by Lucy Monroe
“Hunter!” The woman threw herself at her husband. “It’s Dimitri Petronides. He’s the one. You’ve got to get him out of here. If Allie sees him, she’ll have a relapse. She’s just started sleeping at night. Do something!”
None of the woman’s words or actions had made sense since she’d told Dimitri Xandra was dead, but then how could anything make sense in the face of that devastating fact?
He turned to go, more than willing to abandon the scene.
Alexandra could hear her sister’s voice raised in agitation from where she sat chatting with one of Hunter’s many business associates in the penthouse’s living room. She excused herself and stood up. Madeleine’s voice had lowered to the point where Alexandra could not make out what her sister was saying, but the urgency was still there.
She walked through the dining room tastefully decorated in autumn colors for the Thanksgiving holiday and out onto the balcony. Madeleine was gripping Hunter’s biceps and saying something about getting rid of someone. A bowl of water, tinged pink and a bloodied towel lay on the table to her right and the smell of spilled whiskey permeated the air. A small pile of broken glass lay winking in the outside lights near the outer wall of the terrace.
“Madeleine, are you all right, chérie?”
Madeleine whipped around, her expression horror stricken. She rushed to Alexandra and grabbed her wrist. “Come on, Allie.” She started tugging.
Alexandra resisted simply because she didn’t understand the urgency in her sister’s voice and wanted to know the reason for it. She looked down the length of the balcony to see if she could discover the source of her sister’s agitation and froze. Dimitri Petronides was heading in the opposite direction, toward the sliding glass doors leading into Hunter’s study.
He stopped at the open doorway and turned. “I didn’t mean to upset your wife,” he said to Hunter in a voice unlike anything she had ever heard out of Dimitri’s mouth.
His gaze flicked over the tableau she made with her sister pulling frantically against her arm.
His eyes appeared unfocused, as if he wasn’t even seeing them. “I’ll see myself out.”
Then he was gone.
Again.
He’d walked away from her for the second time without a backward glance. It was no consolation that this time he would have been hard pressed to recognize her.
“I’m sorry, Allie. I don’t know how he came to be here. Are you going to be all right?” Madeleine’s voice buzzed in Alexandra’s ears. “I slapped him.” Her sister’s words finally registered.
“You what?”
“I slapped him and I called him a pig.”
Alexandra almost smiled. “He deserved it.”
“Yes, he did.”
“How did you know who he was?”
“I told him you were dead, I mean Xandra Fortune. Anyway, he asked if it was because of the baby and I just knew.”
“You told him Xandra was dead?”
“Yes, she did, but it’s not true is it? You’re alive and I’d like to shake you both until your teeth rattle.” Dimitri’s fury filled voice sent Alexandra’s nerves into overdrive.
Madeleine dropped Alexandra’s wrist in shock. “Go away!” she shouted at Dimitri.
He towered over them, his skin an unnatural shade of gray, his eyes registering anger and a brief moment of vulnerability that disappeared before Alexandra could be certain of its existence. “I’m not going anywhere. In fact, I think it is you and your husband who need to go so Xandra and I may speak in private of affairs that do not concern you.”
Madeleine opened her mouth to speak, but Alexandra forestalled her. She pivoted her body so she faced Dimitri fully and fixed him with a bored stare. “My name is Alexandra Dupree and I’m sure you and I have nothing to discuss.”
Since leaving her Xandra Fortune persona behind, she’d run into former colleagues and none of them had recognized her. She’d had her hair cut short and dyed back to the rather mousy-brown color she’d been born with. She’d ditched the green contact lenses and her body at five months pregnant in no way resembled the willow thinness of Xandra Fortune’s trademark figure.
There was no reason she couldn’t bluff this confrontation with Dimitri out. And a very good reason why she wanted to. She’d thought and thought about why he would tell his wife about her and the baby and the only logical solution she’d been able to come up with was that Dimitri had decided that though he no longer wanted his ex-lover, he did want their child.
Something dangerous flashed in Dimitri’s indigo blue eyes. “Do not play games with me.”
“I am not playing any games. If you do not believe me about who I am, I can show you identification. I’ve been Alexandra Dupree my whole life. I should know.” She deliberately infused her voice with a New Orleans accent, one she hadn’t spoken with since being sent to convent boarding school in France at the age of eight.
“Ten minutes ago I believed you to be dead.”
“I can confirm without question that Xandra Fortune is indeed dead, but I am not and I am Alexandra Dupree.”
He didn’t even look disconcerted. “You may be Alexandra Dupree, but you are also Xandra Fortune and how you believe you could deny such truth to me, the man who knows you more intimately than any other, I cannot understand.” His usual flawless English was heavily accented with Greek intonation.
“I assure you, you do not know me intimately at all.” And that was the truth. If he had truly known her, he could never have suspected the baby had been fathered by someone else.
Terrible rage reflected in Dimitri’s eyes before he leaned forward and swept her high against his chest, his arms as tight and inflexible as steel bands.
Madeleine shrieked, “Put her down!”
Hunter strode forward to grab Dimitri’s shoulder.
