by Lynne Graham
Hauling back the covers on the bed in the aftermath, Nik swept her up and laid her down on an exquisitely cool sheet As he urged her back into his arms, Nik vented a husky laugh. 'It was worth thinking about all week as well, yineka mou,' he confided, with very male appreciation.
Olympia's heartbeat was only slowly subsiding to a less maddened pace. She discovered that once more she could think. Her joy at being with Nik again spilt over into momentary sadness, for, looking back ten years, she realised that she now saw a different picture. At seventeen, her ultimate dream guy had asked her out and put an engagement ring on her finger. Nik had genuinely been attracted to her, Nik had genuinely loved her, but she hadn't been equal to the starring role in what had felt too much like a fairy story. So, aided and abetted by her grandfather and Katerina, she had questioned the dream, doubted the dream, and ended up losing the dream through her own sense of unworthiness.
Nik shifted with sinuous sensuality against her. The faraway look of regret in Olympia's eyes was replaced by one of shaken sexual awareness. In the wake of that acknowledgement of loss, she was gripped by a fierce desire to make the most of every moment and live it to the full. 'I loved you so much—'
'Did you?' His lush lashes dipped, screening his spectacular eyes to the merest glimmer of reflective light.
She sensed Nik's withdrawal and knew that once again she had got too close to the fire. She wanted to offer him feverish confirmation and tell him that she loved him still, but fear and pride held her back from that brink. Unable to voice what was on her mind, she took refuge in touching him instead. She wrapped her arms round him in an almost clumsy gesture of affection.
'You're driving me insane with all this intense rave-from-the-grave stuff...it's like the clock stopped ticking for you when you were seventeen,' Nik framed with blunt censure, sliding over on to his back and carrying her with him, rearranging her with confident hands to his own satisfaction.
Olympia was desperately hurt by an accusation that was, she registered belatedly, all too accurate. Yet on their wedding night she had been the one to accuse Nik of being obsessed with the past. Now their roles had been reversed. But, perhaps mercifully, her weak body was already reacting with brazen hussy efficiency to the urgent arousal of his. A wave of responsive heat gripped her, blurring all thought. Her breasts were crushed into his chest, her tender nipples tingling at that sensation. She was so close to him, but not anything like close enough.
Nik surveyed her with deceptively indolent sexuality and teasing expectation. 'Now I would like to demonstrate all the many wonderful ways I can give you incredible pleasure, Kyria Cozakis.'
His supreme confidence blazed over her like a scorching golden aura, and she could not hold back the tender smile curving her mouth.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Four weeks later, Olympia sat up, sipping the iced water she had poured from the flask by the bed.
They had arrived at Nik's magnificent villa on the island of Kritos late the night before. Olympia had slept well, but now she felt slightly dizzy and nauseous. And she knew why, didn't she? Frowning at that acknowledgement, Olympia tagged on a light robe and slid back the doors that gave access to the superb balcony beyond the bedroom. A sea breeze wafted in, the cooling air bliss on her clammy skin. As the voile drapes she had brushed back fluttered, she stilled them with a careful hand and glanced back at the bed.
Nik was still asleep in an indolent sprawl of long, lithe bronzed limbs, the pale linen sheet tangled round his lean hips. A dreamy smile curved her mouth. After an entire month spend cruising the Mediterranean, she was happier than she had ever dreamt of being again. Yet if that was true, why was she holding back on telling Nik that she was pregnant?
'‘‘It was only eight, but Olympia was too restive to return to bed and went for a bath. Lying back in the scented water, she recalled the terms of their marriage deal and sighed heavily. Nik had been breaking those same rules for the past month. He was living with her! Although he had flown in several staff, and begun making use of his office on board Aurora, he still spent an enormous amount of time with her. Now that they were back on dry land again, she saw no reason why that shouldn't continue.
Towelling herself dry, she acknowledged that recently Nik had indulged her every wish to the hilt. Such freedom of choice had rather gone to her head, for all her life she had longed to travel and see the sights she had only read about Over the past weeks the yacht had docked at Majorca, Corsica, Sardinia and finally Sicily. In retrospect, a bewildering jumble of memories engulfed Olympia. Sunlit beaches, shimmering seas, twisting roads and extravagant and beautiful scenery.
