Her eyes flashed to his, a sudden fierceness in her gaze as if she could personally hold back his grief, standing between him and it. Her sympathy was active, alive and pulsing and it shocked him to his core.
‘I’m so sorry for your loss.’ Even her condolence was defiant almost, rather than the muted sadness he’d had from others.
‘It was years ago,’ he dismissed and as she held his gaze something fresh came into his mind.
It was twelve months ago.
His eyes widened in shock. The sudden, completely unbidden realisation that Althaia’s death had hit him just as hard as that of his parents gutted his heart. He mentally shook his head and excused himself from the table. As he stalked out towards the rear of the restaurant, he ordered himself to get a grip. When he got back to the table he’d send her on her way. He couldn’t be around her. She prised things from him he usually kept locked tight. And he didn’t have to be told how innocent she was. She’d blushed at the word thrust, for God’s sake. He should send her home and head back into town and find someone to lose himself in.
Summer felt a presence coming towards the table, but instinctively knew it wasn’t Theron.
‘Good evening.’
She looked up to find a man even taller than Theron standing at a respectable distance away, as if not wanting to interrupt.
‘Lykos Livas,’ he said, holding out his hand for her to take. ‘I’m an associate of Theron’s. I hope you don’t mind,’ he said, placing his free hand on his heart in a gesture she was sure would have charmed a large percentage of the population. It might have worked on her too, if her mind wasn’t already onanotherhandsome Greek man. Her mind and her heart.
‘It is sacrilege to allow a woman as beautiful as you to be here on your own,’ he concluded.
The sheer ridiculousness of the line made her laugh and, to her surprise, rather than being offended, Lykos Livas seemed strangely pleased.
‘Does that usually work?’ she couldn’t help but ask.
‘Yes, actually,’ he declared.
‘Tourists?’
‘Always,’ he affirmed happily.
Summer shook his hand and felt...nothing. Not the tingles that shot up her arm every time Theron accidentally brushed her hand. Not the heart pounding, breathless feeling in her chest when she caught him looking at her that echoed deep within her until she felt as if she might explode.
‘So, you work with Theron? With Kyros?’ Summer asked, trying not to flinch as she said her father’s name.
Lykos’s silvery gaze sparkled as he held her gaze for a little too long. ‘No,’ he finally replied with a deadly smile. ‘My millions are my own.’ He looked behind him as if checking for Theron and reached into his jacket. He handed her his card. ‘Just in case you ever need anything.’
‘Why would I—?’ she said, taking his card and, before she could stop him, he had swept up her hand, bowed and pressed his lips to the air just above her skin in a kiss right out of one of Star’s historical romances.
‘It was nice to meet you, Ms Soames,’ he intoned and vanished as quickly as he had appeared.
Summer was still staring after his retreating form when Theron stalked over to the table with such fury she reared back.
‘What did he say to you?’ Theron demanded.
‘What?’
‘Livas. What did he say?’
‘Nothing,’ she said, folding Lykos’s card in her palm. ‘He just asked if I was alone. When I said no, he left.’
Theron stared at her, then threw some money onto the table. ‘And the kiss?’
‘What kiss?’
CHAPTER THREE
THERONKNEWHEwas overreacting, knew absolutely one hundred per cent that he had regressed several millennia into caveman behaviour, but he couldn’t help it. His blood rushed in his veins, pounded in his ears, and his inner voice had howled out the wordminethe moment he’d seen Lykos bent over her hand.
He hadn’t seen Lykos for ten years and Theron hated that his first reaction had been one of joy. And then he’d remembered. The way that Lykos had left, the argument they’d had, the demand Lykos had made. The betrayal he’d felt. He hadn’t even been there for Althaia’s funeral.