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CHAPTER 29
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2021-10-01 07:24:22Lara shivered in spite of the heat. Demis had left careful instructions for his burial and he had chosen to come back to Greece to the sunbaked hillside where his own parents had been laid to rest.
The funeral was small, strictly family but the press was just beyond the graveyard, a sea of hungry wolves, restrained only by the strong police presence.
“It’s time to go.”
Francine briefly leaned on Lara’s extended arm for support and then straightened again. Lara felt deserted and superfluous to requirements. For days she had told herself not to be childish, not to be selfish, not to expect Christophe to find time for her when his every waking moment was filled with ceaseless demands for his attention.
Lara had innocently expected to make
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“I’ll tell you what I don’t enjoy now. Your jealousy, chérie,” Christophe replied to her with blistering derision. “At least Meghan knows when to shut up and be feminine and warm...”“Seriously?” Lara went white, lowering her lashes over shocked and wounded eyes.“I can’t believe you just said this…” Christophe had turned on her with biting cruelty unfamiliar to her.“All I wanted tonight was the sweet oblivion of your body…”So that’s my mission tonight after you being away for so long… To provide sex,” Lara countered with a shudder of mingled rage and pain.“Why not? You’re my wife,” he slung back at her harshly. Dear God
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“Yes… I can see it…” she murmured and felt shivers down her spine.“Perfect! And now you can watch me fall asleep... Such incriminating stuff… Oh, get ready! Meghan makes her entrance in about half an hour…”“Meghan…” Lara echoed weakly.“I could’ve had all this material cut and rearranged, but I didn’t want to spare you a single second of the entertainment.” Swallowing hard, Lara dutifully watched Christophe falling asleep, the most awful suspicion beginning to assail her.“You can fast forward if you like,” she mumbled in a small voice.“Are you sure, chérie?”“Quite sure…” With a sinking heart, Lara watched Meghan creep in and stand gazing down at Christophe. A litt
Last Updated : 2021-10-02LIGHT AFTER DARK CHAPTER 1
Black as the darkest night hair against a crisp linen pillow, brown skin against a blindingly white sheet, and tiger’s eyes burning with deliberate cruelty and triumph into hers. In horrified rejection of the imagery that had sprung into her mind, Lara Anderson shuddered violently, dimly aware that she was still in the grip of severe shock. Abruptly, she was dredged from her turmoil by the insistent shrill of the telephone in the hall. Reluctantly she answered the summons, carefully shutting the lounge door behind her so that her father was not disturbed.“Lara...?” She froze, her stunningly beautiful face white as snow between the silken wings of her blonde hair. Her breath caught in her throat in a strangled gasp. The r
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Liza had been totally useless, absolutely hysterical somewhere in the background. Lara had found herself in a private ambulance, accompanied not by her friend but by Christophe.“She will follow in my car,” he had asserted, getting in the way of the paramedics while simultaneously telling them what to do. Lara just hadn’t had the strength to fight Christophe Moreau off that day. Her head had been aching fit to burst and her stomach churning with nausea. She had shut her eyes to escape, telling herself that this explosive and domineering stranger was simply attempting to make amends for an accident that hadn’t been his fault in the first place. She had been taken to a clinic, subjected to an alarmingly thorough examination against her will, and tucked into a bed in a very expe
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With an inner shudder of distaste, Lara stepped out of the elevator, outraged by the direction of her thoughts. She had come here without allowing herself to think of what she had to face at journey’s end but the eerie familiarity of her surroundings was like a razor twisting inside her. Three years ago, Lara had stalked along this corridor in a rage to confront Christophe Moreau. And even this length of time after the event it was quite impossible for her to explain how she had very nearly ended up in his bed. The two of them... like animals… Her clothing half off, his hands on her body, her hands on his… Obscene, she reflected with a stab of revulsion. And had it not been for the noisy entrance of the chambermaid into the lounge next door to the bedroom, that disgusting incident might’ve gone
