Mediterranean Men Bundle

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  ‘I like a good dance as much as the next man.’

  She had to force herself not to look his way. ‘I must admit I can’t quite imagine you prancing around in a leotard.’

  His laughter washed over her like a soft rain shower.

  ‘No, but I can definitely imagine you doing it. I’ve seen you many times.’

  She swivelled her head to look at him. ‘You’ve seen me? Where?’

  Kane expertly manoeuvred the car into a tight space between a Fiat and a Volvo a short walking distance from the Opera House.

  ‘At Mercyfields in the ballroom.’

  She sat back in her seat in shock.

  He’d seen her?

  He’d seen her pretending to be the next bright star of the ballet world, when all the time her knee was telling her it was time to quit her dream of professional dancing.

  ‘I hope you liked what you saw,’ she said, then wished she’d phrased it a little better.

  ‘Oh, I did.’ He wrenched on the handbrake. ‘It was quite a revelation.’

  She could just imagine. A leotard was so unforgiving at the best of times, let alone when an injury had set one to the sidelines for weeks on end. Her brain fizzed with the many possible viewing opportunities he might have taken advantage of.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, opening her door for her. ‘I don’t want to miss the first half.’

  The first half made her cry, not that she let on.

  She sat silently in her seat at the Opera House and bit down on her bottom lip to control the distinct wobbling of her chin at the sights and sounds in front of her.

  She’d been to the ballet countless times but for some strange inexplicable reason seeing Cinderella with Kane sitting so close beside her unravelled her normally tightly controlled emotions.

  During the interval she spent an inordinate time in the powder room, and when she came out to the raised eyebrow question on his face she muttered something disparaging about the discrepancy between male architects’ designs and female needs and returned to her seat with her head well down.

  She barely made it through the rest of the performance.

  She knew most of the cast and watched in a combination of awe and envy at what they were doing, wondering if there would be a time when she would be able to let her dreams go without a pang of deep regret.

  The applause was deafening and she joined in with it enthusiastically, knowing how much it elevated a performer’s confidence.

  The curtain came down on the stage like eyelashes closing over eyes and she felt Kane stir beside her, his strongly muscled suit-clad arm brushing the bare skin of hers.

  ‘Thank you.’ She rose to her feet and gave a discreet sniff. ‘I really enjoyed it.’

  He unfolded his tall body from the seat and looked down at her, his brow creasing into a small frown. ‘Why are you crying?’

  She turned away from his intense scrutiny. ‘I’m not crying. It’s somebody’s perfume that’s set me off. I have allergies…I’m allergic to some scents…’ She blew her nose inelegantly and stuffed the tissue up her sleeve. ‘It’s the cross I have to bear for having a sensitive nose.’

  ‘I hope my choice of aftershave doesn’t affect you,’ he said, holding her back with a hand on her hip so that someone could squeeze past them.

  She felt the full imprint of his warm hand through her dress and felt her skin lift in response to his soft touch.

  ‘Oh, no,’ she said without thinking. ‘I really like your…I mean I don’t think it’s that…I’m just sensitive, that’s all.’

  ‘Come on.’ He took her arm once the aisle was clear. ‘I don’t know about you, but after watching all that exercise I’m starving.’

  Bryony spooned another mouthful of blueberry cheesecake into her mouth and promised herself that tomorrow her diet would start in earnest.

  Kane was sitting opposite with a barely touched summer pudding on his plate, his eyes steady on her.

  She dipped her spoon into the creamy denseness of her dessert and holding it in front of her mouth, asked, ‘Since when did you start subscribing to the ballet?’

  He stirred the long black coffee the waiter had placed in front of him a few moments ago.

  ‘I don’t subscribe regularly but I do enjoy certain performances.’

  She scooped up another spoonful of pure sin and asked, ‘Do you have a favourite performance?’

  ‘Not really,’ he answered, picking up his cup and raising it to his lips. ‘What about you?’