Dimitri glared at him, his body tense with primitive masculine aggression. “Take your hand off me.”
“I won’t allow you to take my sister-in-law out of this apartment against her will.”
The entire situation was unreal. Dimitrius Petronides doing something so uncool as to attempt to kidnap a pregnant woman from a party was beyond the scope of her imagination, much less believable reality.
Dimitri looked down at her, his blue gaze compelling agreement. “Tell him you want to come with me.”
She glared back at him. “I don’t.”
Dimitri stiffened and Hunter became more menacing, but in his fury, Dimitri shrugged off Hunter’s restraining hold as if it were nothing more than a wispy cobweb. He spun to face Hunter. “I’m not going to hurt her. She’s mine. She’s pregnant with my child and we’re going to talk.”
After that, neither Dimitri nor Hunter spoke for what seemed like several minutes, but was in all probability only seconds. Then something passed between the two men and much to Madeleine’s dismay and Alexandra’s irritation Hunter nodded.
“You can talk to her, but you’ll have to do it here.”
Alexandra tried to shove herself out of Dimitri’s arms. “I’m not talking to him.”
His hold tightened. “Be careful. If you fall, you could hurt the baby.”
“What do you care about my baby?”
If possible, his expression turned grimmer. “I care.”
Those two words scared her more than the thought of giving birth to a child. He was going to try to take her baby from her. She knew it. “I’m not giving you and your little Greek paragon wife my baby. I’m not!”
He shook his head. “Talk. Xandra. We need to talk.”
“You didn’t even believe the baby was yours at first,” she said, giving up any hope at deceiving him about her identity.
Emotion passed across his chiseled features. “I do now.”
“What changed your mind?” she demanded, ceasing her struggle against the increasing pressure of his hold.
He smelled like whiskey, expensive aftershave and sweat. Something had made Dimitri sweat. In fact, his hairline still showed ev
idence of moisture. The thought of losing his baby must have really destroyed him. She could almost feel sorry for him, but she refused to be so weak. He’d denied his paternity of their baby. He deserved what he got.
“I spoke to a doctor. He told me it was actually quite common for a woman to have one or even two menses after conceiving a child.”
“So you believed some stranger over me. I’m impressed, Dimitri. It certainly shows where our relationship fit in the scheme of your life.”
“He’s not a stranger. He’s a friend.”
Who cared how well he knew the stupid doctor? “I’m not giving you my baby!” she reiterated while inside she cursed the doctor who had put her bond with her child at risk like this.
“If you don’t put my sister down this instant and leave my home, I’m calling the police,” Madeleine interrupted.
Eyes deadly with intent, Dimitri met Madeleine’s gaze with his own inflexible one. “Go ahead.” He turned to Hunter. “I’m not going anywhere without her.”
Hunter sighed. “You can talk out here. We’ll close off the doors to the house so you’ll have some privacy.”
Alexandra shuddered. She didn’t want privacy with Dimitri. “If I have to talk to you, I’d rather do it somewhere public.”
“You don’t have to talk to him at all,” Madeleine’s angry voice interjected.
Hunter squeezed Madeleine’s shoulder. “She’s pregnant with his child, my love. They have to talk.”
Her sister turned on her husband with murder in her eye. “I suppose that’s some macho code all arrogant men try to live by, but I’m not standing by and watching him rip my sister into emotional shreds again. Don’t you remember how she was when she got here?”
As much as she loved her sister and appreciated Madeleine’s loyalty, Alexandra did not want Dimitri to know how much he had hurt her. Her pride would not take it. “Put me down. We can go to Casamir,” she said, naming a French restaurant on B Avenue.
Dimitri and Madeleine said no at the same time. Alexandra opted to deal with her sister first. “Maddy, I want this settled.”
Madeleine’s eyes filled with tears. “I don’t want you hurt again.”
Alexandra shook her head, very certain of that if nothing else. “He can’t hurt me anymore. I despise him.”
Dimitri’s body jerked.
She ignored the reaction and asked him, “Why can’t we go to Casamir?”
“We tried to talk nicely in a public venue once and it did not work. Did you see the photos? They were all over the papers the week after my engagement to Phoebe was announced. Wealthy Greek Tycoon Argues with Secret Pregnant Paramour. My grandfather relapsed and had to have emergency by-pass surgery.”
Alexandra stifled her urge to offer sympathy. Dimitri got nothing from her from this point forward. Nothing.
“Talk out here, Allie. You don’t want your circumstances bandied about any more than Dimitri does. If pictures of you make it into the scandal rags here, your mother may not have a heart attack, but the hissy fit she’ll throw won’t be much of an improvement and it will all come down on your head.”
Madeleine glared at her husband, but agreed. “Hunter’s right. If you are going to talk to this swine it might as well be here where no sleazy journalists are waiting to quote an overheard conversation or take damaging pictures.”
Dimitri’s patience was wearing thin and Alexandra could feel his anger mounting. Some things, it seemed, had not changed. She could still read him like the other half of herself. She found the thought so disturbing, she buried it immediately.
