THIS WAS EXACTLY what he needed, Achileas thought, stepping onto the balcony that led off his bedroom and into the warm, fluttering air. After the fast-food and exhaust-fume-filled grey air of London there was something cleansing about the bright beat of the sun.
Greek sunlight was laser-white and hot—so hot that even wearing loose linen trousers and a T-shirt he felt overdressed.
He squinted through the light to where the sapphire sparkle of the sea met the cloudless blue sky, letting his eyes adjust, and then he caught a movement down on the sleek stone terrace. He tensed as a small, slight figure in a pale ankle-skimming dress and a cartwheel-sized straw hat stepped into view.
Effie.
He felt his breath catch.
It was just over a week since he had knocked on the door to her Lilliputian flat and asked her to be his wife. It had taken eight days to extricate her from her job, and get the legal documents written up and signed before flying first to Athens on his private jet and then by helicopter to the island.
His island.
He stared out across the terrace, his gaze leapfrogging over the low stone wall that edged the pool area to the untouched landscape of wind-tangled cedar and feathery grasses, and further still to the smooth, wide strip of never-ending blue.
It was nearly seven years since he’d bought this tiny outcrop of rock at the edge of the Cyclades, and he still wasn’t tired of the view. Truthfully, it was the only place on the planet where he stopped to notice the view. Perhaps that was why he came closest here to feeling at home.
It wasn’t just the view. There was a serenity and a simplicity that both soothed and invigorated him. And, of course, privacy. His mouth twisted. Maybe it was a hangover from shared dormitories at school, but he liked to have his own space.
Except now it wasn’t just his space.
Out on the terrace, Effie was making her way around the edge of the gleaming turquoise infinity pool. He watched her, his eyes narrowing on the sway of her hips as she moved. But his body was remembering the feel of those hips when he’d kissed her and she had kissed him back, arching against him, her body curving like a bow in his hands.
His fingers tightened against the rail. He had kissed her to prove her wrong. Instead, he had been proved wrong.
Tracking her progress across the smooth slabs, he felt his pulse speed up. She had tasted sweet like honey, and she had been so responsive. That was what had shocked him most—what shocked him now. He had thought she would be prim and proper, and there had been a kind of hesitancy at first, but then she had melted into him, against him.
He could feel it now. Still.
And he hadn’t been able to hold back. Hadn’t wanted to stop. It had taken a massive effort of will to pull away from her body, to tear his mouth from hers, and even then, he had struggled to hide the truth of things.
He jammed his hands in his pockets. It was his own fault. The self-inflicted consequence of six months of celibacy. And it wouldn’t happen again. She wasn’t his type.
But she was going to be his wife.
Only for that to work they needed to get comfortable with one another. Comfortable enough for him to be able to confidently introduce Effie to his father. The corners of his mouth curved into a small, satisfied smile.
Then, finally, he would be rightfully, publicly and legally acknowledged for what and who he already was. An Alexios.
It couldn’t happen soon enough, he thought with a flicker of impatience. Now that he had a wife waiting in the wings, he just wanted it done. So, there would be no diving into the pool and swimming a few leisurely lengths as he would normally. He had told Effie to meet him for breakfast. He wanted to go over the story of how they’d first met.
His gaze dropped to the woman who would be joining him—only Effie wasn’t there. His smile stiffened as he caught sight of her hat, disappearing out of view. Apparently, she had somewhere else to be. Somewhere he wasn’t.
Blue.
Blue everywhere as far as the eye could see.
Effie turned slowly on the spot, blinking in the sunlight. Without her glasses it was almost like being underwater.
She had never experienced such an intensity or variety of one colour. It was as if after waking this morning she’d found her world had switched from monochrome to colour. The sky was a sweep of harebell-blue, darkening to navy where it merged with the sea. And the sea—
Holding her breath, she took a hesitant step towards the edge of the path and gazed down over the edge of the rockface. Up until this moment, the only sea she had ever seen in person had been on a rare holiday to Great Yarmouth. The North Sea had been wet and salty and vast, but that was where any resemblance to the expanse of water in front of her ended.
She stared in silence at the miracle of the Aegean, almost unbelieving. There was so much light, and even though the sea didn’t seem to be moving every time she looked it was different, each rippling wave catching the sun’s rays and making it shimmer like a gemstone so that there wasn’t just blue but silver and gold.
