would be, the moonlight casting silver shadows over his olive skin...
Good grief. A blush rose to Talia’s face as she realised just how far she’d strayed into fantasy territory. And about Angelos Mena of all people, whom she didn’t even like. He certainly had no regard for her. What on earth was she thinking?
‘Sofia is upstairs,’ Maria said, and Talia was grateful for the distraction. ‘She is waiting for Ava, who comes for her lessons.’
Talia nodded and quickly finished her breakfast, taking her dishes to the sink before going in search of Sofia.
She still felt weirdly affected by that stupid little fantasy, as if someone might be able to guess the nature of her thoughts just from looking at her. All right, Angelos Mena was a handsome man. A very handsome man. A stunningly virile and sexy man, fine. And maybe she had extremely limited experience with the opposite sex. A boyfriend at seventeen, a couple of kisses. So what?
It didn’t mean she had to fantasise about the first good-looking man who came into her orbit. And anyway, it wasn’t as if Angelos Mena was the first good-looking man she’d ever seen. William Talbot III, whose portrait she had painted just a few months ago, was very attractive. Admittedly, he thought so too, and he’d insisted on being painted with his golf clubs and two yappy terriers, but still. He was, objectively speaking, a good-looking man.
But he was, Talia acknowledged wryly, no Angelos Mena.
She walked down the hallway, checking several spare rooms, before she finally found Sofia in a large, airy room at the end of the hall, its gabled windows overlooking the sea. Sofia was curled up in the wide window seat, looking out at the glittering waters.
‘Kalimera,’ Talia tried as she came into the room. Sofia turned to look at her, smiling shyly although Talia could still see sorrow in her big, dark eyes.
‘Hello.’
‘We’re both learning,’ Talia approved. She came to sit on the window seat next to Sofia. ‘You have lessons this morning?’ With a bit of miming of reading and writing, Talia was able to communicate what she meant, and Sofia nodded.
They sat in silence for a moment before Talia ventured, ‘Papa? Yia sou?’ She mimed waving goodbye, and Sofia shook her head.
‘Papa...not...say,’ she said in halting English.
‘He didn’t say goodbye?’ Talia struggled to keep the dismay from her voice. Sofia shook her head again.
‘Ohi...no. But...’ She pointed to a sheet of paper in her lap, the single page filled with strong, slanting handwriting.
‘He wrote you a letter,’ Talia surmised, and Sofia nodded.
The letter was in Greek, of course, and Talia would never read someone else’s correspondence, yet she found she was intensely curious to know what Angelos had written to his daughter...and why he hadn’t said goodbye.
The sound of a motorboat cut through the still air, and Sofia leaned out the window to wave to the woman approaching the dock. ‘Ava,’ she said, turning back to Talia, and then said something in Greek Talia didn’t understand but could guess the nature of.
‘Your teacher,’ she said, and Sofia repeated the new word.
‘Teacher. Ne. Yes.’
A few minutes later Ava, a friendly woman in her forties, came upstairs. Fortunately she spoke English, and when Talia had explained who she was she offered to help her learn Greek after her lessons with Sofia.
‘I’ll have to ask Kyrie Mena,’ Talia said, suspecting that Angelos would want to hear about any changes in plan. ‘But I’m sure he’d like me to know more Greek.’
Ava laughed knowingly at that and Talia headed downstairs while Sofia had her lessons. Maria had disappeared from the kitchen, and so after standing uncertainly in the spacious hallway for a moment, Talia decided to go outside.
The air was hot and dry even though it was only a little past nine in the morning, and the sun shone brightly above, glinting off the sea.
Talia made her way through the garden, enjoying the colour and scent of the jumble of flowers. The gardens at the estate back in New York were lovely, but in a careful, manicured way. She liked the wildness here, felt its surprising answer in herself.
Funny, really, to think that Angelos Mena, of all people, would have a wild garden. But perhaps he wasn’t here enough to keep it in order.
The thought made her frown as she stepped onto the beach, slipping off her sandals so she could feel the warm sand between her toes.
She made her way to the water’s edge, letting the warm sea lap at her toes. She imagined Angelos back in Athens, sitting down at some important business meeting, making his so-called swift decisions. Athens was only an hour away, and yet he’d said he wouldn’t be back for weeks. Why couldn’t he make the trip more often, for Sofia’s sake?
Talia knew it wasn’t her concern; Angelos had certainly said as much. Besides, she was only here for six weeks, and she could hardly entangle herself in the lives of the Menas.
And yet...thoughts and questions whirled through her mind. The portrait of the secretly smiling woman; the fire Angelos refused to speak about. The sorrow she saw in Sofia’s eyes, and the letter that had lain on her lap.
And of course the book. The real reason she was here, she reminded herself, was to find Giovanni’s book. Sighing, Talia turned from the beach and headed back up to the villa.
Sofia was still in her lessons so Talia stayed in the kitchen with Maria, watching her as she kneaded bread. She’d offered to help, but Maria had vociferously refused, instead sitting her back down at the table, this time with a cup of what she called mountain tea. Talia took a cautious sip—Maria had made it by boiling what looked like a bunch of stems and leaves in a little brass pot—and found it surprisingly pleasant, a cross between chamomile and peppermint.
‘It cures everything,’ Maria assured her, ‘except heartbreak. But you are not heartbroken, are you?’
‘No, definitely not,’ Talia assured her.
‘You did not come all this way to Greece because of a failed romance?’ Maria asked, sounding almost hopeful. Talia smothered a smile at the housekeeper’s not so subtle attempt at digging into her past.
‘No failed romances,’ Talia answered. ‘No romances at all, unless you count the boy I dated when I was seventeen.’
‘You’re waiting for someone special,’ Maria said sagely. ‘That is good.’
‘I think I might be waiting a long time.’ Talia shrugged the woman’s sympathy aside. ‘I’ve been happy on my own. I still am.’
‘Every woman needs a man.’
Talia decided not to argue this point. ‘But you don’t want me crawling into Angelos’s bed, do you?’ she joked, only to flush as Maria eyed her appraisingly.
‘It was Kyrie Mena this morning.’
‘It still is,’ she promised. ‘That was a slip. Trust me, I’m not going to be crawling
