The Greek Tycoon's Achilles Heel

CHAPTER TWELVE

THE text message was simple and heartfelt.

I need to talk to you. Why have you stopped replying? L

He hesitated before sending it, afflicted by a feeling that the world had turned on its head. He’d received so many texts like this, but never before had he sent one. Would she reply to him as he had so often replied to the others? The thought sent him cold with alarm. But he must do this. He could no longer endure the silence between them. He pressed the button.

Her reply was quick.

I’m sorry. I needed to be alone to think. P

He answered, I thought that, but it’s a mistake. We must do our thinking together. L

She texted back, We only hurt each other.

This time he sent her only one word. Please.

She called back and he heard her voice.

‘Please, Lysandros, it’s better if we don’t talk for a while.’

‘No,’ he said stubbornly. ‘It isn’t. There’s a way out of this-’

‘Not if you don’t believe me. And in your heart you don’t. Goodbye-my dearest.’

As she hung up he passed a hand over his eyes, troubled by something he’d heard in the background, something he couldn’t quite place-something-

He bounded to his feet, swearing. A tannoy announcement. That was what he’d heard. She was at the airport.

Frantically he called back, but she’d switched off. Neither speech nor text could reach her now. She was on her way back to England.

The world was coming down about his ears. Once she was gone he’d lose her for ever; he knew that well. And then everything would end.

He moved like lightning, calling his private pilot. A moment later he was rushing through the grounds to the landing stage where his helicopter waited, and a few minutes after that they were in the air.

While the pilot radioed ahead to the airport, arranging for a landing and a car to meet them, he called Information to check the next flight to England. It would take off in half an hour. He groaned.

The pilot was skilful and made Athens Airport in the fastest possible time. The car was waiting, taking him to the main building. As he stared out of the window he prayed for a delay, something that would give him the chance to get her off the plane. But then he saw it, rising into the sky, higher and higher, taking his life with it.

Even so, he clung to hope until the last minute. Only the word Departed on the board forced him to accept the brutal truth. She had gone. He’d lost her. His life was over. He almost reeled away from the desk, blinded by misery, wanting to howl up to heaven.

He was pulled up short by a collision. Two arms went around him, supporting him as they had so often done before. He tried to pull himself together.

‘I’m sorry, I-Petra!’

She was clinging to him, staring up into his face, hardly able to believe what was happening.

‘What’s the matter?’ she asked quickly. ‘Why are you here?’

‘To stop you leaving. I thought you’d be on that plane for England that just took off. You can’t go like this.’

‘Like this?’ she asked hopefully.

‘Not until we’ve settled things.’

She didn’t know what to make of that. It might almost have been business-speak, but he was trembling in her arms.

‘I’m not going back to England,’ she said. ‘That’s not why I’m here. Please calm down. You worry me.’

He was taking huge gulps of air as relief shuddered through him.

‘Let’s find somewhere to sit,’ she said, ‘and I’ll explain.’

Over a drink she said quietly, ‘I was going to Corfu. I’ve been thinking a lot about how Nikator knew what we said, and it seems to me that he must have known a lot more about Priam House than he’s ever let anyone know; enough to have bugged the place, even long ago. So I was going to see what I could find.’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That’s it. We’ll find the answer. But why didn’t you tell me?’

‘I wasn’t sure how you’d-well, anyway, I meant to go alone, but when I got here I realised I should tell you first. Because if I find bugs, I need you to be there, don’t I? Otherwise-’ she gave a wan smile ‘-otherwise, how will you know I didn’t plant them, to clear myself?’

‘Don’t,’ he whispered.

‘Anyway, I was just about to leave the airport. I was going to come to you and tell you what I was thinking, but here you are. What brought you here?’

‘You. I heard an announcement in the background and I thought you were leaving the country. I had to come and stop you. Look, it doesn’t matter about all the other things. I can’t let you go.’

‘Even though you still doubt me?’ she asked wryly. ‘No, never mind. We’ll worry later. We can’t tell how this is going to work out.’

‘My helicopter’s here. It can take us straight on to Corfu, and we’ll find all the answers we need there.’

Petra didn’t reply. She knew that everything was far more complicated than he’d understood. They might find some answers, but not all and there were still obstacles to overcome. But this wasn’t the time to say so.

For the moment she would enjoy the happiness of seeing him again, even though that happiness was tinged with bitterness and the threat of future misery.

An hour later the helicopter set them down on Corfu. As they covered the last few miles she wondered if this was just a forlorn hope and they were chasing it to avoid facing the truth.

