The Darkest of Secrets (18 page)

Khalis gazed down at the financial report he was reading and tried to make sense of the numbers for the third time. In disgust at his own lack of focus, he pushed them away and stared out of the window of his father’s office in Rome’s EUR business district. Below him tourists and office workers bustled about their business, whether it was snapping photos or grabbing their lunch.

He should have forgotten her by now. Or at least stopped thinking of her. He’d been able to do that for his own family; why couldn’t he do the same for a slip of a woman who had virtually lied to him and betrayed her own marriage vows?

Instead he kept remembering everything about her. How her eyes had lightened with sudden humour and her lips had curved as if she wasn’t used to smiling. Her passion and strength of purpose for her work, her focus which matched his own. The softness of her breasts pressed against his chest, her body so wonderfully yielding against his.

And how she had deceived and duped him into thinking she was innocent, a victim like Leda. She should have told him. At some point during their time together, she should have told him. No, he realised with sudden savagery, it wasn’t the telling that mattered. It was the doing. He wanted her not to have had the affair at all. After such a huge betrayal … how could he trust her?
Love
her?

His intercom buzzed, disrupting his pointless recriminations. ‘A phone call for you, Mr Tannous, on line one.’

‘Who from?’

‘He didn’t say, sir. But he said it was urgent.’

Khalis felt a flicker of irritation. He paid a receptionist to field his calls, not just pass them on. ‘Very well,’ he said tersely and picked up his phone.

‘Yes?’

‘Hello, Khalis.’

Khalis’s fingers froze around the phone as his mind blanked with shock even as he registered that familiar voice. A voice he hadn’t heard in fifteen years. His brother.

His brother who was supposed to be dead. Khalis’s mind raced in circles. Was his father alive as well? What the hell had happened? Swallowing, he finally managed to speak.

‘Ammar,’ he said without expression. ‘You’re alive.’

His brother let out a dry, humourless laugh. ‘You don’t sound pleased I am back from the dead.’

‘You died to me fifteen years ago.’

‘I need to talk to you.’

Khalis fought down the tide of emotion hearing his brother’s voice had caused to sweep over him. Shock, anger, pain, and both a joy and regret he didn’t want to acknowledge. ‘We have nothing to say to each other.’

‘Please, Khalis,’ he said, but it still sounded like a command, the older brother bullying him into submission once more, and his resolve hardened.

‘No.’

‘I’ve changed—’

‘People don’t change, Ammar. Not that much.’ Khalis wondered distantly why he didn’t just hang up.

‘Do you really believe that?’ Ammar asked quietly, and for the first time in Khalis’s memory he sounded sad rather than angry.

‘I …’
Did
he believe that? He’d been living that truth for the last fifteen years. His father wouldn’t change. Couldn’t. Because if he had … if he could … then maybe Khalis wouldn’t have had to leave in the dramatic fashion that he did. Maybe he could have stayed, or returned, or worked something out. Maybe Jamilah wouldn’t have died.

Khalis swallowed, forced the agonising thoughts back. ‘Yes,’ he said stonily. ‘I do believe that.’ And then, his hand trembling, he hung up the phone.

The ensuing silence seemed to reverberate through the room. Khalis stabbed at his intercom. ‘Please block any calls from that number,’ he told the receptionist, who bumbled through an apology before Khalis severed the connection. He rose from the desk and paced the office restlessly, feeling caged not by the four walls but by his thoughts. His memories.

Had
Ammar changed? He’d changed once before. Khalis had a sudden sharp memory of when his brother had turned eight. Their father had called him out of the nursery where they’d been playing with Lego together, neither of them knowing it was to be the last day of boyish pleasures. Khalis didn’t know what Balkri had said or done to his oldest son that day, but when Ammar returned his lip was bleeding and the light had gone out of his eyes. He never had a kind word or action for Khalis again.

As the years had passed the rivalry between them had hardened into something unforgiving and cruel. Ammar always had to win, and not just win but humiliate Khalis. He was older, stronger, tougher and he let his little brother know it at every opportunity. Grace had asked him if Ammar was a bully, but it hadn’t been a simple case of sibling rivalry. Ammar had been driven by something darker, and sometimes Khalis thought he’d seen a torment of emotion in his brother’s eyes he knew he didn’t understand. If he tried to, Ammar just turned away or hit him. There was no going back to those simple days of childhood. There was no going back at all.

