He’d only kissed her to make it clear who was boss around the place. And she knew her place all right.
Kizzy was perfectly accustomed to being at the bottom of any pecking order—her stepfather had made sure of that over the years, even to the extent of making sure she and her mother were made legally destitute upon his death. She couldn’t care less for herself; she’d have rather slept in a gutter than spend one more night under that roof. But her mother had suffered so much in her travesty of a marriage—she didn’t deserve to die in poverty, the final insult.
…
She was thinking again, Andreas observed.
Silently, he watched every twitch of her face, each tiny mannerism, waiting for the first clue that would expose her as a ruthless fortune-seeker.
She was probably wondering how to claw her way back to his yacht after heroically refusing the five-star accommodations on offer. But it would take more than that act of piety to convince him she was a humble, low-maintenance woman. She had refused to accept new clothes from him at first, but it hadn’t been long before she had given in.
“From here we take the Lindos taxi or continue on foot,” he announced gruffly at the end of the pontoon.
“Taxi?” Kizzy shielded her eyes against the harbor lights and squinted past the bustling taverna they were approaching. “I can’t see a road.”
“Correct,” he replied. “No road required.”
He smiled into the darkness as he led her around a corner to a cave set in the cliff behind the beach. It was dark and full of curious, wide-eyed donkeys.
“This is one of Lindos’ taxi ranks,” he announced. “Hairy and noisy, but totally at your service.”
Kizzy looked at the animals’ faces, noting the way their owner was clanking grumpily about with an armful of buckets.
She reached out to the nearest donkey and scratched its rough forehead. The beast closed its eyes in appreciation.
“They look tired,” she murmured, and turned on her heel. “Let’s walk.”
The donkey owner barked out a few grouchy sentences, then roughly threw a cracked leather bridle past Andreas into a crate.
Andreas frowned with interest as Kizzy made for the path outside. “Are you absolutely sure about that?”
Since when had a woman walked any farther than the jetty without complaining before now? He had been expecting an undignified wail about ruining her Louboutins.
Then he smiled. He’d almost missed the trick—she was wearing sensible pumps on the end of those shapely legs.
A happy coincidence? Or natural pragmatism?
Oh no, he didn’t think so. She was just very, very good at this game.
And those practical little slips of footwear? They’d cost three hundred euros and were embellished with mother of pearl. She was going to have to do better than that if she wanted to hide her true colors.
“That would be convenient,” Andreas replied, suddenly spotting an easy opportunity to further test Kizzy’s mettle. “Stavros has just informed me in no uncertain terms that the donkeys are finished for the night. And he doesn’t give a damn how many euros I’ve got.”
“Good for him,” she countered, and shot him a defiant smile before striking out up an extremely steep and rough path into the gloom.
…
“Are we going around in circles?” Kizzy muttered half an hour later, and pressed a shaking hand against her breastbone to steady her breathing.
The narrow paths and alleyways of Lindos village were bustling with life but she could no longer appreciate their fusion of color, noise and fragrance. She was far too hot and exhausted to care.
They had climbed achingly steep, narrow routes, worn smooth over the centuries, and she had stumbled a few times in her attempts to keep up with Andreas’s long strides. Naturally she had refused his offers of a steadying hand—she wasn’t going to give him the opportunity to consider her a weakling.
Ancient shop fronts, archways, and crumbled architecture formed an impenetrable canopy that gave only brief glimpses of the night sky and held in the warmth of the day like a thick blanket above their heads.
Kizzy realized she was becoming disoriented. The stars that were beginning to dance in front of her eyes were clearly a warning.
“Is it much farther?” she managed.
Andreas turned to look down at her, expecting to see a frowning, pouty little madam stamping her foot in annoyance. He had been set to continue his deliberately protracted and circuitous tour of the village in a cynical attempt to break her spirit, maybe even get her to explode into the spoiled diva she inevitably must be.
But looking at her now, she’d clearly had enough.
Staring down into the deep lilac of her eyes, Andreas saw that she was too weak even to prevent him from brushing away the damp lash of hair plastered to her forehead.
He felt a lurch of shame at the pit of his stomach.
He was starting to feel hot and bothered himself, and he’d been brought up with this heat whereas she—well, she was clearly struggling, and the last thing he wanted was for her to faint on him.
She was still in control of herself, he noted, not verging on hysteria as many women would have been. She was strong, both physically and mentally. He was in danger of being impressed by that. But her hands were visibly shaking.
“We’re almost there,” he replied casually. “But we can stop for a cold drink—”
“No, I’ll be fine,” Kizzy replied with a determined shake of her head. She rubbed the small of her back. “I’m right behind you.”
Kizzy’s heart sank as he turned sharply left and marched up another claustrophobic alleyway, even if it was beautiful with geraniums and bougainvillea in shades she’d never seen before, lit up against ancient creamy stone. She had resolved to stay calm, but was so tired now that a flood of tears was welling up against her will.
“We’re here,” he announced, in the gloom of an extremely dark and quiet corner, adorned only by the battered frame of a scooter. “You can relax now.”
Was he kidding?
Alone, exhausted, vulnerable, and about to pass through a mysterious door in a deserted alley was not the best position in the world for a penniless woman in Greece. A sane person would be telling her to run as fast as she could away from this dangerous situation and Kizzy knew that, but her knees were wobbling and she was so exhausted she no longer cared what happened to her.
Her head spinning, she leaned against the wall to steady herself.
Andreas punched a series of numbers into a keypad set in a recess, and a heavy wooden door creaked open. Kizzy was vaguely aware of being guided through a dark, rocky tunnel and emerging into a basin of honeyed lamplight; a strong arm had somehow been threaded around her waist, warm and powerful.