by Jane Porter
His thigh brushed her hip and she tensed, shoulders hunching around her ears. She was aware of Christos in every nerve in her body, feeling his strength and warmth as if he were the sun and she the moon.
He rubbed the aloe between his hands and she could hear the slick lotion slurp against his skin. It struck her as an indecent sound, sexual and raw, and the ache in her lower belly intensified. Pressing her inner thighs together, she tried to control her breathing and yet her heart raced, her senses enflamed. She wanted him to touch her even as she feared it.
“Lie still,” he commanded, leaning forward, his sinewy thigh pressing against her own. “This might sting a bit.”
Sting? The ointment felt like ice. Helplessly she bucked against his hand, wriggling to escape the prickly hot and cold sensations. But he didn’t let her escape. He pressed her down against the sheet and continued applying the aloe gel in slow, steady strokes.
Little by little the anesthetic went to work, numbing the worst of the pain and again making her hopelessly aware of Christos’s hands stroking her spine. His hands moved over her body, down the length of her spinal column, into the dip of her lower back, and then up, over the flare of her hips.
Heat coursed through her, but this warmth had nothing to do with the sunburn and everything to do with his sensuous caress.
His fingertips explored the hollow just above the cleft in her cheeks and she wiggled, telling him to move away. He did, but only to move to her flare of hips, caressing up her waist, to the curve of her breasts.
Alysia couldn’t breathe. His thumbs stroked the soft swell. Her nipples hardened, the soft flesh prickling with awareness. She wanted more sensation than feathers and butterflies, more than just this soft teasing touch.
His hands returned to her rib cage and then lifted altogether. She drew a short, shallow breath. “Thank you,” she choked.
“Not quite done,” he answered, lightly massaging her shoulders and nape.
“It’s good,” she replied, her voice sounding thick and slow.
But how could it be otherwise? His touch sent blood coursing through her veins with dizzying speed. She couldn’t catch her breath. Her heart raced too fast. Her body quivered from head to toe, but the greatest tension coiled in her middle, hot and heavy, her inner thighs almost dancing with need.
“I haven’t covered everything,” he replied, squeezing another dollop of gel onto the middle of her back.
She wanted to protest but no sound came from her mouth. Instead she closed her eyes, her lips parting, attuned to every shift of his body, every press of his thigh against her own.
Again his palms fanned the width of her rib cage and curved down to cup her breasts, thumbs flicking across taut, swollen nipples.
Mercy.
If there was purgatory, she’d found it. Caught between heaven and hell and she wanted him to stop just as much as she couldn’t let him.
Swept away by touch, sensation, raw physical hunger. Years of being nothing but skin and bones and suddenly she was all nerve endings. Alive, humming, hot liquid desire.
Forget prayers and penance, she’d take sin any day.
He stroked down again, his warm, hard hands moving beneath the towel, shaping the curve of her bottom. The liquid heat between her thighs threatened to consume her. She pressed her legs together tighter, trying to deny the tingle in her flesh, but Christos applied more pressure, deeply kneading the muscles in her bottom and she felt equal waves of shame and craving.
“Don’t,” she muttered, humiliated and yet sinfully aroused.
“Do you want me to stop?”
“N-n-no.” The confession cost her but it was the truth.
Even without being able to see his face, she could feel his smile. But for once she didn’t care. The sensations filling her body were too lovely, too consuming to interrupt.
His fingertips discovered the sensitive line between bottom and thigh and he caressed that, too, awakening a river of longing in the only place that hadn’t been burned. The teasing of her sensitive flesh created the most awful awareness of her body and needs. She felt huge in that moment, voracious.
She ought to have more control, ought to tell him in scathing tones that she wouldn’t put up with such liberties, but oh, liberties had never felt so wonderful. She was quite dizzy with want, and she took in air in short, shallow gasps, afraid to breathe, afraid to distract him, afraid that this pleasure would end.
Pressing her open mouth to her forearm, she shuddered as Christos’s fingers slid inward, tracing the cleft of her bottom down, until he’d discovered the tight protective curls and her hot, wanton dampness.
