Stranded with Her Greek Tycoon Page 3

  Alex gave Hayley a welcoming hug. But over Hayley’s shorn blonde head he questioned Cristos with his eyes: What’s going on? Alex had become as close as a brother. They shared secrets. Cristos knew the truth behind his cousin’s hasty marriage and Alex and Dell knew the extent of Cristos’s fortune. Alex would be as surprised as he was by his wife’s sudden reappearance.

  ‘Where have you been hiding?’ Alex asked Hayley, valiantly tiptoeing around the truth. Alex knew all about Cristos’s fruitless search for her.

  ‘Sydney,’ Hayley said after hesitating a moment too long.

  Alex’s dark brows rose.

  ‘I was living there for—’

  Auburn-haired Dell interrupted. ‘Sydney is my home town!’ she exclaimed. ‘I’d love to hear what you got up to there. Not only that, of course—I’ve been longing to meet you. Unfortunately we now have to go share ourselves around the other guests. But I’ll seat you near us for lunch so we can chat.’

  Her ebullient welcome defused the awkwardness of Hayley’s surprise visit and Cristos shot his cousin’s wife a glance of gratitude. He’d made friends with Dell when she had been working for Alex on Kosmimo, before there had been any romance between her and his cousin. There had been no one more delighted when they’d got married and he’d been their best man. If Hayley and Dell hit it off it would help make the rest of the day go smoothly.

  ‘I’ll look forward to that,’ Hayley said, returning Dell’s smile—her smile was pointedly not directed at him. Dell hugged Hayley before she turned to move away.

  That left just the two of them, standing apart from the other guests in the glorious but increasingly chilly grounds of the chapel. But Cristos didn’t even notice the view of the white-capped sea or the profusion of dark clouds rolling in. His senses could only register the presence of his wife. Hayley might be hostile but she was here. Before she got back on that boat to Nidri he would insist he got answers.

  But his spirits dipped as he noticed his seventy-seven-year-old grandmother heading their way. Hayley noticed too. He heard her dismay in a hiss of indrawn breath and she tensed as if to flee. ‘I don’t think I can handle a confrontation with your grandmother,’ she said. ‘That wasn’t part of the deal.’

  Cristos’s protective instinct kicked in. He’d kept his anger about the ugly way Hayley had ended their marriage to himself. He would not tolerate criticism of her from anyone else. Not even his beloved grandmother, who had rather an impressive track record in that regard.

  He put his arm around Hayley and drew her close. She did not object, realising, perhaps, that it would be easier if they gave the appearance of being a couple. ‘Leave my grandmother to me,’ he said.

  Dell called Penelope the purveyor of information for the extended family—kind terminology to describe an unashamed gossip and self-appointed matchmaker. His yia-yia had worked to get Alex and Dell together despite seemingly impossible odds. But she was convinced Cristos had made completely the wrong match in Hayley. She’d made that very clear to Hayley the one time they’d met when he’d brought Hayley home to introduce her.

  The old woman’s journey towards them now was hindered by the other guests greeting her, but she would be with them in mere minutes. He could not allow old grievances to erupt that might make Hayley change her mind about staying for lunch. Not before he’d had time to thrash out the truth behind the reasons they had parted.

  Hayley twisted within the protection of his arm to look up at him, her blue eyes clouded with concern. The wind lifted fine wisps of blonde hair that feathered around her face. He resisted the urge to smooth them into place. Such an intimate touch belonged to their past.

  ‘Your grandmother hated me before. What will she think of me now?’ she whispered.

  ‘Hate?’ He frowned. ‘That’s too strong a term. Penelope didn’t approve of you—or me at the time, for that matter—but I’m sure she didn’t hate you. We didn’t ask their permission and married without inviting them to the wedding. That meant we broke all sorts of Greek family rules.’

  Her mouth turned down. ‘I didn’t make it any better by telling her that my own parents weren’t invited either. Your grandmother drew her own conclusions about that. Conclusions that didn’t reflect well on me.’

