‘And I asked…perfectly reasonably…why?’
Her chin came up, her blue eyes bright with defiance. ‘That’s none of your business.’
Nik could not credit what he was hearing. ‘I insist…’
A little scarlet devil literally leapt up in the invigorating surge of Prudence’s anger. If he wanted the whole truth and nothing but the truth she would give it to him. ‘All right…’
‘Let’s eat while we talk.’ Nik urged her back indoors to where the first course awaited them.
Prudence sat down. Even in that short space of time her temper was fading and she was shaken by the hostility in the air, not to mention her own unfamiliar desire to fight with him. For goodness’ sake, she was hugely fond of Nik. There was no sense in destroying their friendship by trying to score points. An apologetic light in her soft blue eyes, she forced a smile back on her tense mouth and speared a juicy cube of melon. ‘I can’t believe we’re arguing.’
‘Believe it.’ Bereft of an appetite for food, Nik rested back in his seat in an attitude of highly deceptive indolence. His cutting-edge logic had already led him to draw a conclusion that shook him to his core. There was another man in her life; there had to be. For what other reason would she suddenly demand a divorce?
Prudence stole a glance at him from below her eyelashes. His remarkable eyes were smouldering like the stormy heart of a fire, eyes the colour of amber and precious gold that had haunted her thoughts for far too long, she conceded guiltily. Breaking free, breaking the final bond was the healthy thing to do. Lingering on the edge of his life was pitiful, she reminded herself.
‘But there’s no need whatsoever for this bad feeling,’ she murmured quietly. ‘I’m so fond of you…’
‘You’re also fond of cats, dogs, foxes, badgers, donkeys, horses…in fact, all the members of the animal kingdom…and of most of the people you meet.’
The vein of derisive dismissal in that response made Prudence redden. ‘I thought you’d want a divorce, too. I don’t see the problem unless it’s because I came up with the idea first. It’s not as if we’ve ever been married like other people-’
Nikolos levelled brooding eyes on her. ‘Whose choice was that?’
Her smooth brow furrowed. ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I asked you whose choice it was that we ended up with a marriage that never got off the starting blocks.’
Her sense of perplexity deepened. ‘I always thought it was a mutual thing-’
‘Did you really?’ His rich, dark drawl was so quiet she actually leant forward to hear him, her whole attention welded to his lean, strong face. ‘Yet you’re the one who moved out of my bedroom. You’re the one who had hysterics when I tried to kiss you. You’re the one who took the first excuse available to leave Greece and stay away.’
It was Prudence’s turn to disbelieve the evidence of her own ears. Her eyes had opened very wide. ‘Er-you’re complaining?’
‘I was in no position to complain, was I?’ Nik breathed, tight-mouthed.
Prudence had no idea what he was driving at and she lacked the ability to listen and learn, for she did not want to relive the painful period of unhappiness she had endured before she bit the bullet and left Greece. Her face felt all tight and her tummy muscles were taut with stress. ‘Well, I hardly think you were likely to complain, Nik. In fact, I think it’s very hypocritical of you to make comments of that nature-’
‘Is that a fact?’
‘Yes, it is a fact. Honestly, I don’t understand why you’re acting like this,’ Prudence condemned shakily, pushing her chair back from the table in a sudden movement. ‘After all, I know you must have been hugely relieved when Trixie’s illness gave me a very solid reason to get back out of your life again!’
‘That is not true,’ Nik shot back.
Prudence was flushed and trembling. When it came to talking about anything that touched on the hurt and humiliation of their marriage, she reached the edge of her control very fast. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said fiercely. ‘But that’s not a very convincing protest from a guy who got himself blind drunk so that he could successfully avoid having to consummate our marriage!’
For an instant, Nik sat as though he had been turned to stone. Then with equal rapidity he sprang upright, took a pace forward and stood over her, six feet three inches of uncompromising, aggressive masculinity. His darkly handsome features were forbidding. ‘Say that again…’ he urged thickly.
‘I don’t think so.’ Instinct made Prudence scramble up and go straight into retreat.
‘You said that I successfully avoided…consummating our marriage…’
Eggs could have fried on Prudence’s hot cheeks. She could not believe that, eight years after the event, she had got so upset that she had sunk to the level of actually throwing that humiliating fact at him.
Scorching dark golden eyes locked to her discomfited face. ‘Are you saying that nothing happened between us on our wedding night? Nothing…at all?’
‘I hardly think that can be news to you,’ Prudence muttered, ducking her head down, talking to her toes.
Rage roared through Nik’s lean, powerful frame like a flaming fireball. He felt light-headed with the force of it. In all his life he could never recall being so angry. Yet at the same time what he had just found out banished the dark spectre of guilt that had dogged him for so many years. He had not touched her in anger or in desire on their wedding night. He felt amazingly liberated by that knowledge. With a swift jerk of his head he dismissed the waiter entering with a laden trolley. Closing his hand over Prudence’s, he pulled her out of the room in his imperious wake. An unexpected emergency, he told the hotel manager. His bodyguards bringing up the rear and depriving them of privacy, he headed back out to the helicopter, still without offering Prudence a word of explanation.
What’s happening? Where are we going? What about lunch? Why are you acting like this? All those questions flashed through her head but caution kept her silent. Had he just flipped at the reminder that their wedding night had been the non-event of the decade? But it didn’t fit his character; the Nikolos Angelis she had always known was a lot cooler than that.
Back at the farmhouse, Nik thrust wide the front door and strode into the sitting room. His stunning eyes welded to her in a blaze of wrath. ‘Do you realise that for eight years I’ve been blaming myself for something that never happened?’
Prudence gazed back at him, her brow furrowed with confusion. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. What have you been blaming yourself for?’
Nik strode forward, dominating the room with the strength of his sheer presence and size. ‘When I woke up the morning after our wedding, I was naked-’
‘Your friends did that-’
‘The bed had been stripped and remade…’
‘You asked me for a drink of water and I spilt it all over the bed, so I changed it.’ Prudence was frowning. ‘Are you saying you were too drunk that night to remember anything the next day?’
‘It’s still a blank. I don’t remember the evening part of the reception or anything until late the next morning. I had a complete blackout…I told you that at the time.’
Prudence looked away, tension thrumming through her. The room felt suffocatingly warm and she pulled open the patio door to let cooler air flow in from the terrace outside. ‘I assumed that was just an excuse, something you were just saying to cover up-’
‘Why would I lie?’ Nik incised curtly.
She heaved a rueful sigh. ‘Because people do when they’ve taken too much alcohol-’
‘By all accounts your mother had a problem telling the truth sober or under the influence. So don’t compare us.’
‘You’re not being fair to her when you say that.’ But Prudence was painfully aware that Nik and her mother had mixed like oil and water. Trixie had bitterly resented her daughter’s refusal to profit from her marriage into the wealthy Angelis clan and accept an allowance from Nik. Her mother’s acid comments
when Nik visited had led Prudence to suggest that she see Nik in London instead.
Nik rested grim, dark golden eyes on her. ‘I wasn’t lying to you when I said I had a blackout-’
‘That may be the case,’ Prudence conceded reluctantly. ‘But I didn’t know you well enough then to be able to tell the difference.’
His burning anger undimmed, Nikolos stepped back from her and swung away, tension emanating from him in waves. ‘The day after our wedding you shrank away from me,’ he breathed thickly. ‘You wouldn’t meet my eyes. You couldn’t even bear me to touch your hand-’