it held her in its thrall.
And she knew she could not free herself from it now—she had succumbed to it abjectly, helplessly. Succumbed to Leo Makarios and what he could make her feel.
Every day when he came back to the villa her heart gave a leap. She tried to crush it, but it would not be crushed. She felt her breath quicken in her lungs, felt a rush of pleasure. Of anticipation.
Sometimes he took her to his bed immediately. Walking up to her, catching her hand, and taking her upstairs. She would feel her body quickening even as she went with him, feel the warm, delicious flood of arousal start in her body. She was as ardent as he; she could not help it. She wanted to feel his mouth on hers, his hands on her body, her hands on his, their bodies seeking, melding, fusing together in a rush of desire so intense it consumed her, time, after time, after time.
It had been a revelation—never had she understood how raw, how powerful, desire could be. Leo Makarios had taken her to a new place, one she had not known existed.
It was a place of passion, of ecstasy, of wanting and needing, of sating and slaking.
She knew no peace. Not during the day, when her restless body waited in forced patience for his return. Not when he was there either, and she went to him and let him take her in that white rush of desire as she took him into her. No peace then, only hunger, a driving, pulsing hunger that was a desperate, ravening need for what he and he alone could give her.
She knew only the brief, strange peace that came after, when their bodies were spent and they lay, exhausted, in each other’s arms.
As if they were lovers.
But they weren’t lovers. She knew that. Knew it deep in her being. There was nothing between them. Neither knowledge nor intimacy.
They were strangers. Day after day. Night after night.
Nothing but strangers.
A dull, crushing heaviness filled her as she sat, now, putting cream on her legs, before plunging into the warm waters of the pool. She looked around. There was a house full of staff tending the villa and its grounds—other human beings who lived and breathed and had hopes and ambitions and families and friends and loved ones—and yet she was all on her own.
You’re always on your own. You always have been.
The thought distilled in her mind. It was true. It had always been true. Her grandmother loved her dearly, had brought her up single-handed after her mother’s death, with her father long since disappeared into whatever wasteland involuntary fathers disappeared to. But her grandmother, for all her love, all her protection, was two generations away from her—happy with her little world in the street of terraced houses beside the gasworks, happy to spend the day watching soaps and chat shows, and scared to let Anna go out into the world. Let alone take up modelling.
Her grandmother hated it; she’d always known that. Warning her about the evils of the life she was heading for. But she could not have turned down her one big chance to get away from the gasworks and the beckoning biscuit factory. She’d always visited her grandmother as often as she could, and the years had passed, and she’d become too infirm in body and mind to go on living in her little terraced house. Now she passed her time in an expensive private nursing home, paid for by her granddaughter’s modelling fees, sometimes recognising her when she visited, sometimes not.
Who will I have when my grandmother dies? Who will I have then?
The question echoed in her head as she stared out over the azure sea beyond.
She had some friends—good friends like Jenny, with whom she’d bonded in the frenetic, superficial, all too often corrupt and corrupting world of fashion modelling, and a few others that she trusted. But, valuable as her friends were, they each had someone special in their lives. Even Jenny had the child she would bear, in secrecy and safety, in her new life that she would make for herself in Australia.
I could go with her.
The thought came from nowhere.
And even as it formed a terrible heaviness came in its wake.
When Leo Makarios is finished with me—what shall I do?
She had thought she would simply go back to her life. Had thought nothing else.
But now, with punishing clarity, she knew it was impossible, that her life was empty.
She could never go back.
Her life as a model seemed a million miles away from here. On another planet.
She could never go back to it.
And the terrible heaviness crushed at her. She would have to leave here. One day, coming closer day by day, when Leo was bored with her, when he’d decided she’d made reparation enough, when some business crisis cropped up, needing his attention in New York, or Geneva, or London, then he would simply go.
And she would be bundled onto a plane and disposed of.
She would never see him again.
Never.
The word clanged in her head like a stone.
A bitter mockery filled her. Dear God. Once, brief days ago, if someone had said she would never see Leo Makarios again she’d have felt a relief so profound it would have lifted her off the ground.
Now—now it tolled like a funeral bell. Filling her with dread.
And there was an ache in her body that she could not extinguish.
An anguish.
An anguish that filled her being.
She stared out over the silver sand, the azure waters. Paradise on earth.
But, for her, the worst place in the world.
A place of unimaginable, exquisite torment.
Leo limped, bad tempered, out onto the terrace, and looked down across to the pool deck. Anna was swimming up and down with her graceful stroke. He watched her a while. It was strange seeing her during the daytime. Deliberately, he never let himself think about her when he was away from the villa. He just put her out of his mind, focusing instead on things like making a fast tack in the cat, or doing some tricky freestyle move on his board. He glowered. The damn loop he’d been working on yesterday had caught him out—and down he’d gone into the water, foot still caught in the footstrap. The result was a badly wrenched ankle. At least it wasn’t a break or a sprain—the doctor had confirmed it just now. But he’d also stipulated resting his foot. No more watersports for a few days.
So what the hell was he going to do all day now? He’d deliberately kept his work to a minimum—an hour morning and evening, communicating remotely with his direct reports and a handful of key people, was all he allowed himself. He didn’t want to get sucked back in.
He stood, watching Anna swim up and down. Well, he could swim too—just about. Moodily, he headed down, tossing his dark glasses on a chair. He limped to the deep end and dived in.
He powered down the length,
