His Forbidden Bride (22 page)

be built. Her imagination must have supplied the rest' His mouth twisted

bitterly. 'Maybe she, too, could not—completely—give up their dream.'

She said in a low voice, 'Instead, they destroyed ours.'

'You knew that he had given her the house,' he said. 'Why did you not tel

me?'

'I was going to—that morning we were supposed to meet there. I intended to

hand back the papers,—tel you I wanted no part of it, and that we should

bury the past.' Her laugh cracked in the middle. 'Oh, God, what a joke. What

a hel ish, tragic joke.'

She paused. 'Did you never suspect who I was?'

'How could I—when I never knew you existed? My father always grew angry

when I tried to discuss the Vil a Danaë with him. He refused even to tel me

the nationality of his lover, let alone her identity. And my mother only called

her "the foreigner". The possibility of a child was never mentioned. Then, that morning in Athens, he poured out his heart to me—held nothing back.

The phone call from Stavros had alarmed him, of course. He realised he

had to put a stop to our relationship at once, so only frankness would do.

'Even then, I did not believe him. God forgive me, I thought it was a ploy to

push me into another marriage he could be planning for me. He had to show

me photographs of her—even that last letter before I could accept the truth.'

'She should have told me,' Zoe said numbly. 'Why didn't she tel me?'

'Maybe she also wished to forget the past. Wanted you to go on believing in

your happy family.'

'Yes.' She wrapped her arms round her body, her face anguished. 'Oh, why

did I ever come here?' She bit her lip, sending him a swift, remorseful

glance. 'You knew, didn't you, that I was hiding something?'

'Yes,' he said gently. 'But so was I, Zoe
mou
. I thought—I convinced myself that it was just part of the game of love that we had begun to play. And that,

soon, we would have no secrets from each other.' He paused. 'And now,

God help us both, it is true.'

'He was a married man,' she said with intense bitterness. 'He had no right to

fal in love with her.'

'I do not think he had a choice, Zoe
mou
. No more than I had when I

watched you coming down the stairs towards me, and al I could think

was—"Here she is, at last".'

She bent her head, a solitary tear making its way down the curve of her

cheek. 'Andreas—don't.'

'No.' He got to his feet. 'It wil be better, I think, if we do not meet alone

again.' He walked across and picked up his travel bag, thrusting his errant

belongings back inside it, and zipping it shut He turned and looked at her.

'We are fortunate, perhaps, that we do not have more to regret.'

'One kiss,' she said desolately. 'Oh, Andreas, God won't punish us for just

one kiss.'

He paused at the door, his face haggard, his eyes burning into hers. 'No,

pedhi mou
?' The harsh mockery in his voice seared across her skin. 'I think we are being punished already—now, and every day for the rest of our lives.'

The door closed quietly, and he was gone.

A lifetime later, she heard the whine of a powerful engine, and the throb of

propel ers as the helicopter departed, taking him far away from her.

Zoe turned over, burying her face in the pil ow he had slept on, and lay,

unmoving, until the sound died away. She felt total y disorientated when she

awoke the next morning.

Not long after Andreas' departure, the housekeeper had arrived and,

tactfully ignoring her tear-stained face, had chivvied and coaxed her gently

to another room in a different part of the house. It had come as no real

surprise, either, to find that her luggage had been brought from the hotel,

and unpacked. To see that her very ordinary night-dress had been fanned

across the bed's sumptuous satin cover, or that an enticingly scented bath

was being run for her by a maid.

What's the point of being a multimil ionaire if you can't wave a magic wand

when you need to? she had wondered with irony, realising she was being

given an object lesson in how the other half lived.

Left alone, she'd walked over to the window, and drawn back the filmy

drapes, staring out into the darkness. If only there were a magic wand to

mend a broken heart, she'd thought, or wipe out memory, so that she could

forget the smile in Andreas' eyes, and the warm strength of his body when

he'd held her in his arms. And, most of al , the promise in his kiss.