Certain memories stood out in sharp definition. Nik linking his hand with hers as they walked through the exclusive re-sort of Porto Cervo in Sardinia a week ago...his fury at the sudden appearance of paparazzi with flashing cameras and the protective way he had screened her from that unpleasant invasion. Nik laughing, teasing, caring and attentive in all sorts of little ways. Nik telling her off for not wearing a higher factor sun cream when she got burned, his concern palpable. And, oh, at least a hundred memories of his love-making. Occasionally gentle, sometimes wild, but always passionate.
He loved her body. She accepted that now. At every opportunity he made her feel sexually irresistible. There had been days when her plans to explore new places hadn't even got off the ground, days when Nik had taken one incredulous glance at the itinerary she had mapped out and rebelled, taking her back to bed instead. Nights when they'd never made the dinner table and had eaten in the early hours.
Yet still she was in no hurry to share the news that she had conceived their first child. It was forty-eight hours since Nik had insisted that a doctor examine her sunburned shoulders. Conscious that she hadn't had a period since before their wedding, Olympia had made full use of that consummation. A brief examination and one little test had followed, and then the confirmation had been given: she was going to have a baby. She was both thrilled and terrified. Before their marriage Nik had made her getting pregnant sound like a likely halfway post to divorce.
And what if they didn't really have a new understanding? How could she tell for sure? Nik never mentioned the future. Nik never mentioned the deal he had forced upon her. They could well have been living in a time capsule, where only the immediate present existed. And for now he was charming, the ultimate in entertaining company. But then why shouldn't he be? she thought with a sinking heart. He had already got her pregnant in record time.
'I've got a complaint to make. Where were you when I woke up?'
Olympia jumped halfway out of her skin and spun round from the mirror. Nik was poised in the doorway, black hair wildly tousled, strong jawline dark with stubble, slumberous dark golden eyes gleaming, a wolfish grin of amusement carving his mouth. He looked heartbreakingly gorgeous.
Nik—'
'I've ordered breakfast...for later.' Strolling across the spectacular mosaic-tiled bathroom, Nik closed his hands over hers and urged her into his arms. 'Join me in the shower and tell me who you were daydreaming about... it had better have been me, pethi mou.'
Delicate colour burnished her cheeks. She buried her face in his shoulder, loving the hot, musky evocative scent of his brown skin. 'Who else?'
Disposing of her robe, he swept her under the shower with him. 'I have so much work to catch up on,' he muttered raggedly between hard, drugging kisses that left her taut and trembling, caught up and inflamed by his hungry urgency. 'We have guests coming too. Theos mou...to hell with all that!'
A long while later, they breakfasted out on the beautiful stone terrace, shaded by tulip trees and a lush, colourful tangle of bougainvillea. The day was glorious, hot and still, the very light golden. In every direction the views were breathtaking. Set high on a mountainside studded with cypress groves, which stretched down to the blue green waters of the Aegean, the villa was surrounded by lush natural gar-dens which blended into the landscape.
In the distance she
could see the harbour, adorned by picturesque collection of houses, and the most lovely little church with a domed campanile. In the deep natural bay Aurora towered like a giant ocean-going liner in a sea of brightly coloured fishing boats. From her first glimpse of Kritos by moonlight the night before, Olympia had been utterly enchanted.
Only then recalling Nik's reference to guests, Olympia frowned in sudden mingled dismay and amusement at her own inability to concentrate earlier. 'You mentioned guests... who's coming and when?'
'Markos Stapoulos and his wife, Samantha. She's British. I think you'll like her,' Nik drawled levelly. 'They couldn't make our wedding because Markos's father was ill, but they're flying in to lunch with us. They should be here in about half an hour.'
Olympia had already stiffened. Ten years back, Markos Stapoulos had been Nik's best friend. Filled with strong discomfiture at the prospect of meeting him again, she said sharply, 'I suppose Markos knows all about that pathetic car park story as well!'
