After a few seconds her breathing returned to normal and with a little nod she walked forward; Antonios dropped his arm and went to pull out her chair.
‘I hope you are feeling better this morning, Lindsay?’ Daphne asked as one of the staff poured Lindsay some of the thick Greek coffee she’d learned to drink and even like while she was there before.
‘Yes, I think so. Really, I was just tired.’
Ava and Parthenope shot each other significant looks and Lindsay wondered why that remark would set Antonios’s sisters off. Deciding not to care, she focused on eating her breakfast of fresh fruit and yogurt with honey, and thankfully the conversation swirled around her without her needing to contribute to it.
‘Would you like to go back to the villa?’ Antonios asked as they left the dining room. ‘I need to work this morning.’
‘I suppose.’ She could check her email and do some work on her research. She glanced at Antonios, wished she knew what he was thinking about everything. What she’d shared last night. What they’d nearly done together this morning.
Clearly none of it had changed anything between them—but had she wanted it to? The question jarred her because she didn’t want to ask it, much less answer it.
‘You’ll be all right?’ Antonios asked when he’d dropped her back off at the villa.
‘I have an anxiety disorder, not a life-threatening illness,’ Lindsay answered a bit sharply. ‘You don’t have to coddle me, Antonios.’
‘I’m just trying to be considerate,’ he returned. ‘Since I wasn’t before.’
His thoughtfulness made guilt twist inside her. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘This is hard for me.’
‘I know, Lindsay. And I’m trying to make it easier.’
‘I don’t mean that. I mean having you know about my condition. I hate seeming weak.’
He raised his eyebrows at that. ‘You think you seem weak? I think you’re strong. Amazingly strong, to have managed as much as you have, and coped for so long.’ He smiled with a painful wryness. ‘I think you’re strong for having been able to hide so much from me, but maybe I was just too blind to see it.’
‘I think we were both to blame, Antonios.’
‘Maybe so.’
They stared at each other for a moment, regret etched on both of their faces. Then, her heart aching, Lindsay turned to go inside.
She fetched her laptop from her carry-on bag and Antonios retrieved his phone and shrugged on a blazer before heading out once more.
‘I’ll see you later,’ he said and Lindsay watched him go, wishing all over again that things were different between them...and knowing they never could be.
CHAPTER SIX
ANTONIOS SPENT THE morning working in his office but he had trouble focusing on anything. His mind once more was on Lindsay, and all the things she’d told him last night.
As well as what had happened this morning. Dear heaven, but it had felt so good to have her in his arms once again. It had taken every ounce of his control not to slide inside her, not to take his pleasure and give her her own.
And yet what a paltry pleasure it had turned out to be. Good or even incredible sex wasn’t enough to make a marriage. And he accepted now that their marriage had made Lindsay miserable. Guilt and grief weighed heavily inside him at the thought.
After Lindsay left him, he’d been so consumed with self-righteous anger. So certain it was all her fault, that he’d done everything in his power to make her happy. He’d bought her clothes and jewels, had showered her with physical affection, had brought her into his home and his family, and he’d thought that had been enough. He knew now it hadn’t been, and never could be.
He attempted to focus on work for another hour but thoughts about Lindsay were bouncing around his brain like the little ball in a pinball machine and he finally gave up and headed out into the sunshine of a fall afternoon. He walked back to the villa with no clear goal in mind other than seeing Lindsay again. What he would say to her, he had no idea. What was there left to say?
He came into the cool shelter of the villa, stopping in the doorway to watch Lindsay unobserved. She was sitting on the sofa, her slender legs propped up on the coffee table, her computer on her lap. She was frowning at the computer screen, utterly intent, a few tendrils of hair having escaped her plait to frame her face in white-blonde curls. She was, he saw with a sudden surge of affection, mouthing something silently.
‘You look incredibly engrossed in what you are doing,’ he said and, startled, she jerked her head up, her body tensing as she caught sight of him.
‘Just some research.’
