‘I thought it was the pearls.’
‘No, Max and the dogs flew out the day before yesterday to ensure our comfort while we’re here. They’re staying in the guest cottage down the lane.’
As the dogs romped around her, deliriously excited at the reunion, Ella could not have been more pleased by Nikolai’s surprise. Although she had already been aware that Max was to continue working for them, the older man was a fabulous cook and organiser as well as being wonderfully pet friendly. His presence on the domestic front meant that Ella could totally relax.
* * *
Nikolai eyed the level in the wine glass and watched Ella reach for her water bottle. He knew the main reason why women usually stopped drinking and it sent a chill of dismay down his spine. But how could Ella possibly be pregnant? One of the qualities he most admired about Ella was her unflinching honesty and in his world that was rare indeed. Had she been pregnant he knew she would have told him immediately.
‘Why have you stopped drinking?’ Nikolai asked lazily.
Ella had been almost drugged by the sun-drenched scene before her. They were lying on a rug in the shade of a giant chestnut tree only a few yards from a deserted cove where unbelievably blue and clear water washed a pale sand shore. Weeks of relaxation on Crete had brought down most of Ella’s defences and she only stiffened a little in receipt of that awkward question, relieved that she had an answer already prepared.
‘I had a ghastly hangover a couple of months back and I just lost my taste for alcohol.’
‘But why pretend to still drink?’ Nikolai broke in.
Her tension soared up the scale. ‘It can make people uncomfortable when you say you don’t drink.’
‘It doesn’t make me uncomfortable.’
‘Then I won’t pretend any more,’ she told him glibly but she was shocked at herself. She was actually lying to Nikolai and it was wrong. When had wrong begun to seem right? She had had three perfect weeks with Nikolai, without a doubt the happiest three weeks she had ever enjoyed. Even flying back to the UK to attend the funeral of the bar manager who had died in the hotel fire had not doused that happiness. Nikolai had said that she didn’t need to accompany him but she had wanted to give him her support and she knew he had appreciated her presence. She had not accompanied him though when he had had yet another interview with the police, but had shared his relief when the police had intimated that, although they were as yet nowhere near charging anyone for arson, they did have leads to follow.
Back on the island Nikolai and Ella had continued to make memories. They had visited fabled ancient Minoan sites, including the archaeological dig that was currently taking place on land Nikolai owned nearby. They had explored Chania after dark on several evenings, eating at lively tavernas, shopping for gifts and visiting clubs in the old harbour area. Ella preferred the seafront bars to the clubs once she saw how blatantly Nikolai was besieged by predatory women drawn by his looks and wealth. Returning from the cloakroom to find him surrounded had been unnerving and had ramped up her insecurity.
How attractive would Nikolai still find her once pregnancy changed her body? There were already little changes that only she was aware of. Her breasts were a little bit fuller and her nipples more tender. When they had visited the almost tropical lagoon at Elafonisi it had become very hot and she had felt dizzy for the first time. In a Byzantine monastery in the mountains that glowed with colourful frescos and icons, she had felt nauseous because they hadn’t eaten in hours and Nikolai had fussed all the way down the hill to the village café, where they had stuffed themselves full of pizza.
She had already decided to tell him about the baby once they had returned to London. She had an almost superstitious fear of breaking the news on their idyllic honeymoon. He didn’t love her. She was very, very conscious of that, because she had been the idiot who had involuntarily shouted out her feelings in bed one night and he had not reciprocated, although he had held her close afterwards while probably fighting the desire to apologise for not being able to return the sentiment.
And that was what she didn’t want: a male who felt guilty because he didn’t love her, because eventually that guilt would eat away at what he did feel. Even so, a man in love with his wife would be much more accepting of an unplanned pregnancy than one who merely suffered from insatiable desire. And Nikolai was insatiable with her, she conceded, a secretive smile tilting her lips as long fingers swept below the hem of her dress to stroke her thigh in a way that sent tiny hot tremors of helpless anticipation rippling through her. That seemingly unquenchable hunger of his made her feel safe. She was willing to admit that it wasn’t the fairy-tale relationship she had once dreamt of having, but it was still a lot more real and passionate than anything she had ever known.
Nikolai kissed her, slow and deep, and then lifted his tousled dark head again. ‘My sister, Sofia...’ he framed with startling abruptness, ‘committed suicide. She took an overdose. That’s why I find it hard to talk about.’
Emerging from a male as reserved as Nikolai, that speech was a breakthrough and Ella gazed up at him with warmly concerned eyes. ‘That must’ve been very tough for you to accept.’
‘I didn’t even know she was depressed. I hadn’t seen her in months,’ he explained in a bitten-off, tight undertone. ‘I kept on offering to fly her over to London and she made excuses. I should’ve realised something was wrong and flown to her in Athens, but that was in the days before my private jet and I was working night and day on getting my first hotel opened up. I neglected her. I put profit first.’
‘You didn’t know there was anything wrong. When you’re busy time goes by and you don’t notice.’
‘Don’t try to comfort me,’ Nikolai interposed darkly. ‘I let Sofia down when she needed me, the only time she ever needed me. I had all these ideas about what we would do together once I made some money, but I should’ve been concentrating on the present, not the future.’
Ella’s eyes stung, for she could feel the guilty grief he had never managed to overcome. ‘You didn’t know, Nikolai, and obviously she didn’t want you to know or she’d have told you how she was feeling.’
His lean, strong face froze. ‘I found out by reading her diary. I felt bad about doing that but I needed so badly to know...why...’ he completed jaggedly.
‘Of course you did. That’s human nature,’ she murmured softly, touched that he had finally chosen to confide in her, her heart full to overflowing with love.
She still didn’t know what it was about him that had made her fall so deeply in love at such speed, she only knew that the thought of life without him terrified her.
And in their differing ways that evening as they attended a party at Nikolai’s great-aunts’ house in Chania, both of them mulled over that conversation and reached certain conclusions.
After being widowed in their sixties, the twin sisters had set up home together again and as each of them had had several children, all of whom lived locally, they were rarely without visitors. From their very first visit, Nikolai and Ella had been made wonderfully welcome, long-lost members of the family being brought back into the fold. Ella had watched Nikolai slowly unfreeze and lose the cool distrustful front that he so often wore to the world. That particular evening, Ella saw him tripping up over one of the toddlers and pausing to pick him up and dry his tears.
‘He’ll make a good father, unlike his own,’ Dorkas Drakos pronounced with satisfaction.
‘Our brother was a misery all his life. His money never brought him happiness,’ Dido piped up at her sister’s elbow. ‘Nikolai is very different.’
Guilt was nagging at Ella as she watched Nikolai with the little boy. Maybe she shouldn’t wait until they returned to London to make her announcement...
Straightening, Nikolai met his bride’s luminous green eyes. He had to tell her the truth. She had said she loved him but had she meant it? Nikolai had never seen himself as