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“I’m usually travelling, staying in a hotel. They decorate.”

“You travel that much?” She glanced at him as he nodded. “What about family?”

“They’re in Athens.”

“You don’t spend Christmas with them?”

“Sometimes.”

She frowned.

“You think that’s strange?”

“I mean, yes. It is strange. Christmas is a time of year when people get together with their families, even if they don’t really like them,” she added, wrinkling her nose. “Is that it? Do you not like them?”

His laugh was a short bark of laughter. “They’re my family.”

“Which tells me nothing.”

“It’s complicated.”

She was silent for long enough for him to ask the next question.

“You can’t understand, because you are close to your family?”

Her lips tugged in an involuntary smile as she thought of home. “Yes.” She looked across at him, her heart thumping so loud she was surprised he didn’t hear it. “You’re happy with the direction we’re going in?”

“It looks like Christmas,” he said, as though he had no concept of what that actually meant.

She expelled a breath of relief. “Okay. I’m so glad. I really hoped you’d like it.”

“You’re doing me a favour, remember?”

“Yeah, but…I want her to be happy,” she admitted, her sympathy enlivened by the picture he’d painted of the grief-stricken girl he’d been left in charge of. “She’s home Friday?”

“Yes.”

“Would it be okay for me to talk to her then, about her room? See if she has any thoughts on what she might like?” And before he could answer, she rushed on. “I’ll be gentle. I told you, I’ve got nieces her age. I know it can be a sensitive time, even without all the…grief she’s been through.”

Dimitrios stared down at her for what felt like an age, and she held her breath, wondering if she’d overstepped.

“I can’t tell you how grateful I’d be for that,” he said, finally. “Can I start showing you my appreciation with dinner?”

Dinner hadn’t really been his idea. Jane had come to him that morning to ask if Chloe would be eating in her room, or with him, and Dimitrios had realized there was a tangly knot he had to unravel. For most contractors or staff, it was simple. They were treated like the rest of his employees—housed in the staff wing of the manor, eating in the kitchens there, left to their own devices. But something about Chloe’s being here was more personal. She’d moved mountains to help him. She was doing him a favour—albeit whilst being paid handsomely. But more than that, she seemed to want to roll up her sleeves and help with Ellie, and that was something he couldn’t put a price on.

He just knew he was desperate, and she was willing, and that was enough.

And so he’d sent word to Jane to have a room made up for Chloe in the family wing of the house, and notified her that yes, of course Chloe would be eating with him. It had all been so easy to arrange when it was a simple academic equation.

But now that they were standing so close he could smell her sweet vanilla fragrance in the air, it suddenly seemed stupid to encourage physical closeness.

Physical closeness? Get a grip. It was just dinner.

“Dinner would be great,” she said, smiling up at him in a way that made his gut tighten. “I’m starving.”

“Have you eaten today?” His voice emerged sharper than he’d intended.

“There was food,” she said, waving a hand through the air. “But I didn’t want to stop.”