Page 33 of Reclaimed By His Billion-Dollar Ring

How long it lasted he did not know—could not know, for time had ceased.

Then oblivion receded and his body became heavy and inert, drained. Chest heaving, he let his body slacken, felt her arms, warm against the sudden chill in his muscles, draw him softly against her, cradling him as his exhausted limbs became torpid.

He was dimly aware that he could still feel after-tremors in her body, slowly ebbing away. Dimly aware that of all the places in all the world where he might be, here was the only place. Dimly aware of a heaviness pressing him down, as if gravity had suddenly quadrupled and there was no strength left in him.

He said her name. It was all he could do.

And then sleep took him.

Calanthe lay with Nikos’s sleeping body in her arms. Her own body was still and cold. So very cold.

And yet the night was warm.

She gazed with blank eyes at the white-painted ceiling. A single thought was circling in her head. Pulsing in her stricken limbs now slack and exhausted.

What have I done? Dear God, what have I done?

But she knew the answer. No matter how many times the question circled endlessly in her sleepless brain.

The fire she had let run so fatefully—so fatally—had burned away all sense. But now that fire was cold, cold ash.

Memory swept over her. Not of the night that had just passed, but of nights so long ago.

How many times had she held him like this in the aftermath of passion, his body deep in heavy slumber, still embracing hers? Countless times in that long-ago lost summer. Until the very last time...

But now... Now there was a new last time. There must be.

Slowly, she pressed her mouth to his sinewed shoulder as he lay half across her, making her farewell. What she had once thought she had with Nik had never truly been at all—nor was this true now. Carefully...very carefully...she eased her body from his, drew herself away. Got to her feet, swaying slightly, pushing back her loosened tresses, and reached for her discarded clothes.

And when Homer’s rosy-fingered dawn crept out over his wine-dark sea beyond the pebbled beach she had already gone.

Leaving Nikos to wake alone.

CHAPTER SEVEN

‘I WAS THINKING, PAPA, of perhaps heading back to London a little earlier than planned,’ Calanthe ventured tentatively.

She eyed her father across the dinner table. She’d arrived back in Athens before lunch, having taken the first ferry of the morning, terrified that Nikos would wake and come after her. But she’d made it back home, had heard nothing from him since, and all she could feel was abjectly grateful.

Her father paused in the act of raising his wine glass.

‘Oh, my darling girl, why?’

There was dismay in his voice and Calanthe felt doubly bad. She didn’t want to leave her father early. Especially right now. She frowned, her eyes resting on him.

Her gaze skimmed his face. He’d told her he’d be cutting back on the rich food, reducing his intake of wine and alcohol in general, but she’d seen no sign of it yet. Tonight’s dinner was rich roast lamb, the wine heavy and plentiful. His colour was high, and her announcement just now had made his cheeks flush more. She wanted to ask him—yet again—whether he’d made an appointment for the further tests that he’d admitted his cardiologist had recommended. But he always waved the question away, getting tetchy and irritated, changing the subject determinedly.

Well, tonight the subject was changed, all right. And clearly it wasn’t one he welcomed.

‘I’ve a lot to get on with,’ she said, hoping he wouldn’t ask for details.

His shrewd gaze rested on her and Calanthe wished it wouldn’t. She braced herself for his questioning, yet it did not come. Instead, his expression changed, became bland.

‘Well, stay at least until next weekend,’ he said. ‘I had in mind a dinner party for this coming Friday.’

He mentioned some familiar names of his own generation. None, Calanthe thought thankfully, with sons who might make potential husbands for her.

I can last out till the weekend. And if Nikos tries to make contact, then...

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