Beth had a feeling she was being totally ignored by both Jason and Trudy.
It was almost as if Jason had forgotten her very existence.
She took a step away from him intending to leave the two together, but all she succeeded in doing was capturing his attention.
He stopped her from making an escape by grabbing her arm.
“Trudy . . . this is Beth. Beth and I are working on the villa,” he explained.
Carefully he felt for Beth’s hand. Jason began gripping her hand so fiercely she thought he would crush her fingers and stop the circulation.
So that’s how it’s to be, thought Beth.
Beth was cautiously summing up the situation between Jason and his ex-girlfriend.
So . . . I’m to be his work-mate and not the women he shared his bed with yesterday night with so much passion it caused his vision to change and return.
Damn the man.
Trudy was glancing at her watch and looking worried.
“I’ve been waiting for you to get back for about thirty minutes. I was just about to leave without seeing you.”
“Was there something urgent you want to see us about?” he asked.
“Us? . . . No . . . I just thought whilst I’m in Athens I would let you take me out to dinner. Like old time and . . .”
“Sorry . . . but we can’t have dinner this evening,” Jason replied abrupt. “I’m having a special dinner with Beth. A very special dinner.”
This was news to Beth. She had no idea that they were supposed to be going out.
“But Jason darling, you can have dinner with Beth anytime if you’re working with her. I’m only here in Athens for tonight. We set sail and start filming tomorrow. I don’t know how long we’ll be gone and that means I don’t know when I’ll be able to get back here and see you again. We have to talk about the way things are between us.”
Jason was still holding Beth’s hand and she felt his nails dig warningly into the flesh of her palm.
She almost let out a scream.
“I’m afraid you’ve picked the wrong night Trudy. Tonight Beth and I are dinning together . . . because we’re celebrating . . . We are celebrating our engagement.”
Beth couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
She looked at Jason in amazement.
She thought she had heard him say they were about to be engaged?
It was the first she knew about it.
“Beth has done me the honour and has said yes to my proposal.”
Beth froze like a statue.
Surprise and open mouthed in amazement, she didn’t know what she was supposed to say.
Beside her she could feel Jason’s tension and she was waiting for his next move.
Trudy suddenly developed an interest in Beth.
“Oh . . . but you’re not thinking of marrying . . . her?”
Trudy sound astonished and not very complimentary at the thought of Jason and Beth together.
Hearing the disapproval in Trudy’s voice, Jason saw red.
“I’m not thinking of marrying Beth. It’s a fact. We’re getting married.”
Jason was angry.
How dare anyone question what he said? And now he was digging his heels in.
If he had any doubts about what he was going to do, there were no qualms now.
There was absolutely no doubt in his mind Beth was going to marry him.
Even if she objected all the way to the church, he was going to marry her.
Having realised he couldn’t let Beth go, he thought it was the perfect solution to his problems.
And no one was going to tell him who he could or could not marry . . . Especially Trudy.
To stop Trudy coming back into his life marrying, Beth was the only thing he could think of on the spur of the moment as a defence.
It seemed irrelevant Beth had yet to be asked if she would go along with his plan.
To him it was the most logical solution to his problem.
It was Trudy who walked out on him leaving him in a hospital bed, not the other way round. Trudy had ended the relationship. And he didn’t want Trudy back.
He wanted Beth.
“Beth loves me as I am . . . don’t you my love? She’s not prepared to wait for my sight to return and she’s demands I marry her now . . . and of course I’ll do anything Beth demands.”
“Jason . . .” Beth gasped amazed and astonished beyond belief.
But before she could say anything further, his mouth had plunged and found hers and his lips were forcing hers apart with a brutal kiss.
Here in the hotel foyer where everyone could see and hear, he had masterfully pulled her to him and was holding her tightly and possessively against the whole length of his body.
She couldn’t pull away.
He held Beth with arms locked to her side whilst he ravaged her mouth.
It was only when a taxi driver entered the hotel and called out for his passenger that the silence of the moment was broken.
“Taxi for Ridgeway,” called the driver from the door.
The taxi was for Trudy.
“I have to go.” Trudy told Jason. “The director and film crew are waiting for me. But I’ll be back. I haven’t finished with you yet. We still have to talk about us and if it’s not here in Athens it will be on your island. Either way, I’ll be seeing you again . . . and soon.”
Trudy walked away from them towards the waiting taxi driver and out of the hotel.
