LITMIR.BIZ

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you hear me? I’m pregnant. That’s what … that’s what’s wrong.’

      Angel’s hands tightened reflexively around her half-sister’s and she looked into her dark brown eyes—so different from her own light blue ones, even though they both shared the same father.

      Angel tried not to let the shock suck her under. ‘Delph, how did it happen?’ She grimaced. ‘I mean, I know how … but …’

      Her sister looked down guiltily, a flush staining her cheeks red. ‘Well … you know Stavros and I have been getting more serious …’ Delphi looked up again, and Angel’s heart melted at the turmoil she saw on her sister’s face.

      ‘We both wanted to, Angel. We felt the time was right and we wanted it to be with someone we loved …’

      Angel’s heart constricted. That was exactly what she had wanted too, right up until— Her sister continued, cutting through Angel’s painful memory.

      ‘And we were careful, we used protection, but it …’ She blushed again, obviously mortified to have to be talking about this at all. ‘It split. We decided to wait until we knew there was something to worry about … and now there is.’

      ‘Does Stavros know?’

      Delphi nodded miserably and looked sheepish. ‘I never told you this, but on my birthday last month Stavros asked me to marry him.’

      Angel wasn’t that surprised; she’d suspected something like this might happen with the two of them. They’d been sweethearts for ever. ‘Has he spoken to his parents?’

      Delphi nodded, but fresh tears welled. ‘His father has told him that if we marry he’ll be disinherited. You know they’ve never liked us …’

      Angel winced inwardly for her sister. Stavros came from one of the oldest and most established families in Greece, and his parents were inveterate snobs. But before she could say anything Delphi was continuing in a choked voice.

      ‘… and now it’s worse, because the Parnassus family are home, and everyone knows what happened, and with Father going bankrupt …’ she trailed off miserably.

      A familiar feeling of shame gripped Angel at the mention of that name: Parnassus. Many years before, her family had committed a terrible crime against the much poorer Parnassus family, falsely accusing them of a horrific murder. It was only recently that they had atoned for that transgression. When her great-uncle Costas, who had actually committed the crime, had confessed all in a suicide note, the Parnassus family, who were now phenomenally successful and wealthy, had seen their chance for revenge, and had returned to Athens from America on a wave of glory. The consequent scandal and shake-up in power meant that her father, Tito Kassianides, had started haemorrhaging business and money, to the point that they now faced certain bankruptcy. Parnassus had made certain that everyone now knew how the Kassianides family had wilfully abused their power in the most heinous way.

      ‘Stavros wants us to elope—’

      Angel’s focus came back, and she immediately went to interject, but Delphi put up a hand, her pale face streaked with tears. ‘But I won’t allow him to do that.’

      Angel shut her mouth again.

      ‘I won’t be responsible for him being cut off and disinherited—not when I know how important it is to him that he gets into politics some day. This could ruin all his chances.’

      Angel marvelled at her sweet sister’s selflessness. She took her hands again and said gently, ‘And what about you, Delph? You deserve some happiness too, and you deserve a father for your baby.’

      A door slammed downstairs and they both flinched minutely.

      ‘He’s home …’ Delphi breathed, a mixture of fear and loathing in her voice as the inarticulate roars of their father’s drunken rage drifted up the stairs. More tears welled in her red-rimmed eyes, and suddenly Angel was extremely aware of the fact that her baby sister was now pregnant and needed at all costs to be protected from the potential pain of dealing with any scandal or losing Stavros. She took her gently by the shoulders and forced her to look into her eyes.

      ‘Sweetheart, you did the right thing telling me. Just act as if everything is normal and we’ll work something out. It’ll be fine—’

      Delphi’s voice took on a hysterical edge. ‘But Father is getting more and more out of control, and mother is unravelling at the seams—’

      ‘Shh. Look, haven’t I always been there for you?’

      Angel winced inwardly. She hadn’t been there when Delphi had needed her most, after Damia, her twin’s death, and that was why she’d made the promise to stay at home until Delphi gained her own independence, her twin’s death having affected her profoundly. Now her sister just nodded tearily, biting her lip, and looked at Angel with such nakedly trusting eyes that Angel had to batten down the almost overwhelming feeling of panic. She caught a lone tear falling down Delphi’s face and wiped it away gently with a thumb.

      ‘You’ve got exams coming up in a few months, and enough to be thinking about now. Just leave everything to me.’

      Her sister flung skinny arms around Angel’s neck, hugging her tight. Angel hugged her back, emotion coursing through her to think that in a few months her sister’s belly would be swollen with a baby. She had to make sure she and Stavros got married. Delphi wasn’t hardy and cocky, as her twin had been. Where one had been effervescent and exuberant, the other had always been the more quiet foil. And as for their father—if he found out—

      Delphi pulled back and spoke Angel’s thoughts out loud. ‘What if Father—?’

      Angel cut her off. ‘He won’t. I promise. Now, why don’t you go to bed and get some sleep? And don’t worry, I’ll handle it.’

      CHAPTER ONE

      I’LL handle it. Those fatalistic words still reverberated in Angel’s head a week later. She’d gone to speak with Stavros’ father herself, to try and remonstrate with him, but he hadn’t even deigned to see her. It couldn’t have been made clearer that they were social outcasts.

       ‘Kassianides!’

      Abruptly Angel was pulled out of her spiralling black thoughts when her boss called her name. It must have been the second or third time, judging by the impatience on his face.

      ‘When you can join us back on earth, go down to the pool and make sure it’s completely clear and that the tea lights are set out on the tables.’

      She stuttered an apology and fled. In all honesty Angel’s preoccupation had been distracting her from something much more panic-inducing and stressful. Almost too stressful to contemplate.

      She was here at the Parnassus villa, high in the hills of Athens, to waitress at a party that was being thrown for Leonidas Parnassus, the son of Georgios Parnassus. Everyone was buzzing about the fact that he might be about to take over the family business and what a coup it would be, Leo Parnassus having become a multimillionaire entrepreneur in his own right.

      It hit her again as she hurried down the steps that were expertly overgrown with extravagantly flowering bougainvillea. She was in the Parnassus villa, the home of the family who hated hers with a passion.

      For a second she stopped in her tracks, a hand going to her breast as an intense pain tightened in her chest. This was the absolute worst place she could be in the world. For a second she felt hysteria rising at the irony of it. She, Angel Kassianides, was about to serve drinks to the crème de la crème of Athens, right under the Parnassuses nose. The thought of what her father would do if he could see her now made her break out in a cold sweat.

      She bit her lip and forced herself to go on, breathing a sigh of relief when she had a quick look around the pool area and saw no one. The guests hadn’t started to arrive yet and, though there were some staying at the villa, Angel knew that

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