She was lithe and graceful; always had been. They moved together in perfect fluidity, and Nick began to enjoy dancing with her far too much.
“You look beautiful tonight,” he said formally.
“And you look handsome.”
The compliments were clunkers, spoken on automatic pilot. Awkwardness and tension built between them. Helena’s expression, underneath the social smile, was miserable. Did she hate him that much?
Regret sliced into him. Once, he could have sworn she’d loved him. Once, she’d been his and the future had looked golden, stretching ahead of them like one long holiday. Until the afternoon on Santorini when he’d gone back to the freighter to help with the provisioning. He’d been scheduled to rejoin the ship in the morning.
His superior officer had asked if he’d had a nice vacation. In an odd tone.
Oblivious, Nick spread his arms wide and grinned. “Of course. How could I have a bad one? We’re on Santorini and I’m in love!”
His boss had taken Nick aside. He could still see the man clearly as he stood in his office on board. Franco was a small, portly man with sparse, graying hair, a nose like a button and a thick, coarse, silvery mustache that resembled a scrub brush.
“Sit down, Pappas.”
Nick sat. “Is something wrong, sir?”
“That all depends upon how you look at it.”
“Sir?”
“Pappas, what do you know about the girl you’ve been romancing?”
Nick stiffened. “I don’t see how that’s—”
“You’re right.” Franco overrode him. “It wouldn’t normally be my business. However, she’s Elias Stamos’s daughter.”
Nick stared at him. “The shipping magnate?”
Franco nodded. “The man who signs your paycheck. And mine. Very protective of his girls. Do you understand?”
But Nick barely heard his words. His thoughts flew back to the night when he’d asked Helena, half kidding, if she were related to Elias. They’d been on the beach at Mykonos that evening, drinking wine and kissing in the moonlight.
She’d laughed easily. Stamos is a very common name, Nikolas…. And she’d headed for the water, looking like temptation itself. He’d followed, and that had been the very first night they’d made love, in the tiny little room they’d rented, with blue and white furniture.
Nick blinked at his boss. If that had been heaven, then this had to be the gateway to hell. He had a ring in his pocket for her, had planned to propose that very night. And she’d lied to him about her identity.
“Pappas, do you hear what I’m saying? If you’re smart, you’ll end this affair. Now.”
“Sir, with all due respect, this is my personal life,” Nick said evenly.
“In this case, it’s also your professional one. And mine. If you’re smart, you won’t mix the two.”
“Thank you for your concern, sir,” Nick said between gritted teeth. His thoughts went haywire. How could Helena have lied to him? Had she just been having a fling at his expense? The shipping princess, slumming it with the deckhand?
Franco sighed. “Pappas. I know this isn’t easy to hear. It’s not easy for me to say. I don’t enjoy it. But you’re a fine young man, and I’d hate to see your future ruined. Take my advice. Forget about this girl. Work hard in the navy. Study. And learn to take orders a little better, eh? You like to do things your own way, I see that. But let that come later. Learn the rules before you break them. All right?”
Nick stared at him stonily. “Am I dismissed, sir?”
His boss nodded, his eyes full of understanding that Nick could do nothing but resent. “Dismissed.”
NOW HE STOOD in the moonlight again with the boss’s daughter. He was a captain now, not a deckhand, but it made no difference. All of the shiny buttons on his dress uniform were nothing but brass.
They didn’t hold a candle to the flawless emeralds in her ears or anything else in her jewelry box. Top brass had nothing on royalty, and to Nick, Helena was royalty.
He’d never confronted her about what he’d learned, which was unlike him. He’d simply been too stunned. He’d made love to her one last time in the little bed, pretending that everything was fine.
“Is something bothering you, Nikolas?” she had asked.
“No, agape mou,” he’d lied. Because he still hadn’t made up his mind to walk away. He hadn’t bought an engagement ring lightly.
