‘You probably have the wrong clinic—’
‘I think I have the wrong fiancée.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean? I’m the one who’s having your baby!’
‘Are you? Or is it as fabricated as your affection for me? You made it up, didn’t you? Made the whole story up in one final desperate attempt to get rid of Cleo and get your talons into me. And it nearly worked. Well, no more. The wedding is off. And you are no longer in my employ. I want you out of here.’ He turned on his heel and strode out of the room and suddenly she was there, tugging at his arm.
‘But I love you, Andreas! We can make a baby just like your mother yearns for, I know we can.’
Fury flared inside him. ‘What did you say? Did she tell you that? Is that how you came up with this plan to trap me? I’m sorry, Petra. Maybe I wasn’t clear enough before. I don’t want you. I never really did. I want Cleo.’
‘She wasn’t good enough for you. She was young and naïve and stupid.’
‘I love her!’
And her eyes went wide. ‘You couldn’t. You can’t. Andreas, please, listen to me—’
‘Get out, Petra. I never want to see you again.’
And then she was gone and he was alone. Alone to the realisation that had shocked him as much as it had Petra.
He loved Cleo.
And he was going to get her back.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
SO MUCH for autumn. Cleo wiped the sweat from her brow as she lugged the vacuum cleaner along the balcony of the Kangaroo Crossing Hotel, the last pub, the sign boasted, this side of the Black Stump.
It might be April but a last hoorah from summer had the sun shining down like a blowtorch, turning the already parched earth to yet more red dust. As if they needed more. A convoy of four-wheel drives roared down the main street, turning the air red and rich with diesel fumes.
Welcome to the outback, she thought as she tackled the sticky doors of yet another balcony room.
Inside was thankfully cooler, the thick stone walls protecting the rooms from the worst of the heat, but still she managed to work up a sweat as she cleaned the last of the rooms.
She’d been lucky to score this job. Her mum had had to give up work as her pregnancy was now quite advanced and she was happily awaiting the arrival of her baby. Cleo couldn’t help but be excited for her, not only because she’d been able to take over the cleaning job from her. She could even supplement her income by pulling beers in the bar at night.
And the best thing was the job came with its own accommodation True, it was in the basement, but it was nothing like the poky closet she’d endured in London. This was a real room with a real bed, and so much the cooler for being underground.
She’d save up now she was home and when she had enough she’d enrol in that Classics course in Sydney. She’d discovered she could do it by correspondence and hopefully she’d be able to start next semester. She could hardly wait. The books from Santorini she’d brought home were so well read they were dog eared and slipping from their covers.
She looked around and gave a small sigh of satisfaction as she straightened the last kink out of the queen bed’s coverlet and stopped to smell the roses she’d salvaged from the twisted climbers covering the beer garden. A VIP had booked for tonight, the manager had proudly advised, the room had to be perfect. And it was. Dubbed the honeymoon suite because it boasted its own bath and loo, it was the grandest room the hotel had to offer. She smiled. Some honeymoon suite. Nothing at all like the suites she’d shared with Andreas in London and Santorini. But then, this was Kangaroo Crossing, and if she was ever going to have a honeymoon herself this was the best she could hope for.
Not that that was likely. Since coming home, she’d sworn off men for good. Clearly she had no idea how to fall in love with the right one. She hauled the vacuum cleaner and her gear back out into the hot still air, allowing herself just a second to remember what it had been like in those first few giddy days and nights she’d shared withAndreas on Santorini, when there’d been times she’d actually believed he’d cared about her, those perfect days before she’d discovered she was being used as some sort of shield between him and Petra, the woman who was carrying his child, the woman he was probably already married to.
The vacuum cleaner thumping almost reassuringly against her shin brought her back to reality. Her time with Andreas had been nothing more than a fantasy. This was her life now. This was her world, a world that had shrunk in the last two weeks to one big wide dusty stretch of highway lined with low timber-board buildings.