A promise that could never be fulfil ed, but which would haunt her for ever

just the same.

'Kyria Zoe.' A tap on the door brought Dr Vanopolis. 'Your father is anxious

about you.'

Her mouth curled. 'He's al heart.'

He said with slight reproof, 'He wishes you to know that he wil not intrude

on you tonight, but asks that he may see you in the morning, when you are

rested, and calmer.'

'Rested?' Zoe chal enged ironically. 'Calm?' She shook her head. 'Tel me,

Doctor, are you licensed to perform frontal lobotomies?'

His faint frown held compassion as wel as concern. 'Would you settle for a

sleeping tablet instead? I will leave one on the night table for you to take

after your bath.'

Thanks to the medication, she'd actually managed to sleep, but her dreams

had been troubled and disjointed.

And now the night was over, and she had to face the day ahead. And the

inevitable confrontation with the man who claimed to be her father.

She stared at herself in the mirror, trying to discern some faint vestige of

Steve Dragos in her appearance. But as far as she could see, there was

none.

I'm like my mother, and that's al there is to it, she thought.

The chambray dress had been removed, along with other items from the

wardrobe, for laundering, so she settled for her denim skirt and a white top

with short sleeves and a scooped neck.

After al , she wasn't out to impress anyone. She was a schoolteacher on

holiday, and that was all.

The manservant from the night before was waiting at the foot of the stairs to

conduct her into the dining room. Zoe took a deep breath, thrusting her

hands into her skirt pockets, then walked in.

Stephanos Dragos was seated alone at the head of the large table, glancing

through an array of international newspapers, but he pushed them aside and

rose as soon as Zoe entered. He was wearing a shirt in Sea Island cotton,

and a pair of cream linen trousers, and there was a vigour and

determination about him that was almost tangible this morning.

A marked contrast to the grey-faced man who had destroyed her life with a

few incredible words only a few hours ago, she thought.

'
Kalimera
.' He pul ed out a chair, indicating that she should sit next to him.

She returned an unsmiling 'Good morning' and took a seat further down the

table.

His brows rose slightly, but he made no comment. 'May I pour you some

coffee? Or there is tea if you prefer it? And the rol s are freshly baked.' He

signalled to the maid waiting by the massive sideboard to serve her.

'Just orange juice, please,' she said. 'And coffee. I'm not hungry.'

'But you must eat,' he said. 'Or you wil make yourself il .'

She looked back at him cool y, and level y. 'Mr Dragos, I'm sick at heart

already, and food wil do nothing to cure that.'

There was a silence, then he spoke curtly in Greek to the maid who served

Zoe, then scuttled out of the room.

Steve Dragos settled back in his chair, the dark eyes examining Zoe

unblinkingly. He said, 'If you have everything you need, then we wil talk.'

'There isn't a great deal to say.' Zoe drank some orange juice. 'You had an

affair with my mother, and I was the result I was happier not knowing about

this. That covers it for me.'

'You have no curiosity about the past?'

'Once I did. That's why I came here, because I found the papers giving my

mother the Vil a Danaë. I thought I needed to know about that, but I was

wrong.'

'You speak of an affair,' Steve Dragos said, after a pause. 'But it was more

than that. Your mother was the love of my life, and I lost her.'

Zoe put down her glass, her mouth curling. 'How history does tend to repeat

itself.'

He was silent for a moment, then he said quietly, 'I thought there was little

more I could learn about guilt or unhappiness, but I was wrong.'

'I can make no excuse for loving your mother, little one. Nor can I apologise

for it. Every word she spoke, every smile, every gesture was a blessing to

my life.

'But, believe me, I never meant that hurt should come to you or to my

Andreas.'

She looked down at the spotless linen cloth. 'In that case, you'l understand

why I can't stay here. Why I need to go home.'

'This is your home.'

