Yesterday's Sins

by Wine, Shirley

  The sensation of being watched brought her whirling around. In shocked surprise, she faced the old Greek woman who'd been her jailer on Maude Island.

  "You."

  "So you came back," she hissed in deep, accented English.

  "You speak English?" Bitterness soured Kate's voice as she remembered her desperation to make this woman understand her.

  "Of course I speak English." The old crone laughed, the harsh sound sent a shiver down Kate's spine. "Have you come back to destroy Alex's peace of mind? You're a wicked, evil girl."

  Kate took a step backward, bringing her hard against one of the carved bedposts. "I've returned to see my daughter."

  "Phwzzt." The virulent hiss made Kate shiver. She wouldn't put it past the old witch putting a spell on her. "Sarah is Alex's daughter. Harlot. You still have to get him on the bed. Look at you. Hair messed up, clothes handled. Slut. How many other men have had what you give so freely? And you, you refused to accept Alex's wedding ring."

  The insults had Kate clenching her hands but she refused to glance at her dishevelled clothes. "How dare you say such things?"

  "Easy. You ran away." She snapped her fingers crudely, making a guttural noise in her throat and stepped closer pushing her nose into Kate's face. "Leave. Alex wasn't good enough for you before. You refused to have his son. Why come back now? He has another woman."

  Feeling sick, Kate knew that the old crone was right. None of which had stopped him making love to her on the bed he'd prepared for his wife.

  That thought made her ill with shame.

  "Who are you?"

  "Noni." The old woman cackled. "I'm the only mother little Sarah knows. You can never take my place."

  Kate was filled with blind rage.

  This woman must have understood her all those years ago. "You're a nasty old witch. Why did you pretend to speak no English?"

  "What Alex wants is nothing to do with me." Noni shrugged her bony shoulders. "You killed Marcos, it's right you pay."

  "I never killed Marcos. My cousin stole my car and hit the child." Then she remembered Emily. "You! It was you who drove Emily away and prevented her marrying Dimitri."

  It was a wild guess but Kate knew she was right when the old woman backed away.

  "Dimitri loved his Helen."

  "You loved him, didn't you? And your jealousy stopped him finding happiness with another woman," she said harshly, moving closer. The old crone's eyes moved from side to side, avoiding Kate's. "You won't get rid of me so easily. Shall I tell Alex how you prevented Emily becoming his new mother?"

  "He wouldn't believe you," Noni muttered.

  "Wouldn't he? He'd believe Emily."

  The old besom sidled out the door, leaving Kate trembling from the confrontation.

  The evil old woman was so jealous, it was frightening. And she was the only mother two generations of this family had known. And even Kate knew the power of the Greek Matriarch was legendary.

  Bleak and angry, Kate replayed Noni's words. If Alex had another woman, what was her role in his new life? An annoying encumbrance?

  I should never have allowed you to come here.

  His earlier words mocked her. Did he regard her as an easy lay because of their shared past? He must do, or why else would he make love to her on the very bed he had prepared for his wife? Bile rose in her throat as she recalled how willing she'd been to sacrifice her hard won self-respect.

  She recoiled as she met Noni in the corridor.

  "Don't come back," the old woman hissed at her departing back. "You cause trouble. You're too sickly to give Korda sons. You couldn't even carry a girl full term."

  The poison darts ringing in her ears, Kate fled to her car.

  It was too late for weeping. Sarah was happy, Alex was getting married and she had no place in their lives.

  So why did she feel so empty and cheated?

  Reaching her cottage, Kate threw herself onto her bed, burying her face in the pillows trying to blot out the anguished hunger of Alex's kisses. What would have happened if Sarah hadn't interrupted them?

  Shame scorched her.

  She would have willingly helped him take it to its inevitable conclusion. She had no pride and no inhibitions in his arms.

  Gripped by an agony of frustration, she gave a violent start when hands descended on her shoulders. She turned over and met Alex's accusing eyes. "Why did you run away?"

  "What are you doing here?" Has he got a key to my house?

  "The door was ajar and when you didn't answer my knock I was worried."

  "Why don't you ask Noni?" she flared, still smarting from the old woman's insults. "Do you think I'm a harlot put on the earth to appease your carnal appetites?"

  "Noni?" Thrown off balance, his eyes betrayed his bewilderment. "What has Noni got to do with us? And when have I ever suggested that you were a harlot?"

  "When have you ever thought I wasn't?"

  "Are you ever going to forgive me?" He stood up and rocked back on his heels, looking down at her.

  "I never knew she could speak English."

  "She's always spoken English." Alex frowned and sat on the edge of the bed. "You met Noni this afternoon?"

  "I was told to get out of your life. According to her, I'm a harlot who refused to marry you and give you sons."

