The Affair

by Maya Banks

  Jewel laughed and squeezed Marley’s hand with her free one. “I’ll tell you after Chrysander. That way you two don’t try to talk me out of it.”

  “Uh-oh,” Bella said with a groan. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

  “I’m too curious to try and dissuade her,” Marley said. “If you’ll stay out here, Jewel, Bella and I will make sure Piers is occupied while you talk to Chrysander.”

  “Thank you.”

  The two women disappeared indoors leaving Jewel to gaze out over the sea. She was so absorbed by the view, that she didn’t hear Chrysander when he came out.

  “Marley tells me you’d like to speak with me.”

  Startled, she made a quick turn, and swallowed as she stared back at Piers’s older brother. He raised a brow in surprise.

  “Do I frighten you, Jewel?”

  “Oh no, of course not…okay, yes, you do,” she admitted.

  “It is certainly not my intention,” he said formally. “Now tell me, what can I do for you?”

  She twisted her fingers nervously in front of her. This was probably a stupid idea, and Chrysander would probably tell her she was out of her mind. He might even be angry that she intended to pry into Piers’s past.

  “Piers told me about Joanna…and Eric.”

  Chrysander’s eyes grew cold.

  “I know how hurt he was by what happened.”

  Chrysander sighed and moved closer to Jewel. “He was devastated, Jewel. Hurt is a very tame word for what he went through. He loved Eric, considered him a son for two years. Can you imagine thinking a child is yours for that long? And then having him snatched away?”

  She swallowed and lowered her gaze. “No, I can’t imagine. It would devastate me too.”

  “Perhaps you can understand now that he’s told you about them.”

  She looked up again, braving Chrysander’s stare. “That’s just it. I want your help.”

  Chrysander’s brows came together in confusion. “My help? With what?”

  “Finding Eric.”

  “No. Absolutely not. I won’t allow Piers to go through that all over again.”

  Jewel put her hand over Chrysander’s when he turned to go back inside.

  “Please. Hear me out. Part of the problem was that Piers never got to say goodbye. He never got any closure. His wound is still raw and bleeding. He’s still grieving for that two-year-old he lost. His only memory of Eric is of the day she left with him, how Eric screamed and cried for him. Maybe if he could see him now it would help to ease some of that pain. I can only imagine that he’s wondered over the years if Eric is happy, if he’s well, if he’s needed anything. If he saw that Eric wasn’t hurting, maybe it would go a long way to healing the awful pain Piers feels.”

  “You would do this?” Chrysander asked. “You would willingly bring a child back into his life that he loved? Risk contact with a woman he once loved just to make him happy again?”

  “Yes,” she said huskily. “I would do anything to ease his hurt.”

  Chrysander studied her for a long moment. “You love my brother very much.”

  She closed her eyes and turned away. “Yes,” she whispered. “I do.”

  “All right, Jewel. I will help you.”

  She grabbed his hand. “Thank you.”

  “I just hope when this is all over that my brother is still speaking to me,” he said wryly.

  She shook her head vigorously. “I’ll tell him you had nothing to do with it. I’ll take sole responsibility.”

  “My brother is a lucky man, I think.”

  “I just hope he thinks so,” she said wistfully.

  “Give him time. I have no doubt he’ll figure it out.”

  Chrysander leaned forward and kissed her forehead. “I’ll do some digging and let you know what I come up with.”

  Bella slipped out through the glass doors. “I’m afraid we’ve held him off for as long as possible. I hope you’re done, because Theron and Piers are convinced we’re plotting some evil.”

  Chrysander chuckled. “Bella, I have no doubt that where you’re concerned, it’s absolutely true. I haven’t forgotten that you dragged my wife into a tattoo parlor not so many months ago.”

  Jewel burst out laughing. “A tattoo parlor? You have to tell me about this, Bella. Did Chrysander have a heart attack?”

  “He might have bellowed a bit loudly just before he dragged us out,” Bella said with an innocent grin.

