by Lynne Graham
‘No sex outside marriage,’ Atreus breathed silkily.
Lindy pushed herself up on one elbow. ‘What did you say?’
‘Sex is out of the question unless you’re prepared to marry me.’
In the dim light creeping round the edges of the curtains he was a dark silhouette against the sheets. Lindy glowered furiously down at him. ‘I don’t want sex!’
Atreus just laughed.
‘I mean it, I…don’t…want…sex!’ Lindy launched, even louder, her face burning in the darkness.
‘Liar,’ Atreus murmured softly.
Her teeth gritted. ‘I’m not staying in this bed with you!’ she announced loftily, lunging at the lamp by the bed to switch it on.
‘I know it’s very frustrating to be able to look but not touch. And, yes, I do notice how you look at me,’ Atreus informed her.
‘There are times when I really hate you!’ Lindy hissed.
Atreus slid out of bed with fluid grace, reached for the robe lying by the bed and extended it for her use. Lindy clambered out of bed a great deal more slowly than he had. Although she was ready to hate him she had planned to stay in the bed, but his move called her bluff. She was awesomely conscious of her proportions in the sensible bra and panties he had mercifully left her clad in, and almost in tears of mortification at having to expose herself to that extent. Naturally the robe would not close across her stomach.
He showed her into the guestroom next door.
In silence, Lindy cried herself back to sleep in a cold bed. She didn’t like his sense of humour. Of course he didn’t still want to marry her! But she was cringing at the knowledge that he seemed to have the ability to see through her pretences of being simply pleasant and friendly around him. She felt fat and horrible and deeply unsexy, and she wished she had kept quiet when she’d awoken, so that she could have continued to enjoy lying that close to him again.
There would be no opportunities for such togetherness after the baby was born. Their dealings would become much more detached once their son was in existence. Atreus had a very strong sense of responsibility and he had proved that he was extremely reliable. As soon as he’d realised she was pregnant he had become thoughtful of her comfort and very supportive in every way. But she was already worrying about how they would share their newborn child, and whether it would mean that she had to adjust to being regularly parted from her baby.
Later that morning she was woken up with breakfast on a tray. When Atreus strode in she was happily reflecting that there was a lot to be said for being spoiled, and even more to be said for a man who took the trouble to spoil you.
‘I know the baby is due in only a couple of weeks, but I think I should introduce you to my family before our son is born,’ he imparted, poised at the foot of the bed, looking impossibly sleek and groomed and gorgeous in a business suit.
Lindy avoided looking at him now for longer than two seconds, because she knew that it was not safe to do so. He could spot lusty admiration at fifty paces and she needed to be more careful. But his invitation to meet his family shook her, and she shrank from the challenge of following heavily in tiny Krista’s light and delicate footsteps.
‘I don’t think I’d be allowed to fly at this stage…’
‘Private jet,’ he pointed out gently.
Lindy could not think of a ready excuse that he would not shoot down in flames. When Atreus got an idea in his head he was unstoppable. ‘Suppose…just suppose I went into labour,’ she urged, trying to scare him away from the idea.
‘We’ve got plenty of doctors in Athens,’ Atreus responded cheerfully, already resolving to ensure that there was a contingency plan for any emergency…
CHAPTER NINE
DURING the flight Lindy asked Atreus about his family.
‘Since my grandfather died my Uncle Patras and Aunt Irinia have become the most important people to me. When I was seven years old, they took me into their home,’ Atreus advanced with studied casualness.
‘I didn’t realise that your parents died while you were still a child.’
‘They didn’t. My mother was a heroin addict and my father couldn’t cope with her and a child. When the social services got involved because I was rarely at school my father’s family intervened. Patras and Irinia agreed to bring me up. Their own children were already adults, so it was a considerable sacrifice for them to take on a seven-year-old.’
‘A heroin addict?’ Lindy repeated, settling shocked and concerned eyes on his lean strong face, for it had never occurred to her that he might not always have enjoyed a happy, privileged and secure background.
