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But after a steak sandwich and the most expens- ive half-bottle of claret on the menu Jade felt a good deal better, good enough to find herself whis- tling a little tune as she hurled herself under the duvet, wearing her best pair of black cami-knickers, and the flimsy little top which accompanied it- just dying for the opportunity of fighting Constantine off when he came in from dinner.
Her next recollection was waking up at mid- morning and throwing on a matching black satin wrap to wander mid-yawn into the drawing-room, her hand raking back through the tousled blonde disarray of her hair to find Constantine, fully and immaculately dressed, as though he was going to an appointment in the city.
And Jade couldn’t help the powerful pang which wrenched at her heart at the sudden and utterly devastating sight of him first thing in the morning.
The olive face was impassive, the black eyes se- cretive, but there was no mistaking the flash of hunger which lit them as they alighted on her semi- clothed state. ‘Good morning. You slept well, I trust?’
Was that a twitch of amusement she saw at the corners of his mouth? She found herself wanting to demand what time he’d come in, why he hadn’t come in to… oh, for heaven’s sake, was she mad!
‘Very well, thank you.’
‘I’ve rung for some coffee.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘I’m afraid that I shan’t be able to join you, as I have a meeting to attend.’
Jade shrugged, feigning nonchalance, trying to convince herself that if he had joined her she’d be eager for him to be away. He was just using subtle psychology, that was all, probably following that old adage—what was it they said? ‘Treat them mean, and keep them keen’. Well, he was in for a shock if he thought she was going to fall for that one!
He left minutes later, and Jade was left to fill up her day. In the event she had a wonderful day. All the time she’d lived in London and she’d never even been to St Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, the Tower…so she set off sightseeing with a vengeance.
But when she arrived back in the suite at just after four o’clock it was to find Constantine waiting for her, pacing the floor like an expectant father and resembling a caged panther even more strongly. As the door closed behind her, she saw the two big hands clench beside the muscular shafts of his thighs, the knuckles white, as though it were only through the most supreme effort that he didn’t physically manhandle her.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ he demanded, before she’d barely closed the door behind her.
Jade knew enough about people to know when they had reached the end of their tether. ‘Sightsee- ing,’ she answered, frowning.
‘Sightseeing?’ He made it sound as though it warranted a gaol sentence. Black eyebrows knitted together in two formidable dark slashes. ‘How?’
‘Well, first you buy your ticket, and then you—’
‘Silence!’ he bellowed. ‘I mean—how did you get there?’
Jade stared back in confusion. ‘Well, by Tube, of course!’
He swore long and profoundly in his native tongue; incomprehensible to Jade, but it wasn’t difficult to get his drift. ‘You little fool!’ he ground out in English, just in case she’d missed the message.
Jade looked up at him, her green eyes troubled. He sounded seriously worried. ‘What have I done?’ she asked in confusion—had she forgotten to pull the door shut? Had the suite been burgled while she’d been out?
He shook his head impatiently. ‘Do you not re- alise that, as my fiancee, you are now the target for all kinds of lunatics?’
‘What,’ she ventured, ‘exactly are you talking about?’
‘I am talking about kidnap!’ he emphasised harshly, then nodded grimly as he saw her wide- eyed look. ‘Yes. It happens. Your clothes were here, and you were… I thought…’ His face blackened with a terrifying rage again. ‘In future you will use the car and the driver I have provided for you. Do you understand?’
She’d never seen a man so angry before; he was almost shaking with it. It was frightening to see someone who she had imagined to have an un- breakable control, to be that close to losing it com- pletely. And he was intelligent enough for his fears to have some rational explanation to them, rather than just the nebulous fears of the over-cautious. Jade found a wave of sympathy washing over her as she registered the sharply defined lines which divided the very rich from the ordinary person. A life haunted by the threat of abduction. She might resent him for forcing her into marriage, yes, but not enough to send him over the edge.
‘I should have left a note,’ she said quietly. ‘I won’t do that again.’ Then, to divert him, ‘Shall we have some tea—I’m absolutely parched?’
He stared at her for a long, long moment, and then some spark fired at the depths of the coal- black eyes, something very like reluctant humour lifted one corner of his mouth.
‘Tea?’ he echoed faintly.
With equal reluctance, Jade smiled back. She could get quite used to seeing him look ever so slightly nonplussed, she thought. ‘Yes, tea,’ she reiterated. ‘And if you spare me your “you English and your tea”, speech, then I won’t tell you that Greek coffee has the consistency of mud!’
He laughed then. ‘But that’s not true, is it, Jade? As I recall, you loved Greek coffee—’
She quickly turned away to pretend to look out of the window, afraid to speak, shaken with a strange, debilitating sadness and precariously close to tears at the intimate sound of that simple little memory. It was also, she realised, the first time she’d heard him laugh since the magical time they’d spent together on the island, when he hadn’t seemed to stop laughing. In fact, he had marvelled about it at the time—that she had the ability to make him laugh, almost… as though that in itself were a rare commodity.
‘I’ll go and freshen up,’ she said hastily, grateful that he said nothing, but aware of his watchful eyes on her retreating back.
When Jade went back out into the sitting-room, the tray of tea had arrived, and Constantine was stretched out in one of the armchairs, his eyes closed. His long legs were elegantly sprawled in front of him and there were lines of fatigue etched deep on the craggy features. Just for that one brief moment she was reminded of her own father; a million years away from Constantine in lifestyle perhaps, but looking similarly exhausted as he battled to earn the kind of money which would support the spending habits of his extravagant wife. A battle he had finally lost.
