He frowned swiftly, and she tensed, prepared for some blistering retort. At last he said, ‘What do you want from me, Gemma? Reassurances about how beautiful you are? Do you not know that you fill my eyes?’ He pulled her towards him almost fiercely, and his mouth took hers in a hard, bruising kiss in which the simmering anger she sensed in him was more evident than passion. When he let her go, she had to resist an impulse to cling to him, and was glad she’d done so when he said coolly, ‘Now come with me quickly, because I am already late for my appointments.’
He opened a door, and she found herself in a broad corridor, floored with marble, the exterior wall made of glass to give panoramic vistas of the gardens. She would have liked to have lingered, but his long stride gave her no chance, and she was breathless by the time they arrived in the foyer. While Andreas went over to the long reception desk, Gemma stood staring about her.
There were stairs, she saw, directing guests to an open-air restaurant on the first floor, as well as lifts, desks for car hire and tourist information and an imposing shopping mall opening off the foyer itself. There were few people about. Most of the guests would be outside, she thought, soaking up the afternoon sun and other delights. Inside, there were no raised voices or loud noises, or even canned music. The whole atmosphere was one of hushed, unhurried luxury, and it made Gemma sigh a little. How the other half lives, she thought ruefully.
Andreas came striding back. ‘I’ll take you down to the pool area,’ he told her. ‘Dimitris, one of the under managers, is there, and he will look after you, and see you have everything you need.’
Gemma shook his hand off her arm. ‘I can look after myself. I don’t need another jailer.’
His mouth thinned. ‘You need a beating,’ he said softly and furiously. ‘It is fortunate for you that I do not have time to administer it. Now, while you are here, you will keep a guard on that wasp’s tongue of yours,’ he added grimly.
His hand closed round hers, and this time she knew she wouldn’t shake him off without a struggle, so she let him take her, seething, out of the foyer on to an enormous sunny terrace, and down a narrow flight of steps in the corner on to the lawns beneath.
She was aware immediately that they were attracting attention. Every step they took was being monitored in some strange way from beneath the sun umbrellas they were passing between, and Gemma couldn’t imagine why.
Unless everyone knew they weren’t guests at the hotel, and their presence was being remarked and resented, she thought forlornly.
She began to hope they would find this Dimitris soon.
He turned out to be a short, stocky man, talking to the waiters at the poolside bar, and when he saw them coming towards him, Gemma saw his jaw drop visibly, although he recovered immediately and came towards them smiling, and holding out his hand in greeting.
Gemma felt absurdly self-conscious as she stood waiting while they talked to each other. She didn’t understand a word of what was being said, but it sounded as if Andreas was giving instructions rather than asking any favours, she thought, surprised.
And then a new voice intervened, female, husky and speaking good but accented English. ‘Andreas—where have you been hiding yourself all this time? We have all missed you.’
She was beautiful, Gemma thought detachedly, a real Val
kyrie
of a girl with flaxen hair, and a figure bordering on the voluptuous and shown off to the best possible advantage in a tiny leopardskin print bikini. She was smiling at Andreas radiantly, and at the same time managing to give Gemma a look from her vivid blue eyes which was both hostile and dismissive. A clever trick, Gemma found herself thinking, and one which the newcomer had got down to a fine art.
Andreas turned to meet her, his smile easy in response. He said, ‘You flatter me, Helga. I am sure your life is too full, too interesting, for you to have even given me a thought.’
She gave a little gurgle of laughter. ‘Then you are wrong. We were only saying at lunch how cruelly you have been neglecting us.’ She came even closer, putting a hand on his arm caressingly. ‘But it is good to see you because I have an invitation for you. Tomorrow is my father’s birthday and we are having a special dinner to celebrate. Both he and my mother would be so glad if you would join us.’
Her smile was winning, her fingers curling possessively on his dark skin. Gemma, watching, was shocked by a predatory impulse to do her violence.
He said, ‘If only it were possible, but to my infinite regret, I have engagements for several days.’
She pouted appealingly. ‘They will be so disappointed. We have hardly seen you at all this year.’ Her glance flicked to Gemma. ‘It is not kind to desert your—old friends.’
