As Maria attempted to assure her husband that Demetri’s assistant would never use one of the company’s helicopters for his own use, Jane swallowed convulsively. Dear God, Demetri couldn’t be here, could he? He’d promised…
But what had he promised? she asked herself. Only that he’d keep out of her way. He’d said nothing about staying away from the island. It was his home, after all, and Ariadne was here.
‘Hardly his own use, my dear,’ Leo was saying now, reaching for his cane and getting up from his seat at the head of the table. He tilted his head and Jane realised the noise had ceased. ‘It seems he has landed. I will go and wait for him on the terrace.’
‘I can go—’ began Ariadne, but Demetri’s father merely waved her offer away.
‘You go into the salon with the others, my dear,’ he said charmingly. ‘Enjoy your coffee. If it is Demetri, I would prefer a few moments with him alone.’ He paused. ‘Company matters, katalavenis? You understand?’
Looking from Ariadne to her mother-in-law, Jane couldn’t tell which of them was the most put out by his words. ‘You’re supposed to take things easy!’ exclaimed Maria sharply, but Leo only raised a finger to his lips.
‘And I will,’ he promised, making for the door. ‘After I have spoken with my son.’
‘And why can’t Demetri speak to you in your study?’ demanded Maria, going after him. ‘Just because she is here does not mean that Demetri cannot enter his own home.’
‘Jane. Her name is Jane,’ said Leo tersely, his dark eyes, so like his eldest son’s, flashing his displeasure. ‘See to the coffee, vineka. I will not be long.’
He left the room without another word and for a moment there was silence in the room. Then, seizing her chance, Jane pushed back her chair and got to her feet. ‘If you’ll excuse me, Maria, I’d like to go to my room now. It’s been a long day and I still have unpacking to attend to.’
Yeah, right. One haversack containing a couple of dresses, some shorts and tank-tops and underwear would take all of five minutes to unpack. But Demetri’s mother wasn’t to know that, even if Ariadne knew what she’d brought with her from the ferry.
‘Kala—well, if you are sure?’
Jane was sure Maria—and Ariadne for that matter—couldn’t believe their luck. ‘I’m sure,’ she said, managing a smile for Demetri’s brothers. ‘It’s been nice to see you again, Stefan,’ Yanis.’ Nice! She cringed at the word. ‘If I don’t see you again, thank you for making me feel so welcome.’
Leo had just reached the outer door when she entered the hall. Taking off her sandals so as not to attract his attention, she hurried across to the stairs and climbed swiftly to the upper floor. She was breathing rather unevenly, as much from nerves as exertion, when she reached the landing, and she paused for a moment to look down into the hall.
But when she heard the unmistakable sound of men’s voices, she panicked. Hurrying across the landing, she hastily let herself into her room. The last thing she wanted was for Demetri to think she was eager to see him again. If she did decide to tell him about the baby, he mustn’t think she expected him to change his mind about the divorce. Nothing had changed. He was still a lying bastard. After the way he’d behaved in London, she owed him nothing.
Moving across to the windows, drawn by a faint illumination, she saw the underwater lights gleaming in the pool below. She and Demetri used to swim there after dark when the rest of the household was sleeping, she remembered unwillingly. How horrified Maria would have been if she’d seen her precious son and his wife playing there in the nude.
Making love…
The images wouldn’t go away, and leaving the window, she walked into the bedroom. She found someone had closed the window and switched on lamps at either side of the huge bed. The bed had been turned down, too, Egyptian sheets very white in the lamplight. And someone had also unpacked her haversack, hanging her other dress in the armoire and folding everything else into the drawers of the chest nearby.
Of course, Maria would have known this, Jane reflected, but her mother-in-law had made no attempt to dissuade her from leaving. And why should she? Maria hadn’t wanted her here. Ariadne was the favourite in residence. Jane was just an annoying encumbrance that her husband had insisted on bringing back into their lives.
Jane tipped the straps of her dress off her shoulders and allowed it to fall about her ankles. She wasn’t wearing a bra and her breasts seemed heavier than before. Stepping over the dress, she walked into the bathroom and stared at her reflection. Yes, there were definitely changes. She could see them. When she weighed her breasts in her hands, they felt different somehow.
Turning sideways, she laid both hands over her stomach. The lacy thong, which was all she was wearing now, exposed the slight swell she’d noticed before. Or perhaps she was only imagining it. She was barely six weeks, after all. How soon was a pregnancy visible? She should have asked her sister.
Or perhaps not. Lucy wouldn’t have been able to resist telling their mother. And Mrs Lang would have been offended, and all hell would have broken loose. She sighed. No, it was probably best if she kept the news to herself, at least for the moment. Until she’d decided definitely what she was going to do.
‘Admiring yourself, Jane?’
The voice was painfully familiar. What wasn’t so familiar was the thickening emotion in his words. If she hadn’t known better, she’d have said that Demetri had been aroused by watching her touch her body. How long had he been standing in the bathroom doorway? Had he seen her examining her breasts, perhaps? He must have done, she decided, her pulse quickening. That was why he was looking at her with such raw passion in his eyes.
CHAPTER SEVEN
SHE MADE herself turn her head and look away from him and for a long moment the silence stretched between them. She knew she ought to grab a towel to cover herself, but something—some perverse desire to taunt him, maybe—kept her from doing so. She wondered what he expected her to say to him. He must know his coming here like this, uninvited and unannounced, was breaking every rule in the book. They were getting a divorce, for heaven’s sake. His fiancée-to-be was waiting for him downstairs. There was no way he could justify his actions. And she was a fool for not ordering him out of her suite immediately.
But all she said was, ‘Déjà vu, Demetri?’ And knew he’d know exactly what she meant.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw his hard face darken with frustration. ‘Hardly,’ he retorted, after a taut moment. ‘Put some clothes on. I want to talk to you. I’ll wait in the room next door.’
‘The bedroom?’
‘No, the sitting room,’ he amended tersely. ‘Viasoo!’Hurry up!
Jane looked back at her reflection. ‘Perhaps I don’t want to put my clothes on,’ she said softly. ‘I came upstairs to go to bed. I’m tired. I think you should go now. I’ll talk to you in the morning.’
‘I won’t be here in the morning,’ replied Demetri through clenched teeth. ‘I have to attend a conference in Athens. It’s due to last two days. I hope to be back by the end of the week.’
‘And this concerns me—how?’ Jane didn’t know how she did it, but she put a note of sarcasm into her voice.
‘Just get dressed,’ he said shortly, unhooking a velvet-soft bathrobe from behind the bathroom door. He tossed it towards her. ‘This will do.’
Jane made no attempt to catch the robe and it fell, unheeded, to the floor. Demetri swore in his own language and then he came towards her, his reflection joining hers in the mirror, picking up the robe and thrusting it onto her shoulders. ‘Wear it.’ he said roughly. ‘Or I won’t be responsible for my actions.’
‘Ooh,