  She looked down at the two remaining blueberries on her plate and began chasing them with her spoon, thinking about how she should answer. Should she say Cinderella? What about Swan Lake? But then there was Petroucha and Prince Igor…

  ‘I love the whole atmosphere of ballet,’ she said at last. ‘I love the training and the discipline, the costumes and the emotions one has to engage in order to perform.’

  He placed his teaspoon on the saucer of his coffee cup. ‘So you have to feel something to dance?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ She gave up on the last blueberry and looked across at him. ‘You have to be the character, feel the things they would be feeling, just like an actor does on stage or in the movies.’

  ‘You must miss it terribly,’ he commented.

  ‘Yes…’ She stared at the lonely blueberry and sighed. ‘I do.’

  ‘Tell me about your dance studio.’ He set his cup back down.

  She toyed with the edge of the tablecloth. ‘I teach classical ballet five afternoons a week.’

  ‘How many students do you have?’

  ‘I share the workload with my partner, Pauline, and two junior teachers, but the total enrolment stands at about one hundred and fifty students.’

  ‘That’s a lot of little girls in tutus.’ He reached for his coffee once more.

  ‘Yes…’

  ‘So tell me—’ he leaned forward in his seat to rest his wrists on the table ‘—does every little girl dream of being a ballerina?’

  She found his dark eyes totally mesmerizing.

  ‘Not just girls,’ she said. ‘We have several boys as well.’

  ‘It must be difficult for them,’ he said, ‘being so outside the square, so to speak.’

  ‘We try to make them feel comfortable. We have one who is absolutely brilliant, very focused and determined. I think he’ll make it.’

  ‘Not many do?’

  She shook her head and looked back down at her plate. ‘Not many girls, let alone boys. It’s not always about pure talent. It’s a combination of physical ability and luck and a certain level of skill.’

  ‘What stopped you?’

  She gave him a rueful grimace before she squashed the hapless blueberry with the back of her spoon.

  ‘I have a dicky knee, as they say in the business.’

  ‘Have you seen someone about it?’ he asked.

  She pushed the purple mess of her plate away. ‘I’ve seen the best money can buy and he said the same as all the rest. Take up swimming instead.’

  ‘Did you tell him you do a mean backstroke?’

  Her eyes went to his. ‘No…I didn’t tell him that.’

  He picked up his coffee and took a sip, looking at her over the rim of his cup. ‘I would if I were you. It might make him feel a whole lot better about taking your dancing away from you.’

  No one had ever mentioned to her how difficult it must have been to relinquish her dream of professional dancing. How ironic that it was Kane Kaproulias who had done so first.

  ‘I haven’t swum in years,’ she said, unable to stop her eyes from going to the white-ridged scar on his top lip.

  He waited until her eyes made their uncertain way back to his. ‘Neither have I,’ he said and, turning away from her, signalled to the waiter for the bill.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  BRYONY fell into step beside him as they made their way back to his car, unable to stop thinking about the evening they’d just spent together.

  Together.

/>   What an intimate word to be using when referring to someone like Kane Kaproulias!

  He activated the central locking and opened her door for her, waiting until she was inside and belted up before closing the door and making his way around to the driver’s door.

  She watched his progression from under the screen of her lashes, her eyes taking in his tautly muscled form and the easy grace with which he moved.

  He looked across at her as he clipped on his seatbelt, his dark eyes dipping briefly to her chest as if he couldn’t help himself.

  ‘I was thinking we could have a nightcap or another coffee somewhere. I’ve narrowed it down to my place or yours, but I’m open to other suggestions.’

  Bryony felt a sudden desire to see where she was going to reside.

  ‘Your place will be fine.’

  ‘My place it is,’ he said and fired the engine with a roar.

  His place was nothing like she’d imagined.

  Somehow she had thought his residence would be along the lines of the tackily overdone opulence of recently acquired wealth, but when he pulled into the driveway of his Edgecliff house she was surprised to see that it was of modest proportions with just the right amount of prestige to make it stand only slightly apart from its neighbours.