‘Have I done so?’ He lifted her hand to his lips. ‘Then I apologise. Convey my respects to your parents, and assure them I shall have the pleasure of dining with them one night next week.’
Helga’s eyes were heavy with seductive meaning. ‘That will be good. We shall all look forward so much ...’ She paused. ‘Now, won’t you introduce me to your little friend?’
As a put-down, it couldn’t be bettered, Gemma thought as she shook hands politely and murmured something. Helga’s eyes were all over her taking in every detail of the cheap dress, and the simple sandals, and letting Gemma know what she thought of them with one derisive flicker of an eyebrow.
Andreas was looking frowningly at his watch. He pulled Gemma to one side. He said in an undertone, ‘I have to go.’ He paused, the frown deepening. ‘You will be all right?’
She said brightly, ‘Never better,’ and watched him walk away round the edge of the pool. It needed all the strength she possessed not to run after him, begging him to take her with him wherever he was going, and she was proud of the control that kept her standing where she was.
She didn’t know what his relationship had been with the gorgeous Helga, although she could guess. And the fact that her parents seemed to be around would make very little difference either. She was beautiful, sexy and very determined—a potent combination, Gemma had to acknowledge.
And next week—when her plane had left for England—next week he had promised to dine with them—with Helga for dessert, no doubt, she thought, her nails digging convulsively into the palms of her hands.
And she was all kinds of a fool to feel so bitterly, grindingly jealous because she’d known all along that she only existed on the fringe of his life, their relationship, such as it was, purely temporary, born out of bitterness and vengeance.
And when it was over, Helga and others like her would be waiting ...
And I’ll be waiting too, Gemma thought achingly. Waiting for the rest of my life.
Chapter Nine
GEMMA lay under the sun umbrella, pretending to read. Dimitris had been endlessly kind, producing a lounger and umbrella for her as if by magic, providing a selection of the latest paperback bestsellers for her to choose from, insisting that she had a long cool drink. But he could not persuade her to accompany him to the hotel boutique and choose a bikini to sunbathe in. Kyrios Andreas, he kept repeating almost plaintively, had left instructions. Kyrios Andreas would not be pleased if they were disregarded.
Gemma, however, remained adamant. She did not want to swim, she told Dimitris mendaciously because the glittering turquoise water looked infinitely cool and alluring, and she preferred to stay in the shade.
At last he shook his head sadly, said that if she required anything, she had only to tell one of the waiters, and took himself off.
She knew she was being an idiot, but she couldn’t help it. She was conscious all the time of Helga’s sharp blue gaze following her every move from across the pool, and there was no way she was going to strip and reveal all her body’s pallid deficiencies in front of that sneering, suntanned goddess. Compared with Helga, she wasn’t just slim, but thin, she knew despondently, and under the circumstances she preferred to remain covered, no matter how hot it was.
She found she was stealing covert glances at Helga from time to time, despising herself as she did so. The German girl was spectacular and knew it, she thought drily, especially after she had casually discarded the top of her bikini. She wondered what Helga’s parents, who looked portly, middle-aged and conventional, made of their glamorous daughter’s antics, and decided after a few moments’ observation that they regarded them with doting, uncritical fondness. And presumably if she wanted to spend part of her vacation in bed with a rich, sexy Greek that was all right too.
She bit her lip sharply. That kind of speculation was bad news. The last thing she wanted was to start building images of Andreas and Helga together, his darkness against all that golden splendour.
She tried to interest herself in her book. It was by one of her favourite writers, but the problems of the main characters seemed to pale into insignificance beside her own, and for once the plot failed to grip.
‘Still all alone?’ Helga asked with sweet malice. Without waiting for an invitation, she gestured to a passing waiter to put a vacant lounger next to Gemma’s. She had her sunglasses with her, and a bottle of expensive oil. She looked as if she’d come to stay, as she stretched languorously on the lounger, and began to apply the oil to her full, firm breasts. ‘It is wicked of Andreas to leave you for so long. But that is the way he is.’