And then there was the air.
Back in England, she’d never thought about breathing, and she knew that the air she was breathing here must be the same mix of oxygen and nitrogen. Only how could that be? Had it been washed in the sea? Was that why it was as soft and clean as freshly laundered sheets? There was salt and thyme and rosemary... It was as if the island itself was breathing—
Her head was spinning. It was too much.
But then should she be surprised, given who owned the island?
A shiver, not of cold but of heat, that had nothing to do with the quivering white sun, ran down her spine. Too much. That was what she had thought about Achileas in the car when he had looked over at her and everything had stopped. Then dissolved.
Her bones, her breath.
Her sense of self-preservation.
But locking eyes with him had been a warm-up act. His kiss had knocked the world off its axis and sent it spinning into space and she was still scrabbling to get back on her feet. And now she was here with him on this island—his private island—surrounded in every direction by a sea as mesmerizingly blue as his gaze.
She stared fixedly at the horizon, using it as a spirit level to steady herself.
Over the last few days, she had refused to let herself think about that moment in the flat, concentrating instead on practicalities. Like packing and getting a passport.
She hadn’t told anyone what she was doing. Not the official version and certainly not the truth.
At work, it had been easy to let Emily and Janine and Mark believe that she was leaving to start her business. Which was sort of true. But when it had come to her mum, she had said nothing about that. As far as Sam was concerned, she was taking a well-deserved holiday.
Her hands curled at her sides. She didn’t tell lies, and lying to people she cared about—to her mum in particular—was horrible. More horrible still was knowing that she could do it with such ease. Remembering how effortlessly the lies had spilled from her father’s mouth, she felt her stomach knot. She didn’t want to be a chip off that particular block.
But in spite of the lies, and the quivering, slippery panic she felt whenever she thought about being alone with Achileas, it would be worth it in the end. Picturing the rows of bottles in her yet to be opened flagship store, she felt a sudden, unfiltered upswing of happiness. It was going to be all right.
First, though, she had to get to know her husband-to-be.
In fact, she was supposed to be doing that now, she thought, a prickling panic darting over her skin as she realised the time.
Turning, she began to walk back along the path, quickly at first, and then more hesitantly. Distracted by the light and the sea and the air, she hadn’t been paying much attention to where she was, and now she wondered if she had gone the wrong way.
She was on the verge of retracing her steps when a breeze from the sea whipped at her hat. Reaching up, she snatched at it, laughing, feeling a rush of exhilaration rising inside her at the absurdity and newness of it all.
And then suddenly, just as her fingers curled around the rim, he was there.
Blue-eyed, dark-jawed, even darker scowl.
Achileas.
They almost collided again. Just in time she took a hurried step sideways and—
She gasped, her eyes widening, her exhilaration switching to fear as the ground seemed to be cut away beneath her and she felt herself starting to fall.
And she would have kept on falling if Achileas hadn’t caught her arm, clamping his hand painfully around her elbow to jerk her to safety.
Although safety was relative where he was concerned, she thought a moment later, her pulse twitching out of time.
Looming over her, his face was starkly furious in the daylight. And he was swearing more than she had ever heard anyone swear in her life. Not that she understood what he was saying as she didn’t speak Greek, but she didn’t need to.
Only it wasn’t his anger that was making her pulse stumble. It was the jewelled brilliance of his eyes and the hard heat of his very male body. It felt so intimate, even though there had been no intimacy between them.
Except for that kiss, she thought, remembering his hard, insistent mouth and the surge of devastating, irrational hunger that had swept through her body to pool deep in her core. She felt goosebumps rise along her arms as his gaze locked on hers, eyes narrowing as if he too was reliving those frantic, feverish moments—
Abruptly, he let go of her arm.
‘Do you ever look where you’re going?’ he demanded, swapping to English with a fluency that, despite her panicky heartbeat, she found herself envying.
‘Do you?’ she countered.
His eyebrows snapped together. ‘I was looking where I was going. More importantly, I was also on time for our meeting this morning. Unlike you.’
He stared down at her, a muscle pulsing in his cheek. Beside them, the sea kept on being the sea, and she wondered if he was regretting bringing her. Or just contemplating throwing her in.
