The Greek Tycoon's Tarnished Bride (Men of the Zodiac) Read online

  “But you loved him?”

  “Of course. Given the choice I would have lived with him rather than my mum, but the courts always seem to side with the mothers from what I’ve seen and heard.” She swallowed before continuing. “Sometimes I wish it had been my mother that did what he did in the end, not him.”

  “What did he do?”

  “You don’t know?”

  Tito crossed his ankles and leant against the counter. “I’m not sure, tell me.”

  “Dad worked his guts out, but she wanted more and more money, for me apparently but I never saw any of it. The Child Protection service was after him as well for support payments that he couldn’t afford, and it all got to be too much when he just got deeper and deeper into debt. A dog walker spotted him early one morning with his car on the edge of a cliff. He was asleep on the grass until the click of the walker opening the gate woke him. The woman saw the look in his eye and…he just rolled over twice and over the edge, falling four hundred feet down to his death. They found an empty whiskey bottle, pills, and his suicide note. Case closed.”

  Tito’s expression was hard as he watched her rub both thumbs against her forefingers, something she did when she was agitated or nervous without realizing a lot of the time. “I’m sorry. I had no idea,” he murmured.

  “Your investigators aren’t that hot, are they?”

  “Seems not. Khloris Frangos hired them. I was just following orders.”

  “But Khloris Frangos isn’t in charge anymore?”

  “No, not exactly, but that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. Khloris is Yannnis’s mother, the woman who has lost a husband and two sons and had to have a funeral for all three at the same time. Her pain is unimaginable.”

  “Yes, horrible,” Erica said and began to feel uneasy at the hesitant tone of his conversation.

  “She wants to meet Nick, her grandson, the only Frangos male left.”

  It had to happen, this was why she and Nick were here, but the prospect made Erica want to run for the hills. Her spine stiffened. “Of course, we must arrange something.”

  Tito took a deep breath before the words came tumbling out. “She’s already here, waiting with coffee in the main courtyard. I had to leave her there because it was the only area with enough space…she has brought all forty of the Frangos women with her.”

  Chapter Ten

  Tito didn’t need to ask what Erica was thinking because the expression on her face said it all. The blood had drained from her cheeks, and she resembled a marble statue for what seemed like minutes. Even Nick was quiet, sensing that something had changed in the atmosphere and looked from one adult to the other as he chewed on the plastic spoon.

  Erica finally spoke and there was a croaky edge to her voice. “Forty of them?”

  “Forty-one if you count Khloris.”

  “Bloody Nora…”

  Tito eased himself away from the counter and rubbed his clean-shaven jaw. “So if you clean Nick up, I will take him over to meet his Greek family.”

  She stood ramrod straight, and her eyes turned to the color of a dark stormy sea. “And where do I fit into all this? Are you expecting me to hide away in here while you get this over with?”

  He shrugged, knowing that he was going to get it in the neck from one woman or the other whatever strategy he used. “It’s up to you.”

  Her lips pressed together so hard that they turned a pale color, and he thought she might combust. “Tito, have you told that murder of black crows that you have taken a wife as well as rescued the Frangos heir?”

  She didn’t tiptoe around. “Only Khloris knows. And none of the others have said anything much yet. I was taken by surprise at her arriving like that, to be honest, not to mention the vast numbers that needed the bathroom as soon as I opened the door.”

  “Did they come en masse by coach or something?”

  “Actually yes, it’s been a long time since we Greeks used camel trains or donkeys on a day-to-day basis.”

  Erica stooped and hugged her arms around her waist. She seemed to be shaking as she muttered a string of expletives. “Then I had better run a comb through my hair and put on more than a clean pair of underpants too, hadn’t I?”

  “What are you planning to do?”

  She flashed him a defiant look. “Can’t you work that out, smarty pants?”

  His heart sank, although he should have expected this to happen. What was wrong with him? Erica was as tough as they came when she needed to be. She didn’t do hiding. “You’re coming with me and Nick, aren’t you?”

