by Lynne Graham
Astonished by that censorious attack, Atreus was studying the document she had received. ‘I did not authorise this!’ he proclaimed in angry rebuttal.
‘Didn’t you? But you do want me off your estate, don’t you?’ Lindy noted the faint hint of colour that accentuated his wonderful cheekbones. ‘What gives you the right to disrupt my whole life? Where did you think I was going to move to on my income, with two dogs and a business to house as well as myself?’ A scornful laugh fell from her lips. ‘Of course—the point is that you didn’t care.’
‘I have no intention of evicting you for non-payment of rent,’ Atreus ground out in an accented drawl that was roughened with scantily controlled rage. ‘In the circumstances that is a ridiculous charge—and someone will lose their job over this…’
‘Your estate manager, who has four kids and another on the way?’ Lindy fired back at him in unconcealed disgust. ‘Atreus, you made this situation. Don’t make someone else pay the price for it going wrong. He’s an employee who is clearly aware that you want me to leave the estate.’
Atreus sent her a fierce appraisal. ‘I was willing to offer you generous financial compensation for simply considering the prospect of moving.’
‘So your estate manager probably thought he would win brownie points with you by getting rid of me on the cheap.’ Lindy shrugged, the generous curve of her lips compressing to a thin line. ‘That doesn’t free you of the responsibility for the distress and inconvenience that I have been caused.’
Irate at finding himself in the position of being reproved for his behaviour, Atreus held up two hands to still the flood of condemnation flowing from her. ‘You’re not listening to me. I deeply regret any distress that has been caused, but this was not a mistake of my making.’
Lindy shook her head unimpressed. ‘You don’t think so? You’re a ruthless bastard, Atreus. You have a God-given belief in your right to put your wishes above everyone else’s, no matter how selfish or wrong you are in principle. Oh, yes, that’s one more thing you lack—principles…’
Atreus stared back at her with chilling intensity. ‘You are here to strike back at me because I walked out on you at the weekend?’
It was Lindy’s turn to get mad. ‘No, I am not!’ she protested, her eyes brightening with fury. ‘I just wanted you to know what I think of you, because I won’t agree to see you or speak to you again if you get down on your knees and beg!’
‘Message received, but the scenario you suggest is highly unlikely to happen,’ Atreus derided, soft as silk. ‘However, you may disregard this foolish document and make your own decision about where you live and do business without any fear of interference from me or from any of my employees.’
‘It’s too late for that. Ironically, you’re going to get what you want—I’m moving out just as soon as it can be arranged,’ Lindy admitted tightly. ‘I’m lucky that I have some real friends, who don’t feel the need to use the power of their wealth and position to persecute people who dare to annoy them!’
His lean, darkly handsome features set hard, Atreus strode round his desk. ‘What a drama queen you can be!’ he condemned. ‘How can you possibly accuse me of persecuting you?’
Lindy was recalling his pronounced air of detachment when she had first entered his office, and the turmoil of her teeming thoughts suddenly fixed on the recognition of one deeply unsettling and wounding fact. ‘I can see now that you were never comfortable with being involved with me. I didn’t fit, I didn’t match your high expectations, and I was never good enough in your eyes to be anything other than a mistress. I will never forgive you for the way you have treated me.’
An ebony brow quirked. ‘I’d like to get back to work now…if you’re finished?’
And all the way back home on the train his unemotional parting words haunted Lindy. How could she still be so in love with a man like that? And how could he be so horribly, hatefully indifferent to her? But she had no regrets about having paid him a visit. This time he knew how she felt, and she could only hope that something of what she had said stayed with him.
The following day Lindy went to see her doctor. She was sent to the nurse for tests and sat around afterwards in the waiting room, feeling dreadfully tired and nauseous again even though she had been sick earlier that morning.
When she was called back in the doctor had a shock in store for her.
‘You’re pregnant,’ she was told.
