Kate Proctor - No Mistress But Love

Cover Page

Excerpt Lindy froze suddenly. “ What did you say ?” she just about managed to croak. “I’ve just told you that I won you in a poker game last night,” he informed her indifferently, turning and strolling to the door. He paused as he reached it. “By the way, when your husband turns up—tell him he’s fired. I did mention it to him last night, but he was probably too worse for drink to remember…I dare say the fact his wife is now mine to enjoy has also slipped his memory, so perhaps you’d be good enough to remind him of that, too. And by the way—I’ve had your things moved into my suite.”

About the Author KATE PROCTOR is part Irish and part Welsh, though she spent most of her childhood in England and several years of her adult life in Central Africa. Now divorced, she lives just outside London with her two cats, Florence and Minnie (presented to her by her two daughters who live fairly close by). Having given up her career as a teacher on her return to England, Kate now devotes most of her time to writing. Her hobbies include crossword puzzles, bridge and, at the moment, learning Spanish.

Title Page No Mistress But Love Kate Proctor www.millsandboon.co.uk

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Copyright

“I’ve just told you that I won you in a poker game last night,” he informed her indifferently, turning and strolling to the door. He paused as he reached it. “By the way, when your husband turns up—tell him he’s fired. I did mention it to him last night, but he was probably too worse for drink to remember…I dare say the fact his wife is now mine to enjoy has also slipped his memory, so perhaps you’d be good enough to remind him of that, too. And by the way—I’ve had your things moved into my suite.”

KATE PROCTORis part Irish and part Welsh, though she spent most of her childhood in England and several years of her adult life in Central Africa. Now divorced, she lives just outside London with her two cats, Florence and Minnie (presented to her by her two daughters who live fairly close by).

Having given up her career as a teacher on her return to England, Kate now devotes most of her time to writing. Her hobbies include crossword puzzles, bridge and, at the moment, learning Spanish.

www.millsandboon.co.uk

THE very first time Lindy Hall had seen Niko Leandros her breathing mechanism had all but seized up on her; and on subsequent meetings, despite decided reservations as to his character, she had found her fingers itching to reach out and ascertain for themselves whether or not that vision of male perfection comprised actual flesh and blood.

‘Where is your husband?’

And that was another thing about him, reflected Lindy, lack of sleep dulling her normally alert mind—his voice: its unmistakably English, and markedly upperclass drawl would unexpectedly soften with the slightest of Greek accents on the odd word, rendering it one of the sexiest voices she had ever heard.

‘Am I to take it you don’t wish to tell me where your husband is?’ enquired Niko, his tall, statuesque form gliding past Lindy’s desk and to the window behind her.

‘I really do wish you’d call me Lindy.’ She sighed involuntarily, and was immediately cursing both herself, for inviting yet another glacial rebuff, and Tim Russell for never being around when he was needed.

And where on earth was Tim? she wondered irritably. He had sloped off early yesterday afternoon and, as far as she knew, hadn’t set foot inside the hotel since—a fact which, coupled with last night’s abnormally oppressive heat, had guaranteed her a virtually sleepless night.

‘Yes, I suppose I should—under the circumstances,’ murmured Niko in that soft, drawling voice of his as he parted the slats of the blind to peer out into the dazzle beyond, where sea and skies merged into a single shimmering blue.

‘I beg your pardon?’ croaked Lindy, scarcely able to believe her ears.

She swivelled round her chair in order to see him, a small frown creasing her brow as her eyes caught sight of the still-livid scar running from within the gleaming black of his hairline right down to the elegant arch of his right eyebrow. Though admitting it brought her a decided pang of guilt, she realised that she found something almost comforting in the sight of that one blemish on the otherwise chiselled perfection of his features—no one had any right to look as good as this man did.

‘Perhaps it is best if I start calling you by your first name,’ he reiterated, his gaze still on the view beyond the window.

Lindy’s eyes rolled heavenwards. What was she supposed to do—get down on her knees and thank him for the favour he was bestowing on her? He might be the most gorgeous-looking man she had ever clapped eyes on, but his downright arrogance more than cancelled that out! From the moment he had arrived he had treated both herself and Tim to a brand of polite disdain that left neither of them in any doubt as to who was the master and who the servants.

‘And you may call me Niko.’

Had the chair not been of the solid, figure-hugging variety Lindy felt sure she would have fallen from it in shock.

‘You’ve obviously misunderstood me,’ she managed coolly. ‘I wasn’t implying I wanted to be on first-name terms with you…it’s just that…well, to be honest, it makes me feel ancient when people refer to me as Mrs Russell.’ And nine times out of ten she failed to respond to that bogus name, she added miserably to herself—there having been nothing in the least honest in her stammered excuse.

‘Under the circumstances,’ murmured Niko, turning from the window to face her, ‘it would be rather ludicrous for us to be on anything other than first-name terms.’