  A smile crumpled his lips. Anger seared, how dare he laugh?

  "She's old Greek to her toes," he said attempting to placate her. "To turn down a marriage of honour is the worst insult a woman can give a man. If you found Noni offensive, thank heavens you never ran across my father."

  Kate made a stuttering noise of disbelief at his hypocrisy.

  "I know." He picked up her hand and stroked it. "It's an archaic double standard. I could take your virtue because you'd killed my nephew. That's acceptable, but you turning me down, an unforgivable insult."

  Kate stared at him, and when she saw that he was serious, she couldn't prevent a burst of hysterical laughter. It wasn't funny. But if she didn't laugh, she'd cry.

  Joe Kallinikos had expressed the same sentiments when he'd excused Alex's actions.

  "I don't hold to the old ways." He laid a hand on her shoulder. "Being raised in Australia and having an Australian mother has somewhat diluted the rigid Greek values."

  Not by much, she realised with acute perception. He was hard, proud and fierce in his defence of family honour. After all, family honour was the reason she had entered his life.

  "I never knew that Noni pretended not to speak English."

  "Would you have cared?" She turned away. "I felt so helpless."

  "You were helpless." He stretched out on the bed and drew her into his arms. "I can never justify my actions. My only excuse is that I was out of my mind with grief."

  She didn't protest as she lay within the shelter of his arms, desperate to understand. "Why, Alex? Why did you do something so horrible?"

  "Do you remember how you felt when Chris died?" He toyed with a lock of her hair.

  "Absolutely bereft," she said, shaking with remembered grief. "I lost part of my heart and soul that day."

  She'd turned on Alex, uncaring of the hurt she inflicted. His acceptance and stoicism still surprised her. Never once had he betrayed the shocking truth behind that fatal accident.

  "So did I, when I lost Marcos." Alex crushed her close against him. "He was my dead twin's son, my last link with his father. In a way his death was even worse."

  Kate stiffened, staring at him in disbelief. "You were a twin?"

  "It's not an uncommon condition." He gave a rueful smile. "Does it explain my behaviour?"

  Kate toyed with his shirt button as she digested this information. Had Alex been crazed with grief, as human and vulnerable as she was?

  Why had she never known he was a twin?

  Because I never wanted to know, it was easier to hate than understand.

  "A little." She rested against him, gaining surcease to loneliness. "After I lost Chris I wasn't rational."r />
  "Do you think I didn't know that?" He gave her a little shake, holding her away from him so he could see her face. "How could you believe I'd get Gregori to do my dirty work and pay you off?"

  Any hurt she had inflicted on Alex, had been returned tenfold, when Gregori gave her the money she'd mistaken as a payoff.

  The hurt so bitter, she'd fled.

  "He gave me drugged coffee, so it seemed reasonable."

  "Hell. I'm forever condemned," he muttered, his grip tightening. "The only way we ever met without harsh words was in bed."

  "Sex is your answer to everything."

  "Not quite." A whimsical smile touched his lips. "But it helps smooth away a lot of frustrations. Had Sarah not interrupted us this afternoon it would have been an academic argument. Could you have stopped?"

  "No." She stared at his mouth mesmerised before she looked into his eyes. "Then found myself pregnant again. Was that your intention?"

  "I'm not that big a swine."

  "No?" she flared with more anger than caution.

  "In that case I've got nothing to lose in doing this."

  He bent his head and ravaged her mouth in a possessive kiss. Within seconds, anger faded into explosive passion as they sought to conclude what they'd had begun earlier.

  "I need you, Catriona," he muttered, against lips swollen from his kisses. "I'll make sure you're safe from pregnancy. Do you trust me?"

  A corner of her brain screamed in warning. She looked his eyes and saw the sincerity of his promise written there. Surely it was time to learn to trust again?

  She nodded.

  At her capitulation, Alex's restraint shattered.

  This was no gentle wooing, as he claimed her with banked up hunger, she responded, ardent and passionate in a fiery mating. Afterwards he moved his body to one side, cradling her close.

  Kate buried her face in his throat, for a few moments savouring the ecstasy of total peace. It would be so easy to slip back into the folds of habit, leaving all friction outside the bedroom door.

  She wasn't the same woman who'd last shared this intimacy. Her pride and self-respect spurned such easy compromise.

  "Why did you kidnap me?"

  Alex stiffened at her question. It was her deliberate breaking of an unspoken pact.

  "You came into the black vortex of my grief. Bright, untouched and so certain you'd been the one wronged. I thought you'd killed Marcos, and I hit out without thinking it through."

  "And you got the wrong woman."

  His arm tightened, crushing her.

  "Yes. And in wreaking revenge, I destroyed my honour." The bleak words underscored his torment. "If it's vengeance you need, Catriona, you've had it in full measure. That mistake made me less than a man."

