Bound by Their Christmas Baby

by Clare Connelly

  But why?

  He looked around, wincing when he saw a nearly empty bottle of Scotch with a solitary glass beside it.

  Abby.

  Memories of the day before came rushing back.

  The way they’d argued; the things he’d said.

  The threat he’d made.

  Her face when he’d told her he would fight her for Raf. He didn’t want to lose his son but, hell, he’d never planned to sue Abby for custody. He’d wanted his cake and to eat it too. Raf, Abby—it was all part of the same equation. He’d wanted to give Raf a family.

  And what did he want?

  Not this.

  He felt the sentiment of what he’d said—he’d been honest with her but, God, he’d also been an ass. She was young and inexperienced and believed herself in love with him; instead of gently reminding her that everything was new and overwhelming, he’d thrown his lack of emotion at her like a trophy. His determination to not become a fool in love had always made sense, but now it seemed childish. Stupid. Pathetic, even.

  He answered the phone in a rush, hope flaring inside him.

  ‘Arantini.’

  ‘Oh, Gabe?’ The voice on the other end wasn’t Abby’s. His heart dropped.

  ‘It’s Holly Scott-Leigh. Dr Scott-Leigh,’ she said. Gabe racked his brain and for one moment panic assailed him. Raf? Abby? No. This was the doctor he’d convinced Noah to see, the therapist.

  God, he’d let the ball drop there. His best friend was going through hell and, apart from the occasional phone call, Gabe had been so wrapped up in his own life that he hadn’t bothered to so much as think of Noah.

  ‘Yes, Holly?’ He was unintentionally curt, but he could think only of Abby.

  ‘I’m worried about Noah,’ she said, her voice trembling. ‘I think he needs you. Urgently.’

  It was, without a doubt, the only possible thing that could momentarily push Abby from his mind.

  ‘Why? What’s happened?’

  ‘I… I think you should come here. To London. To see him. I’m sorry, it’s just… I don’t know what else to do.’

  Gabe was already reaching for his jacket. ‘I’ll come subito.’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  IT WAS ONLY right to pack the tree away.

  How stupid she’d been to think she could decorate the house into a state of festive merriment and somehow make her heart whole when it had been obliterated into a thousand pieces.

  Without Hughie, it would take all her efforts to get the thing down and drag it through the door, but she didn’t care. She would do it because its very presence, two days after Christmas, was mocking her.

  She unwrapped the lights with care, placing them on one of the chairs, and then, with a sense of satisfaction born purely of emotional need, she pushed at the tree until it collapsed with a loud, echoing thud to the ground. The scent of pine filled the air; she didn’t breathe it in. She could barely breathe.

  Gabe had been gone two nights.

  Christmas night had been spent in a state of almost catatonic numbness, unable to comprehend what had happened. Boxing Day had been spent with Raf, and yet her ears had been listening for Gabe the whole time, for any sign of his approach.

  There had been none. No helicopter to herald his return.

  Was this how he expected their life to go? Would he just run away whenever she disagreed with him?

  An angry sob burst from her and she stomped her foot, bending down and grabbing the tree by its narrower end, trying with all her might to drag it towards the door.

  It didn’t budge more than an inch.

  She let out a roar, hoping that would help. It didn’t.

  But when she straightened, dragging a hand over her brow, she heard a noise behind her. The door slamming shut.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’

  She whipped around, her eyes flashing to Gabe’s with all the hurt and pain and accusation she felt before she sobered and tried to look cool. Hard to do while sweating and pink-faced from wrestling with an overgrown Christmas relic.

  ‘What does it look like?’ she snapped, refusing to let herself feel anything for the man, no matter how much she’d missed him, no matter how arrogantly handsome he looked.

  ‘Abby…’ He moved towards her and she flinched without realising it, backing away, closer to the tree. His eyes roamed her face and something passed between them, something that made her heart hurt and her chest thick with sobs she refused to give in to. Then he was Gabe Arantini, successful tycoon, tech billionaire. He stared at her for two more seconds before looking away, his eyes settling on a point past her shoulder. ‘My plane is on the runway, refuelling now. When you’re ready, I’ll drive you to the airport.’

