‘And what did you get from the friendship?’ Only a day ago he would have added, ‘Apart from a rich benefactor?’ to his question but such cynicism would be wrong now.
‘She reminds me of my grandmother.’ There was a wistfulness to her voice and he found he didn’t need her to explain any further.
Tabitha’s life must have been lonely.
Giannis had never known loneliness. He’d always had his family, always had good friends, always been surrounded by people he could rely on. The only person who had ever let him down was the woman he had fallen in lust with and foolishly married. His humiliation at Anastasia’s hands had been an unspoken secret within his circle but not one of them had taken the gossip to the press.
And now he was going to marry Tabitha, a woman who elicited more desire in him than he’d known possible. A woman he felt the strangest compulsion to avenge. And protect.
He’d never wanted to protect anyone before. Not Anastasia, not even his sisters, who he’d always considered perfectly capable of protecting themselves.
These were all the feelings he’d sworn to avoid when he married again.
He’d had his head turned with lust before and had paid the price for it.
He had to get control of it all before it took control of him.
‘I will arrange for an invitation to be given to her when we’ve set the date,’ he said in a far more temperate voice than what lay beneath his skin. ‘I will see the mayor tomorrow and get everything organised. He can marry us at my home.’
‘Don’t we have to marry in a church?’
He shuddered at the thought. ‘No. We’ll keep it a small affair. I’ve done the big, white wedding. I have no wish to go through that again.’
Her ensuing silence sat uncomfortably in his guts.
CHAPTER NINE
THE FOLLOWING WEEK sped by. Tabitha signed more documents and read through more paperwork in that time than she’d done in her entire life. She’d been taken aback at the speed with which Giannis had got things done but barely had time to blink let alone think. Which was probably just as well. She had a big enough headache as it was without adding thinking to the list.
And now their wedding was only one day away.
For the first time since Tabitha had agreed to marry him, Giannis had left the villa without her. He’d flown to Athens and would be spending the evening in his apartment there, the one traditional part of a wedding he intended to embrace.
Was that because he wanted a breather from her? Or because he genuinely feared it would bring bad luck to their marriage if they saw each other the night before the wedding?
Until that morning, she had spent all her waking time with him. He’d included her in everything: lawyers’ meetings and the visit to his family to break the good news about their wedding. He’d flown her to England so they could get her birth certificate and had visited the embassy. He’d taken her to Athens for a day shopping for clothes, insisting on buying every single item that caught her eye, even those on which she had done nothing more than brush her fingers. As a result she had a wardrobe stuffed with beautiful, expensive clothes, which she had no chance of wearing all of before she became too big with child to fit in them, and a dressing table crammed with more cosmetics than a professional make-up artist possessed and more perfumes than a perfumer could sniff in a career.
When she had protested at this unnecessary extravagance, she’d been rebuffed with a, ‘You are going to be a Basinas. When it is time for you to wear maternity clothes, we will go shopping again.’
She should be grateful for this time away from him, should be making the most of her last few hours of freedom, not moping around as if she missed him.
But she found she was missing him. The gregarious man she had fallen into a romantic dream with the night of the ball was slowly emerging from the austere shell into which the truth of her identity had put him.
She found she had to keep reminding herself that their marriage was not about them. It was all for their baby. She was not his wife of choice and now she feared he no longer even desired her.
He hadn’t laid a finger on her since that small, comforting kiss in his car.
There had been more occasions than she could count when she had found herself trapped in the heat of his gaze but he’d made no move. What was stopping him from touching her?
And what was stopping her from touching him? She ached to touch him but something kept holding her back.
To keep the demons in her head from plaguing her too much, she decided to tidy her bedroom and clean her bathroom. Tomorrow they would no longer be hers. She would be in Giannis’s bed, a thought that made her scrub the shower door that little bit harder.
‘What are you doing?’
She whipped round to find Giannis at the bathroom doorway, a bemused expression on his face.
‘What are you doing here?’ she asked dumbly.
The ghost of a smile appeared on his lips then disappeared as a furrow cleaved his forehead. ‘I’ll answer that once you’ve answered my question. Why are you cleaning? I pay staff to clean.’
‘I needed to do something.’
Now his brow rose quizzically. ‘Did it have to involve cleaning bathrooms?’
‘No, I cleaned my room too,’ she answered tartly, desperate to cover the mortification soaking her. Who wanted to be caught scrubbing a shower dressed in a pair of designer denim shorts and a designer short-sleeved shirt she’d tied around her midriff, clothing he’d spent a small fortune on?
Taking a softer tone, she added, ‘Cleaning’s therapeutic and, let’s be honest, something I’m good at.’
He nodded slowly, his expression softening too. ‘We will have to think of something else for you to do when you’re in need of something therapeutic to do, or Zoe will be worried for her job, but that is something for us to think about after the wedding. The reason I’m here is because I have a gift for you.’
From behind his back he produced a small box, the logo on it signalling that it contained a smart phone.
