strange if you didn’t.’
After everything. Two little words that made her remember how he’d held her so tenderly, how hard and solid his chest had felt beneath her cheek. How she’d wanted to stay there for ever, wrapped in his arms, protected and safe.
Angelos rose from behind his desk, and taking her by the hand, he drew her to the two club chairs in front of the fireplace. She sank onto one, her legs shaky, and he sat in the other. ‘So they took you from the Eiffel Tower,’ he prompted, his voice low and steady.
‘They grabbed me so quickly. I didn’t even see...’ She swallowed hard, remembering how brutally and ruthlessly efficient the man had been, pulling her tightly to him, leaning down as if he were whispering in her ear, looking all for the world as if they were two lovers sharing an intimate moment. In reality he’d been pressing a chloroform-soaked cloth to her mouth and nose. She’d been unconscious in seconds.
She forced herself to meet Angelos’s gaze and continue. ‘They drugged me. When I woke up, I was in some kind of shed. It was locked, of course, and there was nothing in there. A dirt floor, a tin ceiling...barely room to stand up. And it was so dark.’ A shudder ran through her. ‘I had no idea where I was, or what they were going to do to me.’
Angelos’s face was pale, his eyes like burning dark coals. ‘That must have been utterly terrifying.’
‘It was.’ She pressed her lips together, memory rising inside her, choking her. ‘A man brought me food and water, although he never spoke to me. After a while I actually started to feel bored, which sounds ridiculous, but I just wanted something to happen.’ She shook her head. ‘I was so naïve.’ She lapsed into silence, remembering the endless days and weeks of sitting in that cramped cabin, filthy, exhausted, emotionally spent. Almost wanting it to be over...for good. She knew what despair felt like. She understood hopelessness.
‘What happened then, Talia?’
She jerked her gaze up, refocusing on Angelos. ‘There was a storm one night. A terrible storm, worse than the one we had here. I think the lightning must have struck something nearby, because there was a terrific crash, and I heard something fall nearby, a tree, I suppose. I was afraid they would leave me to die in there and save themselves. Or maybe they’d died, and no one would ever find me.’ Her fists had become bloody and bruised from banging on the door, a useless but instinctive bid for freedom.
‘But they didn’t?’ he prompted quietly when she’d fallen into silence once more.
‘No, they didn’t. In the middle of the storm the door opened and there were several men, some I hadn’t seen before. I couldn’t see their faces...they dragged me out of the room. I had no idea what was going to happen. One of them had a knife.’ She stopped, expelling a trembling breath, and heard Angelos mutter a curse. ‘They didn’t actually hurt me,’ she said. ‘They held a knife to my throat, but it was only for a picture. A ransom note. I didn’t realise that at the time though. I couldn’t think about anything. I could barely stand up.’ She tried to smile ruefully but her facial muscles felt like they weren’t working properly. ‘They took the photo, and then they pushed me around a bit, and then they shoved me back in the shed.’
‘I cannot imagine, Talia,’ Angelos said. He was gripping the armrests of his chair, his knuckles white, his face bloodless.
‘They weren’t as smart as they thought they were though,’ Talia continued, trying to inject a cheerful note into her voice and failing. ‘They sent the photo of me to my grandfather, and he used his resources to locate me from what they’d seen in the photo and then to prosecute the kidnappers. Just twenty-four hours after they sent the photograph a helicopter came with a SWAT team to rescue me.’
‘A helicopter,’ Angelos repeated after a pause. ‘Is that why you are scared of helicopters?’
‘Sort of. The sound reminds me of that whole time, and the rescue effort was...intense.’ She remembered the shouts, the staccato gunfire, the stranger who yanked her arm so hard he nearly dislocated her shoulder as he pulled her towards the waiting helicopter. At that point she hadn’t even known if the man was friend or foe, or if she was facing freedom or death. She’d collapsed inside the helicopter, watching in disbelief as a man was shot and killed right in front of her. And then the soul-freezing terror had morphed into an incredulous and numb relief, both emotions overwhelming.
‘But really,’ she told Angelos, ‘any confined space is difficult. From...from being in that shed. I’ve tried some different therapies for it, but none of them have worked.’ She gave him a lopsided smile. ‘But I supposed claustrophobia and a fear of thunderstorms is a small price to pay for my freedom.’
Angelos shook his head, his hands still clenched on the armrests. ‘I don’t know how you survived such a thing.’
‘How does anyone survive?’ she answered. ‘And survive is the right word, because sometimes it’s felt as if that’s all I’m doing.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Coming to Athens was the first time I’d got on an airplane in seven years. The first time I used public transportation, or ventured out of my comfort zone at all. After the kidnapping I dropped out of college and retreated to my grandfather’s estate. I couldn’t face people, and just being in a small space, even in a classroom, sent me into a blind panic. My grandfather was understanding, and he let me hide myself away. I think he thought I’d come out again, but I never did.’
Confusion clouded Angelos’s eyes and he shook his head. ‘But you must have. You said you were an artist—’
‘I have a private studio there. Clients come to me. I hardly ever leave. I can’t stand crowds, or cities, or small spaces. Which leaves me feeling pretty limited sometimes, but I’ve been happy. At least, I thought I was happy.’ But now, with a taste of what it felt like to truly live again, to feel excitement and happiness and desire, Talia knew she hadn’t been. She’d been content, maybe, but that was all. She’d been living a half-life without realising it, telling herself it was enough.
‘But you did come to Athens,’ Angelos said. ‘You tried. That’s important, Talia.’
‘Yes...’ But he didn’t know why she’d tried. Talia could tell that Angelos assumed she’d come to Greece simply to break out of her cocoon. Now would be the perfect time to tell him about the book, the real reason she was here.
And yet she stayed silent. She might have been brave in coming here, but in many ways she was still a coward. Because she didn’t want to risk Angelos’s anger at learning her true motives, feeling deceived. She didn’t want to leave Kallos or Sofia. She didn’t want to leave him.
The realisation of how much she was starting to care about this man drove her upright. ‘I should go. Sofia’s lessons will be finished, and we were going to sketch today, outside.’
Angelos rose also and reached for her hand. The slide of his fingers along hers was infinitely, achingly sweet, and it lit a flame of need in her belly. ‘Thank you,’ he said quietly. ‘For telling me all of that.’
‘Thank you,’ Talia answered, ‘for comforting me last night.’
And then, because she didn’t trust herself not to throw herself into Angelos’s arms just as she had last night, she yanked her hand away and hurried from the room.
