He wasn’t smiling now.
‘I was going to marry Angus, you know, even when I wasn’t in with love him. I was going to marry him and hope that everything would just work out. I nearly made that mistake once and I can’t do it again.’
Now Leonidas was completely still, his face like thunder. ‘What are you saying?’
Hannah didn’t know, but the words tripped out of her mouth before she could consider them. ‘If you don’t love me, Leonidas—not even a little bit—if that lightning bolt struck me and me alone, then we can’t do this.’ Her eyes filled with tears and she found herself powerless to halt their progress. ‘If I didn’t love you, maybe it would be different, but feeling like I do and marrying you...it would be hell. Every day would be a torment.’
His nostrils flared as he expelled an angry breath. ‘We have discussed this. There is so much in our marriage that would be good, so much you would enjoy.’ He forced a smile to his face but his eyes remained intent, disconnected. ‘You will see the world, travel to places you cannot imagine, and all in five-star luxury...’
‘With an army at my back?’ she challenged.
‘No matter what happens, the army is something you will have to adjust to.’
She shook her head, pushing that aside for the moment. ‘That’s not enough.’
‘It has to be!’ He spoke loudly, the words thick with impatience. ‘I have told you all along what I am offering. When you came to me in Capri I was clear, and I have been clear all along.’
‘Are you saying you still feel that way? That nothing’s changed for you since then?’
He regarded her through half-shuttered eyes, lifting his arms and crossing them over his broad, naked chest for good measure. ‘Things have changed,’ he conceded, finally.
Hannah relaxed, just a little.
‘But I don’t love you. I’m not free to love you, Hannah. I made a promise to someone and even though she’s dead, it doesn’t change that. I have told you this as well, and I cannot fathom why you can’t just accept it.’
Misery exploded inside her. Hannah drew in a breath, her eyes firing to his, hurt unmistakable in their green depths. He looked away, his jaw rigid as he unfolded his arms and reached for the piece of plastic paper that was on the windowsill. It was a photo, she saw now, and he’d been looking at it right before she’d entered the room.
He handed it to her, his eyes holding a challenge when they met Hannah’s.
She turned her attention to the picture slowly, scanning it and frowning as similarities leaped out at her. For the briefest second, she thought the photo was of her, but it wasn’t. Close, though.
The woman in the picture was smiling, her lips painted a similar red to the colour Hannah favoured. Her eyes were wide-set and almond-shaped, like Hannah’s, and an almost identical shade of green. Her skin was pale, like Hannah’s, though Hannah had tiny freckles on her nose and it didn’t look as if this woman had any.
Her hair was loose around her face, falling to beneath her shoulders, and it was the exact same auburn red of Hannah’s own hair.
Hannah looked at the picture without comprehending, at first.
‘Is this Amy?’ she whispered, something in the region of her heart bursting, shattering his internal organs with the force.
‘Yes. My wife.’
It was just three words, three tiny words, but they were wielded like a machete. Hannah lifted her face to Leonidas’s, her skin completely blanked of colour, so that even in the midst of this conversation, he felt a blade of concern.
‘Please sit down.’ He gestured to the bed, putting a hand on her elbow, but she wrenched out of it, moving away from him, dropping her gaze to the picture. Her fingertips shook and her eyes were filled with tears, making it difficult to focus properly. But she’d seen enough.
Clarity—a different kind of clarity from what she’d experienced last night—settled about her.
‘This is what you saw in me that night on Chrysá Vráchia, isn’t it?’
Leonidas was quiet.
‘If I didn’t look like this—’ Hannah lifted the photo in the air a little, at the same time she reached for her hair ‘—you wouldn’t even have noticed me, would you?’
Still, he was silent. What could he say? How could he defend this? The evidence was staring back at her.
‘Did you think of her when you slept with me?’ Her eyes pierced him, the hurt and accusation in them like a physical weapon.
