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‘I’m Lily Rose. We spoke on the phone. You have a very beautiful home, Mr Zervakis. It’s kind of you to invite me to share your special day.’ Blushing charmingly, she then attempted to speak a few words of Greek, a gesture that both distracted his father and guaranteed a lifetime of devotion.
Nik watched as his dazzled father melted like butter left in the hot sun.
He kissed her hand and switched to heavily accented English. ‘You are welcome in my home, Lily. I’m so happy you are able to join us for what is turning out to be the most special week of my life. This is Diandra.’
For the first time Nik noticed the woman hovering in the background.
He’d assumed she was one of his father’s staff, but now she stepped forward and quietly introduced herself.
Nik noticed that she didn’t quite meet his eye, instead she focused all her attention on Lily as if she were the lifebelt floating on the surface of a deep pool of water.
Diandra clearly had sophisticated radar for detecting sympathy in people, Nik thought, wondering what ‘news’ his father had for them.
Experience led him to assume it was unlikely to be good.
‘I’ve brought you a small gift. I made it myself.’ Lily delved into her bag and handed over a prettily wrapped parcel.
It was a ceramic plate, similar to the one he’d admired in her apartment, decorated with the same pattern of swirling blues and greens.
Nik could see she had real talent and so, apparently, did his father.
‘You made this? But this isn’t your business?’
‘No. I’m an archaeologist. But I did my dissertation on Minoan ceramics so it’s an interest of mine.’
‘You must tell me all about it. And all about yourself. Lily Rose is a beautiful name.’ His father led her towards the table that had been laid next to the pool. Silver gleamed in the sunlight and bowls of olives gleamed glossy dark in beautiful blue bowls. Kostas put Lily’s plate in the centre of the table. ‘Your mother liked flowers?’
‘I don’t know. I didn’t know my mother.’ She shot Nik an apologetic look. ‘That’s too much information for a first meeting. Let’s talk about something else.’
But Kostas Zervakis wasn’t so easily deflected. ‘You didn’t know your mother? She passed away when you were young, koukla mou?’
Appalled by that demonstration of insensitivity, Nik shot him an exasperated look and was about to steer the conversation away from such a deeply personal topic when Lily answered.
‘I don’t know what happened to her. She left me in a basket in Kew Gardens in London when I was a few hours old.’
Whatever he’d expected to hear, it hadn’t been that and Nik, who made a point of never asking about a woman’s past, found himself wanting to know more. ‘A basket?’ Her eyes lifted to his and for a moment the presence of other people was forgotten.
‘Yes. I was found by one of the staff and taken to hospital. They called me Lily Rose because I was found among the flowers. They never traced my mother. They assumed she was a teenager who panicked.’ She spoke in a matter-of-fact tone but Nik knew she wasn’t matter-of-fact about the way she felt.
This was why she had shown so much wistful interest in the detail of his family. At the time he hadn’t been able to understand why it would make an interesting topic of conversation, but now he understood that, to her, it was not a frustration or a complication. It was an aspiration.
This was why she dreamed of happy endings, both for herself and other people.
He felt something stir inside him, an emotion that was entirely new to him.
He’d believed himself immune to even the most elaborately constructed sob story, but Lily’s revelation had somehow managed to slide under those steely layers of protection he’d constructed for himself. For some reason, her simply stated story touched him deeply.
Unsettled, he dragged his eyes from her soft mouth and promised himself that no matter how much he wanted her, he wasn’t going to touch her again. It wouldn’t be fair, when their expectations of life were so different. He had no concerns about his own ability to keep a relationship superficial. He did, however, have deep concerns about her ability to do the same and he didn’t want to hurt her.
His father, predictably, was visibly moved by the revelation about her childhood.
‘No family?’ His voice was roughened by emotion. ‘So who raised you, koukla mou?’
‘I was brought up in a series of foster homes.’ She poked absently at her food. ‘And now I think we should talk about something else because this is definitely too much detail for a first meeting, especially when we’re here to celebrate a wedding.’ Superficially she was as cheerful as ever but Nik knew she was upset.
He was about to make another attempt to change the topic when his father reached out and took Lily’s hand.
‘One day you will have a family of your own. A big family.’
Nik ground his teeth. ‘I don’t think Lily wants to talk about that right now.’
‘I don’t mind.’ Lily sent him a quick smile and then turned back to his father. ‘I hope so. I think family makes you feel anchored and I’ve never had that.’
‘Anchors keep a boat secured in one place,’ Nik said softly, ‘which can be limiting.’
Her gaze met his and he knew she was deciding if his observation was random or a warning.
He wasn’t sure himself. All he knew was that he didn’t want her thinking this was anything other then temporary. He could see she’d had a tough life. He didn’t want to be the one to shatter that optimism and remove the smile from her face.
His father gave a disapproving frown. ‘Ignore him. When it comes to relationships my son behaves like a child in a sweetshop. He gorges his appetites without learning the benefits of selectivity. He enjoys success in everything he touches except, sadly, his private life.’
‘I’m very selective.’ Nik reached for his wine. ‘And given that my private life is exactly the way I want it to be, I consider it an unqualified success.’
He banked down the frustration, wondering how his father, thrice divorced, could consider himself an example to follow.
His father looked at him steadily. ‘All the money in the world will not bring a man the same feeling of contentment as a wife and children, don’t you agree, Lily?’
