made it easier for her to look at him with a veiled expression—helped her feel protected from the impact those deep, dark eyes were having on her...

  Abruptly, he spoke, yanking her back to full focus. ‘Why did you not mention that you had already made my acquaintance?’ he said.

  Sarah felt her eyes widening. There was only one answer to give. ‘Why didn’t you?’ she said. She sought to copy the dismissive inflection that Sabine would surely give.

  Her answer was a sudden opacity in his gaze. ‘You must know why—’ he said.

  From his dark, deep-set eyes a message blazed that was as clear as day...as old as time.

  Sarah could feel her breath catch in her throat, her pulse leap—and suddenly Sabine, with all her worldly defences, felt a long, long way away.