are we in Greece, exactly?’ she asked curiously.
‘This is Thalia.’
She quickened her pace to catch up with him. ‘Thalia was the daughter of Zeus,’ she said, trying to remember her Greek myths.
‘Or the nymph Thalia, deity of rejuvenation?’ he suggested. ‘No one knows for sure which one the island was named for.’
‘This is an island?’ The slow rumblings of cold suspicion pulled her to a sudden stop.
Having reached the car, he turned to look at her, his expression growing impatient when he saw her standing still a couple of metres away. ‘Can we do the Greek-history lesson another time? It is growing late and I need to be back here in time to take off again before dusk.’
It was like being hit with too much information. Zoe turned a full circle, casting her gaze out across the forest tops. They were surrounded by sea, glinting water everywhere she looked. The island could be no bigger than a few miles wide either way.
‘Island,’ she whispered, staring at him as if he’d grown horns out of his head. ‘You’ve done it again, haven’t you? You’ve promised me one thing then done something else!’
Looking at her standing there pinned to the shimmering tarmac in her slender black clothes—which more and more were making him aware that there was a nicely shaped women hidden within—Anton let out a sigh. ‘Having a normal conversation with you is like treading on broken glass! What,’ he incised, ‘Are you getting so fired up about now?’
‘This!’ Zoe cried, flinging her arms out. ‘You are intending to just dump Toby and me here with Theo Kanellis before you fly off into the sunset!’
‘Are you out of your head?’ Anton fired angrily back at her. ‘This is not Theo’s island it is my island! Don’t you even know the name of your own father’s birthplace?’
The way she blinked those infuriatingly beautiful eyes at him made it clear that she did not. The lowering sun was turning her hair into a halo of spun-golden threads. Oh damn it, he thought, growling the curse inside his own head. And he knew why he was cursing—hell did he know.
‘You grandfather’s island is called Argiris—Argiris!’ He repeated it furiously, flinging out one of his arms. ‘It lies about fifty kilometres off in that direction.’
‘Oh,’ she mumbled, and actually swivelled to look as if she had laser vision and could see fifty kilometres away.
He allowed himself the absolutely guilty pleasure of visualising himself striding over there and dragging her into his arms so he could kiss that contrite pout she was now wearing off her pink mouth. ‘Get in the car,’ he growled, and made do with swinging the car door open then stood, glowering down at his shoes, while he waited for her to come and get into the car.
He caught the scent of her again as she came closer, that distracting smell of freshly cut apples that made the juices inside his mouth spring out on to the flat of his tongue. It attacked other parts of him too, making him pull in the muscles around his hips.
‘Blame yourself if I can’t trust a single thing that you say or do,’ she informed him coolly before she disappeared into the car with an aggravating, lofty flounce.
Anton closed the door with a cringingly gentle click. Zoe bit down on her soft bottom lip and stared after him as he strode off towards the other car. He didn’t even want to be in the same car as her any more, she realised, and felt this strange hollow feeling open up in the pit of her stomach.
‘It is not always wise to make him angry,’ a dry voice murmured beside her.
STARTLED, Zoe wrenched her head around then blinked when she found Kostas sitting across on the other side of the car with Toby strapped in between them sleeping the sleep of the contented innocent.
‘It is not wise to give arrogant bullies like him all their own way, either,’ she flicked right back.
‘You goad him,’ said Kostas.
‘I asked him a simple question and he took my head off!’ She defended herself despite knowing that she did goad Anton all the time and without really understanding why she needed to do that.
And where was he going to that he needed an extra car? she wondered as she watched the lead car begin to move away. Preferring to slit her own throat than to ask Kostas the question, she made do with telling herself that she didn’t care where he was going so long as it was far away from her.
‘He has business to attend to in the village.’ Kostas, who could clearly read minds, offered up the information without her request. ‘He must then be back here to board his plane before sunset arrives because our small airport is not authorised to function after dusk.’
‘So this isn’t actually his private island, then?’ He’d just claimed it as such.
Kostas made a face. ‘It is the place of Anton’s birth, the home of his late father and many more Pallis fathers before him. Anton built the airport, the small hospital in the village and the new school, and he provides employment for anyone who wants to stay on the island or helps those who prefer to find employment elsewhere.’
There was pride in Kostas’s voice as he reeled off his employer’s good points, pride and affection. It only stung Zoe’s into a stubborn determination to think the worst of Anton Pallis’s motives even here in this island where everyone obviously believed he was some kind of living saint. Well, the devil knew how to soften people up with favours—before he demanded your soul as recompense. And she was determined to keep her soul very much intact, thank you very much!
She hated Anton. It was really quite unsettlingly exciting how much she hated him. The feeling kind of taunted her with all different kinds of nerve-stimulating flicks and flurries, so she had to sit tense-backed and consciously control her breathing so what was going on with her on the inside would not show on the outside.
They’d been driving steadily down through the trees since they’d left the tiny airport; now the forest had thinned out to reveal pretty green meadows dotted with olive and fruit groves basking in the sultry late sunlight. In front of them the water was closer, the dusty road they were travelling along showing a junction not far ahead. The front car went to the left; they turned to the right and were suddenly travelling parallel to a pine-edged sandy beach. She could see boats out on the shimmering sea like tiny white dots of glinting white and was surprised to see a small hotel on the opposite side of the road.
‘You have a tourist industry here?’ she asked because, despite not wanting to be interested, she discovered that she was.
‘Tourism is not discouraged,’ said Kostas. ‘However it is expected of anyone who comes to stay on Thalia that they maintain standards of behaviour we islanders are used to here.’
Another snippet of information, Zoe acknowledged. Kostas was a native of this island too.
‘So, what happens if they don’t behave?’ Suddenly her lost sense of humour crept out for an airing. ‘Does he have them thrown into jail then lord it over