‘She was an artists’ model, famed for her wild bohemian lifestyle. Before he met her my father was an exemplary husband and businessman who never put a foot wrong. But he walked out on his marriage for her and even turned his back on his responsibilities at Dionides Shipping. He never worked again. He lived on his trust fund,’ Atreus shared with biting contempt. ‘He did marry my mother, but they were too different for it to work.’ His handsome mouth twisted. ‘I barely remember them, but I do remember the violent arguments and the fact that the house was always full of noisy strangers coming and going at all times of the day and night.’
‘It must have taken a lot of guts for your father to stand by your mother. I suppose he had given up so much to be with her that he felt he had to make the best of things,’ Lindy mused.
‘That’s not the family point of view,’ Atreus said drily.
Lindy didn’t say that she already knew the family point of view just by watching him and listening to what he had to say and how he said it.
‘My father let everyone who ever depended on him down—his first wife, his family, his child, even our employees at Dionides Shipping.’
‘Is he dead now?’
‘He died in a car crash ten years after my mother died of an overdose. He was a weak, self-indulgent man. He lived abroad and he never made a single attempt to see me again.’
Lindy was heartbroken on his behalf. She could see how deep that final omission and hurt had gone. Indeed, it was obvious to her that Atreus had been taught to be deeply ashamed of both his parents, and she thought that was a cruel burden to give a child to carry into adolescence and beyond. She now understood why Atreus had once confidently assured her that he would only marry a woman from a similar background to his own. But this awareness only made her marvel at the reality that, in spite of the undoubted conditioning he had undergone, he had still asked her to marry him. What she had just discovered gave her a whole new view of him and of his marriage proposal.
When he escorted her into the Dionides family home, a handsome country mansion outside Athens, Lindy was elegantly clad in a terracotta linen dress and matching light jacket.
‘Before we join my relatives, I should warn you that they are very much shocked by the fact that we are not even engaged, not to mention married. I told them that they needed to move with the times, but I doubt if they took my advice on board,’ Atreus drawled wryly.
Lindy groaned. ‘You have a great sense of timing. I wouldn’t have got off the jet if you’d told me that any sooner.’
‘I’m the head of the family and they have excellent manners. No one will be rude,’ he told her with some amusement.
But, even though he spoke the truth on that score, Lindy hated every moment of the meeting that followed. The interior of the house had a formal funereal gloom, and an echoing silence that seemed a fitting backdrop for the very reserved group of people waiting to greet them. There were about fifteen people in a big room shaded by lowered blinds. The atmosphere, for all the heat outside, was distinctly chilly and unwelcoming, and Patras and Irinia Dionides were the chilliest of the lot. Eyes were swiftly averted from her pregnant stomach, and the fact that a baby was on the way was never once mentioned.
For that reason when Lindy felt a disturbing tightening sensation in her abdomen she did not dare refer to it. As she sat there, trying not to shift position too often
, the tightening gradually reached the level of pain. She began to breathe with care, while making frantic calculations and wondering whether she was having a scare or if it was the real thing. When her nerves couldn’t stand the suspense any more, and a gasp escaped her at the strength of a particularly strong contraction, Atreus turned to her with a frown of enquiry.
‘I think I might be going into labour,’ she whispered as discreetly as she could.
Well, there was nothing discreet about Atreus’s reaction to that. In the middle of a conversation he leapt upright, yanked out his phone, stabbed out a number and began speaking in an urgent flood of Greek. Consternation spread like a tidal wave, engulfing the room, and while concentrating on keeping calm Lindy tried to console herself with the reflection that going into labour in front of her hosts would presumably linger longer in family memory than whatever favourable impression Krista Perris had left behind her.
‘It is just as well that I reserved a room at a maternity clinic in case we needed it,’ Atreus informed her with decided satisfaction, bending down to lift her off her feet and carry her out of the house to the waiting limousine. ‘There’s also an excellent obstetrician standing by in readiness for our arrival, agapi mou.’
