MELANIE MILBURNE - The Greek's Bridal Bargain

She’d come down to the lake to bathe in private, for even though the large kidney-shaped swimming pool lay near the wisteria walk at the rear of the house she hadn’t wanted to be observed, preferring the secluded shade of her favourite hideaway.

At seventeen she’d been conscious of the weight she’d gained during her final term. An injury to her knee, her anxiety over exams and the stodgy diet ordered by Madame Celeste had taken its toll on her normally svelte figure. She hadn’t been able to dance for eight weeks and it showed.

She’d slipped into the cool embrace of the dark water and sighed with pleasure, her limbs feeling like silky ribbons released after months of being tightly coiled. She’d swum back and forth beneath the shield of the hanging arms of the willows, glad to be finally free of the constraints of the school term.

She’d lain on her back and looked up through the canopy, the dapple of sunlight speckling along her wet body as if someone had dropped a handful of gold-dust over her.

Smiling at her overactive imagination, she’d begun stroking backwards, her arms slicing through the water, gradually gathering speed as she’d pretended she was in the final heat of the Olympic fifty metre backstroke, she was in front…she was going to win…Thump!

Bryony had gagged on the mouthful of water she’d swallowed before turning around to see what she’d run into, expecting to find a fallen log or even a partially submerged rock.

She had not expected to see Kane Kaproulias standing waist-deep in the water with his nose streaming blood…

‘Oh, my God!’ she gasped while her feet searched vainly for a foothold in the slippery mud.

‘Did I hurt you?’ he asked as his hands came out to her shoulders to steady her.

Bryony felt her feet sink into the velvet mud, offering her a stability she badly needed once Kane’s warm brown work-roughened hands touched the creamy skin of her shoulders.

She stared up at him, fighting for breath, suddenly conscious of the tight cling of her Lycra bathing suit which, in her current physical shape, was at least two sizes too small.

‘No…’ she said a little breathlessly, ‘you didn’t hurt me at all but look what I did to your nose.’

‘It’s nothing.’ He let her go and rinsed his face in the water.

‘I didn’t know anyone was here, otherwise I would have—’

‘It’s just a nosebleed, Bryony, it won’t kill me.’

She found it hard not to stare at his face. She hadn’t seen him for months. During her last holiday he’d been working part-time on a neighbour’s property, only coming home occasionally to see his mother. She’d heard he was saving up enough money to put himself through a university course but she had never asked him what he’d intended studying.

He looked much fitter and stronger than the last time she’d seen him. At twenty-two he was only a year older than her brother but somehow he seemed to be so much more mature.

Austin was boisterous and loud, as were most of his friends who often spent time at Mercyfields during their university vacations, their numerous boyish pranks in stark contrast to Kane’s silent brooding presence. She suspected his surly demeanour was an inbuilt part of his personality and not just a reaction to being labelled the cleaning lady’s son.

She couldn’t imagine what her father would say if he could see her now, standing in the water with Kane, his broad smooth chest glistening with droplets of moisture as he looked down at her with eyes darker than the mud beneath her curling toes.

‘Do you usually swim here?’ he asked.

‘I…no…not usually.’

‘You shouldn’t come here, especially not alone.’

She didn’t care for the quiet authority in his tone. She was the daughter of the house, he was the servant’s son—he had no right to tell her what to do.

She tilted her chin at him. ‘Why not? It’s my lake, not yours.’

The look he gave her was hard to decipher given the shady nook they were in, but she suspected he was sneering at her behind the screen of his dark lashes.

‘If you hurt yourself no one would find you.’

‘How could I hurt myself? I’m a good swimmer.’

‘You’re a very careless swimmer.’ He gave his nose another wipe with the back of his hand. ‘Instead of me it could have been a rock you hit. You could have easily knocked yourself out and drowned.’

‘It’s none of your business what I do,’ she said, annoyed that he was right but unwilling to admit it. ‘If I want to swim here I will and nothing you say or do can stop me.’

Bryony became increasingly aware of the pulsing silence. The shadows danced like wraiths around them, the water where his blood had spilled lapping gently against her thighs like a caress, heightening her awareness of his physical closeness in the most intimate and primal way.

The sunlight shifted, revealing more of his face to her, and she was relieved to see that his nose had more or less stopped bleeding. But then she gave a tiny involuntary shiver as she saw his eyes slide down to the overflow of her breasts, her tight bathing suit doing an inadequate job of keeping them contained with any sort of decency.

She crossed her arms and glared at him. ‘I’ll tell my brother you have insulted me by leering at me like that.’

His gaze lingered another full ten seconds before he lifted it to meet her flashing one. ‘Do you imagine I am afraid of that spineless little jerk?’

She was incensed by his attitude towards the older brother she adored. ‘You will be when I tell him you’ve touched me under the willows of the lake.’

He didn’t say a word, just stood watching her steadily, which somehow made her even angrier.

‘Do you think he won’t defend his sister from the filthy hands of the cleaning lady’s son?’ she added spitefully.

‘He very probably will,’ he answered after another long cicadas-beating-in-the-background pause. ‘So in that case I’d better make sure that what’s coming to me is well and truly warranted.’

She was still trying to make sense of his coolly delivered words when he reached for her, his strong arms coming around her, pulling her out of the sucking mud and up against his hard body. His mouth came down, his lips warm and firm as they explored the soft surface of hers.

Bryony had never been kissed before and wasn’t quite sure how to react. Part of her insisted she pull away at once, but the lure of finding out what a real man’s kiss tasted like won. She closed her eyes and gave in with a soft sigh of pleasure at the feel of his mouth discovering the moistness of hers with a determined probe of his tongue. She could taste the metallic saltiness of his blood where it had come into contact with his mouth and a new and totally alluring sensation unfurled low in her belly, making her cling to him unashamedly.

He suddenly pulled away from her with a jerky movement that made her lose her footing. She went sprawling backwards, landing ungainly on her bottom in the mud, the murky water lapping her chin as she glared up at him in outrage at being released without warning.

He offered her a hand at the same time as her other hand came upon a rock under the water, her fingers curling around it as he hauled her inelegantly to her feet.

It was his smile that made her do it.

Without really thinking of the consequences, she raised her hand and smashed the rock in her tightly clenched fist against that sneering mouth…

BRYONY blinked herself back out of the past and stared down at the now still surface of the lake, surprised the water wasn’t still red even after ten long years.

She hadn’t thought an injury could bleed so much.