  She walked with him to the front door, the fragrance of jasmine and honeysuckle wafting through the warm evening air as he turned his key in the lock.

  The black and white tiles of the foyer welcomed her as she stepped inside, the sweeping staircase winding upwards elegantly, nothing like the menacing dark wood coil of Mercyfields.

  ‘The kitchen is this way,’ he said, moving towards a door off the hall. ‘And, if you need it, the bathroom is the first on the left.’

  She chose the bathroom, not because she particularly needed it, but more because she wanted to gather herself for a few precious moments.

  She stared at her reflection in the gilt-edged mirror and wondered how she was going to negotiate the next few moves.

  Kane was all politeness now, but what would happen when he had a circle of gold around her finger?

  She was scripted as his trophy wife, the spoils of war, so to speak. He had waited a long time to claim her, no doubt planning every move of his revenge in fastidious detail…

  She gave a little shiver and bent her head to wash her hands, but as she dried them on the soft towel provided she couldn’t help wondering who it was who kept his house in perfect order.

  Nothing was out of place. Not a used dish or glass, not a speck of dust anywhere. The mirror in front of her was spotless. Would he expect her to keep it that way? Or had his threats been made simply to prove a point about the way in which his mother had been treated during her time as their housekeeper? But how could she tell for sure?

  He was waiting for her in the kitchen, a tray set out with coffee steaming in two cups, a liqueur bottle with two shot glasses and chocolate.

  Her eyes went straight to the chocolate, her mouth watering at the thought of allowing a square of its forbidden pleasure past the rigid shield of her lips.

  Remember Christmas, she told herself.

  ‘No, thank you,’ she said as he offered her the mouthwatering squares.

  ‘Dieting?’ He raised one brow at her, his mouth tilted in mild amusement.

  ‘Always.’ Her tone was rueful as she took the cup of coffee off the tray he was holding.

  He didn’t respond, which somehow irritated her. Why couldn’t he have reassured her by saying she didn’t need to diet? Most men would have, but then she remembered… He wasn’t exactly like most men. He didn’t issue empty compliments; neither did he speak unless he had something worthwhile to say.

  ‘How long have you lived here?’ she asked over the rim of her cup.

  ‘Close to three years.’

  Three years.

  He’d been living this close for three years? Her apartment was a few minutes away in Watsons Bay. She’d probably passed him on the road many times without knowing it, had maybe even walked past him on the street. It gave her a funny feeling to think of them being within such close proximity without her knowing it, especially as her awareness of him was so acute when he was in the same room as her, much less when he was touching her…

  ‘Where were you living before?’ she asked to fill the sudden silence.

  ‘Here and there,’ he said, stirring his coffee.

  She took a sip of her coffee and wondered why he was being so evasive.

  ‘I understand you’ve found a dress for our wedding,’ he said.

  She stared at him. ‘How did you know that?’

  He gave a could-mean-anything shrug.

  She narrowed her gaze. ‘Have you been speaking to my mother?’

  ‘Do you have a problem with that?’

  ‘Yes, I do have a problem with that,’ she said through tight lips.

  Who did he think he was, calling her mother and quite possibly upsetting her? It wasn’t as if he were a real son-in-law-to-be. He was their enemy, he’d deliberately set out to destroy them and his marriage to her was the final blow in his dastardly enterprise.

  ‘Don’t you think it might appear strange to other people if I never speak to either of your parents?’ he asked.

  ‘I think people will think it even stranger if you do,’ she told him. ‘You’ve taken everything away from them, including me. I think that more or less warrants a cold war, don’t you?’

  ‘There will be no cold war, as you call it,’ he insisted. ‘Nor will anyone outside your family know our marriage is anything other than a genuine love match.’

  ‘Love?’ she spat in indignation. ‘How dare you insult me by using that word when referring to our situation?’