  Abby froze, her chest cleaving, and fear had her launching at Gabe. ‘Don’t you dare! Don’t you dare send me away!’

  ‘What are you saying?’ he asked, having to raise his voice to be heard above her.

  ‘You don’t want me, I get it. I don’t care. I can’t leave my son. I won’t lose him. Don’t you dare send me away from him! I’ll marry you, I’ll marry you. Just please let me stay with him.’

  Gabe looked as though she’d stabbed him. He reached for her wrists and contained them with ease, his strong fingers wrapping around her, holding her tight. He spoke with urgency, his voice hoarse. ‘I’m not sending you away from Raf.’ His eyes were suspiciously moist, his voice gravelly. ‘He’ll go with you. You were right. This whole scheme was madness. We’ll find another way to do this.’

  Now Abby did sob because even though she’d told him she needed to be free of this whole marriage scenario, the reality was ripping her apart. Life without Gabe flashed before her, a barren, empty, hollow reality she didn’t want to contemplate.

  ‘I have an apartment in New York. You can have it. I’ll buy somewhere else for myself. Do you have a lawyer?’

  His fingers, curled around her wrists, were making her flesh warm yet her blood was ice-cold. ‘No,’ she whispered.

  ‘Fine. You can use my lawyer too. I’ll engage someone else.’

  ‘Why do we need a lawyer? I have nothing to give you, and you’ve just said you’ll let me be with Raf.’

  His face tightened. ‘I presume you won’t want to deal directly with me,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘We can arrange visitation rights through our lawyers. You keep the nannies and when I have Raf they’ll come too, so at least there’ll always be some kind of continuity for him.’ He cleared his throat.

  ‘Continuity,’ she repeated, for no reason except that she couldn’t understand what was happening and she had no idea how to make sense of it.

  Gabe, as if just realising he was holding her, stepped backwards, dropping her arms swiftly and rubbing his palms on his jeans. ‘Go and pack, Abigail. You’ve got your wish. You’re going home.’

  Her wish? Her wish was for Gabe to love her, for them to be a real family. He was showing her what he wanted—and it wasn’t a life with her.

  ‘Is this really what you want?’ she whispered.

  He stared at her, a strange mix of fear and determination in his eyes. ‘I don’t want to hurt you more than I have,’ he muttered. ‘You have to leave here. Go home.’

  Tears welled in her eyes but she nodded. He was right. He’d never promised her anything like love. Her grief was all her own fault. She was the one who’d forgotten the parameters of their relationship. She was the one who’d fallen in love.

  Without another word, she left the room. She moved through the house quickly, fighting an instinct, the whole time, to return to him. To beg him to reconsider. But that was a foolish impulse, one born of hope rather than reality. And so she forced herself to ignore it.

  It didn’t take Abby long to return their things to her suitcase. She’d brought only what she absolutely needed. There were clothes in New York
. She would have a fresh start.

  She lifted Raf out of the cot, her eyes brimming with tears as she carried him down the sweeping stairs. Gabe had removed the Christmas tree and the foyer was now empty, barren, like her heart and the marriage they might have had.

  This was the right decision. She was numb, yet it was right.

  But when Gabe approached her and his eyes dropped to the baby in her arms, she felt as if the earth was tipping on its axis. He stared at Raf and she saw his heartbreak, saw the cruelty of what she was doing, and grief throbbed hard in her veins.

  ‘I can’t take him away from you,’ she said desperately. ‘That’s not right either.’

  Gabe shifted his attention to Abby’s face and then looked away again. ‘I’ll come to New York,’ he said with an attempt at detachment. ‘I’ll see him often. You should be where you’re happy.’

  She swept her eyes shut, acknowledging that he was doing this for her. That he wanted to spare her pain, and so was sending her away. She acknowledged that even when her heart was breaking, both for herself and their son.

