Sara Craven - Her Greek Groom

For the dancing, thought Cressy with sudden unease. She sent a restive glance at her watch.

‘There is a problem?’ No mistaking that deep voice. Cressy looked up, shocked, to see Draco depositing a bottle of white wine on the table and taking the seat opposite.

Her warning antennae had let her down badly this time, she thought, biting her lip.

She hurried into speech. ‘I was wondering about the ferry. What time does it leave?’

He sent an amused glance at the exuberant holidaymakers. ‘When these people are ready to go. There is no hurry.’ He paused. ‘Or are you so anxious to leave us?’

She kept her voice even. ‘I think it’s time that I got back to the real world.’

‘Or what passes for reality at the Hellenic Imperial hotel,’ he said softly.

‘You don’t approve of such places?’

He shrugged. ‘The islands need tourists, and tourists need hotels. They can prove—lucrative.’

‘Especially,’ Cressy said waspishly, ‘for someone like you.’

His grin was unabashed. ‘I do not deny it.’ He picked up her glass to fill it with wine.

She said, ‘I didn’t order that.’

He smiled at her. ‘It is a gift.’

‘I didn’t expect that either.’

‘You ask for so little, matia mou. It is one of your many charms.’

Cressy flushed. ‘If you really want to do me a favour, kyrie, you’ll stop calling me matia mou.’

His brows lifted. ‘Why?’

‘Because it’s—inappropriate. In my country it could be construed as harassment.’

She couldn’t believe how prim and humourless she sounded.

He said quietly, ‘But you are in my country now. On my island. And things are different here.’

‘Is that a warning?’ She stiffened.

‘Do you feel that you are in danger?’

Yes, she wanted to scream. Yes—and I don’t understand what’s happening to me. I don’t want this.

Aloud, she said lightly, ‘I’m the stranger within your gates, kyrie. Isn’t that what you told me? I’ve eaten your bread, and now I’m drinking your wine.’ She lifted her glass towards him, then took a mouthful. It was cool and crisp against her dry throat. ‘So why should I be afraid?’

He raised his own glass. ‘Stin iyia sas. To you, thespinis, and to your beauty in that dress. If your lover was here, he would beg on his knees to make you his bride.’ He drank, and put down his glass.

He said softly, his gaze holding hers, ‘I will make a bargain with you. I will not call you “my eyes” until your eyes promise me that I may. And, in return, you will tell me your given name.’

Under the cool white cotton, her skin felt as if it was on fire.

She lifted her chin. ‘Very well, kyrie. I’m called Cressida.’

‘Cressida,’ he repeated thoughtfully. ‘The golden one—who was faithless to her lover Troilus.’

‘According to Shakespeare, and the other men who wrote about her,’ Cressy said crisply. ‘She, of course, might have had a different viewpoint. And, if it comes to that, your own namesake isn’t much to brag about—a tyrant imposing laws that no one could live under. Although that shouldn’t surprise me,’ she added with warmth.

‘Quarrelling?’ Yannis arrived with two plates of grilled swordfish, Greek salads, and a big bowl of fries. ‘Not while you eat my food, or you will get bad stomachs.’ He wagged an admonishing finger at them both, and went off.

Draco grinned at her. ‘He is right. Let us begin again.’

He held out his hand. ‘Hero poli, Cressida. I am pleased to meet you.’

Reluctantly, she allowed her fingers to be enclosed in the warmth of his. ‘Hero poli—Draco.’

‘And your name is very beautiful,’ he added.

Cressy wrinkled her nose. ‘I used to hate it,’ she confessed. ‘But then I hated everything about being a girl. I wanted so badly to be a boy when I was little that my father used to call me Sid as a joke. My mother was very cross about it, so he’d never use it in front of her. Only when we were on our own.’

‘And does he still call you—Sid?’ His brows lifted.

Cressy looked down at her plate. ‘Not for a long time,’ she said quietly.

‘I am not surprised.’ He gave a faint smile. ‘I must tell you, Cressida, that you are no boy.’

She met the sudden intensity of the dark eyes and flushed, reaching hurriedly for her knife and fork.

The swordfish was succulent and delicious, and she ate every scrap, even conducting a laughing battle with Draco over the last few fries.

‘It is good to meet a woman who does not wish to starve herself,’ he told her as he refilled her glass.

She shook her head. ‘One of these days all these calories will suddenly explode, and I’ll turn into a mountain.’

‘No.’ The dark eyes travelled over her in smiling, sensuous appraisal. ‘For me, you will always look as you do now, agapi mou.’

Cressy frowned. ‘What does that mean?’ she asked suspiciously.

He laughed. ‘It is best that you don’t know.’

Cressy felt her colour deepen helplessly. To cover her confusion, she turned to watch the bouzouki players, tapping her fingers on the table to the music.

Draco was watching her. ‘You like bouzouki?’

‘I don’t know very much,’ she admitted. ‘Just “Zorba’s Dance”, like everyone else.’ She hesitated. ‘I liked what you were dancing to this morning.’

‘That was also by Theodorakis.’ He smiled faintly. ‘He is still very much a hero. A man whose music spoke to the people.’

She said, ‘I—I hope you’re going to dance tonight.’

‘Only if you will promise, just once, to be my partner.’

‘But I couldn’t,’ Cressy protested. ‘I’ve never done any Greek dancing.’

‘I did not mean that. When the entertainment is over, Yannis plays other music.’ The agate eyes glittered at her. ‘We will choose something very slow—very sweet—so that you won’t hurt your foot.’

‘Oh.’ Cressy felt hollow inside, but she mustered a smile. ‘Thank you.’

‘Would you like some dessert? Halva, perhaps—or baklava?’

‘Just coffee, please.’

He said, ‘I’ll fetch it.’

She watched him lithely threading his way between the tables, and saw without surprise that several of the woman holidaymakers from the large party were watching him too, nudging each other and exchanging whispered comments and giggles.

I could always send a note over saying, ‘He’s available,’ Cressy thought sourly. Only people might get killed in the rush.

She’d come away on holiday to relax, yet she’d never felt so edgy and restless in her life.

She’d had her day and her evening neatly planned, but here she was, in another woman’s wedding dress, having dinner with a man who supplemented his income by ‘befriending’ lonely women.

And she wasn’t lonely, she told herself vehemently. Yes, she missed her father’s company, but she had plenty of friends. She could go out every night, if she wanted. And there were plenty of men who’d be keen to escort her.

Which was fine. It was when they tried to get closer that warning bells started to ring and she felt herself freeze.

No man was prepared to be held at arm’s length for ever. She understood that perfectly well. She’d always assumed that one of her casual friendships would eventually bloom into something deeper. Something based on liking and respect, rather than casual physical attraction.

She’d always sworn she’d never be caught in that trap.

So a holiday romance had never been on the cards.

Draco was good-looking, with a sexual aura as powerful as a force field, but this time he’d chosen the wrong target, she told herself with determination.

Their acquaintance would end with dinner, as she would make clear.