Table Of ContentH
Had she said yes
much too quickly?
Corinne had met Gregori on a
holiday in Paris. Older than she,
he was a lover who swept her to
heights she'd never dreamed of.
She had vowed to meet him in
Greece and marry him there.
She had promised to become
part of his threateningly
close-knit, powerful family.
Now it was too late to wonder if
she had been foolishly
impulsive. But standing under
the wedding garlands with her
proud, exultant bridegroom,
Corinne was overcome by a
sense of dread....
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AMR PROMO IN S A O
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REBECCA STRATTON
IN HARLEQUIN ROMANCES
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2006—PROUD STRANGER
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2050—GEMINI CHILD
2078—GIRL IN A WHITE HAT
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2131—SIGN OF THE RAM
2141—THE VELVET GLOVE
2154—DREAM OF WINTER
2173—SPINDRIFT
2180—IMAGE OF LOVE
2201—BARGAIN FOR PARADISE
2222—THE CORSICAN BANDIT
2261—LOST HERITAGE
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Original hardcover edition published in 1979
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ISBN 0-373-02274-3
Harlequin edition published July 1979
Copyright @ 1979 by Rebecca Stratton.
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CHAPTER ONE
ON such a lovely day Corinne knew she should have been
feeling happy and lighthearted, especially in view of the
fact that she had received a letter from Gregori. Instead it
was his letter that caused her to feel so troubled and un-
sure of herself.
It was five weeks since she had heard from him last,
and for the first time she was ready to admit that, almost
without realising it, she had begun to have doubts about
the wisdom of the step she had taken—now when it was
almost too late. Gregori had written to say that he would
be arriving in London on the twenty-first to take her
back to Greece with him as his affianced bride.
It was typical of Gregori, she realised, that he stated his
intentions firmly without even mentioning the possibility
of her having different ideas. It was true that she had no
family ties in England, and there was no sound reason
why she should not be married in his country as they
had agreed, but she would like to have had the chance
of changing her mind.
Corinne had loved his confident, almost dominating
manner, and had accepted it as being part of his char-
acter without taking exception to it—until now. Only
now did she find herself feeling vaguely resentful at the
way he informed her of his intent without seeking her
present opinion.
5
6 LARK IN AN ALIEN SKY
It seemed scarcely possible it was only two months
ago that she and Gregori had met for the first time in
Paris. Corinne had been on holiday, and wandering
around an open-air art exhibition on her first day there.
She had been having a little trouble making herself
understood by a persistent young artist who spoke no
English, but still managed to make his meaning quite
clear, and Gregori had come to her aid. Speaking fluent
French, he told the young man exactly where he got off
and, too surprised to say anything, Corinne had accepted
his intervention without ever letting him know that she
had been more amused than fearful of her unknown ad-
mirer's approach.
She had been attracted to Gregori even in those first
few moments, for he was a man that women were bound
to notice. In the bright and noisy gaiety of the narrow
street, among the artists and their would-be clients, she
had told him her name, Corinne Thomas, and he had
looked vaguely puzzled for a moment until she repeated
it.
Their first laughter had been shared over his confusion.
The fact that her two names together, as she had said
them, sounded very much like the Greek word for lark. It
had become a habit from then on for him to call her
'my lark' whenever he used an endearment, and he had
used that endearment, and others in his own tongue, with
increasing frequency during the next three weeks.
After that first meeting he had escorted her back to
her hotel and taken her to dinner that evening, and from
then on they had seen one another every evening as well
as whatever time Gregori had free from business meet-
ings. It had seemed inevitable that their companionship
should lead to romance.
He was a serious man for the most part, though not
LARK IN AN ALIEN SKY 7
without a sense of humour, and quite a lot older than
she was, but Corinne found him irresistible. He was so
different from any man she had known before, and his
attractions became more apparent on closer association.
He was a new and exciting experience.
Brown-skinned, black-haired and dark-eyed, he had
seemed to bring the passion and warmth of another world
into her life, and aroused in Corinne such emotions and
desires as she had never known before, which she thought
of now with a slight sense of diffidence. It had been all
too easy to fall in love with Gregori, and when he had
asked her to marry him on the last night before she had
to fly back to London, she had accepted without hesita-
tion because it seemed the natural conclusion to those
perfect weeks together.
She had felt quite sure that she could never love any-
one else as she did that mature and stunningly attractive
man. It was not until she received his latest letter that
she felt a definite doubt. She had, she realised, gradually
reached the conclusion that she and Gregori had ex-
perienced nothing more than a holiday romance, inspired
by the romantic atmosphere of Paris, no matter how real
it had seemed at the time.