  Jewel wrapped an arm around Bella in a show of loyalty.

  “Just what we needed around here. Another woman to cause trouble,” Chrysander said with a mock groan.

  The door opened, and this time Marley came out with Theron and Piers on her heels. Both men wore expressions of suspicion as they surveyed Chrysander laughing with Bella and Jewel.

  “Whatever he’s said, don’t believe a word,” Theron said as he dragged Bella back against his side.

  “Why do I gain the impression that my family is plotting against me?” Piers murmured as he went to stand at Jewel’s side.

  She wrapped her arms around him, hugging him close. Then she leaned up to brush her lips across his jaw. “You’re being paranoid. Chrysander was just divulging all your family secrets.”

  Both Theron and Piers donned expressions of horror. Chrysander held up his hands. “Don’t worry. I’ve told them nothing you’ll be sorry for later.”

  “You mean there is dirt they’d be sorry for?” Bella asked. “Do tell. Theron always acts as if I’m the troublemaker in the family.”

  Jewel relaxed against Piers and enjoyed the laughing and teasing that went on between the others. She already liked Bella and Marley so much, and she was beginning to lose her uneasiness around Theron and Chrysander. To their credit, both men had seemingly accepted her presence in Piers’s life.

  Piers’s hand went to her belly as it often did, rubbing lightly over the swell. She wasn’t even sure he realized what he was doing, but it made her heart ache with love for him.

  She was beginning to realize that for all his coldness and aloofness that he was a man of great passion. When he loved, he did so with everything he had. How fortunate both her and her child would be to have his love and devotion. She would never have to worry about being alone or of being accepted again.

  “Are you ready for dinner, yineka mou?” he murmured close to her ear. “I have it on good authority that the chef has prepared all your favorites tonight.”

  “Hmmm, I think I could get used to being so spoiled,” she said with a sigh.

  “You’re easily satisfied,” he teased.

  “I just want you,” she said seriously.

  Fire blazed in his eyes, and his grip tightened around her midsection.

  “Don’t tempt me so or I’ll forget we have guests and take you upstairs to bed.”

  “And this would be bad why? Your brothers all have wives. Surely they’d understand.”

  He laughed and kissed her on the nose. “You’re bad for my control, yineka mou. Come, let’s go eat. I’ll carry you up to bed later.”

  CHAPTER 17

  “Mrs. Anetakis, there is a call for you.”

  Jewel looked up to see the maid holding the cordless phone out to her. She took it and smiled her thanks at the younger woman. After she’d retreated, Jewel put the phone to her ear.

  “Hello?”

  “Jewel, this is Chrysander. I have some information for you about Eric. I’m glad you asked me to look into this. The news is not good.”

  Jewel frowned and got up from her seat at the breakfast table on the terrace. She ducked back inside so she could better hear over the distant roar of the ocean.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I found him. He’s in foster care. He was made a ward of the state of Florida two years ago. He’s been through six homes in that time.”

  “Oh no. No, no, no,” she whispered. Her fingers curled tightly around the phone as she battled tears. This would destroy Piers.

  “Jew
el, are you all right?”

  She swallowed the knot in her throat. Memories that she’d spent her life suppressing boiled to the surface.

  “I’m okay,” she said shakily. “Thank you for doing this, Chrysander. I’d appreciate it if you could email me all the information you have. I want to thoroughly investigate this before I tell Piers.”

  “I understand. I’ll send it over as soon as we get off the phone. And, Jewel, if you need any further help from me, let me know.”

  “Thanks, Chrysander. How is Marley doing?”

  Chrysander sighed. “It’s been difficult for her. She’s already ill with the pregnancy, and the stress of having to identify the kidnappers and give more statements is getting to her.”

  “I’m sorry,” she offered softly. “Will you be much longer in New York? Will she have to remain there for the trial?”