‘Does anyone know where Nikator is?’ he asked suddenly. ‘I’ve been looking for him, but he seems to have vanished.’

‘Nobody’s seen him for days.’

‘How wise of him to avoid me. It was always the way when he was in trouble,’ Lysandros said. ‘He never did stick around to face things.’

‘You do know that he did this, don’t you?’

‘I’ve been finding out. And when we know this last thing-’

Then you’ll trust me, she thought. But not until then.

Was she making too much of it? she wondered. He’d come looking for her, desperate to stop her leaving him. Wasn’t that enough?

But it wasn’t. What still lived in her mind was the look that had fleetingly been on his face when disaster had struck. It had been a look of appalled betrayal, saying that she was no different from all the others. Now something must happen to wipe it out, but she had a terrible fear that nothing ever could.

The house was as they had left it, except that then it had been infused with joy. That had vanished now and its silence was the deadly silence of fear.

Lysandros wasted no time. Gathering tools from the shed, he strode out, through the grounds, under the trees, to the place where Brigitta and her child lay, incongruously at peace. Somehow Brigitta seemed a very real presence now, crying out to Lysandros to remember only her love and forget all else.

In the end he’d managed to do that. But too late.

‘Why is he doing this?’ Petra asked her spirit. ‘Can he really only love and trust me when he has something tangible to hold? Isn’t there anything deep inside him that tells him the truth? Those times when our hearts were so close that we were like one, do they count for nothing now?’

She thought she could hear Brigitta’s melancholy cry, echoing from Hades, the underworld, across the River Styx and down the centuries. There was no hope in that sound.

‘That’s it!’

Lysandros’s shout broke into her thoughts. He’d been hard at work, digging, scrabbling around the grave. Now there was a look of triumph in his eyes.

‘Got them,’ he said, holding something up.

‘What have you found?’ she asked.

‘Bugs. Tiny microphones powerful enough to pick up anything, including what we said to each other.’

So she was cleared. She waited for the surge of joy that this should have brought her, but nothing happened.

‘So this place was bugged,’ she said.

But her heart was still waiting for him to say that he would have believed in her anyway, even if he’d found nothing. Desperately hoping, she nudged him in the right direction.

‘But how do you know that I didn’t come here earlier and put them there?’

If only he would say, Because I know you wouldn’t do that.

Instead, beaming and oblivious to the undercurrents, he said, ‘Of course you didn’t. Look at them, they’re old. They’ve been here for years. Nikator must have had spies that told him about this place and bugged it long ago. He’s just been waiting for his moment.’

‘Ah, I see. So the evidence clears me.’

‘Of course it does.’

He scrambled up out of the grave and seized her shoulders.

‘Darling, can’t you see how wonderful this is? It makes everything right.’

‘Does it?’ she whispered.

He barely heard her words and totally missed her meaning.

‘Come here,’ he said, pulling her to him, kissing her fiercely. ‘Now nothing can part us again.’

He seized her hand and began to run back to the house, his face shining with happiness. Upstairs, he kicked in the door of his bedroom and drew her swiftly down on the bed. She had a split second to make up her mind, whether or not to go through with this, for she knew that they were coming to the end. But for that very reason she would allow herself this one last time.

She made love to him as never before, giving him not just her body, but a heart infused with sorrow. Everything in her belonged to him. Soul and spirit were his, and there would never be anyone else. He had spoiled all other men for her, and she would live with that. But she could no longer live with him.

With every tender gesture, every whispered word, she bid him farewell. Each caress was a plea for him to remember always that she had loved him utterly and always would, even though their ways must now lie apart.

They reached their moment together and she saw him smiling down at her in triumph and relief, something that had always been her peak of joy. Afterwards he held her tenderly, protectively, and she had to struggle not to weep.

‘Thank goodness,’ he said fervently. ‘We so nearly lost each other.’

To him it was all so simple. He hadn’t faced the inevitable yet, but she must face it for both of them.

‘Lysandros-’

‘What is it, my darling?’

‘Don’t you realise that we have lost each other?’

‘No, how can we? We know how it was all done now. The whole newspaper thing was fake, he had us followed to the Achilleion by someone who eavesdropped on what we said, and now we’ve found the evidence that clears you.’

As soon as he said the last words he knew what he’d done. She saw it in the sudden dismay that swept over his face.

‘Yes,’ she said sadly, ‘you needed evidence to clear me because my word alone wasn’t enough.’

