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come here expecting to meet Mrs Elsa Murdoch, paid nanny. Instead he’d met Elsa, marine biologist, friend, protector, mother to Zoe in every sense but name.
    After the shock of learning of Zoe’s existence, his plan had been to rescue his orphaned cousin, take her back to Khryseis and pay others to continue her care. Or, if Zoe was attached to this particular nanny, then he could continue to employ her to give the kid continuity.
    It had to be option two.
    Only if he broached it now Elsa might well lock the door and call the authorities to throw him off her land.
    So do it when? He had so little time.
    â€˜I need to go back to Khryseis tomorrow,’ he told Zoe and glanced sideways to see relief flood Elsa’s face. ‘Elsa’s said she’ll drive me into town now. But I’ve upset her. She thought I might want to take you away from her, and I’d never do that. I promise. So if you and Elsa drive me into town now, can I come and visit again tomorrow morning?’ He looked ruefully down at his ceremonial trousers—now liberally coated in cat fur. ‘If I’m welcome?’
    â€˜Is he welcome?’ Zoe asked Elsa.
    â€˜If you want him to come,’ Elsa said neutrally. ‘Stefanos is your cousin.’
    Zoe thought about it. He was being judged, he thought, and the sensation was weird. Judged by an eight-year-old, with Elsa on the sidelines doing her own judging.
    Or…it seemed she’d already judged.
    â€˜If you come you should bring your togs,’ Zoe said.
    â€˜Togs?’
    â€˜Your swimming gear—if you own any without tassels and braid,’ Elsa said, still obviously forcing herself not to glower. ‘As a farewell visit,’ she added warningly. ‘Because, if you really are Zoe’s cousin, then I accept that she should get to know you.’
    â€˜That’s gracious of you,’ he said gravely.
    â€˜It is,’ she said and managed a half-hearted smile.
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    The drive back to town started in silence. Elsa’s car was an ancient family wagon, filled in the back with—of all things—lobster pots. There was a pile of buoys and nets heaped on the front passenger seat, so he was forced to sit in the rear seat with Zoe.
    She could have put the gear in the back, he thought, but she didn’t offer and he wasn’t pushing it. So she was chauffeur and he and Zoe were passengers.
    â€˜You catch lobsters?’ he said cautiously.
    â€˜We weigh them, sex them, tag then and let them go,’ she said briefly from the front.
    â€˜You have a boat?’
    â€˜The university supplies one. But I only go when Zoe can come with me.’
    â€˜It’s really fun,’ Zoe said. ‘I like catching the little ones. You have to be really careful when you pick them up. If you grab them behind their necks they can’t reach and scratch you.’
    â€˜We have lobsters on the Diamond Isles,’ he told her. ‘My friend Nikos is a champion fisherman.’
    â€˜Do you fish?’ Zoe demanded.
    â€˜I did when I was a boy.’
    They chatted on. Elsa was left to listen. And fret.
    He was good, she conceded. He was wriggling his way intoZoe’s trust and that wasn’t something lightly achieved. Like her father before her, Zoe was almost excruciatingly shy, and that shyness had been made worse by people’s reaction to her scars.
    Stefanos hadn’t once referred to her scars. To the little girl it must be as if he hadn’t noticed them.
    The concept, for Zoe, must be huge. Here was someone out of her papa’s past, wanting to talk to her about interesting stuff like what he’d done on Khryseis when he was a boy with her papa.
    She shouldn’t be driving him back into town. She should be asking him to dinner, even asking him to sleep over to give Zoe as much contact as she could get.
    Only there were other issues. Like the Crown. Like the fact that he’d said that Zoe had to return