Lindy was impressed, and some of her anxiety ebbed away. ‘You really do shine in a crisis, Atreus.’
But little else relating to the birth of their son went as they expected. Lindy was in labour for hours, and she was becoming increasingly tired when the foetal heart monitor revealed that the baby was in distress. She was then whisked off for an emergency Caesarean. But her son was the most beautiful baby she had ever seen, with a shock of black hair and a cry as effective as a fire alarm.
Afterwards, Lindy drifted in and out of an exhausted sleep, still suffering from the effects of the anaesthetic she had had. At one point she opened her eyes and saw Atreus staring down into the crib with one long finger caught in his son’s grasp. Caught in the act of appreciating his newborn son, Atreus looked happier than she had ever expected to see him.
‘Do you like him?’ Lindy whispered with a hint of teasing.
‘If you can forgive him for what he’s put you through, I certainly can,’ Atreus declared, brilliant dark eyes shimmering with strong emotion. ‘He’s so perfect. Have you seen the size of his fingernails yet? They’re tiny—he’s like a doll. Do you think he’s healthy?’
‘He was ten pounds! He’s a big baby and of course he’s healthy.’ Lindy was touched by his concern and enthusiasm but she had to force her eyes to swerve away from him again. Just looking at Atreus could make her heart pound, and she wondered when, if ever, her fascination with him would fade. In comparison to him she was a mess, with her tousled hair and unadorned face. Atreus, on the other hand, looked astonishingly vibrant for a male who had missed a night’s sleep. Even with his lean, dark and devastating features adorned by a dark shadow of stubble, his tie missing and his suit crumpled, he looked utterly gorgeous.
Atreus straightened from the crib and spread his arms wide in an emphatic gesture. ‘I know already that I want to be able to see him every day. I want to be there when he smiles, takes his first step, says his first word,’ he told her, in a tone of urgency that locked her troubled gaze back on him. ‘I want to pick him up when he falls over, to hold him, be there for him. All those things are hugely important to me. But if you don’t marry me I’m unlikely to ever be that close to my son.’
And, watching Atreus stroke an infinitely tender fingertip down over their baby’s little face, Lindy was suddenly powerfully aware that she was no longer the primary focus of his interest.
It was clear that Atreus had fallen passionately in love with his first child. She knew in her bones that he would make a terrific father, driven to give his own child what his father had not given him in terms of time, interest and affection. Surely no one else would ever love their child so much as his own father? How could she deny Atreus and her son the closest possible relationship available to them?
And she was still in love with Atreus, wasn’t she? Brooding over the truth that she had tried to avoid, Lindy almost stared a hole in the blank space of wall. When Atreus was in her life she was much happier. Even seeing Atreus on a platonic basis, as she had been for the weeks before the birth, had lifted her spirits a great deal, and his support from the instant she went into labour had been invaluable. Feeling as she did about him, didn’t marrying him make sense? And even if their marriage didn’t last, at least she would have the consolation that she had tried to make it work.
‘All right,’ Lindy mumbled sleepily, finally breaking the taut, tension-filled silence.
Atreus closed a lean brown hand over hers. ‘All right…what?’
‘I’ll marry you. But be sure and tell your family that it was all your idea,’ she urged, squirming at the mere concept of meeting his relatives again after her undignified exit from their home the previous afternoon.
His ebony brows drew together as he frowned. ‘What made you change your mind?’
‘I think our son should have two parents,’ Lindy mumbled drowsily. ‘You and I both grew up without a father.’
Atreus released her hand. ‘Get some sleep, glikia mou.’
Her feathery lashes dipped, and then suddenly her eyes flew wide again. ‘You’ll have to wait until I can get into a decent wedding dress!’ she warned him.
They decided to call their son Theodor, which was one of the few names that they both liked, and in a matter of days Theodor had become known as Theo.
