‘You’ve taken me out for so many meals that I want to treat you for a change,’ she whispered as she traced his lips with the tip of her finger. ‘I shan’t be long.’
Moodily, Xandros waited while she clattered around with pots and pans. He could hear the sound of some kind of extractor fan sounding like a small aircraft about to take off in her kitchen. By the time she eventually returned and deposited dishes and plates on the table, her face was all warm with steam and tendrils of hair were spilling untidily around her face.
‘It’s a bit burned.’
‘So I see.’
‘Your fault for kissing me.’
‘Fault?’ he echoed faintly.
‘Or mine for letting you.’ But he didn’t smile back.
They dished the meal out in silence and Rebecca couldn’t shake off the terrible sense of impending doom as she gave him a portion of the least cremated part of the pie.
‘So when did you last eat a home-cooked meal?’
He wanted to say never—and wouldn’t that have been the truth? But Xandros had no desire to tell her that and to have to parry the questions which would inevitably follow.
And wasn’t there one tiny part of him which couldn’t fail to be touched by all the trouble she’d gone to tonight? But he steeled his heart against it—because he knew the category of this evening’s entertainment.
It was: See what a perfect home-maker I can be, Xandros.
There were others, of course.
The: Let me ensnare you with my sexual prowess, Xandros.
Or, I’ll make myself so indispensable to your life that you’ll wonder how you ever managed without me, Xandros.
But they were all variations on a theme. All part of the games that women played. Show them a single man with sex appeal and billions in the bank and they seemed to go straight onto some kind of predictable autopilot. Xandros would be the last person to deny his own arrogance and self-assurance—but it was a simple fact that women had been trying to marry him for years.
Was that why Rebecca had produced this touching little scene tonight? Had she decided that a man so used to untold wealth would be captivated by a more humble setting? Didn’t she realise that he had seen it all before—and then some more?
‘Xandros?’ she prompted him, hating the tense and forbidding mask which seemed to have tightened his handsome face. ‘I was asking when you’d last had a home-cooked meal like this?’
He topped up their wineglasses and gave her a bland smile. ‘I don’t remember.’
Rebecca frowned. They never talked about the kind of stuff that other couples talked about. Surely they’d been together long enough now for her to be able to ask him a little more about his past? Because how could they get to know one another better without knowing the basics? ‘What about when you were a little boy?’ she asked, her voice growing gentle—trying to imagine him as a youngster.
‘Was there something specific you wanted to know?’ he questioned coolly.
‘Well, not really specific—I meant more general, really.’ She smiled at him in silent appeal. I’m interested, that’s all—her eyes tried to tell him. ‘You never talk much about your life in Greece, or your brother, for that matter. I can’t even remember his name.’
He felt like pointing out that his brother’s name was irrelevant. ‘His name is Kyros. And there is nothing much to say. You know the facts about my former life.’ His black eyes glittered her a warning. ‘I left when I was eighteen and I have not been back.’
‘But he—Kyros—he’s your twin, isn’t he?’
‘And?’ She was using his brother’s name as if she knew him! As if she ever would! Xandros pushed his plate away and his eyes were cold—for she had persisted when he had made it very clear that he did not wish to pursue the subject.
‘The world seems to have some kind of universal theory about twins which is based on sentiment rather than fact,’ he ground out. ‘The consensus being that there is always some kind of telepathy—some unbreakable bond between them. Well, let me tell you, Rebecca—that much is pure fantasy.’ As were so many of the myths peddled about family lives. That mothers cared and fathers played with their sons.
She was taken aback by the sudden harshness in his voice, as if she had touched on a very raw nerve indeed. Intuition told her to back off, but a far more powerful instinct overrode it. Because what was the point of being with Xandros if all she was allowed to do was operate within the strict emotional boundaries he seemed to want to dictate? Hadn’t that been one of the reasons why she’d organised this wretched dinner in the first place? To burrow beneath his peculiar icy-yet-passionate persona to find the real substance of the man beneath.
‘You sound so bitter, Xandros,’ she ventured quietly. ‘So angry. Won’t you tell me why?’
He flinched as if she had struck him, staring at her. ‘You dare to call me bitter? You dare to speak of what you do not know?’
He was twisting her words, just as he was twisting his mouth into a contemptuous curve of condemnation. ‘It wasn’t meant like that!’ she protested. ‘It wasn’t supposed to be an insult. All I wanted—’
‘I don’t care what you want!’ he bit out. ‘Because what I don’t want is to unburden myself to you, my beauty.’ Black eyes burned into her. ‘That was never part of the deal.’
His words weren’t making sense. ‘The deal?’ she echoed unsteadily. ‘What deal?’
His heart had begun to pound, the blood to beat thickly through his veins. Draining off the last of his wine, he put the empty glass down on the table. ‘My time with you was supposed to be a pleasant interlude—and now suddenly I’m supposed to be baring my soul just because you’ve peeled a few potatoes. If I’d wanted a damned therapy session I could have crossed the road in New York and found a hundred!’ He saw her stricken face and with an effort, he quelled his fury. ‘Listen, Rebecca,’ he said, in as gentle a voice as he’d ever used with her. ‘What we’ve had together has been—’
‘Nothing!’ cut in Rebecca furiously—because she saw where this was heading as clearly as if she were emerging from the darkness into the bright, glaring light of day. He was about to dump her! And along with that revelation came the realisation of just how weak and compliant she’d been all along—always accommodating his needs. It had been Xandros, Xandros, Xandros all the way. She had tiptoed around him, trying to gauge what he wanted and how he felt. She had walked on eggshells and look where it had got her. Suddenly, she felt filled with self-disgust at the way she had behaved.
So if she didn’t like the way she had been treated by the Greek billionaire—then she had only herself to blame. It wasn’t too late for her to seize the tattered remnants of her pride before he did irreversible damage to it. She sucked in a shuddering breath. ‘You know—for all the fancy restaurants and beautiful hotels—it’s really been nothing but sex and small talk! That’s all we’ve ever had between us,’ she bit out tremblingly. ‘And do you know something else, Xandros? I’m glad it’s over. Yes, glad!’
Xandros stilled, his senses on alert. ‘But I haven’t told you that it’s over.’
Rebecca almost laughed out loud at his exquisite arrogance—if it hadn’t already started to hurt so much. ‘No, that’s right. You haven’t. Because I’m telling you. It’s over—maybe it should never have begun. Heaven knows, I did my best to resist you.’
‘But you couldn’t,’ he taunted.
‘No. I couldn’t. You’re very good, Xandros—I’ll admit that. The best, in fact. It would take a stronger