That unholy union of sexual tension and unanswered questions propelled me to where she sat, cloaked in secrets that mocked me.

Her slight tensing when I crouched in front of her unsettled me further, despite the fact that I should’ve been satisfied to see that she wasn’t wholly indifferent to me.

‘You want to know about the inconvenience your absence caused, Calypso?’

She remained silent.

‘Some newspaper hack got wind that my wife wasn’t in Agistros, enjoying her first weeks of marital bliss. Nor was she with friends, as she’d led everyone to believe. To all intents and purposes she seemed to have fallen off the face of the earth.’

A delicate frown creased her brows. ‘Why would that be of interest to anyone? Especially when you intended to banish me to Agistros for the duration of our arrangement anyway?’

‘You’re my wife. Everything you do is news. And appearing to have deserted your marriage was definitely newsworthy.’

She blinked. ‘Appearing to have?’

‘I have an outstanding PR team who’ve had to work tirelessly to put a lid on this.’

There was no hint of remorse on her sun-kissed face. Instead she looked irritated. ‘If you’ve managed to somehow spin my absence to suit our narrative then there’s no problem, is there?’

I allowed myself a small smile, one her gaze clung to with wary eyes. ‘You would like that, wouldn’t you? To escape every unpleasant fall-out from your actions?’

‘You don’t have the first idea of what I want, Axios.’

My name on her lips sent a punch of heat through me. Thinking back, I couldn’t recollect her ever saying it before Bora Bora. Not when she’d spat fire at me, not when she’d confessed her untouched state, and not when she’d been in the complete grip of passion. Certainly not when she’d asked me to take her with me to Athens.

There had been far too many times over the last year when I’d regretted not doing so—not because of that infernal hunger that had long outstayed its welcome, but simply because it would have curtailed her actions.

But the past was the past. There was still the future to deal with. And my new reality.

My son.

‘For the sake of probability, and if I were in the mood to grant wishes, what exactly would you want, matia mou?’

Wariness made her hesitate, but slowly defiance laced with something else pushed through. ‘I’d want a divorce. As soon as possible.’

Stunned disbelief rose in me like a monumental wave I’d once ridden on the North Shore, and then just as swiftly crashed on the beach of her sheer audacity and shock. It was all so very dramatic.

I couldn’t help it. I laughed.

Her pert little nose quivered as she inhaled sharply. ‘What’s so funny?’

Affront and defiance flushed her skin a sweet pink, drawing my attention to her alluring features. My wife was now all woman. An arrestingly feminine woman who’d just demanded...a divorce.

‘Why you, my dear, and your continued ability to surprise me.’