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“Never!” Lara gasped breathlessly, searing his dark, savage visage with all the tortured fury of her discomfiting and powerless position.“The very image of you touching me again makes me feel physically sick!”“One lesson wasn’t enough for you, was it?” Christophe murmured huskily, narrowed eyes raking over her outraged features. “Don’t you remember how it was like when I made love to you?”“That wasn’t love!” Lara vented fiercely. “That was pure, unadulterated lust! Nothing more!”“And you have a problem with that... I don’t,” Christophe confided in a silky-smooth voice. And then, with a sardonic laugh, he released her when she was least expecting the gesture and thrust her carelessly back from him. Lara was trembling in cons
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Lara didn’t need another invitation. On unsteady legs, she backed out in haste. Out in the corridor, she closed her eyes and breathed in slowly and deeply. She felt hurt, alone, worthless, and the sensations were intense. Christophe confused her, cast her into turmoil. He still had this power. They were opposites in every way but just for a strange and highly disturbing moment, she had recognized an utterly inexplicably glimpse of empathy. When she saw that, Lara had wanted to put her arms around him. Crazy! Unbelievable! Just one of those mad tricks of the mind when one’s emotions were on a high... ‘After all, would I pet an enraged tiger plotting to put me on his menu?’ Lara thought.
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She kept the car waiting an hour. Lara packed as though she was going away for the weekend. In the back of her mind, a voice kept on talking… scolding her… ‘You can’t be doing this... You can’t have agreed…’“Three months… This is going to be pure hell,” she whispered and lifted a photo of Randall off the nightstand and stared at it tautly. It had been taken the day he opened the photo studio. He was wearing a suit… so unusual. A slim, fair man of medium height with gentle brown eyes.“It doesn’t matter to me... That sort of thing isn’t really important,” Randall had soothed when she sobbed out her shame and despair after that dreadful afternoon when she had almost ended up s
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“Yes… I can see it…” she murmured and felt shivers down her spine.“Perfect! And now you can watch me fall asleep... Such incriminating stuff… Oh, get ready! Meghan makes her entrance in about half an hour…”“Meghan…” Lara echoed weakly.“I could’ve had all this material cut and rearranged, but I didn’t want to spare you a single second of the entertainment.” Swallowing hard, Lara dutifully watched Christophe falling asleep, the most awful suspicion beginning to assail her.“You can fast forward if you like,” she mumbled in a small voice.“Are you sure, chérie?”“Quite sure…” With a sinking heart, Lara watched Meghan creep in and stand gazing down at Christophe. A litt
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“I’ll tell you what I don’t enjoy now. Your jealousy, chérie,” Christophe replied to her with blistering derision. “At least Meghan knows when to shut up and be feminine and warm...”“Seriously?” Lara went white, lowering her lashes over shocked and wounded eyes.“I can’t believe you just said this…” Christophe had turned on her with biting cruelty unfamiliar to her.“All I wanted tonight was the sweet oblivion of your body…”So that’s my mission tonight after you being away for so long… To provide sex,” Lara countered with a shudder of mingled rage and pain.“Why not? You’re my wife,” he slung back at her harshly. Dear God
LIGHT AFTER DARK CHAPTER 29
Lara shivered in spite of the heat. Demis had left careful instructions for his burial and he had chosen to come back to Greece to the sunbaked hillside where his own parents had been laid to rest. The funeral was small, strictly family but the press was just beyond the graveyard, a sea of hungry wolves, restrained only by the strong police presence.“It’s time to go.” Francine briefly leaned on Lara’s extended arm for support and then straightened again. Lara felt deserted and superfluous to requirements. For days she had told herself not to be childish, not to be selfish, not to expect Christophe to find time for her when his every waking moment was filled with ceaseless demands for his attention. Lara had innocently expected to make
