A second letter arrived the next day, again from the London office of Coustakis Industries. Its contents were even terser.
Dear Fraser,
You failed to communicate your receipt of the letter dated two days ago. Please do so immediately.
Like the first letter, Andrea took it into work—Kim must definitely not see it. She had suffered far too much from the father of the man she had loved so desperately—so briefly. A sick feeling sloshed in Andrea's stomach. How could anyone have treated her gentle, sensitive mother so brutally? But Yiorgos Coustakis had—and had relished it.
Andrea typed a suitable reply, keeping it as barely civil as the letters she had received. She owed nothing to the sender. Not even civility. Nothing but hatred.
With reference to your recent correspondence, you should note that any further letters to me will continue to be ignored.
She printed it out and signed it with her bare name—hard and uncompromising.
Like the stock she came from.
Nikos Vassilis swirled the fine vintage wine consideringly in his glass.
'So, when will my bride arrive, Yiorgos?' he enquired of his host.
He was dining with his grandfather-in-law-to-be in the vast, over-decorated house on the outskirts of Athens that Yiorgos Coustakis considered suitable to his wealth and position.
'At the end of the week,' his host answered tersely.
He didn't look well, Nikos noted. His colour was high, and there was a pinched look around his mouth.
'And the wedding?'
His host gave a harsh laugh. 'So eager? You don't even know what she looks like!'
Nikos's mobile mouth curled cynically.
'Her looks, or lack of them, are not going to be a deal-breaker, Yiorgos,' he observed sardonically.
Yiorgos gave another laugh. Less harsh this time. Coarser.
'Bed her in the dark, if you must! I had to do that with her grandmother!'
A sliver of distaste filtered through Nikos. Though no one would dare say it to his face, the world knew that Yiorgos Coustakis had won his richly dowered, well-born wife by dint of getting the poor girl so besotted with him that she'd agreed to meet him in his apartment one afternoon. Yiorgos, as ambitious as he was ruthless, had made sure the information leaked to Marina's father, who had arrived in time to prevent Yiorgos having to undergo the ordeal of sex with a plain, drab dab of a girl in daylight, but not in time to save her reputation. 'Who will believe she left my apartment a virgin?' Yiorgos had challenged her father callously—and won his bride.
Nikos flicked his mind back to the present. Was he insane, going through with this? Marrying a woman he hadn't set eyes on just because she happened to have a quarter of Yiorgos Coustakis's DNA? Idly he found himself wondering if the girl felt the same way about marrying a complete stranger. Then he shrugged mentally—in the world of the very rich, dynastic marriages were commonplace. The Coustakis girl would have been reared from birth to know that she was destined to be a pawn in her grandfather's machinations. She would be pampered and doll-like, her primary skill that of spending money in huge amounts on clothes, jewellery and anything else she took a fancy to.
Well, Nick acknowledged silently, glancing around the opulent dining room, she would certainly have money to spare as his wife! Once he'd taken over Coustakis Industries Ms income would be ten times what it already was—she could squander it on anything she wanted! Spending money would keep her busy, and keep her happy.
He paused momentarily. With a wife in the background he would obviously have to keep his personal life more low-profile. He would not be one of those husbands, all too familiar in the circles he now moved in, who thought nothing of flaunting their mistresses in front of their families. Nevertheless, he had no intention of altering the very enjoyable private life he indulged himself in, even if he would have to be more discreet about it once he was married.
Oh, he was well aware that as a rich man he could have been as old as Methuselah and as ugly as sin and beautiful women would still have fawned on him. Wealth was the most powerful aphrodisiac to those kind of women. Of course even when he'd been dirt-poor women had always come easily to him—another legacy from his philandering father, no doubt. One of Esme's many predecessors had said to his face, as she lay exhausted and sated beneath him, that if he ever ran out of money he could make a fortune hiring himself out as a stud. Nikos had laughed, his mouth widening wolfishly, and turned her over...
He shifted in his uncomfortably ornate chair. Thinking about sex was not a good idea right now. His razor-sharp mind might not have objected to kow-towing to Old Man Coustakis's summons that night, but his body was reminding him that it had been deprived of its customary satiation. Even though he'd put in extra time these last lew days at the gym and on the squash courts in the exclusive health club he belonged to, Nikos could feel a familiar tightening that presaged sexual desire.
As soon as he decently could he'd take his leave tonight and phone Xanthe Palloupis. She was an extremely complaisant mistress—always welcoming, always responsive to his physical needs. Even though it had been three months since he'd last visited her—Esme Vandersee had replaced her over two months ago—he knew she would greet him warmly at her discreetly located but very expensive apartment, confident that he would tell her in the morning she could go to her favourite jeweller's and order something to remember his visit by.
Would he keep her on when he had married this unknown granddaughter of Yiorgos Coustakis? She had other lovers, he knew, and it did not trouble him. Esme, too, right this moment was doubtless consoling her wounded—and highly developed!—ego by letting another of her crowded court do the honours by her. As a top model she always had men slavering after her, but for all that Nikos knew perfectly well that he would only have to snap his fingers and she would come instantly to his heel—and other parts of his anatomy.
He shifted uncomfortably in his seat again. He definitely needed some energetic physical release before his wedding night! The Coustakis girl would be a virgin, of course, and bedding her would be more of a duty, not a pleasure, though he would be as careful with her as was possible. He'd never taken a virgin—he would have to make totally sure he was not sexually frustrated on his wedding night or she'd be the one to suffer from it, however plain she was.
Just how plain was she? Nikos wondered, his mind running on. He had a pretty shrewd idea that from the tinge of open malice in Yiorgos's expression when he'd made that coarse comment about bedding her in the dark she had no looks at all. The old man probably thought it amusing that a man who was never seen without a beautiful woman hanging on his arm should now be hog-tied to a female whose sole attraction was as the gateway to control and eventual ownership of Coustakis Industries.
Another thought flitted through his mind. Just who exactly was this unknown granddaughter of Yiorgos Coustakis? One of the main attractions of taking over Coustakis Industries was that Yiorgos had no offspring to fight him for control. His only son had been killed in a smash-up years ago. Marina Coustakis had had some kind of seizure, so the gossip went, and had become a permanent invalid—though not managing to die until a few years ago. That meant that Yiorgos had not been free to marry again and beget more heirs. But then, mused Nikos, if the son had indeed been married when he died, and the granddaughter already born, maybe that hadn't mattered too much to Yiorgos. The son's widow had presumably married again and was out of the picture, apart from having dutifully reared the Coustakis granddaughter to be a docile, well-behaved, well-bred Greek wife.