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Her spoon scraped against her empty bowl, and she quickly put it down. That told her, she thought, fighting a betraying flush of colour as he let his gaze drift dismissively past her to the Aegean.
‘It can’t be validated. For that to happen we need to be seen together. As a couple. Help people leap to the right conclusion.’
A couple.
Shaken by his words, she stared at him mutely. So, this was it: this was the reality of what she had agreed to back in London. Only she wasn’t sure she was ready. Wasn’t sure she would ever be ready.
‘And how do we do that?’ she asked.
His gaze narrowed across the table. ‘The usual way.’
Remembering the last time he had used those words, she turned her head slightly. But she could only look away for so long and, folding her hands out of sight under the table in case they trembled, she met his gaze.
He stared back at her steadily, and she couldn’t stop herself from devouring his hard, arrogant beauty. The high sweep of his cheekbones, his straight nose...and that mouth. His beautiful sensual mouth that she knew could curl into a smile no mortal woman could resist...
But he wasn’t smiling now. ‘We’ll take the launch over to one of the other islands. We can have a look at some temples...do some shopping. Then grab some lunch.’
He made it sound so easy. Probably it would be for him. But for her...?
She felt her pulse pick up. She knew how couples behaved. London was full of them, walking hand in hand, their eyes meshed, their bodies no more than a hair’s breadth apart. Would Achileas hold her hand? Would he pull her against him as they walked? Press his mouth against hers, claiming her for all to see?
Her mind shrank back from the idea even as her body responded with a burst of shimmering electric heat that she was terrified he might sense.
She squared her shoulders. ‘I don’t think I have anything to wear.’
Now he smiled. It pressed against her skin like hot metal.
‘I thought you might say that.’ He leaned back in his seat, his astonishing blue eyes locking onto hers so forcefully that she felt as if a tide had rushed in and rolled over her, taking her out to sea.
‘That’s why I’ve arranged for a stylist to drop by with some suitable outfits. All you have to do is pick one and be ready to leave at eleven,’ he added, picking up his phone and punching in a number, his focus already on something else.
It was not a request but a demand, she thought as she walked slowly back to her room. Like every other word that came out of his mouth.
Part of her couldn’t help but admire the absolute conviction with which he lived every moment of his life. He simply didn’t acknowledge the possibility of refusal or rejection. But then why would he? From birth he had been surrounded by immutable certainties. His family’s wealth. His parents’ love. They, and his father in particular, had given him the confidence to expect, to demand what he wanted.
Chest tightening, she thought back to her own childhood, to how every single thing, every day, had seemed like a battle. Nothing had ever been easy or permanent. Always there had been that sense of sand shifting beneath her feet. The fear that if she closed her eyes when she opened them again everything would be gone.
Like when she’d come home from school that time and the sofa and television had disappeared—taken by Bill to clear a debt or cover a bet.
The sofa’s feet had left four neat circular indentations in the carpet, like miniature crop circles. No matter how often she had vacuumed over them they hadn’t faded.
Maybe they never would. Maybe they would stay there for ever. Like the scars inside her.
The scars that had kept her hiding in the shadows—scars that made it hard to trust other people, to trust herself.
Except when she made perfume. Then she was confident in her judgement.
She sighed. It was too late to worry about scars and trust. Now there was this.
There was Achileas.
And there was a ‘them’...an ‘us’. Only, unlike other couples, their relationship required a burden of proof. They needed to be seen. And so, for the first time in her life she would have to step out from the shadows and into the sunlight.
Two hours later, Effie tottered out onto the terrace, feeling like an underprepared understudy walking onstage.
It wasn’t Virginie the stylist’s fault. The dress was indisputably lovely. It was also nothing like any dress she’d ever worn before or would ever have chosen to wear. Skin-coloured, with short sleeves, and a pleated hemline that hovered above her knees. Virginie had paired it with wedge-heeled sandals.
She looked—she felt—naked.
