by Penny Jordan
‘Something still worries you?’ She looked up at him. He was her husband, the only key to the past she had. She took a deep breath. It was time she started behaving like an adult and not a frightened child.
‘When you touched me, I felt as though it was wrong for me to respond….’ She shook her head, trying to grasp the elusive strands of memory which always remained just out of reach. ‘I can’t explain it properly, but it’s as though I have to be on my guard with you.’
For a moment he simply stood staring out of the window, and Sienna wondered what thoughts were running through his mind. ‘Dr Theonstanis says I mustn’t jog your memory about the past. It has to come back naturally. But we are married, Sienna, and there is no reason in the world for you to fear that our marriage in any way is insecure. Trust me,’ he asked quietly, ‘that’s all I shall ask.’ He came across to her and tilted her chin so that she was forced to look up into his eyes. ‘Will you do that? Will you give me your trust?’
She wanted to, so much, and when she nodded her assent it was as though she had laid down a heavy burden. Alexis slid his fingers into the thick hair at her nape, pushing her head down on to his shoulder, stroking and soothing her with hands that she knew instinctively would know how to give a woman pleasure.
‘How did I have my accident?’ She had wanted to ask the question before but somehow never dared.
‘It was my fault.’ She could sense the tension inside him. ‘We had a quarrel and you ran out into the street. You were hit by an oncoming car. I thought I had lost you.’
‘It’s funny, the only thing I can remember is our wedding.’ She felt his muscles tense and wondered if it was because she had said their wedding and not his lovemaking. ‘The first thing I remembered when I came round properly was a hazy recollection of the marriage ceremony. Were we married in England?’
‘Yes.’ His voice was almost terse. ‘Don’t try to force yourself to remember, Sienna. It will happen in due course.’ He glanced at his watch, and Sienna noticed that it was an expensive one. Hard on the heels of the thought she frowned. How had she known that? Dr Theonstanis had explained to her that the memory was a complex thing, that some things she would know and remember automatically, while others would elude her.
‘Ready?’
She nodded, trying to quell the rising storm of butterflies taking wing in the pit of her stomach. Alexis had a car waiting, a black Mercedes which smelled of expensive leather. He must have a very good job, she thought, as he fastened the seat-belt for her, but when she voiced her thoughts his smile did not quite reach his eyes. Had they quarrelled in the past about money? She didn’t think she was a particularly extravagant female, or one who placed a great deal of importance on wealth. It was what a man was that mattered, not what he had.
Athens was completely unfamiliar, the heat and the blare of sounds outside the car making her shrink unwittingly into the safety of her seat. Above them on the hill, she caught tantalising glimpses of the Acropolis, but Alexis shook his head when he saw her wistful expression. ‘Another time,’ he told her. ‘You’re well on the way to recovery but not yet strong enough for sightseeing in the full heat of our summer sun.’
‘Summer?’ He caught the surprise in her voice and said, ‘Yes, you had your accident in May, it’s now nearly the end of June. You were in a coma for several days initially and Dr Theonstanis tells me that the rest of the time you spent in hospital will probably never be more than a blur.’
‘I was lucky I didn’t break anything, I suppose.’
‘Yes, if you count a fractured skull as “not breaking anything”,’ Alexis agreed sardonically, but there was pain as well as irony in his eyes when he looked at her, and that more than anything that had gone before buoyed her spirits. They were travelling by helicopter to Micros, and when she looked surprised Alexis said perfunctorily, ‘The island is very small, my father bought it just after the war, and I was tempted to sell it when he and my stepmother were drowned just off the coast in their yacht, but Sofia didn’t want me to, and I must admit that I’m glad I didn’t too.’
‘You own the island?’ She breathed the words with awed disbelief, everything suddenly meshing into place, the fact that he could take unlimited time off work, the expensive watch and clothes he always wore, the dress and underwear he had bought for her. ‘You’re rich!’
