by Lynne Graham
'Planned it?' she questioned, but Nik was already opening the door and standing back for her entrance.
CHAPTER TEN
Five heads turned towards the door, and with only two exceptions all faces betrayed discomfiture of varying degrees when Olympia appeared.
Spyros Manoulis looked the least surprised and the most pleased. Nik's brother, Peri, greeted her with a wide grin of approval. Achilles, Nik's father, who always looked forbidding, merely stiffened. Nik's mother, Alexandra, cosily seated beside Katerina, froze with unease. And Katerina? Katerina stared, and then pinned a bright smile to her lips.
The other woman had no fear, either of Olympia or of her lies being exposed, Olympia recognised bitterly. In pleased receipt of a warm hug from her grandfather, and a cooler acknowledgement of her arrival from the other parties present, she took a seat. How was she supposed to confront Katerina without any proof that she had lied? Why should Nik's cousin confess anything when she had so much to lose? While Olympia was frantically wondering what she could say that might provoke the brunette into showing her true colours, Nik started talking.
'I have a story to tell you all,' Nik drawled lazily from his stance by the marble fireplace.
Curiosity awakened, everybody sat up a little straighter to listen. But when Olympia realised what story it was that Nik intended to tell she was disconcerted and embarrassed. She decided that the minute she got him out of the room she would kill him! It was purgatory to be forced to sit there while Nik told the tale of the message on the mirror on their wedding night, and then went on to mention the newspaper article which he had tried to protect Olympia from. By the time he got round to the photos which she had found hidden in her handbag Olympia was squirming.
Achilles Cozakis breathed with distaste. 'A most unpleasant business.'
Alexandra Cozakis, who had turned to ice at the mere mention of her eldest son featuring in an intimate photograph with Gisele Bonner, said without hesitation, ‘That was the behaviour of a very malicious woman.'
'Disgraceful!' Spyros Manoulis pronounced, with sincere annoyance on his granddaughter's behalf.
'Now I know why I never really took to Gisele,' Peri mused with a grimace.
'How awful for you!' Katerina gasped in turn, giving Olympia a look of caring commiseration.
Katerina's exclamation seemed to draw everybody's attention to the fact that neither of Nik's parents had offered their daughter-in-law sympathy for what she had suffered.
'Who do you think was behind that campaign against my wife?' Nik enquired softly.
Everybody frowned while they tried to work out why he was asking what appeared to be a stupid question.
'It wasn't Gisele,' Nik emphasised, and he drew a folded document from the inside pocket of his jacket. 'It was a member of this family. Someone who has run tame in this house since I was a child. Someone we trust, someone we care about.'
Comprehension hit Olympia as she looked across the room and recognised that Katerina had turned as white as milk. The brunette was sitting forward on her seat, her tension palpable. Dear heaven, Olympia realised then. It hadn't been Gisele behind that campaign; it had been Katerina!
'You shouldn't have been so careless, Katerina. Damianos is a very thorough investigator,' Nik delivered.
The whole room seemed to erupt then. Nik's parents spoke up in furious Greek, most probably defending Katerina, who had burst into instant floods of tears.
'Use English,' Nik cut in with quiet authority. 'Olympia's Greek is much improved, but you are speaking too quickly and nobody has a greater right to understand all that is said here. And before anybody gets carried away with the need to comfort my cousin, let me tell you how she contrived to wage such a campaign.’
Katerina had been on board Aurora with Achilles and Alexandra Cozakis the week before the wedding. She had bribed Olympia's maid into carrying out her instructions. Nik handed the document in his hand to his father. 'The maid was in regular contact with Katerina during our honeymoon. Katerina flew to Spain to meet up with the maid and pass over the photos. That meeting was witnessed by another crew member. The photographer who sold the photos to Katerina was willing to identify her. The evidence against my cousin is incontrovertible.'
'How could you imagine that I would do such dreadful things?' Katerina wept brokenly.
'Because it wasn't the first time, was it?' Olympia heard herself answer, and slowly she rose to her feet.
