by Julia James
His right hand, which had been lying inert at his side, lifted. It touched along her knuckles as her fingers clutched the duvet to her. Then he twined his fingers into hers.
‘I hurt, Vicky. I hurt so much.’
His voice was quiet.
‘I hurt. But it was mortal pain, so I could hardly feel it. Not beneath the monster tearing me to shreds. But it was there all the same, all the time. Invisible, unnoticed, ignored. Until tonight. Until now.’
His fingers tightened on hers. Everything had gone very, very still all around her. Nothing moved. No breath in her lungs. No blood in her veins. All quite, quite still.
He looked up at her. With eyes that were not veiled.
‘Why did you run from me that morning on the island? You said you panicked—but why? Why didn’t you just turn on me and berate me for what I’d done? Why did you let me tear you to shreds about your adultery? Why did you let me do what I did to you when I made you come back to Greece? You’ve given me answers, Vicky—but there’s one more truth to tell, isn’t there? Isn’t there?’
His grip on her was drawing her down to him. She could not pull back.
‘Isn’t there, Vicky?’ he said again. Insisting—insisting on the truth. All the truth. One last secret, one last lie undone.
His hand slid from his neck to hers, holding her with effortless power, so that she could only look down into his face from so, so close.
‘I’ll answer for you,’ he said. His eyes poured into hers. ‘You did what I did—and, like me, you never intended to, but it happened all the same. To both of us, Vicky. To both of us. And I’m going to say the words to you, so that you can hear them from me and not be afraid—not any more, never again. S’agape. I love you. Now say the same, Vicky—say the same. You can do it because I can do it. It’s weird and strange and unbelievable—but we must believe it because it is the truth. S’agape. Say it, Vicky, matia mou. My eyes. My love.’
How hard it was, to say the truth. Even in a whisper.
‘S’agape, Theo.’
He drew her down to him and kissed her gently. Then he cradled her in his arms and drew the duvet over them both.
‘What would you say,’ he said, and his breath was warm on her cheek, ‘to another wedding?’
She felt love—hers and his—flow between them. A levelling tide that floated them away to the shores of that land they would never leave now, through all that might ever happen, safe in what they had.
She smiled against his mouth.
‘I’d say yes,’ she said.
EPILOGUE
SUN dazzling on the sea. The scent of thyme, crushed beneath the feet of the wedding guests. The whiteness of the chapel walls against the blue of heaven above.
Vicky stood with Theo, arm in arm in the narrow doorway of the tiny chapel on the hill, on the island, and all around in the clear bright sunlit air was light, pouring down like a blessing on their union.
The guests came forward to embrace them. Her mother and Geoff, hugging her, then her uncle, tears unashamedly in his eyes, and Jem, wrapping her in his bear hug and telling her to avoid the paps in future because he was done with being foolhardy and rushing off to confront vengeful husbands intent on grievous bodily harm to him.
She laughed, and cried, and laughed and cried again. Her mother was kissing Theo, and Geoff was pumping his hand, and Jem was slapping him on the back, and Aristides was enveloping him in the kind of embrace that no Englishman could ever give another man, then turning to her mother and embracing her even more tightly, telling her thickly that his brother was calling down blessings from heaven on his beautiful daughter. Then he was steering them all down the narrow path to the stonewalled villa, which was nowhere near big enough for the party except on the shady terrace, where the wedding breakfast was spread out for them.
The officiating priest, a personal friend of Aristides, had received his brother’s daughter into the Orthodox church for her wedding—her real wedding this time, her real marriage. The bride and groom were seated side by side, while her parents and stepbrother and uncle raised their brimming champagne glasses to toast their happiness and their future.
Then a team of staff emerged from the sleek cruiser moored at the tiny quay, and proceeded to present a meal fit for a Michelin starred restaurant.
It was several hours later, and the sun was westering, before the wedding guests started to make their way along the quay to embark upon Theo’s cruiser, which would take them back to the mainland. With many embracings, and yet more tears and laughter, they took their leave, and Vicky and Theo watched them go, their arms wound about each other’s waists. A final wave, a final blown kiss, then the engine roared and the cruiser cut its wake through the azure waters, heading away.
They watched till it was out of sight.
Then turned to one another.
‘So, Theo Theakis, what do you propose we do now?’ asked Theo.
‘We could clear the table,’ said Vicky.
‘Done already. My staff are well trained.’
‘Do the washing up?’
‘Also done already.’
‘Well, there must be something we should do.’
His eyes glinted.
‘There’s certainly something I should do. This.’
His fingers smoothed the fabric of her wedding gown from one shoulder.
‘And this,’ he said, and his lips smoothed the skin beneath. ‘And similarly…’
He performed the same task to her other shoulder.
‘Then, of course, there is this.’ His hand went to her back, and with a single fluid movement drew down her zip. ‘Why, Theo Theakis, you do not appear to be wearing underwear…’
‘It’s the heat,’ she murmured.
‘Ah, well, that is something we can remedy, I believe.’ The glint in his eye, the deliberate not touching of her naked back, was sending tiny delicious sparks through her. ‘You may find it, Theo Theakis, cooler indoors. Shall we?’
He guided her inside the villa, into the single bedroom. With the double bed.
‘Much cooler,’ she murmured.
‘Oh, I think we can do better yet,’ he said. The jacket of his wedding suit had long ago been discarded, and still hung around the back of the chair he’d sat in for the breakfast. His cuffs were undone and his shirtsleeves rolled up. His tie hung loose around his neck, the top button of his shirt unfastened. Now he proceeded to unbutton the rest of it.
‘Allow me to help,’ said his wife. ‘Wives should always help their husbands in all those little tasks they like help with.’
One by one her fingers slipped his buttons, drawing the fine material apart, slipping it from his broad shoulders. Then, as he stood stock still, no muscle moving, she unbuckled his belt and started on the fastenings of his trousers.
His hands moved like lightning, imprisoning and lifting.
‘Some tasks,’ he said, and there was a tightness in his voice she’d have been deaf not to hear, ‘may prove a little…precipitate…if helped with. Allow me, instead, to reciprocate.’
He drew her loosened dress from her, exposing first one breast and then the other. They were full, engorged already, their tips like coral. He touched each lightly, felt them flower at his touch. Sensation shot through her.
He let her gown fall to the floor. She left it there. She would tidy it later. But now, right now, it was time for one thing only.
She took his hand and lifted it above her breasts, to her heart.
‘Roll back time, Theo. Make the past come back again. But make the present now the past. This the reality. Now. For us both. Now and for ever.’
He turned his hand in hers, and took hers with his, raised it to his lips.
‘Now and for ever,’ he said.
For one long, timeless moment they gazed into each other’s eyes, and all the needless pain and torment were undone.
Then he let go her hand and replaced his own at her breast.
‘Now,’ he said, ‘where were
we?’
‘You were starting to make sensual, passionate, bliss-inducing love to me on my wedding day,’ said Vicky helpfully.
‘Ah, yes, so I was. Well, then…’ His thumb started to tease her nipple, sending weakness and desire dissolving through her. ‘Let’s continue, shall we?’
‘Yes,’ said Vicky faintly, as her body turned boneless, ‘let’s.’
ISBN: 978-1-4268-0283-6
BOUGHT FOR THE GREEK’S BED
First North American Publication 2007.
Copyright © 2007 by Julia James.