‘Don’t say it as though you’ve suddenly discovered I’ve got typhoid,’ Alexis said dryly. ‘You look quite shocked.’ He flicked a glance at her pale face and huge eyes. ‘Not many women would look so disturbed to discover they were married to a wealthy man. Isn’t that supposed to be every beautiful girl’s goal?’
‘Not mine,’ Sienna said positively, knowing intuitively that it was true. ‘I didn’t marry you for your money.’
‘No.’ He said it dryly, and Sienna wondered what lay behind the brief agreement. Had there perhaps been a time when he had thought she had married him for his wealth? She knew with a knowledge that was deep-rooted that she herself had not come from a moneyed background, although she couldn’t have pinpointed how she knew, but Alexis was an extremely shrewd and intelligent man and it was impossible to believe that he could ever assume any woman with eyes in her head would marry him purely for monetary reasons.
‘Was that what we quarrelled about,’ she asked awkwardly, ‘money?’
‘Quarrelled?’ His voice was sharp and she shrank back under the sting of it. As though he realised that his tone upset her, he said in a softer voice. ‘No, it wasn’t about money. Although a man in my position does tend to become, shall we say, slightly sensitive about other people’s motives. That’s why I always like to come back to Micros. The people who live there live what I suppose could be termed a simple life, but it is one they are content with. The men are proud and the women content. Here we are.’ He parked the car in silence, and helped her out of it, carrying her case as though it weighed no more than the soft leather clutch bag he had given her. The bag matched the soft cream shoes she was wearing, both unfamiliar to her, and there had been nothing inside her bag she could identify with. It had contained a lipstick, obviously brand new, a small palette of eyeshadow in what she suspected must be high fashion colours, some drachmas, a handkerchief and very little else.
When he realised that she was falling behind, Alexis matched his long stride to accommodate her shorter one, his hand under her elbow as he directed her towards the waiting helicopter. The pilot greeted him respectfully, and they exchanged a few sentences in Greek, although they spoke too quickly for her to understand more than a few words. Alexis helped her into the ungainly craft and got in beside her, smiling when she voiced her sudden fear that she would not be able to make herself understood to Maria and Georges.
‘Don’t worry, they both speak English, although you can understand Greek.’
‘Did you teach me?’ It was an automatic and quite natural question and she wasn’t prepared for the way he frowned, his eyes suddenly dark and his mouth forbidding.
‘You can ask me that question again tonight when I hold you in my arms and listen to your love words.’
They had met in London, Alexis had told her, and when they were airborne Sienna found herself wondering how they had met. He was a very wealthy man and she, she was sure, was a relatively ordinary mortal, so how had their paths crossed—and not merely crossed, but continued together? London…. She closed her eyes and tried to think, but as always when she tried to recapture the past there was nothing, nothing but an aching sense of frustration and a renewal of the horror she had felt when she first discovered she had lost her memory.
It would all come back to her in time, Dr Theonstanis had told her, but what if it didn’t; what if she was condemned to a lifetime of not knowing anything more about herself than she knew now? Her parents, her family, her growing up—what had they been? She must have made a small sound of despair, because Alexis turned towards her and touched her cheek. Her eyes flew open and met his.
‘I was try
ing to remember,’ she told him wretchedly, ‘but I can’t, I can’t!’
‘You will. Look down below and you will see the first of the islands….’ She allowed him to change the subject. Obviously her loss of memory must be as worrying to him as it was to her. She had hardly behaved towards him as a loving wife. That was something she must try to correct, she told herself firmly. Alexis was right, she must listen to her body, not her mind. He struck her as an intensely physical and virile man, one who would expect the woman in his life to share his pleasure in lovemaking. Which presumably she had done, so why did she feel this frisson of—well, apprehension tinged with something that bordered on anger against herself at the thought that she might? The apprehension was understandable perhaps—after all, Alexis was now a stranger to her, but the other…. Sienna gnawed at her bottom lip. Why should she feel that in making love with Alexis she was going against some inner rule that urged her at all costs to hold him at bay?