Her response to the doctor was that it was totally impossible! The doctor looked weary, as though he had heard that claim before, and asked to examine her while making enquiries as to her menstrual cycle. It was true that she’d felt her system was a little out of kilter, she acknowledged, but she argued that no risks at all had been taken. The doctor cheerfully pointed out that certain unmistakable changes were already taking place in her body, and informed her that it was possible to have an unusually light period in the early stages of conception, before the pregnancy hormones fully kicked in. By the time he had told her that condoms could have up to a twelve percent failure rate in the first year of use, she was beginning to sink into the shock of acceptance.
She drove home with care, struggling to adapt to the reality that she and Atreus had quarrelled bitterly and broken up while all the time a tiny new life was growing inside her womb. Her sense of wonder and warmth towards that little being was soon disrupted by less pleasant feelings. Atreus didn’t want her and he would certainly not want her baby. The knowledge chilled her, but Atreus had been brutally frank on the subject of children. He would only consider having a family when he was married—to a suitably rich Greek woman.
Alissa rang to chat at length about her plans for Lindy’s move, and midway through the conversation Lindy blurted out that she too was expecting a child.
‘My goodness! Have you told Atreus?’
Lindy explained in some detail why nothing would persuade her to organise such a ghastly confrontation. ‘I couldn’t face it—not knowing that he doesn’t want the baby or me.’
‘The sooner you move the better,’ her friend commented soothingly. ‘Don’t worry about it. You don’t need Atreus Dionides any more.’
Lying in her bed that night, Lindy tried to convince herself of the same fact, drumming up a recollection of Atreus’s every masculine flaw and telling herself that she would be a much happier person without him. Unfortunately she could only remember how happy she had been while she was with him, even if that happiness had been built on shaky foundations. But she knew she was a survivor and that Atreus had been a bad choice, different as he was in every way from her.
That acknowledgement made and accepted, Lindy splayed her fingers protectively over her slightly rounded tummy and allowed herself to think of how comforting it would be to see Elinor and Alissa on a more regular basis. She wanted her baby. She wanted her baby very much, even though she was worried sick about how she would manage to raise a child alone, without a father’s support.
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘YOU’RE selling a country fantasy along with your products,’ Alissa pointed out, rearranging the skirt of Lindy’s floral sundress on the summer swing seat on which she was reclining, with a pretty basket of freshly cut lavender by her side. ‘Your customers want to believe you are living that fantasy.’
Before the hovering photographer could zoom in to take another photo of her Lindy pushed herself up heavily on her elbows, gasping at the effort it took to rise from a supine position since she had lost the ability to bend in the middle. The baby bump had taken over, and even a pretty dress and professional make-up couldn’t make her feel attractive when the solid mound of her pregnant tummy reminded her of a Himalayan peak.
It had never occurred to her that her accidental pregnancy might coincide with one of the hardest working periods of her life. But that was how it had turned out in the four months that had passed since she had left the Chantry estate. Having taken up residence in an idyllic and recently renovated thatched cottage, complete with a couple of acres of groun
d, Lindy had begun to calculate how she could make her business more lucrative and therefore more secure for her child’s sake. Idle conversations on that score with Atreus had long ago ensured that she knew exactly where she was going wrong in her pursuit of profit. Atreus had told her she needed an upmarket catalogue and fancier packaging, and she had now followed through on that useful advice. Alissa’s husband, Sergei, had insisted that even the smallest business required publicity to sell its products, hence the interview she had given earlier that day, and the photographer now snapping fluffy shots of her, the dogs and the beautiful garden.
There was no fantasy in her world now, Lindy conceded ruefully. It had taken a lot of concealer to hide the big dark shadows below her eyes from sleepless nights. In the months since they had parted Atreus had been seen out and about with an ever-changing collection of women, and rarely with the same one twice. Recently, however, that had changed. Just weeks back Atreus had been photographed dining out with an extremely eligible Greek heiress, who…yes…naturally was tiny and very beautiful. The gossip columnists had got very excited and had wasted little time in forecasting wedding bells for so well-matched a pair.