‘No.’ The word came out gravelled, and it was as if he were being roused from a long way away. ‘You are similar, at first glance, but believe me, Hannah, I saw only you.’
She wanted to believe him, but pain was slashing her from all angles.
‘But she was in my mind that night. She was a heaviness inside me.’ He expelled a long, slow breath. ‘That island is where I met her. On New Year’s Eve, and it’s where I proposed to her. I go there every New Year because I’m a sadist and it’s my particular brand of torture. And this year, you walked in and for a moment, I felt like I’d slipped back in time...’
A sob filled Hannah’s chest. She was such an idiot! She’d been falling in love with this man, and he’d been living with a ghost.
She groaned, spinning away from him blindly.
He moved after her, gripping her arm, holding her gently, turning her around to face him. ‘But that’s not why I slept with you.’
His eyes held hers. Even when she wanted to blink away, she couldn’t. She was transfixed. Talk about sadism.
‘No?’ The word was just a whisper. She cleared her throat. ‘So why did you?’
‘I wanted you, Hannah. I’ve wanted you since that night. I’ve been tormented by how much I wanted you. And I’ve hated myself for that. When Amy was killed, I was furious. I swore I would never forget her, never move on with my life. I resisted any woman, any connection with anyone, until you. Even wanting you physically is a betrayal of what I promised myself, of what I owe Amy.’
His words were dragged from him.
‘I had a family, Hannah, and they were murdered because of me. Do you think I have any right to close that book and pick up a new one? To simply move on because you’re here and pregnant with my child?’
Hannah’s heart broke a little more, but for Leonidas this time. He was trapped by his grief, and she couldn’t fight that for him. He alone could forgive himself, could work out how to love Hannah and their daughter while still holding Amy and Brax in his heart.
Hannah looked down at the photograph of Amy, and felt a sense of kindredness with this woman, this poor woman. They had both loved the same man, and it bonded them in some way. Hannah handed the photo to Leonidas with an expression that was pure sympathy.
‘What would she want?’
He shook his head slowly. ‘Amy would want me to be happy.’
Hannah’s heart chirruped a little. She stepped forward, so their legs brushed, and she lifted her hands to his chest. ‘Then be happy, Leonidas. You’ll never stop loving Amy and Brax, and I don’t want you to. They’re a part of you, and I want them to be a part of our lives. I want to hear more about the little boy who made you laugh, I want to hear about him, I want you to keep him alive within me and one day his sister. You can’t live in stasis for ever. I’m here, and I love you, and I’m asking you to open yourself up to this. To look inside your heart and see that I’m there, too.’
She dropped her hands to his, finding his wrists and lifting his palms to her belly. ‘I’m asking you to marry me today because you love me, not because you’re worried I’ll be hurt, not because I’m pregnant. Marry me because you don’t want to live your life without me in it.’
He stared at her as though he were drowning, but she was too far away to help him.
He stared at her as though nothing and no one could ever help him. As though he didn’t want to be saved.
‘I didn’t suggest this because I wanted it,’ he said, finally, his voice hoarse. ‘I can’t bear to be the reason someone else is in danger. I shouldn’t have slept with you and I shouldn’t have got you pregnant, but now that I have and you are, the least I can do is make sure you’re safe and looked after.’
His words, so reasonable, so decent, were the polar opposite of what she wanted to hear.
Hannah stared at him for several moments, as the small seed of hope she’d let grow in her chest began to wilt.
‘I don’t want to be safe and looked after,’ she said quietly. ‘At least, that’s not a reason to marry someone.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘You don’t think?’
‘No.’ She tilted her chin defiantly, even when she’d begun to shake. ‘I can take care of myself, and our baby.’
‘You have no idea what’s out there.’
‘And nor do you,’ she interrupted forcefully. ‘Neither of us has a crystal ball, but I know this: if I stay here and marry you, I’m going to regret it. I’m going to be miserable, and our child’s going to be miserable. After my parents died, I went to live with my aunt and uncle and saw for myself how damaging this kind of relationship can be. I won’t put our child through that.’