‘There’s Micros down below, to the left. Look, can you see it?’ She had to move closer to Alexis to gaze in the direction he was indicating, the hard warmth of his thigh pressed against hers, the contact brief, but disturbing. So much so that she was glad to be able to draw away when she had finally picked out the small island.
When they drew nearer and she saw how small and remote Micros actually was she glanced nervously at Alexis. ‘Something wrong?’
‘No. I was just thinking how tiny Micros looks—how remote. Wouldn’t it have been better if we had stayed in Athens, at least until….’ She floundered badly when she saw the expression in his eyes. He knew quite well why she was having second thoughts, and they had nothing to do with the inaccessibility of the island and everything to do with the knowledge that she would virtually be alone on it with him.
‘We would have been equally alone in my penthouse suite,’ he told her suavely, confirming that she had read his glance correctly, ‘but Athens is hot and crowded at this time of year. Doctor Theonstanis and I both thought the island would be better for you. It has the benefit of a cooling breeze and its beaches are quite safe. The Aegean is very pleasant to swim in.’
Swim? Yes, she would enjoy that! Sienna frowned as the thought winged its way through her mind. How was it she could remember that she could swim, but until he walked into her hospital room that morning she hadn’t been able to remember the slightest thing about her husband?
‘Alexis, were we happy together?’ she asked him impulsively, ignoring his swift frown as he looked back at her. ‘Please…’ she begged. ‘I can’t help worrying about the fact that I can’t remember you. You’re my husband, we’ve been lovers, but….’
She saw that she had angered him and blamed her tactlessness. In his shoes would she have welcomed hearing that he could not remember her? ‘Dr Theonstanis has already told you, you will remember when you are ready.’ As she subsided into her seat once more Sienna realised that he had not answered her question, but she knew she would not repeat it. ‘Tell me about your sister,’ she said instead, ‘about your childhood.’
For a moment she thought he meant to refuse, then he shrugged carelessly. ‘Sofia is living in New York with her husband now. She is ten years younger than me. My father was married twice, but neither marriage was what you would term in Europe “happy”. He married my mother because she brought with her a good dowry, and he married Sofia’s because he wanted more than one son. My mother died in childbirth, and as I have said, Sofia’s was drowned off the coast of Micros with my father.’
‘You must have missed him dreadfully,’ Sienna said sympathetically, but he shrugged her concern aside, his attention on the island taking shape below them.
‘Not really. He and I were never very close. After I left university he wanted me to join him in his business—I had other ambitions, but I was his only son, in Greece that is a very close bond, and when he was killed I had no choice. Sofia was barely twelve and my responsibility.’
‘What would you have done, if you hadn’t had to take over the business?’ Sienna enquired, curiously.
‘Who knows? I wanted to buy a schooner and sail it round to the West Indies, perhaps do some charter work, anything other than sit in an office directing the business my father had built up.’
If he was ten years older than Sofia he must have been twenty-two when his father was drowned, a young age to take on the responsibility of a teenage sister and a business empire. Was it that that made him seem so hard? Sienna wondered as the helicopter started to lose height and the dusty brownness of the island rose up to meet them. Among the green and browns she could see the ruins of an ancient temple and wondered to whom it had been built, what deity had commanded the hearts and loyalty of these islanders.
As Alexis explained when they were safely down, because Micros was too small and rocky to support a runway he normally travelled to it by yacht, which was berthed in Piraeus, using the helicopter when time was short. A Land Rover was parked to one side of the small, flat piece of ground where they had come down, and Alexis directed her across to it, the sudden sound in the air behind her warning her that the pilot was taking off, and that now she really was on her own.
