Chapter 6 #2
“The timing isn’t great but one of my oldest friends just called. He’s choppered to the island to check up on me.” He laughed. “Actually, I suspect he wants to meet you.”
“Me?” Fear made her stumble a little. “What do you mean? What did you tell him about me?”
“Only that I had the most beautiful house guest in the world and that he should stay away.”
“And yet he’s here anyway,” she responded breathily.
He nodded. “He was concerned that I might become morose after Aristotle’s death.”
“You? Morose?” She couldn’t help but tease. But butterflies were filling her whole chest cavity.
The small speedboat was already waiting at the bottom of the ladder. The dream of the sea-life was over. Life would go on.
“Who is he? Your friend?”
“Rocco Barone,” he said, watching as she climbed deftly down the ladder. “You will like him.”
She smiled awkwardly. His name wasn’t familiar. What were the chances that he knew her husband? She settled herself in the boat, trying to calm her nerves.
They walked more quickly on the return to the beach. It was not far to the mansion. As they crossed onto the tufted grass lawn that bordered the sand, they were met by a man who was, Saphire presumed, Thad’s friend.
Rocco.
He was just like Thad, in many ways. Tall, swarthy, with eyes that saw too much and a face chiseled from stone. His body was broad, his sculpture defined.
Thad squeezed Saphire’s hand reassuringly, and he continued to hold it as they got nearer to Rocco. The Italian’s eyes were unapologetic as they purposefully appraised Saphire before turning back to Thaddeus.
“I’m not invading,” Rocco said in response to his friend’s look of admonishment. “I had business in Athens, and it seemed a waste not to come to you, seeing as I was almost here anyway.”
“Yes, a waste,” Thad said with amusement.
“You are always welcome. Even after being specifically told not to come.” He performed the perfunctory introductions and Rocco held a hand out to Saphire.
Instead of taking the fingers she extended, he reached for her left hand and brought it to his lips.
His kiss was brief, and interestingly, stirred nothing inside of her.
“A pleasure to meet you, Miss Arana.”
Something in the way he said it ignited a fire of warning in Saphire, but she told herself she was simply being paranoid. It was her own guilty conscience, and the fact she was used to hearing Arana in concert with the title ‘Mrs’.
“Come. Join us for breakfast,” Thad said, gesturing towards the house.
“I’d like that.” Rocco slid a glance towards Saphire that made her pulse spin, and not in a good way. His look was thickened with an emotion that didn’t fit. Something dark she couldn’t explain.
“Excuse me,” Thad murmured as they reached the patio. “I’ll let the housekeeper know to bring food.” He disappeared through the doors, leaving Rocco and Saphire alone on the sun-lit balcony.
“You just met him?” Rocco queried, his manner appearing civil.
She nodded jerkily and licked her lower lip. She was nervous. So nervous!
“How?”
“On the flight over.” She settled herself into a chair, knowing that she had to at least appear calm, even though she was far from it.
The intrusion was premature. She wasn’t ready to answer questions about her and Thad.
She wasn’t sure she’d ever be. But after the night they’d spent on the boat, she knew she needed to speak to him.
To tell him the truth. And to beg him to help her.
“Interesting. What brings you to Greece?”
She swallowed. “A few different things, actually. And you? How do you know Mr Konstanides?”
“Mr Konstanides?” He repeated in obvious disbelief and Saphire laughed despite the tension she felt. The sound was pleasant. Rocco had arrived certain he would despise her, yet her appeal easily challenged that expectation.
“I’m sorry. It’s an inside joke, I guess. I just sort of like the way it sounds.” She shook her head. “How do you know Thaddeus?” It was the first time she’d said his name. She liked the taste of it in her mouth.
“Our grandfathers were friends.”
“Ah. A dynastic relationship, then,” she said with a smile that only added to her sweetness.
“Absolutely. That’s us. Out to rule the world one transportation company at a time.”
Her eyes sparkled with mirth and intelligence. “How noble.”
“What is noble, agape mou?” Thad asked, walking with his natural athleticism through the doors and taking the seat next to Saphire. He reached over and caught her hand in his, lacing their fingers together.
“Nothing, Mr Konstanides,” Rocco jibed his friend.
“Ah, I see your name for me is spreading. How … wonderful,” he drawled. Then, to Rocco, “Don’t you start.”
“You have come from the boat?”
“We slept there,” Saphire nodded, though her cheeks had a betraying smudge of pink when she thought of how little sleeping they’d actually done.
“A nice night for it,” Rocco murmured conversationally. “Clear and warm.”
“It could have been pouring with rain and it still would have been perfect,” Saphire said instantly, but the sentence knocked them all off-kilter, and her the most. She had to be more careful.
She was the one who’d imposed rules to keep their relationship simple and now she was breaking them in every way.
Thad squeezed her hand and then leaned forward. “What’s happening in Athens?”
Rocco shook his head. “That idiot accountant of mine has misplaced half a million euro.”
Thad’s laugh was unexpected. “You were supposed to fire him.”
“He’s the friend of a friend.” The admission was said with an accompanying roll of the eyes.
“He’s Marissa’s friend,” Thad corrected. “And that’s the only reason you haven’t fired him. You do not suffer fools, and he is undoubtedly just that.”
Rocco waved a hand in the air dismissively “It will turn up. He has no doubt just forgotten which account he deposited it into.”
Platters of food began to arrive, and while they ate, Rocco and Thaddeus chatted and Saphire reclined a little, inviting the sun to warm her skin and the food fill her stomach.
Thad’s voice was like liquid lava on her veins.
She let it run over her, relaxing her, soothing her, until she couldn’t help but believe that somehow, everything would work out.
Rocco, while appearing intent on a light-hearted discussion with his friend, kept a large part of his focus on the beautiful English woman.
There was no doubting her appeal – Thad hadn’t exaggerated her physical charms – but she was also duplicitous.
The way she pawed Thad’s hand the whole time they sat left him in little doubt she had her own agenda, and fooling his friend was at the heart of it.
When Saphire stifled a yawn and then straightened Thad turned to her immediately.
His eyes were so full of concern that something snapped inside of Rocco.
The image of his friend, vulnerable and grieving the loss of Aristotle, being taken in by a woman such as this was too much to bear.
He’d come to the island to protect Thad’s interests, and the time had come to follow through on that.
He transferred his gaze to her pointedly, wondering if she knew the hammer was about to drop.
“Arana is an interesting name, Saphire. Is it Italian?”
Her eyes flew to his. She was instantly wary. “Spanish.”
Rocco’s gaze clung to her. He enjoyed the way mottled pink marred her perfect ivory skin. “You don’t look Spanish.”
“I’m not.” Her smile was tight. Her eyes were starting to sting; blood was gushing through her body.
“What are you getting at, Rocco?” Thad asked with silky warning, for he knew his friend well enough to know when he was hedging around a point.
“Would you like to tell him? Or shall I?” Rocco’s eyes didn’t leave Saphire’s face. She was as white as a sheet suddenly, and Thad felt a bolt of antipathy towards a man he had always loved as a brother.
“Tell me what?” Thad demanded in a tone his enemies knew to fear.
Saphire felt like the whole world had lost its gravity. She was weak and hot and cold and exhausted. “Please don’t.”
“Someone tell me what the hell is going on,” Thaddeus exclaimed.
Rocco knew that the words would bring his friend some pain. But temporary pain was better than letting the likes of Saphire Arana run all over a man who usually exhibited far better judgment.
“Your lover is married. Saphire Arana is, in fact, Mrs Jordan Arana of Notting Hill, London.”