‘I did not use you!’
‘We both used each other. It was just—what was it you said? A night of meaningless passion.’
‘Meaningless is the truth. You couldn’t get out of there quick enough!’
Oh, if only he knew the reality of it!
Skye felt tears threaten and fought against them hard, tightening her jaw and clamping her mouth tight shut against the little cry of distress that almost escaped her.
If only he knew how she had felt that morning when she had woken to find herself curled up close to his long, warm body, clasped tight in the strength of his arms.
For a few, wonderful moments reality hadn’t quite sunk in and she had lain there, keeping her eyes closed, a small, ridiculous smile on her face, just enjoying the sensation of being held like this. How she had wished that she could just stay there, held close, and never, ever move again.
And when she had finally left the room, her face had been streaked with tears. Tears of loss for a man who hadn’t even known who she was and—if fate was kind—would never know.
But of course fate had not been kind. The truth was that fate had been at its cruellest that night, and again when it had brought her here, to this island just three days ago.
Because it had brought her face to face with the man who had stolen part of her soul on that single night in a London hotel. The man whom she had tried to convince herself she never wanted to meet ever again. But the man whom she knew, deep down in her heart, she most longed to see in the entire world.
Until he had appeared in Helikos in the form of the one man that she must never, ever, even dream of getting close to. The man who was totally forbidden to her, and had to stay that way for the rest of her life.
CHAPTER TEN
‘I’M SORRY.’
Skye felt obliged to say it.
‘I never meant you to feel used.’
The truth was that it was the last thing she had expected.
‘But can’t we forget about that night—put it behind us?’
‘You know damn well that we can’t!’
Theo’s voice was rough and husky and his eyes burned like polished jet as they scoured her face.
‘It’s still there—between us. I can’t forget about it—can you?’
Never in her life, Skye acknowledged, but she was going to have to try. There was no way she and her family could have a future if she didn’t escape from the past.
‘I have to,’ she said with what she hoped sounded like conviction. ‘We have to. Nothing can happen between us. I’m marrying your father. We have to live as if we’d never met before. As if we’d never…’
‘And you can do that, can you?’ Theo put in when her voice failed her, lacking the courage to complete the sentence. His tone was dark with cynical scepticism, making his disbelief all too plain. ‘You can pretend that we were never lovers—that we have only ever been stepmother and stepson?’
No! No, I can’t do it—I can’t bear it! Skye’s heart felt as if it were being ripped in two at just the thought. She didn’t want to be Theo’s stepmother. She didn’t feel at all motherly towards him. She wanted…
But she couldn’t have what she wanted. That was forbidden to her. She had to put even the dream of it out of her mind and learn, somehow, to live with what was real.
She found the strength to straighten her back, lift her head. She even managed to look him straight in the face, meeting the black-ice stare of those coldly assessing eyes.
‘Yes,’ she managed, and was stunned to hear an assurance that she could never have felt actually sounding in her voice.
But was it enough to convince Theo? He had to be convinced. She didn’t know how she could go on if he wasn’t.
He didn’t look convinced. But then she didn’t know what he did look. She couldn’t read his still, inscrutable expression. Couldn’t tell a single thought that was passing through his coolly assessing brain. She could only hope and pray.
Still with his eyes fixed on her face, Theo stirred slightly. He drew in a long, thoughtful breath, inclined his head to one side, ever so slightly.
‘Prove it,’ he said.
‘What?’
‘Prove it,’ Theo repeated, with a harder, slashing emphasis. ‘If you’re so convinced that you can act as if we’ve never been lovers—as if there is nothing between us—then do it. And get some practice in before my father comes home. He said I would look after you; I think I’d better start doing that.’
‘But…’ Skye tried to protest, but Theo cut through her stumbling attempt to speak.
‘Spend the rest of the day with me. We’ll do a guided tour of the island—that seems like the sort of thing a good stepson would do. Be my stepmother—nothing more. And if at the end of the day you can still say you can live with things that way, then I swear I’ll leave you alone—for good.’
I’ll leave you alone—for good.
Skye’s mind swung violently between hope and despair; agreement and total, desolate rejection of his suggestion. One part of her wanted to do this so that he would leave her in peace—and yet the thing she most wanted in all the world was that he would never leave her. But the way she wanted that was what was totally forbidden to her.
She was going to have to learn to live with that. And perhaps the way that Theo had suggested—the idea of practising, of trying to get used to the idea, without the fear of having Cyril’s eyes following every move—might just work.
She didn’t know. But the one thing she was sure of was that the ruthless, determined set of Theo’s hard features made it only too plain that if she refused then he would put his own interpretation on that fact. An interpretation that spelt death to her hopes of any peace of mind in the future.
It seemed to her that she had only one possible choice.
‘All right,’ she said slowly. ‘I’ll do it.’
Was he really going through with this? Theo asked himself when they were in the car and heading down the rough, winding road that led away from the house. What had happened to his doubts, to the private acknowledgement of the risks he ran, the temptation he would have to endure if he stayed?
The truth was that he wanted that temptation. He couldn’t turn away and just leave it. When he was with Skye he felt more involved with everything, more alive than ever before, and he wasn’t going to abandon a chance to experience that sensation once more, even if it was for the last time.
Besides, he hadn’t been back to Helikos in all the five years he had been apart from his father. He wanted to reacquaint himself with the place, revisit his favourite spots, the places he had loved as a boy. And he would enjoy seeing them afresh through her eyes.
‘We’ll follow the coast road first,’ he told her. ‘That way we can visit the ruined monastery and take a look at some of the caves before we head for the village. I know a wonderful little taverna where we can eat dinner. The people who own it were like family to me.’
And almost more than family, he recalled. Berenice, the oldest daughter, a woman not much more than five years older than himself, had had an intense affair with his father at about the time that the old man had tried to push his son into an unwanted marriage. He remembered how, in one of the last conversations he had had with Cyril, he had flung the fact into the older man’s face.
‘If