‘I imagine a private island is just about de rigueur for a Greek tycoon, isn’t it?’ she was saying now, lightly, with a clear infusion of amusement in her voice.
Bastiaan sat back in his chair, lifting his glass. ‘Do you take me for a tycoon, mademoiselle?’ he riposted.
But there was a deep timbre in his voice all the same. She felt it like a low vibration in her body.
‘Oh, surely you could be nothing less, m’sieu?’ she answered in kind. ‘With your private island in the Aegean!’
She had matched the slight tinge of ironic inflection that had been in his voice and suddenly there seemed to be a flicker in his dark eyes, a slight curve of his mouth, as if for her alone... Something she didn’t want to be there.
Something she did...
No, no I don’t. And, anyway, isn’t it bad enough that I’ve got to deal with Philip’s bad attack of calf love? The last thing I need is to develop a crush of my own on his cousin.
She paused. Crush? Was that what she was calling this strange, disturbing electricity between them? This ridiculous, absurd awareness of his overpoweri
ng physical impact on her? A crush?
Negation leapt in her. No, this was no crush. There was only one cause for what she was feeling about this man who had walked into her dressing room that night, who had taken her in his powerful, controlling clasp on the dance floor, who was now watching her, his heavy eyes half lidded, waiting for her to reply in similar vein...
Desire. Raw, insistent desire. Desire bred of her burning awareness of his presence, of his physical existence—the way the tough line of his jaw squared his face, the way the strong column of his throat rose from the open neck of his polo, the way the sable darkness of his hair feathered the broad brow, the way his shirt moulded across the strength of his shoulders, his torso...
Desire—that was the only word for it. The only name to give what she was feeling now as her body flushed with heat, with awareness...
Desperation spiked in her. It was like a sideways sweeping wave, knocking her askew, derailing her. And she could not allow it to happen. Not with her whole life’s ambition consuming her right now. That was all she must think of—that was all she must focus on.
Not on this man who can make my pulse catch just by letting his dark, dark eyes rest on me, setting my senses afire...
It was a fire she had to quench—and fast.
She reached for her champagne, needing its potency to regain control of herself.
‘Bast’s island’s in the Ionian Sea, not the Aegean,’ Philip was saying. ‘Off the west coast of Greece. Not far from Zakynthos.’
Sarah turned her head towards him, half reluctant, half grateful to drag her gaze away from his darkly disturbing cousin. ‘I don’t know Greece at all,’ she said. ‘I’ve never been.’
‘I’d love to show you. You’d love Athens!’ Philip replied immediately, his voice full of enthusiasm.
A low laugh came from the other end of the table. ‘A city full of ancient ruins? I doubt it. I’m sure Sabine would prefer sophisticated cities, like Milan or Paris.’
She didn’t correct him. The real Sabine, wherever she was right now, probably would prefer such cities, and at the moment that persona was hers. She’d better let the issue lie.
She gave a very Gallic shrug, as she had so often seen her French mother give.
‘I like warm climates,’ she answered, which seemed an unrevealing comment to make, and was true as well. The Yorkshire winters she’d grown up with had never been her favourite, nor her mother’s either. She had preferred the soft winters of her native Normandy. She looked at Philip again. ‘I couldn’t stand the frozen East Coast USA winters you have at uni.’
Philip shivered extravagantly. ‘Neither can I!’ He laughed. ‘But we get snow in Greece sometimes—don’t we, Bast?’
‘There is even skiing in the mountains,’ his cousin agreed.
‘Bast skis like a champion!’ Philip exclaimed, with open admiration for his older cousin.
‘I was at school in Switzerland,’ Bastiaan said laconically, by way of explanation.
Sarah’s glance went back to Bastiaan. ‘Is that why your French is so good?’ she asked.
‘Oh, Bast’s fluent in German as well—aren’t you, Bast? And English, of course. My English is probably better than my French, actually, so really we should be speaking—’
‘Tell me more about your private island.’ Sarah’s voice cut across Philip, preventing him from finishing his sentence. She was starting to think that this was ridiculous—all this stuff about her being Sabine. She should just come right out with it—trust Philip’s cousin with her real identity and be done with it.