A Shameful Consequence (5 page)

‘
I’VE
changed my mind.’

The concierge was excellent, Nico decided, because apart from the bulge of veins in his neck, Nico would not have known the inconvenience he was causing. ‘I would like to stay for another night here in Xanos. For now, I would like a driver to be arranged, one who can take me around the island. I do not know for how long.’

It was no trouble, the concierge assured him, no trouble at all.

‘And …’ He turned and gave an unusual request, one he would not have given had he stopped to think about it. ‘My room is not to be disturbed.’

‘I will have the maids just deliver fresh towels and make up the bed.’

‘It is to be left,’ Nico said, and for the second time in a lifetime, he almost blushed.

And Nico tried not to notice a middle-aged couple being shepherded, protesting, out of a vehicle, their luggage unloaded. In just a few moments the concierge led
him out to his driver, who was a local. His name was George, he informed Nico as he climbed in.

‘Anything you want to know, just ask.’ George turned and looked over his shoulder as the car slid off. ‘Have I driven you before?’

‘I’ve never been to Xanos,’ Nico said. ‘Perhaps in Lathira, or on the mainland.’

‘I’ve never been off the island.’ George shrugged. ‘You look familiar. Are you sure …?’

‘You’re mistaken,’ Nico said, because he did not like small talk, or pointless chatter, but ‘familiar’ was a word that would repeat in his soul throughout the day. George took him down streets and through the town, along the curved mountains, to viewpoints that looked out to the ocean, and Nico felt something he hadn’t even known was missing. He felt peace in the midst of confusion, a peace he had never known.

‘I want to see the south.’

That caused a flurry of grumbles from George. ‘It’s all changed now,’ he moaned. ‘You have to pay to go there. There’s only one road and there’s a toll—there’s even a watchman. They say it’s to keep the press away, but it’s as much to keep us locals out. He might not let us through …’

‘He’ll let me,’ Nico said, because it was never otherwise, and sure enough, as the tollman peered into the back of the car and saw Nico lounging there, they were waved on immediately.

‘It was always the poor side,’ George explained, and for once Nico wanted to hear from his driver and asked
him questions, encouraged him to speak on. ‘The soil is more fertile in the north, that is where vines and orchards are, and the markets and ferry, too—really the south was just for local fishing, but not now.’

As the car swept along the beach road, even Nico, who was used to luxury, was taken aback by the contrast to the north of the island. Huge homes were carved into the rocky hillside. Yachts were out for their Sunday sail, but it had none of the charm of Puerto Banus; there was a certain sterility to the place and Nico was less than impressed.

‘It would be good for the island’s economy, though?’ Nico asked, because that the was the sort of talk he was interested in, but George shook his head. ‘They come here for seclusion, they don’t eat in our restaurants and the developer uses his own men for the building. Really, it has done nothing for us …’

Nico could see what he meant as they drove: the houses were stunning, vast properties that overlooked the ocean, but the main street was nothing like the bustling town of Xanos, the aroma-filled town centre on the north of the island where yesterday he had sat. Here it was a sanitized version, with an exclusive hotel and smart designer boutiques, trendy cafés and restaurants.

‘Which serve what foreigners think is Greek,’ George explained, and Nico found himself smiling as they drove on. ‘These aren’t done yet,’ George said. ‘This was how it once looked.’ And this was the real Xanos, Nico decided and told George to slow down. Simple
houses were dotted in the hillside, but the once-loved gardens were now overgrown and neglected, the bulldozers idle for the weekend but waiting to move in soon. There was a small taverna they drove past, where tradesmen now ate and drank, George explained, and what was left of the locals, but soon they, too, would be gone.

‘They’re all sold,’ George said as Nico moved for his phone. ‘He bought up the lot—there are a few locals that lease from him, but only till the work is complete and he’s done with them.’

‘Who?’ Nico asked, but George didn’t know.

‘Some rich Australian.’ Lack of information didn’t stop Nico. Neither did the fact that it was Sunday. Even if it was her one weekend off, he rang an eternally patient Charlotte and told her to make enquiries and to get back to him. Then got out of the car and started walking.

He wandered for an hour or more, along the cobbled streets and up the stone steps to a couple of deserted properties. He found one that was a little larger, shaded by a vast fig tree, whose fruit lay rotting on the ground. The air thick with the scent of it but there was beauty in neglect, too; the paths were overgrown, the stone pool mossed and empty, but vivid cyclamen still burst from shaded pots and it wasn’t Puerto Banus that was tempting him now.

