storm had threatened the pleasant meadow she’d been walking in, and truth to tell she was frightened. It hadn’t sat well with her all these years that she’d agreed to fall in with her father’s advice to simply disappear and then get herself a whole new identity, but at the time she’d been far too traumatised to argue. Recent events had prompted even more painful reflection.
Her father had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, and although his illness had undoubtedly forged a closer bond between them, and she perfectly understood why he had taken her away, Ellie wished she’d fought her ground and stayed to talk to Nikolai. Maybe if she’d stayed he would have eventually stopped blaming her for Sasha’s death, realised that somehow his brother must have had a major part in events given his proclivity to be both reckless and intoxicated? In time he might even have come to accept that Ellie really couldn’t recall what had happened that day and forgiven her at last.
If all that had transpired then she would still be looking after her niece now, and wouldn’t be burdened by the most dreadful guilt that she had indeed abandoned her sister’s child in her hour of need. But, even though she had a deep and abiding regret about leaving so suddenly, Ellie believed her father had acted with the best of intentions too. By being there in her hour of need she knew he had somehow hoped to make it up to her for all his years of emotional and physical neglect of her and Jackie when they were younger.
Fear of the consequences if her fate should be left to Nikolai had also inspired his actions. A man who had such enormous wealth and power at his fingertips could never be trusted, her father had warned. It would be like living with a time-bomb! If he chose to bring a private case against Ellie she would have little defence, considering that she had lost her memory. There was no telling how he and his fancy lawyers might twist things to their advantage! Yes…it was better that she had moved right away from him, until the sorrows and mistakes of the past were a little less raw and blunted by the passing of time…
Staring at her reflection now in the full-length mirror, Ellie touched a trembling hand to the balconette bodice of her dress, with its simple shoestring straps. God! She looked as pale as sugar frosting! What she wouldn’t give for a little sun in some warmer climes, to bronze her skin and brighten her up! But that was going to be impossible, given her schedule at both the practice and the centre. Add to that this recent bout of television work, and she’d be lucky to grab a moment she could call her own…let alone have a holiday!
But her disappointment about not being able to look forward to a break paled into insignificance when Ellie thought about meeting up with Nikolai again. Her stomach lurched. It was unlikely she’d be able to swallow even a morsel of food all evening, confronted with his glowering accusing face across the table! He had looked even more frighteningly fit and intimidating then she’d remembered, and Ellie knew he had meant every word of that threat he’d left her with earlier… There would be were consequences for what he saw as her cold-hearted desertion…
‘I took the liberty of getting us a table where we would have privacy.’
I’ll bet you did! Ellie thought nervously as she sat in the padded velvet chair the smartly suited maître d’ had pulled out for her. Tucked away in the most secluded corner of the hotel’s elegant dining room, with its artistic silk panelling on the walls and its brass chandeliers fashioned in intricate Celtic knotwork hanging from the ceiling, they would have privacy in plenty.
In more ways than one their location couldn’t be faulted. Their position overlooked a charming stone patio with a plethora of terracotta tubs filled with still abundant trailing pink and white blossoms, glinting in the pale light of late summer evening. It was breathtakingly pretty. The blooms surrounded a pretty fountain commanded by a modern sculpture.
Reluctantly withdrawing her admiring gaze from the appealing view, Ellie attempted to focus on the wine list the waiter had left them to peruse. Absently stroking the fine white linen napkin that had been draped on her lap, she fought hard against another intense desire to flee. And again she knew she would do no such thing. Whatever the consequences Nikolai intended, she would stay and face them.
If nothing else, Ellie was desperate to see Arina again. She was, after all, the closest link she had to her much loved sister, and now that her father’s health was cause for concern she longed for the chance to somehow make amends and be part of her niece’s life again. Ellie also wanted Nikolai to know that she wasn’t about to follow the same escapist route she’d taken five years ago.
‘Are you happy for me to select the wine?’ he asked, civil-voiced and Ellie glanced back at him in surprise, not trusting the polite veneer.
‘Go ahead,’ she replied. ‘I’m certainly no expert!’
‘Maybe not with wine,’ Nikolai commented smoothly. ‘But clearly you have become an expert in psychology.’
‘I may have got the necessary qualifications, but it takes a lifetime to be really expert at anything. And even then I’ll still be learning! I mostly think of myself as an enabler…somebody who can help a person in trouble take the next step towards healing and hopefully give them some useful tools to help themselves.’
‘Your humility is commendable…although your current high profile in the media is somewhat at odds with that, wouldn’t you say?’
Having expected his derision at some point, Ellie wasn’t disappointed now. Her whole body tensed. ‘I’m not interested in having any sort of media profile, for your information! It only happened that I appeared on television because a local reporter where I worked got wind of a case I’d worked on and the client’s father was well known.’
Nikolai named the politician concerned, with his trademark ice-cool equanimity, and Ellie grimaced. She might have known he would have all the information he needed at his fingertips.
‘I have that reporter to thank for helping me locate you, so I cannot regret his interest!’ he continued, with a faint ironic lift at the edges of his disturbingly sensuous mouth. ‘A bottle of Château Lafite Rothschild will fit the bill perfectly to celebrate our timely little reunion, I think. The wine was named after a French politician, so perhaps it is fitting, yes?’
Knowing very little about wine, but silently concerned that it sounded frighteningly expensive, whatever it was, Ellie stayed mute.
‘You need not look so overwhelmed!’ her companion remarked in mock amusement. ‘Naturally I will insist on footing the bill, so do not fret. The cost makes no difference to me. I have already expended too much time, money and concern over your whereabouts over the years as it is! I am only relieved that in the end my searching was not in vain! Tell me…why Scotland? Who did you know there? My informants certainly did not discover any extended family in that location, or anywhere else in the UK!’
His comments made Ellie revisit afresh the gravity of the horrific event that had changed her life for ever, and the devastation she had undoubtedly left behind her. As well as that came the disturbing realisation that Nikolai had not resumed his life in the way she’d hoped he would, forgetting all about her. For long moments she struggled to give voice to her racing thoughts.
‘I don’t know why. It’s just a place like any other…a place where nobody knew us…where we could make a fresh start. My father was worried about me. That was why he took me away,’ she finally explained.
‘What was he worried about? That I would hold you in some way responsible for what happened to my brother despite the verdict reached by the courts?’
The cold slash of Nikolai’s chilling voice immobilised Ellie in her seat. Nervously
