A Greek Escape - By Elizabeth Power Page 0,70
‘I was crying because I love you—because the whole experience for me had been so…so amazingly incredible. And because I knew—thought—you didn’t feel anything for me and that sooner or later you’d want me to go. And you did,’ she reminded him, with all the agony of the past few weeks rising up to torment her again. ‘Why? If you feel the same way I do?’
‘Because I didn’t fully realise it—or want to acknowledge it—until after you’d gone,’ he admitted, his chest lifting heavily, ‘and I didn’t want to hurt you any more than I knew I already had.’
‘And all the time you’ve been doing this…’ She pulled back from him slightly to gaze awestruck at the painting. ‘Wow! Do I really look like that?’
‘You’d better believe it,’ he said, with a sexy sidelong grin.
‘It’s brilliant. You’re a genius,’ she praised, and he laughed. ‘No, I’m serious,’ she breathed, meaning it. She couldn’t understand why, with so much talent, he hadn’t made art his career.
He made a self-deprecating sound down his nostrils when she asked him. ‘There were reasons,’ he divulged almost brokenly.
‘What reasons?’ she pressed gently, realising that it was stirring up some deeply buried pain for him to talk about it.
‘My father had other ideas for me,’ he said. ‘He wouldn’t countenance having a son who painted for a living. He thought it less than manly. We argued about it—and never stopped arguing about it.’ And now he had started pouring out his most agonising secret he couldn’t stop. ‘We were arguing about it in the car the night my mother died. If I hadn’t been determined to oppose his will he wouldn’t have kept turning round to shout at me and we would never have had the accident that killed her. I wouldn’t let up when I knew I should have, and it was my mother who ultimately paid the price. After that even the thought of painting was abominable to me. How could it be anything else?’ he suggested, his strong features ravaged by the pain he had carried all these years. ‘Knowing that she’d died because of it. Because of me!’
‘You didn’t kill her!’ Kayla exhaled, understanding now what devils had been driving him all his life to make him so hard-headed and single-mindedly determined—understanding a lot of things now. ‘You were—what? Fourteen? Fifteen? Barely more than a child! Your father was the driver. He was also an adult. It was up to him to exercise restraint until he’d stopped the car.’
‘My father didn’t see it like that,’ he relayed. Yet for the first time he found himself taking some solace from the tender arms that went around him, from the gentle yet determined reasoning in her words.
Art was feeling and feelings were weakness. His father had indoctrinated that into him. But the feelings he had for this beautiful woman—which were being unbelievably reciprocated—made him feel stronger than he had ever felt in his life.
‘This house…it’s yours, isn’t it?’ Kayla murmured, with her head against his shoulder. ‘This is where you lived when you were a boy.’
Locked in his arms, she felt the briefest movement of his strong body as he nodded. ‘It was the first time I’d been able to bring myself back here since my father died last year. The first time I’d been back—apart from visits to Philomena—in over fifteen years.’
His voice cracked as he mentioned the grandmother figure who had filled the void when he had been left motherless and without the nucleus of a loving family. Understanding, Kayla held him closer. Hadn’t she lost a grandmother too?
‘I love you,’ she whispered. It was the only thing it felt right to say just then.
He smiled down at her and her heart missed a beat when she recognised the sultry, satisfied response of the man she had fallen in love with. ‘I love you too—very much, psihi mou. We may not have got off to a very good start, but knowing you has made me see that there are more important things in life than everything I’ve been pursuing. Oh, money and position are wonderful to have, but they’re nothing without the most precious things in life—like a caring partner and a family. Without love,’ he murmured against her lips, acknowledging it indisputably now. ‘Do you think you would find it too much of a punishment to marry a company man with a briefcase and a secretary—who, incidentally, is fifty-three years old and worth her weight in gold? A man who—also incidentally—does own an island and builds eyesores for a living? Though not literally. He leaves the spade and shovel work to his minions nowadays.’
He was joking about the minions. She could hear it in his voice. But she couldn’t believe he was actually asking her to be his wife.
‘Of course if you don’t want to…’ He was looking so uncertain, so vulnerable, that she reached up and brought his head down to hers.
‘Leonidas Vassalio, of course I’ll marry you,’ she whispered smilingly, before she kissed him and felt the surge of power that trembled through his body as he caught her to him. ‘Leon…’
That’s better, his eyes said approvingly when he lifted his head, and the gleam in their dark depths promised everything that was joyous and exciting. ‘And now…’ suddenly he was sweeping her up into his arms ‘…I believe we have some unfinished business upstairs.’
Much later, after he’d gone to make some coffee, Kayla was surprised when he returned almost immediately.
‘Your cell phone is bleeping,’ he told her, handing over her bag, and she was alarmed to see the display on her phone showing half a dozen missed calls—all from Josh.
‘Lorna’s in hospital,’ she told Leonidas when she’d finished speaking to her friend’s husband. ‘She was rushed in for a Caesarean section this afternoon but everything’s OK.’ She was laughing and crying as she added, ‘Both mother and daughter are doing well!’
‘Thank heaven for that!’ he expressed, with his hand against his robed chest, looking as thrilled and almost as relieved as Kayla felt. ‘This means we have to get a move on if we want to catch up with Josh and Lorna—particularly if you’re going to fill my island with dogs and horses and babies, Mrs Vassalio. It’s in the Bahamas, by the way. And at this exact moment I can’t do too much to fulfil your dreams with the first two things on your wish-list, but I can certainly do something right now about fulfilling the last!’
Later, lying in his arms, Kayla stirred and stretched contentedly.
He’s a good man, Philomena had tried to tell her, and Kayla knew that now. She also knew that as men came—company or otherwise—they didn’t come any better.
All the characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author, and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all the incidents are pure invention.
All Rights Reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Enterprises II BV/S.à.r.l. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, storage in an information retrieval system, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the prior consent of the publisher in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
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First published in Great Britain 2013
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of Harlequin (UK) Limited.
Harlequin (UK) Limited, Eton House, 18-24 Paradise Road,
Richmond, Surrey TW9 1SR
© Elizabeth Power 2013
eISBN: 978-1-472-00209-9
Table of Contents
Excerpt
About the Author
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Copyright
Table of Contents
Excerpt
About the Author
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Copyright
Table of Contents
Excerpt
About the Author
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Copyright