Moon Of Aphrodite

Moon Of Aphrodite
Sara Craven

Mills & Boon proudly presents THE SARA CRAVEN COLLECTION. Sara’s powerful and passionate romances have captivated and thrilled readers all over the world for five decades making her an international bestseller.She was the chosen bride of a LeandrosHelen's mother had almost been forced into an arranged marriage, but she'd managed to escape. Now Helen was in a similar situation: she was expected to marry Damon Leandros!When she first came to her grandfather's Greek island, Helen intended to avoid the arrogant Damon. Soon, however, she knew she couldn't deny his powerful attraction.Regardless, Helen's pride rankled at the though' that everyone on the island expected her to give in to the ridiculous arrangement. But as Helen discovered, pride goes before a fall….

Moon of Aphrodite

Sara Craven

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

Former journalist SARA CRAVEN published her first novel ‘Garden of Dreams’ for Mills & Boon in 1975. Apart from her writing (naturally!) her passions include reading, bridge, Italian cities, Greek islands, the French language and countryside, and her rescue Jack Russell/cross Button. She has appeared on several TV quiz shows and in 1997 became UK TV Mastermind champion. She lives near her family in Warwickshire – Shakespeare country.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

COVER (#u958c19f3-f669-5df5-a4e5-1b5e6795fb65)

TITLE PAGE (#u4cec8715-43cc-5b5b-8465-4709805c1a77)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR (#udcb9eb5c-bda0-5015-bacb-a12453d482da)

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

ENDPAGE (#litres_trial_promo)

COPYRIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER ONE (#ua706dab5-b335-597c-9c13-a6c27867eb6b)

‘I’M not going and that’s final,’ Helen said.

Hugo Brandon gave a worried sigh and pushed a hand through his thick thatch of greying hair. The letter lay between them on the breakfast table, flimsy, foreign-looking, the handwriting spiky and black, managing to convey an impression of autocracy.

He said, ‘Don’t be too hasty, darling.’

‘Too hasty?’ Helen’s eyes flashed fire. ‘Dad, you can’t be serious! After the way he treated you and Mother—cutting her off completely like that. Refusing all communication, even when she was so ill and begged him to write and say she was forgiven?’

Her father was silent, staring down at the tablecloth, his fingers drawing a restless pattern on it.

She said, ‘Or that’s what you’ve always told me, Dad, dozens of times. Are you going to say now that it wasn’t true?’

‘Oh, it was true. And more.’ Hugo’s voice was heavy. ‘But he’s an old man, Helen, a sick old man. You’re his only grandchild, and he wants to see you. It isn’t that extraordinary.’

‘My God!’ Helen said explosively, and there was a tense silence.

The letter from Grandfather Korialis had come like a bolt from the blue. Helen had read it twice and she still could hardly believe the contents. For nearly nineteen years, her Greek grandfather had chosen to forget her existence. He had not even acknowledged the news of her birth. And now this demand for her presence at his villa on the island of Phoros, just off the Greek mainland. Surely he couldn’t really believe that after all this time, all this bitterness, she would simply present herself to order.

But perhaps he did. Perhaps when you owned a chain of hotels like Michael Korialis, when you said ‘Jump’, everyone jumped.

Well, she, Helen, was neither his employee nor beholden to him in any way. On the contrary, she thought broodingly, she would be the exception to the Korialis rule. She would not jump.

Hugo said gently, ‘Has it occurred to you to think what your mother would have wanted you to do?’

Helen had a brief unhappy image of her mother not long before her death six years previously, the sweet high cheekbones, which Helen had inherited, thrown into prominence by the haggard thinness of her face.

She knew what Maria Brandon would have wanted—had wanted all her married life, happy though it had been. She had wanted to be reconciled with the stern man in Greece who had cast her off from him completely when she had defied him and the marriage he had arranged for her, to elope with the tall English artist who had been staying in a nearby village.

She knew that if it had been to her mother that this unexpected olive branch had been extended, then she would have accepted it without a second thought, and joyfully too.

But I’m not capable of that kind of generosity, Helen told herself flatly. After years of slights and neglect, I can’t just perform an about-face and pretend that it all never happened. All this time, he’s ignored the fact that I’m alive, yet now he wants to see me. It makes no sense.

