The Millionaire's Revenge

by Cathy Williams

  And he then proceeded to show her how erotic he found her. But nothing could be as erotic as the thought that at long last the dream of happiness had become reality and that from here onwards their steps forward would be taken together ...forever.

  EPILOGUE

  ‘Gabriel, darling...’ It was three-seventeen in the morn­ing. Laura could glimpse the illuminated hands of the clock on the table next to her beloved husband, whose naked body was warm next to hers. She brushed her lips against his cheek and then grimaced as another contraction hardened her stomach.

  Nearly two weeks overdue and a girl, Gabriel was for­ever telling her with a grin, because only a female would keep everyone waiting for as long as she had done.

  ‘Gabriel, don’t panic, but...’

  It must have been the word panic that did it because his eyes flicked open and the first words he uttered were a heartfelt, ‘Dios!’

  ‘I’m only just beginning,’ Laura said soothingly, gritting her teeth together as another contraction ripped through her, and watching with amusement as Gabriel leapt out of the bed and began flinging on his clothes, only switching the light on as an afterthought.

  ‘Laura, my sweetest, God, you are in pain.’

  ‘It happens around this time of the pregnancy.’ She began edging herself off the bed and he raced to net side, half tripping over his trousers, which were hot fully on.

  ‘You’re wincing. You’re trying to be brave but you’re wincing. I am not blind! I can see!’

  ‘Calm down.’

  ‘How can I calm down? Your bag. I’ll get your bag. Where is your bag? Of course I know when your bag is! Stay calm, Laura, don’t panic!’

  He had solicitously helped her pack her bag over a month ago, insisting on adding so many unlisted items to the contents that in the end she had warned him that he might have to buy a trunk to hold it all.

  ‘I’m not...’

  ‘And do not get dressed!’ he ordered from their en suite dressing room, from which he was fetching the bag as well as jumpers and coats for them both, I will help you!’

  ‘I think I can manage.’ Sometimes she wondered why she bothered to say certain things when she could always so accurately predict his responses. As she expected, he completed the job of getting her nightdress off, his voice laced with frantic panic as he demanded to know whether she was up to changing or whether they should just fling a coat over her and hurry to the hospital. Maybe, he ful­minated, they should take the helicopter.

  ‘I don’t think the hospital has anywhere for helicopters to land,’ Laura said lovingly.

  ‘I’ll carry you to the car.’

  ‘I can walk, you idiot. Just support me a little.’

  Seven months of wedded bliss and she was still awe­struck at the love that could so easily have eluded her, a love that seemed to grow with each passing minute. Their wedding had been simple and attended only by his closest family members and their mutual friends and she had en­joyed every second of it, basking in his tenderness and adoration, which he made no attempt to hide.

  She could sense his frustration as he navigated the dark lanes, and finally the wider, better-lit roads, that he couldn’t take the pain away from her. By the time they reached the hospital, he was far more jittery than she was and she had to murmur softly that there was no need to worry, that everything was perfectly straightforward and, really, the staff there knew how to deal with women in labour.

  ‘How can you be so calm?’ he accused, seething with annoyance at the seemingly languid manner in which they were checked in whilst he tapped his foot and glowered.

  ‘One of us has to be.’

  ‘I am calm.’

  ‘Oh, yes, as calm as someone on the verge of a nervous breakdown.’ Their eyes met and Gabriel felt his heart swell with love, then finally things started happening. They were shown to the labour ward and after a brief examination, from which he was excluded by some very decisive draw­ing of curtains around the bed, the next few hours raced by with the terrifying speed of a runaway train.

  And there was nothing he could do! Only be with the woman he loved, hold her hand, mop her brow and try to remember all those pearls of wisdom he had read in the various pregnancy books he had devoured, much to his wife’s amusement, and most of which he had now com­prehensively forgotten.

  ‘She’s doing fine, Mr Greppi,’ one of the two midwives told him at some point in the proceedings, ‘but you look as though you could use a cup of tea. She’ll be here for at least another couple of hours. Why don’t you go down to the canteen and have something hoi to drink?’

  ‘I’m here for the duration.’

  ‘Well, just don’t go fainting on me.’

  ‘I never faint. Shouldn’t there be a consultant in here?’

  ‘I’ve delivered more babies than you’ve hail hoi dinners, young man.’ But the middle-aged woman gunned and winked at him. ‘She’ll be fine.’

  Never in his life had Gabriel felt more lacked with nerves and never in his life had he ever been so reduced to speechless awe than when, an hour and a half later, he glimpsed his baby as one final push expelled his son. Eight pounds, eleven ounces and groggily unaware of his sur­roundings until he drew in his breath and released an out­raged shriek.

  ‘It’s a baby boy,’ the midwife said, bustling with him and then handing him wrapped in a blanket to Laura. ‘What a lot of hair.’

  Laura looked down at the small bundle lying against her, fists closed and eyelids fluttering, and smiled.

  ‘We have a son.’ Pride and joy threatened to make his eyes water. ‘Didn’t I tell you that it would be a boy?’ He stroked Laura’s blonde hair away from her face, which was still glistening with perspiration, and she glanced up at him with a tender smile.

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Of course I did,’ Gabriel said gruffly. ‘And look at that mop of black hair. He looks just like his father.’ He bent to kiss his wife and then the small, warm cheek of his baby and watched in fascination as the little bundle wrig­gled and stretched and then settled back into position.

  ‘My family,’ he said with a lump in his throat. ‘My perfect family.’