by Maya Banks
The man froze and his hand dropped to his lap.
Alekos smiled. ‘Good decision.’ He switched to Greek, knowing that Kelly wouldn’t be able to follow the conversation. ‘Touch her again and you will find yourself working at the supermarket checkout.’
Kelly was staring at him as if he’d gone mad.
Maybe he had, Alekos thought savagely, noticing that his knuckles on the glass were white. Never before had he lost control during what was, essentially, a business meeting. For once in his life he hadn’t cared about the end, only the means; if the means meant allowing some guy barely out of his cradle to paw Kelly, he wasn’t interested.
Takis broke the sudden stillness around the table. He laughed and lifted his glass. ‘Never underestimate what a Greek man will do when defending his woman, heh? We will drink to young love.’ There was a faint ping as he tapped his glass against Alekos’s. ‘This relationship is serious, no?’
Alekos saw Kelly blush.
‘It is time you settled down, that’s good.’ Takis gave a fatalistic shrug, as if it were a fate that befell every man eventually. ‘You will need strong sons to take over that shipping business of yours. Kelly is not Greek, but—’ he smiled forgivingly ‘—never mind. She is beautiful, and I can tell that she will give you strong sons.’
Alekos felt the familiar rush of blind panic. Sons: more than one. Lots of children, all depending on him for their happiness and well-being.
He reached for his wine glass and drank.
‘The sooner you start, the better.’ Takis didn’t seem to notice the sudden crackle of tension and the stillness of Kelly’s shoulders. ‘The job of a Greek wife is to have Greek babies.’
Wondering whether Takis was tightening the screw on purpose, Alekos winced as he anticipated Kelly’s outrage at that blatantly sexist comment. Intent on heading off bloodshed, he decided to intervene before she exploded. Their relationship, he thought, was too delicately balanced to weather too great a storm. ‘This discussion is a little premature,’ he said smoothly, but if he’d expected gratitude from Kelly he was disappointed.
She looked him in the eyes, her face as white as the napkin she placed carefully on the table in front of her.
‘You think the discussion is premature? I think overdue would be a better word, don’t you?’
Detecting something in her tone, Alekos lowered his glass slowly, aware of the sudden interest from everyone in the restaurant.
Her eyes suspiciously bright, Kelly stood up, her chair scraping on the floor. ‘Excuse me,’ she muttered stiffly. ‘I need to use the bathroom.’
Exchanging looks of embarrassment and fascination, the men rose to their feet in a gesture of old-fashioned courtesy, and Alekos took one look at the ultra-shiny floor of the restaurant and decided that he’d better follow her.
He sprang upright, threw a final, fulminating look of warning towards the young businessman who was now several shades paler than he’d been at the beginning of the evening and followed Kelly.
The thin spike of her heel echoed on the marble, each angry tap a furious indicator of her mood. A few paces behind her, Alekos was treated to a close-up view of her incredible legs and wondered whether they could get away with leaving before dessert.
‘You’d better take my arm before you slip,’ he drawled as he lengthened his stride to catch up with her. ‘And maybe you’d better not talk so much next time. I know Takis is old-fashioned when it comes to his views on women, but you almost blew that.’
‘I blew it? You denied our baby!’ She whirled to face him, her eyes furious and hurt. ‘You’re never going to change, are you? I’m just kidding myself. This past few weeks I thought you were coming round to the whole idea, but the truth is that you’d just buried it. You’re just doing what you do best—pretending it isn’t happening!’
‘That is not true.’
‘It is true.’ She virtually spat the words at him. ‘When Takis said you should be thinking of babies, you said it was a little premature. Well, how much time do you need, Alekos?’
‘I have no intention of discussing my private life with Takis Andropolous.’
‘Oh, stop kidding yourself, Alekos! You don’t want this baby. You never did. The only reason you’re sticking with me is because you want sex. And don’t you dare tell me that I was the one who almost blew the meeting—you were the one who sat there, all jealous and possessive, glaring at me across the table when I’m trying to chat to that guy you made me sit next to! You were the one who started a tirade of Greek, knowing I wouldn’t be able to understand a word anyone was saying, and you were the one who left me sitting there drowning in all this testosterone and chest thumping while you lot were all glaring at each other!’
Alekos watched in appalled fascination as she drew breath. ‘Kelly—’
‘I haven’t finished! I could have forgiven you for all that because you’ve obviously got some weird views on women that come with being Greek, but I will never forgive you for denying the existence of my baby.’
Swearing under his breath, Alekos shot a fulminating look at the riveted diners. ‘I did not deny the existence of our baby.’
‘You did! And don’t you dare call it our baby. You haven’t once mentioned it over the past few weeks. You buy me flowers, jewellery, anything you think might soften me up so that I’ll have sex with you, but do you think of the baby? No. Do you mention the baby? No. And don’t use bad language in front of our child. I may not speak Greek, but I can tell from your tone of voice that you were saying something that no one under the age of eighteen should hear.’