Do people change?

Ammar might not have changed, but could he make that kind of assumption about everyone? About Grace?

Khalis halted his restless prowling and stared unseeingly out of the office window. He pictured Grace as he’d last seen her, her head bowed in regret, tears starting in her eyes. Did he believe she’d changed, or was he going to freeze her in her weakest moment, refuse to allow her to move past it? How much was his experience of his father and brother colouring his perception of Grace?

She was different, he realised with a shaft of self-recrimination. Of course she was. He still didn’t like the stark reality of it, he knew. He wished things could be different. But he’d told Grace there was no point in looking back, no point in useless regrets. He wanted to look forward.

He turned away from the window, a new resolve hardening inside him. He needed to see Grace again. Speak to her.
Help me understand
, he’d asked. But he hadn’t understood, not then. Maybe they both needed a second chance.

Grace straightened her simple grey sheath dress and glanced round the crowd of art enthusiasts and academics that comprised the guest list for tonight’s reception at the Fitzwilliam Museum. Khalis was once again being hailed a hero for donating his father’s works of art, in this case the two Leonardos of Leda.

‘You must be thrilled,’ one of her old professors told her as she plucked a glass of champagne from one of the circulating trays. ‘Such important works of art being exhibited so close to home!’

‘Yes, it’s wonderful news for the museum,’ Grace answered dutifully. Cambridge didn’t really feel like home although she did still possess the house on Grange Road where she’d grown up. She let it out to visiting academics. And as for Khalis donating the works to the Fitzwilliam.
why
had he done that? Grace had wrestled with that question for many sleepless nights. It almost seemed like the kind of tender, thoughtful gesture that had made her fall in love with him—but he hated her now. So what kind of message was he trying to send?

She continued her progression around the grand entrance hall of the museum, chatting to guests, keeping an eye on the door. Even though she knew there was no real point, she still could not keep herself from looking for him and wanting to know when he was here.

Even if she hadn’t felt it—that curious prickling between her shoulder blades—she would have known he’d arrived by the speculative murmurs that rippled through the crowd. Tall, imposing in an immaculate navy suit and utterly gorgeous, Khalis would draw admiration wherever he went. Grace stepped back against the wall, holding her untouched glass of champagne in front of her like some kind of shield. She saw Khalis’s grey-green gaze search the crowd and knew he was looking for her. And then he found her, his unwavering stare like a laser that pierced all of her defences. She stood there, still clutching her glass, unable to move or even think.

Khalis’s face was neutral yet his eyes seemed to blaze right into her, searing her soul. He really did hate her. With effort Grace turned away, walked on wobbly legs towards the next knot of people and tried desperately to seem unconcerned as their chatter washed over her in an incomprehensible wave.

Regret lashed him as Khalis watched Grace walk away. Her back was straight, her figure lithe and slender in the simple silk sheath she wore. Had she lost weight? Her face had been so pale, her eyes huge as they’d gazed at each other.

He’d had plenty of time to acknowledge how his past had coloured his perception of the present, of Grace. He’d duped himself, just as he had with his own father. He’d wanted to believe only the best of her and so he’d refused to heed her warnings, insisted on painting his own rosy picture.

And when she’d finally worked up the courage to give him the truth, he’d walked away. He’d wanted her trust—demanded it, even—only to abuse it at the first opportunity.

Why, he wondered bleakly, should she ever trust him again?

CHAPTER ELEVEN

G
RACE
felt her nerves tauten throughout the evening, so by the time the reception came to an end she felt as if they were overstretched threads, ready to snap. Her body ached with the effort of appearing interested and unconcerned, as well as thrilled that Khalis had donated such magnificent works of art to the museum.

Khalis, she’d observed, had circulated around the room in distinct counterpoint to her rotation; there could be no question he was avoiding her—or at least that she was avoiding him. Perhaps he was simply indifferent to her now. Yet, despite the distance between them, she remained constantly and agonisingly aware of him. Even as she chatted with guests she strained to hear his low, husky voice, felt every one of his easy movements reverberate through her own body.

