Page 20 of Vows of Revenge

Kassia smiled. ‘Well, maybe it will help give you a taste for relaxing more—taking your foot off the business accelerator.’

He didn’t answer, only idly laced the water between his fingers. For a few moments longer they went on sitting there, side by side, hands casually stirring the water, hearing birdsong all around them, other visitors wandering past, sunshine bathing them all.

She gazed about her at all the splendour of their surroundings in the summery warmth. This day had come out of nowhere...being here with Damos Kallinikos who, for whatever inexplicable reason, seemed to want to spend it with her. But she wasn’t going to question it. All she was going to do was simply enjoy it...

Damos levered himself to his feet. ‘Shall we check out the lower water terrace now?’ he posed.

Kassia stood up, and they made their way off the upper terrace.

‘Apparently, the fountains on the lower terrace are in the style of Bernini’s fountain in the Piazza Navona in Rome,’ Kassia remarked.

‘Have you been to Rome?’ Damos asked casually.

He wanted to keep all his conversation with her casual. He’d been unnecessarily intense on the house tour, sounding off about how hard he’d had to work to get where he was today. His own assertion echoed in his head now.

‘I made my money honestly.’

Well, it was true, he thought defiantly. Hehadmade his money honestly—he had never cheated, or undercut, or been underhand. When the time came he would make Cosmo a fair offer for his business—once he’d disposed of Yorgos Andrakis’s attempt to snap it up, using his own daughter to do so.

Just as you are doing.

The words hung in his head, making him suddenly uneasy.

He dismissed them.

It would stop her father using her, he retorted instantly. And nothing her father wanted would be in Kassia’s interest—certainly not being bullied and browbeaten into marrying Cosmo Palandrou.

Whereas what I want is, in fact, in Kassia’s interest.

And not just to protect her from her father’s ruthless ambitions.

Her words over lunch came back to him. He’d wondered why she did not make more of her appearance, but now he was pretty sure he knew the answer. His mouth tightened. He’d take a bet that Yorgos Andrakis, powerfully built and physically imposing, well used to overbearing other people with his abrupt and hectoring manner, did not like it that his own daughter dwarfed him—it would put his back up straight off. And it sounded as if her mother simply made her even more self-conscious about her slender height.

His glance went to Kassia, walking beside him. She wasn’t hunching her shoulders, he noticed. Presumably because he was taller than her and she didn’t need to? Her now straight back and shoulders gave a graceful sway to her body as they strolled along...

‘A couple of times,’ Kassia said.

Damos realised with a start that she was answering his question about whether she’d visited Rome.

‘The remains of ancient Rome are very splendid, but they’re a thousand years and more later than my period.’ She smiled.

‘Yet two thousand years ago from the present day?’ he commented. He frowned deliberately. ‘History does seem to occupy an inordinate length of time,’ he said ponderously.

She laughed, and he liked the sound of it.

‘And on that profound note,’ he said, lightly and self-mockingly, ‘shall we head down towards the lake?’

‘That would be nice,’ she replied politely.

He gave a laugh. ‘We don’t have to if you don’t want to—there’s a lot else to see.’

‘Well, it’s your day out, after all,’ she answered. ‘I can come here any time, really, whenever I visit my mother, but you might not be in this area again.’

‘True,’ he murmured.

Truer than she realised...

I’m only here at all because I am in pursuit of you.

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