Log In
Or create an account ->
Imperial Library
Home
About
News
Upload
Forum
Help
Login/SignUp
Index
CHAPTER ONE ALEXEIS NICOLAIDES glanced around him with displeasure. It had been a mistake to come here. A mistake to indulge Marissa. He was only in London for a twenty-four-hour stop-over, and when he’d got out of the day-long meeting in the City and returned to his hotel suite he’d simply wanted to find her waiting for him. Then, once the bare niceties had been dispensed with, and they had made polite and completely empty enquiries about each other’s well-being, he would have done what his fundamental interest in Marissa was: taken her to bed. Instead, however, he had ended up in this overcrowded art gallery, bored rigid and surrounded by yapping idiots—among whom Marissa was the key offender. At this moment she was giving full throat to her knowledge of the art market and the financial worth of the artist on display. Alexeis couldn’t have cared less about either. And with every passing moment he was caring less and less about Marissa, and about spending any more time with her. Not h
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO CARRIE kept walking forward. If she kept walking, she wouldn’t think. Wouldn’t think she’d just lost her job. Again. Was she doomed to keep losing jobs? she thought woefully. It had been her own fault, obviously, and she couldn’t blame them for sacking her. She’d let herself be distracted, she knew—fatally—by that incredible man. If she hadn’t been gawping at him so stupidly she’d have been more aware of what was going on. But, no, she’d had to just stand there like an idiot. She hadn’t been able to help herself, though. He had just been so incredible! It really was the only word for him. She’d never seen a man that good-looking, who had that kind of impact. Talk about tall, dark and handsome! In the few moments she’d looked at him she hadn’t really been able to take in any specific details, but the overall impact had been just amazing. And when he’d met her eyes… She felt again the whoosh that had knocked her in that breathless moment, when she’d felt the impact of those d
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE THE ‘somewhere quieter’ that Alexeis had promised was quieter indeed. It was the dining room of his suite, overlooking the gardens of the Embankment below, and the dark, flowing Thames beyond. Her eyes had widened when she’d seen the view, but she had not objected or said anything, simply stared out over the river and the shore beyond. ‘The Festival Hall, the National Theatre, the Hayward Gallery—all the South Bank,’ said Alexeis, coming up behind her. His hand rested lightly and very casually on her shoulder as he pointed them out with his other hand. She felt warm beneath his touch, through the thin material of her blouse. She was like a gazelle, easily startled—easily affrighted—and so he kept his contact brief. He stepped away, feeling a wry smile tugging at his mouth as his eyes flickered over her rear view. She had called her uniform ‘stupid’. He had another word for it. But it was not one he would use in front of her. Instead, he would merely—enjoy it. As, indeed,
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR CARRIE sat in the wide leather seat in the first-class compartment of the aeroplane, overcome with wonder and disbelief. What on earth am I doing? What on earth am I doing? The words circled slowly in her brain. It was hard to think coherently, rationally. Hard to think at all. She didn’t want to, she knew. She wanted very much not to think. To simply—accept. Accept that something had happened that had never happened to her in her life before and never would again. She had spent the night—the most amazing, incredible, breathtaking night of her life!—with a man who had been a stranger twenty-four hours ago. And now, even more unbelievably, she was flying to New York with him! It was like some kind of fantasy—the kind you dreamt up when life looked grim and you needed something rose-tinted and impossibly wonderful to think about. The mental equivalent of eating a cream cake or pigging out on a box of Belgian chocolates. Her head turned to look at the most incredible man in t
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE BEING in Chicago with Alexeis was just as wonderful as being in New York. As was San Francisco, and then Atlanta, and then, after America, back across the Atlantic in Milan. Being anywhere with him was wonderful—anywhere at all! For as long as he wanted her. And he did seem to want her! That was the amazing, fantastical thing! She had given up wondering at it, worrying about it. Time seemed to have stopped. Past and future seemed to have slipped away—there was only an endless, wonderful ‘now’ that swept her away on wings of wonder and delight. A ‘now’ that was focussed only and entirely on Alexeis. Alexeis. Irresistible Alexeis. Carrie was helpless and could only give herself to him—time after time, night after night. His care of her, his consideration, the way he laughed and met her eyes with wry amusement, the way she felt at ease with him, chatting about…well, she wasn’t sure what. But it all came easily, and she didn’t feel awkward or shy in his company, however intimi
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX CARRIE sat in her wide leather seat on the executive jet, gazing out of the window at the landscape far, far below. Relief filled her. In her head she still heard Alexeis’s voice on the yacht, sounding almost brusque. It had filled her with such dread. ‘A change of plan.’ Even as she’d heard the words she had felt her heart plummet. This was it. He was sending her away. Finishing it. But it hadn’t been that at all. Instead, the change of plan had consisted not of sailing across the Tyrrhenian Sea to Sardinia, as Alexeis had originally told her, but flying to an island off the western coast of Greece. ‘It will only be for a couple of nights,’ he’d said. ‘Then we’ll go to Sardinia, as planned.’ He hadn’t explained why there had been a change of plan, and Carrie hadn’t asked. She accepted that Alexeis took travel for granted, and for him it was no big deal. She was just grateful he was taking her with him—because one day, she knew, with that feeling of a stone being lodged ins
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN CARRIE turned over on to her stomach, letting the warmth of the sunshine seep into her as she lay on a padded sunbed in front of the beach house. She was on her own, and for once she was glad. She’d slept heavily, having taken some painkillers for the tension headache that had started to grind around her temples after the gruelling ordeal of that awful dinner party. The pills had knocked her out, and she’d been unaware that Alexeis had come to bed. Then, as the bright morning sunlight had pressed through the unsuitably ornate drapes of the bedroom, he had hunkered down beside the bed, roused her by softly shaking her shoulder, and said, ‘I have to go up to the villa, but I won’t be too long. We’ll leave for Sardinia as soon as I’m back.’ There had been a constraint in his voice she had picked up on even through her drowsiness, but she had not questioned him. Then he’d gone. Now her thoughts were troubled, but she didn’t want to think. She also felt queasy as well. Perhaps
