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Momentarily his espresso rich coloured eyes darkened, before he schooled his features back to that practised smile and slipped on a pair of sunglasses.
‘Come,’ he commanded, his hand outstretched to hers. ‘We have an appointment.’
She hesitated, momentarily cast back to the feel of his touch, of his kiss from the night before. The aching realisation that their intimacy was for public display returned and she sadly took his hand, chiding herself for the errant thought that she’d wished, for a moment, for him to take her hand because...because he just wanted to.
He led her up the gently sloping street, past restaurants and shops selling everything from ceramic masks of Greek mythology with impressive swirling beards, to leather sandals, and Grecian-style dresses of turquoise, white and fuchsia. The bright vibrancy was infectious and soon smoothed away most of the exhaustion from the night before.
She was thankful, as the heat of the sun began to warm the streets, that she had determinedly chosen her clothing from her new wardrobe. The wide-cut tan linen palazzo trousers and white T-shirt, more fitted that she would usually have worn, were a godsend. Loukis, too, was in linen, dark trousers and a white shirt, rolled back at the sleeves, with his jacket hooked on his finger and trailing over his shoulder. He looked every inch the charming playboy and for the first time she felt as if she might just fit in beside him.
They drew to a halt at a small building squashed between two others, one a restaurant and another selling antique books. The darkened windows looked closed to further inspection, but Loukis confidently ushered her through the door before him.
A small man who could not be any younger than eighty greeted Loukis like a long-lost friend, taking him by the arms in a deceptively strong grip and kissing both cheeks of her soon-to-be official fiancé.
A smattering of Greek filled the small room, which, as her eyes adjusted, she could see was absolutely full of the most incredible jewellery. Shafts of sunlight from the street picked out princess-cut diamonds, baguette cuts of what looked like blue tourmaline, pear-shaped rubies far outshining the cluster of tiny pearls in which they were set...it was as if she’d wandered into Aladdin’s cave.
As the two men continued to chat away, Célia’s eyes snagged on a marquise-cut diamond solitaire. A whisper of hurt wound out from her heart. It was exactly like the ring Marc had once pointed ou
t to her.
‘When I ask your father for your hand in marriage, that is the ring I will buy you.’
At the time, she’d been so overwhelmed, thought she’d been so happy, she hadn’t realised that his ‘proposal’ had been more of a statement, and that he’d put her father first. The signs had all been there, she just hadn’t wanted to see them.
‘Really?’
Loukis’s question interrupted her thoughts.
‘That is what’s caught your eye?’
‘I was just looking. You don’t like it?’
‘It’s not whether I like it, but it doesn’t quite seem like you.’
How was it that this man, who she barely knew, who she had yet to even share a bed with, seemed to know her better than Marc, with whom she had spent nearly four years?
‘What do you think would suit me best, then?’ she asked, pushing past her bruised and battered heart.
He levelled her with a gaze so considered she wanted to turn away, fearful that he might somehow divine her thoughts. Finally, as if deciding something, he took her by the shoulders and guided her to a velvet ring display on top of the counter. The old man stood behind it with an exhilarated look across his features. She was distracted by that for a moment, before looking down at the single ring held by the dark velvet folds.
‘Oh.’ She couldn’t have prevented the small sound of shock falling from her lips. It was beautiful; a thin gold band, set with bright green sapphires in a half eternity pattern. It was everything that she would have ever wanted for her engagement ring. And it was altogether too much.
The man behind the counter gently prised the ring from where it lay and gave it to Loukis, gesturing for him to present it to his fiancée.
‘I’m sure it won’t...’
She trailed off as Loukis took her hand in his, his thumb unfurling her ring finger, smoothing away the slight tremors she felt across her skin, and slid the exquisite piece down to where it fitted, perfectly at the base of her finger.
She looked up at him then. She shouldn’t have, but she couldn’t resist. The look in his eyes, the dark promise, the undercurrent of something more than just an agreed upon fake relationship, shocking them both.
CHAPTER SEVEN
AS LOUKIS EXITED the shop, he tried to ignore the residual feelings that had been brought on the moment he slipped the engagement ring onto Célia’s finger. For a man who had been determined to avoid such a thing ever happening, he put it down to the fact he was going against his very nature. Rather than the fact that for a moment, in the shop, Célia had seemed utterly vulnerable. Without artifice or defence, her expressive amber eyes had contained too much. Had communicated too much.
He grasped her hand and placed his arm around her shoulders, persevering through the flinch he had expected, and settled her into his side, careless of the other pedestrians trying to rush around them in their haste.
He felt her head scan to one side, then the next, as much as he saw it from his peripheral vision, given that she barely reached his shoulder.
‘What are you looking for?’ he asked, curious.
