Read Online The Greek's Stolen Bride by Kate Hewitt - Free Book Online Page A

what the circumstances. She would do well to remember that. This marriage wasn't real. Even if they slept together, it wasn't real. They didn't love each other.
    Except, Ariana thought with a sharp pang of fear, she was afraid she might be falling in love with Theo already.
     
    Theo watched emotions flit across Ariana's face: fear, hope, excitement, terror . Yes, terror. He felt it too. Last night had, bizarrely, changed everything. Shaken up all his certainties and turned them in doubts.
    He sipped his coffee, felt a pressure build in his chest. This was a bad idea. A very bad idea, because he didn't want to become emotionally engaged with Ariana, and yet after holding her all night long he knew he already was.
    And that meant she would get hurt.
    He wasn't about to fall in love. Not when he'd seen how love had controlled his father. Made his mother miserable and as for Spiro's wife--well, she couldn't have been happy, knowing he had a mistress and bastard son living in an apartment in Piraeus.
    Love was messy. Disastrous. And yet as he watched Ariana pick at her breakfast he was afraid she might be falling in love with him. He should have known it could happen. Despite her strength and independence, she was innocent. She'd seen so little of life, had so little experience of a good or honest man--she was bound to feel something when the first one strolled across her path.
    Except he was neither good nor honest, not really. He'd told her about his past working in a street gang, but he hadn't told her his intentions now. His complete and utter determination to ruin her father.
    Guilt picked at him, and he didn't like it. He didn't want anything to interfere with his plan for revenge. Yet as Ariana glanced up at him, those silver eyes wide and rain-washed with uncertainty, he knew something already had.
    Resolutely Theo pushed such thoughts--regrets--away. It was too late to wonder if he was doing the right thing. And he had spoken the truth, marrying Ariana would safeguard both their interests. Besides, five million euros was nothing to sneeze at.
    And it would be worth every cent when he had taken everything away from Miles Leotokos, even the person he loved.
    Just like he'd done to Theo.
    The doorbell rang, and Theo smiled. "Time to get started," he said and rose from the table.
    An hour later they had both signed the document that guaranteed Ariana would five million euros in six months--and not a penny more.
    Theo had had his lawyer fly by helicopter from Athens, and he made sure the man--whom he trusted implicitly--explained everything in detail to Ariana. He did not want her to feel manipulated or tricked. She had a good brain, and she grasped the particulars with both ease and speed.
    With the document signed, all that was left was the marriage itself. Vows to be said.
    Guilt niggled once more. Marriage was a serious business. He'd told Ariana it was no more than a piece of paper and a promise, but he didn't really believe his light words. His word was his honor.
    And he lost no honor in marrying her, Theo told himself. He would protect and provide for her. He'd been honest with her from the beginning about what to expect--and what not to expect.
    Not quite.
    He hadn't been honest about his intentions for her father. Yet Theo did not intend to reveal those now. Ariana might still possess some misplaced loyalty for her father. He did not intend to find out.
    "Do you want to freshen up for the ceremony?" he asked, for when the priest had arrived, dressed all in black and with a bushy gray beard, she'd gone seriously pale.
    "Yes. Thank you. I'll just be a few minutes."
    She went upstairs and Theo went outside, breathed in the salty air from the sea mingled with the dusty scents of lavender and thyme. He wondered what Ariana's marriage to Dion Paranoussis would have looked like. Would she have worn a wedding dress? Would her father have given her a proper wedding? Probably, if just for a show. Miles Leotokos liked to