At least she wouldn’t see him again. The Leonardos had been the last two works from the Tannous collection. There would be no more receptions or galas, no need to encounter him at all. No risk, no danger. The thought should have brought blessed relief, not the wave of devastation Grace felt instead.

Finally the guests were trickling out into Trumpington Street and Grace found an opportunity to slip away. Khalis, she’d seen, was still chatting with a few hangers-on. She hurried out of the entrance hall, grabbing her coat, and into the damp night. It was midsummer, but the weather was wet and chilly and she wrapped her coat more firmly around herself as she headed down the street, her heels clicking on the slick pavement.

So that was that, she thought dully as she walked towards the hotel in the centre of town where she’d booked a room for the night. She’d probably never see him again. Talk to him again.
Touch
him again.

‘Grace.’

For a second Grace thought she must be imagining things. Fantasising that she’d heard Khalis because she missed him so much, even though she knew she shouldn’t—

‘Grace.’

Slowly, stunned, she turned around. Khalis stood there, his hair damp and spiky with rain. He’d forgotten his coat.

Grace simply stared, her mind empty of thoughts. Why had he sought her out? He didn’t look as if he was angry but she could not think of a single reason why he would come and find her. Surely everything had been said that awful night at her apartment?

‘Are you staying at your father’s house?’ he finally asked after they’d simply stared at each other for an endless moment.

Grace shook her head. ‘I’ve let it out. I booked into a hotel, just for the one night.’

‘Tomorrow you go back to Paris?’

She nodded. ‘Thank you for donating the Leonardos to the Fitzwilliam,’ she said awkwardly. ‘The museum is thrilled, of course.’

‘Well,’ Khalis answered with a crooked smile, ‘the Louvre has the Mona Lisa, after all. And I know how much you care about these paintings. I thought they should go to your second home.’

Sudden tears stung Grace’s eyes as she slowly shook her head. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘It was kind of you, especially considering—’ Her throat closed up and all she could do was stare at him, knowing her heart was in her eyes. Her heartbreak.

‘Oh, Grace.’

In one fluid movement Khalis strode forward and pulled her into his arms, wrapping her in a gentle yet fierce hug. Grace felt the damp wool of his suit against her cheek, her mind frozen on the fact that he was here, hugging her, and it felt unbelievably, unbearably wonderful.

With effort she pulled away. ‘Someone will see—’

‘To hell with that.’

‘I don’t understand you,’ Grace whispered. ‘Why are you here? Why are you—?’
Hugging me. Looking at me as if. Almost as if you love me.

‘Because I’m sorry, Grace. I messed up. A lot.’ His voice wavered on the last word and she stared.

‘
You
messed up?’

‘I shouldn’t have walked out on you. I was shocked, I admit that, but I … I wanted you to trust me and then I threw that trust away with both hands.’

She blinked, taking in his words, the self-recrimination that lanced each one. ‘You judge yourself pretty harshly.’

‘I had no right to judge you.’

‘I know what I did, Khalis—’

‘I know you do. Everything you said and did is marked by guilt, Grace. I couldn’t believe I didn’t see that before.’

She angled her face away from him, knowing he was right. Wishing he wasn’t. ‘I don’t know how to let go of it,’ she whispered.

‘I asked you to help me understand,’ Khalis said quietly. ‘And you told me the truth, but I don’t think you told me all of it.’

She nearly choked. ‘What more do you want me to say—?’

‘Help me understand,’ Khalis said as he drew her to him, his arms enfolding her and holding her close. Accepting her, even now. Especially now. ‘Not just the things you regret or wish were different. Help me understand
you.
’

‘I don’t know how—’

‘Tell me. Tell me everything.’

It wasn’t until she was lying in his arms that she started to speak. Khalis knew he had to be patient. Gentler than he ever had been before. He’d thought it had been hard to get her to trust him before, when she hadn’t told him anything and he’d thought she was perfect. Now he knew there were things he wouldn’t want to hear, facts he would be reluctant to accept. And still he needed to hold her close and justify this fragile trust she’d placed in him.