Taki’s voice came over the ether, sounding studiedly neutral.
‘Kyrios Dimistris’s companion is a model by the name of Sylva Ramboulli.’ He paused for a fraction. ‘The agent there took photos of them together, if you wish to see them.’
‘No, damn you! But if she’s not with—’
His voice broke off, then resumed.
‘Keep looking,’ he said tersely. He didn’t wait for an answer, just cut the connection.
He sat at his desk, staring out across his vast office. Every muscle in his body was motionless, tense.
Three days. Three days since he’d
come back that evening to an apartment that had been strangely, eerily silent. Different.
He’d come back before when Vanessa hadn’t yet been back from whatever she did in the daytime. But it had not been the same. Something had been different the moment he’d walked in. He had felt it.
He’d gone into his bedroom to change out of his suit, and then taken a shower. It had been in the en suite bathroom as he was drying himself, that he’d noticed. It had looked—different. He’d gone back out into the bedroom. That had looked different too. For a moment he hadn’t been able to work out what it was, then it had registered. There was nothing on the bedside table on Vanessa’s side of the bed. Usually there was a book, or a tube of handcream. Maybe she’d had a tidying blitz.
He’d gone into the closet to select some clothes to relax in for the evening. He’d wanted a quiet evening in—the jet lag had been catching up with him, and he’d wanted nothing more than to relax and chill out.
Make his peace with Vanessa.
He shouldn’t have spoken to her like that, he knew it. Oh, not the message—the message had had to be got across—but he could have put it more gently. But her challenge to him had come out of the blue, he’d been totally unprepared for it. Hell, it was one he’d never expected Vanessa, of all women, to make! He’d thought he was safe with her—that she was different.
Well, she was different—six months of her had confirmed it. No other woman had ever been as devoted, as adoring as Vanessa. But it was exactly that devotion that had made him think that she would never try anything on with him.
Words had played in his memory. Leo at his schloss, putting his arm around his shoulder one morning, just before they set out on the day’s skiing trip. Speaking to him in a warning tone.
‘You’ve got a mistress in a million, but never forget, little cousin, that naivety can be as dangerous as cunning. Watch yourself with her.’
He’d only laughed. ‘How was your sable beauty last night? As good as she looks?’
Leo had dropped his arm immediately. His expression had been grim and his voice even harsher as he’d said, ‘Leave it.’
Markos had thrown up a hand. ‘OK, OK. You sort your own problems out.’
Leo’s eyes had flashed. ‘You may have some of your own,’ he’d thrown at him, and stalked off, bad mood clearly visible.
Markos had looked after him pityingly. He didn’t have problems, not with Vanessa. That was why he’d kept her so long. Because she never gave him any grief.
As the conversation had replayed itself in his memory, Markos had felt his expression harden. His cousin had been right. Vanessa’s naivety had proved a problem after all.
Because naivety, Markos knew, was what it was. What she’d thrown at him that morning after his return from Australia had not been an attempt at manipulation, an exercise in female cunning. He accepted that now. He hadn’t at the time. He’d gone into knee-jerk reaction, his brain out of kilter from jet lag, and laid into her. But even before he’d reached the office he’d begun regretting his reaction. He should have been easier on her. Spelt it out, yes. But not so brutally.
She was naïve, that was all. He’d hurt her. He’d seen it in her face.
It hadn’t made him feel good.
And he didn’t like not feeling good.
He’d decided he would get his PA to deliver flowers—a lot of flowers—and take that hurt look out of her face.
But he’d never got around to giving the instruction. The moment he’d walked into his office he’d been bombarded with a dozen more urgent things to attend to, and somewhere along the rest of the day he’d forgotten all about it. Instead, as Taki had driven him back to the apartment early that evening, he’d intended to take the hurt look out of her face in person. He’d sit her down, take her hand, and explain—kindly, gently, but firmly—why she must understand that he liked his life just the way it was. That she was the best mistress he’d ever had, that he really appreciated her, and that they would make it to the Caribbean the very first moment he could get away.
But to do all that she’d have had to be there. And she hadn’t. As he’d walked through into his closet to change into casual clothes he’d been on the edge of feeling a flicker of irritation at her. OK, so maybe she was just out buying a new dress, or getting her hair done or whatever—maybe she’d thought that wowing him that night would be the best way to get past the episode that morning—but her timing was bad. Here he was, all prepared to kiss and make up, and she wasn’t around.
He had walked into the closet—and stopped dead.