  ‘Remember your parents didn’t approve of me either. That was another reason we didn’t tell any family about the wedding until we were Mr and Mrs.’

  Hayley didn’t deny it. ‘They thought I was too young to get married. Especially while I was still at uni. My father was so disappointed in me.’

  There had been more to it than that. ‘They might have thought better of it if you’d married someone they approved of. Your mother was disappointed I was from humble origins.’ Her mother had had a particular sneer for him that had let him know she’d thought her daughter had married way beneath her.

  ‘That you were a foreigner was reason enough for her disapproval.’ Was that a glimmer of a smile of complicity from his estranged wife, as the memories danced across her face? ‘She saw it as an act of defiance on my part. To get married at the register office and have lunch afterwards at the pub with our friends. What a crime that was in “Surrey mother” circles.’

  He smiled in return. ‘We got married exactly the way we wanted. Free from anyone’s expectations but our own. I never regretted that, in spite of the dramas it caused with my family.’

  ‘Me neither,’ she said. ‘No matter how it turned out in the end.’ Her gaze met his for a long moment. Then the shutters came down and she turned her face away. Why would she want to indulge in reminiscence about their wedding when she’d come seeking a divorce?

  ‘Penelope is heading our way,’ she said.

  He felt a shiver run through her. ‘Cold?’ he asked. As the wind rose, the temperature was beginning to drop.

  ‘A little scared, to be honest. Your grandma is a formidable lady. She doesn’t look any less hostile than when she interrogated me the first time we met when we came to Greece on our honeymoon.’

  ‘Which is why we never came to the islands again.’ His family’s rejection of his wife had hurt Hayley so much he had decided to give his grandparents time to get used to the idea of his marriage before they met again. Then when the modelling career he had fallen into so reluctantly had taken off with such speed there hadn’t been the chance to come back, to try and mend bridges. Or, indeed, time to work on the cracks that had been appearing in his marriage that he had seen as hairline and Hayley as canyon-like crevices.

  He’d eventually returned home without a wife. And given no explanations for her absence other than she had left him. And that he didn’t particularly care. He’d hidden his heartbreak behind that mask of indifference.

  ‘Now I’m wishing I’d never come here,’ Hayley said. ‘How can I face her?’

  ‘Does it matter?’ he replied. ‘You won’t have to see my grandmother again after today. Or me. But for now, let’s present a united front. To keep the peace for Dell and Alex’s sake.’

  ‘I’ll try,’ she said, slowly. ‘They’re really nice people.’ To his relief, she stayed by his side.

  * * *

  Hayley braced herself. The last thing she wanted to do was cause a scene with Cristos’s grandmother. But she wasn’t twenty-two any more. Twenty-two and desperate to impress her new husband’s family. Back then she might as well have festooned herself with signs begging them to like her. Now she had learned not to take rubbish from anyone, no matter their age. She had wanted approval and acceptance from Penelope, instead she had been crushed by rejection for no real reason that she could see.

  Cristos’s grandmother’s shrewd black eyes flitted from Hayley to her grandson and back again. In spite of her resolve to stand up for herself, Hayley couldn’t help but feel intimidated by the elderly Greek matriarch in full sail. She took a deep breath.

  ‘It’s always a surprise to see you, H
ayley,’ Penelope said in her charmingly accented English, with a smile that didn’t reach those eyes. The surprise of their marriage had not been welcomed by Cristos’s clan. Her surprise visit this time obviously wasn’t either.

  Before she could think of a suitable reply, Cristos spoke. ‘A wonderful surprise, Yia-yia, that Hayley could join us for Alex and Dell’s celebration.’

  ‘Is that why you came here?’ Penelope addressed her question to Hayley.

  Hayley wasn’t good at lying; she had to think about her reply. ‘A loving marriage is an excellent thing to celebrate,’ she said.

  The old lady’s eyes narrowed until they were mere slits in the wrinkles of her face. ‘And your own marriage? Have you come back to be with your husband?’