Another car was making its way through the town, a trail of red dust behind it, a car impossibly shiny and as low slung and inappropriate for the outback roads as you could imagine. She stopped to watch for a moment, expecting it to keep right on going, only to see it slow to a halt, pulling up alongside the hotel in the shade of an ancient gum tree. Could this be their VIP, then? Kangaroo Creek didn’t get many of those. She put down the machine and rested her arms on the timber balustrade to watch. And then the driver stepped out and the air was punched from her lungs.
Andreas.
Dressed in light-coloured chinos, a white shirt unbuttoned halfway down his chest and a gold watch glinting against his olive-skinned wrist, he looked cool and urbane. And then she thought of what he’d done to her, of his hot mouth and his clever tongue, and the very concept of cool and urbane tripped into overload.
Dry-mouthed, she clung to the railing now, knowing that if she didn’t her legs would never hold her up. Why was he here? What could he possibly want?
Unless it was to show off his new wife…
The honeymoon suite. A VIP. It all made sense. But why bring her here? Surely Andreas wouldn’t stoop that low?
But he was alone, and as she watched he tugged a single leather holdall from the boot. She should go before he saw her. She should disappear back to the basement and hide.
And then he looked up, and their eyes jagged, and her heart flipped over. Please, she thought, please, I want to hate you for what you did. I want to be angry about how you used me. I want to forget. Please don’t make me remember…
But just one look at him was enough to know that she still hungered for him, and then he pulled the sunglasses from his face and she knew that he wanted her too.
Oh, God, why was he here? What could it mean? And why did she have to look such a bloody mess? She pushed back from the railing, preparing to flee, when he raised a hand and spoke.
‘Kalimera, Cleo,’ he said, in that gorgeous accent that always made her insides quiver. It was probably the first time the greeting had ever been uttered in Kangaroo Crossing. And probably the last, if she had anything to do with it.
‘What the hell are you doing here?’
‘I love Australian women,’ he shouted from below. ‘They always speak what’s on their mind.’
There was a murmur of agreement from below, no doubt from the blokes lining the verandah watching the occasional car go by, but she was already intent on her reply. ‘Have you known that many to know?’ And instantly she wished she’d fled when she’d had the chance because it seemed as if half the pub’s contents had suddenly spilled out onto the verandah below to watch the proceedings.
‘Only one,’ he admitted. ‘But that was more than enough.’
A ripple of laughter drifted up from the crowd. They’d all seen the car, they’d all seen the man that had stepped from it like some Greek god dripping with money and influence. She didn’t have to see their glances to know what they were all thinking. That anyone would be mad to turn this man away. But they didn’t know what he’d done. They didn’t know he had a woman back home pregnant with his child.
‘Go to hell, Andreas!’ Damn him. She battled the vacuum cleaner down the outside stairs, thankfully in the opposite direction from where he was standing, and headed inside for the basement stairs, her mind too confused to deal with whatever was going on, her heart too filled with hurt to assist.
She was too slow. He met her in the lobby, where the entrance hall met the stairs going down to the basement. ‘Cleo.’
‘How ironic,’ she said, her feet riveted to the ground, ‘that we should meet like this again. Have you plans for taking over the Kangaroo Crossing Hotel, then? Should I start looking for another job?’
‘I didn’t come for the hotel.’
‘No?’ She clutched the rounded stairway newel like a safe haven. If she hung onto that, surely her legs would keep working. Although maybe she should be more worried about her heart. Right now it felt so big it was a wonder it didn’t spill right out of her mouth. ‘Then what are you doing here?’
‘I came here to see you.’
There was no way her legs were going to get her down those stairs, not with the way he was looking at her now.
‘And what if I don’t want to see you?’
The noise from the bar next door was almost overwhelming as the customers spilt back into the cool interior, one topic of conversation and conjecture clearly discernible amongst the shouts and laughter.
‘We need to talk. Not here. Somewhere private. Have dinner with me tonight and I’ll explain.’
‘Mr Xenides, I presume?’