‘Don’t,’ he interrupted her hurriedly. ‘Don’t say it.’

‘I have to. I’m going away-at least for a little while.’

‘No. I won’t let you go. I’ll make you stay until you see sense-’ He heard himself and screwed up his eyes in dismay. ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’

‘It’s all right. I love it that you want me, but perhaps it isn’t right for us. If you only knew how much I’ve longed for you to believe in me anyway, in the face of all the evidence. Now it’s too late.’

‘But we’ve just made everything right.’

‘My dearest, we’ve made nothing right. Can’t you see that? We made love, and it was beautiful, but real love is so much more than passion. I know what to do when I’m in your arms. I know the caresses you can’t resist, just as you know the ones that affect me. We know how to tempt each other on and on until we explode with desire, and for a while that seems enough. But it soon passes, and then we have to see the distance between us.’

‘It doesn’t have to be there,’ he said harshly. ‘We can overcome it.’

She loved him for his stubborn belief. She would have given anything to yield to it and it broke her heart to refuse, knowing that she was breaking his heart in the process.

She remembered how he’d raced to the airport to stop her leaving, caring nothing for her guilt or innocence as long as he kept her with him. Surely that was enough? But he was an acquisitive man. What was his had to remain his. There might be no more in his possessiveness than that. It wasn’t enough to build on.

If only, she thought desperately, there was still something that could happen-something that could give them hope for the future-but the last chance had gone. He had the evidence in his hands now, and evidence made blind trust unnecessary.

It was too late. Nothing could happen now.

‘You’re saying that I’ve failed you,’ he grated. ‘You can’t forgive me.’

‘There’s nothing to forgive,’ she said passionately. ‘What was done to you was terrible, and it’s not your fault that it’s scarred you. But it has. You can’t really believe in anyone now, even me. I thought I could help you but I can’t. Please try to understand.’

A dead look came into his eyes.

‘Yes,’ he said at last. ‘Of course you must go, because I let you down, didn’t I? Get out while you can. Get out before I destroy you as I did her.’

He dressed hurriedly and walked out without looking back. Shattered, she stared after him. This was what she’d planned, but now it was here it was terrible. Throwing on her clothes, she hurried out after him.

As soon as she reached the head of the stairs she knew that something had happened. The door to the cellar stood open. Through it she could see a light and hear voices.

She knew who would be there before she entered. Lysandros stood by the far wall, his eyes fixed on Nikator, who aimed a small pistol at him.

‘Get out,’ Lysandros shouted to her. ‘Go now.’

‘Oh, I don’t think so,’ Nikator said, pointing the pistol at her. ‘I’ve waited so long to get you both together. Come down, my dear, and let’s all three have a talk.’

She’d thought she knew the worst of Nikator. But now his eyes were bright as if he was high on something and his most dreadful side was on display. This man could kill, she was sure of it. And now only one thing mattered.

‘How do you come to be here, Nikki?’ she asked, trying to sound casual.

‘It wasn’t hard. I knew you’d both arrive soon.’

‘Let her go,’ Lysandros said. ‘I’m the one you want.’

‘But she’s also the one I want. She always has been. And now I’m tired of waiting. If not one way, then another. Isn’t that so?’

‘Then you can have me,’ Petra said. ‘Let Lysandros go and I’m all yours, Nikki.’

‘No!’ Lysandros’s howl of rage and despair seemed to hit the ceiling, causing some dust and wood flakes to float down.

‘It makes no difference to you,’ she told him, smiling. ‘We’d decided to part anyway. I never stay with any man for long. What do you say, Nikki?’

She was still on the stairs and he reached up to take her hand and draw her down beside him.

‘You mean you’d stay with me-?’

‘If you let Lysandros go.’

Nikator laughed softly, horribly.

‘Oh, darling, I so much want to believe you, but you’re lying. You’re still in love with him. After all the things I’ve heard you say to him-’

‘You mean-?’

‘Yes, I heard it all. It’s not just the gardens that are bugged. Everywhere. I bugged it years ago. Years and years I’ve been waiting. I’ve been with the two of you all the time.’

Lysandros’s roar filled the air. The next moment he’d launched himself onto Nikator. There was an explosion as the pistol went off and the next moment the whole place was shaking as the bullet hit the old ceiling, which began to disintegrate.

‘It’s coming down,’ Lysandros said hoarsely. ‘Get out fast.’

But the wooden stairs were collapsing and the next moment the ceiling began to descend on them. She saw it getting closer, then it was blocked out by Lysandros’s head, and then there was darkness.

