Weakness ebbed through her, dissolving and debilitating. Dear God, but he was just so beautiful to look at…
She came back with a start.
‘Well, however much I moan about it, it still beats packing biscuits all day long in the local factory,’ she returned, taking a mouthful of wine herself, to restore her composure. ‘I never did well at school, so higher education was out.’
‘You don’t strike me as unintelligent,’ observed Leo. ‘Why did you not do well at school?’
She looked at him, surprised. Leo Makarios didn’t look like the kind of man to assess any woman for her intelligence. Let alone her. Perhaps, she thought acidly, he assumed that a thief had to have a basic degree of intelligence.
‘I’ll answer that for you,’ he said dryly. ‘I can’t see you taking kindly to a teacher’s authority.’
Anna’s face was expressive. ‘Some were OK,’ she allowed. ‘But most of them…’ She didn’t finish the sentence. Then she shrugged. ‘But I was the one who was the fool—I should have been smart enough to make school work for me. Instead…’ She shrugged again. ‘Anyway, when I was eighteen I got spotted by a talent scout for an agency, trawling the shopping malls of north London. That got me started.’ She took another mouthful of wine to wash down the spicy prawns. ‘My gran—she’d brought me up—hated it. She thought I’d be dragged into a den of iniquity. She was right, of course. But luckily I wised up pretty fast. And toughened up. I don’t put up with garbage any more.’
The wine was coiling slowly through her veins in the warmth of the day and the rare pleasure of eating filling food. The combination made her feel strangely relaxed. Maybe that was why she was able to talk like this to Leo Makarios. She took another forkful of food, her eyes flickering to his face. It was odd, definitely, to be talking to him.
Leo contemplated her.
‘Are you as aggressive with your lovers?’ he enquired.
Anna’s fork stopped halfway to her mouth, and lowered again.
‘I don’t have lovers,’ she said tightly.
Leo stared at her.
Anna Delane didn’t have lovers?
He wanted to laugh out loud. Of course a woman as beautiful as she was had lovers. Men must have been swarming around her since she hit puberty!
Did that mean she’d helped herself, though? She certainly threw you out of her bedroom, right enough!
He jabbed angrily at the piece of lamb fillet he’d just cut. It always came back to that, didn’t it? Anna Delane throwing him out of her bedroom. Spitting with outraged virtue even while her breasts were still taut and aroused from his caressing…
A hypocrite. That was all she was. Saying one thing with her mouth while her body spoke a quite, quite different language…
‘What do you mean, you don’t have lovers?’
His own question interrupted his thoughts, which were leading him in a direction he did not want to go on a day he’d told her she could have the night to herself.
Anna resumed eating.
‘I mean I don’t have lovers,’ she repeated. ‘What’s the big deal?’
‘Why not?’ There was genuine incomprehension in his voice, as well as underlying disbelief at her extraordinary assertion. ‘You are far too beautiful not to take lovers.’
The flash of green fire came again. ‘You mean I have some sort of duty to offer myself on a plate to all comers just because they fancy me?’ Her voice was shrivelling with contempt.
‘Of course not. I merely mean that with your looks you could have the pick of my sex.’
Anna’s mouth tightened. ‘With you as a prime example? No, thanks.’ The green flash came again. ‘Look, I thought the deal was we were going to try and be civil to each other. So stop going on at me, all right? Can’t you talk about the weather or something?’
He sat back. ‘Very well,’ he said heavily. There was an expression in his eyes she could not read. ‘So, what would you like to do after lunch?’
She shrugged. ‘You know the island, not me.’
‘Would you like to do more shopping?’
She rolled her eyes. ‘Good grief, what is it with you? I don’t need or want to buy anything else, thank you. Actually—’ a thought struck her ‘—what I do want is a swim, to cool off. Is there a beach nearby?’ Another thought struck her. ‘But maybe with your ankle you can’t go in the water?’
‘That is not a problem,’ replied Leo airily, astonished that she’d actually condescended to voice a preference to him. ‘And I know just the beach to take you to.’ His eyes gleamed. ‘Tell me, can you surf?’