  ‘That’s between Cristos and me,’ Hayley said without hesitation.

  ‘Hayley is right, Yia-yia.’ Cristos’s tone was kind—she knew how much he loved and respected his grandmother—but firm. His grip around Hayley’s shoulder tightened and she automatically leaned in closer to him. Accepting his protection was something she had always done. Until she’d had to deal with the biggest crisis of her life without him.

  Again Penelope addressed Hayley. ‘You’ve put my grandson through hell, young lady. And if you—’

  ‘There are always two sides to the story,’ Hayley retorted. ‘I—’

  ‘Our seeing each other again really is our business,’ said Cristos smoothly. ‘While we appreciate your concern, you need to let us handle it in our own way.’ He turned to Hayley. ‘Isn’t that right?’

  Hayley nodded. ‘It most certainly is.’

  Penelope muttered something in Greek under her breath. Hayley had made an effort to learn Greek when she’d fallen in love with Cristos. She’d let it lapse with the end of their marriage; she didn’t have the heart to speak Greek if it wasn’t to her husband. But she knew enough to know that whatever Penelope had said wasn’t polite. Hayley gritted her teeth. She did not want to get into an argument with Cristos’s formidable grandmother. What would be the point? Their paths would not cross again after today. She looked up to him in mute appeal.

  In response, Cristos looked deep into her eyes and smoothed the flyaway hair from her forehead with gentle fingers. Her breath caught at his touch, so familiar and yet so startlingly new, and she could not break her gaze from the deep green of his. ‘I am so happy to have my wife back with me,’ he murmured in that deep, rich, lightly accented voice that had always thrilled her.

  Hayley knew he didn’t mean that. It was a message for his grandmother—a subtle way of defusing the situation. But it felt anything but subtle to her as shivers of awareness rippled through her. Her body had not forgotten the pleasure his touch could bring.

  It had been so long.

  She lifted her face and closed her eyes to better savour the sensation as he made the act of smoothing her hair into a caress. She was so lost in the feeling she was totally unprepared when he kissed her.

  Oh!

  His mouth firm and warm on hers, the roughness of his chin, his scent, spicy and male. Her own lips soft and yielding under his. His hands sliding around her waist, pulling her closer. This felt so good. Too good. Her eyes flew open.

  She didn’t want this. Not this languorous warmth overtaking her. Not this feeling of being lost in his possession. Not this surge of awakening when she’d worked so hard to suppress her longing for him. She didn’t want him. The marriage had been all on his terms—and in loving him so desperately she had lost herself.

  She tried to pull away. ‘We have to make this look believable,’ he murmured against her mouth.

  Why? She had agreed to play along with the charade of reconciliation so as not to disrupt his cousin’s festivities. Not to kiss Cristos. She did not welcome the whoosh of long-banked-down embers igniting into flames. Because of a kiss. A simple—you could almost call it chaste—kiss.

  ‘Don’t kiss me again,’ she murmured back against his mouth. His grandmother, watching intently, might take it for sweet talk. She stepped back with a shaky little laugh that sounded fake to her own ears but might fool the grandmother. The smile he gave her in return seemed equally fake, though ragged at the edges. And as soon as his grandmother headed away from them she shrugged herself free, making a play of smoothing down her coat.

  ‘We should follow the others to lunch,’ she said.

  CHAPTER THREE

  HAYLEY FOLLOWED CRISTOS into the dining area of the resort where some forty guests were gathering for an early lunch. In spite of all her resolve, she could not help but admire the splendour of the view of his back. His immaculately cut dark charcoal jacket—no doubt from the collection of his favourite Italian designer—worn with equally well tailored tapered trousers. The suit emphasised his broad shoulders and perfect behind, his long, leanly muscled legs. Cristos wore his clothes with effortless, masculine grace. No wonder he’d been such an instant hit as an international model.

  Did he sense her gaze on him? He paused, turned back to her and reached out his hand. His eyes urged her to take it, for appearances’ sake.

