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Swinging her feet off the bed, she stood slowly, straightened her skirt and headed for the bathroom, sluicing her burning cheeks with cold water and dragging a brush through her tangled hair. Staring sightlessly at her reflection, she took several deep, calming breaths.
Dimitri thought he’d got her right where he wanted her. But she would prove otherwise. Always up front—what you saw was what you got?
??she would change the habits of a lifetime and learn to be as devious as he. She’d had a top-flight tutor in that regard, hadn’t she?
Useless to confront him now with what she knew. It was far too late. Pointless to repeat what Irini herself had told her, his aunt’s sly hints, or to remind him forcefully of the evidence of her own eyes and ears. The way when Irini was around, he’d always give her the undivided attention she routinely demanded—the way he’d dropped everything on that last morning, not hanging around even to share morning coffee with his wife as he always did. His avowal of love to the other woman would continually haunt her nightmares.
And other things—things that hadn’t troubled her one iota before—had fallen into place when she’d been forced to face the truth on that dreadful morning.
Their low-key wedding in the tiny village church, with only her immediate family invited to witness the event, for instance. As if he was ashamed of marrying so far beneath him and regarded the ceremony as a necessary evil, the tedious preliminary to a hopefully shortlived marriage that would provide him with what he really wanted.
Greeks made a great celebration of marriage, and in the normal course of events a man such as Dimitri Kouvaris would have wanted an almighty splash—with his aunt there, of course, and all the distant relatives Irini had spoken of, his large circle of friends and business colleagues, the press, all in admiring awestruck attendance.
Useless to confront him with what she knew—because with the heir he wanted so badly now on the horizon he would deny everything until his face turned blue. There was too much at stake for him to do anything else.
So for the next few weeks she would play it his way. Grit her teeth and fall in with the charade of starting their marriage afresh. There was too much at stake for her to do anything other. Oh, how she wished she’d come straight out with it on the night of that party—insisted that Irini repeated what she’d said in front of Dimitri. On the face of it Amanda’s advice had seemed sensible after all, she was married to a well-heeled Greek herself and would know how their minds ticked. But, oh, how she wished she hadn’t taken it!
She would have to find a way to warn her parents that their comfortable new lifestyle would soon be a thing of the past, give them time to make contingency plans. And plan her own bid for freedom—because no way was he going to take her baby from her.
If she couldn’t bear the thought of giving up the tiny life inside her now, she couldn’t begin to contemplate how very much worse it would be after the birth.
When they were back on the mainland she would be able to work on what she had to do. Transfer some of what she had always considered to be the over-the-top personal allowance he’d made her from Greece into her still open but paltry account back in England for starters.
Not that she wanted anything from him for herself. She definitely didn’t, and the thought of actually doing it turned her stomach, but for her baby’s sake she had to have some funds behind her. Enough to live frugally until the birth, until she could rebuild her career and work to keep them both.
And back in England she wouldn’t make the unthinking mistake she’d made before. She wouldn’t go near her family, but hide somewhere he’d never find her.
In the meantime she would bide her time, let him think she was willing to make a fresh start. It was the only way she could ensure that he didn’t suspect what she was planning. Besides, pulling the wool over his eyes while playing him at his own game was one way of paying him back for what he had done. Taken her heart and broken it.
She left the room and went down to find him, her head high, the welcome upsurge of renewed self-confidence momentarily smothering the pain of what was happening. It lasted until she tracked him down, hearing his voice, the tone low and warmly intimate, issuing from what turned out to be the huge airy kitchen. That upsurge of self-confidence drained away as he abruptly ended a call as soon as she entered the room, closing down his mobile and slipping it into his back pocket.
‘Maddie—’
‘Dimitri—’ How she kept her voice cool, her smile pleasant, she would never know. He looked—what? Guilty? Glittering golden eyes, a faint band of colour across those sculpted cheekbones.
‘You look so much better. Pregnancy suits you!’
‘Does it? That’s nice.’ She wandered further into the room. He’d been working at the huge central table, but the much smaller one beneath one of the open windows had been laid. Plates, a bowl of crisp salad, rolls, cold chicken and a ham.
The way he’d ended what had obviously been a highly personal conversation, judging by his intimate tone, the spattering of endearments she’d recognised in his native tongue, the call ending so abruptly at her approach, made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up on end.
‘Who were you talking to?’ She was making like a suspicious wife—but who could blame her in the dire circumstances she found herself in? ‘Irini, was it?’ Couldn’t wait to tell her the good news?’
She watched his features harden, the softness in his eyes replaced by an unhidden glint of cold anger. Noted that he didn’t answer her specific question directly. ‘I’ll never understand what you’ve got against her,’ he stated in a cool challenge. ‘Whenever she’s around you show all your prickles, close down, and when she tries to speak to you you answer in monosyllables. It upsets her. She would like to be your friend. And believe me, Maddie, she needs friends.’
So protective of the woman he loved. Her cheeks burning, she could have ripped her tongue out. She would have to watch what she said in future, especially when it concerned that woman!
She could tell him exactly what she held against Irini. Starting with that hateful conversation at that first party, when she’d told her her days as Dimitri’s wife were numbered, and why. But doing so now would put him on his guard, put her plans to leave him in jeopardy. Unfortunately, the time for coming out into the open was past.
So she simply shrugged, essayed a smile, and told him, ‘Sorry, I’ll try harder. She’s just not my cup of tea, and we’ve nothing in common. But, I don’t think we should quarrel about it, do you?’
Dimitri expelled a slow breath. He felt something warm enfold his heart, banish irritation. Did she know how adorable she looked? How the band of freckles across her pretty nose moved him to an unbearable tenderness? An almost painful hunger gripped him in a vice as he met those clear blue fathomless eyes, his heart turning over and swelling within him. Maddie, his wife, was carrying his child. Nothing would put that child at risk.
Nothing! For the sake of his child, for his child’s future happiness and security, with two parents in apparent harmony with each other, he would wipe her rejection of him from his mind. Forget it. Try to make their marriage work. And to do that, to forget what she had done and why, it must never be spoken of. That he was determined on.
He extended his hand towards her. ‘Come and eat.’ He waited, his shoulders relaxing when, after a tension-filled moment, she gave him her hand. A ghost of a frown darkened his brow as, slightly ahead of her, he led her towards the small table beneath the window. It seemed as though she was falling in with his earlier stated wishes. Making a fresh start, burying the past, wiping the word divorce from her vocabulary.
Why? Should it matter? He knew his reasons, knew they were sound. Was the news of her pregnancy her reason? Had it settled her, made her earlier behaviour appear as the nonsense it was? Or had his promise that she would want for nothing, that whatever her heart desired would be hers, been the deciding factor?
