The Passionate Greek

by Catherine Dane

  Melanie was dismayed. She needed time on her side to seduce Nicos, she told herself, time alone with him, time to work her wiles on him. Time to make love to him, time to hold him in her arms, time to make him fall in love with her all over again.

  That evening there was no dinner laid on the terrace. Mr Chalambrous, Maria proudly informed Melanie, was dining with her grandfather and her grandmother had been busy all day preparing. Melanie learned from Maria that Nicos often ate at the village houses of the islanders, a feted and welcome guest. Melanie couldn’t imagine it was Katerina's idea of fun and she wasn’t surprised to learn that Nicos would be the only guest.

  The next day with Electra firmly strapped into her buggy Melanie was drawn down to the harbor. The “Athena” rode serenely at anchor, but of “Dancing queen” there was no sign.

  She gazed out to sea feeling forlorn. Nicos, for all his promise, had gone sailing without her. A plan began forming in her mind. If Nicos was not going to invite her she would invite herself. First she had to find out when Nicos next planned to take the boat out. A casual query to the boatman and she had what she needed to know.

  Nicos was sailing the next day and wanted the dinghy made ready for a nine o’clock start. A timetable began to form in her mind. Electra woke early, plenty of time to get her up and give her breakfast and for Maria to arrive. Time for Melanie to get down to the harbor but how to get aboard without Nicos knowing? The boatman would mention it if she asked him to take her out to the boat. There was only one thing for it. She would have to swim out, and do it without being seen.

  The yacht was moored in deep water, but a pathway let down to where the sea beat against rocks at the entrance to the harbor. Melanie had discovered it one afternoon when she was exploring for new places to take Electra. The rocky promontory protected the harbor and Melanie reasoned a swimmer could slip from the rocks and approach “Dancing Queen” from behind, out of sight of anyone watching from the harbor front.

  The swim proved longer than she had anticipated and the water rougher than she had thought it would be. She had a panicky moment when it seemed the yacht instead of getting nearer seemed to be getting further away. The tug of the current was strong and she found she needed all her strength against it. It felt like ages before the boarding ladder was in her grasp and she hung on to it breathless. Her strength restored she hauled herself aboard; confident she hadn’t been seen from the shore.

  She hadn’t thought the door from the cockpit to the cabin might be locked and her breath caught in her throat when she saw a padlock and chain round the door handle. But it was hanging loose and she was down the steps into cabin below. She made her way forward to the small cabin separated from the main area by a Louvre door. She curled up on a bunk and waited.

  It wasn’t long before she heard the sound of an outboard engine and felt the yacht rock gently as someone boarded. There was a thump as something was heaved on board and she heard Nicos humming to himself as he moved about the deck, his footsteps clearly audible to her. Then the engine started up and the motion of the boat changed in the swell at the harbor bar.

  Melanie waited her moment. She wanted to be far enough out to sea so that Nicos wouldn’t think of turning back. She had found herself a towel and dried off after her swim but once at sea she shivered in her bikini in the cabin‘s cool. Now it was time to confront Nicos she felt her courage desert her. But she couldn’t stay in the cabin all day. She had to make a move. Stealing herself she moved determinedly through to the main cabin. The cockpit was open and all she could see of him was his tanned lower legs as he stood at the wheel.

  Grasping the handrail she pulled herself up. As she mounted the steps she kept her eyes fixed on him. First his legs, up to his taught stomach, to his chest and finally his face came into view.

  He let out a shocked expletive, but then incredulously he was laughing. ‘A stowaway! I ought to throw you overboard

  Chapter Eight

  His eyes swept over her body and in her brief bikini Melanie suddenly felt vulnerable. ‘You promised to take me sailing again so here I am,’ she said breathlessly.

  ‘Why is it you never fail to surprise me,’ he said wryly. ‘I’m curious. How did you get aboard without anyone seeing you? Please don’t tell me you swam out.’

  ‘Yes, from the rocks. It’s not far,’ she said. She wasn’t going to tell him how difficult the swim had proved to be. He threw back his head and laughed. ‘Melanie, Melanie, you’re crazy. Don’t you know how dangerous the mouth of the harbor is? You were lucky not to be swept out to sea. I should be really angry with you except no woman has ever put her life in her hands to spend the day with me.

