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Head up, she pinned on a confident smile and, picking up a corsage that someone had dropped on the floor she tucked it at a jaunty angle into her buttonhole. She intended to see to it that the society wedding of the decade didn’t go without a hitch.
CHAPTER TWO
CHRISTOS watched the irate best man vanish around the side of the building and suppressed a twinge of guilt. For a second he was tempted to follow him, but instead he blew on his fingers to revive the circulation. It struck him as faintly ludicrous that even after all that had happened his first instinct was to bail his cousin out.
What Alex needed was not someone to hold his hand and wipe his nose—he needed to take responsibility for his own actions. Christos’s attempt the previous year to instil a sense of responsibility into the younger man had failed spectacularly.
When he had spelt out the new rules to his cousin, the younger man had laughed.
‘This is a wind-up. You’re bluffing.’
Christos had shaken his head. ‘Turn up at the office more than once every six months, and when you’re there do more than drink coffee and chat up female staff.’
‘I delegate,’ Alex had protested.
‘No. I delegate; you sponge. Work, cousin—or the very healthy cheque that’s credited to your bank account every month won’t be there.’
Christos hadn’t been bluffing.
There were a number of family members who had called him a heartless monster for refusing to be swayed from his decision—though naturally not to his face. Interestingly, there had been an equal number who had said, About time too!
But Alex’s response to the challenge had not been what he’d hoped. In fact it had been something he could not have predicted.
Christos had never decided if Alex had wanted him to find out, but there was no similar ambiguity when it came to his ex-fiancée’s intentions. Melina had known Christos was coming to her flat that evening, to return the keys and pick up the laptop he’d left there.
‘Don’t be silly—there’s no reason we can’t be civilised. We have history,’ Melina had said when he’d rung to say he would send someone round with the keys. ‘You come, darling, and we can have a drink to the good times.’
The look of spiteful triumph in her eyes when he had walked in and found her and Alex naked on the floor, amidst a pile of discarded clothes and several empty wine bottles, had removed any lingering guilt Christos felt about ending their short-lived farcical engagement the previous week.
Mild disgust and contempt were not the responses a man was meant to have when he found the woman he had briefly contemplated spending the rest of his life with making love to another man!
He’d felt no desire to take violent retribution, no desire to wipe the supercilious smirk off his cousin’s face—just a compelling urge to walk away from the sordid and tasteless spectacle.
And that was what he had done. He had slung the keys on the table and left. His only regret being that he had ever been insane enough to think all right and workable were thoughts a man should have as prerequisites for marriage.
Before Christos succumbed to frostbite, or to the austerity of his own grim reflections, his great-aunt, whom he had been delegated to escort, arrived. Christos heard her before he saw her. Her bony frame was swamped by several layers of motley fur, and her grey hair was crammed into an ancient shapeless hat, but her voice was not similarly fettered. It was loud and penetrating.
‘It is not civilised. I shouldn’t be surprised if this British weather kills me!’ she was telling a fellow guest.
‘I should be very surprised.’
A smile illuminated the lined, leathery face as Theodosia Carides identified the tall figure who had materialised at her side.
‘So you did come,’ she grunted, offering her rose-scented withered cheek for her great-nephew’s respectful salute.
‘Seeing you, Aunt Theodosia, makes the effort worth while.’
‘Don’t try your charm on me,’ the old lady recommended, repressing a pleased grin as she accepted the arm her tall handsome nephew offered. ‘I’m immune.’
The still-upright septuagenarian, who did not even reach his shoulder, did not see the need to lower her voice as her favourite nephew escorted her into the hushed, vaulted interior of the Cathedral.
‘I thought you were in Australia, Christos?’
‘I was.’ Christos saw Melina, looking as stunning as ever, seated a few feet away. They nodded in a civilised manner to one another.
‘Did Alex really ask you to be best man?’
‘Yes, he did.’
‘And you said no?’
Christos’s expression didn’t alter as he inclined his dark head in agreement—which, considering the mental picture of his ex, naked astride the groom, which was at that moment flickering across his retina, was no mean achievement.
‘I expect you had your reasons…?’
Christos did not satisfy her curiosity. ‘Can I take that for you, Aunt?’ he asked, indicating the large portmanteau his elderly relative clutched.
‘I am not an invalid.’ Despite this sharp assertion, she paused to catch her breath. ‘I suppose you know that Andrea is saying your refusal is just another symptom of your deep-seated jealousy?’
Christos’s dark brows lifted. ‘Jealousy?’
