Conveniently His Omnibus(44)

‘It’s very hot,’ she told the old man gently, not wanting to hurt his pride, ‘and it can be very tiring to walk in such heat. I have a car...and...and a driver... Perhaps we could give you a lift?’ As she spoke she was searching the street anxiously. Where was her driver? Andreas would be furious with her if she was late for their flight, but there was no way she could leave without first ensuring that the old man was alright.

‘You have a car? This car?’ he guessed, gesturing towards the parked limousine.

‘Well, it isn’t mine,’ Saskia found herself feeling obliged to tell him. ‘It belongs to...to someone I know. Do you live very far away?’

He had stopped holding his side now and she could see that his colour looked healthier and that his breathing was easier.

‘You are very kind,’ he told her with a smile, ‘But I too have a car...and a driver...’ His smile broadened and for some reason Saskia felt almost as though he was laughing a little at her.

‘You are a very kind girl to worry yourself so much on behalf of an old man.’

There was a car parked farther down the street, Saskia realised, but it was some distance away.

‘Is that your car?’ she asked him. ‘Shall I get the driver?’

‘No,’ he said immediately. ‘I can walk.’

Without giving him any opportunity to refuse, Saskia went to his side and said gently, ‘Perhaps you will allow me to walk with you to it...’ Levelly she met and held the look he was giving her.

‘Perhaps I should,’ he capitulated.

It took longer to reach the car than Saskia had expected, mainly because the old man was plainly in more distress than he wanted to admit. As they reached the car Saskia was relieved to see the driver’s door open and the driver get out, immediately hurrying towards them and addressing some words to her companion in fast Greek. The old man was now starting to look very much better, holding himself upright and speaking sternly to the driver.

‘He fusses like an old woman,’ he complained testily in English to Saskia, adding warmly, ‘Thank you, my dear, I am very pleased to have met you. But you should not be walking the streets of Athens on your own,’ he told her sternly. ‘And I shall—’ Abruptly he stopped and said something in Greek to his driver, who started to frown and look anxiously up and down the street.

‘Yannis will walk back with you to your car and wait there with you until your driver returns.’

‘Really, there’s no need for that,’ Saskia protested, but her new-found friend was determinedly insistent.

‘There really is no need for you to come with me,’ she told the driver once they were out of earshot of the older man. ‘I would much rather you stayed with your employer. He looked quite poorly when I saw him in the street.’

To her relief, as she finished speaking she saw that her own driver was getting out of Andreas’s car.

‘See, there is no need to come any further,’ she smiled in relief, and then frowned a little before saying anxiously to him, ‘Your employer... It is none of my business I know...but perhaps a visit to a doctor...’ She paused uncertainly.

‘It is already taken care of,’ the driver assured her. ‘But he... What do you say? He does not always take anyone’s advice...’

His calmness helped to soothe Saskia’s concern and ease her conscience about leaving the older man. He was plainly in good hands now, and her own driver was waiting for her.





                 CHAPTER SIX

SASKIA DARTED a brief look at Andreas, catching back her gasp of pleasure as she stared out of their plane and down at the blue-green of the Aegean Sea beneath them.

He had been frowning and preoccupied when they had met up at the airport, not even asking her if she had enjoyed her sightseeing trip, and now with every mile that took them closer to his home and family Saskia could feel her tension increasing. It seemed ironic, when she reflected on how she had dreamed of one day spending a holiday in this part of the world, that now that she was actually here she was far too on edge to truly appreciate it.

The starkness of Andreas’s expression forced her to ask, more out of politeness than any real concern, she was quick to assure herself, ‘Is something wrong? You don’t look very happy.’

Immediately Andreas’s frown deepened, his gaze sweeping her sharply as he turned to look at her.

‘Getting in some practice at playing the devoted fiancée?’ he asked her cynically. ‘If you’re looking for a bonus payment, don’t bother.’