‘They’re not interested in selling.’ Charlotte soon got back to him. ‘Especially not on a Sunday.’

‘Get me a price,’ Nico said, because there always
was one, and Nico was more specific with his instruction now, describing the house in detail, this the one that he wanted. He lingered a little longer, searching for answers to a question he didn’t know, then back to the old town they went. Nico was looking for something he did not understand, but his head was pounding by the time he was back at the hotel.

He went to the bar.

Told himself it did not matter that there was no sign of her.

He checked his phone for perhaps the fiftieth time, answering it promptly when it rang. He was curiously deflated when it was Charlotte on the other end. Even Nico’s eyes widened when his PA rang and gave him the price.

‘He’s not interested in negotiating,’ Charlotte relayed.

‘Who?’ Nico asked.

‘I just got a lawyer, and he wasn’t particularly chatty. That’s the price,’ Charlotte said. ‘Are you sure you’re not in Monte Carlo?’

He let out a grudging laugh.

He worked well with Charlotte, perhaps because they rarely saw each other—she lived in London and was permanently available on the phone and online. Occasionally, when needed, she travelled with him, but their relationship had survived because, unlike too many previous PAs, Nico had not bedded her. Put simply there was no attraction, just mutual liking, and as a team they worked well.

‘I’ll ring and speak with him …’

‘Well, good luck, but he’s been instructed that you can take it or leave it. If you try to bring the price down, he will refuse to take any more calls.’

His business brain instantly rejected it, but for a moment he lingered. There was need to be here and he had no reason why.

His mind flicked to Constantine.

To dangerous thoughts of long-time lovers, but he hauled himself out of that tempting space.

But what if she needed somewhere to run to if she chose to reveal all?

Nico scolded himself for the very idea.

It was a bloody expensive women’s refuge!

It would be a most fiscally unwise decision, logic warned him—he should follow his own rule, buy when the pendulum swung in the other direction, when the developer went bust or the rich and famous migrated to the next exclusive locale.

‘I’ll text you the number.’ Charlotte said, but Nico halted her before she rang off.

‘Tell him I’ll take it and get the paperwork started.’ He heard his voice disobey his brain’s orders and then snapped off his phone.

Instinct won.

And then he looked up and saw her walk into the bar with her husband and their families. And she would be his lover, Nico decided. For her, he would break his rules—would be her regular refuge. He saw the strain
on her features, saw her eyes almost pleading as they met his.

How she pleaded.

Connie felt like a hostage, her family her captor, and there, most unexpectedly, was Nico and she wanted his arms, wanted not to be made love to tonight but to be held, to be shielded, to be carried down the ladder from the wreckage her family had built for her.

She watched him stand.

Watched as he lifted his hotel key and rather pointedly pocketed it, and knew now that tonight she could go there—that Nico would be there for her, that maybe what she had wished for last night was being offered: liaisons in Athens; passion and phone calls; an occasional escape to a secret life.

How much easier it would be to play along with the charade, to laugh along with her parents and later say farewell to them, to turn into her hotel suite and then, a discreet while later, knock on Nico’s door.

So badly she wanted to take the easy option—especially when it meant the sweet reward of Nico’s arms tonight—but Nico had awoken something else within her, had made her a woman in more ways than he knew, for though scared she felt stronger.

It was for that reason she left Nico waiting alone through what would prove the longest night, in a bed that had been scented by them.

‘I
STILL
can’t believe you would do this to your father.’ She’d heard it a hundred, perhaps a thousand times, and it still stung as much as it had the first time, but Connie held her head high.

‘I still can’t believe that he would have done that to me.’ She put the last of her things in her case, knew that her time here in Xanos was over for now. She had brought shame to the family—annulled the most celebrated marriage on the island—and there was no choice but to leave. The word was about to get out, the presents ready to be returned, the families confronted, the accusations and threats hurled, and through it all Connie had stayed calm, even when her father had, this very morning, collapsed with chest pain in his office and was, having been examined by the doctor, lying in his bed guarded by a nurse. When even that did not dissuade her, her mother had finally told her to get out. But now, as she tossed in a honeymoon dress that was still unworn and wrapped in unopened tissue paper, she thought of the excitement when she had bought it and
she had to swallow down tears as she pulled the zipper closed on her case. The brave facade was slowly slipping.