The old lady nodded. ‘According to her, you’ve always been jealous of her precious Alex.’ No longer able to conceal her amusement, she gave a loud cackle of mirth and shared the joke. ‘Apparently you never lose any opportunity to belittle him and make him look foolish. Though from what I’ve seen he doesn’t need much help—and so I told his mother. Andrea always was a very silly woman.’
‘I must remember to avoid Aunt Andrea.’
‘As if you care what she thinks. As if you care what anyone thinks.’ Her expression suggested she approved of this attitude.
Christos gave one his most charming smiles. ‘I care what you think, Aunt Theodosia,’ he promised slickly.
The old lady dismissed the comment with a derisive snort. ‘Does nobody but me care about tradition any more?’ she wondered out loud. ‘Nobody would even know this was a Carides wedding,’ she continued, in the same disapproving bellow. ‘Nobody has yet explained to me why they’re not having a proper Orthodox ceremony.’
‘Don’t look at me, Aunt Theodosia. This wedding has nothing to do with me.’ He was only here because his mother had got distressed and played the duty card. ‘They’ll think you don’t like your cousin.’
‘I don’t.’
In the event his honesty had not won him any points with his mother. She had bitterly enquired over the phone if he derived some form of malicious pleasure out of tormenting her.
‘If he gets a little loud around you it’s because you make him feel inadequate,’ Mia Carides had explained.
On the other side of the world, Christos had given a wry grin. Inadequate was one of the things a man might be excused for feeling if he found the woman he was to have married having sex with another man. Only he had never really been in love with Melina.
In truth, it had come as something of a surprise to Christos to hear the news of his own engagement!
When Melina had pulled her father to one side and whispered in his ear, Christos had had no inkling of the secret she was sharing. Not until two minutes later, when their host had called for hush and shared the news with the rest of the three hundred or so close friends who were there to celebrate the thirty years of married bliss he and his wife had enjoyed.
‘I am happy to announce that my daughter and our dear friend Christos Carides are to be married.’
Christos had had no desire to humiliate the rather drunk Melina, with whom he had enjoyed a casual on-off relationship for several years, so he had smiled through the inevitable congratulations and gone home with the firm intention of ending the engagement the next day.
That had been his first mistake!
His next had been not to agree when a very shame-faced and repentant Melina had turned up the next morning, promising to set the record straight immediately. Her remorse had appeared totally genuine, and she’d obviously been mortified—so much so that he had heard himself saying, ‘Why bother? We could give it a trial run.’
‘Do you really think so, Christos?’
‘Why not? We get on well enough, and it’s not as though either of us is waiting for love at first sight.’
Contemplating life without love did not overly concern Christos. A person could not miss what they had never had. And perhaps, as Melina had claimed in one of their many arguments, he was incapable of the emotion?
‘What do you mean, nothing to do with you? You’re head of the family, aren’t you?’ Aunt Theodosia demanded shrilly.
With a rueful smile Christos refocused his attention on the demanding little lady at his elbow. When jet lag eventually kicked in he was going to sleep for a week. ‘A title with few benefits.’
His dry observation drew a crowing little laugh from the old lady, but she added severely, ‘Don’t whine, Christos. You have been blessed with brains, looks and health—not to mention a gift for making large amounts of money without breaking a sweat.’
The unsympathetic recommendation brought a smile to Christos’s dark, expressive eyes. ‘Sorry, Aunt,’ he said, bowing his dark head meekly.
‘This girl of Alex’s has got a face like a horse,’ she observed regretfully.
‘Sally is a very nice girl,’ Christos responded, a quiver in his deep voice.
It was at that moment he saw her.
He stopped dead, and didn’t hear what Theodosia was saying—or, for that matter, anything else. She was framed in the doorway, her hair as she entered the Gothic candlelit Cathedral an incredible burnished beacon.
For a few seconds things got seriously surreal. But there was in all probability some perfectly prosaic reason for the rest of the world receding, leaving him with the impression that he and the redhead were the only two people in the place.
Christos, his jaw clenched, blinked hard, and the hum of conversation gradually filtered back into his consciousness. Jet lag, he concluded, loosening the constricting tie around his neck a little as he narrowed his gaze on the bright head of the slim, simply dressed woman.
He had never seen her before. Not that this made her exceptional. There were any number of people attending the wedding that he had never laid eyes on before. But, unlike this late arrival, those strangers had no connection with the prickle on the back of his neck. The groove between his dark, strongly delineated black brows deepened as he lifted a hand to the affected area.
With a first-class degree in pure maths, and the owner of a mind that was widely held to be brilliantly analytical and logical, he saw nothing contradictory in trusting his instincts. And there was absolutely no doubt in his mind that the slender redhead represented trouble of a major variety.