'No!' Zoe said in a stifled voice. 'It's not, and it never can be. That is—just

not possible.'

'Not yet, perhaps,' he said. 'But one day you will feel it. Because my blood

runs in your veins,
pedhi mou
.'

'Does it?' Zoe shook her head. 'If that was true, I'd feel it
here
.' She pressed a clenched fist to her breast 'I'd be aware of some connection between

us—but I don't…'

'I can be patient,' he said. 'I have learned to be. And one day you will accept

me as your father.'

She flung her head back in open chal enge. 'There are tests that can decide

that, Mr Dragos.'

'You doubt me?' The heavy brows snapped together. 'Then perhaps you wil

believe your own mother.'

He reached into the breast pocket of his shirt and extracted a sheet of

paper, discoloured and fragile with folding.

Zoe took it reluctantly, and scanned the few faded lines. There was no

question it was Gina's writing, and it said simply that she was wel , and

happy and expecting his child. It ended with her love.

'And this was the last time she ever wrote to you?' She shook her head. 'It

makes no sense.'

He said heavily, 'I have told myself the same a thousand times. And I blame

myself, too. I should have gone to Britain, insisted that she come to me. But

I had made her a promise, and, by some oversight, left no loophole,' he

added cynical y. 'So I could not fol ow without breaking my word, which she

would not have forgiven.' He paused. 'And the next I heard of her, she was

married.'

He gave her a piercing stare. 'He was good to her, this man?'

'Yes, he was wonderful to us both.' She swallowed. 'That's why I can't

believe that he or my mother could have lied to me about something so

important.'

He was silent for a moment. 'Did she never talk of me at all?' There was an

odd note in his voice that Zoe recognised, shocked, as wistfulness.

'No.' She tried to speak more gently. 'I think she'd put that part of her life

strictly behind her. But she kept your photograph, and she painted a

wonderful picture of the house you built for her.'

'And which you have now inherited.'

'I came across the papers by accident, and wondered…'

She swal owed. 'But the Vil a Danaë was never hers in any real sense. And

it isn't mine either.

He said quietly, 'But I wish you to have it,
pedhi mou
.' As she began to

protest he lifted a silencing hand. 'Use it as you wish. Stay there sometimes.

Sel it. Give it away. The choice is yours.'

'That's—very generous.'

'You are my daughter. I would give more, if you would allow it Acknowledge

our relationship publicly.'

'Oh, no.' Zoe bit her lip. 'It's too soon. I—I need time. I have to think about

this—al the implications.' She looked at him. 'You must understand that.'

'I shall try.' He pushed his chair back and rose. 'Come, let us walk in the

garden together.'

As they paced along the terrace he said quietly, 'Andreas did not have to tel

me she had gone from me. I felt it a while ago.' He glanced at her. 'Does it

hurt you when I speak of her?'

'No,' she said. 'How could it? We—we both loved her. I accept that at least.'

'Do you want to know how we met?' He sighed reminiscently. 'It was all

because of a sprained ankle. I was driving back to this house, when I saw a

young woman sitting at the side of the road, nursing her foot I could see she

was in pain, so I stopped the car and offered assistance. She did not wish to

be taken to the clinic, so I brought her here, and my housekeeper bathed

and bandaged her injury.'

'A romantic story.' Zoe forced a smile.

'But that was not your mother,' he said softly. 'It was her sister. I gathered

she had hurt herself when she stormed off after some quarrel, not for the

first time.'

'Nothing new there,' Zoe said before she could stop herself.

'No?' His mouth thinned slightly. 'I can believe it, although Gina was always

loyal. I sent a message to Stavros at the hotel that his English guest was

safe, and—Gina came to col ect her.' He was silent for a moment, then said

with difficulty, 'I loved her the moment I saw her. When she came into the

room, she made the sunlight pale. And she confessed later it had been the

same for her.'

'I did not hide that I was married, but our feelings were too strong. We