“Do you miss England, Kizzy?”
She looked at the ground. There were rose petals scattered over the mosaic of paving slabs. It was a question she hadn’t expected to hear from him tonight—they were supposed to be celebrating, not thinking about the future. She didn’t even want to think about what lay ahead—not right now, anyway.
“I miss my mother.”
Andreas’s jaw clenched. “I’d bring her back if I could.”
“I know,” Kizzy whispered, and stooped to pick up a handful of rose petals. “There must have been a wedding here today.”
“It’s Friday,” he pointed out. “So there will have been a number of weddings. Couples come from all over the world to get married here. It’s big business.”
“I can see why.” She bit nervously down on her bottom lip as if it would stop the words from coming out of her mouth but the compulsion was too strong. “Did you get married here?” She sensed his body stiffen but carried on regardless. “You must have been happy with her once—at least on your wedding day.”
“We married in Athens.” Roughly, he drained his glass. “And I could do with another drink. Let’s get back to the taverna. We should make more of an effort to be sociable.”
Kizzy was grateful that the tension in Andreas’s body seemed to ease once they were back in the noisy crowd on the beach. The small taverna set into the rocks was the focus of the night’s celebrations, a glowing beacon in the blue velvet night, fizzing with warmth and excitement. There, the clatter of a busy kitchen and the tantalizing scents of fish and meat being seared on a hot grill helped to distract her from her fears, and Andreas’s possessive arm about her waist made everything feel wonderful again.
She had taken a risk in asking him about his marriage; he never talked about it, and she knew that was the way he wanted things to stay. However much she longed to know about his past, about this woman he must have cared about enough to marry, she would have to be satisfied with his silence.
“Dorinda’s been telling me about Prasonisi at the southernmost tip of the island, where the Mediterranean meets the Aegean,” Kizzy murmured into his ear as they danced to the bouzouki music on the sand. “She says that just before you reach it, on the top of the hill, you can see huge, rolling waves on the right of the point and calm, sheltered sea to the left—a natural wonder. Could we go there sometime? I’d love to see it for myself.”
“Of course we can,” he said, and placed a tender kiss on her forehead. “It sounds like the perfect day out before I leave for Paris next week.”
“Paris—I’d forgotten about that trip.”
“It’s only for a few days, and it will be incredibly dull. You’ll forget all about me once you’re back to scrabbling around and getting dirty at the school.”
“I won’t!” She nudged him playfully in the chest. “I always miss you terribly when you have to go away and I can’t come.”
“Good, because I will miss you on that trip to Paris too,” he replied, and slid a hand lower to skim her bottom. “Abstinence verges on the painful these days, believe me.”
“So we can go tomorrow?” Kizzy asked excitedly. “Shall I ask Dorinda to make us a picnic?”
Andreas nodded and a broad smile lit up his face. “If you like, and I’ll tell Demetrios. He’ll be driving us down at about nine in the morning.”
“Demetrios? I’d hoped we could go alone.”
Andreas looked taken aback for a moment, then his expression darkened as she pulled away from him with surprised eyes. “No, I don’t think so, Kizzy.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t drive these days, don’t you remember? I’ve always found driving tedious and I’ve been successful enough in business to ensure that I don’t have to do it anymore.” To her puzzlement, he broke eye contact. “It’s also a matter of status—you wouldn’t expect me to clean my own bathrooms just because I can, would you?”
“It’s not quite the same thing.”
He forced a hollow laugh. “Anyway, the hill roads here are near suicidal. You haven’t offered to drive, I notice.”
“I haven’t got a license, I’ve told you that before,” Kizzy replied irritably, frustrated by how helpless she still was in so many ways, so reliant on him. “I always wanted to learn but I couldn’t justify the cost of lessons.”
“Well, I wouldn’t let you even if you had a license,” he replied firmly. “Some of these hill roads are treacherous. Narrow, steep—that’s why the tourist coaches can’t get down there. That’s why it’s still so unspoiled.”
This wasn’t like Andreas, she thought, trying to read his expression. Capable, can-do, dynamic, world-beating Andreas Lazarides. She knew she ought to let it go, but somehow she couldn’t. “But you used to drive a Lamborghini. That’s got to take a ton of skill. Perhaps if we hired one of those little Jeeps, it wouldn’t be too taxing. That’s what all the surfers do. It will be wonderful, you’ll see. Just the two of us alone for once.”
“Demetrios is an advanced driver,” he said and took a step back from her, his expression suddenly deadly. “He has Special Service training—a safe pair of hands even over the most difficult terrain. I will not risk your safety on a whim, Kizzy, however much you urge me to. It would be reckless and irresponsible and—and I refuse to waste Demetrios’s skills when I’m paying him so damn well.”
Kizzy had overstepped the mark and irritated him with her persistence. All she wanted was to be miles away from everyone and alone with him for a change. They had the peaceful grounds of the villa, their sanctuary from the cheerful hubbub of Lindos village, yet there were always staff around in the day and however discreet they might be, Kizzy was uncomfortable with their constant presence.
Her heart twisted as she realized this was the first time Andreas had ever said no to her.
“Demetrios must drive us then, since you won’t humor me,” she replied with a sigh, hoping that he might change his mind later. “But it would be a good idea if I started learning to drive, so that I can be more independent.”
“More independent?”
“Yes, there’s no reason Demetrios should drive me to work every day. I should stand on my own two feet a bit more, and it’s not exactly dangerous there, is it?”