Lindy had honestly believed she was fully recovered from Atreus until Alissa had passed her a glossy magazine containing an article that made it very clear, to Lindy at least that, Atreus was indeed thinking of marrying Krista Perris. Lindy had been very brave about the news while she had an audience, but had wept buckets once she was alone. It had hurt so much to see Krista and Atreus pictured together in a full colour spread in that magazine. Krista, heiress to another shipping fortune, was so patently perfect for him in every way. Elinor’s husband, Prince Jasim, had urged Lindy to waste no more time in getting in touch with Atreus and telling him that she was pregnant, and Sergei had even offered to tell Atreus personally—an offer Lindy had hastily declined, reckoning that the Russian billionaire would pull few punches at such a meeting.
In a move that had convinced Lindy that Atreus was serious about Krista, Atreus had taken Krista home to meet his family. The picture of Atreus and his beautiful petite heiress heading into a party being thrown by his relatives had hurt Lindy the most. After all, it was an honour that he had never considered Lindy worthy of receiving. There was no way that Lindy wanted to pop up right now, with a big pregnant tummy, to break news that would scandalise the Dionides and the Perris families, appal Atreus and devastate his bride-to-be.
Lindy was far too proud and independent to stage such a tasteless denouement. She was getting by fine without Atreus and would continue to do so. To be happy at the same time was expecting too much of herself. As far as possible she was concentrating on her business and the child she carried, and she never, ever consciously allowed herself to think about Atreus Dionides. With the single exception of the baby, Atreus had been a mistake—the biggest mistake she had ever made.
Woken from her sleep at an unusually early hour for a Sunday morning, Lindy sat staring aghast at the double-page spread in the tabloid newspaper. It was luridly entitled ‘Tycoon’s Secret Mistress and Child’.
‘This is my worst nightmare!’ she gasped, stricken, while she studied the photo of her that appeared in the catalogue which innocently advertised her business. ‘How on earth did they get hold of this stuff?’
Alissa, who had seated herself at the foot of the bed, groaned. ‘It looks like someone who knew you when you were living on the Chantry House estate put two and two together and decided to talk to the press—probably for a pay-off.’
Even before she’d read the accompanying text Lindy had broken out in a cold sweat. But when she digested an account of her relationship with Atreus in which she was described as a ‘weekend mistress’, and their sudden split was mentioned, together with hints that rumours of her pregnancy had circulated even before her departure from Chantry, her blood boiled with angry mortification. It was even more humiliating to see herself depicted side by side with a gorgeous picture of the ultimate size-zero hottie and heiress Krista Perris.
Her mobile phone started buzzing like an angry wasp on the bedside table, and after a moment of hesitation she snatched it up. Shock paralysed her when she heard Atreus’s rich, dark accented drawl.
‘Have you seen the article in the Sunday Voice?’ Atreus enquired with freezing bite.
‘Er…yes.’
‘I’m flying down to see you to deal with this. I’ll be with you in just over an hour.’
‘I don’t want you to come here—to my home—I really don’t want to talk to you, either!’ Lindy argued vehemently.
‘I didn’t offer you a choice,’ Atreus asserted, and the phone line went dead as he hung up on her.
Alissa frowned when Lindy informed her of Atreus’s plans. ‘It may not be what you want, but you do need to sort things out with him, Lindy.’
‘Why?’ Lindy manoeuvred her heavy body out of her comfortable bed and turned angry blue eyes full of enquiry on her friend. ‘After the way he behaved, I don’t owe him anything. And you and Elinor agreed with me!’
‘In the heat of the moment. I hate to admit it, but it was Jasim who made me stop and think. He’s always so levelheaded. Even if you don’t feel you have a claim on Atreus Dionides, your baby does, and it’s much wiser to get this out into the open now, rather than try to keep it a secret. On the face of it, the press have done that for you.’
Trembling with alarm, and a shameful sense of anticipation at the prospect of seeing Atreus again, Lindy breathed in deeply to steady herself. It had not yet occurred to her to think of her unborn child as an individual, with the right to seek an independent relationship with Atreus at some point in the future. Alissa’s reminder had sobered Lindy, however, and forced her to acknowledge how complicated the issue of her child’s paternity would become if she did not deal honestly with it in the present.