  ‘If that’s what you want,’ she said, cuddling Raf close. ‘Would you like to…?’ She held their son towards Gabe and he made a guttural noise of pain before taking the boy from her and pulling him to his chest. He turned his back on Abby but she could see from the way his torso was moving that he was struggling to bring his own emotions under control.

  She stood behind him, wishing more than anything on earth that she’d said nothing to him. That she’d simply married him and made the best of what they had. Sex, a baby they both loved and a future that could have been anything they chose. Maybe, just maybe, he’d been wrong. Maybe one day he would have learned to love her, despite what he thought now. And would that have been enough? Could she have spent her life waiting, hoping, wondering?

  ‘Well,’ he said finally. ‘We should go.’

  He didn’t speak on the drive to the airport and nor did Abby. Every time she formulated what she wanted to say, she took one look at the determined set of his features and remembered that Gabe Arantini wasn’t a man who did anything he didn’t want. Gabe didn’t want Abby’s love. It had terrified him, and so he was disposing of her.

  When they arrived at the airport he brought the car to a stop at a private terminal and turned to face her. ‘Abby?’

  She waited, her heart suspended, needing to hear what he was going to say, needing it with all of her being.

  ‘I’m sorry for bringing you to Italy. When you told me about Raf, I reacted without thinking. I had no right to displace your life as I did. No right to manipulate you into an engagement that was so obviously wrong.’

  She bit down on her lip and her huge eyes held his for several devastating moments. ‘I’m sorry I fell in love with you,’ she said softly.

  He shook his head and reached for her cheek, cupping it with his hand. ‘Don’t be. I don’t deserve your love—I don’t want it—but that doesn’t mean it’s not an incredible…privilege.’

  She sobbed then, because it made no sense and because she wanted him to understand something she couldn’t even explain.

  ‘Text me when you land,’ he said, pulling away from her and opening his door. He came around to her side and opened it before returning to the rear of the car and removing Raf. ‘And if you need anything. Anything at all.’ His eyes burned her with their intensity; Abby could no longer look at Gabe.

  It hurt too soul-destroyingly much.

  * * *

  It was her engagement ring that did it.

  He found it on her side of his bed—not that she’d ever used the bed as her own. She’d come to him each night and they’d made love, but she’d acted like a guest in his room. A guest in his castle, and his life.

  He lay on his back, staring at the ceiling, but it was no good. The bed smelled of her, of them. He swore sharply and sat up straight, rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands. It hadn’t even been a week—how was he meant to do this?

  Every time he closed his eyes he saw her as she’d been at the airport. Her face so pale, clutching Raf. His child, and the mother of his child, boarding a flight to take them halfway across the world.

  He’d sat in his car and watched the plane lift off, imagining them settling in for the flight, wondering if Abigail was nervous or relieved? Relieved to be leaving him, relieved to be free of his threats and control?

  He groaned and stood, pacing out of his room towards his study. He poured himself a measure of Scotch but cradled the glass in his hand, looking at the door against which they’d made love.

  A glimmer of hope flashed in his belly. She’d been worried about falling pregnant. Might she have? Might she, even now, have his baby in her belly? Would that change her mind? Surely then she’d marry him?

  With rich self-disgust he threw the Scotch back, burning his mouth with the alcoholic acidity. Was he really so desperate to secure his family that he’d wish her to be pregnant when she so obviously hadn’t wanted that? Was he such a despicable man?

  She’d called him honourable; she’d been wrong.

  He’d ruined Abigail’s life. She’d given him the chance to be involved with their baby; she’d needed his help. Help he could have given to her easily. He should have given it to her. When he’d seen the way she was living, and comprehended how alone she was in the world, he could have made everything better. Instead, he’d strong-armed her into agreeing to marriage and moving to Italy, and all because it suited him to have her here.