A bumpy track led from their landing place downwards through gorse and sparse grass which grew among the rocks, the odd olive tree providing a welcome patch of shade from the searing heat of the Aegean sun. They drove past the ruins Sienna had seen from the sky. They had once been a temple to Diana, Alexis told her, but were too small to merit any interest by the authorities. ‘Nearly every island in the group boasts something of the sort,’ he told her, ‘and if you look carefully when we drive through the village you will also see that nearly every house has at least one piece of stone pillaged from the temple.’
The village nestled in a small cove, the houses clustered by the harbour, a tangle of fishing boats bobbing gently on its calm water. ‘Fishing, sponge diving, maintaining a few goats and the odd stand of olive trees, that is how the islanders make their living,’ Alexis told her as they drove through, their progress witnessed by a group of wide-eyed children and the silent women knitting in the open doorways that gave on to the street.
As the road climbed they passed a church, gleaming white in the hot sun, a landmark against the parched background of brown and dull greens.
‘The island only has two roads,’ Alexis told her, ‘this one which circumnavigates it, and another which crosses it. Most of the land is useless for anything other than goats.’
It certainly was barren, Sienna acceded, glancing at the rocky outcrops and sparse vegetation, but it also possessed a sombre beauty and its setting, in a sea of dense blue, must surely be unrivalled. The road dipped and she glimpsed a beach of soft white sand, and then ahead of them she saw the house, perched above the bay and looking down on it.
Gleaming white and completely plain, the symmetry of the building instantly appealed to her. They drew up outside it and Alexis opened her door and helped her out into the cobbled courtyard, the scent of thyme reaching her from the flower beds surrounding the cobbles. ‘The main windows of the house look out to sea,’ Alexis told her as he ushered her towards the door. The house looked modern, too modern to have been commissioned by his father, and when she commented on this Alexis agreed.
‘Yes, I commissioned it shortly after his death. Sofia had always loved the island, and I decided to build myself a house here large enough for me to work from if necessary so that I could spend the summer holidays with her.’
He pushed open the door and they were in a pleasant square hall tiled for coolness, the richness of their design offset by the stark white walls and modern lighting. Niches set into the walls revealed exquisite pieces of pottery which Sienna vaguely recognised as Japanese, their colours picked out by those of the tiles, and although Alexis didn’t say so, she guessed the pottery was antique and extremely valuable. He opened another door, into a large room with windows overlooking the sea. The room was comfortably furnished in muted creams, bold splashes of co
lour provided by the cushions which echoed the changing colour of the Aegean, modern paintings adorning the walls.
As Sienna stared round her, another door opened and a plump dark-haired woman dressed in black came bustling in, darting them both an apologetic smile.
‘Sienna, this is Maria,’ Alexis told her, nodding his head as the woman burst into a torrent of Greek. ‘She asks you to forgive her for not being here to greet us, but she is preparing my favourite meal.’
That Maria doted on her employer was patently obvious, but Sienna found that she herself was welcomed warmly, and guessed that Maria had been warned by Alexis about her loss of memory.
‘Georges will have brought our cases in from the Land Rover, and Maria will unpack for you. If you would like to have a rest before dinner, Maria will show you to our room. I have some work to catch up on.’
He must have, Sienna recognised, remembering how much time he had spent with her at the hospital, smiling her agreement, and a little alarmed by the intensity of her relief when she was free to go with Maria and escape his magnetic presence.
The room Maria took her to was huge, plainly decorated like the other rooms she had seen, but elegant and comfortable. Off it was a bathroom with a huge bath, large enough to accommodate at least two people, and Sienna found herself avoiding both it and the enormous double bed, which seemed to dominate the restful bedroom. Patio doors opened on to a small patio, the ground dropping away beyond it, providing an endless vista of sea and sky.
‘You like?’ Maria asked proudly, plumping up cotton pillows and pulling back the heavy cream cotton spread. ‘For many years we have wanted the kyrios to marry,’ she added, ‘it is not good for a man to have no sons.’ Her eyes rested curiously on Sienna’s face, and Sienna began to regret that Alexis was not with them.
