Читать книгу Modern Romance December 2016 Books 1-4 - Кейт Хьюит - Страница 18

CHAPTER NINE

TALIA WOKE TO sunlight and an empty bed. She blinked the world into focus, her heart giving a funny little dip at the sight of the smooth expanse of sheet next to her. At some point in the night, and she had no idea when, Angelos had left her.

Talia flipped onto her back and stared up at the ceiling as memories of last night unspooled through her mind like scenes from a movie. Angelos coming in and seeing her drenched with sweat and shaking with terror. Angelos gently removing her clothes, stepping into the shower with her, holding her in his arms.

And she’d let him. Of course she’d let him. She’d never felt so treasured, so protected, and it had been the most amazing and incredible feeling in the world. It had felt deeper and more important than any physical desire that she’d felt for him, although there had been that last night too.

Resting her cheek against his chest, hearing the steady thud of his heart as he cradled her...she’d been so tempted to tilt her head upwards and let him kiss her.

But of course he probably wouldn’t have kissed her. He’d been wonderfully kind last night, comforting her when she’d been in the grip of a major panic attack, but that’s all it had been. Comfort.

And for what he’d done, Talia knew, he deserved an explanation. One she didn’t relish giving, because she hated for anyone to pity her, to know her weakness. But Angelos had already seen her weakness, so perhaps she had nothing left to lose.

Sighing she rose from the bed and went to get dressed. Sofia was just finishing her breakfast as Talia came into the kitchen, instinctively glancing around for Angelos. She didn’t know whether to feel relieved or disappointed when she saw he wasn’t there, but she caught Maria noticing her wandering gaze and a blush rose to her cheeks. Maria’s lips pursed. The housekeeper didn’t miss anything.

‘Hey, Sofia,’ Talia said brightly, and avoiding Maria’s speculative gaze, she sat down at the table and helped herself to fresh fruit.

After breakfast Sofia went off with Ava for her lessons, and resolutely Talia went in search of Angelos. She found him, predictably, in his study, and his terse, ‘Enter,’ when she knocked on the door made her wonder if last night had happened at all.

Then she opened the door and saw him sitting at his desk, dressed in his usual button-down shirt and pressed trousers, seeming brisk and remote and yet so utterly wonderful, and colour flared into her face.

To her surprise an answering colour touched Angelos’s sharp cheekbones as he looked up at her. He cleared his throat and then closed his laptop. ‘How are you feeling this morning?’

‘I’m fine. Good actually.’ She closed the door behind her and took a deep breath. ‘I’m sorry for being so...’ Her mind spun as she tried to think of a word for what she’d been.

‘Don’t be sorry, Talia,’ Angelos filled in quietly. ‘I’m the one who should be sorry, for not realising how the storm affected you. I would have checked on you, if I’d known.’

‘There was nothing you could have done. That is...’ She swallowed convulsively, resisting the urge to press her hands to her hot face. ‘Besides what you did. Which was wonderful and way beyond the call of...’

‘Duty?’ he supplied, quirking an eyebrow, amusement lighting his eyes, turning them almost golden, and making her insides fizz in response. Scowling the man was almost unbearably attractive. Smiling he was impossible to resist.

‘Yes,’ she managed, dragging her gaze away from his. ‘I suppose.’

‘I said last night and I will say it again, there is no need to feel embarrassed.’

‘You don’t think?’ Talia blurted. ‘You saw me naked. Not to mention sweaty and shaking and...’ She closed her eyes briefly. ‘I’d really rather not remember.’

His mouth twitched in what she thought was amusement. ‘I’ve seen women naked before, Talia.’

‘Like most of your nannies?’ Angelos’s eyebrows snapped together and, horrified, Talia slapped a hand over her mouth. ‘I mean,’ she said through her fingers, ‘Maria mentioned that they’ve tried to seduce you. And failed.’

‘Maria talks too much,’ he replied, but he didn’t sound angry.

Slowly Talia dropped her hand, knotted her fingers together. ‘It’s just I don’t want you to think...’ What? That her sweating and shaking was supposed to have been a turn-on? She was absolutely no good at this, Talia thought as a fresh wave of mortification swept over her. She had absolutely no experience with sex, or even talking about sex, and especially not with a man as gorgeous as Angelos Mena.

‘I don’t think that, Talia,’ Angelos said. ‘Last night you were in no shape for a seduction.’

‘Right. Sorry.’ She gave a little shake of her head. ‘I’m handling this really badly. I actually came in here to thank you, and also to explain why I reacted the way I did last night. Because, contrary to what you may think now, I’m not actually scared of storms.’

Angelos’s look was one of almost comical disbelief. ‘You could have fooled me last night.’

‘I know.’ She gave a shaky laugh. ‘Would you believe I actually liked storms when I was little? I loved watching them from the window of my bedroom, especially in summer. They were so...wild.’

