Except perhaps one.

But he would never meet her again.

Unless he was very unlucky.

Or very lucky.

‘You look gorgeous!’

Petra Radnor laughed aside the fervent compliment from Nikator Lukas.

‘Thank you, brother dear,’ she said.

‘Don’t call me that. I’m not your brother.’

‘You will be in a couple of hours, when your father has married my mother.’

‘Stepbrother at most. We won’t be related by blood and I can yearn after you if I want to.’

‘No, I think you’ll be the brother I’ve always wanted. My kid brother.’

‘Kid, nothing! I’m older than you.’

It was true. He was thirty-seven to her thirty-two, but there was something about him that suggested a kid; not just the boyish lines of his face but a lingering immaturity that would probably be there all his life.

Petra liked him well enough, except for his black moods that seemed to come from nowhere, although they also vanished quickly.

He admired her extravagantly, and she justified his admiration. The gaunt figure of her teen years had blossomed, although she would always be naturally slender.

She was attractive but not beautiful, certainly not as the word was understood among her mother’s film-land friends. She had a vivid personality that gleamed from her eyes and a humour that was never long suppressed. But the true effect was often discovered only after she’d departed, when she lingered in the mind.

To divert Nikator’s attention, she turned the conversation to Debra, the starlet who would be his official companion.

‘You two look wonderful together,’ she said. ‘Everyone will say what a lucky man you are.’

‘I’d rather go with you,’ he sighed.

‘Oh, stop it! After all the trouble Estelle took to fix you up with her, you should be grateful.’

‘Debra’s gorgeous,’ he conceded. ‘At least Demetriou won’t have anything to match her.’

‘Demetriou? Do you mean Lysandros Demetriou?’ Petra asked, suddenly concentrating on a button. ‘The Lysandros Demetriou?’