The Darkest of Secrets by Kate Hewitt Read Free Book Online Page A

speculative. Knowing.
    ‘You grew up in Cambridge, you said?’ he finally asked, and Grace felt relief that he wasn’t going to press.
    ‘Yes, my father was a fellow at Trinity College.’
    ‘Was?’
    ‘He died six years ago.’
    ‘I’m sorry.’
    ‘And I should say the same to you. I’m sorry for the loss of your father and brother.’
    ‘Thank you, although it’s hardly necessary.’
    Grace paused, her fork in mid-air. ‘Even if you were estranged from them, it’s surely a loss.’
    ‘I left my family fifteen years ago, Grace. They were dead to me. I did my grieving then.’ He spoke neutrally enough, yet underneath that easy affability Grace sensed an icy hardness. There would be no second chances with a man like Khalis.
    ‘Didn’t you miss them? At the time?’
    ‘No.’ He spoke flatly, the one word discouraging any more questions.
    ‘Do you enjoy living in the States?’ she tried instead, keeping her tone light.
    ‘I do.’
    ‘What made you choose to live there?’
    ‘It was far away.’
    It seemed no question was innocuous. They ate in silence for a few moments, the only sound the whisper of the waves and wind. When she couldn’t see those high walls she could almost appreciate the beauty of this island paradise in the middle of the Mediterranean. Yet she could still feel them, knew that the only way out of here was by another person’s say-so. At this thought another bolt of pain lanced through her skull and her hand clenched around her fork. Khalis noticed.
    ‘Grace?’
    ‘Did you grow up here?’ she asked abruptly. ‘Behind these walls?’
    He didn’t answer for a moment, and his narrowed gaze rested on her thoughtfully. ‘Holidays mostly,’ he finally said. ‘I went to boarding school when I was seven, in England.’
    ‘Seven,’ she murmured. ‘That must have been hard.’
    Khalis just shrugged. ‘I suppose I missed my parents, but then I didn’t know as much about them as I should have, being only a child.’
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘You are most certainly aware that my father was not the most admirable of men.’
    ‘I’m aware.’
    ‘As a child, I did not realise that. And so I missed him.’ He said it simply, bluntly, as if it were no more than an obvious fact. Yet Grace was both curious and saddened by his statement. When, she wondered, had Khalis become disillusioned with his father? When he left university? And did learning of a loved one’s flaws make you stop loving them? In Khalis’s view, it certainly seemed so.
    ‘What about your mother?’
    ‘She died when I was ten,’ Khalis told her. ‘I don’t remember much about her.’
    ‘You don’t?’ Grace didn’t hide her surprise. ‘My mother died when I was thirteen, and I remember so much.’ The scent of her hand lotion, the softness of her hair, the lullabies she used to sing. She also remembered how dusty and empty their house on Grange Road had seemed after her death, with her father immersed in his books and antiques.
    ‘It was a long time ago,’ Khalis said, and although his tone was pleasant enough Grace could still tell the topic of conversation was closed. It almost sounded as if he didn’t want to remember his mother … or anyone in his past.
    She felt an entirely unreasonable flash of curiosity to know this man, for she felt with a deep and surprising certainty that he hid secrets. Sorrow. Despite his often light tone, the easy smile, Grace knew there was a darkness and a hardness in him that both repelled and attracted her. She had no business being attracted to any man, much less a man like Khalis. Yet here she was, seeing the sleepy, veiled look in his grey-green eyes, feeling that slow spiral of honeyed desire uncurl in the pit of her belly, even as pain continued to lance her skull. How appropriate. Pain and pleasure. Temptation and torture. They always went together, didn’t they?
    With effort she returned the conversation to work. ‘Tomorrow morning I should like to see the