Ellie blanched, ‘Consequences?’
‘I have to go now. But I have a table booked in the hotel restaurant in a couple of hours’ time. I will expect you to join me there for dinner. Do not even think of refusing me!’
There was a knock at the door and, unable to disguise his impatience, Nikolai called out, ‘Yes?’
A large man with close-cropped hair, immaculately suited and with the kind of physical frame that suggested moving mountains would be as easy as treading on an ant to him, put his head round the door. Remembering that from time to time Nikolai employed the use of such men as bodyguards, Ellie shivered. The man spoke briefly in Russian, and Nikolai answered equally as briefly. The man left.
‘I am late for my next meeting,’ Nikolai snapped, as if it were entirely Ellie’s fault.
She touched a nervous but indignant hand to a button on her jacket and frowned. ‘You sound like you’re looking for some kind of revenge… Is that it?’
Even as she articulated the words her body started to tremble. Chillingly, her reaction only seemed to amuse Nikolai. He smiled, and she watched his broad shoulders lift in a careless shrug.
‘Call it what you will, Dr Lyons… But however you like to refer to it… however you might psychoanalyse what appears to be a crude desire on my part to make you suffer…just know that you will pay!”
CHAPTER TWO
THE change in her was subtle, but nevertheless arresting. After his encounter with Elizabeth, Nikolai had for the first time in years sat through a business meeting and not been able to give the matter in hand his full and utmost attention. His usually meticulous and organised mind had been completely hijacked by thoughts about Arina’s aunt and former nanny.
Now, as he entered the lift of the same hotel she was staying in, to go up to his suite—he had made the reservation as soon as his sources had informed him that she would be staying there—he reflected on the meeting they had had, his mind and body in turmoil. For so long Elizabeth Barnes’s whereabouts had consumed him, and he had begun to believe that disturbing memories of her would be all he’d ever have. Then he had chanced to catch a glimpse of her on television being interviewed—and discovered that she was Dr Ellie Lyons now.
Nikolai had barely been able to think straight, he had been so shocked and furious. But beneath his rage and tumult were feelings that were not so easily explained or quantified. He seemed to be gripped by something unnameable and compelling that existed just below the surface of his everyday thoughts about her.
A wave of memory submerged him. When he had seen her last she had been almost coltishly lean. Now, five years had developed those youthful angles into the most arresting curves. Her face, which had always verged on being breathtaking—with those luminously clear rain-washed eyes and that soft curving mouth—had become even more so. And the lustrous corn-coloured hair tied back in that businesslike ponytail was the perfect setting to showcase such beauty. She was an absolute gift to the world of television. Not only was she a practising psychologist at a time when the world seemed fascinated by other people’s relationship problems and wanted to hear them discussed on a regular basis, but she looked like a flaxen-haired angel too!
Torn and angered by the troubling direction of his thoughts, Nikolai flexed his fingers and willed the lift to reach his floor. The last thing he wanted to do was admit that Elizabeth’s beauty disturbed him! There was far too much at stake here for him to become sidetracked or distracted by her undoubted physical appeal…especially when the lady had categorically proved she absolutely could not be trusted.
Once inside the plush hotel suite, his body brimming with the kind of restless energy that could not be contained, Nikolai opted to go back downstairs to the gym. Starting to disrobe on his way to the bedroom, he discarded his jacket and tie and then started on the buttons of his Savile Row shirt. Lifting some weights and running on the treadmill would help pass the time until dinner, when he and his reluctant companion would meet up once again.
He grimaced bitterly at the thought, at that moment feeling nothing but resentment and a desire to punish where she was concerned. Kicking off his handmade leather shoes, he arrived in the bedroom, but barely registered its fine furnishings and understated elegance. Having inherited an oil business from his father at just twenty-four, to him hotel rooms—however opulent and well appointed—were merely a necessary convenience, that was all. He much preferred to return home after meetings whenever possible, and as he owned several houses all over the world home could be any place he chose.
When he was in London, he and Arina resided at the house in Park Lane from where, on that fateful day five years ago, Elizabeth had driven his brother Sasha to some unknown destination…
For months after her aunt’s disappearance Arina had sobbed herself to sleep most nights, unable to be soothed by either Nikolai or the first of what had turned out to be a stream of hopeful replacement nannies. None of them had forged the almost maternal bond Elizabeth had. How could they? Undoubtedly the blood-ties the infant shared with her aunt had helped her form a strong attachment to her, and Arina had clearly been disturbed by the fact she was no longer in her life.
What Nikolai could not forgive was that, knowing such a bond existed between them, Elizabeth had still callously deserted them without so much as a hint that she planned to leave so suddenly. Add to that the shocking discoveries that had been brought to light after the accident—a family heirloom found in the car after it had crashed, clearly stolen, plus his increasing belief that Elizabeth must have been having an affair with Sasha for her to commit such a reckless act as to drive the car for him—Nikolai had barely known how to subdue the rage that had consumed him.
When she had absconded after the inquest he had utilised a lot of time, money and expert help in trying to locate her whereabouts, and her disappearance had caused him no end of sleepless nights and stress-filled days. What had really happened on the day of the accident? He burned to know. Elizabeth’s sudden flight had screamed her guilt to the rooftops, and it had definitely fuelled Nikolai’s desire to somehow make her pay. Whatever else transpired, that terrible day had robbed him of his brother and Arina of her father—and she had definitely played her part in the tragedy that had taken place.
Now that she eluded him no longer she would quickly see that the perfect little life she had fashioned for herself for the past five years was definitely going to undergo some radical changes—one way or another…
***
Ellie chose a simply designed black cocktail dress to wear to dinner. The irony of the colour was not lost on her. Ever since she’d set eyes on Nikolai Golitsyn again it was as though a violent darkening storm had threatened the pleasant meadow she’d been walking in, and truth to tell she was frightened. It hadn’t sat well with her all these years that she’d agreed to fall in with her father’s advice to simply disappear and then get herself a whole new identity, but at the time she’d been far too traumatised to argue. Recent events had prompted even more painful reflection.
Her father had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, and although his illness had undoubtedly forged a closer bond between them, and she perfectly understood why he had taken her away, Ellie wished she’d fought her ground and stayed to talk to Nikolai. Maybe if she’d stayed he would have eventually stopped blaming her for Sasha’s death, realised that somehow his brother must have had a major part in events given his proclivity to be both reckless and intoxicated? In time he might even have come to accept that Ellie really couldn’t recall what had happened that day and forgiven her at last.
If all that had transpired then she would still be looking after her niece now, and wouldn’t be burdened by the most dreadful guilt that she had indeed abandoned her sister’s child in her hour of need. But, even though she had a deep and abiding regret about leaving so suddenly, Ellie believed her father had acted with the best of intentions too. By being there