His Forbidden Bride (21 page)

But the look of agony in his eyes gave her al the confirmation necessary. A

look that she knew would stay with her until the end of her days. A look of

knowledge and renunciation that said all hope was lost for ever. Consigning

them both to private but separate hel s.

And it was the last thing she saw as a pit of whirling darkness opened in

front of her. She tried to say Andreas' name, but the darkness was al

around her, consuming her, and she gave herself up to it.

She became aware of things. Softness beneath her. Light beyond her

closed eyelids. Voices speaking quietly. Something cool, damp and infinitely

comforting touching her face.

She forced her heavy eyes to open, staring around her in dazed

incomprehension. She was lying on a bed in a lamplit room, and a man she

had never seen before, someone with a thin, kind face and a small neat

beard, was standing beside her.

He said, 'So you are with us again, Kyria Zoe. That is good.' His hand closed

round her wrist, checking her pulse rate.

'Who are you?' Her voice was a thread.

'My name is Vanopolis. I am Mr Dragos' personal physician.

Her mind stirred, beginning to col ect images—memories. A voice saying

impossible words. A man's eyes saying goodbye for ever.

She moved feebly. 'I feel sick.'

'Lie still,' he said. It wil pass.'

'What—what happened?'

'You fainted,' he said. 'But fortunately Mr Dragos was able to catch you as

you fel , so you were saved any physical injury.'

'Mr Dragos,' she echoed. 'But he was on the other side of the room.'

'I meant the younger Mr Dragos,' he said. 'Andreas— your brother. He

brought you here.'

For a long moment, she stared up at him, absorbing what he had said.

Realising that it was not just a nightmare to be forgotten as the sun rose.

And that her life was in ruins.

She thought, I wish I were dead.

She felt tears stinging on her face like drops of ice, and turned her head

away so that he should not see her cry.

When she could speak normal y, she said, 'I'd like to leave here now,

please.'

'It is better that you remain,' he said. 'You have had a shock, and your father

wishes you to stay under my care tonight. Your hotel has been informed.'

'And I have no say in the matter,' she said, with sudden fierceness. 'My

whole life has been turned upside down. I don't even know who I am any

more, and I can do nothing. Is that what you're tel ing me?'

He hesitated. 'I am sorry that you should have found out in such a way. I

wished the news to be broken more gently.'

Zoe sat up, pushing her hair back from her face, feeling the room dip

slightly, then steady. She said, 'It would have made no difference, Dr

Vanopolis. There's no way such a thing could ever have been made

acceptable.'

He sighed. 'Rest now, Kyria Zoe. Would you like some tea to be brought?

Or food?'

'No,' she said. 'I want to talk to Andreas. Wil you ask him to come here,

please?'

He said gently, 'Perhaps it would he better for you to talk to Kyrios

Stephanos first.'

'No.' Zoe thumped the mattress with her fist, her eyes blazing. 'Andreas. Or I

swear I shall walk out of this house, and never come back, and to hel with

your Kyrios Stephanos.'

He sighed again, but went to the door. Zoe lay back on the pil ow. She still

felt faintly nauseous, and her head ached, but her mind was clear. And for

the first time she took a good look at her surroundings.

It was a large room, beautiful y set out with highly polished if old-fashioned

furniture. The bed she lay on was wide and comfortable, with a heavily

embroidered coverlet. The shutters were drawn, and in the light from the

lamp on the night table she saw a book, lying open, face own, and a pair of

discarded cuff-links. There was a leather suitcase in one corner, its contents

spil ing out onto the floor, and a man's jacket and tie were draped across the

arm of a high-backed chair. A cupboard door was ajar, and she could see

other male clothing hanging inside.

She felt her whole body begin to shake in frightened awareness.

The knock at the door was barely perceptible. Andreas came slowly into the

room, remaining near the doorway, his face in shadow.

Zoe pul ed herself upright, staring across at him, her eyes enormous in her

pallid face.

She said huskily, 'This is your room, isn't it? Your bed. You brought

me—here.' Her voice cracked and broke. 'Oh, God, Andreas, how cruel is

that?'

He said with a terrible weariness, 'It was the nearest room, and you were il .

I—I did not think beyond that. Forgive me.'

She closed her eyes. 'What are we going to do?'

'There is nothing,' he said. 'I am my father's son. You are my father's

daughter.' His voice was cool, remote, as if he had rehearsed the words so

often that al feeling was gone from them. 'That is the only consideration.'

'When did you—know?'

'My father was telephoned in Athens by an old friend,' he said. 'Someone

who had known about the original affair, because your mother was staying

at his hotel when it began.'

'Stavros?'

'Yes,' he said. 'Stavros. As soon as he saw you, he realised who you were.

And when he saw us together, he feared what the truth might be.' He

shrugged. 'I suppose we should be—grateful to him.'

'Should we?' Her voice was low. 'I—I'm afraid I haven't reached that stage

yet.'

'No.' There was a note of savagery in his tone. 'Nor have I.'