Lindy leaned back against the chair, willing herself not to react to the taunting tone of those words and willing her eyes to keep their appreciation to themselves as they surveyed the broad-shouldered muscularity of the body beneath the heavy white silk of the shirt encasing it.

‘You keep saying ‘under the circumstances",’ she muttered, hastily removing her unreliable eyes from the muscled tautness of the well-shaped thighs they were now graphically envisaging beneath close-fitting, immaculately tailored black trousers.

‘True—I keep saying ‘under the circumstances",’ he concurred, taking a couple of unexpected strides towards her and hauling her to her feet. ‘And almost every time you look at me your eyes begin eating me,’ he added inconsequentially, his fingers biting painfully into her flesh.

Momentarily stunned by the complete unexpectedness of both his actions and words, Lindy gazed up blankly into the face now scant inches from her own, her widespaced blue eyes widening in shock as they discovered just how cold brown eyes could be, even brown ones flecked with gold, as she now discovered his to be, and which should rightly have been the embodiment of nothing but warmth.

‘I’m afraid you suffer from a seriously over-inflated ego, Mr Leandros,’ Lindy informed him with all the coolness she could muster, given that her pulses seemed intent on breaking the sound barrier. ‘Because what you’ve seen in my eyes and misread is pity—pure and simple! Though I’m sure that, given time, the terrible disfigurement on your head will fade to little more than a barely noticeable scar.’

Had her own common sense not already told her how utterly pathetic that spur of the moment excuse had been the expression of amused disbelief flickering across Niko Leandros’s handsome features would have quickly brought it home to her.

‘My, my—so you’re compassionate as well as beautiful,’ he drawled, his words husky with laughter as he sank his fingers none too gently into the shoulder-length thickness of her sun-streaked dark blonde hair and tilted back her head. ‘Perhaps I’m a far luckier man than I’d realised.’

‘Would you mind letting go of me, Mr Leandros?’ demanded Lindy frigidly, his taunting reference to her looks touching a raw nerve in her that put a merciful break on her racing pulses.

‘Why? Surely you don’t object to a man—even one as grossly disfigured as I am—telling you that you’re beautiful?’ he enquired silkily, an openly predatory gleam in his eyes as he tugged her body against his.

‘I’m not beautiful—and we both know it!’ she exclaimed in a strangled voice, tearing her body free from its electrifying contact with his and racing round to the other side of the desk.

‘Well, that’s a novel line, I must admit,’ he muttered, his eyes narrowing to watchful slits as Lindy, her cheeks burning with humiliation, gazed sightlessly down at the papers strewn across the desk.

This was it, she told herself furiously; Tim Russell could rant and rave and make all the threats he liked—she had had enough and was taking the first boat she could get off this damned island!

‘Unfortunately for you, I don’t find it in the least intriguing when women start playing silly games and fishing for compliments—so you can dispense with both,’ he informed her coldly, then added with mocking amusement, ‘Under the circumstances, it would pay you to do both with alacrity.’

Lindy’s eyes flew to his, anger darkening their blue to navy.

‘It seems your husband hasn’t had the guts to put you in the picture,’ he continued, his eyes taking almost insultingly candid stock of the slim, golden-skinned figure across the desk from him and lingering openly on the softly rounded curves that even the shapeless T-shirt dress she was wearing couldn’t disguise. ‘Though I can’t say I’m surprised—one can’t really expect honour in such a man, now, can one?’

‘One hasn’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about,’ snapped Lindy, wondering what on earth it was that Tim had been up to this time, and wondering even more at her own perverseness in finding this loathsomely arrogant specimen of a man so unspeakably attractive.

‘Really? Not only does he play cards badly and way beyond his means—but he also cheats.’

Lindy only just managed to stifle a groan of complete exasperation. She had had more than enough of Tim Russell and his ghastly ways—even though she had no one to blame but herself for that unpleasant fact.

‘Perhaps you will find it a little ironic that, even cheating unchallenged, he still managed to lose you to me last night.’

‘What Tim does…’ Lindy froze suddenly. ‘What did you say?’ she just about managed to croak.

‘I’ve just told you that I won you in a poker game last night,’ he informed her indifferently, turning and strolling to the door. He paused as he reached it. ‘By the way, when your husband turns up—tell him he’s fired. I did mention it to him last night, but he was probably too worse the wear for drink to remember… I dare say the fact that his wife is now mine to enjoy has also slipped his memory, so perhaps you’d be good enough to remind him of that too. And, by the way—I’ve had your things moved into my suite.’

Lindy leaned back against the desk as the door closed behind him, her mind reeling in a daze of confusion. Unconsciously she raised a hand to rub against her upper arm where the imprint of Niko’s fingers still tingled against her flesh, while the thought crept accusingly into her head that it was the inexplicable potency of the attraction she felt towards Niko that had somehow prevented her having a show-down with Tim.