  Her first instinct was to pull back from any further physical contact, even such a simple act as holding hands. It aroused too many memories of happier times. Times when she’d felt a surge of joy as Cristos’s much larger hand had closed over hers. She had felt safe, protected and proud to let the world know that the extraordinarily handsome man by her side was hers. Then there were the memories of those skilful, loving hands on her body...

  She shook her head to rid herself of unwanted thoughts. She especially didn’t want to think about how she had reacted to his kiss back there in front of his grandmother. Those feelings should be firmly relegated to the past. She could not lose control of her life again. Since she had left him she had learned to be herself instead of the support act to her handsome, glamorous husband. She wanted it to stay that way.

  But some kind of show of togetherness would be expected of a husband and wife having a civilised meeting and she didn’t want to draw unwanted whispers from the people she knew were observing them. So she let her hand stay in his and made appropriate small talk about the resort as she walked by his side. It was just an act, she told herself, on his part as well as hers. He’d made steps towards divorce too. She could endure it for a few hours.

  ‘You’re not seeing the island at its best,’ he said in a casual, conversational tone that anyone could overhear and think nothing of. She was grateful to him for that; she was aware that many ears in the room were tuned into their conversation hoping for a hint of what was going on between Cristos and the wife who had left him. Even if they could lip-read they wouldn’t catch anything titillating. ‘We’re having an unusually cold winter,’ he added.

  The weather was always a useful standby but in this case it was a topic of genuine interest. The breeze that had outside played havoc with her hair had turned into something much stronger, buffeting the windows that looked out to the sea. The view was magnificent, the deep turquoise sea whipped up to whitecaps, grey clouds scudding across the sky.

  ‘It must be breathtaking here in summer,’ she said. ‘But I can see the place has its own wild winter beauty too.’

  ‘Kosmimo is special at any time of the year,’ he said with an air of possession that surprised her. As far as she knew, his cousin Alex owned the island. But then his family were very close—perhaps what belonged to one belonged to the others. Who knew? She had an older sister but they weren’t particularly close.

  Hayley didn’t have to fake how impressed she was by her surroundings. The resort building was white and elegant in its simplicity as it stepped down the side of the slope to the sea and the single jetty that served the private island. As she had approached it by boat earlier in the day she had admired the way the structure sat so perfectly in the landscape.

  The interiors exceeded all expectations—strikingly s
tylish with pale marble floors, whitewashed woodwork, large shuttered windows and wide balconies facing the incredible view of the sea to the front and the forested hills to the back. It seemed serene, she thought, but with a subtle air of energy as well, fitting for a holistic resort where the guests came to rest and recharge. She was not surprised when Cristos told her the fit out had won design awards.

  ‘Why is the resort called Pevezzo Athina?’ she asked Cristos as he led her to their table.

  ‘Pevezzo in the local dialect means safe haven. Athina is after our family-run taverna on the island of Prasinos not far from here. It’s also the name of the restaurant my great-uncle, Alex’s grandfather, started in Sydney.’

  ‘So the name is a tradition,’ she said. Once she had realised the connection to his family, she had not gone anywhere near that Sydney restaurant.

  He nodded. ‘Tradition is important to my family.’

  When she had met him in Durham they had both been strangers away from home. His English had been near perfect, just slight differences in inflexion giving away that he was not a native speaker. They had been lovers and partners and husband and wife. The fact he was Greek and she was English hadn’t mattered. It wasn’t until they had visited Greece on their honeymoon that she had appreciated how Greek he was and how important his culture and traditions were to him.

  ‘A safe haven.’ She nodded slowly as she looked around her. ‘I can see that. And the way the wind is starting to lash around the windows I want to feel safe.’ She glanced down at her watch. ‘Do you think it will be okay for you to take me back to Nidri in your boat after lunch?’

  Cristos had suggested she cancel the return trip she had booked with the boatman and let him take her back along with other guests in his bigger boat. Looking through the windows at how angry the sea had turned, she thought it had been a wise decision for her to agree.