But in the small hours of the morning, as he’d watched her sleep, he’d at last come reluctantly to a decision. Even if she wasn’t playing him, slumming for fun, he couldn’t marry someone who’d deliberately hidden her identity from him. And the daughter of Elias Stamos, a billionaire, wouldn’t have him, anyway. It was out of the question.
He could have woken her. Could have gotten some kind of explanation. Could have said goodbye. But instead he’d moved silently around the tiny room, gathering his things into his ancient duffel bag. She hadn’t stirred once.
He’d stood gazing at her; almost changed his mind. Then he’d bent and kissed her lightly on the lips before leaving for good.
SO WHAT WAS HE DOING with her in his arms tonight? Torturing himself? Trying to relive the past? All he knew was that he didn’t want her to hate him, as she seemed to.
“Tell me about your work, Helena,” he prompted. “What’s it like? How do you even begin to design costumes for every last actor in a production?”
She shrugged slightly. “I talk with the director first, to make sure we’re on the same page. I find out what his or her vision is. And then I begin to think of designs, fabrics and details that will distinguish each character but still contribute to an overall ‘feel’ for the project. I make sketches and then complete illustrations of how I see the character. I meet with the director again and incorporate any suggestions or changes. Then I start choosing fabrics and making patterns.”
“You do it all yourself?”
“I create the patterns myself. I have help with the cutting and sewing.”
“You love what you do—I can tell from your voice.”
She nodded. “I do love it. There are challenges, as with every job. Sometimes a design may be utterly unsuited to a particular actor or he may interpret his role very differently from the way I do. In that case, we have to fall back and regroup. Then there are always adjustments and issues, right up until opening night. After that, I can relax and let assistants handle anything that comes up during the stage run—unless it’s a film. Then I have to be on set almost constantly.”
“I admire you,” Nick said. “I don’t have a creative bone in my body.”
She looked up at him with a small smile. “You might be surprised. Creativity is mostly problem solving. The rest is just skill and practice. I would assume that you problem-solve every day.”
He nodded slowly. “I can’t even draw a stick man, though.”
“You could if you studied it. I promise. It’s just a different way of seeing.”
They fell silent for a few beats, and Nick enjoyed the feel of her in his arms.
Then she asked, “So what do you like the most about your job?”
“Being on the water and in constant motion,” Nick said. “I’m a Gypsy at heart, just like you. And I like meeting all sorts of different people. The paperwork—that I could do without.” He chuckled.
Helena had begun to relax slightly but now he felt tension work its way back into her shoulders and her posture. He wondered why.
Her mouth quivered and her next question came after what was clearly a great internal struggle. “Nick…what did you do to earn your captain’s hat?”
He misunderstood. “I spent ten years in the navy, piloting every kind of vessel. I worked damn hard and studied for hours every night. I learned proper etiquette in my nonexistent spare time. And I never doubted that one day I’d have my own ship.”
“I know…you told me you would, the first time we met.” Her dark eyes held some emotion he couldn’t quite read. Regret? Suspici
on? Condemnation?
He studied her, trying to comprehend it. And then he realized that he’d answered her question literally, when she’d asked it with a double meaning. Suddenly he understood why she’d struggled.
She was asking if it was coincidence that they’d met aboard her father’s freighter, that he’d suddenly put an end to their relationship and disappeared, and now fifteen years later he was in command of one of Elias’s ships….
His jaw tightened and he almost left her on the dance floor.
“I did not earn it by walking away from the daughter of Elias Stamos,” he said icily.
She searched his eyes, her own full of old hurt and suspicion. “Nick, I’m so sorry, but I had to ask. I love my father, but I do know what he’s capable of. He doesn’t mean to do harm, but…”
Nick glared back at her. “Did you really think so little of me?”
Her lips trembled. “I didn’t know what to think of you, Nikolas. You left without a word. I woke up and you were gone. I imagined all sorts of things, every possible scenario.”