Atreus’s relatives visited them in the clinic. They were surprisingly animated, and a great deal more likeable after being introduced to the youngest and newest member of the Dionides clan.
As soon as Lindy was fit to travel she and Atreus flew back to London. After a week in Atreus’s penthouse apartment, with a nanny to help out, Lindy regained her mobility sufficiently to head back home to her cottage and her dogs. While she was occupying one of the guestrooms in Atreus’s apartment she had not felt at home.
Alissa and Elinor had insisted on organising the wedding, and Lindy was glad of their assistance and their company. Atreus, after all, was working very long hours, and within a fortnight of returning to the UK went off on a two-week business trip to Asia. When he visited in between times, he focused all his attention on Theo, but was otherwise cool and distant. Lindy waited in vain for his attitude to warm up. She had naively believed that once she’d agreed to marry him everything would go straight back to the way it had been between them, but it was soon clear that she was very much mistaken in that hope.
As their wedding day drew closer, Lindy became more and more apprehensive. She’d found a beautiful dress, and was relieved that she had regained her figure. Of course she had been fairly active during her pregnancy and had not put on a great deal of weight. She was offered interviews by several celebrity magazines which she turned down. She knew that Atreus loathed that kind of publicity, and saw no reason why she should surrender her privacy purely because she was about to become the wife of a very rich man.
The night before her wedding, Lindy stayed in Alissa and Sergei’s fabulous town house. She lay in bed, castigating herself for not having had the courage to tackle Atreus and persuade him to talk to her about feelings he had never once acknowledged he even had. Was he actually suffering from a case of cold feet? Did he regret proposing to her in the first instance? Was he ever going to touch her again? Was he even planning on a normal marriage? Or was he only marrying her to give Theo his name and gain better access to his son?
Those were the fears tormenting Lindy on the day of her wedding, as it dawned on her that her love might well not be enough to oil the wheels of her marriage. Her mood was not improved by the acknowledgement that she was too much of a coward to force those issues with him lest it provoke the cancellation of the wedding.
Elinor, who was acting as her Matron of Honour, loaned her a fabulous tiara to wear with her veil, while Alissa, her bridesmaid, gave her a go
rgeous pair of designer shoes. A sapphire and diamond necklace arrived from Atreus, and it was obvious that Alissa had known in advance about that. It was a magnificent gift, and Lindy put it on and spent some time admiring the glittering jewels in the mirror.
‘You’re the quietest bride I’ve ever come across,’ Elinor complained. ‘Is there something wrong?’
‘No, of course there isn’t,’ Lindy disclaimed hastily.
‘It’s okay to have doubts and be scared,’ Alissa declared cheerfully, giving Lindy’s shoulder a gentle squeeze. ‘Everyone feels like that. Marriage is such a big step, and you’ve seen so little of Atreus since you came back from Greece.’
‘I didn’t realise he would be working so much,’ Lindy confided ruefully.
‘Sergei and Jasim were exactly the same, but when you’re living together you’ll find more time for each other.’
‘You’ve had a bumpy courtship,’ Elinor pointed out. ‘You need to talk about what you both want and expect from your marriage.’
Lindy felt it was easy for Elinor, not knowing all that had happened before, to give advice of that nature when Jasim was so obviously deeply in love with her, his wife, and knew no greater happiness than to make her happy. If Lindy had had the confidence of knowing that Atreus was in love with her, she wouldn’t have had a single worry in her head. But she strongly suspected that if she asked Atreus to sit down and talk about their mutual wants and expectations within marriage he would run for the hills…and never come back.
When she walked down the aisle at the church, her heart hammering so loudly in her ears that she felt light-headed, Atreus turned to watch her progress. He treated her to a keen head-to-toe appraisal, taking in the off-the-shoulder wedding gown which faithfully followed her womanly curves and complemented them with its simple, understated design. His stunning eyes gleamed like molten gold, and her mouth ran dry because she knew that look, recognising that irrefutably sexual smoulder in his gaze with a leap of answering response and profound relief.