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There was just one detail she needed to ask him about… something she had always wondered about…“Chris… What did you do with that shoe I left behind three years ago?” He looked at her and smiled.“Well, dear Cinderella… It’s somewhere safe.”“Oh…”“Did you think I might have had it dipped in pure gold and placed in a glass case?” Christophe teased her.“Until that day it was one of my favorite pairs of shoes.”“What did you do with the one you had left?”“Dumped it.”“There you are, then,” Christophe mocked. “I was more sentimental than you were.” Lara became serious once again.“I thought you’d laugh about
LIGHT AFTER DARK CHAPTER 27
Christophe stilled. His fiercely narrowed gaze slewed at speed back to Lara and simply stayed there.“Gay? Anderson was gay?” he practically whispered in disbelief. Lara unfroze and whirled out of the room. She was outraged and devastated at one and the same time. Demis Agelastos must have had her investigated. Where else could Meghan have obtained such information? All along Christophe’s father had known all about her background. She felt invaded and violated, horrified that such information should have fallen into Meghan’s grasping hands, cheap fodder for her spite. Christophe caught her back on the landing before she could head for the sanctuary of their bedroom. A far from gentle hand closed around her forearm.“Pull yo
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Her strained smile glazed over. Oh, God, Christophe had laid on the ‘I-love- your-daughter’ routine with a trowel. Very impressive indeed.“Christophe’s a rather more complex character than I ever appreciated,” Kenneth admitted. “I always thought of him as very cool and controlled. He is in business. But in love... he’s all emotion and reaction. So, now you tell me how you feel.” Lara took a deep breath.“I’m… Uh… I’m crazy about him, of course.”“Oh… You’re much more reserved than he is... Hmm… Did your mother and I do that to you?” he sighed regretfully. “I’m sorry, Lara… Both Linda and I ruined everything for you. And Randall…”“Daddy, stop,” she begged him and put her loving arms around hi
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Christophe scanned the wildness in her sapphire eyes for a fulminating ten seconds, a muscle jerking tight at his hard jawline.“Listen, I don’t know what the hell you think you’re playing at but the wedding goes ahead tomorrow... Even if I have to drag you through it by the hair!”“I don’t think so! I refuse to be a part of this disgusting masquerade. You hear me?” Lara slung rawly. “No. Meghan told me why you had to get married! So go and find yourself another woman willing to play this game!”“Ah… Meghan… Alright, let’s hear why do I have to get married?” Christophe invited very softly. “I’m extremely curious about my real reasons behind this wedding.”“Stop it, Christophe! You know why… You lied to me,” Lara condemned fiercely. “Every single thing you told me was a lie..
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His words came back in her mind, harsher and harder to digest than before. ‘Someday you will come to me on your knees and beg me to take you... and I will break you.’ Lara shivered, suddenly cold and scared. Just a few short days ago, Christophe had still been talking in the same vein. And though he had yet to discover it, he had already won. She was over the moon in love with him… the man she learned to hate for three long, excruciating years. Whatever happened, Lara knew she was going to be very badly hurt. But the heart wants what the heart wants and cancel her love for Christophe wasn’t an option anymore. Another knock sou
LIGHT AFTER DARK CHAPTER 23
His hands wrenched down the straps of her sleeveless dress and Lara glanced down, shocked to see her own bared breasts, helplessly shy of him and yet unbearably aroused by his impatience. With a groan, Christophe lifted her and suckled at an erect pink nipple and her hands clenched fiercely into his shoulders, an involuntary moan of excitement torn from her. Her head fell back as his tormenting mouth bit at her sensitive flesh with a knowing eroticism that drove her out of her mind with excitement. Lara was boneless in his grasp, a wanton creature drunk on sensation. A lean hand skimmed beneath the flimsy silken fabric of her gown, following the upward curve of a slender thigh and lingering there with devastating effect.“You drive me crazy, chérie…” Christophe groaned, sinking to his knees t
