Page 36 of Forbidden Greek Mistress
On the nights when he found himself in the flat, he would lie on the couch and drive himself insane with the memory of her. Right there with him. Lying on top of him. Fitting to him so perfectly that he had never felt quite right in his own body once she was gone.
He had wondered if he might truly go mad, for how could he possibly reconcile himself to this? Knowing that she lived, knowing where she was, and not having her?
How could he live with the knowledge that his father could, at any moment, have his debauched hands all over her?
Thanasis had begun to think that dying might have been easier than living without her, not that he intended to find out. In the meantime, he had resigned himself to the torture.
But now she wanted to go dancing some more.
“I have an idea,” he told her, as it came to him in a flash. The perfect solution, with only slightly more torture than usual. “I will take you dancing, Selwen.”
“Surely not,” she replied, in such a smooth, deliberate way that it gave him pause. Because it made him think of Saskia. His Saskia. It made him wonder how much of her had come back to London, bubbling up inside Selwen after all. “What if we’re seen? What if someone thinks we’re together? Worse still, what if they know that I was recently engaged to your father?”
All valid concerns. Yet, “They won’t,” he said curtly.
And when they rang off, he sent his secretary a message, telling her to reach out to a client who had invited him to a masked ball in New York and tell them that although he had previously declined, he would now be coming. With a guest.
The next day he went by the flat for the first time since he’d foolishly greeted her here and ripped his own heart out with all he’d lost. Even though he had his own key, he buzzed up and waited for Saskia to let him in.
“Who is it?” she asked through the intercom.
“Who else knows you’re here?” he replied.
She didn’t reply. She only buzzed him in.
He took the stairs slowly, feeling the ghosts of all the other times he’d come here pressing in on him. Whispering him into states of nostalgia and need that could only cause trouble.
“She is not yours,” he reminded himself beneath his breath. “She barely knows who you are.”
But she opened the door at the top of the stairs before he made it there, and that felt the way it always had.
Like a homecoming.
Like he was finally where he was meant to be.
He got to the top and he watched her face closely as he drew nearer to her. He could have sworn that he saw that recognition again. He would have bet everything he had that it was there.
And everything in him sang out, but he didn’t reach for her. Though he did see at once that she was no longer wearing the shapeless, flowing things she’d lived in on the island. She was dressed in her own clothes now. Even five years old, Saskia’s wardrobe was timeless. She had an eye for the classics and always chose items of clothing because they flattered her shape, not because she wanted her shape to fit into them.
A critical difference that she had lectured him on at some length, many times.
Fashion is tyranny,she had told him.Women are bludgeoned with messages about how they ought to look when half the time it’s biologically impossible. It would be better by far to teach women to love any shape they find themselves in, and dress for that.
I am fascinated, of course,he had told her, stretched out as he was beside her on their bed after a long and intense game of theirs that had involved experimenting with various bindings, and different ways to beg. She had done so, and so prettily, every time.
Not fascinated enough,she had retorted, grinning at him wickedly. Then she had started kissing her way down the length of his torso. She’d cupped him in her hands, and licked him, root to tip.Why don’t we experiment with fit, here and now?
Now I am even more fascinated,he had gritted out.
But that was a long time ago. Today Saskia looked at him both as if she didn’t recognize him and yet she did, and he had to order his cock to get control of itself as he followed her into the flat.
“Do you like coffee?” she asked, and slid him a look that he found…unreadable.
He was sure there were minefields here, but he couldn’t see them. “I do.”
“I thought you must. There’s a rather dramatic espresso machine in the kitchen, and I can’t imagine it would only be for me.” She wrinkled her nose. “Besides, I like tea.”
“You like tea all day and into the evening, yes,” he corrected her. “But in the mornings, you enjoy a decent coffee, like all civilized people do.”
