MORNING WAS BREAKING over the gardens, reaching pale fingers of sun across the dew-drenched lawn. Christine stood at the window of her bedroom, a silk peignoir wrapping her, gazing blindly out. Her face was sombre, her thoughts far away into the past. The past that had become the present. The present she could not deny. Nor could she deny that she had allowed something to happen that should never have happened.
I called it insanity when he said we should marry. But what I’ve just done is insanity.
How could it be anything else? She turned her head, looking back towards the sleeping figure in her bed, the bedclothes carelessly stretched around his lean, golden-skinned body so that she could see the rise and fall of his chest—the chest she had clung to in that madness, that insanity of last night, as she had clung so often in that long-ago time that should have been gone for ever!
It has to be gone—it has to be! It’s over!
And she could not, must not, allow it to be anything else. Whatever the unbearable temptation to do otherwise—a temptation that Anatole had made a million times more devastatingly powerful after what had happened last night.
I can’t be what Anatole is telling me to be. Urging me to be. It’s impossible—just impossible!
Impossible for so many reasons.
Impossible for just one overwhelming reason.
The same reason it’s always been impossible.
Pain constricted her throat as she stared across at him now, where he lay sleeping in her bed.
There can be no future between us now—none. Just as there could be no future for us then.
She felt the breath tight in her lungs and moved to turn away. But as she did so she heard him stir, saw his hand reaching across the bed, his face registering her absence. His eyes sprang open and he saw her standing there. Emotion speared in his face but it was she who spoke first.
‘You have to go! Right now! I can’t have Mrs Hughes realising you spent the night here.’
His expression changed. ‘But I did—and in your arms.’
He was defying her to deny it, his eyes holding hers. He sat up, reaching for her, catching her hand. Resting his hand on her flank, warm through the cool silk. Looking up at her.
‘It’s far too late for pretence,’ he said softly. ‘Didn’t last night prove that to you?’
He drew her to him.
‘Doesn’t this prove it to you?’
His mouth lowered to hers. His kiss was like velvet—the kiss of a man who had taken possession of the woman he desired. She felt honey flow through her, felt her limbs tremble with it.
His eyes poured into hers, rich and lambent. ‘It’s happened, Tia.’ His voice was as intimate, as hushed as if they were the only two people in the world. ‘It’s happened, and there’s no going back now.’
She tried to pull away. Tried to free herself.
‘There has to be!’ she cried. ‘I can’t do what you want, Anatole. I can’t—I can’t!’
I mustn’t! I daren’t! What you are offering me is a temptation beyond my endurance. But I must endure it—I must.
She had endured it before—she must do so again. Must find refuge somehow. Find the strength to keep refusing him. Even now, after she had burned in his arms, in his embrace.
Now more than ever. Now that I know how weak I am...how helpless to resist you. Now that I know how hopelessly vulnerable I am to you. Now that I know the danger that stands before me.
Raggedly, she pulled free of him. ‘I won’t marry you, Anatole,’ she said doggedly, each word tugged from her. ‘I will not. Whatever you say to me—I will not.’
Who was she speaking to? Him or herself? She knew the answer. And she knew what that answer told her—knew the danger it proved her to be in.
Frustration flared in his eyes. ‘Why? I don’t understand? Why, Tia? How can you possibly deny what there is between us?’
She would not reply—could not. All she could do, with a desperate expression on her face, was beg him yet again to go. For an instant longer Anatole just stood there, then abruptly he stood up, seized up his discarded clothes, and disappeared into the en suite bathroom.
Rapidly, Christine got dressed too—pulling on a pair of jeans and a lightweight sweater, roughly brushing out the tangled hair that waved so wantonly around her shoulders, echoing her bee-stung lips in its sensuality...
With a smothered cry she whirled around to see Anatole emerge, wearing his clothes from the night before, but only the shirt and trousers. He looked...she gulped...he looked incredibly, devastatingly sexy. There was no other word for it—no other word to describe the slightly raffish look about him, compounded by the lock of raven hair falling across his forehead, the cuffs of his shirt pushed back casually, the dark shadow along his jawline.
She could not take her eyes from him—could feel her pulse quicken, the blood surging in her, colour flushing across her face, lips parting...
He saw her reaction and smiled. A slow, sensual smile, full of confidence.
‘You see?’
It was all he said. All he needed to say. He walked towards her. Strolled.
She backed away, panic suddenly replacing her betraying reaction to his raw sexuality. ‘No—Anatole, no! I won’t let you do this to me—I won’t!’
