Bride by Day Read online

  “Do you, Samantha Telford, take Perseus Kostopoulos to be your wedded husband?”

  About the Author

  Title Page

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Copyright

  “Do you, Samantha Telford, take Perseus Kostopoulos to be your wedded husband?”

  “Yes.” With all my heart, she murmured inwardly. No matter how bogus this wedding might be, she loved Perseus. Her part of the ceremony would not be a lie.

  The pressure of his hand seemed to tighten a fraction before the priest asked in a solemn voice, “Do you, Perseus Kostopoulos, take Samantha Telford to be your wedded wife?”

  “I do,” came the fervent response. Perseus was such a wonderful actor; he sounded as if the vows actually meant something to him. In the next instant he removed the flower garland from her lace-covered head. A strange smile hovered at the corners of his compelling mouth as he found her left hand and placed a ring with one exquisite teardrop-shaped diamond on her finger.

  “Make no mistake, Kyria. We’re married in the eyes of God and the world. I’m your husband now.”

  Everybody loves a wedding: they’re romantic and exciting. And in our WHIRLWIND WEDDINGS miniseries we have weddings that are more exciting than most!

  WHIRLWIND WEDDINGS is a series that combines the heady romance of a whirlwind courtship with the joy of a wedding—strong heroes, feisty heroines and marriages made not so much in heaven as in a hurry!

  Titles in this series are:

  January MARRY IN HASTE by HEATHER ALLISON

  February DASH TO THE ALTAR by RUTH JEAN DALE

  March THE TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR BRIDE by DAY LECLAIRE

  April MARRIED IN A MOMENT by JESSICA STEELE

  August THE MILLION-DOLLAR MARRIAGE by EVA RUTLAND

  September BRIDE BY DAY by REBECCA WINTERS

  December READY-MADE BRIDE by JANELLE DENISON

  REBECCA WINTERS: Rebecca, an American writer and mother of four, is a graduate of the University of Utah. She has also studied at schools in Switzerland and France, including the Sorbonne. Rebecca is currently teaching French and Spanish to junior high school students. Despite her busy schedule, Rebecca always finds time to write. She’s already researching the background for her next Harlequin® romance!

  Rebecca Winters

  Bride By Day

  TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON

  AMSTERDAM • PARIS • SYDNEY • HAMBURG

  STOCKHOLM • ATHENS • TOKYO • MILAN • MADRID

  PRAGUE • WARSAW • BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND

  CHAPTER ONE

  “I’M SAM Telford from Manhatten Office Cleaners. My employer told me you wanted to see me.”

  Samantha, who preferred to be called by the shortenend version of her name, had been forced to run all the way from her apartment, and had been caught in the middle of an early May cloudburst. She was dripping wet and didn’t dare sit down on any of the upholstered chairs.

  The elegant, middle-aged secretary looked at her with vague disdain. “Are you the person who cleaned this office last night?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’re the one. It’s after two o’clock. You were expected in long before now.”

  “I was in class all morning. My boss didn’t reach me until I returned to my apartment a little while ago. Obviously something is wrong.”

  “You could say that,” came the cryptic reply. “Please, just...stand there for a minute.”

  Sam bit her bottom lip. She couldn’t afford to be in trouble, let alone lose her only source of income. Right now she was literally down to her last hundred dollars, and was counting on her next paycheck. At this point she was grateful for her job, and would die before she went begging to her father, a portrait painter of international repute who had never acknowledged her existence as a human being, let alone his daughter.

  Through the art department she’d heard rumors that he was living somewhere in Sicily with his latest mistress.

  Her jaw hardened. Someday, when she’d made a big success of her own artistic career—and she would if it killed her—she’d present herself to him. That day couldn’t come soon enough for her. She was living for the moment of confrontation, not only because of its shock value alone, but because she couldn’t wait to show him she’d made a success of her life, without him.

  He’d gotten away with murder for years. But not forever, she vowed vehemently.

  “Ms. Telford? Mr. Kostopoulos will see you now.”

  The head man himself?

  Sam’s nervousness increased. Kostopoulos Shipping and Export owned the impressive sixty-eight-floor office building located on the Upper West Side in New York City.

  Trepidation set in as she walked through the double doors of the office she’d cleaned less than eighteen hours earlier. To her embarrassment, her tennis shoes squished on the marble floor, announcing her entry in no uncertain terms.

  Automatically her eyes flicked to the wall. To her relief the Picasso was still there among a grouping of original oils and graphics. For a moment Sam had feared there might have been a theft during the night. It belonged in a museum like the D’Orsay in Paris where the whole world could admire it. Instead, it was part of a private collection only a privileged few would ever be allowed to see.

  The simplistic yet charming painting of a pair of hands holding a bouquet of flowers had to be an original, though Sam recognized that it was an unknown version of Picasso’s masterpiece, Petit Fleurs.

  She imagined he’d paid a fortune to obtain such a treasure. Most likely there’d been private negotiations between the Marina Picasso family and Mr. Kostopoulos.