'What's that supposed to mean?' the brunette demanded, her voice stronger the instant she saw Olympia in front of her, her hostility unconcealed.
'When Nik and I got engaged ten years ago, you decided to break us up.'
'I have no idea what you're talking about,' Katerina said woodenly.
'Like hell you haven't!' Nik launched without warning at his cousin. 'Ten years ago you swore in front of witnesses that you caught Lukas and Olympia having sex in my car!'
Such plain speaking provoked a moan of reproof from Nik's already shaken mother.
'I'm sorry.' Olympia was sympathetic towards the older woman's embarrassment. 'Of course you don't want to be forced to listen to anything more unpleasant, but this does have to be cleared up. I was unjustly accused and I do want the truth to be known and accepted.'
'Katerina!' Nik thundered impatiently.
'All right!' Katerina said flatly. 'For what its worth, I got together with Lukas and we set you both up. Nothing happened between Lukas and Olympia...I just made the whole story up! Are you satisfied now?'
An unearthly silence fell at that unemotional rendering of such offensive facts.
‘Why? Nik demanded with sudden rawness. 'Why would you make such filthy allegations about my fiancé? You're my cousin. Lukas was my friend.'
Katerina turned her head away in mute refusal to respond. In silence, Spyros Manoulis ushered Olympia back into her seat and remained beside her.
'She was in love with you, Nik,' Olympia sighed ruefully. 'I'm afraid it was a little more than just a crush. I moved in on what she saw as her territory and she's hated me for that ever since.'
'I am appalled by this,' Achilles Cozakis admitted to Olympia, making no attempt to conceal his horrified embarrassment at the lies which the brunette had told. 'We accepted everything Katerina said without question.'
'I too am filled with disgust, Katerina,' Alexandra Cozakis stated with tear-filled eyes but a cold, steady voice. 'You hurt and distressed my son and destroyed Olympia's good reputation. Yet I remember how warmly Olympia received your offer of friendship. She did you no harm and neither did Nik. Your lack of shame even now shocks me most'
Beneath that onslaught of censure, Katerina's face hardened.
'What was Lukas's part in all this?' Nik breathed with a roughened edge to his dark drawl, ashen pale now beneath his bronzed skin.
'Lukas had to get very drunk to do what he did that night, Nik,' Olympia answered in gentle consolation. 'He was very unhappy about it, but he seemed to believe that if the Cozakis and Manoulis families got together in business, his family's company would be unable to compete.'
Nik awarded Olympia a stunned look of comprehension. 'Yes, when I think of it, that would have been a possibility, but it did not occur to any of us at the time. Christos... where were my wits?'
'We can be grateful that at least Lukas's parents don't have to live with the knowledge of their dead son's part in this sordid affair,' Achilles Cozakis stepped in to say, his tone one of finality before he turned to address Katerina. 'I have called a car for you. You will not be welcome in this house again!'
'You were still telling lies about Olympia on our wedding day!' Nik suddenly erupted in an outraged roar, taking everybody by surprise.
Katerina jumped up, her face twisting with sudden fury and violent resentment as she stalked to the door. 'You could have had me as a wife but you picked a nothing, a bastard from a backstreet in London, and you got what you deserved!'
Nik's parents reared back in al
most comical horror from Katerina's rage and abuse. It was clear that neither had ever seen that side of the younger woman.
'No, Olympia got what I deserved,' Nik muttered with sick distaste, and turned away as the door slammed on his cousin's exit.
'What a lively family you have, Achilles!' Spyros Manoulis said to Nik's father in apparent wonderment. 'But that one who has just gone out is a snake. I would not like to think that Katerina would again be in a position where she might harm Olympia.'
'She leapt up like a madwoman!' Alexandra Cozakis gasped with a stricken sob. 'Who would ever have thought that Katerina could be like that?'
'Be assured that that young woman will cause no further trouble,' Achilles Cozakis asserted in considerable mortification, patting his distraught wife's shoulder. 'But I think we have all had enough of her for one evening.'
Nik was by the window, silent, still, and not looking in anybody's direction.