‘Damn it, Hannah. You agreed to this...’
‘Yeah,’ she choked out the agreement. ‘But that might as well have been a lifetime ago.’
‘Not for me.’
She grimaced. ‘No, not for you. And that’s the problem. You can do this—you can marry me and sleep with me and hold me through the night and not feel a damned thing.’ Tears burned her lashes but she dashed them away angrily. ‘I’m not like that. This is real to me.’
‘So stay for that. Stay because you love me. I’m not going to hurt you. Stay because you love me and I’ll spend the rest of my life taking care of you, making sure you are happy in every way. Stay here, marry me. I promise you, Hannah, you will have everything you could ever want in life.’
‘I’ll have nothing I want,’ she contradicted, but it was sad now, not angry. She blinked, as if she were waking up from a nightmare. ‘I can’t do this.’
His eyes didn’t waver from hers. He stared at her, and she felt a pull within him, a tug between two separate parts of him, and then he straightened, his expression shifting to one of calm control.
‘You must.’ He hesitated; she felt that pull once more, as if he were at war with himself. ‘I cannot allow you to walk away.’
‘Are you going to keep me here as your prisoner?’
He stared at her for several seconds. ‘No.’ His hesitation wasn’t convincing. ‘But I will fight you for our child. I need to know she’s safe, Hannah, and only here, under my protection, will I believe that to be the case. I will sue for custody if I have to. I will do everything within my power to bring her to this island—I would prefer it if you were a part of that. For our daughter’s sake.’
She drew in a breath, her eyes lifting to his as those words sliced through her. Words that made her body feel completely weak. The idea of someone as wealthy and powerful as Leonidas Stathakis suing her filled Hannah with a repugnant ache.
But then, she was shaking her head, and her heart thudded back to life.
‘No, you won’t. You’re not going to drag me through the courts and make my life a living hell. You’re not going to do anything that will garner the attention of the press, that will expose our daughter to harm. I don’t mean physical harm. I mean the kind of harm that will befall her when she’s twelve and goes on to the Internet and sees those stories. Do you think I don’t know anything about the man I’ve fallen in love with?’
His jaw throbbed.
‘You’re not going to do that. You’re not going to threaten me and you’re not going to take her from me.’ She swept her eyes shut, exhaling as she realised how right she was. ‘You’re a good person, Leonidas, and you’re not capable of behaving like that. Whatever you might feel, you know our daughter belongs with me.’
‘And not with me?’ he prompted.
‘Yes, with you, too,’ she said simply. ‘And we’ll work that out. We’ll work out a way to share her properly, to give her everything she deserves. For my daughter I would do almost anything—on Capri, I thought I’d even marry you for her. I thought needing her to have a “proper family” and to know her safety to be assured meant this marriage was essential.’ She stared up at him, her eyes suspiciously moist, her voice unsteady. ‘But I’ve got to know myself this week. I finally understand who I am and what I want—marrying a man who doesn’t, and says he will never, love me would be a monumental mistake; one I have no intention of making.’
Only ten minutes earlier she’d been readying herself to tell him she loved him, and now Hannah was laying the groundwork for her departure.
‘You told me this place is impossible to leave without your say-so. I’m asking you to let me go now. Today. This morning. To organise your plane or your helicopter or your yacht, something to take me away.’
His eyes narrowed; he regarded her sceptically for a moment, and when he spoke there was a bitterness in his words. ‘And where will you go, Hannah? To Australia? To your horrible aunt and cousin? Or to London where you know barely anyone?’
Her chest pricked with blades of hurt. ‘So you think I should stay here because there’s nowhere better to be?’
‘I think you should stay here because you want to and because it’s best for everyone.’
‘Not for me. I won’t stay and be an instrument of your self-flagellation, another weapon for your sadism. You punished yourself every year by going to Chrysá Vráchia, and now you plan to punish yourself by having a wife you desire but won’t ever love, because it would betray Amy. No, thanks. That’s not for me.’