He moved forward. Pulled the high-backed chair forward and sat in it, still

keeping a careful distance, impatiently pushing the discarded clothing onto

the floor.

She heard herself say automatical y, 'Andreas—your jacket. You'l ruin it…'

and stopped, appal ed, as she saw him flinch.

He said bleakly, 'You speak as if you were my wife, Zoe
mou
. Who is the

cruel one now?'

'Oh, God.' She buried her face in her hands. 'I can't do this.' Her voice was

stricken. 'I have to get out of here— go back to England.'

'No,' he said. 'I am the one who is leaving. I am returning to Athens tonight.

You must stay, at least for a while. My father wishes to make, the

acquaintance of his daughter, and he has waited a long time to do so.

Whatever your feelings,
pedhi mou
, you cannot deprive him of that.'

Her voice trembled. 'Did you know about my mother— about their

relationship?'

'I thought I knew about al my father's women.' His face looked as if it had

been sculpted from rock. 'My mother saw to that. "I am dying and your father

has a new whore." I lost count of the times she threw that at me when I was

a child. But these were girls he kept in Paris, Rome and New York. Thania

was his refuge. My mother hated it, and never came here. And on Thania

there was no one, until he met her—your mother—and loved her.'

He paused. 'And after her, I think, no one—anywhere.'

He looked down at his hands, clenched tautly in his lap. 'My mother

screamed that he was building a house on Thania for some foreign bitch.'

'I can remember her laughing when it stayed empty, year after year.

Laughing at the idea that this woman he loved so desperately would return

to him one day, so that they could be happy together at last.'

'She was happy,' Zoe said chokingly. 'Happy with her husband—my father.

The man whose name is on my birth certificate, who brought me up, and

looked after me. Why would he have done that for another man's child?'

'Perhaps, because he was a good man, and cared for her, too. She seems

to have been a woman who could inspire love.'

Zoe's throat tightened. 'Yes,' she said. 'Yes, she was.' She drew a quivering

breath. 'We were—a happy family. Or I thought we were.'

He said quietly, 'As my family, of course, was not.'

She said thickly, 'If your father was so in love with my mother—so endlessly

devoted, why didn't he get a divorce and marry her?'

'He tried,' Andreas said quietly. 'But although my mother did not care about

living with him as his wife, she liked the money and social position. She

enjoyed her position as a patron of the arts—her high-profile work for

various charities, when her health permitted, of course,' he added bitterly.

'My God, she used illness like a weapon. Even as a child I could see that. '

'As his ex-wife, her status would have suffered, and she knew it. So, she

became hysterical-threatened suicide. She had made an attempt once

before, it seems, not altogether seriously, but my father could not take the

risk.'

He paused, his face sombre. 'It was a hideous situation, and it affected your

mother very badly. She felt torn between her love for my father, and the

mounting problems that their liaison was causing. Because although she

was wil ing to make a life with my father as his mistress, there was no

certainty that my mother would have left them in peace.

'And in the end she could not risk it either, and—she left. She went back to

England, and made him give a solemn promise that he would never fol ow.'

'Even though she was expecting his child?' Zoe demanded incredulously.

'He let her go?'

'Neither of them were aware then that she was pregnant,'

Andreas said quietly. 'And he did not simply—abandon her,
pedhi mou
. He

could not have done that. He kept his word about fol owing her, but he wrote

to her constantly, pleading with her to return to him. He went on building the

house for her, as a pledge for their future.'

'And when she wrote back, tel ing him there was to be a child of their love,

he was overjoyed. He replied instantly, begging her to come to him, sending

an airline ticket— money. But they were returned unused, without

explanation, and he had no further contact with her.'

Zoe gasped. 'And he just allowed that to happen?'

His mouth tightened. 'He had been seriously overworking—trying to

compensate for the loss of his beloved woman—living on hope. This was a

blow he had not expected, and as a result he suffered a kind of breakdown.

He was il for several months, and when he recovered his first act was to

write to her, imploring her to reconsider. But all his letters were returned,

unopened. Your mother had moved, and left no forwarding address. She

seemed, indeed, to have disappeared without trace.'

'And when, eventually, he tracked her down, she was already married, and

he had the additional pain of knowing that she had cal ed his child "Zoe", the name he had once told her he would choose if he had a daughter.'

He sighed. 'Even so, he wrote one last letter, tel ing her that he loved her

still, and would wait for her always.'

He leaned back in the chair, his face tired and drawn. 'And I, Zoe
mou
, had to put my own feelings aside, and tel him, a sick man, that al hope was

gone.'

'What did he say?' she asked huskily.

'For a while, nothing. Then he said that it was no surprise, because he had

been grieving for her from the day she went from him. But that she had left

him—you. And you had come to find him.'

Zoe shook her head. 'She never mentioned his name,' she said wearily.

'There was just—the picture. A painting of a house she never even saw.'

She spread her hands. 'How could she do that?'

'He sent her drawings—many photographs. And she knew where it was to