A Bride at His Bidding Read online

He pulled a thoughtful face. ‘It’s more of a peninsular off another island but the peninsular belongs in its entirety to me.’

  Carrie silently swore as, under the heavy noise of the rotors twirling, the helicopter lifted off the ground.

  She hadn’t had an inkling about any of this. What else had she missed in her research on him?

  Whose name had this property and accompanying land been bought in? Was it a secret shell company? She would get digging into it as soon as she had some privacy and a decent Internet signal. She needed to check in with her editor and let him know where she was too. But after she’d had a shower and, hopefully, some sleep. She’d been in the same clothes for almost a whole day, not having dreamt when she dressed that morning that she would end the day in the famed wedding and honeymoon spot of the Seychelles.

  By contrast, Andreas had showered an hour before landing and changed from his suit into a fresh, crisp white shirt and light grey tailored trousers.

  She dragged her attention away from the powerful body brushing so close against her own and the tangy scent playing under her nose by envisaging the shower she would have when they reached his home. She wouldn’t have the temperature scalding as she usually did. To rid herself of the stickiness clinging to her pores she would lather herself under refreshingly cool water.

  Her thoughts dissolved as a particularly sharp movement from the pilot caused Andreas’s thigh and arm to compact against hers. An immediate shock of awareness crashed through her, so acute and so sudden and so totally unexpected that she froze.

  It felt as if she’d been tasered.

  For long moments she couldn’t breathe.

  A large hand covered hers and squeezed.

  ‘It’s nothing to worry about,’ he murmured. ‘Just a little turbulence.’

  Carrie swallowed and forced a nod, trying desperately to get a coherent thought into her scrambled brain, her lungs finally opening back up again when he let go of her hand.

  She was just tired, she assured herself, digging her nails into her palms.

  Better he think she’d been frightened by the sudden turbulence they’d flown into than know of the turbulence that had exploded inside her at the feel of him pressed so tightly against her.

  She looked out of the window and made an effort to relax her frame.

  Come on, Carrie. You’ve always wanted to fly in a helicopter. At least try and enjoy it.

  Violet had always wanted to fly in a helicopter too. She remembered how excited her sister would get during sunny days when their mother was still alive and they would go out for walks and spot helicopters zooming overhead. Her chubby little arms would wave frantically and she was always convinced the pilots waved back.

  What was Violet doing at that moment? Her sister had been in California for three months now, her recovery from addiction and all her other issues a slow, fragile process. Carrie had called her a couple of days ago, their weekly conversation as stilted and awkward as they had been since Violet had woken from her coma and it was spelled out how close to death she had come. Whenever she spoke to her sister now it was like talking to a stranger. The little girl whose first word had been ‘Cawwie,’ and who had followed Carrie like a shadow from the moment she could crawl was gone. In truth, she’d been gone for a long time and it tore at Carrie’s heart to remember the sweetness that had once been there.

  Blinking away hot tears at all that had been lost, Carrie continued to gaze out of the window. The moon was bright, allowing her to see the small landmass they were approaching in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Soon they flew directly over a beach gleaming white under the moonlight, the form of a large house emerging from the shadows as the pilot brought the helicopter down.

  Andreas got out first then held out his hand to assist her, his eyes holding hers with a look that made her stomach knot in on itself.

  Knowing she didn’t have any choice, she took the hand. His fingers tightened as they wrapped around hers, solid and warm, keeping her steady as her feet reached for the ground.

  ‘Thank you,’ she muttered, glad the darkness cloaked her flaming cheeks from his probing gaze.

  ‘My pleasure.’ His fingertips swept gently over hers as he released his hold and then he climbed back inside to speak to his pilot.

  Alone for a moment, Carrie inhaled deeply and found her senses filled with the heady scent of unseen flowers. The breeze of the ocean had cleared the humidity away, a fresh warmth brushing over her skin. It was all she could do not to close her eyes and savour the feeling.