‘There are reporters waiting out on the main road,’ Alissa told her. ‘If you want to go out, I’d advise using the farm lane.’
‘Thanks for the warning. I need a shower.’ Lindy sighed, and headed in the direction of the bathroom.
‘I’ll stay a minute and pick out something for you to wear.’
‘Where are the children?’ Lindy was belatedly noticing the absence of Alissa and Sergei’s lively toddler, Evelina, and their six-week-old baby boy, Alek.
‘I left them with Sergei.’
Having witnessed Sergei in the role of childcarer when Alissa was recovering from giving birth to their son and their nanny had fallen ill, Lindy was surprised. Before Lindy had taken charge Sergei had tried to hand his newborn son a bottle, and had given Evelina a packet of biscuits instead of a meal.
‘He has to learn how to handle them some time, and he assured me he would manage fine,’ Alissa quipped, with the smile of a woman who liked to see her husband occasionally faced with the challenges of childcare.
Lindy ignored the pretty feminine outfit which Alissa had selected for her to wear and went for an embroidered black skirt and a black camisole top, both of which she was convinced minimised the size of her stomach. By the time she heard the noisy clatter of a helicopter approaching she was extremely tense. She let the dogs out, not wanting the fuss of their greeting Atreus indoors.
The helicopter bore a large scarlet Dionides logo, and it landed in the paddock next to her cottage. From upstairs, her heart beating very fast, she watched Atreus’s bodyguards emerge first and check the surrounding area before their employer appeared. The dogs circumvented the efforts of the bodyguards to head them off and hurled themselves at Atreus with joyful jumping abandon. No doubt he would be a little less immaculate than he usually was when he finally fought free and reached her doorstep, Lindy reflected, without even a small stab of conscience. She hated him, she totally and absolutely hated the man she had once loved because of the power he still had to hurt her.
In the act of brushing his suit free of dog hairs and muddy pawprints, Atreus saw Lindy in the doorway, blue eyes violet-bright and the summer sun
light picking up the sheen of her chestnut-coloured hair, which had grown in length since he’d last seen her and now fell well past her shoulders. Bitter icy-cold anger engulfed him, because he had always trusted her and had never dreamt that she might pull such a stunt on him.
‘If we had to see each other I would rather it hadn’t been here. This is my home,’ Lindy told him with quiet dignity. ‘And you’re spoiling my Sunday. You’re going to make me late for church.’
Atreus was distracted by her concluding comment, snatched back to the weekends when he had regarded keeping her in bed with him rather than rushing off to church as the ultimate challenge.
‘Who sold the story to the Sunday Voice?’ he queried, before he had even entered the cottage.
His lean bronzed features were cool and grim, but he could not conceal the hot angry gold of his arrogant gaze. He was still the most beautiful man she had ever seen, and the admission annoyed her—for she felt that a truly intelligent woman would by now be indifferent to his vibrant dark good-looks.
‘How would I know?’ Lindy riposted. ‘Lots of people knew about us in the village, even though they said nothing to my face. Everybody on the estate knew as well. We weren’t exactly the world’s biggest secret.’
‘So, you’re saying that you didn’t sell it?’ Atreus caught a sideways glimpse of her altered shape and stared at the fecund swell of her stomach with frowning force. There was certainly no doubt that she was pregnant.
Shifting uncomfortably beneath that stare, Lindy shot him a furious glance. ‘No, indeed I did not. I’m not short of money, and I wouldn’t sell details of my private life even if I was!’
Atreus was treating the elegant modern fittings of the living room to a curious appraisal. ‘This seems to be a comfortable house.’
‘It is. Alissa oversaw the renovation project for all the buildings on the estate, and she never does anything by halves,’ she advanced. ‘If you’ve come all the way here to accuse me of giving the press that story, I can assure you that you’re barking up the wrong tree. I had nothing to gain and everything to lose from that article appearing in print because I value my privacy.’