She held her hands up as if to ward him off. He halted, his expression changing. When he spoke there was frustration in his voice, and challenge, in equal measure.
‘Tia, you cannot ignore what has happened.’
‘I am not Tia! I am not her any more—and I will never be her again!’
The cry of her own voice, its vehemence, shocked her. It seemed to shock Anatole as well. His eyes narrowed, losing that blatantly sexy half-lidded look with which he’d stared at her before. For a moment he did not speak. Just looked at her pale face, the cheekbones etched so starkly. Saw the tremble in her upheld hands.
‘No,’ he said quietly. ‘You’re not Tia. I’ve accepted that. I’ve accepted that you are Christine Kyrgiakis—Mrs Vasilis Kyrgiakis.’
The use of the description made her start. Made her hear the rest of what he said.
‘The widow of my uncle—the mother of his son—the mother of my cousin.’ He paused again, as if assessing her, the way she was reacting. ‘I have made my case, Christine—’ deliberately he used the name of the woman she was now, the woman she would always be going forward ‘—and I have given you the reasons why we should marry. And I believe I have done it in more than words.’
For a second that look was back in his eye—that heavy, half-lidded look that made her tremble as nothing that he could say could make her tremble, making her limbs turn boneless, her heart catch in mid-beat. Then he held up a hand, as if she had tried to interrupt him.
‘But for now I’ll leave it be. I understand, truly, that you must have time to get used to it. Time to come to terms with it. To see it as being as inevitable as I see it to be.’ He took a breath, his tone changing. ‘But for now the subject is closed. I accept that.’
He turned away, fetching his jacket, so carelessly thrown on a chair last night, and shrugging it on, tugging his cuffs clear and fastening them, then looking across at Christine again.
‘I’ll go now—to preserve the appearances that are, I know, so important to you right now.’ There was no bite in his words, only acknowledgement. ‘But I’ll be back later. We have Nicky to collect—and, no, please don’t tell me not to come with you. He’ll be disappointed if I don’t.’
She nodded in dumb acquiescence. It seemed easier than contesting his assertion. All she wanted—desperately—was for him to be out of here, finally to be able to collapse in a state of mental and emotional exhaustion, her body aching and spent.
She sheared her mind away—no, don’t think, not now. Not ever...
* * *
But it was impossible not to think, not to feel, for the rest of the day, and when Anatole returned late in the afternoon—as he’d told her he would—so they could drive over to collect Nicky from the Barcourts, she felt a leap of unbearable emotion as her eyes went to his. And his to hers.
For a moment, as their eyes met, she felt as if she had been transported back in time and was poised to do what she had once done so automatically and spontaneously—run into his arms that would open to her and fold her to him.
Then his eyes were veiled and the moment passed. As he helped her into the car he made some pleasantry about the weather, to which she replied in kind. They chatted in a desultory way during the short journey, and Christine told herself she was thankful.
And she was even more thankful that as they arrived there was a melee to greet them: Elizabeth Barcourt’s grandchildren, their mother and their grandmother, all chattering to them madly.
As for Nicky—he was only too eager to regale them both with the delights of his day.
‘I rode a pony! Can I have a pony—can I? Can I?’ he pleaded, half to Anatole, half to Christine.
A spike drove into her heart as she saw the way her son addressed them both. As if he accepted her and Anatole as a unit. She tensed, and it was noticed by Elizabeth Barcourt, who drew her a little aside as Anatole crouched down to Nicky’s level to get the full account of the joys of his day and the thrill of riding a pony for the first time.
‘My dear, I’m glad Anatole is able to spend time with you—the more the better.’ She cast a look at Christine, and then at Nicky. ‘He’s a natural with him! One might almost think—’
She broke off, as if conscious she had said too much, then stepped away, quietening her noisy grandchildren and telling them it was time for Nicky to head home.
As they finally set off Nicky’s chatter was all of ponies and puppies and the fun he’d had with the other children.
‘I’m going to paint a picture of a pony and a puppy,’ he announced as they arrived, and then belied his intention by giving a huge yawn, indicating how little actual sleep his exciting sleepover had involved.
‘Bath first,’ said Christine, and then hesitated.
What she wanted to do was tell Anatole it was time for him to leave, to go away, to leave her alone with her son. But her hesitation was fatal.
‘Definitely bath time,’ Anatole said, adding with a grin, ‘I’ll race you upstairs!’
With a cry of excitement Nicky set off up the wide staircase and Anatole followed—as did Christine, much more slowly, her face set.
OK, so the two of them would bath Nicky, and see him to bed and then she’d tell Anatole it was time he left. That was her intention—her absolute resolve. Because no way was he going to spend the night here again.