  “Not if I can help it,” he said fiercely. “The District Attorney has offered a plea bargain. If they accept it, then they’ll forgo a trial, and Marley will be finished with this nightmare.”

  “Give her my love, please.”

  “I will. Let me know if there is anything else I can do.”

  “I will, Chrysander.”

  She hung up the phone and then went to find her laptop. A few minutes later, she received Chrysander’s email. She frowned as she read through the details. A few phone calls would have to be made, but she couldn’t wait to tell Piers what she’d discovered. There was no need for Eric to be in foster care when he had a family all too willing to take him in.

  * * *

  Piers sank into his chair behind his desk and looked ruefully at the piles of mail in front of him. Never before had he been so lax when it came to work matters. He had Jewel to thank for his inattention lately.

  His emails were in the hundreds, his voice mail had reached capacity, and he hadn’t opened mail in several days. His brothers would give him hell, but they’d also be happy to know that work wasn’t his life any longer.

  With a sigh, he powered up his computer so he could sift through the backlog of emails. Then he reached for his phone and turned on the speaker so he could weed through voice mails. Most were routine reports from various construction projects. A few minor emergencies from panicked hotel managers, and one offer to buy the new hotel in Rio de Janeiro. That one made him smile. There weren’t many corporations that could afford one of the Anetakis’s hotels. They spared no expense.

  As soon as the voice mails were squared away, he dialed Chrysander’s number. He wanted to check in on Marley and find out the results of their trip to New York to identify her kidnappers.

  When he received no answer, he called Theron instead. They spent several minutes talking about business. Theron brought him up to speed on Chrysander and Marley and then conversation drifted back to business.

  As he chatted, he idly sorted through the envelopes piled on his desk. When he got to one addressed to him from the laboratory that had performed the paternity test, he froze.

  “I’ll speak to you later, Theron. Give Bella my love.”

  He hung up and stared at the envelope in front of him. A smile eased his face as he fingered the seal. Here would be the proof of his paternity. In black and white, irrefutable proof that he was a father.

  Last time it had gone the other way, and he’d lost everything that mattered most to him. This time… this time it would be perfect. He had a daughter on the way. His child.

  Mine.

  The surge of possessiveness that rocketed through his body took him by surprise.

  He tossed the envelope aside. There was no need to open it. He knew what it would say. His trust in Jewel also surprised him, but he realized he did indeed have faith in her. He trusted her not to betray him.

  After sorting through a few more envelopes he glanced back over at the letter. He should open it and revel in the feeling. Then he could go find Jewel and make mad, passionate love to her.

  The idea made him tighten with need.

  He felt like celebrating. Maybe he’d take Jewel on a trip to Paris. She loved to travel, and her doctor had pronounced her fully recovered from her surgery. To be on the safe side, he could schedule a check-up and a sonogram. Then they could take the private jet. They could make love in Paris and then maybe go on to Venice. Take the honeymoon they hadn’t been able to take when they’d gotten married.

  He picked up the envelope again, smiling as he turned it over. He only hesitated a moment before tearing it open and unfolding the letter within.

  He scanned the contents, the perfunctory remarks thanking him for his business, and finally he got to the bottom where the results were posted.

  And he froze.

  He read it again, sure that he’d missed something. But no, there it was in black and white.

  He wasn’t the father.

  Icy rage flooded his veins, burning, billowing until he thought he would explode. Again. It had happened again, only this time it was different. So very different.

  What had she hoped to accomplish? Would she, like Joanna, wait for him to form an attachment to the child before leaving? Use the child as a bargaining tool?

  Was Kirk the father or was he yet another man she dangled from her fingertips like a windup toy?

  Older and wiser? He wanted to puke at his stupidity. In his arrogance, he’d imagined that he’d never be deceived as he’d been in the past, but what had he done to prevent it?

  He looked down at the offending document again. His hands were shaking too much to keep it still. Damn her. Damn her to hell.