Because Gregori, as head of his family's shipping and
export business, had to return to Greece, and Corinne
had to serve out her notice with the company that em-
ployed her as a secretary, parting on a temporary basis
had been inevitable, but in the beginning she had had no
doubt at all about committing herself. Only now when
it was almost too late to go back did it occur to her how
much of a stranger he still was, and she felt a sudden
panic at the thought of his being there any moment
now.
It was Robert's suggestion that she was acting much
8 LARK IN AN ALIEN SKY
too impulsively that had set her thinking along the lines
she was now, she had to admit. But there was truth in
his suggestion that she had jumped in at the deep end, as
he put it, and if she was going to pull out she must do it
now, when Gregori came for her.
He knew she was free of her commitments by now, he
said, and that she would have made all the necessary
arrangements to accompany him home to Greece. Such
arrangements, she knew, he would not normally have left
to a woman, but he knew her to be an efficient junior
secretary; she had told him that herself.
He could not come sooner, she realised that, he was a
very busy and important man, but she wished he had
given her more than the two days he had. Given longer
she could have sat down and written him a sensible and
well considered letter, and explained how she felt. As it
was he would be with her any moment now and she still
was not ready for him. Nor would he be pleased about
her changing his plans for their meeting.
But she chose the park because she could not be cer-
tain her flatmate would give them the privacy their meet-
ing required, for Vanessa was inquisitive, tactless and
quite often malicious. Corinne dared not risk trying to
explain her present doubts to Gregori with the fear con-
stantly on her mind that they might be interrupted. Here
in a public park they could enjoy a curious kind of de-
tachment while still surrounded by people, and the
weather was warm and sunny.
She could visualise his black frown when he got the
message with no time to reply or to change the venue
again, and she tried to stop her hands from trembling as
she sat on a bench under the trees and told herself she
was doing it for both their sakes. Those five weeks
seemed suddenly like a lifetime, and the ten minutes she
had sat there even longer.
LARK IN AN ALIEN SKY 9
If only she could not so easily recall every detail of his
features and the long easy stride as he came towards her,
impatient for their reunion. The remembrance of that
bright dark gaze confidently noting the responsive smile
he knew would be there on her face when she saw him.
and the touch of his mouth like a burning brand on her
senses made her feel suddenly afraid. So much so that
her stomach churned sickeningly, and she could not tell
if it was sheer panic or the same kind of wild excitement
he had always aroused in her.
It was a second or two before she realised that the
familiarity of his face and that long-legged stride were no
longer merely in her memory. Getting swiftly to her feet
as he came towards her across the grass, she slid the tip
of her tongue anxiously over dry lips and clasped her
hands tightly together to stop them from trembling. She
had anticipated his frown, and sure enough his black
brows were drawn into a line above gleaming dark eyes
that searched for some clue to her reason for changing
his plans.
Lithe and sun-tanned, virile and sensual, but perfectly
controlled until desire released a man of passion and
gentleness; a lover who could sweep her to heights she
had never dreamed of until she knew him. And it was
against the memory of those times that she steeled her-
self as he came towards her.
`Corinne!'
He took her hands in his and Corinne's senses re-
sponded in an instant to the strong pressure of his fingers
and the deep caressing warmth of his voice. He looked
deep into her eyes so that she hastily averted them, her
smile wavering.
`How are you?'
His manner was formal enough, but not his touch, and
she took a second or two to bring her emotions under
10 LARK IN AN ALIEN SKY
control before she answered him. 'I'm fine, thank you,
Gregori. Are you?'
He nodded briefly, then turned and looked around
at the sun-dappled paths and the people in their immedi-
ate vicinity, and his frown deepened. 'Where would you
like to go?' he asked, and Corinne shook her head.
Nowhere—I thought we could talk here.'
`Out here in the park?'
Obviously he did not understand her in this mood and
Corinne felt a momentary twinge of conscience for
making their meeting so public, but it was too late to do
anything about it now. 'We can walk or sit down,' she
told him, 'I don't mind which. It's very warm and I
thought the sunshine and -' She glanced at him un-
easily. 'I suppose it isn't a very conventional place for
what we have, to talk about, but I thought— Would
you rather go somewhere else?'
He looked around once more, then shrugged his broad
shoulders and sat down on the bench, pulling her down
with him and still holding her hands. 'I do not under-
stand,' he said, and there was an edge of steel on the
normally velvet smooth voice. 'I understand nothing of
this, Corinne I ask that you be ready to leave with me
and instead I find you sitting here in a public park, as if
you have merely come out for an afternoon walk!'
'I can explain, Gregori— '
'I hope that you can!' His stern air of authority was
something new to her, although she had noticed it briefly
when he dealt with that persistent young man in Paris, on
their first meeting. 'Very obviously you are not ready
to leave as I expected, and just as clearly you have some-
thing on your mind which I suspect you know I will not
like! I do not understand any of it, Corinne, and I wish
you would explain it to me.'