He was in the place that had always been waiting for him. Before him stretched the Styx, the river that ran between the living and the dead. He’d known in his heart that the final choice was out of his hands, and now that he was here he would go wherever the river took him.

Had there ever been a choice? He’d seen the roof coming down on the woman he loved, and he’d lunged forward to put himself between her and danger. There had been no time to think, only the knowledge that without her life was unbearable. He would die with her, or instead of her. Either way, he was content.

He ached all over from the weight of the ceiling on his back, pinning him against her as she lay beneath him, so frighteningly still that he feared the worst.

‘Not yet,’ he whispered. ‘Wait for me, and we’ll cross the river together.’

Incredibly, he sensed a tremor beneath him. Then a soft breath broke from her.

‘Petra, Petra,’ he said urgently. ‘Are you alive? Speak to me.’

‘Aaaah-’ The word was so soft he hardly heard it.

‘Can you hear me?’

Her eyes opened a little way, fixed on him. ‘What happened?’

‘The roof fell on us. We’re trapped here. There’s no way out unless someone up there sees what’s happened.’

And nobody would, they both realised. They were underground, in a part of the house not visible from the road. They could stay here, undiscovered, for days, perhaps longer.

‘You saved me,’ she murmured.

‘I only wish I had.’

‘You took the weight of the rafters to protect me. You could have got out-’

‘And live without you? Do you think I want that? It’s together or nothing.’

She managed to turn her head. There were tears in her eyes. ‘Darling, are you very much hurt?’

‘No, but I can’t move, and I can’t get you out.’

They both knew that if he tried to move he would bring the rest of the place down on them both.

‘Together or nothing,’ she murmured.

‘There’s just one thing I could try,’ he said.

Taking a deep breath, he gave a shout, but immediately there was an ominous sound overhead and plaster began to pour down. They clung together, seeking refuge in each other.

‘Dear God!’ he said. ‘I neglected this place and let it get in such bad condition. This is my fault.’

‘Or maybe it’s my fault,’ she said softly. ‘I came excavating here without thinking of safety. Who knows what damage I might have done?’

‘Don’t try to spare me,’ he said savagely. ‘I did this. I harmed you. I killed you.’

‘Darling, it doesn’t matter now. Just hold me.’

‘For ever,’ he said fiercely, managing to get his arms about her. ‘And perhaps help will come in time. We must hold on to that, Petra-Petra?’

Her eyes had closed and her breathing had become faint.

‘Petra! Listen to me. For pity’s sake, wake up.’

But she didn’t open her eyes, and he knew that the boat was waiting for her; she was embarking on the last journey, leaving him behind.

‘Not yet,’ he begged. ‘Not until you’ve heard me-forgiven me. I shouldn’t have doubted you-say that you understand-that it won’t part us for ever-’

Once before he’d implored forgiveness from a woman as she’d begun the journey across the river, but she hadn’t heard him. Her face had been implacable as she’d climbed into the boat with her child in her arms, not seeing or hearing him, never knowing of his grief and contrition.

Now it was happening a second time, unless he could find a way to prevent it.

‘Forgive me,’ he whispered. ‘Make some sign that you forgive me-’

For he knew that without her forgiveness they could not make the final journey together. He’d betrayed their love with his mistrust; a crime that would keep them apart for all eternity and only her blessing could wipe that out.

But she was drifting beyond him, to a place he couldn’t follow.

Now he understood the face of the statue, raised in despair, calling on the gods of Olympus to grant his last request, helpless, hopeless.

‘Wake up,’ he begged. ‘Just for a moment, please.’

But there was only stillness and the sound of her breathing, growing fainter.

As he saw her slipping away Achilles lifted his face to the heavens, silently imploring,

‘Take me, not her! Let her live! Take me!’

She was in another world. There was the Styx, the river that led to the underworld and from which there was no return, save as a spirit. She looked back at the earth from which she’d come, but it was too late. She had left it for ever.

Then, coming towards her across the water, she saw a boat, with a man standing in the prow. He was tall and magnificent and all the lesser creatures fell away before him, but he had no eyes for them. He was searching for something, and when he saw her his eyes brightened and his hands reached out, imploring.

Now she knew him. He was the man who had chosen to die for her, and was asking if she was ready to follow him.

‘I wasn’t sure you’d come,’ he said. ‘It could only happen if you were willing.’

‘How could I be unwilling to spend my eternity with you?’ she asked.

She went towards him and he lifted her into the boat.

