Chapter Three #2
The kitchen was large and old-fashioned, with a black range set in a fireplace.
There was a slightly less old-fashioned electric stove, large old wooden store cupboards, a massive and solid-looking dresser with solid-looking earthenware crockery on its shelves, an ancient-looking refrigerator rumbling in a corner, an even more ancient-looking stone sink with wooden work surfaces either side.
The centre of the room was dominated by a scrubbed oak table set with kitchen chairs.
The combined scents of cinnamon, citrus and coffee from breakfast hung in the air.
He gave a nod and moved towards the door that led through to the central hallway and the parlour beyond.
He’d seen the parlour already on his way out to the terrace earlier.
As old-fashioned as everywhere else, the room was dominated by a large fireplace with a wood-burning stove and a handsome baby grand piano, which raised his eyebrows slightly though he said nothing.
As he headed up the stairs, Arielle followed him.
‘My room I know,’ he said. ‘Show me the other bedrooms.’
There were another three bedrooms. Two of them were small and just as old-fashioned as his own.
‘The remaining bedroom is mine,’ she said.
He glanced at her. ‘Show me,’ he said. It was not a request.
He saw her expression stiffen.
‘Arielle,’ he said, ‘whatever your objections and protests and obvious resentment, this property does not belong to you. It belongs to me. So, show me the bedroom you have been using.’
For a moment, as they paused on the landing, her eyes refuted his assertion. Then, her gait as stiff as her expression, she opened the bedroom door. He stepped past her.
It was, very obviously, her bedroom. Just as old-fashioned as the others, but far more personal.
Far more feminine. The walls were papered with pink roses, the pattern reflected in the quilt and the fabric covering the stool in front of the dressing table.
An earthenware vase full of pink roses stood on the chest of drawers and the curtains were rose-patterned.
The white painted chest of drawers also had a rose stencil adorning it, as did the large, old-fashioned wardrobe.
‘Seen enough?’ Her voice was cool. Hostile.
He gave a brief nod.
‘You have an en-suite, or only the bathroom I used?’
With visible reluctance she opened a door that might have been to a dressing room, but was not. The bathroom was, predictably, old-fashioned. Whoever bought this place, Lycos opined, would have to gut it completely.
Well, that was their problem, not his. A realtor would probably seek to present it as a project or, even more optimistically, some kind of historic artefact.
‘You hate it, don’t you?’
Her voice was flat. His eyes suddenly met hers.
‘My opinion is irrelevant,’ he said. ‘All that matters to me is that it is sold for the best price it can achieve. I have no other interest.’
He turned and walked out of the room, heading downstairs again.
Something about her accusation, for an accusation it was, riled him.
He glanced at his watch. It was nearing midday.
He should collect his suitcase, get into his car and head off.
Make for Paris. Select a realtor. Get the paperwork of possession sorted and then hand this place over for sale.
She’ll have to be evicted.
Would she go quietly? With or without her livestock?
Which probably wasn’t hers anyway, any more than the mas was.
He frowned a moment. He would need to carefully check that she had no legal claim on the property.
She’d said she’d tried to make a claim and had failed, but maybe she’d just lacked a decent lawyer.
Well, he could afford the best lawyers and they would ascertain his own claim.
And if there was any doubt about it, then Gerald Maitland would pay the price for it.
Staking what was not his to stake was unforgiveable when playing the Wolf… .
‘Are you going now?’
Arielle’s voice from the top of the stairs made him turn.
It had been coolly spoken and he could see her hand gripping the banister.
She obviously wanted him to go. To leave her here.
Enjoy what little time was left to her in the place she was so clearly reluctant to accept was never hers in the first place.
‘No,’ he said.
Instantly, he frowned. Why the hell had he just said that? He’d been on the point of leaving, but now—
‘I’ll stay the night,’ he announced.
Arielle’s grip on the banister tightened. Then, stepping downstairs, she asked in a constricted voice, ‘Why?’
The dark, unreadable eyes rested on her. ‘I don’t believe…’ Lycos Dimistrios said, ‘…that that is any of your business. As I have repeatedly said, I am the new owner of this property and what I want will be.’
Her chin went up. ‘I only have your word that you have acquired it from my stepbrother!’
