PROLOGUE.
Twenty years earlier.
“I’m so hungry,” Helena shivered, her frail seven-year-old frame curled over like a conch shell. The rain was lashing in from every direction, but she had the most sheltered spot in the litter-strewn street. Beneath a threadbare awning, her grotty face dry, her matted hair only a little damp; it was the best Alessandro could do.
“I’m going to find you something to eat,” Alex swore with more determination than clue. “And one day, Helena, we’re going to live like Kings.”
Helena’s teeth chattered. “I-I-I’m not a boy.”
“No,” he agreed, looking from one direction to the other. The commuters were still drifting down the cobbled laneway. It was too early. Soon, though, he’d head out to the restaurant precinct and take what he could. Discarded meals, ignored wallets. Anything that would keep his little sister going. It was harder for her. She was so skinny her bones were protruding through her olive skin; he was big and strong, despite the hunger that constantly gnawed at his gut. He’d got used to it. At fourteen, he could rationalise it. He could tell himself it was temporary.
Alessandro Petrides was determined not to let homelessness, poverty or fear control him.
He sat down beside Helena and the dirty street water soaked through his already sodden pants. “You need to think your way out of this. Imagine yourself on a tropical beach. Imagine you’re warm and dry and your belly is full of food.”
“But I’m so hungry I could die.”
“Don’t die,” Alex responded jokingly, but inside, his heart was breaking. For three years he’d fought for them. He’d kept them alive, but they weren’t really living. What kind of existence was this? “I’d miss you.”
“You’d only have one of us to feed though.”
How could his sweet little Helena have such a sad understanding of their state in the world? He put an arm around her shoulders. “I’d give my last meal to you, Helena. You know that.” He kissed her head. “It’s just you and me, okay? We’re going to be fine.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I’m your brother. It’s my job to look after you.”
“But …”
“No buts,” he contradicted. “Forever and ever, whatever you need, I will be there for you.” He nudged her with his body. “Just promise me you won’t quit.”
* * *
Twenty years later.
“There is no way your husband is cheating on you, Helena. You are being paranoid.”
“I’m not!” The agony in his sister’s voice reached him, across the continent to his palatial home on the ragged cliffs of Corfu.
“Of course you are. I know Eric. He is one of my oldest friends. He is a good man.”
“Trust you to defend him!”
Alex exhaled a long, slow breath and tried to bring his impatience to order. “If he has slept around, believe me, Helena, I will be the first to condemn his behaviour. But you have no proof.”
“I don’t need proof.”
Alex shook his head ruefully. Beneath him, the moon bathed the cresting waves of the Ionian in a pale milky glow.
“You haven’t seen her.”
“The nanny?” Alex scoffed. For Eric Sandhurst was hardly the kind of man to sleep around with menials in his employ.
“Yes, the nanny.” It was a hiss from between her teeth. “Sophie bloody Henderson. All perfect, blonde, five foot nothing of her.”
Alex ran a hand over the back of his neck, dragging his fingers through the dark hair that curled a little at his nape. “Then your solution is simple. If you truly believe this to be true, fire her.”
“I tried! Eric won’t let me!” Her voice was becoming higher in pitch; her tone obviously desperate.
Alex’s dark eyes, almost as dark and shimmering as the night sky beyond him, were focussed on a trawler in the distance. The nets were lowering, and the boat was lurching in the movements of the current.
“It is a domestic decision. You do not need to listen to him. He is barely around to object, I should have thought.”
“That might have been the case before we hired her, but now? He’s like a love-sick puppy. He follows her to the park with the children. He makes sure he is home for story time. They curl in the bed together and read to the boys. Please, Alessandro, you know I would not trouble you with this if I were not truly afraid for my marriage.”
Alex’s fingers curled more tightly around his phone. His sister had always held a flare for the dramatic. It was entirely possible that she was imbuing perfectly innocent scenarios with a degree of fault that didn’t belong. “Why do you not partake in these events too?”
“You are blaming me for his infidelity.”
“Alleged infidelity,” Alex corrected automatically. “And of course I am not. I am simply reminding you that it is your house. They are your children. He is your husband. You are not forbidden from spending time with them.”
“I’m an outsider.” She sobbed quietly, but Alex heard it, and it tore his heart in two. His sister was grieving, regardless of what the facts might be. “The way he looks at her … I know he loves her. Because it is how he once looked at me.”
A small kernel of worry lodged in Alex’s gut. He knew that his sister’s marriage had been troubled. The difficulties they’d experienced conceiving, coupled with several miscarriages and finally, children who were boisterous and exhausting at times, had strained them.
“I think you must fire her.”
“Eric may leave me.”
“Of course he won’t leave you.” Apart from anything, Alex’s old friend was ambitious as hell. His desire to one day run for mayor of London would smother any divorce notions. Even if he no longer loved Helena? Is that what Alex wanted? For his only sister, a woman he had virtually raised, to be in a marriage with a man who didn’t love her?
“Perhaps you and he should get away for a time. Come here, to Greece, where I can talk with him.”
“No!” Her voice shook. “I already suggested a vacation. He told me he has too much work on.”
Alex’s kernel of doubt was gaining in size and weight. He didn’t want to think the worst of his friend. And yet, his sister was clearly not going to be placated.
“Paidi mou, do not make yourself uneasy. I will come to you.”
“And will you end it, Alex?”