Saskia felt a resurgence of her initial hostility towards him.

‘Unlike you, I do not evaluate everything I do by how I can best benefit from it,’ Saskia shot back furiously. ‘I was simply concerned that your meeting hadn’t gone very well.’

‘You? Concerned for me? There’s only one reason you’re here with me, Saskia, and we both know that isn’t it.’

What did he expect? Saskia fumed, forcing herself to bite back the angry retort she wanted to make. He had, after all, blackmailed her into being here with him. He was using her for his own ends. He had formed the lowest kind of opinion of her, judged her without allowing her the chance to defend herself or to explain her behaviour, and yet after all that he still seemed to think he could occupy the higher moral ground. Why on earth had she ever felt any sympathy for him? He and Athena deserved one another.

But even as she formed the stubborn angry thought Saskia knew that it wasn’t true. She had sensed a deep coldness in Athena, a total lack of regard for any kind of emotion. Andreas might have done and said many things she objected to, but there was a warmly passionate side to him...a very passionate side, she acknowledged, trembling a little as she unwillingly remembered the kiss he had given her... Even though it had merely been an act, staged for Athena’s benefit he had still made her feel—connected at a very deep and personal level. So much so, in fact, that even now, if she were to close her eyes and remember, she could almost feel the hard male pressure of his mouth against her own.

‘As a matter of fact my meeting did not go well.’

Saskia’s eyes opened in surprise as she heard Andreas’s abrupt and unexpected admission.

‘For a start my grandfather was not there. There was something else he had to do that was more important, apparently. But unfortunately he did not bother to explain this to me, or to send a message informing me of it until I’d been waiting for him for over half an hour. However, he had left instructions that I was to be informed in no uncertain terms that he is not best pleased with me at the moment.’

‘Because of me...us?’ Saskia hazarded.

‘My grandfather knows there is no way I would or could marry a woman I do not love—his own marriage was a love match, as was my parents’, even if my mother did have to virtually threaten to elope before she got his approval. When my father died my grandfather admitted how much he admired him. He was a surveyor, and he retained his independence from my grandfather.’

‘You must miss him,’ Saskia said softly.

‘I was fifteen when he died. It was a long time ago. And, unlike you, at least I had the comfort of knowing how much he loved me.’

At first Saskia thought he was being deliberately unkind to her, and instinctively she stiffened in self-defence, but when unexpectedly he covered her folded hands with one of his own she knew that she had misinterpreted his remark.

‘The love my grandmother has given me has more than made up for the love I didn’t get from my parents,’ she told him firmly—and meant it.

His hand was still covering hers...both of hers...and that funny, trembly sensation she had felt inside earlier returned as she looked down at it. Long-fingered, tanned, with well-groomed but not manicured nails, it was very much a man’s hand: large enough to cover both of hers, large enough, too, to hold her securely to him without any visible effort. It was the kind of hand that gave a woman the confidence to know that this man could take care of her and their children. Just as he was the kind of man who would always ensure that his woman and his child were safe and secure.

What on earth was she thinking? Agitatedly Saskia wriggled in her seat, snatching her hands from beneath Andreas’s.

‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ she asked him slightly breathlessly as she tried to concentrate on the reality of why she was sitting here next to him. ‘I mean, if your grandfather already doesn’t approve of our engagement...’

It was so long before he replied that Saskia began to think that her question had annoyed him but when he did answer her she recognised that the anger she could see darkening his eyes wasn’t directed at her but at Athena.

‘Unfortunately Athena claims a blood closeness to my grandfather which he finds flattering. His elder brother, Athena’s grandfather, died some years ago and whilst there is no way at all that Athena would allow anyone, least of all my grandfather, to interfere in the way she runs her own financial empire, she flatters and encourages him to the point where his judgement is sometimes not all that it should be. My mother claims that the truth will out, so to speak, and that ultimately my grandfather will see through Athena’s machinations.’