  ‘What are you going to do about it, Bryony?’ He held her glittering gaze and drawled with deliberate insolence, ‘It’s not as if you can call on your cowardly brother any more to settle the score for you.’

  She flinched as if he’d struck her, so hurtful were his words. She couldn’t find her voice, and the anger she needed so badly to defend her dead brother was inexplicably out of reach, replaced by a sudden and uncontrollable urge to cry.

  She caught her lip to stop it from trembling, the saltiness of blood informing her she was doing considerable damage to her mouth in an effort to maintain her fragile composure.

  She put down the cup she was holding and, turning away, reached for her evening purse where she’d placed it on the bench.

  ‘I have to go…’ she mumbled, almost stumbling over her feet in her haste to leave. ‘I’ll get a cab.’

  ‘Bryony.’

  Kane’s deep voice commanded her to turn back to face him.

  She slowly turned and aimed her gaze at a point to the left of his shoulder so she didn’t have to witness the satisfaction on his hateful face that he’d finally made her crack emotionally.

  ‘I—I want to go home.’ She did her best to inject some steely determination into her tone but her voice wobbled dangerously.

  ‘I’ll take you home in a minute.’

  ‘I want to go now.’

  There was a lengthy uncomfortable silence which Bryony suspected was a deliberate ploy on his part to get her pride to drop to rock bottom where he wanted it—at his feet.

  But, to her surprise, he gave a long deep sigh and reached for his keys. ‘Come on, then.’

  She’d expected a fight and had been so busily preparing herself for it that his ready acquiescence shifted her completely off course. She followed him out to his car in a wooden silence, the sheen of tears filming her eyes making it difficult for her to negotiate the path.

  She felt his hand at her elbow as she almost stumbled, his touch light but protective, and even though her pride insisted she pull out of his hold, for some reason she didn’t.

  A few minutes later Kane pulled up in front of her apartment, but even before he could get out of the driver’s door she’d opened hers and, with her head down, walked stiffly towards the entrance
of the building without bothering to say goodnight.

  Kane let out another sigh and waited until he was sure she was safely inside the building before reversing out of the car park with a squeal of rubber on the road that he was sure could be heard on the opposite side of the harbour.

  Bryony worked her way through the week with an energy fuelled by her simmering rage at how Kane had crushed her so ruthlessly, promising herself she’d have her own revenge as soon as she could orchestrate it.

  She ignored the phone when it rang and deleted any messages without listening to them, and when the security intercom sounded at the apartment she glared at it without responding.

  Her last class on Friday evening was a private lesson with a young teenager who was on a slow path to rehabilitation after a serious horse-riding accident. Ella Denby hadn’t regained her confidence and needed lots of encouragement from Bryony to keep rebuilding her skills.

  ‘OK, now let’s take it really slowly,’ Bryony said as the young girl stood in front of the mirror with her. ‘Try the first position…great.’ She smiled encouragingly and continued, ‘And the second…good, now here comes the more difficult one as it requires a little more balance, position three.’

  Ella’s right arm curved upwards while the other was just below shoulder height, her legs crossed at the ankles, her posture almost perfect except for a tiny wobble when she pointed her toes.

  ‘Good, Ella, now try position four.’

  Ella reversed the pose and the wobble was hardly noticeable this time.

  Bryony caught her young student’s smile in the reflection of the mirror and returned it with a brilliant one of her own.

  ‘See? I knew you could do it! Now, let’s finish off with the fifth and…’ Her words trailed off as she met another pair of eyes in the mirror.

  Kane was standing at the back of the studio, his hands in his trouser pockets, his dark gaze trained on her.

  ‘Excuse me, Ella.’ She touched the young girl’s shoulder briefly. ‘I won’t be a minute.’

  Even though she wore track pants over the top she was still conscious of her close-fitting leotard as she crossed the floor, conscious too of her lack of height in her ballet slippers as she came to stand in front of him.