If ever a silence could have been said to sizzle like the string leading to a stick of dynamite, the endless yawning silence which followed that exclamation sizzled.
Studying her with stunned and disconcerted eyes, Nik rammed his hands down on the surface of the table and leapt up to his full intimidating height. 'Christos! Do you think I dined out on that particular story?' he grated, with an explosive fury that shook her. 'Apart from your grandfather, only my parents and Katerina know about that night!'
As Olympia watched, pale but unbowed, Nik strode out from beneath the shade of the tulip trees and into full sunlight. He swung back to face her, his bone structure rigid beneath his bronzed skin, brilliant dark eyes hard with condemnation as he spread his arms in a striking show of raw incomprehension. 'Why are you dragging all this up again?'
'Because you still won't either listen to or believe in my version,' Olympia whispered ruefully. 'And I resent that.'
A dark line of colour scored Nik's hard cheekbones. 'Theos mou...you have no right to resent anything! You're damn lucky I decided to put mat tawdry episode behind us and appreciate you for the woman you are today!'
if you put it behind you, why are you still shouting at me?'
'I...am...not...shouting,' Nik asserted, with such thickened and challenged self-restraint behind that assurance that she could barely distinguish his words.
'Good, because I was never with Lukas and I'm going to keep on telling you that until you listen!'
'But I'll never believe you.' His black eyes glittered like banked twin fires over her, his derision unconcealed. 'I remember the way you looked at me the morning after. You were guilty and proud of it!'
And Olympia remembered her bitter, silent defiance and recognised that Nik's bone-deep conviction that she was now lying stemmed as much from what he had seen in her as from the nonsense he had been told. A great weariness enfolded her then.
'Yet looking back, knowing what I know now...it was nothing!' Nik shrugged with expressive dismissal. 'I should have said it before now, but naturally being your first lover made up—'
it made up for so much you vanished for a whole week!' Olympia slotted in. You have no right to resent anything.
She shivered, trembling fingers curling round her glass of fresh orange juice. Nice to finally find out what lay behind the smooth and charming facade. A stubborn Greek male as unforgiving as a rock that stood through the centuries, weathered but immovable. She was so furious with him she had to weld her back to the seat to stop herself from flying upright and screaming back at him.
'Why don't you just tell me exactly what you did do with Lukas?' Nik demanded with sudden splintering force.
In total shock at that blunt invitation, Olympia's eyes opened very wide.
In response, Nik jerked both his hands up in the air in a speaking gesture of savage frustration. 'It's your fault I'm thinking like this again!' he condemned with raw violence. 'Why the hell couldn't you just leave it alone?'
He strode past the table and then stilled, wide shoulders rigid beneath the fine, expensive cloth of his well-cut jacket. He swung back, dug something from his pocket. He tossed a leather jeweller's box down on the table in front of her. It was a careless, understated move that nonetheless contrived to shout censure, reproach and arrogant male superiority, I was planning to give you that after breakfast.'
Olympia had never liked one-upmanship. 'What's in the box...a truth drug?'
Nik swore long and low in guttural Greek and strode back into the villa.
Olympia flipped open the box and found herself looking at an exquisite diamond-studded locket. She lifted it out, more or less to occupy her shaking hands, and flipped it open. Inside were two tiny photos of her mother and her grandfather. She was incredibly touched by that thoughtful and personalised extra. Had she overreacted or had he? Who was more guilty? The tears overflowed.
Resolving to pull herself together, Olympia went back indoors. Passing through the superb galleried hall, she went upstairs to their bedroom. What did Nik feel for her? Did he feel anything of any importance? Or was she just another bed partner for a highly-sexed male? Was the dark side of Nik's volatile temperament getting a kick out of the fact that she couldn't resist him? For, if he cared at all, how could he still distrust her to such an extent? That hurt her very much. It also seemed to make a complete charade of the wonderful weeks they had spent together.
In search of her make-up, Olympia reached for the handbag she had used the night before. It was a capacious holdall, and with a moan of impatience she tipped out the entire contents on to the bed. In the act of reaching for her cosmetics purse, she stilled in surprise to study the medium-sized brown envelope which had also fallen out of her bag. The envelope was sealed and she had never seen it before.
