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When Siena’s breaths had evened out and he knew she was alseep Andreas carefully took his arms from around her, noting as he did so that not one night since she’d come back had they slept apart. He got out of bed and pulled on a pair of loose sweats and walked out of the bedroom.
He went into the drawing room and spent a long time looking out of the window. Until he could see the faintest smudge of dawn light in the sky. The knowledge resounded inside him that he couldn’t keep fighting it.
Then he went into his study and opened his safe and took out a small box. He sat down and opened it and looked at it for a long time. For the first time since he’d met Siena again the dull ache of need and the emotions she caused within him seemed to dissipate.
Eventually he
pulled out a drawer and put the box in it, a sense of resolve filling his belly. It was the same sense he’d felt when he’d laid eyes on Siena for the first time in five years, except this time the resolve came with a lot of fear, and not a sense of incipient triumph.
He had to acknowledge, ruefully, that he’d felt many things in the last tumultuous couple of months, and triumph had figured only fleetingly.
A week later
It was Friday evening and Siena was leaving work. Andreas’s driver was waiting for her outside the office and she got into the back of the car. Andreas had called earlier to say he’d been held up in Paris, asking if she would come to meet him if he arranged transport. Siena had said yes.
So now she was being taken to his private plane, which would take her to Paris. Trepidation filled her. She wasn’t sure what it would be like to be in Paris with Andreas now… He’d been in a strange mood all week. Monosyllabic and yet staring at her intensely if she caught him looking. It made her nervous, and Siena had a very poisonous suspicion that perhaps Andreas wasn’t quite done with torturing her. Perhaps he was going to call time on their relationship in Paris, where it had all started?
And yet the other night he’d surprised her by asking her abruptly why she loved the birdcage necklace so much. She’d answered huskily that to her it symbolised freedom. She’d felt silly, and Andreas hadn’t mentioned it again.
At night, when they’d made love, it had felt as if there was some added urgency. Siena had felt even more shattered after each time. Last night she’d been aghast to realise she’d been moved to tears, and had quickly got up to go to the bathroom, terrified Andreas would notice…
Siena knew she wouldn’t be able to take it for much longer. Being with Andreas was tearing her apart. Perhaps Paris was the place where she should end it once and for all if he didn’t?
When she got to Paris her heart was heavy and the weather matched her mood: grey and stormy. The hotel was busy, and with a lurch Siena recognised that it must be the weekend of the debutante ball as she saw harassed-looking mothers with spoilt-looking teenagers.
Surely, she thought to herself wildly, Andreas wouldn’t be so cruel…
But then he was there, striding towards her, and everything in Siena’s world shrank to him. She was in so much trouble. He kissed her, but it was perfunctory, and with a grimace he cast a glance to the young debs and their entourages of stylists and hair and make-up people.
‘I’d forgotten the ball was this weekend…’
Relief flooded Siena and she felt a little weak.
Andreas was saying now, ‘I’ve booked dinner. We’ll leave in an hour. I just have some things to finish and I’ll meet you in the room.’
Siena went up and tried to calm her fractured nerves after seeing the debs and being back here again. Still Andreas’s mistress. She forced herself to have a relaxing bath, weary after her week in the office but still exultant to be working.
When Andreas arrived he was in a smart black suit, open shirt, and she had dressed in a gold brocade shift dress.
Solicitously Andreas took her arm and led her out to the lift, down to the lobby, and then into his car. He was so silent that Siena asked nervously, ‘Penny for them?’
He turned to look at her blankly for a second, a million miles away, and then focused. He smiled tightly. ‘Nothing important.’
He looked away again. Siena’s sense of foreboding increased.
They were taken to a new restaurant on the top floor of a famous art gallery with grand views over Paris. The Eiffel Tower was so close Siena felt as if they could touch it. They were finishing their meal before Siena realised that they’d had the most innocuous of conversations. Touching on lots, but nothing really. As if they hardly knew each other.
The bill arrived and suddenly Siena felt as if something was slipping out of her grasp. A panicky sensation gripped her, but now Andreas was standing and they were leaving… She took his hand and thought guiltily that if he didn’t say anything neither would she.
Andreas didn’t make conversation in the car on the way back—again—and Siena was quiet too, not knowing what to say in this weird, heavy silence. When they got back to the hotel one of the duty managers rushed up to Andreas with a worried look.
After a brief, terse conversation Andreas turned to Siena, ‘One of the guests at the ball has had a heart attack. I need to make sure everything is being attended to.’
Siena put a hand on his arm. ‘I’ll come with you if you like?’
Andreas looked at her and his eyes seemed to blaze with something undefinable. But then he said, ‘No, you should go to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.’