His answer was a shrug. ‘I have it in writing. And if that doesn’t suffice, contact him. He’ll confirm it. He’ll have no choice.’
Arielle’s face contorted. ‘I wouldn’t speak to that toad if he were on his deathbed!’
Another shrug came her way. ‘Then don’t contact him.
It’s no concern of mine.’ She watched him make his way into the parlour, settle himself into an armchair and get out his phone, paying no more attention to her.
For a moment or two she just stood there, fulminating, until she heard him start to speak in French.
He was speaking to someone called Marc and was saying he had been delayed and wanted to rearrange his meeting.
She left him to it and stalked into the kitchen. Her thoughts were full. Beyond full.
The implications of what had happened this morning were overwhelming her and out of nowhere she felt her heart start to race and pound.
She leant against the stone sink, trying to get control of herself, but it was impossible.
She felt herself start to shake. More than shake—convulse.
A cry broke from her, tore her throat and dry sobs racked her body.
It had happened. It had finally, finally happened.
The sword that had been hanging over her head since the day she’d read her father’s will, since she’d heard Naomi’s hateful voice and Gerald’s even more hateful one mocking her and taking from her all that she held most dear, had finally fallen. Finally sliced her through…
‘Arielle?’
She didn’t hear her name being spoken. Her eyes were screwed shut and the uncontrollable shaking of her body would not stop, nor would the dry, cracking sobs in her throat.
‘Arielle—stop. This is hysteria.’
She felt her hands seized and pressed together in a much stronger grip than hers, so tightly it distracted her. She flung open her eyes. Lycos Dimistrios, who had arrived like a marauding pirate to take everything from her, was there right in front of her. His expression was strange. Concerned.
‘I said stop,’ he said again. ‘Get control of yourself. Control is essential. Without it you are nothing. No one. Without control you are vulnerable. A victim.’
His eyes were holding hers, like hooks, not letting them go. The force in them was impossible to deny. Impossible to defy…
With racking breaths, she heard her dry, cracking sobs start to die away and her convulsions finally ceased.
He nodded curtly.
‘That’s better.’ He let go of her hands as he reached past her, taking an upturned glass from the draining board and filling it with cold water from the tap over the sink.
‘Drink this,’ he said. ‘All of it.’
She did, though she had to force it past her constricted throat. He stepped back while she drank, but his eyes never left her face.
‘Better?’ he asked, as she carefully replaced the glass.
She blinked. Her heart rate was returning to normal, her breathing easing.
‘Yes,’ she said faintly. She made to turn away, but a hand closed around her upper arm.
‘Sit down,’ he said. He guided her to one of the kitchen chairs, lowered her down on it and she sat unresistingly. He sat himself down as well and looked across the table at her.
‘We had better talk,’ he said.
For a moment Lycos said nothing, collecting his thoughts.
It had been…unnerving…to witness something that had all the hallmarks of a hysterical collapse.
Her complete, uncontrollable, uncontrolled breakdown in front of his eyes.
His thoughts now were conflicted. He’d sat her down and said they had better talk, but he didn’t want to.
Why should he? It was nothing to him that she was upset because she was nothing to him. Yet, all the same, he took a breath.
As he looked across at her he saw that her face was blank. Not with the resistance she’d presented so far, but with a kind of emptiness.
‘Arielle, you’ve had a shock. Something bad you’ve been holding at bay has finally happened.
Now you’re having to deal with it. But look at it this way.
You’ve known since your father died, so you told me, that you are going to have to relinquish what you’d expected to inherit.
There’s nothing you can do about it. Accept it. You don’t have a choice and you know…’
Something edged into his voice he didn’t want to think about.
‘…when you have no choice, it…it frees you. That might sound illogical, but it isn’t. You don’t have to fight any more. You don’t have to fear any more. The worst has happened. That’s it.’
He fell silent, eyes masking a moment. Then he spoke again. Slowly this time.
‘When the worst has happened, nothing more can hurt you. That’s a kind of freedom you know. It has…a value. When choice is taken from you, so is responsibility. Do you understand what I’m telling you?’
Her face was still blank. He went on. He didn’t want to think about where his words were coming from.
Didn’t want to remember.