The Wealthy Greek's Contract Wife(27)

‘It won't be easy, bringing up your sons here,' she felt bound to say.

‘I don't plan to live here,' Ilios told her.

Lizzie looked uncertainly at him. ‘But I thought-that is, you said that the house had to stay within the family.'

‘It does, and it will. But not as a family home. I've got other plans   for it. There's a shortage of opportunities for young apprentices to   learn the skills that go into maintaining a house like this. I found   that out for myself. So I've decided that Villa Manos will become a   place where those who want to master those skills can come to learn   them. Instead of turning the villa into a dead museum, I plan to turn it   into a living workshop-where courses are run for master craftsmen,   taught by those who have already mastered those trades themselves.'

‘What a wonderful idea.' Lizzie didn't make any attempt to conceal her approval.

‘I shall build a house for myself on the other side of the promontory.'

‘Where the apartments were?'

‘Yes. There will also be an accommodation block, and schoolrooms and   proper workshops for the students. They will be situated in the wooded   area between the villa and the other side of the promontory-' He broke   off as Lizzie's mobile suddenly started to bleep.

‘I'm sorry,' she apologised, scrambling in her bag for it so that she   could silence it. Her face suddenly broke into a smile as she looked at   the image which had flashed up on her screen.

‘It's the twins-my nephews,' she told Ilios. ‘My sister sent me a   photograph of them earlier, in their new school uniforms, and now she's   sent me another picture of them.' Lizzie held up the phone so that he   could see.

Ilios glanced dismissively at the screen, and then found that he   couldn't look away. The young woman in the photograph, kneeling down and   clasping a uniform-clad boy in each arm, had that same look of love  and  happiness on her face as Lizzie herself wore when she was talking  about  her family. There was no doubting the closeness her family  shared, and  no doubting Lizzie's love for her sisters and these two  small  dark-haired boys. Fatherless they might be, but they were  laughing into  the camera, confident in the love that surrounded them.  Neither was  there any doubt about Lizzie's determination to protect her  family and  provide for them. If Lizzie herself were to have a child  then she would  love it with the same absolute loyalty and devotion he  could see on her  face now. A child … his child … Absorbed in the enormity  of what he was  thinking, Ilios didn't notice Lizzie move towards him  until he felt her  hand on his arm as she told him, ‘It's thanks to you  that they were able  to have those uniforms.'                       
       
           



       

Thanks to him? Ilios tensed against what was happening to him-against   the savage dagger-thrusts of pain that tore into him with Lizzie's   words. Because they reminded him of the truth. The only reason she was   here with him was because he had blackmailed her into marrying him.

He shrugged off Lizzie's hand on his arm, stepping back from her as he   told her, ‘There are some interesting features in the garden. I'll show   you.'

Feeling rebuffed, Lizzie switched off her mobile and returned it to her   handbag. Ilios obviously wanted to make it plain that their  relationship  was strictly business. He didn't want to be forced to look  at  photographs of her family.

‘How long do you think it will be before your cousin accepts that he   doesn't have any grounds to try and overset your grandfather's will?'   she asked Ilios as they headed for the garden at the rear of the villa.

Here, beyond a wide flagged terrace, steps led down to what must once   have been intricately formal beds of clipped box, surrounding a pool   with a fountain. But Lizzie wasn't really concentrating on her   surroundings. Instead she was hoping desperately for a miracle-for that   miracle to be Ilios telling her that he had changed his mind about   ending their marriage because he wanted them to be together for ever.

He shrugged dismissively. ‘You are, of course, impatient to return to your family?'

‘I do miss them,' Lizzie agreed, her heart sinking. That wasn't the   response she had hoped for at all. It was true that she did miss her   family, but she was also finding it increasingly difficult to behave as   though nothing had happened between her and Ilios. Take now, for   instance. When they had come out of the house she had almost put her arm   through Ilios's, just as if they were actually a genuine couple. Of   course it was because she craved the intimacy of physical closeness with   him, just as any woman in love would.

‘Regrettably, my lawyers feel that we should remain married for the time   being, as a divorce so soon after our wedding would look suspicious.   However, you can rest assured that I am every bit as eager to bring our   marriage to an end as you,' Ilios announced coldly, his response driven   by pride and the need to defend himself from the alien emotions that   were threatening him.

The cold words struck into her heart like ice picks. But it was her own   fault if she had been hurt, Lizzie told herself resolutely.

‘This is what I wanted to show you,' Ilios told her nearly half an hour   later, when they had walked through the extensive gardens to the villa   and emerged at the side of a pretty man-made lake. He gestured towards a   grotto dotted with statuary and ornamented with a small fresh water   spring.

‘What is it?' Lizzie asked him.

‘It's a nymphaeum,' Ilios explained. ‘An artificially created grotto for   which the statuary has been specifically designed. Villa Barbaro has   one-some of its statuary executed by Marcantonio Barbaro, supposedly.   It's a conceit, really. A way for the villa-owner to show off either his   own talent as a sculptor or that of an artist to whom he was a patron.   The lake here needs dredging, and the small temple on the island   renovating.'

‘The whole place is stunning,' Lizzie told him truthfully. ‘I can   understand why your ancestor wanted it kept in the family. I do think,   though, that your plan to turn it into a living workshop is a wonderful   idea-and so very generous. A wonderful gift to future generations,   enabling such special skills to be carried on.'

‘I'm not motivated by generosity. I've been held up on too many   contracts by the lack of skilled artisans-that's why I'm doing it.'   Ilios's voice was clipped, as though her praise had annoyed him.

Because he didn't want it? Just as he didn't want her? She mustn't dwell   on what she could not have, but instead hold in her heart what they  had  briefly shared, Lizzie told herself. She mustn't let that joy be   overshadowed or diminished.

Nor must she allow the fact that Ilios did not return her feelings to   prevent her from behaving as she would have done had she not loved him.

‘I've really enjoyed today. Thank you for bringing me and showing me the   villa,' she told him, with that in mind, as they headed back to the  car  for the return journey to Thessaloniki.

He had enjoyed it too, Ilios acknowledged. When he had not been battling   with the emotions his conflicting feelings towards her aroused.


On the way back to Thessaloniki they stopped at the same tavern where   they had had lunch. The small village overlooked the sea, and the front   of the tavern was protected enough from the breeze for it to be warm   enough to sit outside.                       
       
           



       

They'd eaten plump juicy black olives and delicious grilled kebabs, and   were just finishing their coffee when it happened. A dull noise like   thunder, and the movement of the ground beneath their feet.

The trestle table shifted, spilling Lizzie's coffee, and then Ilios got   up, coming towards her and taking hold of her, pushing her down to the   ground, covering her with his own body as he warned her, ‘It's an   earthquake.'

‘An earthquake?' she echoed.

‘This area's notorious for them. It will be all right-just keep still.'

She had no other option other than to keep still with Ilios's body a   protective weight over hers, pinning her to the ground. His hand was   cupping the back of her head protectively, pushing her face into his   shoulder, allowing her to breathe in the now familiar scent of him.   Lizzie just hoped he would assume that the heavy sledgehammer thuds of   her heartbeat were caused by her shock and fear of the earthquake rather   than by the proximity of their bodies. How fate must be enjoying its   joke at her expense, knowing that when she had longed to be held in   Ilios's arms these were not the circumstances in which she had envisaged   it happening. To be held by him in an embrace outwardly that of the   most intimate and tender of lovers which in reality was nothing more   than a means of safety felt painfully ironic, even if his prompt actions   were for her own benefit.