  Savouring the feeling would have to wait as suddenly lights came on and Andreas’s house—villa—mansion—which the pilot had landed in the back garden of, was revealed.

  It was breathtaking.

  Only two storeys high, what it lacked in height it made up for in width, looking like a white stonewashed Buddhist temple surrounded by a deep red wraparound veranda. Matching deep red roof tiles gave what could easily have been an imposing building a welcoming air.

  Andreas had rejoined her. She could feel his eyes on her and knew he was looking for a reaction.

  What kind of reaction would a true employee give?

  She opted for a truthful one.

  ‘It’s lovely.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’ he agreed. ‘Wait until you see it in the daylight. I fell in love with it from a photograph. I was looking for a holiday home and here I’ve found the perfect place. I can get away from the world but there’s people and nightlife only a short flight or boat ride away.’

  ‘This is your holiday home?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said with mild surprise. ‘Who would want to conduct business on a paradise like this?’

  ‘How long will we be here?’

  ‘Why? Is there somewhere you have to be?’

  ‘No, it’s just...’ She felt herself getting flustered.

  ‘Relax. I’m teasing you. I know you have no commitment you have to rush back for or you would have disclosed it on your application form. We’ll stay here for a while. I haven’t had a proper holiday in some time and need to recharge my batteries.’

  She hadn’t had a holiday in some time either. At least a decade, two or three years before her mother had died.

  But this wasn’t a holiday for her. She was here to work. Her job was to ensure the smooth running of this beautiful mansion and take care of the whims of its owner while secretly undertaking her own work of discovering its owner’s darkest secrets. What kind of secrets she would find in Andreas’s holiday home was anyone’s guess. Chances were she would have to wait until they moved on to one of his other homes where he actually conducted business before she discovered anything useful.

  Expecting a member of his staff to greet them—all his homes had at least three permanent live-in employees—Carrie was a little disconcerted to step inside and find the house shrouded in silence. Yes, it was the middle of the night, but surely the staff wouldn’t retire for the night before their boss’s arrival?

  ‘I’ll give you a quick tour before I show you to our bedrooms,’ Andreas said, leading the way. He headed through an arched doorway without a door and said, ‘Here’s the living area.’

  Her misgivings were put to one side as she slowly took in the beauty of Andreas’s house, a home that managed to be both luxurious and yet welcoming. High ceilings and white walls were given colour by an intricate tiled mosaic that covered the floor wherever they stepped, including the large, airy dining room dominated by a large, highly polished mahogany table.

  The kitchen was the size of an entire floor of her home.

  ‘This is Brendan’s domain,’ he informed her.

  ‘Brendan’s your chef?’

  ‘Yes. If you’re hungry I can call him and he’ll make something for you.’

  ‘I’m fine, thank you.’ Regular meals, which she’d had to force down into her cramped stomach, had been provided throughout the flight by Andreas’s cabin crew.

  He shrugged. ‘If you need anything before morning I�
��m sure you won’t have any trouble finding it. I assume the kitchen functions as a normal kitchen.’

  ‘You assume?’

  He pulled a face. ‘I employ staff so I don’t have to do these chores for myself.’

  ‘When was the last time you used a kitchen?’ she asked before she could stop herself. Somehow, she doubted Andreas welcomed his domestic employees questioning him.

  Her doubt proved wrong.

  ‘In my university days in America—I studied at MIT—I discovered I was a terrible cook so I got a job working as a waiter in an Italian restaurant where they were always happy to feed me. I’ve not cooked for myself since.’

  ‘An Italian restaurant?’

  ‘There were no decent Greek restaurants where I lived then. There was a tapas bar but they didn’t do breakfast so I opted for the Italian one.’

  His long legs powered on gracefully up the cantilevered stairs to the first floor. Carrie hurried behind him, smothering a yawn. All the travelling on top of minimal sleep had exhausted her.