  He looked at her amused. ‘I’d be really flattered if I didn’t think you had some ulterior motive.’ Melanie felt herself flush, but he didn’t seem to notice. ‘Were you going to sabotage the engine so I’d be lost at sea and never seen again?’

  She looked genuinely shocked that he could think she’d do such a thing. ‘Only joking,’ he said lightly. 'Anyway, if you’re here to learn to sail you’ve chosen a bad day. There’s no wind forecast. I only came out to check the engine. It’s been giving problems since it was overhauled. I also presume that if you swam out here you have nothing with you but what you are so delightfully standing up in. No deck shoes, no proper sailing clothes. That would never do.’

  Melanie looked crestfallen. Her plan hadn’t gone beyond getting Nicos alone and instead of a day’s sailing it looked like he would be heading for the home harbor before very long. Mistaking her look for disappointment Nicos relented. ‘I’ll tell you what. I’ll teach you something about the instruments that give your wind speed and the depth of water beneath the keel, all that sort of thing. Come and stand in front of me.’

  Still with his hands on the enormous steering wheel he pushed himself further back and placed Melanie in front of him. ‘Lean back against me,’ he commanded. ‘Put your hands over mine on the wheel and you’ll get the feel of it,’

  He began to explain the uses for the various black panelled instruments in front of them and Melanie did her best to take it all in. But she was acutely conscious of his arms each side of her and the feel of his hands under hers.

  As he talked his mouth was unnecessarily close to her ear and his legs each side of her closed her in. The yacht’s motion as it ploughed its way through the seas rocked them together in unison as if they were one. It was undeniably erotic. His voice fell silent. Melanie was mesmerized. His thighs tightened around her and she could feel his rising excitement. Unconsciously she responded, moving her body back against him and from side to side. He groaned softly into her ear. ‘Keep doing that.’

  Melanie felt her desire rising to meet his. She wanted to turn in his arms and feel his lips on hers, his tongue licking her, his hands on her breasts. She half turned in his arms and her sudden movement broke the spell. He put his head back and sighed heavily, loosening his thighs from around her and moving her body gently from his. ‘I think we might have been about to run aground,’ he said, but she noticed his voice was not quite even.

  ‘He still wants me,’ she told herself triumphantly. ‘And you still want him’ her inner voice came back.

  ‘I think that’s enough tuition for today,' he was saying. ‘I’ll head for Mikos where we anchored the other day. We can moor up there and have a swim before lunch.’ He was cool now, as if their erotic encounter had never happened.

  ‘But it did,’ she thought. ‘And it will again. I’m going to get this man so hot for me he’ll never want me to leave.’ She couldn’t afford to fail. Unless she made him fall in love with her all over again she would leave Skiapolos s at the end of the summer and never see her daughter again.

  They were approaching the small island. Nicos anchored in the bay and cut the engine. In the sudden silence the only sound was the waves lapping the shore and the call of sea birds. ‘The island’s uninhabited,’ Nicos told her. ‘It’s not much more than a rock in the middle of the oce
an. I didn’t have a chance to show you the other day, but there’s a cave at the back of the beach. We could go there.’ His emphasis on the word “there” held an unmistakeable meaning. He looked searchingly at her. ‘Unless you would prefer to stay here.

  Melanie’s heart raced. She had set out to seduce him all over again and now he was playing into her hands. So why was she hesitating? She didn’t want to cheat on this man. She didn’t want to be play-acting with him. She wanted to walk into his arms with love, like it had been before. But she couldn’t unravel the past, and Nicos wouldn’t let her. She came to a decision. She had set out to get him and get him she would.

  ‘The cave,’ she said and smiling a seductive smile over her shoulder she dived off the boat and into the clear blue water. She heard a soft splash behind her and Nicos came alongside her. They swam slowly together, their eyes meeting from time to time signalled sexual promise. He took her hand as they waded ashore and pulled her to him as they walked up the beach. The entrance to the cave was low and they had to duck underneath the arch of rock to gain entrance. It was dark inside and Melanie’s head almost brushed the roof. ‘You can’t stand up in here,’ she said shakily.

