‘Not half as sorry as I am!’ Markos muttered grimly under his breath. He spoke more loudly. ‘I asked what are you going to do about me, Eva?’
She gave a puzzled shake of her head. ‘I’m sorry, but I still don’t understand what you mean…’
No, Markos could see by the blankness of Eva’s expression that she really didn’t understand—that as far as she was concerned theirs was now a purely business relationship.
Which was exactly what Markos had implied it was going to be three weeks ago. Before he had been forced to live every day in this living hell of wanting Eva, of being driven quietly but surely out of his mind with the knowledge of that desire for her, while she obviously had had absolutely no difficulty in resuming their previous business relationship, shutting out all memory of their hours of intimacy.
Or perhaps she hadn’t shut them out at all? Maybe she really had just forgotten them altogether?
It was an idea Markos found totally unacceptable.
He gave a shake of his head. ‘Is this what you do, Eva? Is this what your marriage to Cabot Grey did to you? Did you have a couple of dates with Glen too, a night in bed together, and then not only discard him as unimportant but forget about him altogether?’
‘Of course not,’ she gasped tremulously, her eyes now amber pools of hurt. ‘That really isn’t fair, Markos. You not only flirted with me outrageously the evening we met, but once you realised who I was you also ensured I had no choice but to come here for our appointment on the Monday evening. If anyone forgot about Glen, discarded him, then it was you!’
His mouth twisted derisively. ‘Have you seen him again since that evening?’
‘No,’ she breathed shakily.
‘Why not?’
Eva flinched at the coldness in Markos’s tone. At the subject of this whole conversation. ‘How can you even ask me that?’
Markos raised mocking brows. His inner frustrations this past three weeks was making him determined to get some sort of response from Eva. Even if it was a negative one. ‘Because if you haven’t been seeing me, and you haven’t been seeing Glen, then I’m interested to know who it is you’re hurrying off to meet this evening. Your ex-husband, perhaps?’
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Her face had paled to the colour of delicate white porcelain.
‘Is that what I’m being?’ Markos grated tautly.
‘Where Jack is concerned, yes! Markos, you were there—you saw my reaction to seeing Jack again.’
‘I saw your reaction to seeing his pregnant wife,’ he corrected harshly. ‘Which isn’t the same thing at all.’
No, it wasn’t, Eva acknowledged heavily. Not the same thing at all.
Jack had called her, as his parting comment that evening about ‘being in touch’ had promised that he would, and the two of them had agreed to meet in a suitably neutral coffee shop. The conversation had been stilted and awkward, but once Eva had convinced Jack that she had absolutely no interest in telling anyone that Yvette’s baby couldn’t be his the two of them had reached an uneasy truce, with an agreement that they would both stay out of the other’s life, and if they met again socially would at least be polite to each other. Nothing more, but nothing less, either.
It wasn’t perfect, but it was far better than the anger which had burned so strongly between
them before Eva had realised she was allowing her life to be ruined because of her failed marriage.
It was a realisation which had made her determined to put that part of her life behind her and move on to whatever kind of future might be in store for her, rather than the future she had so neatly planned out for herself.
In a perfect world Eva knew that future would have included Markos—the man she had come to realise these past three weeks she was so very much in love with…
Not that bedazzled young love she had felt for Jack, but the love of a mature woman who knew what and who she was, and also knew how and who she loved.
Eva had no idea how or when it had happened. Perhaps when Markos had defended her so gallantly in front of Jack. Or perhaps it had been the gentleness of his care when he’d rescued her from the bathroom and taken her back to his apartment, before undressing her and leaving her to sleep alone in his bed. Or during that wild and glorious lovemaking the following day, the memory of which still caused Eva to tremble just thinking about it.
Or maybe, just maybe, it had happened the first moment she’d set eyes on him at Senator Ashcroft’s cocktail party…
It didn’t really matter when or how it had happened, only that it had. She was in love with Markos Lyonedes. Completely. Utterly. And he was obviously still as disgusted with her as he had been three weeks ago.
She gave a weary sigh, accepting that perhaps she did owe Markos at least some answers to his questions. ‘I did meet Jack again after his father’s party—’
‘You met him?’ Markos echoed incredulously. ‘He’s a married man, about to become a father, and the two of you still sneaked away together behind his wife’s back—’
‘It wasn’t like that!’ Eva protested painfully.