  In the broad light of day, the room’s clean yet exquisite Hellenic accoutrements deserved a second glance. But her curious gaze fell on the powerfully built male dominating the room. He was structured along the lines of a classic Greek god, and she couldn’t look anywhere else. He was definitely numero uno.

  His taut stance and tightened facial muscles led her to believe some very fierce thoughts were running through his mind. She shivered at the possibility those thoughts had anything to do with her.

  He stood at the window, totally oblivious to the luxury surrounding him. His right profile was in evidence while he stared at some invisible spot only he could see.

  Living in an artist’s world of color as she did, Sam was immediately intrigued by his overly-long black hair. It put her in mind of an inky void no ray of sunlight dared penetrate. She imagined this was the color of darkness before God made the light.

  Aquiline features and brows like eagle’s wings made him an arresting figure. But to Sam’s mind, it was the savage two-inch scar along his right jawline which quickened her interest. It appeared to be an old wound which had healed a long time ago, but stood out because he was a man who probably had to shave twice a day.

  He didn’t look like a person who feared anything. Quite the opposite in fact. Since he made more money than even most wealthy people probably found decent, why hadn’t the scar been removed through plastic surgery?

  Though perfectly groomed and wearing an expensive, hand-tailored gray silk suit, there was a primitive quality about him that hinted at untamed fires burning beneath.

  She could well imagine anyone meeting him for the first time would speculate on the scenario which would have marred such an unforgettable male face—the kind of face she would love to sculpt if sculpting were her best medium.

  “Come all the way in, Ms. Telford.”

&
nbsp; Suddenly Sam became the focus of his unsettling scrutiny. In one sweeping glance his inky black eyes took inventory of her form and feminine attributes, then he scowled. Apparently he found her attire as distasteful as her person.

  Her five feet four inches felt very tiny and pathetic standing there in her sopping wet outfit which consisted of nothing more than scruffy jeans and an old denim shirt she hadn’t bothered to tuck in. Decorated with a print from her own handmade blocks, the pattern looked more like black cat’s paws than odd-size circles, but Sam hadn’t been displeased with the result.

  Maybe it was her hair the imperious-looking man didn’t seem to like. That morning she’d been in such a hurry to get her final art project to the university on time, she hadn’t been able to find her favorite scarf.

  For want of anything else, she’d been reduced to improvise, and had come up with a remnant from one of her originally designed, fishnet chains normally meant to hold hanging flowerpots. She had used it to tie back her thick, yellow-gold hair at the nape. If left unconfined, it flounced like an oversize mop.

  “I’m in,” she couldn’t resist commenting because he was obviously trying to intimidate her.

  The air crackled with tension. “My secretary said you were the person who cleaned this office last night.”

  He spoke impeccable English in the deepest voice she’d ever heard. Yet in spite of his less than friendly demeanor, she caught traces of his attractive Greek accent. Let’s face it, Sam. He’s the most gorgeous male you’ve ever seen in your life, let alone your dreams.

  “That’s right.”

  “What happened to the man who usually cleans this suite?”

  “Jack went home ill, and asked if I would finish up.”

  He continued to stand motionless, feet apart. With her fanciful imagination, he could be the god Zeus, astride Olympus, issuing his latest decree. Sam thought he was closer to forty than thirty, yet she considered him young to run such a vast empire. If rumor among the night crew could be believed, legions of world-famous singers, models and movie stars had tried to become the wife of the mysterious Greek tycoon, but all had failed.

  Of course it didn’t mean that there wasn’t a special woman somewhere in the cosmos who had a softening effect on him. Since Sam heard that he flew to Greece on a regular basis, she assumed he had a love interest in a beautiful woman from his own country and race. Someone who kept a low profile away from the public eye, and the paparazzi.

  The woman would have to be incredibly brave to take him on... And very lucky, a tiny voice whispered.

  “I’ll get straight to the point Last night, while in midflight between Athens and New York, a vitally important telephone call came in to this office. My secretary attempted to route it through to me, but there was too much static on the line, so she left the phone number on my desk. I drove here straight from the airport, only to discover that the note was gone.”

  He hadn’t accused Sam yet, but the inference couldn’t have been more clear.

  She smoothed a damp tendril away from her forehead, all the while conscious of his inquisitive eyes following the movement of her hand whose broken nails and calloused, oil-stained fingers were a far cry from those of his immaculate secretary.

  Sam had never been the kind of person to envy another woman. But for once in her life, she wished she had the kind of remarkable looks and polish to attract a man like him.

  “I’ve been cleaning the offices in this building for the last six months, and know better than to touch anything. All I did was dust, vacuum, and scour the bathrooms.”

  His brows became a black bar of intimidation. “You saw nothing on this desk?”

  Her eyes darted to the mirrorlike finish. Only a telephone was on display. For a man of Mr. Kostopoulos’s legendary business acumen, she wondered how he ran his megacorporation with everything out of sight.

  “No. It looked exactly as it does right now, as if you’d just had it delivered from the furniture store.”

  She shouldn’t have said that last bit. She knew she shouldn’t have said it. Speaking her mind was just one of her many flaws.