“You shouldn’t have imagined that one.” His tone was harsher than he meant it to be, but even now, after so long, he was hurt.
She looked away. “Then truly, I’m sorry. But I still don’t know what to think of you, Nikolas. You’re an enigma.”
“And you’re a riddle.” He tossed the comment back at her.
“Meaning we both need answers?”
He paused for a moment. “Something like that.”
The music continued and other couples whirled by, but the two of them were silent. At last the song ended and Helena pulled away. “I’m going to go back to my room. I just don’t feel comfortable here with you.”
She looked vulnerable, lost, confused.
In spite of her expert makeup, the exquisite jewels, the couture gown, she suddenly seemed much more like the girl he’d left sleeping one morning all those years ago. The careful social mask had dropped.
Though he was still insulted, he felt regret that the evening was ending this way. “Then you have my apologies.”
“Do I?” Helena asked. “I’ve waited fifteen years for them. That’s a long time.”
He could feel his jaw bunching as he looked at her. She owed him an apology. He said nothing at all.
Her chin came up. Banked hurt and pride glittered in her dark eyes. “Thank you for the dance, Nikolas. Take care.” She turned on one elegant heel and walked away.
He caught up in three smooth strides and rested his fingers lightly at the small of her back, trying not to touch her any more than necessary. “I’ll see you back to your room.”
“That’s not necessary,” she said coldly.
“To me it is. If a woman is in my care, I see to it that she gets home safely.”
She raised her eyebrows, but didn’t debate him verbally. Yet in that simple dubious expression she reminded him that he hadn’t seen her home safely on that last morning so many years ago. He’d disappeared without a note or an explanation, leaving her to wake up to an empty bed.
But she had lied to him. She’d been a princess toying with a deckhand, slumming it on a freighter for fun and a change of scene. She’d never been serious about him—he wasn’t the kind of boy she could take home to meet her family.
Yes, he could picture that scene.
Daddy, this is my boyfriend, Nick, who grew up in a three-room cottage. His father is a fisherman. He owns three shirts, two pairs of pants and a 1964 Fiat that only runs a third of the time. He’s never been to the opera, didn’t finish school and probably thinks that the Nike of Samothrace is a gym shoe….
Anger suffused Nick as he politely escorted Helena back to her penthouse suite and opened the door for her. When had she planned to tell him? Clearly, not until after she’d had her fill of how the other half lived.
She paused in the doorway, hesitated as if she were about to say something. Then she shook her head. “Thank you, Nikolas,” she said in formal tones.
He nodded stiffly. “Sleep well.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
HELENA DIDN’T SLEEP well at all, in violation of the captain’s orders. She was too conflicted about the conversation she’d had with Nick. On the one hand, she was relieved that he did have integrity. Her father hadn’t purchased his life and behavior like a bag of nuts at a bodega.
On the other hand, she was saddened even more that Nick must have tired of her after a brief but intense romance. She didn’t know what she’d done wrong.
They’d had so much fun together when they’d arranged to meet again after her freighter trip. A half summer of love. They’d gone sailing on a catamaran during the daytime, skinny-dipped in the ocean at night, shared picnics on the beach and restaurant meals on Santorini. She’d pulled him into art galleries, where he was clearly out of his element but intrigued by many pieces.
She’d sketched him while he lay on his stomach, reading an action-adventure novel. If she were honest with herself, she’d acknowledge that she still knew exactly where that sketch was, in her old college art portfolio. She’d never taken it out again to look at it, but she hadn’t ripped it up, either.
There in the dark, surrounded by nothing but time and thought, Helena began to weep silently, something she hadn’t done since she’d lost the baby. Her tears weren’t for the hurt she felt, but for what might have been if only Nick had given them a chance.
But he’d been a typical twenty-one-year-old male, ready to sample as many women as the world would offer up to him on a platter. He had probably moved on to someone he found more intriguing, or sexier, or just different.