  ‘My room.’ Andreas pushed open a door to reveal a bedroom equal in size to the kitchen, containing everything a spoiled billionaire could need. Carrie hung back, reluctant to enter until he beckoned her inside with the crook of his finger and the hint of a gleam in his piercing light brown eyes. ‘Don’t be shy, Caroline. You need to become familiar with my room.’

  Familiar with it? All she could see was the enormous carved bed heaped with pillows, and her imagination immediately stripped Andreas bare and pictured him sliding with that masculine grace she’d never seen on another man between the navy satin sheets.

  She clenched her teeth together, trying to blink the image away and pretend the rush of blood she could feel pumping around her was not connected to it.

  She’d never imagined a man naked before and it disturbed her that she should have such unwelcome thoughts about this particular man.

  There was such a sensuous potency about him. It was there in his every move, his every breath, his every word, and all it did was add to her growing sense of danger.

  Sheesh, she really, really needed some sleep.

  ‘What other staff work here?’ she asked. Once she knew where everyone was she would stop feeling as if she’d been trapped in a gilded cage that only Andreas had the key to.

  Everything had happened so quickly and smoothly that day that there hadn’t been time for her misgivings to do more than squeak at her but now, here, standing in Andreas’s bedroom in his secret home in the middle of the night, those misgivings were shouting loudly.

  ‘I inherited most of the staff from the previous owners. The grounds are managed by Enrique and his eldest son. Enrique’s wife Sheryl and a couple of her friends take care of all the cleaning. Between them they know everything there is to know about the house and the peninsular and the Seychelles itself.’

  ‘Where are the staff quarters?’

  ‘There aren’t any. Brendan and his assistant live in a cottage on the grounds but the others all live on the main island.’

  Another chime of alarm rang in her ears. ‘So who actually lives in the house?’

  Surely she had misunderstood something. Surely she wouldn’t be the only person living under this roof with him while they were there?

  ‘We do. You and me.’

  ‘Just you and me?’

  ‘Yes.’ His eyes seemed to do more than merely sparkle. They smouldered. His nostrils flared as he added, ‘While we’re on this beautiful spot of paradise, the night time belongs to you and me alone.’

  CHAPTER THREE

  ANDREAS ENJOYED CARRIE’S attempt to hide her horror at this clearly unwelcome revelation.

  ‘I bought this place as a getaway from the world so it’s run in a more relaxed way than my other homes,’ he said. ‘As long as I have someone close at hand to take care of my needs, I don’t need much else and that, matia mou, is why you are here. Consider it an easy breaking-in for you. The house runs itself so you can dedicate your time here to me and we can get to know each other properly in the process.’

  The colour drained from her face, her hazel eyes widening.

  Understandable, he thought lazily. Carrie wouldn’t want him delving into her life with probing questions that would put her on the spot. She wouldn’t want to trip herself up with easily forgotten lies.

  He admired that, through the tumult of emotions flickering through her eyes, her composure didn’t waver. If he were ignorant of her true identity he doubted he would have noticed anything amiss. If he didn’t know the truth he would assume she was a naturally quiet, self-contained woman.

  He looked forward to seeing how far he could push her before she cracked and the real Carrie emerged.

  ‘Now for your room. You will find it adequately appointed.’ But not as adequately as Rochelle’s had been. She was being put in a much different room from the one his former Domestic PA had enjoyed. Rochelle’s room had been located at the other end of the house so she could have her privacy.

  He didn’t intend for Carrie, this cuckoo in his nest, this spy, to have any privacy during her interlude in his life. Her duties would be of the kind he would never dream of imposing on a proper employee.

  Andreas turned the handle of a door in the middle of the left-hand wall of his room. It opened into a much smaller, adjoining room.

  He spread a hand out. ‘See? You have everything you need. A bed, a dressing table, wardrobe and your own bathroom.’ But no television or other form of entertainment. Andreas intended to be Carrie’s only source of entertainment while she was here.

  The colour that stained her cheeks this time was definitely of the angry variety but she kept it in check to ask with only the slightest tremor, ‘My room adjoins yours?’