She was on fire, truly, but this had nothing to do with her sunburn and everything to do with need. Suddenly she’d become all liquid and hunger, like molten lava.
No one had ever touched her with such tantalizing intimacy, not even Jeremy who’d been a timid—and dare she admit?—unsatisfying lover. For Jeremy sex had been just that: a brief coupling and then uncoupling. It hadn’t crossed her mind to assert that she had physical needs.
When Christos’s fingers slid across her slick, sensitive flesh, she trembled, biting her arm to keep from arching against his hand. She couldn’t lose control, couldn’t betray herself with him. But when he stroked the engorged bud, a thousand nerve endings danced and her hips lifted, as if of their own volition.
He caressed her again, and again, and each time he touched the acutely sensitive bud, she felt as though he was winding her tighter and tighter like an old-fashioned wood top.
More, faster, tighter.
Brilliant color filled her mind, painted stripes of red and green and white against the polished wood.
Stroking her, he wound her tighter still, drawing her in and out of herself, aware of his hands, his warmth, her heat, her labored breathing.
She couldn’t catch her breath and the intensity of it made her long to scream. And then when she felt quite mad and mindless, he put her over the edge, setting the coiled wooden top on the ground, fingers stroking faster, faster, faster.
He let her go. And suddenly she was flying, flung across the floor, spinning wildly out of control.
The speed and strength of the climax stunned her. She bit her forearm, choking back a scream, muffling the intensity of her response.
Hell, hell, hell!
She’d thought she’d had an orgasm yesterday, but that…that was nothing like this. This…it was unreal. Incredible. Unbelievable. One could get addicted to feeling this way.
Her open mouth pressed to her arm drew her back to the moment. Christos stirred and she suddenly remembered him, and his part in this.
He’d brought her to a climax with his hand. Good God, how impersonal. How crude. She longed to bury her face in the pillow and hide but that wouldn’t exactly work. He was waiting for her to speak. Waiting for something.
Slowly she turned her head, her eyes feeling heavy, sleepy, and she stared up at Christos. His own gaze looked slumberous, his dark pupils almost black.
He’d enjoyed this, she realized, startled, overwhelmed. He’d enjoying making her fall apart in his hands.
She dampened her bottom lip, overwhelmed by her weakness. And still he waited for her to speak. She grasped at the first thing that came to mind.
“That was nice.”
His lashes lowered, concealing his emotions. “I must be out of practice. I’ll have to work on that.” And with a nod in her direction, he left, leaving her naked and alone in bed.
Sleeping that night was excruciating, her skin so hot she felt as though a fire had been lit beneath her skin. Once she woke to find Christos at her side, aspirin in his hand. She gratefully accepted and allowed him to spray a topical pain relief across her back. He avoided mentioning what had taken place earlier and after he left she fell into a deeper, more restful sleep.
A maid brought a breakfast tray to her in bed and Alysia ate her melon and sweet roll sitting up in bed, moving gingerly, if at all.
; Christos appeared briefly, dressed in a suit and tie, dark hair slicked back, accenting the hardness of his features. “How are you feeling?”
“A little better.”
“I’d warned you about the sun.”
Of course he did. He was the font of all wisdom. She gritted her teeth, resisting the urge to reply sarcastically.
“If you need me, you can reach me at my office.”
“I won’t need you.”
He shrugged. “You say that, but your actions contradict your words.” And with that, he was gone.
He was right, she realized, sinking back into bed. She felt completely split, two personalities inhabiting one body. One part of her craved purity, denial, discipline. Another hungered for heat and passion. It’d always been this way, too. As a child she’d felt so emotional, so hungry for affection, and her father’s coldness, his critical manner, had made her ashamed of her feelings, turning a little girl’s needs into something dirty and wrong.
Daughters were to serve. Daughters were to be silent. Daughters were to sacrifice.
Her father made it clear Alysia failed on all three accounts.