She paused, and Gemma wondered drily whether she was supposed to say, ‘Thanks for the warning.’ ‘Have you known him long?’ Helga asked. ‘And how did you meet?’ She was eyeing Gemma almost incredulously.
Gemma said lightly. ‘Not long. And I suppose you could say my brother brought us together.’
She could see Helga trying to work that one out, and failing, then the other woman said, ‘You are here on holiday, one supposes.’
The supposition was correct, but what Helga really wanted to know was when she would be going home, and Gemma was damned if she was going to tell her.
She said, ‘Yes, I’ve always wanted to come to Crete.’ And launched into a spritely and specious account of the museums she’d visited and the antiquities she’d seen, sensing and enjoying her companion’s rising irritation.
At last Helga interrupted shrilly, ‘But you did not meet Nikolaides in such places. It is not possible. And you are not a guest in this hotel. Did you come on some package tour?’ She made the idea sound like an insult, which was probably exactly what she intended.
And Gemma thought, ‘I’m not the only one who’s eaten up with jealousy. She’ll be here when I’m gone, but she isn’t sure of him.’
She said equably, ‘No, I’m not staying here unfortunately. It’s a beautiful place, isn’t it. Do you stay here often?’
‘We have stayed here each year since it opened,’ Helga returned ungraciously. ‘We spend usually a month, but sometimes it is longer.’
And you’d like it to be permanent, Gemma added silently. Well, you have nothing to worry about from me. I’m just passing through.
But all she said quietly was, ‘It must be wonderful to have such freedom,’ and saw with relief Dimitris almost hurtling towards them.
‘Excuse me ladies,’ he was smiling smoothly, the polite managerial mask well in place. ‘But Kyrios Andreas would like you to join him in the penthouse,
thespinis
.'
She got up thankfully. She looked down at Helga, smiling faintly into the lovely, sulky face. ‘Goodbye,
fraulein
,' she said politely. ‘It was good to meet you.’ It was certainly salutory, she added wryly.
Helga’s smile in return was small and hostile. ‘
Auf wiedersehen
. And you may tell Andreas that if he wishes to change his mind about dinner tomorrow night, he need only arrive.’ She paused. ‘He will be more than welcome.’
‘I’ll tell him,’ Gemma agreed calmly, and walked away.
As they went into the hotel, Dimitris said, ‘I hope Fraulein Gretz has said nothing to upset you,
thespinis
. Her father is a very wealthy man, an industrialist from Stuttgart, and she is an only child who gets very much her own way.’
‘And is consequently spoiled rotten,’ Gemma concluded for him. ‘I’d rather worked that out for myself.’
‘She can be difficult,’ Dimitris conceded discreetly. ‘And Kyrios Andreas was not pleased when he saw she was talking to you,’ he added.
She failed to see why, although she didn’t say so to Dimitris. There was nothing Helga could have told her that she hadn’t been able to work out for herself.
They didn’t use the public lifts, to her surprise. Dimitris unlocked a door in the reception area, revealing a short passage leading to another, smaller lift.
‘This goes straight to the penthouse,’ Dimitris said, pressing a button.
Gemma was totally at a loss as the lift ascended. ‘So, what’s up there?’ she asked. ‘Offices?’
‘Just the boardroom,
thespinis
, and the apartment that Kyrios Andreas uses when he is at the hotel.’
‘And does he stay here often?’ she asked bemused, wondering what a permanent penthouse suite would cost in a hotel as luxurious as this.
‘As often as he can,
thespinis
. Kyrios Nikolaides takes a close interest in the running of all his hotels, as his father did before him.’
She felt dizzy, as if the walls of the lift were closing round her. She said breathlessly, ‘I don’t quite understand, Dimitris. Are you saying this hotel actually—belongs to—to Kyrios Andreas— that he’s the owner?’
As the lift doors opened, Dimitris gave her a slightly reproachful look. ‘But of course,
thespinis
. How could you not know?’
‘How indeed?’ Gemma said ironically.
They passed the boardroom. She glimpsed a long polished table, and two secretaries gathering up papers. Then Dimitris was knocking at a door, and it opened and Andreas was standing in the doorway so close that she could have touched him, and yet in another way, they had never been further apart.