Royal's Untouched Love Read Online Free PDF

Athens changes you. A lot of relationships don't survive that."
    While Heidi tried to think about how she felt about that, Marisol reached over and squeezed her hand reassuringly.
    "You're going to love it. You can really become who are you are meant to be here."
    Heidi repeated Marisol's words to herself a few hours later, when she was alone in her apartment. It was a charming space, one that she might have thought of as on the smaller side if she hadn't lived in New York apartments. The walls were pure white, and they reached up high above her. Her bedroom was barely big enough for her bed, but when she walked through her kitchen, there was a small balcony with a small table and two chairs on it, offering her a view of the street market below.
    The space was beautiful, but for some reason, Heidi had never felt more alone. The sun was going down, and soon the people on the streets below would be going home to their loved ones while she was still out there on her own.
    "Well," she said out loud. "Here's the future."
    Without her will, her thoughts turned to Jaque. She wondered if he was still with the olive-skinned beauty she had seen in his car. She wondered if they were taking in the sights of the town, or whether they had retired to Jaque's home.
    She cut that train of thought short. She was a little country mouse who had come to Athens, and to expect anything at all from her CEO besides fair treatment was asking for trouble.
    Instead, she prepared a cup of tea for herself that she had bought at the tiny grocery store around the corner, and she sat on her new balcony. She looked up at the darkening sky, and waited to see if she could find any familiar stars.
     

CHAPTER THREE
    Two Months Later
    Jaque realized that he had stayed at work so late that it had technically become early. He spun his chair towards the enormous glass wall behind him, the one that looked out over the sea. It was still dim, as the window faced west, but the sky was distinctly lighter. Soon it would be swept with pinks and oranges, and after that, they would give way to the stunning Mediterranean blue that had inspired artists around the world for centuries.
    His office was austere to the point of ascetic. There was only the enormous desk of polished dark wood, a powerful computer, and a surprisingly ancient couch that looked out of place among the modern furnishings.
    No matter how much his secretary despaired about that couch, and no matter how much interior designers despised it, he refused to get rid of it. It was one of the most comfortable pieces of furniture that he owned, and whenever he lay down on it, he could be asleep in minutes.
    He had just laid down on it to get a quick nap before his meetings at eight when his phone rang. He was ready to flip it off and ignore whoever it was, but when he saw it was his mother, he flipped it on.
    "Good morning, Mother," he said. "I take it that you did not notice the time difference between Athens and wherever you are?"
    "As a matter of fact, I am in Spain, and I always remember the time difference. I just assumed that if I tried you at odd hours, you'd actually hear your phone."
    "In all fairness, I've been at dockyards and fabrication plants as well as noisy clubs when you call," he said peaceably, but his mother only snorted.
    "Did you know that you were a father?" she asked, and Jaque's blood ran cold.
    "What are you talking about …? I've not …"
    Greta's laugh was caustic. "Calm yourself. It was disproved. This woman claimed that you were in Japan, which you haven't been to in almost four years. She agreed to a blood test, and you were proven innocent for once. Her child has no relation to any of us."
    Jaque felt himself start to breathe again, but he couldn't see himself sleeping again any time soon. Instead he stood up, stretching as he did so, and began pacing his office.
    "Mother, was there possibly a way to break that news to me that was a little less shocking?"
    "I'm sure there was, but as