‘I’ve already set it up for you,’ he said while she examined it, hands shaking at his unexpected appearance.
He’d flown back just to give her a phone?
‘It’s the latest model,’ he continued. ‘I’ve programmed my number into it and downloaded an app that acts as a translator. It means you’ll be able to converse with Zoe and anyone else without a language barrier.’
‘How does it work?’
She put the phone into his open hand and sat next to him on the sofa. She didn’t even remember walking from the bathroom to the bedroom with him.
Eyes alight with curiosity, she watched him press an icon. The screen lit up and he brought it to his mouth and said something in Greek. A moment later a disembodied voice rang out, ‘Your hair needs a brush.’
She gave a shout of laughter and met clear blue eyes gleaming with an amusement she hadn’t seen since the ball. It was a gleam that made her heart leap and suddenly she was aware that they were sat closer together than they had been in the past week. For all the time they’d spent together, this was the first time they’d been within touching distance of each other when alone.
The gleam in his eyes as they stared at each other slowly dimmed, the amusement on his lips fading. Tabitha’s own lips began to tingle, the nerves on her skin firing, anticipation lacing through her as their faces tilted and closed in...
But then Giannis pulled back, cleared his throat and, without missing a beat, without any hint that he’d just been about to kiss her, murmured, ‘Now you say something into it. It’s programmed to translate both our languages.’
Blinking rapidly, trying to pretend that what had nearly happened just then hadn’t, she took the phone back and brought it up to her chin. Striving for the same lightness he’d displayed when speaking into it, she said, ‘You need a shave.’
Again, barely a moment passed before the same disembodied voice rang out, this time in Greek.
Tabitha put the phone onto her lap and stared at it, suddenly aware that hot tears were burning the back of her eyes and desperate not to let them fall.
This phone, although a drop in the ocean for a man of Giannis’s wealth, was the most thoughtful gift he could have given her. It stopped her being isolated when she didn’t have him there to translate.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered when she was reasonably confident she could speak without blubbing. Who cried over a phone? How ridiculous! The pregnancy hormones must be getting stronger.
Hormones or not, she had to start tempering the wild feelings Giannis evoked in her. Being with him heightened every normal emotion. He could turn her from joy to despondency and twist it all back again in the time it took to switch on a light. One look and her body’s responses took a life of their own, her entire being practically salivating for him.
How could she contain it, she thought with despair, especially now that he’d stopped treating her like the Antichrist? Little acts of kindness had the capacity to melt her heart in the same way one little look from him melted her bones. Combine the two and she became a puddle of mush for him.
‘It is my pleasure.’ He took the phone from her lap without touching her skin and continued in the same nonchalant tone. ‘It’s retina-activated like my own phone. Once it’s done, only you will be able to access it.’
Minutes later and it was all set up and Tabitha was trying hard to concentrate on some of the other features Giannis was showing her. He said something about a music app but his words had become distant, a direct effect of his body having inched closer to hers, her senses catching whiffs of the spicy scent she’d become greedy for.
He swiped the screen at the same moment his thigh pressed against hers.
Tabitha gritted her teeth and tried her hardest to ignore the fresh heat careering through her.
But then he put his hand on her thigh.
Holding her breath, she stared down at the long, tanned fingers resting on her bare flesh...
‘What kind of music do you like to listen to?’ Giannis repeated, wondering why Tabitha had suddenly become mute. ‘You can put in bands and genres and it will select...’
And then he followed her gaze and realised his hand was on her thigh, his middle finger making little circles over the silky skin.
For a moment all he could do was stare at it dumbly before cursing himself.
Would his weakness for this woman ever be controlled?
Being with Tabitha meant being in a constant state of arousal, a condition he’d spent the past week controlling. It had been an internal battle he’d been determined to win, a battle to prove to himself that he could master his reactions around her, a battle he’d thought he was winning.
For the first time since she’d agreed to marry him, he’d unintentionally dropped his guard and now his hand was resting on her thigh as if it were the most natural gesture in the world.
He inhaled deeply to counteract the thuds of his suddenly heavy heartbeats and moved his hand away without comment.
He’d made a vow to himself not to touch Tabitha again until their wedding night, thinking he would have mastered his reactions to her enough by then that when they did make love, it would be an enjoyable experience but not in the world-shifting way it had been on their one full night together.
‘We’ve had a package couriered over,’ he said into the electrified silence, his voice sounding thick to his ears. ‘Your Mrs Coulter sent it. A wedding gift.’
‘That’s sweet of her,’ Tabitha whispered, her own voice containing the faintest hint of a tremor.
Mrs Coulter had regretfully declined the invitation to their wedding, not feeling physically strong enough to make the journey over. To make up for Tabitha’s disappointment, Giannis had suggested she fly to Vienna with him for his next monthly trip to his hotel.
He opened his mouth to remind her of this but the words fell away from his tongue when he met cornflower eyes wide and stark on his.
The groan escaped from his throat before he could hold it back, turning into a growl when his hands cupped the cheeks heightened with colour.
He could control this...