And not in my bed!
Her face flushed with colour, her features contorting.
He’s got to go—he’s just got to.
Close to an hour later, with Nicky tucked up in bed and falling asleep instantly, she walked back downstairs with Anatole. She paused at the foot and turned to him.
‘Are you staying at the White Hart tonight or heading straight back to London?’ Her voice was doggedly bright, refusing to acknowledge there was any other possibility.
He looked at her. His gaze was half lidded, as if he knew why she was saying what she was.
‘Once,’ he said, ‘you were not so rejecting of me.’
The expression in his eyes, the open caress in his voice, brought colour to stain her cheekbones, and her fingers clenched at her sides.
‘Once,’ she replied, ‘I was a different person.’
He gave a swift shake of his head, negating her denial. ‘You’re still that person—whether you call yourself Tia or Christine, you’re still her. And last night showed me that. It showed you that! So why deny it? Why even try to deny it? Why try to deny that our marriage would work?’
And now the caress was back in his voice, almost tangible on her skin, which was suddenly flushing with heat.
‘Last night showed how alive that flame that was always between us still is. From the moment you saw me, Tia, you wanted me—and I wanted you. I wanted you then and I want you now. And it is the same for you. It blazes from you, your desire for me.’
He reached a hand towards her, long lashes sweeping down over his eyes, a half-smile pulling at his mouth.
‘Don’t deny it, Tia,’ he said softly. ‘Don’t deny the truth of what we have. We burn for each other.’ His voice dropped to a sensual husk.
She took a jerky step backwards—an instinctive gesture of self-protection against what he wanted. He didn’t like it that she did so, and he stilled. She lifted her chin. Looked straight at him. She must tell him what she needed to say. What he needed to hear.
Her eyes met his unflinchingly, with a bare, stark expression in them. ‘I know that, Anatole! Dear God, of course I know it! How could I not?’
She shook her head, as if acknowledging a truth she could not deny. Then her eyes reached his, hung on to his, trying to make him hear, understand.
‘It was always like that—right from the first. And, yes, it’s still there. Last night did prove it, just as you say. But, Anatole, listen—listen to me. I can’t let myself be blinded by passion! And nor can you! A marriage can’t be built on passion alone, and nor can it be based on just wanting to make a family for Nicky. You have to see that!’
There was a tremor in her voice, intensity in her face—but in his there was only blank rejection of her rejection of him.
‘All my life,’ he said slowly, ‘women have wanted to marry me. You included, or so I supposed way back then. And yet now, when I want to marry, the woman I want to marry is turning me down.’ He gave a laugh. There was no humour in it. ‘Maybe that’s some kind of cosmic karma—I don’t know.’
He pressed his lips together, as if to control his words, his emotions. Emotions that were streaming through him in a way he had never known before. A kind of disbelief. Even dismay.
His eyes rested on her. ‘So, what can a marriage be built on? Tell me what else there needs to be.’
She looked at him, and there was a deep sadness in her voice as she answered. ‘Oh, Anatole, the fact that you have to ask tells me how impossible marriage would be between us.’
‘Then tell me!’ he ground out.
She shut her eyes for a moment, shaking her head before she opened them again. She looked at him, her features twisting. ‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘But...’ She paused, as if profoundly reluctant to speak, yet she did so. ‘You would know it—’
She broke off, turned away, walked unevenly towards the front door to open it for him to leave. Marriage between them was as impossible now as it had been when she’d thought she lived in fairyland.
Emotion was pressing upon her—unbearable, agonising—but she would not yield to it. Opening the door, she turned back to him. He hadn’t moved. He was just looking at her.
Determinedly, she met his gaze. ‘Anatole—please—’ She indicated the open doorway.
He walked towards it, pausing beside her. ‘We’d make a good couple,’ he said. ‘We’d have each other and Nicky. Maybe a child of our own one day.’
A smothered cry came from her. ‘Go! Go, Anatole, and leave me alone!’
She closed the door on him, not caring that she’d all but pushed him out. Only when the lock clicked, cutting out the sound of his footsteps on the gravelled drive, muffling the sound of his car door slamming, the engine starting, did she turn, leaning back on the closed front door, shutting him out—out of her house, out of her life.
A child of our own...
That muffled cry came again. That was what she had longed for so long ago—before the glowing fairy dust she’d sprinkled over her life had turned to bitter ashes.
Slowly, bleakly, she headed upstairs to kiss her sleeping son a silent goodnight.
The only person she could love.
Could allow herself to love.