They had been cruel in the face of her mutiny. Of course, she could make her own decisions, choose a different life—but if she lived here there were rules, and if she didn’t …

Her bank accounts had been linked to the family business. All now were closed. Her car, which had been a present, had been taken back, all her jewellery, too. She was not to take the luggage, her mother said, that had been bought for her honeymoon. So she had fitted what she could into a very old case, appalled they would treat her this way, while deep down she had known all along this was how it would be.

‘Your father worked so hard to give you everything. We are the richest in Xanos, the most respected, and you would destroy it, this how you treat him. This will kill him, Connie.’

It might.

Her father had played his trump card, lying in bed with chest pain, and, her mother savagely relayed, it would kill him should she still go ahead with the annulment. She should just get back in her box and be Stavros’s wife.

‘Let me see my father, explain to him …’ Connie said as she had many times this morning.

‘You’ve destroyed him, Connie,’ her mother sneered. ‘The doctor says he must rest, that there must be no
more upset. Be a good girl for him and maybe he will get better.’

It would be so much easier to do.

But hadn’t her father clutched at his chest throughout her teenage years—every time she’d questioned, every time she’d considered a different choice, every time she had dared to venture out? It had been the same thing and she couldn’t live like this, couldn’t be good for the rest of her life, just to avoid a funeral.

‘I want a real marriage, Mum.’ Surely she must understand it. ‘Like you have. Can’t you see that?’ But it fell on deaf ears.

‘How will it be for Dimitri, for poor Stavros? Did you ever stop to think about that?’

She couldn’t stop thinking about it.

Even if he would have made the worst husband, her heart ached for Stavros, for both islands were the same in that respect—appearances, however false, were all that mattered to the island’s elite. Far from hating Stavros, Connie felt sorry for him. He was as trapped as she would have been, forced to live a lie because that was what family dictated.

‘If that’s what he wants,’ Connie’s voice trembled, ‘then Stavros will get another wife, poor woman.’ She added, ‘I just hope he has the guts to tell her this time before the wedding night.’

‘Your father—’

Connie couldn’t bear to discuss it even a moment longer. ‘If you won’t let me see him then I’ll leave him a note.’

‘If he lives to read it.’ Her mother burst into tears again. She had dressed from head to toe in black since the day Connie had gone to their hotel room and told them she could not live this life. She had emerged from their row in this costume, as if someone
had
died, rather than that her daughter had stood up for herself. ‘I’m going to lie down. You be gone when I get up.’

‘You’re not going to see me off?’

‘Today you should be returning from your honeymoon.’ She sobbed. ‘Today should be my proudest day.’

It was the hardest note she had ever written.

Connie went to her father’s study, which was the furthest room from her mother’s wailing, and closed the heavy door. It was room that had both intimidated and intrigued her as child, all forbidden cupboards and locked drawers, and it intimidated her now, but quietly she roamed, trying to work out what to say in her letter.

The more they told her that she couldn’t leave, the more she realised why she should.

Why absolutely she must.

Her hand moved to her stomach, and her mind moved to the question that had been begging for answer for days now.

She was late—just a day or two, but getting a pregnancy test on the island was impossible without causing gossip.

There were so many reasons for being late, Connie assured herself—the stress of the wedding and the aftermath.

After all, she had started on the Pill in readiness for her wedding. That might mess around with things.

But she hadn’t been meticulous in taking it.

A baby would have been far from a disaster had her marriage been the one she had intended.

‘Oh, God.’ Panic assailed her, as it so often did these days. She took out the card from her purse, the card Nico had left on the breakfast bar, and how badly she wanted to speak to him, wanted to call him to take the help he had offered.

Not for the first time she dialled the number, and though Connie usually hung up before she had finished even dialling, so badly did she need support, someone who would understand the ways here and what she was dealing with, so badly did she want to hear Nico’s voice, this time she let it ring. This time she listened and held her breath as he answered.

‘Nico.’ He said just this one word.

His voice was an abrupt version of the one she had previously heard—and she was reminded then of who she was dealing with. Not the man who had held her in his arms and made such wonderful love to her, not the man who had made her laugh and smile when she had never thought she would, but a shrewd businessman, a man who’d had many lovers, a man who set his sights on a goal and flew directly to it.