The older she grew, the more she struggled against her passionate nature, fighting to deny herself, fighting to be what her father demanded of her. She’d always had a knack for drawing and she turned to her giant sketch pads, pouring her energy into endless charcoal drawings, portraits of the family servants, sketches of neighbor children, landscapes of the sea and rocky terrain.
Earning the art scholarship had been an answer to prayer. Her father had been furious that she’d even applied, but her mother somehow persuaded him to let her go. Once in Paris she embraced everything new, relishing the eclectic circle of artists and writers who talked about everything but making money. They were passionate and interesting, clever and original. Jeremy was one of them, always the life of the party, charming, handsome, completely irresponsible. She’d loved that about him. Loved the fact that he couldn’t hold a job. Wouldn’t hold a job. He was the least controlling person she’d ever known.
They didn’t date long. A couple of nights after first making love he suggested they move in together. But deep down she was still a good Greek girl and she couldn’t just live with a man. She needed to be a wife, and then a mother.
And so she had been. Both.
Alysia curled on her side, smoothed her hand across the cool cotton sheet. Paris seemed so long ago. Jeremy was just a name of a man she’d once known.
It was strange she thought, she’d lived lives that didn’t exist anymore. The good Greek girl was gone. Only the hedonist remained.
And the hedonist had decided she wanted Christos, wanted to remain with Christos, even if she had to bend the rules to make the relationship work.
He wanted a wife. She’d be his wife. She just wouldn’t get pregnant. The doctor had given her a blue plastic case with a six month supply of birth control pills, to give her time to build up her strength before trying for a baby. So for the next six months she was safe. And then she’d see another doctor, and renew the prescription.
Late in the day, Alysia managed to bathe and dress, slipping on a soft cotton sundress and low-heeled sandals. She ate dinner alone in the formal dining room and wandered the garden grounds, hearing the distant horn of a car.
Footsteps sounded on the flagstone path. She turned, discovering Christos behind her. He’d changed from his suit into pale linen trousers and a smooth cotton shirt the color of butterscotch. The caramel color suited him, enhancing his bronze complexion and the gleam of his black hair.
“I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,” he said. “There’s been a problem at my head office in New York.”
He sounded quietly ironic, as if everything between them was a joke. Hurt unfolded inside her chest, hurt because she understood that there was something intrinsically good in him, in them, but they couldn’t seem to get around the obstacles.
“I’ve been all right. I’m quite good at entertaining myself.”
He nodded slightly, comprehending her implied reference at learning to stay busy and out of her father’s way. “I need to be in New York tomorrow. We’ll leave tonight.”
She felt a leap of excitement, and a peculiar sense of hope. Cynically she mocked her expectations. Starting over in a new place wasn’t exactly starting fresh. The problems would follow. The conflict remained.
But maybe it didn’t have to. Perhaps away from Greece they could start over, make something new. Here everything felt tainted. She felt tainted. But in America they could change, she could change. She would try harder. She’d please more.
“I’ve already instructed Housekeeping to pack. We’ll be leaving soon.” He hesitated, his expression grim. “There’s something else. Your father wanted to stop over tonight, to say goodbye. I told him no. I hope that’s all right with you.”
Christos’s private jet landed so gently that there wasn’t even a bump as the plane’s wheels touched the tarmac. They taxied to the executive terminal and immediately deplaned, exiting the jet only to be handed into the back of a waiting limousine.
Despite the early hour, dawn just breaking, Christos returned phone calls during the short drive to his country house in Darien, Connecticut.
Once during his conversation, he covered the receiver and leaned forward, pointing out a series landmarks to Alysia.
In the dim morning light it was difficult to see much, but she made out the shapes of ornate iron gates, stone walls and extensive grounds with endless manicured lawns. Although she’d grown up surrounded by wealth, the vast American country estates impressed even her.
Christos’s house, rather than dominating the verdant landscape, nestled into a green knoll as if to take comfort in the undulating land with its views of the water and grove of majestic hardwood trees.