She’d told him a bit about her research before, but Antonios hadn’t really understood it. Hadn’t tried to, he supposed, because he’d been showing her his life, not having her show him hers. He’d been incredibly selfish, Antonios thought with a fresh bout of recrimination. Incredibly self-centred and arrogant, assuming Lindsay could just drop her life and friends without a thought. He’d felt, he realized, as if he were rescuing her, and he’d liked that, liked feeling like someone’s salvation. And instead he’d caused the destruction of her happiness.
‘Tell me about it,’ he said now, and he came to sit on the edge of the coffee table. He had an urge to reach out and touch her, wrap a hand around the slender bones of her ankle. He resisted.
Lindsay looked up at him warily, her gaze narrowing. ‘Do you really want me to?’ she asked.
‘I wouldn’t have asked otherwise.’
‘Okay, but you never...’ She stopped, shrugging, and then explained, ‘At the moment I’m working on maximal prime gap function.’
‘Okay,’ Antonios said, although he didn’t actually know what that meant. Lindsay gave him a lopsided smile, as if she guessed as much, and he smiled back and shrugged.
‘I might need you to explain this in plain English.’
‘It’s all Greek to you?’ she teased softly and his smile widened. He was enjoying their light banter. It certainly made a change from the endless arguments they’d had lately.
‘Something like that. You must be used to people not understanding your research.’
She gave him a rueful nod and smile. ‘Most people don’t.’
‘So...maximal prime gap function. Give me the low-down.’
She laughed softly, and the sound was the sweetest music to Antonios’s ears. He’d missed her laugh, her happiness. Knowing he was causing it now, if just a little, was a balm to his soul. To his heart. Maybe he could use this week to make up for the unhappiness he’d caused her during their marriage. If he could make her laugh again, or even smile...
‘Well, you know what prime numbers are?’ she said, and he had to think for a moment to dredge up the arithmetic he’d learned as a child.
‘A number that is only divisible by itself and one.’
‘Yes. The prime gap is the difference between two prime numbers. A maximal gap is the greatest difference.’
‘So, for example, the difference between three and seven.’
‘Yes, although I’m working with numbers far higher than that—numbers that have yet to be determined if they’re in fact prime.’
‘And have you drawn any conclusions?’
She shook her head. ‘Not yet. I’m still gathering data. But when I have enough I’ll start to look for patterns.’
‘What kind of patterns?’
‘Similar gaps between primes mainly.’
‘And what will that tell you?’ Antonios asked. ‘About...anything?’
She let out a laugh, no more than a breath of sound, her smile turning rueful. ‘I know—it seems completely useless to you.’
‘Not useless,’ he replied. ‘But I must admit, as a businessman, I prefer to deal in practicalities.’
‘Understandable.’
‘So what will the patterns tell you?’
‘Well...’ Her fingers splayed over her keyboard, a faint frown puckering her forehead. ‘Maybe nothing; maybe everything. That, really, is what draws me to number theory. The more research scientists do in physics and mathematicians in number theory, the more they realize how much we don’t understand. But the research provides little glimpses into a world of knowledge—a world defined by numbers, and to me it is both mystical and beautiful.’ She smiled self-consciously, but Antonios was intrigued.
‘Defined by numbers?’ he repeated. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, for example, cicadas.’
‘Cicadas?’
‘Yes, you know, like grasshoppers?’ She smiled, her eyes dancing with amusement, turning to silver.
‘What do cicadas have to do with prime numbers?’
‘In the eastern US they only appear after a prime number of years. For example, in Tennessee cicadas have a thirteen-year life cycle. In other places they only appear every seventeen years.’
‘And you think there is a reason for this?’ Antonios asked, mystified.
‘Science has shown us again and again that things in nature are rarely arbitrary. In the case of cicadas, having an irregular life cycle means they’re avoiding their natural predator population cycles. So cicadas on a thirteen-year life cycle are less likely to be gobbled up by a frog.’