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'I...am...not...shouting,' Nik asserted, with such thickened and challenged self-restraint behind that assurance that she could barely distinguish his words.
'Good, because I was never with Lukas and I'm going to keep on telling you that until you listen!'
'But I'll never believe you.' His black eyes glittered like banked twin fires over her, his derision unconcealed. 'I remember the way you looked at me the morning after. You were guilty and proud of it!'
And Olympia remembered her bitter, silent defiance and recognised that Nik's bone-deep conviction that she was now lying stemmed as much from what he had seen in her as from the nonsense he had been told. A great weariness enfolded her then.
'Yet looking back, knowing what I know now...it was nothing!' Nik shrugged with expressive dismissal. 'I should have said it before now, but naturally being your first lover made up—'
it made up for so much you vanished for a whole week!' Olympia slotted in. You have no right to resent anything.
She shivered, trembling fingers curling round her glass of fresh orange juice. Nice to finally find out what lay behind the smooth and charming facade. A stubborn Greek male as unforgiving as a rock that stood through the centuries, weathered but immovable. She was so furious with him she had to weld her back to the seat to stop herself from flying upright and screaming back at him.
'Why don't you just tell me exactly what you did do with Lukas?' Nik demanded with sudden splintering force.
In total shock at that blunt invitation, Olympia's eyes opened very wide.
In response, Nik jerked both his hands up in the air in a speaking gesture of savage frustration. 'It's your fault I'm thinking like this again!' he condemned with raw violence. 'Why the hell couldn't you just leave it alone?'
He strode past the table and then stilled, wide shoulders rigid beneath the fine, expensive cloth of his well-cut jacket. He swung back, dug something from his pocket. He tossed a leather jeweller's box down on the table in front of her. It was a careless, understated move that nonetheless contrived to shout censure, reproach and arrogant male superiority, I was planning to give you that after breakfast.'
Olympia had never liked one-upmanship. 'What's in the box...a truth drug?'
Nik swore long and low in guttural Greek and strode back into the villa.
Olympia flipped open the box and found herself looking at an exquisite diamond-studded locket. She lifted it out, more or less to occupy her shaking hands, and flipped it open. Inside were two tiny photos of her mother and her grandfather. She was incredibly touched by that thoughtful and personalised extra. Had she overreacted or had he? Who was more guilty? The tears overflowed.
Resolving to pull herself together, Olympia went back indoors. Passing through the superb galleried hall, she went upstairs to their bedroom. What did Nik feel for her? Did he feel anything of any importance? Or was she just another bed partner for a highly-sexed male? Was the dark side of Nik's volatile temperament getting a kick out of the fact that she couldn't resist him? For, if he cared at all, how could he still distrust her to such an extent? That hurt her very much. It also seemed to make a complete charade of the wonderful weeks they had spent together.
In search of her make-up, Olympia reached for the handbag she had used the night before. It was a capacious holdall, and with a moan of impatience she tipped out the entire contents on to the bed. In the act of reaching for her cosmetics purse, she stilled in surprise to study the medium-sized brown envelope which had also fallen out of her bag. The envelope was sealed and she had never seen it before.
With a frown, she tore it open. A newspaper cutting and a pair of glossy colour snaps tumbled out on to the smooth silk bedspread. Olympia stared fixedly at the topmost photo, its rather fuzzy quality suggesting the use of a long-range camera. It was Gisele Bonner, lying topless on a sun lounger in the arms of a male who looked remarkably like Nik. Remarkably. She peered at that male image with straining eyes and then bent to examine the other photograph. Another shot of a bare bosom she would sooner not have seen, she conceded, with what felt like a hysterical laugh building like a giant bubble in her tight throat. But in the foreground of that second photo, now standing full face to that clever, intrusive camera lens, she saw Nik. Not a male who bore a remarkable resemblance to Nik but-a male who was without a single shadow of doubt Nik Cozakis!
Her heart sounded a dulled, thunderous thud. Without warning, the door at the other side of the room opened. 'Olympia...?' It was Nik's rich dark drawl.
Without the slightest thought or hesitation, Olympia flung herself face down on the bed across the photos, the newspaper cutting, her handbag and its jumbled contents.
Nik drew to a halt and regarded her prone position with a slight frown. 'Are you feeling OK?'
'Fine...'
When she made no move to get up, Nik hunkered down by the side of the bed, his stunning dark eyes level. 'You've been crying—‘
'No, I haven't been.'
'Liar,' he groaned, one forefinger gently tracing a silvered tear-track marking her cheek. 'I'm sorry I lost my head. I just can't think straight when you mention...' His lean strong face shadowed and darkened, his tension returning. 'I know it's not reasonable, but just please don't mention it again. It makes me.. .unreasonable,' he selected, after a long hesitation and perceptible difficulty in coming up with an alternative word.
'Yes...' She wasn't really listening; the facts of that stupid business with Lukas ten years back now seemed unimportant. She was staring deep into Nik's gorgeous dark golden eyes and praying, praying that the photos she was concealing from him were old photos, sent by his vindictive ex-mistress merely to taunt and distress his new wife.
'Are you sure you're OK?'
Olympia's fingernails curled into t
he bedspread. 'Just give me five minutes to fix my face—'
'Did you like the locket? Damianos said lockets went out with parasols and fans, but I thought it was you...'
'It's me,' she confirmed tightly.
His brows pleating, Nik vaulted slowly back upright.
As soon as he had gone, Olympia rose into a crouch to snatch at the crumpled newspaper cutting lying beneath her. Sinking back on to her knees, she spread it, surprised to see that there were two photos set side by side in the cutting. One the pool scene featuring Nik and Gisele in a clinch and the other of Nik and Olympia emerging from the church after their wedding.
As Olympia registered the proof that the picture of Nik about to snog Gisele must have been taken after she herself had married him, she sucked in oxygen in a great gulp, perspiration dampening her brow. Her stomach curdled. Sick, deep shock engulfed her. Beneath the pool photo, in confirmation of her worst suspicions, ran the immortal words; 'Nik Cozakis breaks his honeymoon in the Med to comfort his mistress.'
That first week they had been married, the week when he had left her alone on the yacht. When else? Nik had been with his mistress, Gisele Bonner. A mistress not former but current. Getting up from the bed, Olympia thrust the photos and the cutting back into her handbag. Then she hovered like a sleepwalker. She went into the bathroom to freshen up. But when she got there she discovered she hadn't brought her cosmetics purse with her and she had to walk back to the bed to fetch it. Then she found that her hands were shaking so badly she was powdering her eyes instead of her shiny nose.
Who had planted that envelope in her bag? Her maid? Five weeks earlier, greeted on the yacht on her wedding day with that 'Compete if you can!' message and the magazine article on Gisele, Olympia had believed the young Greek woman was innocent of any involvement. Now she was less naive. Only her maid had enjoyed such free access to her state room. Only her maid could have easily put anything inside her handbag. But right then the identity of Gisele's helpmate seemed relatively unimportant. It had to be Gisele who was doing this to her, didn't it? Surely Katerina could not be responsible for these photos as well?