“You’re right. Mother is already prepared to disown me and make up some story about my early demise. We’ll talk here.”
She would have mistaken the breath Dimitri expelled as a sigh of relief, but she no longer believed he was capable of feeling enough vulnerability to be relieved.
With a few dire warnings to Dimitri and concerned looks at Alexandra, Madeleine allowed Hunter to lead her from the terrace after turning on the small gas outdoor fireplace. The sound of metal sliding against metal indicated one set of doors closing. A minute of silent waiting and the second set of doors closed from the inside of the apartment. As the vertical blinds slid across the doorway and then turned to create a visual barrier against the rest of the party, Alexandra felt trapped.
She was alone with a man she used to love—a man she no longer trusted.
Dimitri didn’t speak. He didn’t move. He just stared at her and then at the football-size bump that indicated their baby living and growing beneath her heart. Tension arced between them and she became aware of the feel of his hard, muscular chest against her side.
“Put me down.”
He seemed to snap out of a trance and his gaze shifted to hers. “Your eyes are golden. They used to be green.”
“Color contacts.”
“Even at night?”
“The lights were dim, or off.”
“You cut your hair.”
“Yes.”
“It’s darker.”
She shrugged. He, of all people should know her natural hair color. He’d been the only one to see it in the last six years since she’d had her first bleach job and landed her first modeling contract.
“I like it.”
That made her angry. He had no right to like anything about her anymore. He was a married man. “I don’t care.”
His eyes narrowed and his mouth set in a firm line.
She refused to cower before the signs of his anger. “As fascinating as this discussion is, I thought you had more important issues you wanted to talk about.”
He nodded. He gently lowered her into a wicker armchair before seating himself in its twin on the other side of a small wicker and glass table. Both were well away from the broken whiskey glass and first-aid supplies, but near the fireplace whose gas lit flames generated some heat.
Contrarily, she missed the warmth of his body as a slight autumn breeze caught the strands of her chin-length hair and lifted them to chilling effect. She shivered.
“You are cold. We should talk inside.”
Where someone might hear? “No. It was just a breeze.”
He shucked out of his coat and tucked it around her shoulders before she knew what was happening. She tried to shrug it off, but he held it in place by the lapels. “Do not be stubborn.”
His nearness was doing something to her hard won emotional distance so she agreed in order to get him to back off. It didn’t do a lot of good. The coat carried his scent and warmed from his body, it was like having his arms closed protectively around her. Stifling the image that thought provoked, she focused on getting down to business.
She smoothed her oversized, sage green cable knit sweater over the baby, reminding herself that possession was nine-tenths of the law and no one could deny that right now, she was the one in possession of their baby. “What is it exactly you think we have to talk about?” she asked, going on the offensive.
He looked her in the eye, his blue gaze dark with purpose. “I want my child.”
CHAPTER FOUR
HE wanted her baby.
She had suspected it since her call to the Paris apartment, but hearing him say it was like being tossed into a black hole and having all the air sucked out of the universe at one time.
She put her hands protectively over her tummy as if by doing so she could somehow prevent him from carrying through on his monstrous plan. “You can’t have him.”
“You say him. Do you mean to say you know he is a boy?”
Should she lie? Would he fight any less ruthlessly for a daughter? The implacable expression on his face said not.
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
“I had an ultrasound at four months.”
An expression of dawning understanding came over his hardened features. “That’s why you called the apartment.”
She refused to answer.
His hands fisted against the Italian suit wool covering his
thighs. “You were going to tell me our baby was to be a boy.” He sounded astonished by the fact.
Why shouldn’t he be? He’d treated her like the lowest of the low, denied his paternity, ditched her to marry another woman and evicted her from their apartment like a bad tenant ninety days past lease. And she’d called to tell him the sex of their child. How stupidly sentimental could any one woman be?
An expression like grief passed over his face, though what he had to grieve about, she could not imagine. “And you spoke to Phoebe.”
Why bother answering? He knew the details already.
“You refused to tell her where you were.”
“Do you blame me?”
His jaw clenched. “Funnily enough. Yes. I can blame you. Phoebe begged you to tell her where you were and you refused. I’ve spent months of fruitless searching and hired no less than five world-class detective agencies, only to be told by all of them that Xandra Fortune ceased to exist.”
“They were right.”
“Yet, here you are.”
“No. Here you see Alexandra Dupree. I will never be Xandra Fortune again.” She would never allow herself to be vulnerable to the man she had loved as Xandra again, either.
“You told me you were an orphan.”
She felt her mouth twist cynically. “No. That is what your agency told you when you had me investigated as a suitable candidate to be your lover. I just never denied it.”
“You created an entire persona for yourself.”
“Yes.”
“You lied to me every day of our association.”
Association? Was that anything like a relationship gone sour? “I did not lie to you.”
“You let me call you Xandra.”
“Many models use a working name.”
“Only you lived a life completely separate from this reality I now find in a New York apartment. That woman, Madeleine, she is your sister?”
“Yes. Hunter is her husband.”
His brows rose in mockery. “I had figured that out.”
She clenched her fists so she wouldn’t hit him.