* * * * *
Beth tossed her hair back from her face and stood with hands on slender hips as she looked crossly at Jason.
“Now would you like to explain precisely what you were doing and what you hoped to gain from the scene you’ve just enacted?”
“Not now Beth. Wait until we’re in our room.”
“No, I’m not moving until I get an answer. I’d like to know and I’d like to know now. And let me remind you . . . we . . . do not have a room. As from now there is no . . . our room.”
She had never felt so angry with a man before.
“Have you got our key?”
He didn’t wait for a reply but pulled her towards the lifts that would take them to their suite.
They rode the lift in silence.
With the door to their suite opened he pushed her inside and turned to her warningly.
“This won’t be the last we’ve seen of Trudy. She’s like an octopus with suckers. If she gets a hold of her pray she won’t let go. I saw her go to work on a film producer once. She kept on at him until he found her a part. Now it’s going to be me she’s clinging to.”
Jason was pacing the room.
He seemed totally unlike his usual self.
Beth had never seen him so nervous before.
It was as if he was already in the clutches of his ex-girlfriend.
All his masculine arrogance and confidence had disappeared.
But it wasn’t Trudy he was scared of – it was Beth he was scared of. He was terrified Beth was going to walk out on him.
When they were down stairs, Beth had threatened to leave him and he had decided he was prepared to keep Beth by his side using fair means or foul.
“You can’t let Trudy do this to me Beth. Once she gets an idea into her head there’s no stopping her. You have to help me.”
Beth felt betrayed.
It was almost as if he’d already gone back to being with Trudy.
“Your problem with Trudy has nothing to do with me. And I don’t relish being used as a prop to protect you from her. I don’t know what you wanted to achieve by kissing me in the lobby and I have no idea why you think we have to be engaged to be married.”
“I thought it would stop Trudy chasing me. It would send her a clear message that I’m not available. That I’m taken.”
“Well somehow I don’t think she’s got your message. What was her parting shot? . . . “I’ll be back and I haven’t finished with you yet.” . . . and I believe her Jason - I believe her.”
“Well you can believe me. I’ve finished with her. There is no way I’m letting Trudy back into my life.”
“Jason, I’d like to trust you but I don’t. Too much has happened this afternoon. First you want to send me back to England and back to Charles. You more or less tell me you think I’m capable of having an affair with a married man and now you want me to be engaged to you to protect you from Trudy. Do you think I have no morals? ”
“It’s not like that. You’ve got it all wrong.”
Jason was almost on the point of confessing his love to Beth.
“Jason, right now I’m furious with you and I’m even more furious with myself for being foolish enough to fall for your charms like all your other women. I want to leave, walk-out and never come back, but that would be childish. You either send me home now and I catch the next flight to England or you play the game my way.”
She saw Jason turn white before buckling at the knees and sitting himself down on the large soft sofa.
“What are you suggesting we do?”
He was frightened she was about to leave.
Beth was a quick thinker and she was good at solving problems, but she had never thought as quickly as she was thinking now.
“We’ll go shopping for some furniture. The basics, or at least enough furniture to fill a couple of rooms like the bedroom, kitchen and a lounge. And when your sight’s fully returned, you can pick the rest of your things. Anyway, the main thing is - we’ve got to get back to White Island and the sooner the better. Once I get started on the gardens it will take me about a month to finish landscaping and then I can return to England. In the mean time we’ve got plenty of time to set up home and play house. That is . . . if you still want to fool Trudy and make it look like I’ve moved in with you. But there’s still . . . no us.”
“What do you mean - make it look like? I’m telling you Beth, you’re going to be setting up home with me and you are going to marry me.”
“I’m not living with you Jason as your mistress and I’m not marrying you. I’m won’t marry any man just to protect him from another woman.”
It seemed as if his plan was about to back fire. Beth thought he was marrying her to fight off Trudy.
“And what happens if Trudy does come back? What then?” he mumbled awkwardly.
“I don’t care about Trudy,” Beth said defiantly, and she almost said she didn’t care about him, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to say those words.
“Trudy doesn’t know when the film shoot is going to finish,” Beth said, “She could be gone a week or a month or longer. She might not show at all. If she does make an appearance at the hotel or if she follows us to the island, we’ll take it from there.”
“And us . . . what happens to us?” he looked startled.
“There is no us. I thought I made that clear. You don’t trust me and I can’t trust you because you think those horrid things about me.”