‘I need you to pay attention, Effie, because I’m only going to say this once,’ he said at last, his voice gratingly harsh in the whispering breeze. ‘This is not some holiday. We made a deal. I am investing in your business and in return you will be my wife. But for that to be believable we need to spend some time together. So, when I say I’ll see you at breakfast, I’m not asking you.’ His blue gaze locked onto hers. ‘I’m paying you. Is that clear?’
To be fair, it had been clear before. Only, stupidly, she had thought that there was an equality of sorts in their arrangement. But to him she was only a cog in the wheel of a machine, brought here to serve a purpose.
His purpose.
Because, of course, Achileas was the machine.
She gazed up at him, her heart beating in her throat. Sunlight was caressing his cheekbones and the line of his jaw reverently, like an adoring lover. But no amount of sun could disguise the hard, uncompromising set of his features.
‘Perfectly.’
Her response was automatic, her voice as quiet and placating as it would have been if she was at work and he was a dissatisfied guest, but she felt a flicker of defiance as she spoke. As a maid she was truly just a cog, a tiny moving part. But wasn’t a wife—even a fake one—by definition a partner?
‘Good.’ His brooding gaze held hers momentarily. ‘Then let’s get back to the villa. We’ve wasted enough time this morning already.’
It was on the tip of her tongue to point out that they could use the time it would take to walk back to the villa to get to know one another, but he had already turned and stalked off down the path. And, as it turned out, it took considerably less time to get back than it had taken her to reach the sea.
Achileas walked swiftly and with the same intensity of purpose with which he seemed to do everything else, eating the ground with his long, fluid strides, only pausing occasionally and impatiently for her to catch up.
It was as if he was in a race. But where was the finishing line? More importantly, what was the prize? Surely there were only so many houses and private jets and islands you could buy, she thought.
Back at the villa, breakfast was waiting for them on the beautiful stone terrace.
Effie sat down at the table and, like a member of an orchestra tuning up for a performance, her stomach started to rumble.
It was nothing like the breakfast she ate at home, she thought, gazing down at the array of plain white bowls and platters, filled with soft, billowing peaks of yogurt, freshly sliced fruit and delicious pastries dusted with icing sugar.
But, despite her hunger, it was the house that drew her gaze.
She had seen it last night, when they’d arrived on the island, but she had been too tired—not just from the journey but from the days leading up to it—to register much about the exterior except that it wasn’t quite what she had imagined.
To her, Greek architecture was either a ruined temple with lots of columns or those postcard-pretty white houses with blue doors and domed roofs. But the Villa Elytis was neither a ruin nor white. It was a soft shell-pink and it was beautiful. The most beautiful house she had ever seen.
Strangely, though, there was nothing about it to connect it to the man sitting opposite her. Inside everything was perfect but impersonal—like a stage set. Surely his whole life couldn’t be a performance? Not in his home?
‘Why aren’t you eating? Do you want something else?’
Achileas frowned at her across the table. He was dressed casually, in linen trousers and a T-shirt, but somehow that only seemed to emphasise his innate unadorned authority.
‘The kitchen can make you whatever you want.’
By ‘the kitchen’, he meant Yiannis and Anna. Feeling a swirling rush of solidarity with the nameless behind-the-scenes staff, she immediately helped herself to yogurt. ‘No, thank you, this is wonderful.’
And it was. Rich and gloriously creamy, with a hint of lemon. The tiny custard-filled pastries were delicious too.
Achileas watched her while she ate. He didn’t eat, but maybe he had eaten earlier. Or maybe masters of the universe didn’t eat breakfast.
As she put down her spoon he shifted back in his chair, his blue eyes calmer now.
‘We might have to adjust the timeline a little, but I think it’s best if we stick as closely to the truth as possible.’ He took a sip of his coffee. ‘That way it will all flow quite naturally between us.’
She knew he was talking about the story they would tell people—about how they’d met and fallen in love—but something in his darkly handsome face made her pulse pick up and her stomach knot as she remembered what had happened the last time it had all flowed ‘naturally’ between them.
‘Actually, I think we should probably keep as far away from the truth as we can,’ she said quietly. ‘Being forced into a car by a stranger isn’t usually a prelude to marriage.’
He stared at her steadily. ‘Depends on the stranger.’
She felt the knot in her belly twist.
