Despite the efficient air-conditioning, sweat beaded on his brow.
As well as watching Selene they’d been watching Antaxos but her father hadn’t shown his face since their encounter on that day.
What the hell had possessed him to get involved with Stavros Antaxos’s daughter? It was a decision that had ‘trouble’ written all over it.
‘Stefan—?’
Hearing his name, he glanced up and saw Maria in the doorway.
It was unheard of for her to interrupt him in a meeting and Stefan rose to his feet in a cold panic. He told himself that Takis would not have let anything happen to Selene, but still his limbs shook as he walked to the door.
‘What’s wrong? Have you heard from her?’ His voice trailed off as he saw Selene standing in his office, the sun sending silver lights shimmering through her newly shorn hair. She wore a simple cotton strap top and a pair of shorts that revealed endless length of tanned leg.
Tears streaked her pretty face.
His world tilted. ‘Theé mou, what has happened?’ He was across the room in two strides, his hands on her arms. ‘Has he found you? If he’s threatened you in some way then I’ll—’
‘He hasn’t threatened me. I haven’t seen him.’ She choked out the words. Sniffed. ‘Nothing like that.’
‘Then what the hell is wrong? Tell me.’
The quiet click of the door told him that Maria had left the room, which meant that he was alone with someone who repeatedly made him feel as if he were poised on the top of a slippery slope about to plunge to his doom.
‘I was so wrong about you and I’m sorry.’ Her eyes lifted to his. ‘I— This is all my fault. After I met you that night and you were so nice to me I built you up in my head as some sort of hero. I thought about you all the time, I dreamed about you, and then I met you and you were this amazing guy—’ Her voice cracked. ‘And we had that night, and it was fun, and you were so incredibly sexy, and being in your bed was—well, I just—I never thought anything could feel like that—’
‘You need to breathe, koukla mou.’
‘No, I need to tell you this because I feel horrible and I’m not going to stop feeling horrible until I’ve said what I have to say and you have to listen.’
‘I’m listening,’ Stefan assured her, ‘but I need you to calm down. I thought you only cried when you were happy?’
‘Turns out that’s another thing I was wrong about. But mostly I was wrong about you. I was so panicked when I saw those photos, and you were so unconcerned about it I assumed you were responsible. I didn’t even think about it from your point of view. Of course you didn’t know about my father. Why would you? And I was so used to playing my part in this so-called happy family that I didn’t even know how to tell someone that it was all fake.’
‘None of this matters now. It’s fine.’
‘No, it isn’t fine. Because you came to that island to rescue me and all I did was yell at you, and then I found out you’d got me the job and had people watching me so that I was safe, but did I thank you?’ Her voice rose. ‘No! I yelled at you again.’
‘You wanted to be independent. I understand that.’
‘I was embarrassingly unrealistic. I have no experience, no credentials, nothing that would make an employer take me on, and yet I thought I’d be able to just walk into a job and when I did I didn’t even question it. If it hadn’t been for you I probably would have been sleeping rough—’
‘I’ve done that and I didn’t want it for you.’ He wiped that image from his mind.
‘You’ve been so kind to me,’ she mumbled, ‘and I didn’t deserve it. I was mean and I’m not a mean person. But I can see it all more clearly now.’
‘You have been through more than anyone should have to. Why would you trust me? I was your father’s enemy—that’s why you came to me in the first place.’
‘But I never saw you as that. I knew you weren’t. I knew you were good. You are good.’ She was standing so close to him he could smell the scent of her hair and see the flecks of black in her green eyes.