A Shameful Consequence - By Carol Marinelli Page 0,37

He walked the beach and back, and then he did it again, did not want to go to a bed that was empty and to the dream of what was waiting for him. He thought of her there in the house, and didn’t like the comfort it brought, for he knew it could not last for long. He could hear the baby crying as he returned much later, saw her standing in the kitchen in a skimpy nightdress, waiting for a bottle to warm.

She turned and said nothing, guilt in her soul and trouble in her heart, because she could see the wretchedness inside him.

‘I thought you …’ He stopped then, because it should not merit conversation, it was no business of his how she fed her babe. ‘Goodnight, then.’

She felt quite sure she was being dismissed. She headed to the bedroom and held tight to her baby, guilty tears coming as finally she put the teat of the bottle in Leo’s mouth and he suckled eagerly. His dark eyes looking so lovingly up at her, not realising her guilt, unwitting of her failures.

Nico, she knew, would not be so easily fooled.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

AT FIRST her days had been spent dozing on the sofa—her energy seemed to have depleted along with her milk supply, and though Leo was far more content on the bottle, though there was far less for her to do, everything now seemed to exhaust her. Sometimes Connie would jump up, assuming Henry was summoning her, but gradually she learnt she didn’t have to sleep with one ear open and with Nico working all day, slowly, slowly the fog started to lift. Connie took walks in the garden, or sat at the table doing a jigsaw Despina had found when clearing the house. Despina had given her other things, too. Late one afternoon when she’d been there a week or so, she handed Connie two bags. ‘They are my niece’s. I asked for you.’

Embarrassed, Connie was about to refuse, but she was touched and grateful, too, because it was awful facing Nico in the same round of baggy clothes. He’d suggested she go shopping, had told her he’d opened her an account for her in a couple of the boutiques, but the thought of walking into a place like that, let alone Nico paying for it, had been more than enough reason to decline.

‘Thank you.’ As graciously as she could, she accepted the kind offer. Despina left the room and, after a moment, Constantine opened the bags, and realised that Despina’s niece had style and a little daring, too.

There were shorts, skirts and tops that there was surely not a hope of getting into, but she did. Even if the tops were a little tight, there were cool billowing shirts that worked well with them. There was a vivid red bikini too, which she instantly stuffed back in the bag, but it felt wonderful to pull on different clothes, so wonderful that she took a long shower and shaved her legs, pulling on shorts for the first time since she’d left Xanos. A jade halter-neck top was a welcome splash of colour—and she told herself she was not dressing for him, but still, as she glanced at the clock, she couldn’t help but smile at the time. The evenings were the best part of her day. Leo’s nightime bath was a far more relaxed affair now and then she would dress him for bed and enjoy giving him his last drink. She settled him in his cot where he would roll straight on his side and start to suck his thumb, then she would wander in the garden for a while, taking in the fragrance of wild garlic that came in from the hill behind, watching the sun slide down, and thinking how lucky she felt to be there, how grateful she was for the reprieve.

But best of all in the evenings was the sound of the seaplane.

Because it brought him home.

She loved watching it touch down and then Nico step out. Sometimes the tide was in and the jetty submerged, but the plane would take him as close as possible and he would roll up his trousers and walk barefoot. She would have to keep looking away, to pretend not to be waiting, not to be watching, when he came in.

‘How was your day?’ she asked this evening.

‘Impossible,’ Nico told her, and then pulled out the phone and gave Charlotte the next day’s orders. He’d spent the