with rigid self-control, he made his hands relax. To his left he saw from the edge of his vision that Eve Hawkwood was continuing with her meal. His eyes turned to her. She was cutting a piece of lamb on her plate, and it was as if nothing exceptional had been said at all, as if she were perfectly at ease as the subject of her father’s sexual proclivities arose.
And yet—
There was a rigidity in her jaw that was almost imperceptible, but Alexei could detect it all the same. A momentary glazing of her eyes, as if she were shutting something out of her consciousness.
Then, as she proceeded to spear the chunk of meat with her fork, she remarked, ‘I can remember reading an article once—it was quite serious, I believe—about how one could use nude portraiture as a guide to the nutritional habits of the societies that produced those works of art. It might have been pretentious, but I suppose it must be true, after all. Who considers Rubens’ rotund females to be healthy these days?’
There was just the right amount of light humour in her voice, just the right amount of amused questioning. It would have served just as well if she’d been talking to a bevy of bishops or a division of dowagers.
Did she think she was going to get an answer? Alexei’s eyes narrowed even more. Then, abruptly, he spoke. It was an impulse that came from somewhere he thought had ceased to exist in relation to Eve Hawkwood.
But it was something to do with the punishing rigidity of her throat, the blankness in her eyes, the visible whiteness around her fingernails as she lifted and lowered her fork. The jerkiness with which she was eating her lamb.
She was hiding it, but Eve Hawkwood’s stress levels were sky-high.
Why?
There was only one reason. Could only be one reason.
Because Eve Hawkwood was as repulsed by her father as he was.
Alexei’s eyes were riveted to her.
Was that it? Was that what was going on behind that flawless composure, that social surface that Englishwomen of her class presented to the world as effortlessly as they cut their vowels on crystal?
Except that now, right now, it wasn’t effortless. The fan of tension around her eyes, the rigidity of her expression. That required effort. Effort to maintain.
His eyes narrowed fractionally.
What was going on under that blank surface?
And suddenly, as he started to speak, he felt emotion spear through him.
Was I wrong about her? Is she not her father’s creature after all?
And if she weren’t—if Eve Hawkwood weren’t what those surreptitious rumours about her said she was, if she didn’t select her lovers from those men whom her father instructed her to, for his own ends—then maybe, just maybe, what had happened last night, that extraordinary, consuming moment of insanity that had possessed him, that had made him follow after her, seek her out, claim her—kiss her—was not an illusion at all…
The emotion speared him again. He did not know what it was. He had never felt it before.
But it was powerful. Very powerful.
And, because of that, he needed to control it. Absolutely. Totally. Completely.
So as he spoke he pitched his voice to match her own.
‘Health and beauty do seem to be in opposition these days. Obesity was relatively rare in the past, as it still is in much of the non-western world. In the west the opposite holds true,’ he contributed dryly.
He watched her give a slight smile to acknowledge his comment, and saw the web of tension around her eyes slacken minutely as the conversation reverted to acceptable topics.
‘Indeed,’ she responded, picking up on his remark. ‘We’re obsessed with thinness—to the detriment of our health.’
Alexei lifted his glass.
‘You, however, succeed in achieving the perfect medium—as rare as that is.’ He tilted his wine glass in a swift and silent toast, his eyes resting on her, taking in, whether he wanted to or not, the slender but softly rounded curves of her body, veiled by the creamy layers of her dress, and all the more exquisite for it. It enhanced so subtly the extraordinary beauty she possessed. And suddenly, without his volition, the iron guard he had imposed on himself all evening dropped.
It was only for a fraction of a moment, but it was enough. The damage had been done. He had let something show; he knew he had. Something that had been in his eyes last night as he’d approached her, as she’d stood pooled in moonlight beneath the scented pines, remote, beautiful, drawing him to her as no other woman had ever done…
His guard had dropped because she’d made him doubt what he knew about her, made him question his judgement of her.
Which is she? The woman I first thought her or her father’s corrupt creature, using her body for his ends?
The question burned through him. He had to know—
His eyes went on resting on her, letting her see what had been in his eyes the first time he had seen her, silver-framed in the entrance to the casino, pure and beautiful. Was that a lie? Suddenly, it was the most important question in the world.
Eve set down her wine glass. It took all her self-control. But then every moment of this excruciating evening had required every bit of her hard-won self-control. Only by imposing total discipline on herself was she getting through it.
Her mother, she knew, would be proud of her.
Nothing, absolutely nothing of what she was feeling was showing. And that was essential. Utterly essential.
Seeing Alexei Constantin again was disastrous. She had acknowledged that in the first moment he’d walked into the stateroom, and she’d had to glide forward and take his hand in greeting. Not to have done so would have been socially unacceptable, because he was her father’s guest and she, whatever else she would have given years of her life to be, was her father’s hostess.
But even as the cool, long fingers had closed over hers, so very briefly, she’d known she should have done the socially unacceptable, however much her rigid training had told her never, never to do so. Because simply touching his hand, so fleetingly, had been disastrous. Disastrous because instantly, though she’d tried to fight it, she had been there, once again, out in the hotel’s gardens, in the moonlit darkness, alone with a man who—
Who wants your father’s company and who buys sex.
The cruel, condemning words were like stones, crushing her. Crushing hope. Making a mockery of memory.
But memory mocked her still, had mocked her all evening as she’d sat at her father’s table making endless small-talk, as a good hostess should. And now it was more than memory that mocked her.
How could she be so helplessly aware of Alexei Constantin as to want to do nothing more than gaze at him, drink in the planes of his face, the line of his mouth, the dark, chill pools of his eyes? How could she be so punishingly aware of the way his long fingers curved around the stem of his wine glass, the way his
