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‘But I will do nothing to make you uncomfortable,’ Ari swore, his lean, dark features taut. ‘If you decide to agree to this arrangement, you will have your own bedroom, your privacy, whatever else you require. You will have no bills, nothing to worry about. I will take care of everything.’
Cleo gazed back at him in astonishment at the suggestion. Live in that fabulous house without expense or expectations being attached? For anyone in her precarious financial position it was a prize-winning proposition. It would allow her to build up some savings, something that she had always wanted to do but had never achieved, living as she did from job to job, just about managing to keep her head above water on a day-to-day basis. ‘How long would I have to live there for?’ she asked abruptly.
‘At least a few months,’ Ari replied. ‘Right now, I can’t be more accurate than that.’
Cleo frowned. ‘That’s a long time and I’d lose the accommodation I have now—’
‘I’ll help you find somewhere else when the time comes for you to move on,’ Ari slotted in.
‘I don’t want to be put in a position where I’m expected to lie to anyone—’
‘Let’s not worry about what hasn’t happened yet,’ Ari urged.
‘I’m only considering it for Lucy’s benefit,’ Cleo warned him defensively.
‘Lucy?’ Ari queried.
‘She’s too little to be called Lucinda yet,’ Cleo opined in a rush, her cheeks colouring. ‘At least, I think so.’
‘I suppose you’ll want to think about this for a while,’ Ari breathed, pushing away his untouched coffee and rising to his full height.
Intimidated by his even more commanding height while she was still sitting, Cleo quickly followed suit and stood up. Her brain was a morass of conflicting urges and needs, all trying to jerk her in different directions. She blinked rapidly, thought even faster. She had to protect herself. She knew that. But she still wanted to help out for Lucy’s sake. In the set-up he had outlined, she could not lose, could she? She had loved that house of his, too. That shouldn’t count in the scheme of things, but she was human and she could be tempted like anyone else at the idea of her own bedroom and possibly even a bathroom and a garden as well. Those were the kind of luxuries she had never had.
‘When do you finish?’ Ari prompted. ‘I’ll pick you up and we can discuss this more.’
Holy moly, those eyes of his, Cleo thought wildly, momentarily lost in his smouldering dark golden gaze and an intensity that revved up every nerve cell in her body and left her feeling both dizzy and confused. ‘I don’t need to discuss this more...but it’ll be a struggle for me to keep my distance too,’ she heard herself confide inanely and almost cringed for herself.
Ari muttered something in Greek as he stood staring down at her and the fluctuating colour in her triangular face. Hunger lanced through him and settled into a fierce pulse at his groin.
‘B-but we’re adults. We’ll keep our distance because it’s the sensible thing to do. I’ll move in as soon as it can be arranged... I’ll do it for Lucy,’ Cleo informed him shakily.
‘I’ll make the arrangements.’ With a sudden flashing smile lifting the tension from his lean, darkly handsome features, Ari strode off.
Mission accomplished, he thought fiercely. Cleo would move in. Unfortunately, he didn’t feel remotely sensible in her radius, but he knew what she was trying to tell him. In such a situation hehadto be cautious. He had a friend who had ended up with a live-in girlfriend he didn’t want in the wake of a wild weekend. False expectations had been fostered by careless comments and compliments made in the heat of passion. Misunderstandings had followed. It had taken weeks for the male involved to regain his freedom and the unfortunate woman concerned had been very upset.
Ari was not that clumsy or naive. Nor was he foolish. He wouldn’t make those mistakes. He thought Cleo was fantastic in bed and out of it, but nothing would persuade him to express those sentiments out loud. This time around, he would keep his hands off her and respect the boundaries. How hard could that be?
CHAPTER SIX
FIVEDAYSLATER, Cleo scanned her beautifully appointed bedroom and suppressed a sigh of appreciation. She had moved out of Ella’s tiny apartment less than forty-eight hours earlier and already she felt as though she were living in a different world. A world in which meals were made for her and where nothing was too much trouble. Gracious living at its best, Cleo reflected, shaking her head in wonderment.
Her suggestion that she provide her own meals had been received with dismay by Ari’s housekeeper. Mrs Thomas had insisted that she would be glad to have someone to look after because the house was often empty. Since she had agreed to move in, Cleo had only talked to Ari on the phone because he was in Paris on business.
A limo had arrived to collect her, her suitcases and her single box of mementos. Cleo had learned young not to acquire too much stuff because there had rarely been much storage in the apartments she had shared with her mother and she had had even less space to enjoy since she left home. Her mother had moved frequently when she was young. It wasn’t until her mother had married her stepfather and settled in Scotland with him when Cleo was seventeen that Cleo had felt that she too had a permanent base.
Her phone rang and she stiffened at the name that appeared, answering it with reluctance.
‘So, how are you doing?’ her stepbrother Liam asked in a hearty tone.
He then announced that he was coming down from Scotland to look for work in London and he asked if he could stay with her. Wincing, Cleo told him that she was sorry but she couldn’t help.
‘But you gave your mother your new address this week and I assumed that you would have more space now that you’ve moved,’ Liam commented accusingly.
‘I do, but it’s not my house and I couldn’t invite you here to stay.’ Cleo hesitated awkwardly in the strained silence. ‘I’m living with my boyfriend now, Liam—’
‘I didn’t even know youhada boyfriend!’ Liam complained angrily. ‘And you certainly didn’t tell your mother that you were moving in with some guy!’
‘Well, I don’t tell my mother everything,’ Cleo answered quietly. ‘And I’d be grateful if you could keep that fact to yourself until I see whether or not the relationship is going to go the distance.’