He brought his mouth down to capture the beautiful heart-shaped lips in one long, hot, wet, devouring kiss.
His loins sang their delight but he mastered his reactions with a ruthlessness that would have made a Tibetan monk proud. Breaking the kiss, he captured her chin, and this time allowed himself to stare deep into eyes pulsing their own desire back at him, the fingers of his other hand twisting the long, silky locks of her hair.
A sudden wave of possessiveness crashed through him along with an overwhelming urge to gather her into his arms, carry her to the bed and make her his in every way possible.
‘Tomorrow night, matia mou, you will be my wife and in my bed. Until then...’ He pressed one more, lighter kiss to her lips, breathing in her scent for good measure. It infused him, sinking deep into his veins...
He got abruptly to his feet.
He’d played with the flame of Tabitha’s fire enough. A man had his limits and the burning ache in his loins proved he’d reached his.
‘I will see you on the sun terrace tomorrow. Enjoy getting acquainted with your new toy.’
Tabitha watched him leave with her hand pressed tightly to her chest, her heart hammering against her palm.
Her blood pumped thick and strong inside her veins, as it did every time he kissed or touched her, her skin alive in a way that was becoming familiar to her but there had been none of the rightness she’d felt since their very first dance.
Giannis had flown back from Athens especially to give her the phone.
He was doing everything he could to make her transition into his life as easy as it could be.
Their wedding night promised so much...
So why did she feel so wretched?
* * *
The answer to Tabitha’s wretchedness came to her three hours before they exchanged their vows.
She’d eaten a light, plain lunch alone on the pool terrace and then, limbs heavy, had gone to her bedroom to get ready for the wedding.
Two members of staff were in there, moving the last of her new wardrobe and accessories to the marital bedroom she would from that night share with Giannis.
It was the bedroom Anastasia must have shared with him.
Anastasia’s ghost was the cause of her wretchedness, she realised with a strong churn of nausea.
Every step Tabitha took in this magnificent villa had been taken by the woman before her.
Giannis might desire her but he would never feel for Tabitha what he’d felt for his first wife.
It shredded her insides to know she was being denied a proper wedding because he’d already shared one with Anastasia.
She remembered that wedding picture of the two of them. It was one of dozens to be found on the Internet. Giannis and Anastasia’s wedding had been a humungous affair with guests including the cream of Hollywood and European royalty. It had been a true celebration of their love.
For Tabitha’s wedding, the only people he was inviting were his immediate family. No cousins or aunts and uncles. No friends. Their wedding was no celebration.
It shredded her insides even more to know she shouldn’t care if they had what she considered to be a proper wedding or not. She shouldn’t care that she would exchange her vows on Giannis’s sun terrace and not in one of the beautiful, blue-topped white churches Santorini was famous for, and that she would be wearing a simple white summer dress instead of the big, flouncy traditional dress she’d dreamed of wearing when she’d been young and dreams had still existed within her.
She shouldn’t care that Giannis didn’t love her and would never love h
er.
It might have ended horrendously but he’d already had a marriage for love. With Anastasia.
She didn’t want his love, she told herself with a stubborn desperation. She was marrying him to protect her unborn child’s future, the exact same reason he was marrying her, and her irrational jealousy towards his first wife was...well, irrational. More than irrational. Heinous. Anastasia was dead, her life extinguished before she’d reached the age of thirty. What kind of monster was Tabitha to feel jealous of a ghost?
Emotions threatening to suffocate her, she opened one of the bedroom windows but was met with blazing heat.
She needed to get ready! She was hours away from marrying Giannis and all she could do was pace her bedroom, working herself into a lather.
If only she had someone with her, she thought despairingly, wishing her father could be there. She remembered him telling her as a child never to settle for second best, that she was worthy of only the greatest man to marry.
She wasn’t settling for second best. Giannis was. He desired her. She thought he might even be coming to like her. But she was the woman with whom he’d had a one-night stand and he was marrying her from the consequence of that one night so he could claim their child as his own.
Her father would have loved Giannis, not for his mega-wealth and rumoured royal connections, but for his strong family bonds. Those were the kinds of bonds he’d been eager to create for Tabitha when he’d married Emmaline.
If her father had been alive she would have put her foot down and insisted on a big, white wedding but without him there, without any guests of her own, how could she complain? She wasn’t contributing anything to their marriage financially or otherwise.
But how she wished Giannis thought enough of her that he would want to recite their vows in a sacred, sanctified building and give her the dream of her childhood.
Feeling herself on the verge of crying, she sucked the unshed tears back in at the loud rap on her door.
Thinking it must be the staff returning to collect more of her stuff, she opened it and found her heart lightening to see Niki there, arms laden with flowers, beaming widely. ‘Hello, future sister-in-law. I’ve appointed myself your maid of honour, hairdresser and make-up artist. It’s time to turn you into a beautiful bride.’
The Greek's Pregnant Cinderella (Mills & Boon Modern) (Cinderella Seductions, Book 2) Page 11