  He made no answer, just dropped to his knees in front of her, his hands at her hips. She felt him tug down her bikini and he pulled her close to him as her hands found his shoulders. His tongue began to lick softy and she heard herself moan ‘Don’t stop, don’t stop.’ He brought her near to crescendo and sensing it pulled her down under him on the soft sandy bottom of the cave. He entered her savagely the way she wanted him to and she heard him cry out as he scaled the height of his passion, taking her with him on a rising surge of sensation.

  ‘Don’t cry,’ he said afterwards, rocking her close to him. ‘I’m not,’ she said, her face muffled into his body. But tears ran unchecked down her cheeks.

  ‘You told me once that beautiful things often make you cry.’ His voice was tender. ‘Was it beautiful for you? Are you crying because it was?’ She nodded her head against his chest, not trusting herself to speak. She had set out to seduce him, but it was he who had seduced her. She was as much in love with him as ever.

  In the dimness of the cave she could just make out his face as she raised her head to look at him. He smiled down at her and smoothed the hair back from her brow with an infinitely sweet gesture. ‘I never could keep my hands off you,’ he said and there was a touch of wonder in his voice.

  She wriggled from his embrace and felt about her on the cave’s floor to find her abandoned bikini. ‘Don’t dress,’ he said. ‘There’s no one here but us. We can swim naked.’ He crawled out of the cave and pulled her out after him, laughing joyfully. It was crazy to feel shy in front of him after what they had just done, but she did. He circled her within his arm and nestled her close to his hip. ‘Come on, I’ll show you the island. Well, what there is of it . It will take all of five minutes, and then we can swim back to the boat and have lunch.’

  He talked easily as they walked along the sand their bodies gently touching and before long her shyness eased and she found she was beginning to revel in the freedom of their nakedness. As he had promised the tour took no more than five minutes and in no time they were back at the cave. She wanted to retrieve her bikini then but he held her back saying, ‘No, swim back to the boat without it.’

  They entered the sea together and Melanie delighted in the feel of the water on her naked body. Seeing her rapture, Nicos, swimming alongside her, said, ‘See. I knew you would like it. It’s very sensuous, isn’t it?’ Melanie had to admit that it was. The feel of the water caressing her body where Nicos’s hands and lips had so recently raised her to ecstasy elated her. ‘I feel like a mermaid,’ she called to Nicos, who had swum ahead. He laughed and called back, ‘I don’t want to find you’ve grown a tail. I’m very fond of those legs of yours.’

  He reached the boat before her and waited at the boarding ladder for her to catch up, gesturing for her to climb aboard before him. Suddenly conscious of her nakedness she demurred and said, ‘you first.’ ‘Okay, if you want to spoil my treat,’ he complained. ‘I was rather looking forward to you going up the ladder in front of me.’ ‘Well, you go first and the treat will be all mind,’ joked Melanie. They were having fun, she realised, just the way they used to.

  Once on the yacht Melanie looked around for something to cover her nakedness. ‘I am absolutely not eating with no clothes on,’ she said firmly. ‘If you really are determined to spoil my fun I’ll rummage around for something,’ said Nicos, who had pulled on his own shorts.

  He emerged from the cabin clutching a sun-faded scrap of material. Melanie eyed it suspiciously. ‘Whose is that?’ she asked.

  ‘Believe it or not I don’t have women on this boat, present company excepted,’ he rebuked mockingly. ‘It’s mine. I wear it when there’s nobody aboard but me. It’s very comfortable. It’s a sort of sarong.’

  ‘Not much of one,’ said Melanie. ‘It’s postage stamp size.’

  ‘I don’t want you covered up at all,’ he said wickedly. ‘This is a compromise.’

  He draped it around her body, trying it this way and that till finally satisfied he stood back to admire his handiwork. ‘It doesn’t cover much of me,’ complained Melanie.

  ‘Mmmm, perhaps a little tweak here or there,’ he mused, leaning forward and stroking her breasts through the thin cotton material. A small flicker of desire flamed in Melanie discomforting her and leading her to say more briskly than she intended, ‘Let’s eat.’