'Yes, indeed.' Spyros extended a hand down to Olympia, who clasped it and stood up. 'By the way, I'm taking my granddaughter home with me.'
'Home with you...' Olympia echoed, thunderstruck by that casual announcement.
Nik seemed to emerge from his abstraction. Swinging round, he took an almost clumsy step forward, as totally taken aback by that development as everybody else. 'What are you saying, Spyros?'
'I'm taking her back. You don't deserve her. In my home she will be properly valued and protected.'
'Spyros... Nik is in shock, as we all are,' Achilles Cozakis intervened in dismay. 'We are all very much aware that amends must be made to Olympia for her treatment, not only in the past but in the present. We are painfully conscious of our mistakes and prejudices.'
'Come on, Olympia...' Olympia found herself being hustled towards the door at speed by her determined grandfather, who paused in the doorway only to say in conclusion, 'You have lost yourself a fine woman, Nik Cozakis!'
‘That'll give my son-in-law something more sensible to worry about!' Spyros chuckled as he swept them both out of the Cozakis mansion. 'Did you see their faces? All that weeping and wailing! We Manoulises are people of action.'
'But I don't want to leave Nik,' Olympia protested shakily, the evening's events beginning to catch up with her as well, leaving her feeling momentarily weak and weepy and out of touch with what was happening around her.
'I know what I'm doing.' Her grandfather urged her with gentle hands into the limo waiting outside. 'I'm stealing you back for an hour. Now that you're married, Nik's welcome to spend the night in my home.'
'How can he spend the night when he's not with us?'
'Olympia... tonight Nik was so weighed down with his guilt and his bitterness he was in a stupor, and I felt sorry for him. When he saw his wife being trailed away, he went from the stupor into panic...much more healthy!' Spyros asserted, patting her tightly linked hands in a comforting gesture. 'I have no doubt that Nik will be pounding my front door long before midnight! However, I also cruelly misjudged you, and we also have fences to mend.'
And Olympia and her grandfather did mend those fences, quite happily, and, being both of a blunt disposition, they did the mending within a very few words. Had Olympia had Nik by her side she would have felt happier; she did not have her grandfather's faith in the belief that Nik would immediately chase after her.
Arriving at Spyros's villa, she was engulfed in a rapturous welcome by her mother, who was looking terrific.
'Doesn't she look well?' Spyros said proudly of his daughter, Irini. 'Good Greek air performed the miracle.'
Neither Olympia nor her grandfather saw any point in distressing Irini Manoulis with the evening's events. Olympia chose to share the news of her pregnancy instead. Spyros was ecstatic, and broke out a bottle of champagne. Her mother glowed with excitement and briefly wondered where Nik was.
'You'll see Nik over the breakfast table,' Spyros promised, ignoring Olympia's strained look.
Her mother showed her into a spacious guest room and sat down on the edge of the divan to chat to her daughter at length about babies. She began to yawn a little then, and Olympia persuaded her to go to bed. Soon after that, a loud knock sounded on the door and her grandfather appeared looking very smug. He said nothing, though. He just stepped back, and only then did Nik move into view.
His tie was missing, his black hair ruffled, half his shirt undone, a definable dark shadow now roughening his strong jawline. He was far from immaculate but, being Nik, he still contrived to look absolutely gorgeous. Her heart started beating so fast she felt as if she couldn't breathe.
The silence was too much for Spyros. He slapped Nik on the back. 'Even I didn't expect a grandchild on the way this soon!' he admitted, before mercifully closing the door to leave them alone.
Olympia was cringing with mortification.
Nik had frozen in receipt of that congratulatory slap. Haunted night-dark eyes rested on Olympia. 'I didn't give you much choice, did I?'
'I'm really pleased about the baby...' Olympia told him.
'You have to be, don't you?' Nik sighed.
'I am really happy about our baby,' Olympia repeated doggedly, recognising the strain etched in his vibrant dark features. 'Why did it take you so long to get over here?'
‘The limo broke down. I had to get a cab, and then it got stuck in a traffic jam, and I ended up walking the rest of the way with Damianos grousing in my wake.'
Olympia had to gulp back a nervous laugh.