  “Too damn right I am.” She ran both hands through the tangled halo of her blond hair and shot him a glare that could kill at twenty paces. “And you, Tito Makris, are going to introduce your brand new, beautiful, accomplished wife.”

  “Kyria Frangos.” Tito handed Nick over to the matriarch dressed from head to toe in a death defying shade of ultra-black. Even he felt intimidated, so God only knew what Nick and Erica felt. “This is your grandson, Yannis’s boy. He has come home to us.”

  The old woman took Nick in her gnarled hands and smiled, a gummy smile, but an expression of genuine joy nonetheless. “God bless you,” she muttered in a thick accent. “But why are you speaking English?”

  There was a murmur that rippled through the crowd of women gathered around them in a circle to see the child. It was clearly a question they all had on their minds. He steeled himself, perhaps it was good that he hadn’t had any build up to this because there was no way to soften his words or mask the truth. “I am speaking in English because young Nick here understands no Greek.” The old woman admonished Tito in Greek for being so stupid. Nick was just a baby after all and the crowd giggled. This could only get worse. “And I am also speaking English because my own family has grown.” He turned to the left and looked towards a row of marble columns to where Erica stood, leaning against the cool stone in a dress of pale blue linen. “I got married and my beautiful, new, accomplished wife also happens to be English.”

  There was a collective gasp as he made his way toward her, and the crowd parted to let him through. Khloris Frangos clutched Nick to her chest, and Tito could hear her muttering as she followed close behind. There was also a wail that rent the air, the sound of scuffling on the stone tiled floor and some sobbing. He could guess who that would be and Tito braced himself for an undignified scene at the very least.

  He took a deep breath as the two women sized each other up silently, like gunslingers in a Wild West movie. Erica’s demeanor was defiant in the face of what appeared to be an army of disapproval, and he couldn’t help but admire her for that strength.

  “So he finally took a wife,” the old woman said slowly, her bird like eyes running over her pale, youthful quarry. “You must have some witch in your bloodline to have achieved that.”

  Erica’s eyebrows rose, and Tito flinched inwardly as he waited for her to react. This was the woman who had thrown a bottle of water at his head only an hour before; she could do anything if provoked. “Not that I’m aware,” she said silkily, and stepped up to take Tito’s arm, positioning her left hand to display her wedding ring. “Perhaps he just wanted to marry someone he loved.”

  The old woman leaned forward and lowered her voice so that only Erica and Nick could hear. “You speak of love, I wish to believe it is so. But I know damn well what a tsoula you really are.”

  Erica flashed him a questioning look and pursed her lips.

  Tito thanked his lucky stars that Erica wouldn’t understand that insult, she was unlikely to respond well to being called a slut in whatever language it was delivered. “That will do,” he said sternly to Khloris. “Welcome to my home and show respect to my wife.”

  The matriarch’s beady eyes glittered beneath her heavily lined brow and her lips trembled before she spoke quietly. “You would do well to keep your wife away from the crowds until this news settles down. There will be awkward questions.” She twitched her head indicatively to the mob behind her
who were slowly inching closer like a pack of zombies. “They will not hear any details on the matter from me however, even if I disapprove of your choice, not to mention your motives.”

  “But I am not my wife’s keeper,” Tito replied stiffly. “We have an equal partnership, and if she wants her true identity to be known—”

  He felt Erica’s hand close tightly around his upper arm. “I won’t cause trouble,” Erica whispered harshly. “I want to be with my son, that’s all.”

  Khloris Frangos closed her eyes and nodded sadly before handing Nick to his mother. “In that one thing we agree. May God forgive your sins.”

  Horror shot Tito right between the eyes as he saw Erica’s eyes roll. Whether it was with contempt, ridicule, or incredulity he couldn’t be sure, but he was sure as hell glad none of the agitated women around them appeared to notice. Nick, however, had shoved his head into his mother’s neck and was gripping her hair with his tiny fist. It was too much, too soon after all that he had been through. But there were women bearing gifts all around them wanting to kiss The Son as if he was a symbol that their bloodline would continue and the Frangos name would not die out. It was also etiquette to open the beautifully wrapped gifts immediately or cause offense. He whispered this fact into Erica’s ear and received a big sigh in reply.