  Nicos gave a mock disappointed sigh and said, ‘Well if you’d rather have lunch than me,’ and disappeared below to emerge with a large cool box. The heavy thump Melanie had heard from her hiding place in the cabin when Nicos had boarded was the picnic she now saw. He pulled out the collapsible cockpit table and began to spread out the lunch. This time the fare was more grown up than the food he had brought to the beach for Electra. Chilled white wine, plump dark green olives, slivers of smoked salmon, tzatziki, houmous and pitta bread.

  They ate hungrily. ‘There’s nothing like swimming and fresh air to give you an appetite,’ said Melanie. ‘Yes, swimming, fresh air and great sex,’ Nicos enthused, earning himself a sharp kick on the ankle. Nicos looked at her mischievously. ‘Well, it was great sex, wasn’t it? It always was with us.’

  For a moment he looked downcast. It seemed to Melanie that he made a visible effort to shake off whatever it was that had invaded his mood. Leaping to his feet he started the engine and the throb of the heavy diesel silenced the sound of the birds and the waves.

  ‘Are we heading for home now,’ she asked, as he navigated the yacht out of the cove. ‘Not unless you want to,’ he said.

  Melanie sighed happily. She felt suspended in time and didn’t want the day to end. She had the strangest sensation that as long as they stayed at sea everything would be as it was between them. She watched Nicos, his hands sure on the wheel, the breeze shifting his dark hair, his eyes fixed on the horizon. From time to time he turned to look at her, his expression loving.

  He held out his arm to her and she went to him. He pulled her close and she nestled into his body, loving the hard masculine feel of him. He kept one hand on the wheel and one round her. She put her own arm round his waist and slipped the other hand inside his shorts curling her fingers into the hair of his body.

  ‘If you keep that up you’re going to join the mile low club.’

  What’s that?’ she asked, puzzled. ‘The same as the mile high club, only at sea.’

  ‘You made that up,’ she laughed up at him, and continued her exploration. She felt so at ease with him there was nothing she couldn’t do.

  ‘Get me a cold drink before I explode,’ he laughed. She fished in the cold box and produced a cold beer for him. Watching him throw back his head and tip the cool liquid down his throat she felt a great surge of contentment. She was having a wonderful day.

  Later she couldn’t say what changed, what dark cloud descended on them
and left a trail of wreckage in its wake. The sky remained mockingly blue, the wind soft and the sun warm, but Nicos had turned cold as ice. They had been talking aimlessly and Melanie strove hard to remember what she had said that had caused his mood to darken so suddenly. She had been recalling how her late father had loved the sea.

  ’I was only two when my mother died and he brought me up alone for the first six years,’ she had been telling him. ‘I was a motherless child till he married again,’ she had spoken lightly but did the words “motherless child” make him think of Electra and what had happened to them? Had she stirred up memories their perfect day had looked set to bury?

  She stole a glance at him. His face was set.

  ‘Mothers!’ he said bitterly. ‘Everyone think they’re wonderful. Well, I don’t buy into that.’

  Melanie blanched at his tone. Was he saying she wouldn’t make a good mother to Electra? She felt her anger rising.

  ‘I would try to be a perfect mother to Electra if only you would let me. I would cherish her, guard her and give her the best upbringing I could,’ she said hotly. ‘I would do anything, anything at all for my daughter.’

  In her frustration all she abandoned all caution. ‘Why won’t you let me be a mother to her?’ Why are you so set on banishing me from her life?’

  He looked round at her, and to her distress she saw the old familiar tightening of his jaw, the stubborn set of his face. ‘Remember it was you who gave up Electra. It was your choice. I am merely standing by it.’ He was as resolute as ever. Melanie cursed herself. Her outburst would do nothing to help her cause. She had set out to win him over and all she had done was alienate him again.

  ‘At the time I was in no position to keep her.’ Melanie hadn’t meant to but found herself pleading with him once again. ‘Try to think what it was like for me. I had just given birth. I was facing a jail term. All my instincts were to protect her, to give her a safe haven and you were that. I couldn’t think beyond the next few months. But I didn’t know how heartsick I was going to be. I know I gave you full custody and I have never gone back on that and I won’t now. All I want is to see her from time to time, spend time with her, watch her grow.’