With a frown, she tore it open. A newspaper cutting and a pair of glossy colour snaps tumbled out on to the smooth silk bedspread. Olympia stared fixedly at the topmost photo, its rather fuzzy quality suggesting the use of a long-range camera. It was Gisele Bonner, lying topless on a sun lounger in the arms of a male who looked remarkably like Nik. Remarkably. She peered at that male image with straining eyes and then bent to examine the other photograph. Another shot of a bare bosom she would sooner not have seen, she conceded, with what felt like a hysterical laugh building like a giant bubble in her tight throat. But in the foreground of that second photo, now standing full face to that clever, intrusive camera lens, she saw Nik. Not a male who bore a remarkable resemblance to Nik but-a male who was without a single shadow of doubt Nik Cozakis!
Her heart sounded a dulled, thunderous thud. Without warning, the door at the other side of the room opened. 'Olympia...?' It was Nik's rich dark drawl.
Without the slightest thought or hesitation, Olympia flung herself face down on the bed across the photos, the newspaper cutting, her handbag and its jumbled contents.
Nik drew to a halt and regarded her prone position with a slight frown. 'Are you feeling OK?'
'Fine...'
When she made no move to get up, Nik hunkered down by the side of the bed, his stunning dark eyes level. 'You've been crying—‘
'No, I haven't been.'
'Liar,' he groaned, one forefinger gently tracing a silvered tear-track marking her cheek. 'I'm sorry I lost my head. I just can't think straight when you mention...' His lean strong face shadowed and darkened, his tension returning. 'I know it's not reasonable, but just please don't mention it again. It makes me.. .unreasonable,' he selected, after a long hesitation and perceptible difficulty in coming up with an alternative word.
'Yes...' She wasn't really listening; the facts of that stupid business with Lukas ten years back now seemed unimportant. She was staring deep into Nik's gorgeous dark golden eyes and praying, praying that the photos she was concealing from him were old photos, sent by his vindictive ex-mistress merely to taunt and distress his new wife.
'Are you sure you're OK?'
Olympia's fingernails curled into t
he bedspread. 'Just give me five minutes to fix my face—'
'Did you like the locket? Damianos said lockets went out with parasols and fans, but I thought it was you...'
'It's me,' she confirmed tightly.
His brows pleating, Nik vaulted slowly back upright.
As soon as he had gone, Olympia rose into a crouch to snatch at the crumpled newspaper cutting lying beneath her. Sinking back on to her knees, she spread it, surprised to see that there were two photos set side by side in the cutting. One the pool scene featuring Nik and Gisele in a clinch and the other of Nik and Olympia emerging from the church after their wedding.
As Olympia registered the proof that the picture of Nik about to snog Gisele must have been taken after she herself had married him, she sucked in oxygen in a great gulp, perspiration dampening her brow. Her stomach curdled. Sick, deep shock engulfed her. Beneath the pool photo, in confirmation of her worst suspicions, ran the immortal words; 'Nik Cozakis breaks his honeymoon in the Med to comfort his mistress.'
That first week they had been married, the week when he had left her alone on the yacht. When else? Nik had been with his mistress, Gisele Bonner. A mistress not former but current. Getting up from the bed, Olympia thrust the photos and the cutting back into her handbag. Then she hovered like a sleepwalker. She went into the bathroom to freshen up. But when she got there she discovered she hadn't brought her cosmetics purse with her and she had to walk back to the bed to fetch it. Then she found that her hands were shaking so badly she was powdering her eyes instead of her shiny nose.
Who had planted that envelope in her bag? Her maid? Five weeks earlier, greeted on the yacht on her wedding day with that 'Compete if you can!' message and the magazine article on Gisele, Olympia had believed the young Greek woman was innocent of any involvement. Now she was less naive. Only her maid had enjoyed such free access to her state room. Only her maid could have easily put anything inside her handbag. But right then the identity of Gisele's helpmate seemed relatively unimportant. It had to be Gisele who was doing this to her, didn't it? Surely Katerina could not be responsible for these photos as well?