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Her eyes widened. ‘What?’
‘You’ve been mulling since your parents agreed to the sale. So? You’re not happy about this after all?’
‘I’m very happy for them,’ she promised softly, looking at her studio as salvation now. ‘You’ll do excellent things with it, I’m sure.’
His displeasure was obvious, but she stepped out of the car before he could respond, saying goodbye through the slightly ajar door then closing it and walking quickly away, towards her own Epíneio—the studio.
She leaned against the doors once she’d entered, eyes closed, breathing in deeply.
Everything was going from bad to worse. The boundaries she’d wanted to keep in place were all over the place, and worst of all, her heart couldn’t stay out of things. She pushed up from the door and went past her friends’ studio spaces to the back, where her own area was, and sat on the stool with a frown on her face, staring at the landscape of Epíneio.
She loved it. Not just the painting, but also the island. It was—
A noise caught her attention and she looked up just as Alex strode in, his features grim. ‘You forgot this.’ He held up her phone.
She swore softly. Alex’s being here was an invasion she hadn’t counted on. This was her private space, too intimate for him to see. Too revealing. Anxiously, her eyes shifted to the painting of him, which only served to draw his attention to it, so he followed her gaze and then stood completely still, his expression inscrutable.
‘When did you do this?’ he asked, eventually, moving closer to the enormous canvas with its striking likeness.
She compressed her lips, the walls closing in on her as the answer seemed likely to give away so much more than she wanted to.
‘Tessa?’ Sensing it was important, he didn’t let her get away with not answering. ‘When?’
‘After that night,’ she said, and he closed his eyes in response.
‘I see.’ He took another few steps nearer. Her sense of vulnerability increased. ‘While you were seeing him?’
She shook her head. ‘Does it matter?’
‘Why do you have this here?’ He moved closer. ‘Why do you have a huge painting of me in your studio?’ He turned back to it incredulously. ‘Why do I look as though I’m laughing at you?’
His words lashed her, but she couldn’t help the small simmer of pride at having accomplished what she’d set out to with the work. ‘It’s just a painting.’
His eyes bored into hers and for a moment she wondered if he was going to pursue this, but then he expelled a sigh and turned his back on it.
‘Shall I wait for you?’
‘No, no,’ she murmured, feigning distraction. ‘I could be hours. You go...home.’
He cast the painting one more contemplative glance before leaving.
She added touches to the landscape, but mostly she just stared at it, and remembered. The sunlight on her back, sand underfoot, the simplicity of life on Epíneio, before she’d realised she loved him; again. Still? Making love in the water, on the pool deck, in their bedroom.
A lump formed in her throat. Their bedroom. On Epíneio, it really had felt like a shared home, a shared vision.
She worked until the light was gone and then decided she couldn’t delay any longer, locking up the studio and moving outside. Just as she was going to hail a cab, she saw headlights across the street and her heart did a funny little patter.
‘You waited?’ she asked as Alex stepped out of the car.
‘I had some calls to make. It was no trouble.’
‘Uh-huh.’ Just like that, the small shimmy of pleasure faded, because he’d stayed only because it was perfectly convenient for him to do so. Don’t read into it, was the subtext.
Her stomach squeezed uncomfortably as he came around to the passenger side and opened the door for her. Out of nowhere, she wished this was a motorbike, not a car, and that instead of sliding into a sumptuous leather seat she was curling up behind him, arms wrapped around his waist.
On Epíneio she’d felt unconstrained, the rules of the relationship she’d established out of self-preservation had fallen by the wayside, and she’d allowed herself to feel everything without boundaries, without rules. And Alex? What had he felt?
She frowned, the light seeming to dull a little.
