Wedding Night with a Stranger. Anna Cleary

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      When the storm had calmed a little, she sat on the bed and forced herself to reason. In Athens it would be morning. Her uncle would be on his way to his office, her aunt engaged in either her beauty routine or instructing the housekeeper. Thea Leni was always affectionate and easy to deal with, though her compliance in the subterfuge to trick Ariadne onto the plane had been a painful shock. The hurt felt more savage every time she thought of it. Her loving aunt must have believed in her husband’s solution to the ‘Ariadne problem’, at least a bit.

      She put her head in her hands, still unable to believe all that had happened. Had they intended it as a punishment? She’d believed in their kindness absolutely, ever since, after the accident, they’d brought her as a seven-year-old to her uncle’s house on Naxos. Though quite a lot older than her parents, they’d done all they could to replace them. In their old-fashioned way they’d loved her, protected her, even to the point of making her feel quite suffocated by the time she reached eighteen.

      Why hadn’t she woken up sooner to this holiday idea? When had Thio Peri ever wanted her to leave Greece without them in the past? Everything she’d done, every step she’d taken from the time she was seven, had been done under his care and protection, as if she were the most precious individual on the planet.

      Even when they’d sent her to boarding school in England, either Thea Leni or Thio Pericles himself had come personally at every half-day and holiday to collect her. Long after she’d returned to Athens to attend university, she’d been told that one of the gardeners employed at the school had in reality been her own personal security guard. Thio Peri had never stopped worrying that she might be kidnapped and held to ransom.

      How ironic. Once she’d been their jewel, but since she’d let them down and caused the scandal she must have lost her lustre. In their traditional way of thinking they still believed a large part of family honour depended on the marriages their sons and daughters made, the grandchildren they could boast of.

      It wasn’t too hard to understand. They’d never stopped grieving over their own childless state. They’d pinned all their hopes on her, their ‘adopted’ daughter, to provide the nearest thing to grandchildren they could ever achieve.

      ‘You’ll like the Nikostos,’ Thio Peri had enthused on another occasion, determined to lure her into the trap. ‘They’re good people. They’ll look after you. My father and old Sebastian talked in the taverna every night for fifty years. They were the best of good friends. You will be taken care of there every step of the way.’

      Thea Leni had hugged her so tightly. She should have seen then that it all felt like goodbye. ‘It will do you so much good, toula. It’s time you visited your own country.’

      ‘I thought Greece was my country now,’ Ariadne had put in, grateful they were at last moving on after the months of recriminations. And, face it, a little nervous to be venturing so far on her own at long last.

      ‘And so it is. But it’s important to see the land of your birth. Admit it. You’ve lost your job, you’ve lost your flat, people are whispering about you…You need the break.’

      They needed the break. She could see that now. From her. From the embarrassment she’d brought them.

      It wasn’t until she was on the plane buckling her seat belt that she’d woken up.

      ‘Sebastian will meet you at the airport and show you around Sydney,’ her aunt had said at the very last.

      Her uncle’s hearty laugh had followed her down the embarkation corridor. ‘Don’t come back without a ring on your finger and a man in your suitcase.’

      She should certainly have known then. Sebastian’s name had hardly been mentioned until that moment. Still, it wasn’t until the hostess was preparing to embark on the safety rigmarole that a shattering possibility had dawned. In a sudden panic, Ariadne had whipped out her mobile and dialled.

      ‘Thio. Oh, oh, Thio.’ Her voice shaking with a fearful certainty. ‘This isn’t some sort of matchmaking thing, is it? I mean, you haven’t set something up with this Sebastian Nikosto, have you?’

      Guilt always made her uncle bluster. ‘You should be grateful your aunt and I have taken matters into our hands for you, Ariadne.’

      ‘What? How do you mean?’

      His voice crackled down the phone. ‘Sebastian Nikosto is a good person. A fine man.’

      ‘What? No, no, Thio, no. You must be joking. You can’t do this. This isn’t my choice…’

      ‘Choice.’ His voice rose in her ear. ‘You’ve had choices, and look what you did with them. Look at yourself. You’re nearly twenty-four years old. There isn’t a man in Greece—Europe—who will touch you. Now try to be a good girl and do the right thing. Be nice to Sebastian.’

      ‘But I don’t know him. And he’s old. You said he was old. This is a holiday. You promised—you said—’

      Her tearful protests were interrupted.

      ‘Miss, miss.’ The flight attendant was hovering over her, something about turning off her mobile phone.

      ‘I can’t,’ she told the man. She, who had always hated a fuss and had turned herself inside out at times to avoid making trouble. ‘Sorry,’ she tried to explain to the anxious little guy. ‘I have to…’ She made a hurried gesture and turned back to the phone, her voice spiralling into a screech. ‘Thio Peri, this isn’t right. You can’t do this. This is against the law.’ Her uncle hung up on her and she tried furiously to redial.

      ‘Miss, please…’ The attendant held out his hand for the phone, insistence in his tone. Her neighbours were staring with avid interest. All heads were turned her way.

      ‘But this is an emergency,’ she said. Glancing around, she realised the plane was already taxiing. She panicked. ‘Oh, no, no. I have to get off.’

      She dropped the phone, unbuckled her seat belt and tried to rise. Someone across the aisle dived for her phone.

      The urgent voices. ‘Miss, sit down. Miss. Sit, please. You are endangering the passengers.’

      People around her stared as she half stood, clinging to the seat in front of her, craning their necks to see the distressed woman. Then the plane accelerated for lift-off, and she plumped down involuntarily. She felt the wheels leave the ground, the air under the wings, and was flooded with despair. They would have to turn back. The pilot would have to be told.

      When the white rooftops of Athens were falling away below two more attendants had arrived, concerned and more authoritative. ‘Is anything wrong, Miss Giorgias? Are you ill?’

      ‘It’s my—my uncle. He…’ Already they were out over the sea and heading up through clouds. ‘We have to go back. There’s been a mistake. Can you please tell the pilot?’

      She took in their bemused expressions, the quick exchange of glances, and lurid images of the headlines flashed through her head. Ariadne Giorgias provokes airbus incident. Ariadne of Naxos in more trouble.

      More scandal, more shame. More mockery of her name, using the coincidence of the ancient myth. She cringed from the thought of any further СКАЧАТЬ