His home … Claire repeated to herself, and tried to work out why he had used the words with the kind of emphasis that had set instincts firing out all kinds of warnings at her.
‘Your driver is going to drop you off first,’ she nodded, deciding that was what he had been implying.
But beside her the dark head shook. ‘We are all going there,’ he said, waited a few moments for his words to sink in—then added gently, ‘I am taking you both home with me.’
‘But—what for?’ she demanded frowningly. ‘Will my aunt Laura be there?’
There was a long pause when his eyes continued to hold hers but he didn’t answer. He has a beautiful face, she found herself thinking. Good bones and skin and nicely balanced features. It was a shame the whole was spoiled by the cold mask he wore over it …
Then she blinked, realising that he still hadn’t answered her but was just sitting there, watching her studying him, and by the sardonic gleam she could see lurking in his eyes he knew exactly what she was thinking but didn’t give a damn.
Not just cold, she thought suddenly, but proud of it. And she shuddered as if something unholy had just reached out to brush its icy fingertips along her body.
The car came to a stop. ‘We have arrived,’ he announced, and leaned over to flick free her safety belt.
Instantly her skin began to prickle, her heartbeat picking up pace as a burst of alarm forced her into taking avoiding action by pressing her body back into the seat.
‘Be calm,’ he murmured dryly as he carefully guided the belt back into its housing so it didn’t whip across her body. ‘You truly have nothing to fear from me.’
No? Claire wished she could believe that—an hour ago she would have believed that! But since then something about this man had altered subtly and what really frightened her was that she just didn’t understand what that something was!
Nikos, the chauffeur, was opening her door then, and offering to help her to alight. Feeling stubborn in the face of her own confusion, she ignored his outstretched hand and climbed out of the car under her own steam. But the effort took its toll, and she had to steady herself with her good hand on the bonnet of the car while her many aches and pains made their presence felt.
She knew this street, she realised, suddenly becoming aware of her surroundings. It was several streets up from the one where she used to live when her father was alive, though this part of Holland Park was a hundred times more exclusive.
But at least she knew where to run to if she needed to get away from here, she told herself. And with that consoling thought, she turned to watch the chauffeur release Melanie from her safety seat, while Andreas Markopoulou stood to one side of him, waiting to receive the baby into his arms.
The baby arrived, all cute and cosy wrapped in a shawl her mother had so painstakingly crocheted throughout her confinement. And, for some crazy, unexplainable reason, remembering that brought on a violent surge of possessive jealousy that made her want to reach out and snatch the baby from him!
Maybe he sensed her resentment, because he turned then, to glance at her sharply. ‘OK?’ he asked.
No, Claire thought. I am not OK. I want you to give me my baby sister then I want to go home, because every single instinct I possess is telling me I should not be going anywhere with you!
Aunt Laura—Aunt Laura … Like a chant devised to soothe the troubled spirit, she found herself using Aunt Laura’s connection to them both as an excuse as to why she was allowing herself to be taken over like this.
‘Let’s go …’ Her new guardian led the way towards one of the elegant town houses that stood in the middle of an elegant white-painted row.
The door fell open even as they arrived at it, a short plump lady with hair a similar colour to the chauffeur’s appearing in the opening with a warmly expectant smile on her face. The moment she saw Melanie she let out a soft cry of delight, clapped her hands together then opened them up in greedy readiness to receive the baby.
‘This is my housekeeper, Lefka,’ Andreas Markopoulou informed Claire as he dutifully placed the baby in the other woman’s arms. ‘As you can see from her expression, she is ecstatic to be given this opportunity to take care of the child while you are here.’
‘Oh, but—’ Claire began to protest, but even as the words began to form on her lips the housekeeper began speaking over the top of her, in what Claire had to assume was Greek. Then, without a by-your-leave to anyone, she turned and proceeded to disappear with Melanie into the bowels of the house!
‘Usually her manners are much better than that,’ Andreas Markopoulou dryly remarked as they watched the woman go. ‘No doubt she will recover them once her bout of ecstasy has subsided.’ Then, more formally, he invited Claire to enter his home.
The interior was more or less what she had expected—large and warm and beautifully furnished in a tasteful mix of modern and antique.
Light hands smoothly removed the jacket. Glancing up and around, she mumbled a wary, ‘Thanks,’ but felt uncomfortably lost without the jacket to hide in.
Leading the way across the square hallway, he opened a door and invited her to precede him through it. In silence she went, still telling herself that she was going to find her aunt Laura waiting there—needing to find her aunt Laura waiting there.
But, except for the obvious fact that this was a man’s very comfortable study—with its roaring log fire, light-oak-panelled walls and heavy oak furniture—the room revealed no sign of Aunt Laura.
Behind her, the door closed. She turned to confront him.
‘Where’s my aunt?’ she demanded.
Sleek black eyebrows shot up. ‘I do not recall saying that your aunt would be here,’ he replied, moving gracefully across the room to where a big solid desk stood with its top clear of papers.
Had he said it? Claire’s brow puckered up as she tried to remember just what he had said about her aunt, and found she couldn’t say for sure.
But the impression had been drawn, she was sure of it. ‘Then why have you brought us here?’ she asked, puzzled. ‘If it wasn’t to meet up with Aunt Laura?’
He had switched on a small laptop computer and was studying whatever had appeared on the screen while casually tapping at one of the keys—though his head lifted at the question, his dark eyes drifting up the full length of her then back down again in a way that raised every fine hair on her body. ‘I would have thought that was obvious,’ he replied, his attention already back on the computer screen again. ‘You are a mess, quite frankly,’ he stated bluntly. ‘And in no fit state to take care of yourself, never mind a helpless young baby. So, for the time being at least, you will stay here with me.’
‘But I don’t want to stay here!’ Claire cried, too horrified by the prospect to dress up her protest.
That brief grim smile of his that he liked to use so much registered her horror. ‘I wasn’t aware,’ he drawled, ‘that I was giving you a choice.’
No choice? Who did he think he was, for goodness’ sake? ‘It isn’t your problem.’ She flatly refused the offer. ‘We will manage somehow,’ she insisted with more confidence than she really felt. ‘My aunt—’
‘Your aunt,’ he interrupted, ‘is already out of the country. And since we both know that she would rather—break both wrists,’ he said, with a telling glance at Claire’s plaster-cast, ‘than be forced to play housemaid to anyone, then I think we can take her out of the equation, don’t you?’
Out of the country—out of the equation? ‘But it’s you who says where Aunt Laura goes!’ she pointed out confusedly.
He didn’t even deign to answer that. Instead