  And that was a damning slur, one she guessed he would find intolerable to live with. And when she ran, leaving him with their child, she'd turned the screw.

  And didn't I intend to do just that?

  "It caused me to leave Australia."

  "Why?"

  "My family saw you lay your token of sorrow beside Marcos."

  She shivered, the memory of scores of dark eyes caressing her, an unwelcome memento of that dark day.

  "Jessica Howard was convicted and sentenced for the hit and run that spilled family blood. So honour was appeased. Soon afterwards I brought a golden haired child into the family circle, and everyone waited, expecting to meet Sarah's mother. When you vanished, they waited for an explanation."

  Silence settled, stretching unbearably.

  "What did you tell them?" she asked at last.

  "How could I explain? And they would not ask. That's not our way." He laughed harshly. "Believe me, there are few things worse than the judgmental silence of your family."

  "Isn't there?" she asked in incredulous disbelief.

  "Try it some time, Catriona. You may change your mind. I believe the English have a word for it, Coventry."

  Kate swallowed hard pulled back and looked at him.

  "You're serious?"

  "As serious as a heart attack. Greeks look upon the family as a unit. If one is hurt then all will limp. If one offends we all bear the burden of guilt. And believe me, I offended, big time. And once rumours began to surface in the press, so did their accusing silence."

  "What sort of rumours?"

  "Since my father and Marcos were killed, the Korda family has worked damn hard to escape the taint of his name," he said gravely. "When the wild rumours about Sarah's mother circulated, my father's unsavoury past was resurrected by the press."

  "What sort of rumours?"

  "You name it, it was said. And by then, I didn't dare explain. My family was so furious at all the bad press; I couldn't trust them with the truth. I had to protect Sarah and…" he paused.

  "And?"

  "You," he said roughly. "After what I'd done, I had to protect your name. Had the press caught a whiff of your name, believe me they would have found you, assumed identity or not."

  Kate shivered and buried her face in his throat, smoothing her hands over taut muscles back. Before she left Australia she'd been aware of the ugly rumours and for years she'd feared being discovered.

  You and Sarah both, have a lot to thank Alex for. Suddenly, Dr. Hart's words made sense.

  "I didn't know."

  "Don't let it worry you. It's no more than I deserved."

  Silence settled and they drifted off to sleep. Sometime later, strong hands aroused her from sleep.

  With exquisite gentleness Alex made love to her again, leaving no response un-awakened or unappeased, before finally taking his possession with such overwhelming tenderness, she cried with an emotional overload.

  He kissed the tears from her cheeks, soothing her until she fell asleep, wrapped in his sheltering arms.

  The grey fingers of dawn cast ghostly shadows when Kate stirred. She groped for Alex's warmth and not finding it, opened her eyes and stared at the ceiling as she considered the ramifications.

  What was she to do now?

  Alex was her lover.

  He was an addiction her body craved. An addiction she could no longer deny or resist. She knew no shame or pride when she was in his arms.

  And no reasoning or remorse could alter the taint of their relationship.

  Unable to bear remembering her willing response to the man she had vowed to despise forever, she leaped out of bed and headed for the shower. But no amount of scalding water or fierce scrubbing could erase his possessive touch.

  Afterwards, she stripped her bed, desperate to erase the lingering trace of Alex's body scent.

  Why had he come? To finish the encounter started in his bedroom? In despair, she slumped on the bed burying her face in her hands. The doorbell intruded on her thoughts. Who could be at her door at this hour of the day? Alex? It pealed again and she answered the imperious summons.

  "Flower delivery, Ms. Audley."

  A basket of flowers was thrust at her, and she was struck by a sense of déjà vu. A similar flower delivery had changed her life.

  Startled, Kate took them.

  Her eyes softened as she took in the romantic arrangement of dainty ivory, pink tinted roses and baby's breath in a white cane basket. A satin bow in the same shade of palest pink was tied at the base of one side of the handle.

  She buried her nose in them savouring their delicate fragrance.

  Her fingers trembled with anticipation as she reached for the heavy white card nestled among the flowers.

  There was just one word.

  Alex.

  Payment for last night?

  She rejected that wounding thought.

  His repudiation of such sentiments had been implacable. With innate fairness, she admitted he'd never tried to bribe her with his wealth. Why had such a hard, uncompromising man sent her such a romantic bouquet?

  Because they were lovers again?

  Her lips trembled. Was Alex hoping she would be content with a purely physical relationship? He had for
ced her into such a relationship once.

  She would never allow it to happen again.

  Chapter Nine

  Dave met her as she walked into the office later that morning, a roll of plans in his hands. "The scheme plan for the subdivision of Smith's Farm was in the mail. Korda has asked to be informed immediately they arrive."