It was easier to be around him when he was angry. Safer. Cleaner. There wasn’t any muddying of emotion. Her chest tightened as he leaned forward to pour some more coffee. It was even safer when he wasn’t sitting so close. Because he smelled so good it made her want to breathe him in, to bottle him...
‘Perhaps we could say you were rescuing me from a difficult guest,’ she said, inching back in her chair.
The corners of his mouth curved very slightly. ‘Like I said, we should stick as closely to the truth as possible. Maybe play around with a Cinderella-style narrative.’
That was a good idea. Perfect in every way, Effie thought. Except, of course, Prince Charming and Cinderella’s marriage was based on love, not lies.
It took another hour before Achileas was satisfied with the start they’d made. ‘Obviously we’ll go over it again.’ He finished his coffee. ‘But we don’t want to sound too scripted.’
She nodded. It was easy to see why he was so successful. He was meticulous and focused, but he also had an ability to take a step back and see the big picture. In other words, he was more than just a pretty face. And that face was more than pretty. ‘Pretty’ was slight and ephemeral. Achileas Kane was beautiful. Unequivocally. In a way that transcended human limitations.
‘Is there a problem?’
Looking up, she found herself impaled by his disturbingly intense gaze and, horrified that he might read her thoughts—that last thought in particular—she shook her head. ‘No, I was just wondering how you ended up owning this island?’
He shifted back in his chair, his fingers tapping against the handle of his coffee cup. ‘The usual way,’ he said finally. ‘I saw it. I wanted it. I bought it.’
Her stomach clenched. Was that what had happened outside the Stanmore too?
In a way, yes. And yet at the hotel he had simply seen the maid’s uniform and not the woman inside. And afterwards he had only registered the details that mattered to him. Her lack of money. Her ability to keep her head. That was the Effie he’d seen and wanted. The Effie he had bought.
Everything else was of no interest to him.
Her pulse jerked as his phone began to vibrate against the table. He snatched it up, his lip curling like a wolf protecting its kill.
‘Wait!’ he snapped into the mouthpiece as he got to his feet. ‘I have to take this, and then I have some other calls to make, so I won’t be joining you for lunch, but we can finish up later.’ His eyes found hers. ‘Stay away from the cliffs. In fact, don’t go wandering off again,’ he said, in that imperious way that was as much a part of him as breathing. ‘If you want to swim, use the pool.’
‘I can’t swim,’ she said quickly. Not really...not out of her depth anyway.
He stared at her blankly, as if she had suddenly admitted to sleeping upside down in a tree. ‘In that case, stay away from the pool too.’ He glanced down at her face; his brow creased. ‘It’ll get hot this afternoon—much hotter than this—so keep out of the sun. Can’t have you overheating.’
He leaned forward and she felt a wave of heat wash over her skin as he caught the brim of her hat and straightened it.
‘After all, you’ll be no use to me if you get sunstroke,’ he added softly.
She watched him leave, her heart beating heavily in her chest, feeling stupid. Just for a few half-seconds she had thought he cared about her as a person. But he’d just been thinking about his own agenda. And now he had upped and gone.
Only what had she expected?
That he would stay and spend time with her because...? Because what? Because of that kiss?
The memory rose up inside her...more than a memory. It was tactile, scorching a path through her as if it had just happened. And then she remembered that look of dark impatience on his face and she shivered inside.
Stupid, stupid Effie.
It hadn’t been real. She knew that. Knew, too, that it didn’t matter that she was no longer wearing a uniform. When Achileas looked at her he still saw a chambermaid. Somebody paid to make everything look perfect.
Only instead of rearranging the contents of his mini bar or turning down the sheets on his bed, she was here to turn his life into a storybook romance.
She felt a spark of defiance. This was her life too, and maybe he was investing in her business, but he was wrong if he thought that made her just an investment.
He was right about the temperature, though.
It was getting hotter. And hotter.
The house, though, was cool. There was a beautiful light breeze that fluttered through the villa, and with each tentative breath of air came that same intoxicating blend of sea spray and sunshine and herbs. So many fragrant herbs she felt almost drunk.
Did they grow wild on the island? Or was there a garden attached to the villa? Maybe later, when it got cooler, she might venture out to see, but until then...