But at the same time, having read her grandfather’s letter, she was uneasily aware that it made all the sense in the world. The letter had not been long, but it had been very much to the point.

He had suffered a severe heart attack, he wrote, and wished before he died to see his only grandchild. An air ticket to Athens would be provided, transport to the island arranged, and all her expenses met. He would expect her to stay at his villa for a minimum of one month.

The tone of the letter had been so much like a business contract that she had almost looked for the inevitable dotted line on which to sign.

She glanced up and saw her father watching her, his face grave and a little compassionate, as if he sensed her inner struggle.

She said reproachfully, ‘You’re not being fair. But it makes no difference. Even if I wanted to go—and I don’t—it wouldn’t be possible. We’re coming up to the height of the tourist season, and you know how busy the gallery becomes.’

Hugo nodded. ‘I know, but I’d be prepared to release you, and find another assistant, if you were willing to go to Phoros.’

‘I don’t understand you.’ She spread her hands helplessly.

‘I’m not sure I understand myself,’ he admitted. ‘I only know that I’m tired of the bitterness and enmity, and that this seems a good way to end them once and for all. But if you really feel that you can’t do it, then I won’t press you. The ultimate decision must be yours.’

‘If he’d invited you as well …’ she began, but he cut across her with a wry smile.

‘Now that really would be impossible for all sorts of reasons. It’s you he wants to see—Maria’s daughter.’

‘I feel I’m being blackmailed,’ she said in a low voice. ‘Not very subtle pressure is being applied and I don’t like it.’ Her voice deepened passionately. ‘After all, he didn’t respond when Mother was so ill.’

‘Your mother underplayed the seriousness of the situation, perhaps deliberately, I don’t know. She always made excuses for him and his actions all her life. Perhaps she was letting him down lightly for the last time.’

Helen said, ‘Yes,’ almost absently. Her hand reached for the letter, screwing it into a ball. Her eyes met her father’s in defiance and appeal. ‘I may look like her, Dad, but I haven’t her forgiving nature. He may be a wealthy and powerful man, but he can’t come and go in our lives, just as he pleases.’

‘Are you prepared to tell him so?’ Hugo’s voice was gentle and without censure.

‘I don’t intend to reply at all.’ She tossed the ball of paper into the waste bin. ‘Problem disposed of. Now let’s change to a happier topic. Did you get the message from Paul that I left for you last night?’

‘Yes.’ Her father smiled. ‘And I’ve telephoned him. He’s been working really hard, and the exhibition won’t have to be postponed after all.’

‘It never does have to be postponed,’ Helen smiled in response. ‘It’s just eleventh-hour panic on his part. God knows why. Or you do, perhaps?’

‘I have an idea,’ said Hugo. ‘Though I must admit no one ever clamoured to put on an exhibition of my work.’

Helen gave him an affectionate smile before rising to busy herself clearing the breakfast things from the table. Her father’s work, as far as she could judge, had been competent but not outstanding, but he possessed the eye of a judge, a connoisseur where other people’s painting was concerned. He was also a realistic man, and had recognised quite early in his career that he would probably never earn enough from painting alone to support himself, plus a wife and child. A legacy from an uncle had enabled him to buy a share in a gallery near the West End. The gallery wasn’t doing too well, but Hugo Brandon had changed all that, and within five years he had been able to buy his partner out and replace the gallery’s rather pretentious name with the single word ‘Brandon’. He made a name for himself on both sides of the Atlantic and in Europe as a man who could spot a real talent in the making. And Helen had never asked anything better than to join him in his work.

But sometimes she wondered if he ever regretted that it was not his own signature that his customers sought on their canvases. Was he happy, she thought, was he fulfilled, or had he settled for second best? She hoped not, but doubted whether she would ever know the truth.

One thing she had never doubted was his love for her, and for his late wife. But again she wondered if he would have worked quite so hard to make the gallery a success financially as well as artistically if he had not married a rich man’s daughter. Perhaps he had been determined that Maria would never count the cost of all she had given up in order to become his wife.

God, she thought ruefully, as she stacked dishes in the drying rack, everything’s so complicated. Except for my life, she amended hastily.