  ‘How would you take care of my needs if you were on the other side of the house? The previous owners used this room as a nursery. I admit it’s rather small—it was designed for a small child before they went into a proper room of their own—but I can assure you it’s perfectly adequate.’ Adequate for a baby or toddler. Barely adequate for a fully grown woman, even one as slender as Carrie. He’d intended to turn it into another dressing room and was glad he hadn’t got around to organising it.

  ‘Where’s the lock?’

  ‘There isn’t one so it will be nice and easy for you to come and go between our rooms.’ He winked. ‘But do not worry. I am a gentleman and only enter a lady’s bedroom when invited.’

  And should she be tempted to enter his room without invitation, which she undoubtedly would seeing as her whole purpose for being here was to snoop, then the microscopic cameras he’d had installed in his bedroom and throughout the house would monitor her every movement.

  He’d intended to bug her room too with voice-activated cameras but had talked himself out of it. There was a line a person should never cross and bugging a lady’s bedroom, even a journalistic spy like this one, was firmly on the wrong side of it. Now that he’d spent the day in such close confines to her, he was doubly glad he hadn’t crossed that line.

  Carrie had an allure about her that played to his senses like a finely tuned violin.

  She also had eyes that looked bruised from exhaustion.

  ‘I can see you’re tired. Is there anything you wanted to ask before we retire for the night?’

  She shook her head, those soft, plump lips drawing in together. The situation had clearly overwhelmed her. He could sympathise. When she had walked into his offices in the heart of London’s financial district that morning she could not have guessed she’d finish the day cut off from everything she was familiar with in the paradise that was the Seychelles. No doubt she was feeling vulnerable.

  Good.

  He could sympathise but he would not. Carrie was a vulture. A beautiful vulture for sure, but a vulture nonetheless.

  She deserved nothing less than what was coming for her.

  ‘In that case, I bid you goodnight. The clothes I promised you were flown in while we were trav
elling. Sheryl has put them away for you. You will find them imminently suitable. And remember...’

  A pretty brow rose cautiously. ‘Remember?’

  He winked. ‘I like to be welcomed with a smile.’

  As he closed the interconnecting door he smiled himself to imagine her reaction to the clothing selected for her.

  His fun with Carrie was only just beginning.

  * * *

  Carrie threw the entire contents of her new wardrobe onto the narrow excuse of a bed and rifled through them with increasing anxiety.

  She’d expected to be given outfits akin to what chambermaids in hotels wore, not clothing like this.

  Her wardrobe and dresser had been filled with soft, floaty summer dresses, vest tops, shorts that put the meaning into the word ‘short’, bikinis and sarongs. There was underwear too, all of the black, lacy variety.

  Every item had a designer label.

  Her skin had never felt so heated as when she’d picked up a pair of knickers and wondered if Andreas had chosen them personally.

  But how could he have done? She hadn’t left his side since she’d stepped into his office. It must have been his PA, Debbie, who she’d been certain hadn’t liked her in the initial interview and who she’d had to give her vital statistics to as Andreas had whisked her out of his building.

  Carrie tugged at her hair with a mixture of consternation and fear.

  Whoever had chosen the items, which included beach paraphernalia along with all the clothing, this was not right, not by any stretch of the imagination. To make matters worse there was no Internet she could connect to and her phone signal seemed to be non-existent. The text message she’d written to her editor forty minutes ago was still trying to send.

  Who knew she was here? Andreas and his PA Debbie, his flight crew and his Seychellois domestic staff. No one from her own life knew she was in the Seychelles, only people employed by Andreas.

  Rubbing her eyes, she told herself she was probably worrying over nothing. It had been an incredibly long day and she was sleep deprived. Sleep deprivation did funny things to the brain.

  The letter inviting her to the second interview had stated the successful applicant would be expected to start the job immediately. It was her own fault that she hadn’t taken the letter literally enough.