Perhaps the danger she represented appealed to him? Could that alone account for his suddenly out-of-control libido? He didn’t have a clue, and he was not in a mood to analyse his motivation, he just knew he was going to make sure—even at the risk of major disappointment—of meeting her.
At some level he recognised that even the recent months of self-enforced abstinence didn’t totally explain away the compulsion that made him unable to take his eyes off her for fear she would vanish.
Vanish? With that hair? Not likely. His eyes moved hungrily over the mass of rich auburn curls that fell down her shapely narrow back. It was extremely unlikely that she would be swallowed up in the crowd, even though that was clearly her desire. A circumstance that he would investigate at a later date, when other more urgent needs, like hearing her voice, were satisfied.
Christos met many attractive, interesting women during the course of his average day, but none that had ever immobilised him with lust. But now…He trained his eyes on the redhead, who was still trying hard to blend in, and drew a deep breath. This was a temptation he had no intention of resisting.
‘I don’t dislike horses, and from what I’ve seen the girl has got excellent child-bearing hips.’
A thoughtful expression settled on Theodosia’s lined face as she imperiously reclaimed her nephew’s attention with this outrageous observation and a sharp tug on his jacket.
‘Is she pregnant, I wonder? It would explain the unseemly haste. What do you think, Christos?’
With an air of resignation, and still conscious in the periphery of his vision of the redhead, he guided the outspoken old lady into her seat. ‘I think I should mind my own business.’
‘Not that there’s anything wrong with a pregnant bride.’
‘That is very broad-minded of you, Aunt Theodosia.’
‘I’m not a prude, boy.’
Christos’s thickly lashed eyes narrowed in affection. ‘You do surprise me.’
‘And virgins are all well and good,’ she observed generously.
The redhead, he noticed, was in danger of disappearing behind a stone column. He had established, to his satisfaction, that she definitely wasn’t with anyone, but she was too far away for him to tell if she wore any rings.
‘I’m not aware that I know any.’ In his opinion it was more important to be the last man in a woman’s life, not the first, if that woman was the one you intended to spend the rest of your life with.
Theodosia chose to ignore her nephew’s satiric insert beyond tapping him sharply across the knuckles with her cane. ‘I hardly think you’re in any position to criticise. Greek men can be so hypocritical,’ she observed tartly. ‘You’re no saint yourself, young man. At least,’ she continued, ‘when you get a girl pregnant before you put the ring on her finger you know she’s fertile.’
‘That’s very pragmatic of you.’ He cupped the old lady’s elbow as she lowered herself slowly into the pew. ‘But I’m not sure,’ he added in a soft aside, ‘that the bride’s father shares your viewpoint. Or that the modern female would enjoy being likened to a brood mare.’
Just at that moment his mother, looking flushed and breathless, appeared at his shoulder. ‘Christos—I need you.’ Under her breath, Mia Carides said with a fixed smile, ‘Don’t encourage her.’
‘What do you need me for, Mother?’ Christos asked, wondering if the glorious redhead’s hair was as soft and silky as it looked. A man could dream of falling asleep wrapped in that hair…
‘There’s a problem with security,’ Mia improvised smoothly. ‘Such a nuisance. I’m sorry, Aunt Theodosia, you’ll have to excuse us.’
Her son responded to the urgent look with a languid smile which made his mother’s diplomatic expression wobble for an instant as she clenched her teeth. Her son, as she knew, could be very vexing when he chose.
‘Aunt Theodosia and I were just discussing the blushing bride, Mother.’
‘I know—I heard you. So did half the guests,’ Mia observed, waving graciously and bestowing a serene smile on the bride’s indignant parents.
Undeterred, Aunt Theodosia continued, ‘This family needs more babies. What is wrong with you young people nowadays? When are you going to have some babies, Christos?’
Christos bent and pressed his lips in a courtly gesture to the frail, age-spotted old hand. ‘When I find someone with as much spunk as you.’ Or, failing that, red hair. He blinked, wondering where that thought had come from.
The old lady tried to hide her pleased smile. ‘If you do,’ she predicted, ‘it might well be the making of you. That other girl—what was her name?’
‘Melina.’
‘That was it. I didn’t like her. She smiled too much.’
Across the aisle, Melina wasn’t smiling at all. In fact she was looking daggers at a girl with red hair, who Christos had barely taken his eyes from.
CHAPTER THREE
‘WHY do you encourage her, Christos?’ his mother reproached him as she walked down the aisle.
While he lent an attentive ear to his mother, Christos continued to watch the troublesome redhead as she sat down, concealing all but the top of her fiery head from his view.
‘Carl looked furious,’ Mia added in a hushed tone. ‘Especially as Sally is pregnant.’
