The Greek Tycoon's Defiant Bride

Maribel studied the island far below them as the helicopter wheeled round in a turn. There was just enough light left for her to get a good view. Zelos was surprisingly lush and green and there were loads of trees. Long slices of golden sand were edged by the turquoise of the sea that washed the shores. She thought it looked like paradise. A very substantial residence occupied a magnificent site in splendid isolation at one end of the island. At the other, there was a picturesque fishing village with a church and a huge yacht in the harbour. Zelos was where Leonidas had grown up and, for that reason alone, she was fascinated by the prospect of living on the island.

Darkness had fallen when Elias was welcomed into the big sprawling house as though he were royalty. Maribel watched her son being borne off to bed by Diane and her co-nanny, a young Greek woman, closely followed by the housekeeper, the nursery maids and her son’s personal protection officer. Slowly she shook her head. ‘Elias is never going to be alone again, is he?’

‘We Greeks are gregarious by nature. I was alone too much as a child but, just as I was, he will be watched over by everyone on the island. Welcome to your new home, hara mou.’ Leonidas closed a shapely brown hand over hers. ‘Let me show you the house.’

It was as large as Heyward Park, for several generations of his family had built new wings to suit their individual tastes. In a glorious room that opened out onto a beautiful vine-shaded terrace, Leonidas tugged her into his arms with immense care.

‘I want you to be happy here,’ he told her huskily.

Maribel stared up into his brilliant dark eyes and felt her heart lurch. She had promised herself that she would not stoop to asking Leonidas any foolish questions. But suddenly she could no longer withstand her need to know the truth. ‘There’s something I want to ask you, Leonidas,’ she breathed abruptly.

Leonidas regarded her in level enquiry.

‘Did Imogen tell you years ago that I was in love with you?’ Maribel completed.

It was the very last question that Leonidas could have foreseen. Having braced himself for a query of an entirely different nature, indeed an accusation, he was bemused.

Maribel stepped out of his loosened hold. ‘It’s true. She did tell you!’

Leonidas frowned. ‘You haven’t even given me the chance to answer you.’

Maribel drew herself up to her full height. ‘You don’t need to. Sometimes I can read you like a book.’

Leonidas was anything but reassured by that statement. He had long regarded his famed impassivity as a source of privacy that he could take for granted. Once or twice before, however, she had given him cause to suspect that she did possess a certain rare insight where he was concerned. ‘Imogen might once have mentioned something of that nature,’ he conceded with the utmost casualness.

‘Well, it’s not something you need to worry about,’ Maribel told him firmly.

‘I wasn’t worrying.’

‘Or think about.’

‘I wasn’t thinking about it either.’

‘Because it’s no longer true,’ Maribel informed him doggedly, keen to get any such notion knocked right back out of his handsome head again. ‘I got over you after that night at Imogen’s house.’

His superb bone structure tightened beneath his bronzed skin. ‘Why?’

Over two years of pent-up hostility and hurt were suddenly rising up inside Maribel in an unfettered overflow of feelings. ‘You remember you asked for breakfast? There was no food in the house, so I—fool that I was—I went out to buy some.’

Leonidas, who had long found his recollections of that same morning offensive enough to ensure he simply buried them, dealt her a cool, unimpressed appraisal. ‘Where did you go to shop? Africa?’

‘Somewhere rather more convenient. I only drove down the road, but as I turned into the supermarket a car ran into the back of mine. I ended up in hospital with concussion.’

Leonidas studied her in raw disbelief. ‘Are you saying that you were involved in a car accident that morning?’

Maribel nodded confirmation.

‘Why the hell didn’t you phone me?’

‘By the time I had recovered my wits enough and had access to a phone you had already left Imogen’s house. I took my cue from that fact,’ Maribel retorted tightly, her hands clasped together. ‘And it cured me of my attachment to you, because I might as well have died for all the interest you had in what had happened to me that day! You didn’t even bother to call me.’

Leonidas was still stuck in stunned mode. ‘You were hurt…in hospital?’

‘Yes, until the following morning.’