Page 36 of The Billionaire's Seduction Revenge

Vasilios was a complication she hadn’t anticipated and the last thing Emma needed was more complications in her life. It would pain her to leave Costa, but if Vasilios was back, then there wasn’t really a need for her anyway.

She was alone. Completely untethered. How different life had turned out to what she’d expected. She glanced up at Vasilios and something tugged in her chest.

Different, yes, but in this moment, with this man, despite everything, she was strangely content—and that wasn’t nothing.

They shared a cheese flatbread and a small bottle of Italian soda, then stopped at a bar with tables spilling onto the street for a coffee each, which came with a delightful almond biscuit shaped like a crescent moon. It was far less salubrious than the restaurant their night had started at but sitting with Vasilios beneath the blanket of stars, surrounded by the shifting movements of strangers all going about their lives, Emma thought this might have been far nicer anyway.

She was relaxed.

It was as though their argument had cleared the air in some way, had relieved a pressure she hadn’t realised she’d been feeling, and left in its wake only a sense of pleasure. There was her resolution too, to leave sooner than she’d originally planned. And though that brought with it a sense of stress—where would she go? When? It also allowed her to simply enjoy the time she had left in Puglia, with Vasilios and Costa, and then move on.

Emma had learned her lesson about putting down roots—it wasn’t something she intended to attempt ever again. Just the thought made her shudder, so she didn’t think about it. Not then. She would never again find herself trapped by circumstances in a relationship that was so unsatisfying.

“You’re lost in thought,” he murmured, winding their fingers together again as they walked through the cobbled streets—quieter now by virtue of the hour—towards his motorbike.

“Yes.”

“About?”

Her smile was mysterious. “Nothing important.”

“Secrets, Emma?”

“Oh, yes,” she laughed. “Just plotting my next victim,” she added archly. “Who should I target now for all their worldly possessions?”

He had the decency to look slightly indignant—almost embarrassed, and Emma took pity on him. Pity on Vasilios! As if a man like him should ever inspire that emotion. But when she looked at him, she saw not just the man he was today, but also the boy he’d been, with his family disappointing him so monumentally.

“You must have hated it,” she said after a beat.

“What?”

She couldn’t tell if his question was asked honestly or if he was obfuscating, but she answered in kind regardless. “Your father, grandfather. The women, the affairs.”

“I did.”

“But surely as you grew up, as a teenager and then a stupidly handsome young man, there must have been a time when you were tempted to some of the same lifestyle decisions?”

“Hormones have a lot to answer for,” he agreed with a grimace. “But no,cara.I always swore I’d be different. I didn’t want to be like them. I didn’t want to go from woman to woman, particularly not to be seen as a form of currency. I know all women aren’t like that,” he added, before she could speak in defence of her sex. “But there are some, and having met more than my share of them, I just wired myself to be different, to want different things.”

“And you never questioned that? You’ve never fallen in love with someone and wanted to run the risk of being wrong?”

He hesitated a moment, then shook his head. “No. I’ve never been in love.”

“Because you don’t get to know women well enough to love?”

“Probably.”

“You’re getting to know me.”

He frowned. “You are different.”

“Ah, I see. You mean the ends justified the means, because you had to assure yourself I wasn’t scheming to rob your grandfather blind?”

He cast her a look of impatience. “Is this something you intend to beat me over the head with going forward?”

She laughed, and the action brought her closer to him, so he dropped her hand and put his arm around her shoulders instead, holding her against his body, where she fit so perfectly, as though she’d been moulded to stand there.

“I’ve never craved those things,” he said after they’d walked in silence for a few steps. “I never wanted a wife, children, family. I like being on my own.”

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