Page 39 of Greek's Temporary Cinderella

‘Though the water garden is extraordinary, and of course the famous Japanese-style bridge, and all the even more famous waterlilies, I don’t like that it’s separated from the house and the immediate garden of the house. Going through that linking tunnel was a disappointment.’

‘Yes, I agree. It would be much better to have a house whose gardens encircled it—but then Monet had to buy what became the water garden from a neighbour, so I suppose that limited him.’

Leandros looked across at her. ‘What kind of house and garden would you ideally like?’

The moment he spoke he regretted it. She would answer and say it was her father’s villa, and that was lost to her.

Unless her next husband bought it back for her.

Next husband?

He had taunted her with being on the lookout for another rich husband to ensure she never had to face the poverty she’d always been determined not to experience—had bribed her, if it came to that, into agreeing to coming to Paris with him by saying he’d kit her out with a wardrobe suitable for ensnaring another rich husband—or even merely a rich lover.

And I’d move on once I had done with her.

He felt his jaw clench. Had he really thought that? Said that? Taunted her with it?

And I taunted her last evening, calling her Manon for betraying and rejecting a poor lover for a rich protector.

No—he would not go down that path again. Not now—not today.

Things had changed between them. Just how he did not know, and he did not want to. Not right now. Not today.

Nor the next day either. Or the one after that.

For now...

Just take the day as it comes.

And he knew—as he had known that morning, and knew now as he sat here with her, companionably, over lunch at this simple restaurant, eating a simple meal, having wandered in the gardens at Monet’s house, with the afternoon and the rest of the day before them—that it was enough.

Eliana set her knife and fork down on the plate, feeling replete, reaching for her glass of wine. Dappled sunshine shone through the vines shading the terraced seating area and played on her face. Her mood was strange—yet peaceful. Despite Leandros asking her those questions.

Had she wanted to answer them?

All but one.

And that she had avoided. Must avoid. He would not be interested anyway, so what did it matter?

That he was asking questions at all was...was what? Curious? Surprising? Unexpected? Perhaps predictable. The revelation last night of how her marriage to Damian had not been what he’d assumed invited questions.

Not that her answers to any of them mattered—any more than why she and Damian had never tried to have a child.

None of it matters, because no answer I give can ever justify what I did to Leandros.

That was all there was to it—all the truth that it was necessary for her to face.

And the truth she had discovered last evening.

Her eyes went to him now, softening as they did so, and emotion flowed within her, strong and irrefutable. That was all that mattered to her now as she sat here with him, in this time she had.

It would not last. How could it? He had brought her here to free himself of her, purge himself of her, to take from her all that was left of what he’d once wanted.

And I will give it to him—freely and willingly. Even if it is all he wants of me, it is his...

Last night—and the debacle that had ended it—had merely been a...a delay...that was all. Now, tonight, she would be different—fulfilled.

All that he wants—and all that I want to give.

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