  Half an hour later—and with a little help from the nannies—all the gifts had been opened. On a table that the staff had brought there was a pile of gold coins, blankets, toys, evil eye charms, honey, herbs and flowers, and even cloth-wrapped cheeses. Tito had been struck by Erica’s composure throughout her ordeal, especially how she had lived up to the Greek expectation of being sociable to a demanding extended family that she had never met and had no blood ties to herself. Erica Makris, his wife, had strength, stamina, and class. He was being showered with almost as many compliments as baby Nick on his choice of wife, but he didn’t need them. He felt suddenly proud that the woman by his side was a genuine force to be reckoned with even if it wasn’t a genuine love match. But how many of those were there anyway? The moment of agony when he had announced that he was married was now a memory and euphoric relief flooded his veins. He hadn’t realized how much the prospect had been bothering him.

  Valeta was somewhere in the crowd. It had been her who had yelped when the marriage news came out, he was sure of it. She was Yannis’s sister and had assumed that if her brother’s son had needed a surrogate mother and Tito had needed a wife it would naturally be her…he also suspected that Odessa was hanging around in the shadows too. She was the unfortunate creature his mother had repeatedly tried to set him up with, even resorting to blackmail at one point. Neither of the scorned women had presented them with their gifts personally, presumably because their hurt was so intense. He made a mental note to have the staff sweep through the entire estate to make sure everyone had left later on. He didn’t want Erica to have to suffer any unpleasant confrontations. He wasn’t too keen on the prospect himself. He could deal with them if necessary though. He was married and off the market, and by a bizarre twist was that he was now a more liberated man than he had ever been. It felt good. He had done the right thing at the right time.

  “I know how William and Kate feel now!” Erica handed Nick to Mary who had been hovering nearby after the Frangos collective drifted out of the front entrance back to the waiting coach. The rest of them were now safely ensconced in Tito’s vast wing of the castle. “Nick was certainly the star of the show and that lot seemed to almost forget I was the Forbidden Foreign Bride.”

  Fermina came into the spacious living area with a jug of iced water. “No doubt you two got a lot of questions about when you’re going to provide a sibling! He is just so cute.”

  Erica blew out her cheeks, unsure how to respond and the nannies, sensing they may have outstayed their welcome bid their farewells, taking Nick with them for his supper, bath, and bedtime stories. “There was a lot of interest in us having a baby together.”

  Tito stretched a long arm along the back of the white leather sofa he had flopped onto. “That will never happen.”

  Erica sat down at the other end of the sofa by his feet. “You’ve said that before. I know it’s nosy but have you problems?” She pointed to his groin. “Or has Nick proved to be more than enough to put you off even the idea of having your own children?”

  “Could it be that I don’t like kids?”

  “No, it’s something else. You’re great around Nick. You even did that putrid nappy earlier.”

  He laughed. “Hell, yes, that was an experience.” Then his smile faded. “I spoke about that crash on the German motorway.” She nodded for him to continue. “There were a number of vehicles involved. There was a baby, and we all tried to get her out but…we couldn’t and she died. Right there, in the car strapped into her seat. What with the flames and the smoke…” He took a moment to compose himself. “We saw her die, and I can still hear her mother’s screams and the sound of her fingers, fists, feet, head, everything trying to get to her child before someone dragged her off and the whole thing went up.”

  “Oh, my God.”

  “The mother killed herself a few days later, and I felt like doing the same, but Yannis and I talked and talked until I calmed down and made a decision. I vowed to whatever perverse Gods there might be up there that I would make a difference with the rest of my life. So I’m still here.”

  “Nobody should have to go through something like that.”