Pulse quickening, she hurried to her room and retrieved her olfactive kit. Her fingers trembled against the wooden case. Other people had paintings or jewellery, but this was her most precious possession. It was like a genie in a lamp and a magic carpet rolled into one.
She might never have left England until yesterday, but in her tiny flat at Praed Gardens she could open this vial of cardamom and be transported to Jemaa el-Fnaa, Marrakech’s main square. Un-stopper the petitgrain and she was in Provence.
Only this time would be different. This time, for the first time, she wouldn’t be conjuring up a fantasy but attempting to capture a real-time experience. A moment of hope and possibility.
Fresh citrus, then—to create dynamism—starting with neroli. She leaned forward, forgetting Achileas and her doubts, feeling a rush of excitement pulsing down to her fingertips.
‘What’s the stock trading at?’
Shifting back in his seat, Achileas stared out of the window. Never a good sign. But then, he already knew the answer to the question. He always knew the answer to any question he asked.
All except one.
Who are you?
He’d asked Effie Price that question a week ago and he was still no closer to really knowing the answer, and now it was starting to bug him.
Normally he took pride in his ability to read people.
Take the man on the other end of the phone. Dan Ryan. His newest portfolio manager. In five years’ time Dan would have upgraded his suit to a more expensive design, and as well as his college sweetheart wife he would have a mistress. There would be a couple of children. Then another affair, this time more serious, followed by a divorce and another couple of children.
It was all so predictable, but avoidable if you accepted that biology and love were essentially incompatible.
‘Sixty-five dollars. When we close the deal, we could be looking at a nineteen percent bump. It’s your call, of course, but I’d like to size up.’ Dan’s voice was quivering with testosterone.
Something pale fluttered at the edge of Achileas’s vision and his gaze narrowed. It was stupid, but some part of his brain kept expecting to see Effie in that hat drifting out of view, but it was just a bird—a gull. A flicker of irritation beat a path around his body, and he frowned, his patience and interest at an end.
‘Find out who’s being floated as the new CEO,’ he said tersely. ‘Then come back to me.’
He hung up.
Dan was smart, hungry, and desperate to prove himself. But desperation made you take stupid risks. Made you fly too close to the sun.
He was suddenly gripping the phone so tightly his palms hurt. The ache in his chest felt as if he’d swallowed a boulder. Was that what was happening here? Was he flying too close to the sun? Effie was so young and untested. Could she really pull this off? And what would happen if she couldn’t?
Not wanting to dwell on exactly how that made him feel, he slammed his laptop shut. He was just tense for the very obvious reason that he had put this plan together almost on a whim, and now it was in play it was hard not to look for weaknesses.
Then try harder, he told himself firmly.
Standing up, he twisted his neck from side to side, rolling his shoulders. Maybe he would take that swim now. Or, better still, he could work off his tension on the punchbag.
As he walked through the cool interior of the villa, he remembered Effie asking him how he had ended up buying the island. He had condensed his answer into three short sentences, but it had actually been a long and conflicted process.
His mouth twisted. An internally conflicted process. The same old push-me-pull-you battle that always happened whenever he confronted his Greek heritage.
But there had been something about the location of the island—near the mainland, but not so close that he had to acknowledge his father’s proximity—and he had felt a curious affinity with the incongruously pink neoclassical house with a chequered past.
What the—?
He came to an abrupt halt. He was supposed to be heading towards the gym. But apparently that particular memo hadn’t reached his legs. Why else would he be standing in the doorway to the sitting room, staring as though hypnotised by the sight of Effie Price’s downturned and hatless head?
The waft of her scent made his chest feel suddenly too tight for his ribcage and he gritted his teeth. She was leaning over one of the low coffee tables. Beside her was a hinged wooden box, a bit like a paintbox. It was open. But instead of paints it held rows of glass vials filled with clear liquid.
‘What are you doing?’
He knew his voice was unnecessarily harsh from the way her face jerked up to meet his, but he didn’t care. In fact, he hoped it would encourage her to keep her distance. And remind her who was in charge.
‘I was just playing around with some oils.’
His eyes dropped to the neat wooden case and despite himself he realised he was interested. A lot more interested than he had been earlier, talking to Dan Ryan.
‘Playing to what end?’ he found himself asking.
There was a tiny fluttering pause as her brown eyes rested on his face, composed but wary. ‘I’m trying to create a fragrance.’
