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‘Thank you for your help in organising this.’
‘It was nothing. I’ll leave you for a moment.’
Apollo walked away and Sophy could see her own funeral limousine and then Apollo’s blacked-out SUV. The drivers were talking. Apollo was standing at a respectable distance to give her some time. A gesture that made her feel surprisingly emotional.
She turned her back on him and said a few silent words to Sasha. The last few weeks she’d had to think about a lot of things and her relationship with her sister had been one of them. There was a certain sense of liberation now, but as much as that made Sophy feel guilty, she was also sad that it had had to come at the cost of her sister’s life.
Her parents were buried in the same graveyard and Sophy walked the short distance to where they rested in their own plot, laying a flower on their grave.
Then she steeled herself to face Apollo. She turned around, aware of her sober black suit. It was actually the same skirt and shirt she’d been wearing the night she’d met him, and a black jacket. She’d put her hair up in a bun. She felt plain and unvarnished next to his effortless good looks when she walked towards him, where he stood under a tree.
She couldn’t see his eyes but she could feel them on her and her skin prickled. She stopped a couple of feet away. He straightened up from the tree.
‘Was the other grave your parents?
??’
She nodded.
Then he said, ‘Can we go somewhere to talk?’
The thought of being alone with him when she felt so raw made her blurt out, ‘We can talk here.’
Apollo shuddered visibly. ‘If it’s okay with you, I’ve seen enough of graveyards to last me a lifetime.’
She felt a pang in her heart; so had she, come to think of it. She feigned nonchalance. ‘Fine...where were you thinking?’
‘My apartment in London, it’s private.’
Where she’d gone with him the night they’d made love. A penthouse apartment at the top of a glittering exclusive building. The last place she should go with him, but suddenly the lure of seeing him again, however briefly, was too seductive.
‘Okay.’
He stepped back and put out a hand for her to precede him to his car. He spoke with the other driver, who left. Sophy got into the SUV.
The journey into town was taken in silence, apart from a couple of phone calls Apollo made. Presumably to do with work. She wondered about Krisakis, how the resort was shaping up. A place she’d never see again.
They pulled up outside Apollo’s apartment building and Sophy recognised it. It was bitter-sweet to have her memory back.
The driver opened her door and Sophy got out. Apollo was already standing on the pavement. Tall and gorgeous. Drawing appreciative glances from passers-by. Men and women.
Before, Sophy would have looked at Apollo and compared herself as someone who would fade into the background but she knew she had to stop taking on that role. The one she’d played with Sasha, allowing Sasha to be the noticeable one.
She was never going to set the world alight but she could own her own space in a way she had never done before.
She walked ahead of Apollo into the building, through the door opened by the doorman. She could remember being here the first time, feeling so awed and excited. Tingling all over. Nervous. She felt as if she’d grown an age since that wide-eyed girl.
Virgin.
The lift took a few seconds and then they were stepping out into the grandeur that Sophy remembered. Lots of glass and plush carpets. Oriental rugs. Massive paintings on the walls. Sleek coffee tables with hardback tomes showing beautiful pictures of Greece and house interiors.
Of course, it had been dark outside the first time she’d been here and now it was bright daylight. And, in fairness, she’d only been interested in looking at one thing. Apollo.
He turned to her now. He’d already shrugged off his jacket and was loosening his tie. ‘Can I get you tea, or coffee?’
Sophy held her bag in front of her. ‘Just some water, please.’
He disappeared and came back a few minutes later holding a glass of water for her and a small cup of coffee for himself. He gestured around them. ‘Please, make yourself comfortable.’