He let out a curse and crossed the room, but Hannah was done. She lifted a hand, stalling him.
‘I’m sorry I couldn’t disconnect my feelings as well as you did yours. I’m sorry I agreed to this only to change my mind, but I didn’t have all the facts.’ She reached for the enormous diamond engagement ring that had never really suited her anyway and dislodged it, sliding it over her knuckle and off her hand.
‘I’ll go back to London,’ she said, thinking quickly. ‘That makes sense for now. It’s close enough that you can see her often.’
He made a noise of frustration. ‘I don’t want you to go.’
‘I know that,’ she whispered. ‘But can you give me any reason that’s good enough to stay?’
He didn’t say anything, his eyes running over her face as if he could see inside her soul and find some way to induce her to remain. But there was none—not that he could give her.
‘I have a house in London,’ he said, his eyes dropping to her lips before he tore them away, looking over her shoulder. ‘You should take it.’
‘No, thanks.’
‘Hannah,’ he groaned. ‘You’re the mother of our child. I need you to be somewhere safe. Somewhere decent. Just...take the damned house for now. We’ll sort out the paperwork later.’
‘Once she’s born,’ Hannah compromised quietly. ‘But my room is still available. All my stuff is still in it, in fact. I can go back and it’ll be like nothing ever happened.’ Her smile hurt, stretching across her face, filling her with grief.
‘And what of your safety? Do you no longer care for that?’
She felt her stomach twist because he was doing everything he could to get her to stay—but for all the wrong reasons. ‘I presume you fully intend to send guards to watch over me?’
He dipped his head in silent concession.
‘I will cooperate with you on security, Leonidas.’ Her eyes scanned his face. ‘I’m not an idiot. If there’s even a chance anything will happen to her because of who you are then I want all the help in the world to keep her safe. But that doesn’t require marriage. It do
esn’t mean I have to stay here—with you.’ She swallowed, a surreal sense of disbelief that this was happening taking over her.
He swore in Greek, bringing his body to hers, pressing their foreheads together, his eyes shut. ‘We can make this work.’
But Hannah knew it was a lie. Not an intentional deceit, so much as a desire to give her what she needed without losing any part of himself. He didn’t want to hurt her. He was a good person, and this hadn’t been in his plan.
She swallowed past the lump in her throat, a throat that was raw and stinging. ‘No, we can’t.’ She lifted up on her tiptoes then, because she couldn’t resist, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. ‘But at least we can say we tried.’
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THERE WERE NO photos of Amy and Brax in any of his homes for one very simple reason. Leonidas needed no photo in order to see them. They were burned into his retinas, his brain, his heart and soul. He saw them readily, and without any effort.
And now, Hannah was there too, and she was imprinted in a way that was impossible to scrub. He fell asleep with her smiling behind his eyelids and woke up with a start, seeing her visceral, deep pain on that last morning.
Her words were a whisper in his ears all day long. ‘I’m here, and I love you.’
Leonidas had become used to the torment of this—and it was a different torment, because, unlike Amy and Brax, Hannah was out there, within reach, a living, breathing person who loved him.
And he wanted her.
He needed her.
But he wasn’t messed up enough to know he didn’t deserve her. That he couldn’t do that to her. Not when she’d fallen in love with him.
She deserved love. Hadn’t he known that all along? Hadn’t he wished she hadn’t fallen pregnant to him purely because he knew she deserved to meet someone who would dedicate their life to loving her? Completely, unreservedly, in every way? She’d find that person, he was sure of it.
And what would happen then? Leonidas wondered. In fact, in the month since Hannah had left the island, Leonidas had thought about that a lot. When he wasn’t drinking Scotch and glowering at the ocean, or snapping at the domestic staff and firing off ill-thought-out emails, he was imagining what Hannah’s life post-Leonidas might look like.
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