Briefly, so briefly she almost missed it, something flared in Angelos’s eyes. She felt a kick in her stomach and she forced herself to continue, to ignore the helpless desire this man so easily ignited in her, simply by saying a word. Wild. What would it be like, if Angelos let go of his tightly held control? Images flared in her mind, vague swirling pictures of limbs tangling, mouths pressing, hands reaching. She shoved them away and met Angelos’s gaze. ‘It’s not the storm I’m scared of,’ she explained. ‘It’s what it makes me remember.’

Angelos stilled, his hands resting flat on his desk. ‘You don’t have to tell me—’

‘I know. But after what you did, how you helped me, you deserve to know.’ And actually, she realised, she wanted to tell him—even though she’d tried to keep the whole awful episode hidden from everyone, just as her grandfather had kept it out of the press, both of them pretending it had never happened, because that was easier. She wanted someone to know, someone who, amazingly, might understand a little. She drew a deep breath, let the air fill her lungs and buoy her courage. ‘When I was eighteen,’ she stated, ‘I was kidnapped.’

Angelos opened his mouth, but no words came out. ‘Kidnapped...’ he finally said, and his voice sounded hoarse, his tone horrified.

‘I was travelling in Europe, after my high school graduation. It was meant to be my big exciting summer, exploring the world, having endless adventures. I was with a couple of friends...we took precautions and we didn’t do anything stupid...’ Even now she felt the need to justify herself, to explain how it wasn’t her fault, because for years she’d tormented herself with the what-ifs. What if she’d been more careful? What if she’d travelled with more people? What if she could have done something to keep the disaster from unfolding the way it had?

Angelos had recovered himself and was now looking at her with his familiar hard stare, his eyes dangerously dark. ‘What happened exactly?’

‘We were in Paris. The City of Love.’ She let out a short, sharp laugh and shook her head. ‘Right in front of the Eiffel Tower. It felt like it should have been the safest place in the world. My friend Anna had gone to see about tickets to go up the tower and I was just taking a photo.’ She felt her chest start to go tight, her throat constrict, as memories assailed her, memories she’d kept locked tightly away. ‘I’d raised the camera up to my face, and was looking through the lens when...’ She stopped, closing her eyes. That moment when her world had shifted, shattered. One second was all it had taken to go from carefree insouciance to utter, incredulous terror.

‘Talia,’ Angelos said in a low voice. ‘You don’t have to—’

‘No, I want to,’ she insisted. ‘I do. I never talk about this, but I want to now...after what you did...’

‘It wasn’t that much—’

‘It was, Angelos,’ she responded, and she heard how her voice throbbed with sincerity. She saw something flash across Angelos’s face and she realised he’d never given permission to call him by his first name. ‘Sorry, should I not have...’

‘Not have what?’

‘Called you Angelos,’ she muttered. Angelos let out a wryly disbelieving laugh.

‘After everything, Talia, I think you can call me Angelos. In fact, I think it would be strange if you didn’t.’

After everything. Two little words that made her remember how he’d held her so tenderly, how hard and solid his chest had felt beneath her cheek. How she’d wanted to stay there for ever, wrapped in his arms, protected and safe.

Angelos rose from behind his desk, and taking her by the hand, he drew her to the two club chairs in front of the fireplace. She sank onto one, her legs shaky, and he sat in the other. ‘So they took you from the Eiffel Tower,’ he prompted, his voice low and steady.

‘They grabbed me so quickly. I didn’t even see...’ She swallowed hard, remembering how brutally and ruthlessly efficient the man had been, pulling her tightly to him, leaning down as if he were whispering in her ear, looking all for the world as if they were two lovers sharing an intimate moment. In reality he’d been pressing a chloroform-soaked cloth to her mouth and nose. She’d been unconscious in seconds.

She forced herself to meet Angelos’s gaze and continue. ‘They drugged me. When I woke up, I was in some kind of shed. It was locked, of course, and there was nothing in there. A dirt floor, a tin ceiling...barely room to stand up. And it was so dark.’ A shudder ran through her. ‘I had no idea where I was, or what they were going to do to me.’

Angelos’s face was pale, his eyes like burning dark coals. ‘That must have been utterly terrifying.’

‘It was.’ She pressed her lips together, memory rising inside her, choking her. ‘A man brought me food and water, although he never spoke to me. After a while I actually started to feel bored, which sounds ridiculous, but I just wanted something to happen.’ She shook her head. ‘I was so naïve.’ She lapsed into silence, remembering the endless days and weeks of sitting in that cramped cabin, filthy, exhausted, emotionally spent. Almost wanting it to be over...for good. She knew what despair felt like. She understood hopelessness.

‘What happened then, Talia?’

