the crowd, even though that was clearly her desire. A circumstance that he would investigate at a later date, when other more urgent needs, like hearing her voice, were satisfied.
Christos met many attractive, interesting women during the course of his average day, but none that had ever immobilised him with lust. But now…He trained his eyes on the redhead, who was still trying hard to blend in, and drew a deep breath. This was a temptation he had no intention of resisting.
‘I don’t dislike horses, and from what I’ve seen the girl has got excellent child-bearing hips.’
A thoughtful expression settled on Theodosia’s lined face as she imperiously reclaimed her nephew’s attention with this outrageous observation and a sharp tug on his jacket.
‘Is she pregnant, I wonder? It would explain the unseemly haste. What do you think, Christos?’
With an air of resignation, and still conscious in the periphery of his vision of the redhead, he guided the outspoken old lady into her seat. ‘I think I should mind my own business.’
‘Not that there’s anything wrong with a pregnant bride.’
‘That is very broad-minded of you, Aunt Theodosia.’
‘I’m not a prude, boy.’
Christos’s thickly lashed eyes narrowed in affection. ‘You do surprise me.’
‘And virgins are all well and good,’ she observed generously.
The redhead, he noticed, was in danger of disappearing behind a stone column. He had established, to his satisfaction, that she definitely wasn’t with anyone, but she was too far away for him to tell if she wore any rings.
‘I’m not aware that I know any.’ In his opinion it was more important to be the last man in a woman’s life, not the first, if that woman was the one you intended to spend the rest of your life with.
Theodosia chose to ignore her nephew’s satiric insert beyond tapping him sharply across the knuckles with her cane. ‘I hardly think you’re in any position to criticise. Greek men can be so hypocritical,’ she observed tartly. ‘You’re no saint yourself, young man. At least,’ she continued, ‘when you get a girl pregnant before you put the ring on her finger you know she’s fertile.’
‘That’s very pragmatic of you.’ He cupped the old lady’s elbow as she lowered herself slowly into the pew. ‘But I’m not sure,’ he added in a soft aside, ‘that the bride’s father shares your viewpoint. Or that the modern female would enjoy being likened to a brood mare.’
Just at that moment his mother, looking flushed and breathless, appeared at his shoulder. ‘Christos—I need you.’ Under her breath, Mia Carides said with a fixed smile, ‘Don’t encourage her.’
‘What do you need me for, Mother?’ Christos asked, wondering if the glorious redhead’s hair was as soft and silky as it looked. A man could dream of falling asleep wrapped in that hair…
‘There’s a problem with security,’ Mia improvised smoothly. ‘Such a nuisance. I’m sorry, Aunt Theodosia, you’ll have to excuse us.’
Her son responded to the urgent look with a languid smile which made his mother’s diplomatic expression wobble for an instant as she clenched her teeth. Her son, as she knew, could be very vexing when he chose.
‘Aunt Theodosia and I were just discussing the blushing bride, Mother.’
‘I know—I heard you. So did half the guests,’ Mia observed, waving graciously and bestowing a serene smile on the bride’s indignant parents.
Undeterred, Aunt Theodosia continued, ‘This family needs more babies. What is wrong with you young people nowadays? When are you going to have some babies, Christos?’
Christos bent and pressed his lips in a courtly gesture to the frail, age-spotted old hand. ‘When I find someone with as much spunk as you.’ Or, failing that, red hair. He blinked, wondering where that thought had come from.
The old lady tried to hide her pleased smile. ‘If you do,’ she predicted, ‘it might well be the making of you. That other girl—what was her name?’
‘Melina.’
‘That was it. I didn’t like her. She smiled too much.’
Across the aisle, Melina wasn’t smiling at all. In fact she was looking daggers at a girl with red hair, who Christos had barely taken his eyes from.
CHAPTER THREE
‘WHY do you encourage her, Christos?’ his mother reproached him as she walked down the aisle.
While he lent an attentive ear to his mother, Christos continued to watch the troublesome redhead as she sat down, concealing all but the top of her fiery head from his view.
‘Carl looked furious,’ Mia added in a hushed tone. ‘Especially as Sally is pregnant.’
The column was situated so that in addition to the top of her head he could see her neat feet, and as she crossed one leg over the other her ankle-length coat fell back to reveal a pair of worn denim jeans.
‘What’s the problem with security, Mother?’
‘There isn’t a problem,’ Mia admitted, blissfully unaware that she didn’t have her son’s total attention. ‘I just had to get you away from Aunt Theodosia before you made her say something else outrageous.’
Christos wondered if kissing the unknown redhead, fitting his mouth to hers and parting her moist pink lips, would be considered outrageous. If not, his fertile and overactive imagination was capable of conjuring several alternatives that almost certainly were!
Aware that he was breathing too fast, Christos made a conscious effort to slow his rapid, laboured respirations—not an easy thing to do when your head was filled with imaginings about the taste and touch of a woman.
‘I doubt if anyone has ever made Theodosia do or say anything.’
‘Your voice sounds strange, Christos,’ his mother said, reaching up and touching a cool maternal hand to his brow. ‘And you’re hot,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘I do hope you’re not coming down with something. I have never considered air travel healthy.’
‘Well, if I die of something airborne you will have the satisfaction of knowing it was at your instigation I flew halfway around the world to be here.’
‘You,’ his mother retorted tartly, ‘are as bad as Theodosia.’
‘Thank you. I just hope I can grow old as disgracefully as she has.’
His mother cast him a reproachful look, before pausing to be charming to someone important.
‘You know, Mother, I think you’re wrong about the security problem.’
Mia’s eyes widened in alarm. ‘There is a problem? What?’
‘Nothing I can’t handle,’ Christos said, his eyes fixed on the top of that burnished head.
He
