Marisa paled, trying to drag herself away from him, but it was impossible. His hand was like steel around her arm.
‘I’m sorry! I knew I shouldn’t have gone along with Ian.’
Athan shook her like a rag, his face black. ‘Then why the hell did you?’
‘Because we’ve had enough of this endless secrecy!’ she cried. ‘He convinced me we couldn’t hide it any longer. He refuses to hide me away any more. I won’t be his sordid little secret.’
He dropped her arm. It fell to her side limply. She swallowed, just looking at him. His face was like granite. Emotion scythed through her.
‘But whether Eva knows about you or not, you are the “sordid little secret”, aren’t you?’ he said, his voice low and knifing. ‘And telling her won’t make you any less sordid.’
She shut her eyes. ‘I know,’ she said heavily. ‘And I know that walking out now isn’t going to mend anything. She’ll be wondering who I am, why Ian brought me here tonight. So even if I walk out now it’s too late—’
He swore in his own language, the Greek words harsh. ‘Then there is only one thing to be done—only one way to hide it from her.’
She looked at him. He took her arm again. His mind was working frantically, trying to work out how to salvage something from this unholy mess. This was a denouement he hadn’t foreseen.
I thought Ian had let her go—and all along he was planning this.
Rage consumed him. Rage at Ian—and rage at himself for not realising what a treacherous little rat the man truly was.
He took a heavy breath, marshalled his thoughts.
‘I’ll tell Eva you’re here on my account. That Ian was escorting you to the hotel for me as I’ve only just arrived from Athens. That I wanted to introduce you to her.’ He finished heavily, his words biting and accusing, ‘That way I might just manage to protect her from the sordid truth of your existence. After all—’ his lip curled ‘—better that you are my mistress than her husband’s.’
He made to steer her back towards the dining room..
But she wouldn’t move.
She was looking at him. Staring at him. Just staring.
There was no emotion in her face. None whatsoever. Then slowly, very slowly, she peeled his fingers off her arm, and stepped away. He looked down at her, frowning. What the hell was she playing at now?
‘Athan! Come back in!’
He slewed round sharply. Eva was in the dining room doorway, beckoning to him. Ian was standing beside her. Athan’s head whipped back. Marisa had started to walk forward, towards the couple. There was purpose in her steps.
As they all went back inside the dining room and he closed the door on the four of them a sense of doom came over Athan. It was going to happen. The ugly, painful disclosure of the ‘sordid little secret’ that he’d gone to so much trouble to keep hidden from his sister. And all for nothing. For this—for his sister to be humiliated and her heart broken. Well, at least he would be there for her. Ready to let her sob on his shoulder after her husband had walked out on her with his mistress on his arm.
His mouth twisted, but there was no humour in it.
The mistress I want for myself …
But that wasn’t going to happen. All that was going to happen was the destruction of his sister’s fragile marriage. Well, better it ended now than later. Better never to love than to have love smashed to pieces …
He should know …
A blade like a vicious shard of ice slid into his side. He watched Marisa walk up to his sister. Watched Ian smile at her reassuringly.
Intimately.
Watched his sister frown wonderingly.
He went to stand beside her, opposite her husband. Opposite the woman who was never going to be anything more to do with him—who was going to take his sister’s husband from her.
He should have felt rage. Fury. Black murderous anger for his sister’s sake. For his own. But all there was inside him was an empty, bleak hollow. His eyes went to Marisa. She was looking so pale. So pale and so incredibly beautiful. She was standing beside Ian. They made a startlingly handsome couple—both so blond and blue-eyed, with their English complexions. A matched pair—a foil for his and his sister’s dark, Mediterranean looks.
The blade slid into his guts, twisting its sharp, serrated edge as he gazed at Marisa.