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The postcard, however, had exerted a mysterious influence over her. She couldn’t seem to stop herself taking it out of its hiding place and reading it again and again.

‘I still wasn’t sure I was ready to meet my birth mother, but every time I looked at the picture on the postcard, I felt somehow drawn to the place. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that I was connected to Ithos in some way. But since I arrived …’

Ariana peered at the postcard, squinting. ‘Why didn’t they sign it?’

‘I don’t know, it’s almost like a goodbye.’

‘Maybe the person who wrote it was interrupted?’ Ariana looked at the postcard again. ‘There’s something about the writing … and the name …’ She winced and clutched at her head. ‘If I didn’t have such a bad headache, my brain might work properly. I can’t think straight.’ She handed the postcard back to Grace. ‘Thanks for the life story.’ She feigned a yawn.

Grace laughed. ‘I don’t know what I expected to find here. I mean, that postcard must have been written almost twenty years ago, because that’s when my birth mother wrote the letter. Maybe she came here and had a holiday romance.’

Ariana let out a huff. ‘Look, this is all very interesting, but I need to go.’

‘Why don’t you wait here a little longer, until your head feels better.’

‘I don’t want to, that’s why.’ Ariana swung her legs off the bed and stood up. She seemed much steadier on her feet now.

‘Why don’t we pop down to the tavern? Níko is still there, he can drop you home.’

‘Níko?’ Ariana pulled a face and stuck out her tongue. ‘He’s my father’s spy. No, I can get home myself.’

‘How?’

‘I’ll take one of the taxis that waits on the square.’

Grace stood and made to follow her, but Ariana put her hand out to stop her. ‘Look, English girl, maybe you aren’t trying to move in on Christian.’ Her face, despite her smudged make-up and bloodshot eyes, retained some pride. ‘But tonight, don’t try to be my friend, OK?’

Grace sighed. She didn’t like the idea of Ariana trying to make her way home on her own, but she couldn’t force the girl to accept her help. Ithos was a safe place, and the taxi drivers would surely know who she was.

She watched Ariana teeter down the stairs on her high heels and walk slowly but deliberately out of the courtyard. ‘Be careful, OK?’ she called after her.

Ariana raised a hand, whether it was intended as a goodbye or a dismissive gesture, Grace couldn’t tell. She closed the door and lay on the bed, picking up the card where Ariana had left it. She looked at it again, weathered and worn, now yellow with age.

Don’t wait for me …

I’m still waiting Grace thought, still no nearer to knowing how Ithos was tied up with her birth. There was only one way she was going to find out, but was she ready to take that step?

Chapter 32

Demetrios had risen earlier than usual and taken a run up into the hills above Ithos. The air up there felt clearer, more invigorating, and he usually had the place to himself running just after dawn, apart from the odd hill farmer tending to his goats. He found running alone helped him to think things over, and there had been so much to think about these last few days.

Shauna was more beautiful that even his rose-tinted spectacles remembered her to be. Her skin, golden and shimmering, a smattering of freckles over that perfect nose and eyes as green as the shamrocks in her home country. And her body … she had matured, her curves had filled out deliciously. He ran harder, reaching for the summit – just another half a kilometre but it was all at a gradient that made his calves ache. He reached the top and stopped dead, breathing raggedly, his chest rising and falling as he waited for his breathing to even out.

From up here in the hills, the vista of Ithos was laid out before him like a painting; this island that he called home was beautiful, and usually the sight of it eased his soul. Today, however, he was too troubled to enjoy it. The thought that he and Shauna had created a baby girl together, a baby he had never held, whose first tentative steps he had missed, and who he might never meet. Conceived in the summer of 1982, she would be nineteen by now. A year older than Ariana. It felt like a punch in the guts. He was a family man, it was everything to him. Whatever Shauna might think, he would have made things right, if he’d known.

He didn’t blame Shauna. This was all Elana’s doing.

His mother had always meddled in his life. In all of their lives. Pulling strings and manipulating them as if they were puppets. Well, it was time she heard a few home truths. It might be too late for him, but he could at least put a stop to her plans for Ariana.

He turned and headed back along the path, all downhill now. His long strides powered through the kilometres.

It was time his mother was put in her place once and for all.

Shauna dipped her toe in the Mediterranean, enjoying the coolness on her painted red toenails as she entered the water up to her waist. The colour of the sea on Ithos was like an ever-changing jewel; today it was turquoise, and so clear she could see tiny fish darting around in the water. She kicked her legs out and swam to the rocks and back again, the coolness of the water and the breeze contrasting with the heat of the sun which was rising high in the sky. Ithos had burrowed its way into her soul again; it would be hard to leave, but she knew they must.

Swimming back to the shore, she waved at Roxy, who was reading a copy of Vogue, and Alex, who was trying to blow up his inflatable dolphin.

She threw herself on the sand next to Roxy and applied another layer of suncream, then slipped her silk parrot-print sarong over her shoulders.