  She’d wormed her way into his life, into his family’s lives. His sisters-in-law loved her, and his brothers had accepted her. Because of him. Because he’d brought her into their unsuspecting midst.

  Never had he felt so sick. He wished he’d never opened the damn thing.

  What a fool he’d been. What a fool he’d always be. All this time wasted on building a relationship that was based on lies and treachery. He’d bought the house of her dreams, done everything in his power to make her happy.

  And worse, he’d bought into the fantasy as well. He’d begun to believe that they could be a family. That he’d been gifted another chance at a wife and child. That he’d finally been given hope.

  He stared bleakly at the paper in his hand. The worst part was he had to have played right into her hands by offering her a settlement regardless of her child’s paternity. She won either way. And him? He’d lost everything.

  * * *

  Jewel clutched the printouts to her chest and hurried to Piers’s office. She knew it would hurt him to find out Eric’s fate and that Joanna had abandoned him two years ago, but the most important thing was getting Eric out of his current situation.

  Nausea rose in her throat at the thought of the young boy in so many foster homes. Had he harbored the same hopes she had when she was a little girl, only to be disappointed over and over?

  She didn’t knock but burst through the door, breathless from her pace. She stopped abruptly when she saw Piers sitting at his desk, a document crumpled in his hand, his expression so horrible that she nearly forgot why she’d come.

  “Piers?”

  He turned his cold gaze to her, and she shivered as a chill washed up her spine.

  She took a step forward. “Is everything all right?”

  He rose slowly with calculated precision. “Tell me, Jewel. How did you think you would get away with it? Or did you just want to prolong the truth until you had me completely wrapped around your finger?”

  Her heart sank. How had he found out about Eric? Why was he so angry?

  “I was on my way to tell you now. I thought you’d want to know.”

  He laughed but the sound was anything but joyous. It skittered abrasively over her skin, and she shrank away from his obvious anger. Rage. That was the word for it. He vibrated with it.

  “Oh yes, Jewel. I wanted to know. Preferably when this whole charade began. Did you enjoy hearing me spill my guts ab
out Joanna and the deception she perpetrated? Did it give you satisfaction to know that yours was even more sound?”

  She shook her head in confusion. What was he talking about?

  “I don’t understand. Why are you so angry? And at me? I didn’t do this, Piers.”

  He gaped incredulously at her. “You didn’t lie to me? You didn’t try to foist another man’s child off on me? You amaze me, Jewel. How you manage to sound the victim. The only victim here is me and the poor child you’re pregnant with.”

  Hurt crashed over her, making her fold inward in a familiar defense mechanism she’d perfected over the years.

  “You hate me,” she whispered.

  “Are you suggesting that I could love someone like you?” he sneered.

  He thrust the paper forward. “Here is the truth, Jewel. The truth you never saw fit to give me. The truth I deserved.”

  She took the paper with a shaking hand, tears obscuring her vision. It took her three times to make sense of the words and when she realized what it said, she went surprisingly numb.

  “This is wrong,” she said in a low voice.

  Piers snorted. “You’d still keep up the pretense? It’s over, Jewel. These tests don’t lie. It states with absolute certainty that there is no chance I could be the father of your child.”

  She stared up at him, tears trickling down her cheeks. He was cold. So cold. Hard. And unforgiving.

  “You’ve waited for me to fall,” she choked out. “You’ve been waiting for this since the day I called you. It’s the only outcome that was acceptable to you. You weren’t going to be satisfied until you proved I was no better than Joanna.”

  “You have quite a flair for dramatics.”

  She scrubbed angrily at her tears, furious that she’d allowed him to make her cry. “The results are wrong, Piers. This is your child. She is your child.”

  Something flickered in his eyes at her vehemence, but then he blinked, and it was gone, replaced with ice.

  There would be no convincing him. He’d already tried and convicted her. She had some pride. She wouldn’t beg. She wouldn’t humiliate herself. She’d never allow him to know how shattered she was by his rejection. Or how much she loved him.