“But Beth . . .” he said.
Jason took a seat and was sat in front of the panoramic window looking out at the Acropolis in the distance.
His vision was still too blurred for him to see clearly but it was good enough for him to make out the shape of things in the room.
Beth went to the drinks cabinet and got a cold bottle of fruit juice from the fridge and whist she was there she poured Jason a whiskey.
“Is there anything you need?” she asked before setting his glass down on the coffee table in front of him.
“No I’m fine. It’s just that . . . it’s all been a bit of a whirl since this morning. You know what I mean. Waking-up and having bright sunlight shinning in my eyes. I suppose I’m still in shock. I haven’t come to terms with the fact my eye-sight might be returning. You don’t know what it’s like not knowing if you’ll never be able to see again. But you never doubted I would see again . . . did you Beth? You always believed I would get my sight back.”
She didn’t need to say anything.
They both knew Jason was thinking about Trudy and why she had left him when he was in hospital.
Beth downed her drink in one go before grabbing her handbag off the sofa where she’d thrown it earlier.
“I’m not staying here to listen to your worries about your ex,” she told him brutally, “I’m off to see what I can find for White Island . . . or I might even play tourist and go to the Acropolis. I’ve never been to Greece and I might never have the chance to come here again. So you see, you can either join me, or you can wallow in self-pity and hide behind your dark glasses. But me . . . I’m going out and I’m going to get on with my life.”
Beth walked away from him towards the door and out of their suite.
“Beth don’t go . . . don’t leave me.”
But once again she had disappeared, leaving him alone with the horrifying thought she might be gone for good and not coming back.
CHAPTER NINE
Beth only got as far as the down stairs lobby before one of the hotel managers approached her.
“Miss Ashton. If you would come this way please. Mr Andre shouldn’t be too long. We’ve sent for the limousine and I believe Mr Andre is on his way down now.”
“I’m alright thank-you I don’t need the limousine. I know where I need to go and I can find my own way there.”
“No Miss . . . I’m afraid you don’t understand. Mr Andre said under no circumstances were we to permit you to leave the hotel without him. He even said we had to hold you with force if necessary. But I’m sure that won’t be needed . . . will it Miss?”
The manager stood blocking her way to the exit and it was as if he would do all in his power to carry out Jason’s orders.
“Now if you would step this way please Miss.”
But before the manager could usher her into the office to wait for Jason, the doors to the lift opened and Jason emerged carrying his white cane and he was wearing dark glasses and a panama hat for shade.
He walked to where she was standing with such accuracy that there was no doubt in her mind Jason was able to see.
And he could see.
It also meant he was able to see the love shining in her eyes. She was unable to hide or conceal her emotions from him any long. Quickly she took her sunglasses from her bag and put them on. They were her only protection from his prying gaze as she stood by his side.
“Good. You haven’t left me. Now let me show you my country Beth . . . and it’s time you got to know the real me.”
Without hesitation he reached out and took her arm. Steering her out of the hotel doors and towards the waiting limousine.
It was still early in the morning.
Having got the hospital visit over and done with, there was still plenty of time in the day for them to go shopping and get the things that were needed for White Island.
Beth didn’t have any say in the matter as she was being taken mercilessly from one furniture store to the next.
Having chosen the sofa’s, beds and tables, which were all to be shipped on ahead to White Island, she was then escorted to the limousine and transported to more shops for the bathroom and kitchen appliances.
No expense was spared.
She didn’t dare think what Jason was spending. It certainly wasn’t under a million pounds.
There wasn’t a price tag to be seen anywhere in any of the shops they bought from.
In one of the furniture shops, she’d looked yearningly at a solid mahogany bedroom suite, but because she thought it would be above their budget she moved on to the next set of furniture.
Jason had no budget and she hadn’t seen him signal to the assistant to include the double bed and many of the other items she had looked longingly at in the shipment meant for the villa.
Once everything had been chosen, the tempo of the morning changed.
Jason went from business mode to leisure.
Getting into to the car once more they were taken to see the traditional tourist sights of Athens.
Beth had always
thought Greece would be a beautiful country and Athens a spectacular city but nothing had prepared her for the sights she was being shown.
They left the cool of the air-conditioned limousine to watch the Greek guards called – Evzones – doing their thing outside of the Greek parliamentary building. Then afterwards they went to the National Gardens which was situated directly behind parliament.
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