like her at all. She’d behaved like a petulant child.
Remorse stabbed at her. And while a niggling voice said that he deserved it because he’d taken away her right of choice, her freedom, she suppressed it. She was not going to allow Zac’s actions to destroy the person she’d always prided herself on being.
So when Maria arrived with her lunch tray, Pandora gave her a tentative smile and mouthed, “I’m sorry.”
The Greek woman’s face broke into a smile and she started to speak in very broken, very hesitant English. “Zac tell me you not know.”
The knowledge that Zac had taken the blame for what had happened completely flummoxed her, and she stared after Maria openmouthed as she set the tray on the chest of drawers.
After Maria had gone, Pandora picked at the Greek salad with its red tomato quarters and fat olives before pushing the tray aside. Not hungry but not yet ready to venture out and face Zac, Pandora picked up a book. It was a mystery featuring a kick-ass heroine by a favourite author who usually held her entranced. But today the words on the pages aroused no interest.
The afternoon was hot. Even inside the thick whitewashed stone walls, Pandora could feel the temperature rising. The fine cotton dress clung to her body, so she turned up the air-conditioning. Thoroughly restless now, Pandora crossed to the window and pushed it open.
The villa—if one could call a structure with towers and parapets that—perched like an eyrie high above a sweeping cobbled terrace, and far below lay the stony beach. And beyond, the sea glittered in the sunlight. On the terrace, a thickset man with a head of unruly black hair—Georgios, Maria’s husband, she supposed—was watering terra-cotta pots full of bright magenta geraniums.
The startling glare of the heat shimmered off the white walls of the villa. The sea looked blissfully tranquil. Incredibly tempting. Pandora stood there, her arms folded on the wide sill, for what seemed forever.
At last she acknowledged to herself that she was waiting for Zac to appear.
Turning away in disgust, she threw herself down on the bed and stared at the wooden door.
This time she hadn’t locked it.
Because after her cruel words she knew Zac would not return.
Pandora spent the next three days closeted in her bedroom, avoiding Zac, full of remorse at the way she’d spoken to him the last time she’d seen him. But she couldn’t help being a little irked that Zac hadn’t bothered to check on her.
Yet beneath the conflicting emotions lay something more, an unsettling desire that was still very much alive. Despite everything he had done—and her own vehement demand for a divorce—what she really wanted was for Zac to apologise, preferably on his knees, for keeping her here against her will. It infuriated her to be so confused, at the mercy of a man and her own turbulent emotions.
The only respite from the quagmire of emotions, ironically enough, was Maria. Three times each day Maria brought her a tray heaped with delicious food. Swiss muesli and fruit and rich, creamy yogurt with honey for breakfast. Greek salads topped with chunks of crumbled feta cheese and glossy black kalamata olives, pita bread with taramasalata and hummus and slices of warm lamb seasoned with rosemary. Maria clucked like a concerned mother hen if she failed to finish meals and smiled her approval when the plate and bowl were clean of food. Any thought Pandora might’ve had to undertake a hunger strike to make Zac realise how seriously angry she was about what he had done was undermined even as it took root.
Maria brought Pandora a pile of outdated magazines. Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Bazaar and Town & Country, as well as an assortment of Greek magazines, giving Pandora something to do. So one evening, when Maria arrived with a dinner tray, Pandora gave her the silk scarf she’d touched with such reverence that first morning.
Maria’s eyes lit up. “Mine?”
Pandora nodded.
Maria took the scarf, holding it like some fragile piece of glass. Then she stood in front of the mirror and tied it around her neck.
“Here, like this.” Pandora moved to Maria’s side and fiddled with the ends until they were arranged to her satisfaction.
The smile of joy on Maria’s face brought a lump to her throat. The old woman’s wrinkled fingers kept going up to stroke the lustrous silk with reverent touches.
“Beau … beautiful.” Maria struggled with the word.
Pandora dipped her head in acknowledgment. “It was my mother’s. She was an artist—she hand dyed the colours herself.” She’d said too much—Maria’s frown indicated she did not follow.
“Your mother … dead?” Maria asked finally.
“Ne.” Yes. It was one of the Greek words she’d learned over the last few weeks.
Maria shook her head from side to side, muttering something in Greek, her hand going to where the knot sat at her shoulder.
“No.” Stilling the older woman’s hands, Pandora said, “It gives me pleasure to give it to you.”
Maria seemed to get her meaning. “Efgaristo.” And danced out the room on light feet.
Over the last three days Pandora had reread the meagre selection of books in her baggage, scanned the year-old magazines Maria had brought her until they were dog-eared, her heart stopping each time Zac stared unsmiling out of a photograph at her.
Now, as she readied herself for bed, Pandora finally admitted that she was bored out her skull.
So when she woke on Friday morning, Pandora stared out the window at the pebbled beach that edged the stony outcrop below the villa and decided she’d had enough of being cooped in her bedroom while the sun shone outside.
Quickly she donned a brief white-and-silver swimsuit and covered it with a white cheesecloth shirt that Zac had bought for her at the Plaka in Athens, then tied a yellow sarong around her waist and trod into a pair of metallic leather sandals. A slather of sunscreen, a hat, and she was ready to face the blistering Mediterranean sun.
She met no one as she crept down the spiral staircase and bypassed the reception rooms. Outside, the beach was even more alluring than it had appeared from her window. The sea was a clear turquoise under the arch of cerulean sky. Round pebbles stretched into the water. Pandora found a flat rock and spread out her towel and stretched out in the morning sun.
What was Zac doing right now? Just thinking about him brought back the unresolved tension between them. She hadn’t seen him since he’d left her room, white-faced, days ago. Where was he? She hadn’t heard the helicopter depart, so she assumed he must still be on the island.
When was he going to release her?
Surely he’d need to return to the corporation he headed? Or did he maintain a makeshift office in the villa—despite his claim that Kiranos was his retreat from the frenzy that he existed in? From under the hat she risked a glance at the villa and scanned the windows overlooking the beach. Eventually she homed in on the three windows a level below the vast glassed living room. If an office existed, it made sense that there would be some sort of telephone, even a satellite phone—he couldn’t be totally out of contact with the rest of the world.
With