  “I can’t undo it, Erica It’s there in my head and heart forever. So I’ll never have children of my own, however strong the urge. The pain of possibly losing them would be too much. I can’t go through what that poor woman did. It would destroy me.”

  She frowned. “So you would rather not be involved with Nick?”

  “No, not that! Being with Nick is the most wonderful gift, as if fate has given me an outlet for the father that I might have been if it wasn’t for that day. He has no father of his own so I will do that for him gladly and prove that not all fathers are as useless as my own.”

  “He is?”

  “My own father is a browbeaten shell of a man who should have kicked my mother out years ago. He’s pathetic. But in fairness my mother really is a monster.”

  “Can’t be much worse than mine!”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure. Let me tell you a bit about my mother. Every parent’s evening my teacher would say ‘Tito is such a nice, intelligent boy’ and my mother would put on her very posh voice and say something like ‘Do you think so? He’s appalling at home, thick and lazy, like an overfed pigeon.’”

  Erica hunched her shoulders. “Ouch.”

  “My father would just sit there and the teacher would squirm because everyone knew better than to cross her. It was a small world, nobody could escape her poisonous reach. I often wondered if she was having an affair with the chief police inspector because he did seem to discover quite a lot of her sworn enemies had committed heinous offenses that they vigorously denied.”

  “She does sound charming. Perhaps the police stuff was merely a coincidence. And your mother, maybe it was a case of tough love. Do you have siblings? Maybe it was the same for them.”

  Tito made a guttural sound in the back of his throat. “Maybe. I was never present at my sister’s parent’s evenings, obviously, because they left me scrubbing dirty hotel fixtures with an old toothbrush. But she always came back with a bag of sweets or a new toy and mother would be breathless with joy. My father just went to his office to smoke until we had gone to bed and only then would he emerge.”

  “Sounds like he felt pretty bad about it all.”

  “Oh he did—probably still does—and that’s what makes it even worse. I can’t understand why she has such a hold on him; it’s intolerable. She treats him like, like, I can’t even say it. He should have taken her in hand years ago but didn’t.” He shook his head, almost as if it would clear his mind of the awful memories. “And watching my parents’ attempt at married life was more t
han enough to put me off doing it myself.”

  Erica wriggled down into the sofa to get comfortable. “Yes, quite, you did say marriage wasn’t your thing. And what does your sister think about all this?”

  He shrugged and looked away. “I have no idea.”

  “Perhaps you should have a chat with her. You might be surprised.”

  Tito swung his legs off the sofa and leaned forward so his feet touched the floor. “We don’t talk. My sister was adopted. My mother arranged it because she was the blond blue-eyed little girl that she had always wanted, not the dark-haired boy that disgusted her so much. So when I was out in the yard scrubbing out the garbage cans with bleach, pretty little Astra was playing with her doll’s house and eating chocolate buttons. I was no longer required, apart from being the house slave, of course.”

  There was genuine anger in his voice that touched a nerve with Erica. She could empathize with his indignation. His parents’ behavior sounded unforgivable. “So why is your mother so keen to fix you up with the right kind of wife? Why would she care who you married?”

  “Because everything she does is for a reason, a self-serving reason. She has an evil strategy for everything and a suitable marriage would help her up that social ladder just a little bit easier. She’s insane. She genuinely believes she is distantly related to royalty and she wants that status back.”

  Erica made a whistling noise through her teeth and shook her head. “Mothers, huh?”

  “Not you, Erica, and not all mothers, but we were both dealt a bad card in that respect. And you must know that I am fully committed to being Nick’s stepfather, and I will lay down my life for him if necessary. You do know that?”

  She nodded. “Yes, I believe you.”

  “And you also understand why I won’t be having children of my own?”

  She edged closer to him until he could feel the heat of her thighs on his. “Theoretically I understand, yes. I know what the words mean but our hearts have a funny way of overruling us sometimes. I was never interested in having kids until Nick happened. People can change, they grow and want something different sometimes.”