Nik swallowed. One of his hands moved in an awkward gesture and then stilled again. He watched her with intense and beautiful dark eyes and then he breathed in very deep. 'You know I love you so much it hurts...' he said with ragged sincerity.
She flew off the edge of the bed and flung herself at him.
Nik caught her into his arms and held her so close she almost couldn't breathe. 'I was planning to say a lot of other things, but when it comes down to it loving you is about the only thing I've got to offer in my favour.'
'Rubbish,' Olympia scolded chokily.
'I thought I knew so much ten years ago and I didn't know anything. I should have known they were lying!' Nik groaned into her hair. 'I can't forgive myself for being that stupid. How can you? I wrecked everything for us—'
'We were so young, and we were both so desperate to save face we couldn't be honest with each other.' She smoothed possessive fingers through his black hair, allowing happiness to channel through her in an exhilarating wave. 'I don't want to look back any more, Nik. You can't look out for the Katerinas of this world. She was very clever and very convincing. I really trusted her as a friend and I was shattered at the way she just turned on me that night.'
'When Damianos found the photo trail led back to her I was devastated, and I knew instantly that everything you had ever tried to tell me about her had to be true,' Nik confided tautly.
'When did you find out?'
'Late last night. My first urge was to fly straight out to Kritos, but I decided it would be better to confront Katerina and that you had the right to be there too.' His beautiful mouth tightened. 'I didn't want to tell you in advance in case in some way you alerted her and put her on her guard. I knew we didn't have a shred of proof about what she did ten years ago, but I was determined to get the truth out of her or your sake.'
'I'm so grateful you had the evidence that it was her behind those photos.'
Nik looked down at her with immense regret. 'She caused us so much misery. But there's never been anybody but you in my heart...nobody else even came close.'
Olympia hugged him tight, his gruff honesty bringing tears to her eyes.
'I really had already overcome my...my—' 'Unreasonable feelings about what you thought I had done with Lukas?' Olympia put in helpfully. 'I know you had. You made that quite clear—' 'The day you threw me out of the house.' 'I know.' Olympia sighed lovingly. 'You got no credit at all. The fact sort of got lost in what I was feeling about those photos.'
'Katerina again
,' Nik ground out.
Olympia snuggled past his jacket into his shirtfront, drinking in the achingly familiar scent of him, wonderfully aware of the tall, hard, lean length of him. 'Do you know she actually told me that our marriage was arranged before you even met me?’
'What nonsense is that?' Nik held her back from him.
'I know,' Olympia sighed shame-facedly. 'How could I have believed something so far-fetched?'
'There was no arranged marriage.' Nik cupped her cheekbones. His gorgeous dark eyes sought hers with glimmering amusement. 'But I did see a photo of you in Spyros's office the year before we met,' he confided. 'You were sitting with a white cat on your knee. You had such a glorious smile that I had to ask your grandfather who you were.'
Olympia stared up at him in surprise, for she recalled that photo.
'Your grandfather knew I was impressed, and that may be why he invited me over to meet you as soon as you arrived in Greece...I wouldn't put it past him.'
'Neither would 1...' But Olympia smiled, tickled pink by the idea of Nik having admired her that much even before he met her. 'Were your parents feeling better by the time you left?'
'They're very upset about the way they've treated you, and concerned that they may inadvertently have encouraged Katerina. Possibly there was a time when my mother thought she wouldn't mind if I married her,' Nik acknowledged grimly. 'However, I never had the slightest interest in her in that way.'
'But she doesn't ever seem to have faced that, which is very strange.' Olympia frowned, feeling sorry for the other woman as she recognised how irrational Katerina's behaviour had been.
'Because she's obsessed. My father will talk to her family and suggest that she has professional help. It's not a problem that can be ignored. I suspect that guilt over Lukas's death may have hit Katerina harder than any of us could have appreciated,' Nik conceded ruefully. 'He was infatuated with her. How must she have felt when he crashed that car?'
Olympia shivered, and decided a change of subject was overdue. Tell me, would you really have dumped me back at my family's feet in front of our wedding guests?'