She jerked her gaze up, refocusing on Angelos. ‘There was a storm one night. A terrible storm, worse than the one we had here. I think the lightning must have struck something nearby, because there was a terrific crash, and I heard something fall nearby, a tree, I suppose. I was afraid they would leave me to die in there and save themselves. Or maybe they’d died, and no one would ever find me.’ Her fists had become bloody and bruised from banging on the door, a useless but instinctive bid for freedom.

‘But they didn’t?’ he prompted quietly when she’d fallen into silence once more.

‘No, they didn’t. In the middle of the storm the door opened and there were several men, some I hadn’t seen before. I couldn’t see their faces...they dragged me out of the room. I had no idea what was going to happen. One of them had a knife.’ She stopped, expelling a trembling breath, and heard Angelos mutter a curse. ‘They didn’t actually hurt me,’ she said. ‘They held a knife to my throat, but it was only for a picture. A ransom note. I didn’t realise that at the time though. I couldn’t think about anything. I could barely stand up.’ She tried to smile ruefully but her facial muscles felt like they weren’t working properly. ‘They took the photo, and then they pushed me around a bit, and then they shoved me back in the shed.’

‘I cannot imagine, Talia,’ Angelos said. He was gripping the armrests of his chair, his knuckles white, his face bloodless.

‘They weren’t as smart as they thought they were though,’ Talia continued, trying to inject a cheerful note into her voice and failing. ‘They sent the photo of me to my grandfather, and he used his resources to locate me from what they’d seen in the photo and then to prosecute the kidnappers. Just twenty-four hours after they sent the photograph a helicopter came with a SWAT team to rescue me.’

‘A helicopter,’ Angelos repeated after a pause. ‘Is that why you are scared of helicopters?’

‘Sort of. The sound reminds me of that whole time, and the rescue effort was...intense.’ She remembered the shouts, the staccato gunfire, the stranger who yanked her arm so hard he nearly dislocated her shoulder as he pulled her towards the waiting helicopter. At that point she hadn’t even known if the man was friend or foe, or if she was facing freedom or death. She’d collapsed inside the helicopter, watching in disbelief as a man was shot and killed right in front of her. And then the soul-freezing terror had morphed into an incredulous and numb relief, both emotions overwhelming.

‘But really,’ she told Angelos, ‘any confined space is difficult. From...from being in that shed. I’ve tried some different therapies for it, but none of them have worked.’ She gave him a lopsided smile. ‘But I supposed claustrophobia and a fear of thunderstorms is a small price to pay for my freedom.’

Angelos shook his head, his hands still clenched on the armrests. ‘I don’t know how you survived such a thing.’

‘How does anyone survive?’ she answered. ‘And survive is the right word, because sometimes it’s felt as if that’s all I’m doing.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Coming to Athens was the first time I’d got on an airplane in seven years. The first time I used public transportation, or ventured out of my comfort zone at all. After the kidnapping I dropped out of college and retreated to my grandfather’s estate. I couldn’t face people, and just being in a small space, even in a classroom, sent me into a blind panic. My grandfather was understanding, and he let me hide myself away. I think he thought I’d come out again, but I never did.’

Confusion clouded Angelos’s eyes and he shook his head. ‘But you must have. You said you were an artist—’

‘I have a private studio there. Clients come to me. I hardly ever leave. I can’t stand crowds, or cities, or small spaces. Which leaves me feeling pretty limited sometimes, but I’ve been happy. At least, I thought I was happy.’ But now, with a taste of what it felt like to truly live again, to feel excitement and happiness and desire, Talia knew she hadn’t been. She’d been content, maybe, but that was all. She’d been living a half-life without realising it, telling herself it was enough.

‘But you did come to Athens,’ Angelos said. ‘You tried. That’s important, Talia.’

‘Yes...’ But he didn’t know why she’d tried. Talia could tell that Angelos assumed she’d come to Greece simply to break out of her cocoon. Now would be the perfect time to tell him about the book, the real reason she was here.

And yet she stayed silent. She might have been brave in coming here, but in many ways she was still a coward. Because she didn’t want to risk Angelos’s anger at learning her true motives, feeling deceived. She didn’t want to leave Kallos or Sofia. She didn’t want to leave him.

The realisation of how much she was starting to care about this man drove her upright. ‘I should go. Sofia’s lessons will be finished, and we were going to sketch today, outside.’

Angelos rose also and reached for her hand. The slide of his fingers along hers was infinitely, achingly sweet, and it lit a flame of need in her belly. ‘Thank you,’ he said quietly. ‘For telling me all of that.’

‘Thank you,’ Talia answered, ‘for comforting me last night.’

And then, because she didn’t trust herself not to throw herself into Angelos’s arms just as she had last night, she yanked her hand away and hurried from the room.