closed his eyes. The curse that escaped his clamped lips drew Georgie’s attention to the sensual curve of his mouth. Her stomach dipped and she tore her eyes away.
‘Sorry, but I don’t understand Greek. Do you mind translating?’
‘You don’t understand my language because you made not the slightest effort to learn it.’
‘No effort!’ she yelped, stung by this unjust accusation. ‘I may not have been very good, but it wasn’t for want of trying. I only stopped going to the wretched lessons when—’
He looked at her in open amazement. ‘Lessons? You did not take lessons.’
‘Well, I had to do something to fill my days other than shopping and having my hair done.’
She had no intention of telling him that she had wanted to surprise him. That she had cherished an unrealistic ambition of casually replying to him in fluent, flawless Greek. Her ambition to make her husband proud of her seemed painfully pathetic in light of what had happened.
‘So you were not content with your life as my wife?’
‘You didn’t want a wife, you wanted a mistress! And I’m not mistress material.’ She watched an expression of astonishment steal across his face and added as a reckless afterthought, ‘I was bored silly.’
CHAPTER SIX
‘BORED…?’
Georgie turned a deaf ear to the dangerous note in Angolos’s voice and nodded. ‘Yes, bored. I got bored with you and Greek lessons.’
There was no way in the world she would ever tell him how his mother and sister had made fun of her attempts to converse. Angolos, they had said, would be embarrassed by her awkward grammar and appalling accent. Like all her attempts to fit in, this one had never stood a chance, not with in-laws who had never lost an opportunity to make her feel inadequate.
‘I had no idea that living with me was such an ordeal.’
‘Neither did I at the time. Now,’ she told him calmly, ‘I can be more objective.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘So now your life is exciting and fulfilling?’
‘I have a career and a child.’
‘How did you take care of a baby and attend college?’
‘I left him in the college crèche. And fortunately the school I work at is happy for him to go to the nursery there.’
‘So you qualified…?’
‘Amazing, isn’t it? I’m actually not the brainless bimbo you and your family thought me, Angolos.’
His dark lashes swept downwards, touching the curve of his high, chiselled cheekbones as he studied his feet. There was a lengthy pause before he lifted his head and replied.
‘I never thought you were brainless.’
Georgie did not make the mistake of taking this comment as a compliment. She recognised that she was within seconds of losing control totally. Her assertions, the ones that she repeated like a mantra to herself every night, that she was totally over him, would be out the window if she started to batter her fists against his chest.
Their eyes locked and neither combatant heard the first tentative tap on the open door. The second, slighter louder one got their attention.
‘I’ll be right there, Ruth,’ Georgie promised, pulling the door open.
‘No hurry,’ the older woman soothed. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, but Nicky is asking for his cosy. I wasn’t sure what he meant.’
‘It’s his blanket, yellow…sort of. It’s in his bedroom on the chest by the window.’
‘He needs a security blanket?’
The faintest hint of criticism and her hackles were up. ‘Actually it’s a sheet.’ So now he was the child expert.
‘He has problems…?’ A child who had been rejected by his father—why was he surprised? Angolos, a firm believer that a stable family was the only place to bring up a child, knew that if his son had problems the blame lay at his own door. He didn’t know how this had happened, but he was a father and he needed to put right the harm he had already done.
‘No, he doesn’t have problems. He’s a normal little boy who…’ She stopped and frowned. ‘Good grief, I don’t know why I’m explaining anything to you of all people.’
‘Because I am his father.’
‘Biologically maybe…’
She had never expected her dig to evoke any real reaction, certainly not the expression of haunted regret that she saw on his face.
‘Look, Angolos, if you’ve come over with a case of delayed paternal feelings, I suggest you go take an aspirin or buy a shiny new car. I’m sure it will pass.’
‘You think I am that shallow?’ he enquired in a savage growl.
‘Think? I know you’re that shallow,’ she retorted. ‘Shallow and cruel and vindictive…’ Something she might remind herself the next time she found herself in danger of feeling sorry for him. The fact was, if she ever started thinking of Angolos as the victim it was time for the men in white coats. ‘This is a pointless conversation.’
‘It’s one we’re going to have.’
Fine! If he wanted a war of attrition, she thought, he could have a war of attrition. But he was going to discover that during the time they’d been apart she had developed a backbone, not to mention a mind of her own!
‘Why, Angolos? Because you say so? I know it used to work that way, but not any more.’ She gave a hiss of frustration as her trained maternal ear caught the sound of her son’s cry. A few seconds later Angolos heard it too and turned his head in the direction of the angry sound.
‘What’s wrong with him?’
‘Being a mother doesn’t make me psychic.’ It had, however, given her the ability to distinguish between her son’s cries. The one she had heard suggested tiredness, not pain or distress. ‘I’ve got to go to him.’ She started for the door, but he moved and effectively blocked her path with his body. Her nostrils flared as she caught the faint scent of the fragrance he used. Low in her belly her muscles tightened.
‘Fine!’ she snapped, throwing up her hands in angry capitulation. ‘If you want me to listen to you I will, but not now or here.’
‘When and where, then?’
She said the first thing that came into her head. ‘The beach.’
‘Where we used to meet. Where you offered me your innocence…’
His tone, softly sensual, stole the strength from her legs at the first syllable. Falling flat on her face would not be a good move, Georgie decided, reaching casually for the