“It’s not what you expected,” Christos said, noting her expression as he hung up the phone.
And it wasn’t. She’d expected something grandiose, another opulent mansion built of polished marble. Instead this rambling two-story country house had been fashioned from clapboard and stone, featuring big beautiful bay windows and discreet covered doorways. The soft morning light outlined the shingled roof, the sharp gables, the cascading roof-line. It was a fairy-tale house, the entry marked by a profusion of climbing roses.
An older woman answered the door, dressed simply in a black jersey dress, her steel-gray hair coiffed in a severe knot. The housekeeper, Alysia assumed. She assumed wrong.
“Mother,” Christos said, clasping the woman by the shoulders and kissing both cheeks. “What are you doing up at this hour?”
“I’ve been waiting by the door.”
“So I see.”
Alysia went hot, then cold. Not a housekeeper, but his mother. Abruptly the stone and whitewashed clapboard house lost its fairy-tale charm.
Christos made the introductions and his mother, greeted Alysia cordially, if coolly, which didn’t surprise Alysia in the slightest. In Greece, mothers-in-law were notoriously hard on daughters-in-law. No woman was ever good enough for another woman’s son. Greek mothers lived for their sons and considered it their duty to instruct new wives how to run the household, perform domestic duties.
The elder Mrs. Pateras turned to her son. “She’s sick?”
“No, mother, she’s just slim.”
The gray-haired matron cast a skeptical glance over Alysia’s slender figure and wan complexion. “You called a doctor in Athens, no?”
“Yes, Mother, but the doctor assured me she just needs iron. He prescribed some iron tablets and those will help.”
Mrs. Pateras’s dour expression grew darker. She tossed her hands in the air, gesturing with impassioned emphasis. “I thought you wanted family, Christos. Babies, no? A skinny wife isn’t good for making babies. You need a good Greek girl, not a Lemos!”
Alysia expected a mother-in-law who’d been cool, perhaps even critical, but Mrs. Pateras’s vocal attack left her speechless, the blo
od draining from her face, her body cold.
“Mama, gently, please,” Christos quietly remonstrated. “You must give Alysia a chance.”
“I know all about her. I know she’s not the one for you. A good Greek girl, Christos, a good girl.”
Christos glanced at Alysia, their eyes briefly meeting. “She is a good Greek girl,” he answered, his expression blank, his dark eyes shuttered, before turning back to his mother.
“But she’s Lemos’s daughter.”
“Yes.”
“So how can she be the right one for you?”
CHAPTER EIGHT
HIS mother gone, Christos shut the door. “She’ll be fine. She just needs time,” he said flatly.
Alysia didn’t dare contradict him, but knew better than most that time didn’t always heal. Time just made some more bitter, but she couldn’t say that to Christos, and she couldn’t criticize his mother, either. Mothers, especially Greek mothers, were above reproach.
Aware that he felt awkward, she sought to alleviate some of the tension. “Would you like coffee?”
“Yes, but let me make it. You’re the guest.”
The guest. Not his wife, but the guest.
In the kitchen she watched as he ground the beans and filled the machine’s filter. He glanced at her as he turned the machine on, his expression brooding. “Alysia, it would be best if you do not discuss your father here, or in front of my parents.”
“I don’t understand. Is there something I should know?”
“Yes. No. It doesn’t matter. Just do as I say.”
Alysia could hear his mother’s scathing tone echo in her head. A good girl, not a Lemos. She shivered. “This is personal,” she said numbly. “What happened? What did my father do?”
Christos shrugged, obviously uncomfortable. “It’s a long time ago.”
“Not so long ago if your mother can’t look at me without cursing.”
“It wasn’t that bad.”
“Close enough.” She lifted her chin, horrified to discover she was on the brink of tears. She was suddenly scared. She’d begun to feel things for Christos that she’d never felt for any man, not even Jeremy. Christos had broken through that chink in her armor. Pulled the stone from around her heart. If his family hated her they were in serious trouble. “I have a right to know. As your wife, Christos.”