Of course she was. Probably another wicked concoction that would make his head spin like a carousel.
‘And how do you do that?’
This time the pause that followed his question seemed to stretch through the open French windows to the horizon.
‘It’s a process,’ she said at last. ‘I start with an idea of the end scent, and then I have to think about what raw materials might produce that effect. In this case, I want to create something that is not too heavy. I want it to come and go like the lightest of breezes. But I still want it to stop you in your tracks.’
Effie was speaking quietly but he could hear her excitement, her passion. Glancing down, he noted both her flushed cheeks and the press of her nipples against the fabric of her dress, and he felt his body tighten with a different excitement as he remembered how she had turned to flame in his arms.
Had that been a one-off? Did making perfume normally absorb all her passion? What if some of that passion escaped again?
It was only then that he realised Effie was staring up at him, and that he had no idea how much time had passed since she’d started speaking.
‘...that’s the plan...’ Her voice trailed off and she began to pick up the vials and slot them back in the case. ‘Anyway, did you want to go over what we talked about this morning?’
He shook his head. ‘No, I want to know how you make a fragrance that comes and goes but stops you in your tracks.’ Actually, it was simpler even than that. He just wanted her to keep talking. ‘I need to know,’ he added quickly. ‘I mean, I would know something about your job if this was a real relationship.’
She stared at him as if considering the logic of his words. ‘I suppose that’s true.’ Her small white teeth chewed at her lip. ‘Well, I started with neroli...but it wasn’t vivacious enough.’ Picking up one of the vials, she squeezed a drop of oil onto one of the thin strips of card and waved it in front of her face. ‘This works better. It’s bergamot. It’s one of my favourites because it’s the most multi-faceted of all the citrus materials.’
Leaning forward, he took the blotting paper from her hand. Her fingers brushed against his and he felt that phosphorus flare of desire as her eyes jerked up to his face at the whisper of contact.
He breathed in cautiously. ‘Oranges? But spicier?’
She nodded. ‘There’s a woody aspect which will work well with the base notes I have in mind.’
He watched her run her hand over the vials.
‘Now, because bergamot can be a little warm, I want to add clarity and brightness with pink pepper.’
It was oddly relaxing, watching her open the bottles and add tiny drops of pepper, then lime and lavender. In fact, he felt calmer than he had in weeks.
‘Is that it?’ he asked.
‘I wish.’
She shook her head, and then suddenly he forgot all about the perfume and the deal he’d made with her, and even about the ache in his chest, because she smiled a smile of such sweetness that everything he’d thought he knew and cared about was erased. It was a smile that changed her face, added light and colour and something indefinable, so that he found himself smiling back at her.
‘This is just the starting point,’ she said. ‘Like the rough sketch of a dress you want to make. From here, I’ll have to keep playing with different oils to build the composition, and then I’ll have to add the alcohol.’
He held her gaze. ‘How do you remember it all?’
She lifted up a notebook—the cheap kind with a cardboard cover. ‘I take notes. Why don’t you try some of the samples while I get this down on paper? See if you can work out what they are. Then maybe you can try mixing some oils.’
In other words, he should play quietly.
Watching her pick up a pen, he felt an odd mix of outrage and admiration. He hadn’t been told what to do since he was a child. In business, most people fell over themselves to attract his attention and hold it. It was the same with women.
But not this woman. She had that same purity of focus that he’d had at her age.
Unnerved by the idea that he and Effie had something in common other than the deal they had made, he picked up one of the vials at random and opened it. It was numbered, not named, but he knew immediately that it was lemon.
Feeling pleased, he picked another. That was harder. It was spicy. Like Christmas. Cinnamon? Cloves? He frowned and held up a third to his nose, breathed—
His heartbeat stumbled, then stopped. He felt his face dissolve with shock.
He was back in England. It was a cold, wet day, and he was cold, and his clothes were wet, and he ached everywhere—but especially in his chest. He felt desperate and wretched and lonely, winded by loneliness...
With an effort, he pulled his face from the black velvet gravity inside the open bottle and placed it down with extravagant care. ‘What is this?’
Effie glanced sideways at the bottle. ‘That’s a synthetic for oakmoss. The original was—’
She looked up and frowned. She was talking to herself. Achileas was gone.