‘As someone with massive college loans, I wouldn’t dismiss the importance of money,’ Lily said honestly, ‘but I agree that family is the most important thing.’
Feeling as if he’d woken up on the set of a Hollywood rom-com in which he’d been cast in the role of ‘bad guy’, Nik refrained from asking his father which of his wives had ever given him anything other than stomach ulcers and astronomical bills. Surely even he couldn’t reframe his romantic past as anything other than a disaster.
‘One day you will have a family, Lily.’ Kostas Zervakis surveyed her with misty eyes and Nik observed this emotional interchange with something between disbelief and despair.
His father had known Lily for less than five minutes and already he was ready to leave her everything in his will. It was no wonder he’d made himself a target for every woman with a sob story.
Callie had spotted that vulnerability and dug her claws deep. No doubt Diandra was working on the same soft spot.
A dark, deeply buried memory stirred in the depths of his brain. His father, sitting alone in the bedroom among the wreckage of his wife’s hasty packing, the image of wretched despair as she drove away without looking back.
Never, before or since, had Nik felt as powerless as he had that day. Even though he’d been a young child, he’d known he was witnessing pain beyond words.
The second time it had happened, he’d been a teenager and he remembered wondering why his father would have risked putting himself through such emotional agony a second time.
And then there had been Callie…
He’d known from the first moment that the relationship was doomed and had blamed himself later for not trying to save his father from that particular mistake.
And now here he was again, trapped in the unenviable position of having to make a choice between watching his father walk into another relationship disaster, or potentially damaging their relationship by trying to intervene.
Lily was right that his father was a grown man, able to make his own decisions. So why did he still have this urge to push his father out of the path of the oncoming train?
Emotions boiling inside him, he glanced across the table to his future stepmother, wondering if it was a coincidence that she’d picked the chair as far from his as possible.
She was either shy or she was harbouring a guilty conscience.
He’d promised he wouldn’t interfere, but he was fast rethinking that decision.
He sat in silence, observing rather than participating, while staff discreetly served food and topped up glasses.
His father engaged Lily in conversation, encouraging her to talk about her life and her love of archaeology and Greece.
Forced to sit through a detailed chronology of Lily’s life history, Nik learned that she’d had three boyfriends, worked numerous low-paid jobs to pay for college tuition, was allergic to cats, suffered from severe eczema as a child and had never lived in the same place for more than twelve months.
The more he discovered about her life, the more he realised how hard it had been. She’d made a joke about Cinderella, but Lily made Cinderella look like a slacker.
Learning far more than he’d ever wanted to know, he turned to his father. ‘What is the “news” you have for me?’
‘You will find out soon enough. First, I am enjoying having the company of my son. It’s been too long. I have resorted to the Internet to find news of what is happening with you. You have been spending a great deal of time in San Francisco.’
Happy to talk about anything that shifted the focus from Lily, Nik relaxed slightly and talked broadly about some of the technology developments his company was spearheading and touched lightly on the deal he was about to close, but the diversion proved to be brief.
Kostas spooned olives onto Lily’s plate. ‘You must persuade Nik to take you to the far side of the island to see the Minoan remains. You will need to go early in the day, before it is too hot. At this time of year everything is very dry. If you love flowers, then you will love Crete in the spring. In April and May the island is covered in poppies, daisies, camomile, iris.’ He beamed at her. ‘You must come back here then and visit.’
‘I’d like that.’ Lily tucked into her food. ‘These olives are delicious.’
‘They come from our own olive groves and the lemonade in your fridge came from lemons grown on our own trees. Diandra made it. She is a genius in the kitchen. You wait until you taste her lamb.’ Kostas leaned across and took Diandra’s hand. ‘I took one mouthful and fell in love.’
Losing his appetite, Nik gave her a direct look. ‘Tell me about yourself, Diandra. Where were you brought up?’ He caught Lily’s urgent glance and ignored it, instead listening to Diandra’s stammered response.
From that he learned that she was one of six children and had never been married.
‘She never met the right person, and that is lucky for me,’ his father said indulgently.
Nik opened his mouth to speak, but Lily got there first.
‘You’re so lucky having been born in Greece,’ she said quickly. ‘I’ve travelled extensively in the islands but living here must be wonderful. I’ve spent three summers on Crete and one on Corfu. Where else do you think I should visit?’
Giving her a grateful look, Diandra made several suggestions, but Nik refused to be deflected from his path.
‘Who did you work for before my father?’
‘Ignore him,’ Lily said lightly. ‘He makes every conversation feel like a job interview. The first time I met him I wanted to hand over my résumé. This lamb is delicious by the way. You’re so clever. It’s even better than the lamb Nik and I ate last week and that was a top restaurant.’ She went on to describe what they’d eaten in minute detail and Diandra offered a few observations of her own about the best way to cook lamb.
Deprived of the opportunity to question his future stepmother further, Nik was wondering once again what ‘news’ his father was preparing to announce, when he heard the sound of a child crying inside the house.
Diandra shot to her feet and exchanged a brief look with his father before scurrying from the table.
Nik narrowed his eyes. ‘Who,’ he said slowly, ‘is that?’
‘That’s the news I was telling you about.’ His father turned his head and watched as Diandra returned to the table carrying a toddler whose tangled blonde curls and sleepy expression announced that she’d recently awoken from a nap. ‘Callie has given me full custody of Chloe as a wedding present. Niklaus, meet your half-sister.’
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