to accept because she’d never relied on anyone but herself.
‘To be honest I don’t miss it at all,’ she said slowly. ‘I felt more like me once the bulk of the money was gone.’
‘I’m afraid you’ve lost me now.’
She met the cool question in his eyes. Why not tell him? It wasn’t as if it mattered any more. She was no longer that anxious woman who had been terrified he’d stop loving her if he saw through to the dark insecurity which gnawed away deep inside her.
‘Frugality is my default mechanism,’ she explained. ‘That’s what I grew up with. What I was used to. When you’re dirt poor it’s tough, but it has its benefits. It makes you hungry—and hunger was what drove my ambition. It’s what made me enter that TV reality show at the age of sixteen, even though everybody said I didn’t have a chance of winning. But I did win. I confounded all expectations and got myself a recording contract.’
He opened his mouth to reply but at that moment his assistant tapped on the door and entered the room, depositing a tray of tea on his desk. ‘Thank you, Kimberly,’ he said.
Kimberly smiled and Lexi watched as she walked back out of the office with the slightly self-conscious confidence of an attractive woman who was wearing a too-tight dress.
‘Has all your money gone?’ he continued.
‘Not all of it, no.’ Without being asked or offered, Lexi leaned forward and poured herself some tea and this small element of control helped refocus her thoughts. Adding milk and stirring two heaped teaspoons of sugar into her cup, she shook her head. ‘I have my own house—paid off in full—and enough investments to ensure I never starve. And I’m hoping to grow my jewellery design business so that it becomes a viable source of income.’
Xenon watched as she sat there drinking her tea, with the summer sunshine illuminating her hair so that it tumbled down around her shoulders like a pale waterfall. He thought she looked fragile and intensely feminine, yet the spectacles she wore gave her a serious and slightly geeky appearance. This was a new Lexi and he didn’t know how to handle her. He gave a bitter smile as he thought about the ashes of his marriage. Maybe he had never known.
He got up from his chair. ‘Come on. Let’s go,’ he said.
She finished her tea and put her cup down. ‘Where are we going?’
‘Home, of course.’ An odd kind of smile lifted his mouth. ‘We’re going home.’
IT WAS DISORIENTATING being back in the house where Xenon had once carried her giggling over the threshold. Lexi stood in the high-ceilinged hallway of the beautiful nineteenth century building and felt little beads of sweat pricking at her forehead. She knew Xenon was watching her, just as he’d been watching her during the drive from his office to his home in the classical terrace overlooking Regent’s Park. She wondered if he had a clue how weird she found it being here again, after all this time. Did he realise that, behind the smile she’d managed to produce from nowhere, her heart was thudding with pain?
Glancing around the hall, she tried to concentrate on the practical—telling herself that it was only bricks and mortar. But it seemed so much more than that. The air was scented with cinnamon and the walls were hung with beautiful paintings, many of them depicting Greece. There was one with the famous view of the St Nicolas Bay, which could be seen from the terrace of the Kanellis estate in Rhodes. She’d always loved that one.
Silken rugs from the East were strewn over the polished floors and the overriding impression was one of solid wealth and stability. But the décor was as masculine as she remembered and little seemed to have changed since last she’d been there.
Lexi gave a wry smile. This had been their home but it had never really felt like her home. Her sometimes brash and streetwise persona had deserted her when it came to soft furnishings and the truth was that she’d been intimidated by what to put in the Grade I listed building. She’d been terrified that her lack of historical knowledge would cause her to make some basic error of taste, which would have everyone laughing at her. That was why she’d never dared put her mark on the house. Why she hadn’t bought so much as a single vase when she’d lived here.
‘It looks exactly the same,’ she observed as she brought her gaze back to rest on his face. ‘You haven’t done much to it.’
‘No.’ His expression suddenly became closed.
‘Why not?’
‘Well, masterminding the Kanellis empire takes up most of my time. You know how it is, Lex.’
‘Of course. How could I ever forget something as fundamental as that?’ She kept her words as flippant as his. ‘My mother was an alcoholic and I married a workaholic. Must be something in me that brings out the obsessive in a person.’
He stiffened, as if her words had shocked him—and maybe they had. ‘Why are you saying something like that?’
‘Because it’s the truth and neither of us have to pretend any more. We both know I was the world’s most unsuitable wife for you. I’m just reminding us of one of the reasons why.’
He saw the sudden sharp anxiety on her face and something inside him wanted to wipe it away. ‘Stop winding yourself up for no reason,’ he said gently. ‘Try taking a deep breath and calm down.’
‘You think that being back here is contributing to my levels of serenity?’
‘I don’t think anything could do that when you’re so uptight. Come on, let’s go and sit down and you can relax.’
Having little choice but to obey, she followed him into the garden room at the back of the house, the one which had always been her favourite. She wondered if he’d done that on purpose—to remind her of all the things she’d lost?
Two green velvet sofas overlooked a garden filled with white flowers. White roses scrambled up a far stone wall and tall white daisies stood behind neat hedges of white lavender. She walked over to the French windows and unlocked them, and a mixture of scents and the sound of birdsong filtered into the room.
It felt unbearably poignant. She used to sit here during her second pregnancy, making plans and knitting minuscule little bootees—even though nobody else she knew ever knitted. While Xenon was away on business she would dream about what it would be like when their baby was born. When, magically, he would let go of his heavy workload and the three of them would go walking in the nearby park, just like a proper family.
She turned back to find Xenon’s gaze fixed on her and for a split second she thought she saw a flash of understanding in his eyes. But that was nothing but an illusion. She knew that.
Xenon didn’t understand how she’d felt—understanding women wasn’t something he had been brought up to do. He had fixed and old-fashioned views about the opposite sex and the way they should be treated. He wasn’t intentionally cruel, just thoughtless. Women existed to look pretty and have sex with and produce strapping sons and pretty daughters. But she couldn’t even do that bit right, could she?
She realised how quiet the house was; none of the usual staff had appeared offering drinks. There was no smiling Phyllida—his long-serving housekeeper—eager