  And yet the thing that terrified Gabe most of all was the certainty that he would do it all again, simply because he knew that at each step of the way he’d been desperate for whatever he could get of her.

  It had started as hate, hadn’t it? Maybe even revenge?

  No. Never revenge. Just…inexplicable, all-controlling desire. Something heavy sat low in his gut. He’d wanted her. He’d seen her in New York and after a year without women—no, not women—a year without Abigail specifically, he’d lost his mind. He’d been determined to make her his once more. So why had he treated her as he had? Why had he embarrassed her at work, and told Rémy to fire her? Why hadn’t he let her explain properly—all the words he knew she needed to say, and had told her he didn’t want to hear, even when he’d been aching for her to give him something that would eradicate the pain of her betrayal?

  But it hadn’t really been a betrayal. Oh, she’d come to him intending to steal Calypso’s secrets, but it was out of desperation and love for her father. Knowing Abigail as he did now, he didn’t doubt her version of events. She would never have gone through with it.

  But he would have.

  He would have married her on Christmas Day knowing that it was a last resort for her. Knowing she was standing there, pledging her life and heart to him purely because he’d presented her with that sole option.

  He’d been trying to prove that he was nothing like his father; instead, he was so very much worse. He’d been terrified of losing Abigail and yet he hadn’t realised until now—until it was too late.

  With a hoarse oath, he pitched the Scotch glass at the wall so that it cracked into several pieces and hit the ground with a splintering shriek.

  He was terrified of losing Abigail and so he’d lost her.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  GABE STOOD OUTSIDE the door to his Manhattan penthouse for so long he wondered if, in the week since seeing Abigail, he’d become some kind of madman. It was his home—at least it had been until she’d left Italy. He felt as though a nest of snakes was writhing in his chest cavity.

  He clutched the soft toy he’d bought for Raf in one hand and lifted the other to the door and knocked. Twice. Loud. Confident. Nothing that betrayed the way his stomach was twisting and his mind was spinning.

  It wasn’t until she pulled the door inwards that he realised how late it was. He winced at the sight
of her—so beautiful, so sleepy, her long hair pulled over one shoulder, the oversized T-shirt she was sleeping in showing more leg than was helpful in that moment, for he needed to keep a clear mind.

  ‘Gabe?’ She blinked and rubbed her palms over her eyes.

  ‘It’s late, I’m sorry,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Were you asleep?’

  It was a stupid question—he could see quite clearly that she had been.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ She didn’t invite him in. There was a wariness to her, a fear that he’d put there. At one time he might have pushed inside anyway, just as he had on the night he’d discovered Raf. But Gabe was done steamrollering Abby into submission. All along he’d been so wrong.

  ‘Abigail.’ The word came out as a hoarse plea. He cleared his throat and tried again. ‘I need to speak with you.’

  ‘Now?’ She swallowed, her throat shifting, her vulnerability making him ache.

  ‘I…can come back in the morning, if that’s better?’

  His contrition obviously confused her. She frowned, blinked her big eyes and then stepped backwards, gesturing for him to come inside.

  He did so quickly, before she could change her mind, shrugging out of his suit jacket and discarding it carelessly over the back of a chair. ‘This is for Raf,’ he said needlessly, holding up the little monkey toy.

  She crossed her arms over her chest. ‘He’s sleeping. If you wanted to see him.’ She angled her face away from him and he wanted to shout, No!, because he needed to see her, to study her, but he didn’t. Instead, he clenched his hand into a fist by his side, urging himself to be patient, to be gentle. To respect her autonomy and to respect the fact she’d probably tell him to go to hell—with good reason.

  ‘I do, of course.’ He nodded. ‘But I meant what I said. I need to speak to you.’

  She frowned. ‘Is everything okay? Are you sick? Is it Noah?’

  His chest crushed. Why hadn’t he noticed the level of her compassion before? Why hadn’t he understood that she was full of care for others—which in part had led to her downfall? It was compassion for Lionel that had sent her to Gabe, and compassion for Raf that had brought her to Italy.