Page 12 of The Billionaire's Demand

There was something in his voice—something that was like a stab of pain. Then it was gone, replaced by hardness.

He dropped his hands away.

‘No—stupid to think that. With or without sex, you’d still have walked out on me, wouldn’t you, Eliana? Because I wasn’t going to be able to give you what you wanted. Not me...not even sex with me.’

The twist in his voice now was ugly, and she flinched.

‘Just money. That was all you wanted from a man. Any man. Did that hapless fool Damian know that? Know that if his father had done what mine did, and threatened to disinherit him, you’d have dumped him as ruthlessly as you dumped me?’

He quickened his pace and she was forced to do likewise. Emotions were smashing around inside her, but there was nothing she could do about it.

Oh, dear God, why had Leandros turned up like this? Wasn’t her life now grim enough as it was, without him twisting the knife that had been in her heart since what she had done to him?

‘You don’t answer?’ Leandros said now, cynicism in his voice. ‘Well, what does it matter? Damian knew the risk of marrying a woman who’d just dumped the man she’d been keen to marry until his money vanished.’

And something else entered his voice now—something that made it seem to Eliana that he was trying to convince himself.

‘I know the risk I’m taking.’ Now his voice had hardened, conviction made. ‘Which is why I’m keeping my offer strictly limited. I’ll lift you back out of the gutter you’ve fallen into, but on my terms, Eliana—my terms only. Be very clear on that. This is the finish of something old—not the start of something new.’

She didn’t answer—there was no point. Instead, she stopped walking.

‘I’m tired,’ she announced. ‘I don’t want to walk any further.’

She hadn’t wanted to walk at all, but she’d been too dazed, too passive, to do anything else.

‘All right. I’ll see you back to your apartment.’

He summoned a taxi and she sank into it, closing her eyes. She could not bear to see Leandros. Yet his presence dominated her. She knew he was only a few centimetres away from her...that she would only have to reach out her hand to take his...to feel his fingers mesh with hers as they once had.

Anguish filled her suddenly, flooding her with the sheer misery of it all.

I loved him, and I left him.

And what they’d had so briefly in their lives—what she’d willingly, wantonly destroyed—could never, never come back...

He didn’t speak to her again, and she was glad, keeping her eyes shut, terrified that tears might come. Tears he would think deliberate, artificial...manipulative.

At the shabby apartment block the taxi drew up at the kerb, and she stumbled out.

‘Eliana—’

Now he spoke. Demanding she halt. She did, unwillingly turning back as he leant towards her from his seat.

‘You haven’t given me your mobile number.’

She stared at him blankly. Of course she hadn’t. A look of irritation flashed across his strong features, and then he was reaching inside his jacket pocket, taking out a card case, removing a card and holding it purposefully out to her.

‘Take it,’ he said. ‘And text me your number. Then I’ll give you the flight details.’

He was still holding the business card out to her.

Nervelessly, knowing she shouldn’t, but doing it all the same, she took it. Then she turned silently away.

She could barely stay upright. The shock of the whole evening was catching up with her, and she had to get inside—get away, get out of his presence.

She heard him pull the car door closed, speak to the driver, give the name of the city’s best hotel. Heard the taxi move off. Then numbly, dumbly, his card burning her fingers as if it were a hot coal, she went inside the apartment block, trudged up the stairs as if a weight were on her back. She was barely able to function.

She got herself inside her studio, collapsed down on the bed.

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