A violent tremble started at the base of her spine and spread upward and outward. The happy voices around her buzzed as if they were noise feedback. And in that space between them, a charge built up winding and changing with every breath they took.
Leah struggled against it, rationalized against it. He met his lover every week. He could not be attracted to her. Nor she to him.
This charge was antagonism that had gone unaddressed for so many years, hatred and resentment and their struggle against this very fate that was spilling over into something else. Maybe it would be true if she believed it enough, she thought desperately.
Because thinking of Stavros in this way—when even her juvenile crush on him had always left her feeling inadequate, was the last thing she needed in life.
Through sheer will, she forced herself to break his gaze, to focus on the fact that he was giving her a real chance. That Giannis would be far removed from their deal was positive.
“If I do prove that I’m everything that is virtuous and sweet and biddable and completely without personality?” His scowl deepened and since needling Stavros was the only thing she had control over in the sinking confusion of her world, she continued, “I’m just a little bit worried that you might not want to give me up then.”
His laughter clanged in the open café. It was a sound Leah had so rarely heard that she stared at him, her breath caught somewhere in her throat.
That lean chest rumbled as if he couldn’t contain it. From the long column of his throat to the sharp grooves in his sliced cheeks...he was gorgeous to behold.
It seemed the café froze around them to take in the sight.
A woman at the next table stilled with her coffee cup halfway to her mouth, her gaze eating him up. Still laughing, he pushed back the thick lock of jet-black hair that fell onto his forehead.
And the solid gold band on his finger glinted in the streetlight.
The twinkle of the metal struck Leah in the chest as if it were an arrow.
The wedding band... He was wearing his wedding band?
The ring she had slipped onto his finger while tears had pooled in her eyes. The ring that had bound her to him in the holiest of bonds and yet was nothing but a shackle...
Why did he wear the damned ring? Had he worn it that day aboard Dmitri’s yacht?
Had he worn it over the past five years?
Anxiety rippled over her, like a flurry of ants had skittered over her skin.
Just like her, the woman’s gaze also fell on the ring and then shifted to encompass the both of them. Leah felt her curiosity like a prickle, could see her trying to calculate where Leah fit into Stavros’s life.
Nowhere, Leah reminded herself. That he wore that ring was probably nothing but a reminder of his duty to Giannis.
Did he keep it on when he made love to the regal Helene? What would it be like to be the woman he respected, he adored, the woman he promised his utter devotion to? Would his passion run just as deep as his sense of duty?
“Even in the most unlikely chance that I find you that irresistible...” Utter mockery resonated in every word, crashing her down. “I will sign the divorce papers, release your inheritance. You’ll be free.”
Three months with Stavros...
“The freedom to live my life as I want is my basic right. I shouldn’t have to prove anything for it nor should I have to threaten...nor do I have to do despicable things.”
“So you’re not completely without conscience?”
She refused to answer that when he was the one who had pushed her to it. “You’re not the lord of my life.”
“Apparently, I am. And you lost all rights to your own life when you threatened it by living so recklessly.” His very stillness as his gaze burned with frustration was disconcerting. “Theos, Leah...Calista died and Giannis almost did because of the heart attack you gave him. How can you sit there and defend yourself?”
“I can defend myself because...” Clutching the metal edge of the table, Leah breathed deeply. His accusation was unfair, so wrong, and yet, the guilt it brought was no less suffocating.
And to dig into the past, to tell him the truth would mean exposing herself to a man who tolerated no weakness, knew no fears.
Would he laugh at her as he had done just now or pity her?
So she gave in. “Fine. I’ll do as you demand and earn that right back.”
Silence met her acceptance.
He hadn’t expected her to give in so quickly. Did he think it was an admission of guilt?
His arrogance that he knew everyone and the best for everyone had riled her from day one. Not once had he tried to figure out what or how she had felt. He’d only made assumptions, and then ordered her around.
He dropped some bills on the table, and extended his hand for her. “Let’s pick up what you need for a few days. The movers will bring the rest of your belongings later.”