She knew for she had found out all she could about him since that night, had trawled the internet, had read about his success and the teary complaints from scorned lovers.

Their only complaint was that he had ended it, that Nico simply refused to even consider a relationship, or, as Nico called it, being tied down.

‘Hello.’ He spoke in English now, his voice harsh and a touch brutal and she drew in a sharp breath and rapidly hung up.

She could not speak to him, could not be the tearful, upset women again to him. She was better than that, Connie told herself. She was stronger than that.

She would get to the mainland and then, when she had got herself together, when she had found a job and somewhere to live, then, if necessary, she would call him.

And if not necessary, Connie thought with a smile, she might still call him!

Thank you. She said it in her head. She said it a thousand times a day, would not regret the potential of a life inside, not even for a second. In fact, it made her decision to leave easier.

There was no way her parents would accept what had happened.

She had, after all, qualified for an annulment given the marriage hadn’t been consummated.

So she wrote the letter, said sorry for the pain she had caused, but truly hoped that one day her father would see she was right, that one day he could again be proud of her. Her third attempt and still she wasn’t satisfied with it and Connie stood and wandered the room again, trying to find the words to tell her father that she loved him, but she had to live her own life.

Her hands explored the ornaments he collected, just as she had as a child, and then went to the drawers, just as she had as a child, too. As the catch gave, Connie realised that in all the drama and haste of her father’s collapse and the doctor being called, for once her father had left things unlocked.

Connie checked each drawer, her heart in her mouth, terrified that her mother might come in and see what she was doing, but she was curious as to what he kept in there. There was nothing of much interest at first, just endless files, her father’s meticulous notes.

And then she opened another drawer, a file marked ‘Housekeeping’ that she almost didn’t bother looking into but she did. Almost immediately she wished she hadn’t. The folder was thick and within was a file with some work for Dimitri, Stavros’s father. She read of some less than legal deals her father had brokered for Dimitri, and the payments her father had received. Her eyes welled up as she realised the stellar island lawyer she had been taught to respect, the man who had been held up as shining example of all that could be achieved by honest hard work and study, was as much a criminal as the clients he at times defended.

Why would he keep this stuff? She went to close the folder, appalled at what she knew, but her first instinct for her father was to save him from the shame and disgrace if this ever came out.

‘Eliades.’

The file caught her eye and the name burnt in her brain as she slammed closed the folder.

Eliades wasn’t a particularly unusual name, Connie told herself. And her father would surely have no dealings with them, given they lived on Lathira. Nico’s family would have lawyers and advisors of their own. They hadn’t even spoken at the wedding. They were friends with Stavros’s family, and, because she’d noticed Nico, she had noticed them but certainly hadn’t seen them interacting with her family.

And yet she recalled showing her parents the guest list, and her father’s face had frozen for a moment as he’d read who Stavros had intended to invite.

‘Perhaps a smaller wedding …’ Her father had attempted that night, but that was, of course, impossible. Their only child—of course the wedding had to be stupendous.

She wanted to close the folder, wanted to close the drawer, to forget what she knew, except another part of her wanted to know more.

It
was
Nico’s family.

The papers were old and yellow and her heart seemed to lift to her mouth as she saw that her father had arranged Nico’s adoption.

An illegal adoption.

She could feel her pulse in her temples, thought she might be the second in her family to collapse this morning as she realised the Eliades had bought a child.

Had bought Nico.

And it was her father who had sold him.

Did Nico even know he was adopted?

She saw the shaky handwriting of a woman, and
tried to see the surname, but could only make out the first name and it was Roula. Her eyes filled with tears when she saw the paltry sum the woman had been paid.

How could she contact Nico now? Connie asked herself. How could she face him, knowing what she knew and, worse, the part her father had played in it all?

Her mouth filled with saliva. For a moment she thought she might vomit, the room was so stifling. It was suddenly imperative that she sit down.

And then, as she turned over the piece of paper, Connie realised that she never, ever could contact him, for she was holding a birth certificate. Not the one that had been falsified to create a new identity—this gave the real date of birth, moved his age to a few months older and, far worse than that, there was another name.

Alexandros.

Nicolas had born eighteen minutes later.

In that moment, Connie knew that she had lost not just the man she loved but possibly the father to her baby.