  “If it isn’t in my head, it’s not important,” he stated bluntly, reading her thoughts with humiliating accuracy. “The clutter I leave to my secretary’s discretion.” His low voice rumbled through her body.

  If the truth be known, clutter was Sam’s middle name. She’d lived with it all her life. In an office like this, where everything was in perfect order and spotless, she’d go crazy. In fact, she would have said so if he’d been anyone else except the man who could get her fired.

  “Do you recall emptying the wastebasket?” he demanded in a decidedly chilly tone.

  She lifted her rounded chin a little higher. “I would have done, but there was nothing in it.”

  His lips twisted unpleasantly. No doubt he thought she was being impudent again. Clearly not satisfied with her answers, he buzzed his secretary. “Please come inside, Mrs. Athas, and bring your notepad with you.”

  Seconds later, the woman who dealt on a daily basis with his billion-dollar clutter, entered his inner sanctum. She was carrying the small notepad in her hand. It’s yellow color triggered a memory.

  Sam groaned, alerting her interrogator.

  “You were about to say something?” he prodded, a merciless gleam entering those black depths.

  “I—I remember now,” she stammered. “I did see a yellow piece of notepaper, but it was on the floor next to the wastebasket. I assumed someone had aimed for it, but had missed...”

  The inference didn’t escape him and his lips thinned, making her quiver inwardly. “Since it was exactly what I needed, I—” She looked everywhere except at him. “I put it in my pocket.”

  By now his hands were on his hips. To her consternation, his secretary had conveniently disappeared. Sam took this as the worst of omens.

  He muttered several epithets not worthy of repeating before he demanded, “Explain to me why you would have confiscated a supposed piece of refuse from my private office.”

  His arrogance was too much!

  “Actually, there’s a perfectly good reason,” she fired back, cognizant of heat building in her cheeks.

  “For your sake, there’d better be,” he stated with more than a hint of underlying menace.

  Sam didn’t like to be threatened. Staring him down she began, “I was vacuuming the carpet beneath your desk when I saw the exact piece of paper I needed to finish my collage.”

  “Collage?” he bit out.

  “My senior art project,” she defended boldly because she was on steady ground. “At the beginning of this semester my professor, Dr. Giddings, insisted that we could only use those bits of paper left on the grass, the ground, the sidewalk or the floor. No cheating by dipping into garbage receptacles, no using scissors to alter shape. Everything had to go into the collage as found.”

  Warming to her subject she blurted, “With the exception of newspapers, telephone directories or cardboard, we could use absolutely anything else made of paper. The whole idea of the project was to be as original as possible, and still create an interesting design worthy of hanging in an art gallery.”

  Not stopping for breath she explained, “When Dr. Giddings first gave us the assignment, I didn’t realize how fun, how challenging this final project would be. For weeks I’ve been walking around the city with my eyes on the ground, and I’ve come up with the most amazing finds which are now attached to my canvas.”

  By now his eyes had become black slits. “So you’re telling me that the note my secretary left on this desk is now a part of your collage?”

  “Yes. But I didn’t take it from your desk. She must have created a draft and inadvertently knocked it to the floor without realizing it.”

  While Sam spoke, he raked a bronzed hand through vibrant, ebony hair. She longed to twine her fingers in it, and the distraction made it practically impossible for her to concentrate.

  What was wrong with her? Up to
now she’d never become seriously interested in the men who’d wanted a relationship with her. Yet Mr. Kostopoulos, a total stranger, had already ignited a fire in her that was growing stronger with every sparring comment.

  “Your explanation is so incredibly absurd, I’m half inclined to believe you’re telling me the truth.”

  “It’s certainly no more absurd than the fact that you have a Picasso hanging on the wall.”

  He blinked. “What does the Picasso have to do with this conversation?”

  Obviously he wasn’t used to anyone standing up to him. She got a perverse thrill out of shocking him.

  “It has everything to do with it. You’re an art lover who probably can’t paint a straight line.” Mistake number nine or ten. She’d lost count, but it didn’t matter. Something about him had made her lose control.

  “Dr. Gidding’s is an artist who wouldn’t know the first thing about your corporate clutter. The point is, you both love Picasso. While you spend your millions on his art so you can look at it from your comfortable leather chair, my poverty-stricken professor, who probably won’t be a legend until long after he has gone, has made us study Picasso and put his credo to the test.”

  The man confronting her looked incredulous. “What credo?”

  “Picasso said, and I quote, ‘The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place; from the sky, from the earth, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web, from a scrap of paper. We must pick out what is good for us where we can find it.’ End of quote.”

  He thought she was insane. Right now, she felt that she was...

  “Being a disciple of Picasso, Dr. Giddings challenged us to create beauty from the scraps of paper we found.”

  For an instant their gazes collided, creating a new kind of turmoil in her breast, one that squeezed the air out of her lungs for no good reason.

  After an eternity, “Where is this—” He paused. “Work of art?” The mockery in his grating tone was as unmistakable as his derision.