Panic ran free in her gut as Leah shook her head. “No. I...I can’t just pack up everything I need in ten minutes. I need a few days.”
She couldn’t just move in with him in a matter of hours. She needed to get used to the idea first. Needed to get her head screwed on right.
He checked the glinting Rolex on his wrist and then looked back at her. “I’ll have someone come by to give us a hand. In the meantime, we can get started.”
“You’re actually, physically going to help me pack?”
“Is that a problem?”
“Yes, of course it is,” she sputtered, refusing his outstretched hand. “I don’t want you in my...I just... The flat is a mess, and you’ll instantly judge me and tell me I shouldn’t be allowed to live by myself or some such nonsense.”
The hateful man had the gall to smile at her. To actually smile, showing his perfectly even teeth and the dimple in one cheek that should have made him look effeminate yet only added to that austere masculinity.
“What if I tell you that housekeeping is not a criterion I’ll count?”
Desperation coated her throat. “I...I’m not comfortable with others touching my personal stuff.”
“Neither am I about welcoming you to my estate...” With his hand at her elbow, he made it imperative for her to stand up. “I won’t touch anything. You can pack and I’ll supervise.”
“You’ll lord it over me, you mean?” she said, using sarcasm to hide the trembling beneath.
In all the years she had known him, he had, in turns, aggravated her, captivated her and in the end, had ended up ruling over her life. And that was when there was no direct relationship between them.
How was she supposed to survive through three months of living with him?
CHAPTER FIVE
SHE HAD BEEN lying blatantly, of course.
Stavros didn’t know what shocked him more. The fact that she would tell such a white lie about something so trivial or the reality of her lifeless, joyless flat.
It was as if she had intentionally designed herself a sterile prison cell, had punished herself.
Everything inside him recoiled that she had lived like this for five years. Why? Why live as though she was punishing herself when she had argued with him so furiously that she wanted it to end?
Had Calista’s death scared her so much? Had it really changed her?
There was not a single thing out of place in the living room, or the small kitchen, or in the glimpse he had caught of her bedroom. She had everything she required.
The cupboards were full of silverware; a plasma television adorned the wall in the living room, yet was coated with five layers of dust.
There were no decorative items, no knickknacks. Just the bare essentials wherever he looked. The walls were a pristine white exactly as he had remembered from five years ago, when he had inspected the building and the flat, a week after they had married.
It screamed of loneliness, detachment.
Leah was a firestorm and it seemed only a ghost of that girl lived here.
The first year and a few months into the second after she had come to live here, he had had things delivered to her. Boxes of clothes and shoes, handbags and other accessories Helene had told him a young woman would require. He had even sent her things that had once belonged to her mother, found when he and Dmitri had gone through Giannis’s old estate after his heart attack...
But she had sent every box back, stubbornly refusing to accept any of it, and so he had stopped trying. Even the box with her mother’s things.
He had, conveniently, shrugged off his duty toward her. To the point of ignoring her very existence.
His gut twisting into a tight, unforgiving knot, he followed her into her bedroom. There was a nightstand next to the bed. A tissue box, some pencils and loose paper, and a tiny photograph of her father, he assumed from the same brown eyes, were on it.
Stretching on her toes, she pulled a bag out of her closet that was already half full. Turned around and stilled as he stayed at the entrance.
“I have someone bringing up boxes. Not that it seems you need any.”
“The work room has lots of stuff I need.”
He nodded and waited, his thoughts in an unprecedented jumble.
“I don’t have to stay in your house for this...this test of yours, Stavros. I could just continue here.”
He prowled into the small room, feeling on edge. He was angry at himself, he realized slowly. And he was angry at her. It was irrational, and yet he couldn’t loosen its grip over him.
“Why not?” The taunt in his words shamed him.
The brown of her eyes transforming into a dazzling color, she glared at him. Her pulse at the neck fluttered belying the anger in her eyes. “Because I don’t think it’s a good idea.