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT ALEXEIS paused outside the bedroom door. He didn’t want to do this. But he had no choice. He’d scooped Carrie’s inert body up and carried her, as swiftly as he could, to a bed in a guest bedroom in his mother’s villa. Then he’d summoned a doctor, and after he had examined Carrie had asked him outright what was wrong. And the doctor had told him. The shock had detonated in his brain, and his next question had been one that any man in his situation might ask. ‘How many weeks?’ ‘It is very recent indeed. Had you not summoned me she might merely have thought it a delayed period. Many women miscarry and do not even realise they were pregnant. But in this instance—’ he had looked Alexeis right in the eyes ‘—the miscarriage may yet have been averted—I say only may. Continued bed-rest is essential, and no stress whatsoever. I believe that is what may have induced her collapse.’ Alexeis’s face had tightened, but he’d said nothing, only asked what medical care would be necessary. N
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE ALEXEIS gave up trying to talk to Carrie. Every time he asked her a question, her responses were always monosyllabic. He was not sorry to give up, he knew. Carrie was just lying there, the room still shaded, just as she had been lying there yesterday. She might not even have moved for all he knew. One thing he did know—the bleeding had not resumed. She was still pregnant. The doctor was coming again in the afternoon. He’d told Alexeis bluntly there was nothing he could do either way, but Alexeis had asked him to come anyway. He wanted to be sure that if anything happened he would be able to tell himself afterwards that he had done everything he could to prevent it—everything he could to ensure the best level of care for Carrie. He turned to her now and spoke. ‘It’s very hard,’ he said, his voice halting, ‘this time of waiting.’ She didn’t reply. ‘We just have to hope,’ said Alexis. Carrie let her eyes rest on him. She didn’t speak. What could possibly be said? What could p
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN HE GAVE Carrie two days to herself, leaving her entirely to the nurse and to the doctor, whom he summoned to check her over yet again, despite being told it was not necessary. The doctor was blunt. ‘I do not discount her trauma, but she must not be allowed to sink into depression. I can prescribe pills, but best would be a change of scene. Somewhere where she can recover fully. She may not want to—may want only to go on lying in that darkened room of hers, wishing for something that can never now be. But it is not good for her. Though it will take time, move on she must.’ Alexeis nodded, glad to have the doctor back up what he himself wanted. ‘When will she be up to travelling?’ ‘She is young and strong. If the journey is not arduous, I would say at any time.’ It was what he wanted to hear. ‘Thank you,’ he said. The doctor picked up his bag again. ‘And in the meantime get her out of that damn morgue of a room! She needs light and fresh air. Ignore any protestations. It will
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN CARRIE stirred, glad to awake from heavy, humid sleep. It was the noise of traffic that woke her in the mornings—buses rumbling down the busy road in Paddington in the early hours. She wasn’t used to it any more. Nor was she used to sleeping, living and eating in a single room, where the ugly-patterned wallpaper was peeling off in the corners, the carpet needed to go on a rubbish tip, and the electricity ran on a meter. I’ve been spoilt. Spoilt by luxury. The thought shamed her. Added itself to the mountain of shame she already felt. To the shame of what she had done, what she had been, that had burst from her like an infected wound that last hideous morning. It felt as though it had been lanced from the depths inside her, where it had been seeping, day after day, as she had lain in bed at the villa, waiting to see whether the frail, fragile life growing within her would cling to existence. Or be a sacrifice to free her from a man who’d got his mistress pregnant and was
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE CARRIE walked along through the park, heading for the far side. It was wonderful to be home, she told herself. Wonderful to be back in the town she’d grown up in, that she’d lived in all her life. Everything was as familiar to her as if she had only yesterday boarded the train, heartsore and grieving, to head for London. It was as if she had never left. But that wasn’t true, of course. Things had happened to her that had changed her for ever. Alexeis Nicolaides had happened to her. And she had conceived and lost his child. Despite all her strenuous efforts, all her relief and gladness to be back home again, to be welcomed by those she had known all her life, and to have a future to look forward to, she could still feel haunting her the knowledge and the memory and worst of all the dreams that pressed like ghosts against a windowpane. Would she one day be free of them? Surely she must? Surely one day the dreams would stop, the memories would dim, and he would disappear, w
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN SHE wasn’t sure what she said to the sales assistant, didn’t register that the woman had nodded and gone through to the storeroom. Registered only that a hand like steel had gripped around her wrist. ‘What did that woman call you?’ Carrie rested her eyes on Alexeis’s face, where blank stupefaction and disbelief registered across it. ‘She called me Dr Richards,’ she said. Her voice was expressionless. ‘Because that’s who I am. I got my PhD last year—the year my father died. He was a senior research fellow here at the university, and I’ve just taken up a post-doctoral research post in his former department.’ His eyes were on her, quite blank. Then his gaze moved down to her bag, lying on the table, its contents starting to spill. His hand released her. Went instead to the first book resting on the top. ‘“Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors and Human Neoplasia,”’ he read out. ‘Biochemistry,’ said Carrie, in that same inexpressive voice. ‘My research area is oncogene expression. Th
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
EPILOGUE
← Prev
Back
Next →
← Prev
Back
Next →