‘Eternity,’ he whispered.

The boat turned and began to make its way back across the water, until it vanished.

‘My darling, wake up, please!’

Slowly she opened her eyes, frowning a little. The underworld didn’t look as she’d expected. It looked more like a hospital room.

‘How did I get here?’

‘They came in time,’ Lysandros said from where he was seated beside her bed. ‘Somebody heard the gun go off and raised the alarm. Rescuers got us out.’

Now she could see him more clearly. His head was bandaged and his arm was in a sling.

‘How badly are you hurt?’ she asked.

‘Not much; it looks worse than it is. The doctor says we’re both badly bruised, but no worse.’

‘What about Nikator?’

‘He’s alive. I got a message to Homer, and he’s taking him away to a special hospital where I think he’ll need to stay for some time. I’ve told everyone it was an accident. Nobody else needs to know the truth. Never mind him. I was afraid you weren’t going to come round.’

Now she remembered. He had thrown himself between her and the descending roof.

‘You saved my life,’ she murmured. ‘You could have been killed.’

‘And so could you. Do you think I’d let you go on alone? I’d have followed, wherever you went, whether you wanted me or not.’

‘Of course I’d have wanted you,’ she murmured. ‘How could I be unwilling to spend my eternity with you?’

‘Do you mean that?’ he asked anxiously. ‘You spoke as though it was all over between us, and I don’t blame you, but then-’

But then he had chosen to die rather than live without her. It was the sign she had longed for, his offering on the sacrificial altar. Now she belonged to him in every way, in his way, and in her own.

She had no illusions about their life together. He would always be a troubled man, but his very troubles called on something in her that yearned to be vitally necessary to him. It would never be easy, but they belonged together.

‘I’ll never let you go again,’ he said, ‘not after that time I spent holding you down there, wondering if you were ever going to wake, whether you were going to live or die, whether you’d allow me to go with you.’

‘Allow?’

‘It was always up to you. You could have gone on ahead without me, or sent me on without you. I could only beg you to show me mercy. While you were unconscious I listened to the things you said, longing to hear something that gave me hope. But your words were strange and confusing.’

‘Tell me about them.’

‘Once you said, “The story is wrong.” What did you mean?’

‘The story about Achilles forcing Polyxena to die. He didn’t force her. He only asked her to follow him if she was willing. And she was.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Never mind. I know.’

‘Is this another triumphant “find” that will boost your reputation?’ he asked tenderly.

‘No, I’ll never tell anyone else but you. This is our secret.’

He reached out a hand to touch her face with tentative fingers.

‘Never leave me,’ he said. ‘You are my life. I can have no other and I want no other.’

‘I’m yours for as long as you need me,’ she vowed.

It was a few days before they were both well enough to leave the hospital. They paid a final visit to the villa and wandered through the grounds.

‘I’m having it demolished,’ he said. ‘I could never come here again. We’ll make our home somewhere else.’

‘What about Brigitta, and your child? We can’t leave them here. Let’s take them back to Athens and let them rest in the grounds there.’

‘You wouldn’t mind that?’ he asked.

She shook her head. ‘She’s part of your life, and but for her we might never have met.’

‘And if we hadn’t met my life would have gone on in the old dead, hopeless way. I have so much to be grateful for. I feared love as a weakness, but I was wrong. Love is strength, and the true weakling is the man who can’t love, or the one who fears to let himself love.

‘For years I’ve held myself behind doors that were bolted and barred, refusing to allow anyone through. I thought I was safe from invasion, but in truth I was destroying myself from within. Now I know that there’s no true strength except what you give me in your arms, and in your heart.’

She took his face between her hands.

‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘It’s not a weakness to need people. It’s only a weakness if you don’t know that you need them, so you don’t reach out to them, and you’re left floundering alone. But if you reach out, and they reach back, then your strength can defeat worlds.’

‘And you did reach back, didn’t you?’ he asked. ‘It wasn’t just chance that we met again after so many years.’

‘True. I think the ancient gods gave their orders from Mount Olympus.’

‘And that’s why it’s been inevitable between us from the start-if you really feel you can put up with me.’

‘How could I disobey the orders of the gods?’ she asked him tenderly.

And what the gods ordered, they would protect. Their life together had been ordained, and so it must be. It would be a life of passion and pain, quarrels, reconciliations, heartbreak and joy. But never for one moment would they doubt that they were treading the path that had been preordained for them.

One day the River Styx would be waiting to carry them on, to Eternity.

But that day was not yet.