She reminded herself that she’d moved on, too. Within weeks she was dating another student back at Parsons, a guy with a ponytail, a ring through his nose and a black-leather attitude. She couldn’t even remember his name now.
Since then, she’d gone out with bankers and lawyers and doctors. She’d even had a somewhat passionate affair with an Austrian chef—forced to leave him when she admitted to herself that it was mostly for the food.
And finally, Ari had come along. Or rather, he’d been pushed at her by her father.
Helena dried her eyes on a corner of the sheet and rolled over, stuffing her head under the goose-down pillow. Of all the mistakes she’d made, marrying Ari was the worst.
He was so nice. A gentleman, if not a scholar. Placid instead of volatile, like the chef. He’d treated her with deference and respect even though he was clearly eager to take things to a more intimate level.
Helena cringed. After six weeks of outings and dinners and charity events, he’d started undressing her one night. And though she felt mostly indifferent about him, somehow she didn’t want to hurt him. He was just so nice.
And so she’d given herself to him and made him happy beyond belief.
How could she have done it? When she thought about it now, it hadn’t been kind. The kindest thing she could have done was to tell him after that first dinner that it would never work out between them.
Hindsight is twenty/twenty. Two weeks after she’d slept with Ari, she’d been horrified when she didn’t get her period. And though she knew many people who’d terminated pregnancies, it didn’t once cross her mind.
She was thrilled as the baby grew inside of her. And then Elias became involved. Her child needed a father, and wasn’t it selfish of her to deny it that, merely because her would-be husband didn’t excite her?
Katherine had remained neutral on the subject, telling Helena to follow her heart. But what was the correct answer?
She’d finally done the “right” thing…then lost the baby in an unexpected, heartbreaking turn of events, and ended by hurting Ari terribly. Three months after the divorce decree, she still felt like a lower life form.
Her thoughts turned back to Nick, the man she’d been so sure she’d have children with one day. How could she have misread him so completely? Did he look at every woman the way he’d looked at her? As if she were the only one in the worl
d?
Get over it, you silly twit. Still mooning after your first lover—ridiculous. And why? Because he took your not-so-prized virginity?
She gave up on sleep, at least for the next few hours. At last Helena fumbled for the bedside light, switched it on and went to her portfolio. She pulled out a sketch pad, a Conté crayon and a box of oil pastels. She’d brainstorm for the Tosca production, flood her mind with line and color and draping and pattern. Because otherwise, she’d drive herself crazy thinking about the past.
The ideas came, thank God. They rushed into her mind so fast that she could barely get them down on paper before they disappeared. She worked like a madwoman through the dawn, then through noon. She ordered coffee and a light lunch from room service and continued to work until sunset, telling her niece what she was up to.
Two-thirds of the sketch pad was full, and she’d explored three possible color schemes.
Finally, her neck and shoulders screaming from being hunched over for so long, she put everything aside and went to scrub her hands, which were covered in streaks and smears. The mirror over the sink let her know that she had smears on her nose and cheek, too.
It was time for a long, hot bath and a nice glass of wine. Maybe even two—she’d worked hard and deserved to relax now.
NICK STOPPED outside Helena’s penthouse suite door and took a deep breath before knocking. I just want to clear the air between us, once and for all. There’s no need for hostility after so many years.
He knocked, hearing the strains of Tosca from within the suite. She’d loved opera even at the age of eighteen, when most girls had listened to INXS or Tears for Fears or Squeeze.
A moment went by, then two. Perhaps she hadn’t heard him over the music? Nick raised his hand to knock again and the door opened to reveal Helena.
His mouth went dry. She stood before him without makeup, tendrils of her hair damp and curling around her flushed face. She wore nothing but a white terry bathrobe and he tried heroically not to remember what lay beneath it. She held a glass of white wine in her right hand and her eyes were a little too bright.
Karen Kendall - An Affair to Remember Page 6