Page 56 of Undercover Billionaire

‘It means,’ she said, her voice high and getting higher, ‘I’m the woman you use to get over thebig love. The woman to put you back together again for thenextbig love.’

‘What?’ His brow scrunched in utter rejection. ‘That’s the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard.’

Kelsey didn’t give a flying fuck for Ari’s assessment. She was done here. She had to get out. She couldn’t do this. Everything was too mixed up and achy inside. She couldn’t breathe. She wanted out of here. She wanted to go home.

She wanted her mother.

Ari caught her arm as she stormed past him in the doorway. ‘Kelsey. I just want to spend time with you.’

‘Yeah, well… I don’t want to spend time with you.’ Wrenching her arm away, she made a beeline for the door.

‘What are you going to do?’ he asked as she grabbed the knob.

She stilled. She had no idea but she knew she couldn’t stay working for Oceanós. She wanted nothing to do with Ari or his company. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Can I call you?’

A surge of bile rose up her throat as her knuckles whitened around the knob. He had to be joking. ‘Don’t call, don’t message, don’t text. Don’t internet stalk me. Don’t come and visit.’ If she never saw Ari Callisthenes again, it would be too soon. ‘You stay on this side of the world and I’ll stay on mine.’

‘Kaló taxidi.’

Kelsey didn’t know what he’d said, nor did she care, she just turned the handle and stalked out and didn’t stop until she was seated on the nearest vaporetto heading God knew where.

A strangled kind of half sob half laugh rose in her throat as she sat at the bow trying not to cry. She should have known her life was going too well to become complacent. That she was due a bitch slap from the universe, because life wasn’t meant to be easy, and how dare she think that things could actually go her way.

It had been eight years since Eric after all.

An image of Ari on Mykonos a few days ago rose in her mind but she quashed it. That manwasn’tAri. He was AristotleCallisthenes.

Liar. Bastard. Traitor.

Pretending to be somebody else. Fucking her assomebody else. All while taking notes. Reporting back.God. She could pick ’em. What anidiotshe was when it came to men.

She did cry then, jamming her sunglasses on to hide the bitter spring of tears. Somehow this hurt worse than Eric. The betrayal cut deeper. Because she’d thought she was impervious to it now. Armoured against it. That she’d learned from her experience all those years ago.

That she was older and wiser.

How could a guy she’d known for a week hurt her worse than a guy she’d been in love with for a year?

How?

Pushing back against another sob welling in her chest, Kelsey set her jaw. She blinked back the tears and hacked back the rise of helplessness threatening to suffocate her lungs. She wouldnotbreak down over some guy who’d been nothing but life support for a cock. She’d known him for a week. One lousy week.

Nobody fell apart after one week.

Shewouldget mad; hell, she’d probably end up plotting a thousand ways to get even – in her sleep.

But shewould notcry.

12

Ari’s head was still a little fuzzy from the migraine he’d slept off last night. They’d been plaguing him a lot since his return two months ago and he was grateful for his dark sunglasses as he stood at the railing of Theo’s house and stared out over the Aegean.

Mykonos was heaving with his fellow countrymen from the mainland, all here for the long weekend celebrating one of Greece’s most popular holidays –Agios Pnevmatos.

But his mind was not on the holidays or the view. His mind was on another day, here. With Kelsey. Lazing around the terrace, laughing and drinking and eating. Cooling off in the pool. Leaning on the infinity edge and staring out over the jewel-like vista.

Kissing and touching.

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