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‘The baby wasn’t mine. I don’t know who fathered the baby she was carrying at the time of her death.’ His handsome mouth twisted. ‘By then we hadn’t shared a bed for a long time.’
‘I wish you’d shared this with me sooner.’ Bee was still struggling to accept his wounding admission of how much he had loved Krista, for she had convinced herself that Sergios didn’t know how to love a woman. Now she was finding out different and it hurt her pride.
‘I’ve always felt guilty that Krista died. I should’ve been able to do more to help her.’
‘How could you when she wouldn’t accept that her condition needed treatment?’ Bee prompted quietly as she got into bed and rested back against the pillows. ‘Didn’t her parents have any influence over her?’
‘She was an adored only child. They were incapable of telling her no and they refused to recognise the gravity of her problems. Ultimately they blamed me for her unhappiness.’
Striding restively about the room, his stunning eyes bleak with distressing memories and his strong jaw line clenched, he finally told her what his life had been like with Krista. When he came home to the apartment he had shared with his late wife in Athens back then he had never known what would greet him there. Violent disputes and upsetting scenes were a daily occurrence, as were his wife’s periods of deep depression. Krista had done everything from shopping to partying to excess. On various occasions he had found her in bed with other men and high as a kite on the illegal drugs that she was convinced relieved her condition better than the proper medication. Staff walked out, friends were offended, the apartment was trashed and valuable objects were stolen. For three long years as he struggled to care for his deeply troubled wife Sergios had lived a life totally out of his own control and the love he had started out with had died. Bee finally understood why he had been so determined to have a businesslike marriage, which demanded nothing from him but financial input. He had put everything he had into his first marriage and it had still failed miserably. Krista had betrayed him and hurt him and taught him to avoid getting too deeply attached to anyone.
‘Now you know why I never mention her,’ Sergios murmured ruefully, sliding into bed beside her. ‘I let her down so badly.’
‘Krista was ill. You should forgive her and yourself for everything that went wrong,’ Bee reasoned. ‘You did your best and that’s the most that anyone can do.’
Eyes level, Sergios lifted a hand and traced the full curve of her lower lip with a considering fingertip. ‘You always say the right thing to make people feel better.’
&
nbsp; Insanely conscious of his touch as she was, her heart was galloping and her mouth had run dry. ‘Do I?’ she asked gruffly.
‘When Paris asked you if his mother was in heaven you said yes even though you know she was an atheist, moli mou.’
‘She still could have made it there in the end,’ Bee reasoned without hesitation. ‘Paris was worrying about it. I wanted him to have peace of mind.’
‘I should’ve told you about Krista a long time ago but I hate talking about her—it feels wrong.’
‘I understand why now and naturally you want to be loyal to her memory.’ Melita’s name was on the tip of her tongue but she could not bring herself to destroy that moment of closeness with suspicion and potential conflict. That conversation about Krista was quite enough for one evening.
‘So sweet, so tactful…’ Sergios leant closer, his breath fanning her cheek, and pried her lips apart with the tip of his tongue. With one kiss he could make her ache unbearably for the heat and hardness of his body.
‘Someone round here has to be,’ she teased, her breath rasping in her throat.
His tongue explored her tender mouth in an erotic foray and her nipples tingled into prominence. Desire slivered through her then, sharp as a blade. He freed her of the silk nightdress, cupping her breasts with firm hands, stroking the prominent pink crests with ravishing skill. She gasped beneath his mouth as he found the heated core of her and he made a sound of deep masculine satisfaction when he discovered how ready she was.
He turned her round and rearranged her, firm hands cupping her hips as he plunged into her velvety depths with irresistible force and potency. He growled with pleasure above her head and pulled her back hard against him as he slowly rotated his hips to engulf her in an exquisite wash of sensation. While he pumped in and out of her he teased her clitoris with expert fingers. A soul-shattering climax gripped Bee as the tightening knot of heat inside her expanded and then exploded like a blazing star. Shaking and sobbing with pleasure, she fell back against him, weak as a kitten and drained of every thought and feeling.
‘Go to sleep,’ Sergios urged then, both arms still wrapped round her damp, trembling body. ‘You’ll exhaust yourself fretting about Eleni tomorrow.’
That he should know her so well almost made her laugh but she was too tired to find amusement in anything. Worry about Melita and Eleni and the passion had exhausted her and she fell heavily asleep.
* * *
Her first night back in London, Bee spent with her mother, who was both excited and apprehensive about her approaching move to Greece. Eleni was admitted to hospital the next morning. Both a nurse and the surgeon had talked Bee through every step of the entire procedure, which was likely to take less than an hour to complete, but Bee remained as nervous as a cat on hot bricks on Eleni’s behalf, particularly because the little girl was too young to be prepared for the discomfort that might follow the surgery.
‘We’ve already discussed all this,’ Sergios reminded Bee firmly, very much a rock in the storm of her concern and anxiety. ‘There is very little risk attached to this procedure and she will recover quickly from it. It may not improve her hearing but she is falling so far behind with her speech that it is worth a try.’
Cradling Eleni’s solid little body in her lap with protective arms, Bee blinked back tears that embarrassed her for she had long since decided that surgery was currently the best treatment available. ‘She’s just so little and trusting.’
‘Like you were when you married me,’ Sergios quipped with a rueful grin, startling her with that light-hearted sally. ‘You really didn’t have a clue what you were signing up for but it hasn’t turned out too bad for you, has it?’
‘Ask me that in a year’s time,’ Bee advised, in no mood to stroke his ego.
‘What a very begrudging response when I’m trying so hard to be the perfect husband!’ he mocked.
Bee looked up at his handsome face and felt her heart leap like a dizzy teenager’s. The perfect husband? Since when? And why? She had made no complaints, so it could not be her he was trying to influence. Most probably he was trying to please his grandfather, who was openly keen to see his only surviving grandson settling down with a family. But she didn’t want Sergios putting on an act purely to impress Nectarios. Anything of that nature was almost certain to make Sergios feel deprived of free choice and she did not want their marriage to feel like an albatross hanging round his neck.
Bee accompanied Eleni to the very doors of the operating theatre and then waited outside with Sergios. He had taken the whole day off, which really surprised her. It was true that he stepped out several times to make and receive phone calls and that a PA brought documents for his signature, but it was so unusual for him to put work second that she was very appreciative of his continuing support.
