She nodded in answer.
‘I will have her sent up in twenty minutes. Let Dion or any other member of staff know if you need anything.’
Dazed eyes still held his. He’d never believed Helena could look more beautiful, but with the stain of their lovemaking still high on her cheeks, her lips bruised like an overripe strawberry and her hair mussed, his heart bloomed as if he were gazing at a masterpiece.
A thought occurred to him that immediately sent ice up his spine. He had to clear his throat to vocalise it. ‘Protection. We didn’t...’
‘I’m still on the pill,’ she said in the same whisper.
He closed his eyes and nodded. Helena had put herself on the pill days before he’d taken her to Sidiro, laughingly saying that when she tempted him into making love to her, they would be protected.
Even then, so early in their relationship, he’d found the woman he wanted to bear his children.
The compulsion to haul her to her feet, carry her to the bed and then hold her so tightly in his arms that they became fused as one again was so strong that he took a step back.
He was not supposed to feel like this. This was supposed to be a moment of great satisfaction, the fulfilment of his fantasies, the first act in shedding the cloak of humiliation he’d worn since he’d been forced to tell their hundreds of guests that the wedding was off.
This was not how he’d envisaged making love to her for the first time. In his old fantasies, when he’d believed their first time would be the first of a lifetime of lovemaking, he’d dreamed of taking it so slowly that when the moment came for him to take possession of her she would feel nothing but exquisite pleasure. Later, after their relationship had detonated, his fantasies evolved. Knowing that, should they come true, he would no longer be her first, he wouldn’t have to take things gently. He would still take it slowly though. Oh, yes, in his fantasies he would still make her putty in his hands and have her begging for him to take her before finally sinking deep inside her and eradicating the thought of every man who’d come before him from her mind. But not like this. Not as a wild frenzy on the bedroom floor. He wasn’t supposed to lose control of himself.
Desperate to get air into his constricted lungs, Theo strode to the door. Before leaving, he looked one more time at the ravishing beauty now standing by the bathroom door.
Naked as she was, she could be Artemis. But Artemis would not be looking at him with a wary vulnerability that made his heart ache.
Softening his voice, he said, ‘I will see you soon, matia mou.’
The wary vulnerability lifted. Smiling in response, she entered the bathroom and closed the door behind her.
Theo’s smile had never been further away than on the walk he took to his swimming pool.
A swim would clear his mind. A long swim during which he could rearrange his shattered thoughts and try to make sense of what he knew to be a truth.
That, until they had made love on her bedroom floor, Helena had still been a virgin.
CHAPTER TEN
HELENA LEFT HER bedroom feeling as if she’d slipped into a dream.
There had been little time to reflect on the explosion of passion that had consumed them. No sooner had she taken a hurried shower than the stylist and her two assistants had arrived to turn her into a princess for the evening.
The thrum of their lovemaking had still been there in her veins while she’d been pampered and preened. She’d longed to send the women away and have the luxury of composing her thoughts before she had to face Theo again.
All those years ago she’d longed for the complete fulfilment she’d known could only come from his lovemaking. It had been beautiful. It had been everything she’d dreamed it could be.
She had not an ounce of regret.
It was Theo’s reaction that played on her mind.
She’d expected him to crow, not in a nasty way but in a Theo way, in a way that involved him making quips about his own prowess and implying without any subtlety whatsoever that this was what she’d been missing out on all these years.
She hadn’t expected him to just...leave. Not a single comment, not a solitary wink. He hadn’t even strutted out of the room.
He’d looked as dazed as she’d felt.
Helena supposed she should be thankful the stylists were there to distract her, otherwise she’d have her knickers in a twist about where they were going. The palace!
If Theo had planned this in advance, he’d been wise to keep it a secret. Not only was he taking her to her favourite place on earth but, as this was a VIP thing, many of his friends would be there too. She’d always felt gauche in their company. They were all so sophisticated, especially the women, all of whom she’d wondered if they’d shared Theo’s bed. She’d sensed the antipathy towards her, from his friends of both sexes. Theo had playfully accused her of being insecure, which had accounted for some of her feelings, she knew, but she’d also known it had run deeper than that. Whether his friends saw her as a threat who was going to steal the life and soul of the party from them or if they merely disapproved of a non-socialite joining the gang, she’d never been able to discern.
That was why she’d loved their time on Sidiro so much, she remembered wistfully. There, for a whole glorious month, it had been just them, the sun and the sea and like-minded people loving life without any airs, graces or fancies.
At the end of the corridor was a full-length mirror. Taking one final look at her reflection, she reminded herself that she was not the same naïve young woman who’d felt so out of her depth before. She was strong now. She