In the interests of self-preservation Alekos decided that this probably wasn’t a good time to point out that the baby wasn’t even born yet. ‘I wasn’t softening you up so that I could have sex with you. If that was all I was interested in, then I would have just kissed you.’
‘And that would have reduced me to rubble, is that what you’re saying? Because you think you’re such a sex god?’ Her rage bubbled higher. ‘You’re arrogant, egotistical—’
‘Kelly, you need to calm down.’
‘Do not tell me to calm down!’ She was literally shivering with emotion, her eyes bright and feverish in a face that was ghostly pale. ‘This relationship ends now. This is not what I want for my child, and it isn’t what I want for myself. I’m going home, and don’t bother following me.’ Her hands shaking, she tugged the ring off her finger and stuffed it into his hand. ‘That’s it. It’s over. I want to go back to Corfu tonight because I can’t bear to spend a single night under the same roof as you. Babies can sense things, you know. I’ll fly back to England in the morning.’ Barefoot, her head held high, she stalked towards the entrance of the restaurant without bothering to look over her shoulder.
* * *
Sodden with misery, Kelly lay alone in the middle of the huge bed in the villa in Corfu, drifting in that hazy place between sleep and wakefulness. Somewhere in the background there was a clacking sound which she assumed to be the ceiling fan. She pulled the pillow over her head, feeling too low and exhausted to summon the energy to do anything about it.
By the time Alekos’s pilot had flown her back to the island and the car had taken her back to the villa, it had been the middle of the night—not that it had made a difference, because she hadn’t slept anyway.
Her eyes were sore with crying and there were too many thoughts bouncing around her head for her to have any hope of sleep.
The distinctive tread of male footsteps in her bedroom made her freeze with horror. Peeping from under the pillow, Kelly gave a horrified squeak.
Alekos stood there wearing the same dinner-jacket he’d worn the night before, only now the collar of his shirt was undone and the bow-tie was looped around his neck. His arms were loaded with packages and he stopped dead, apparently transfixed by the sight of her on the bed.<
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Still groggy, Kelly rubbed her eyes and tried to concentrate, but already her heart was racing, as it always did when he walked into a room. ‘What are you doing here? And why are you still wearing your dinner-jacket? You look as though you’ve been up all night.’
‘I have been up all night.’ His dark eyes glittered with raw sexual appraisal and she remembered, belatedly, that she was naked.
‘Stop staring at me.’ Her face scarlet, she made a grab for the silk bedcover, but she was lying on it and the process of extracting it turned into a writhing wrestling-match between her and the sheets that brought a sheen of sweat to Alekos’s brow.
‘Enough!’ Depositing the parcels on the nearest chair, he strode across the room, yanked the bedcover free and threw it over her. ‘Theé mou, do you do this on purpose?’
‘Do what on purpose?’
‘Torment me.’ He stepped back with his hands in the air as if touching her had scalded him; Kelly, awash with hormones and hideously overtired, exploded with emotion.
‘Don’t blame me! You’re not even supposed to be here. I wanted to be on my own.’ Too late, she realised that the clacking sound hadn’t been the fan—it had been his helicopter landing.
‘Tough.’ Alekos shrugged off his jacket and threw it across the bottom of the bed. ‘Our deal was that I was supposed to tell you what I’m thinking, so I came here to tell you what I’m thinking.’
‘That was before, and—’
‘Are you going to let me speak or do you want me to silence you in my favourite way?’ His silky tone made her stiffen defensively and Kelly held the cover to her chin like a shield.
‘I don’t want you to touch me. Just say what you need to say and then go. I’ve booked myself on a flight at eleven o’clock.’
His eyes fixed on hers, Alekos drew in a deep breath. ‘Last night at the restaurant you accused me of denying the existence of the baby. But that wasn’t what I was doing.’
Kelly didn’t give an inch. ‘Well, it sounded like it from where I was sitting, and if you’ve come here to make excuses then you’ve wasted your time.’
‘Kelly, you know I am a private man,’ he said in a raw tone. ‘I don’t find it easy spilling my thoughts to everyone, that isn’t what I do. I am fully aware that our relationship is at an extremely delicate point—do you really think I was going to risk destabilising that by announcing your pregnancy to a bunch of strangers? Is that really what you wanted me to do?’
Too upset to consider a different point of view, Kelly sat stiff in the bed. ‘You’ve been denying this baby ever since the moment I told you I was pregnant. I know you didn’t want this. I know this is probably the worst thing in the world that could have happened to you, and pretending that isn’t the case is just kidding yourself, Alekos. You’re just hoping that the whole electric, sex-chemistry thing will somehow get us through this whole tangled mess.’
‘That is not what I’m thinking. And it’s true that finding out that you’re pregnant has been difficult for me—I’m not denying that.’ His voice was thickened, his accent more pronounced than usual. ‘And I probably haven’t coped with it as well as I should have done, but I have been trying. I readily agreed to your request that we sleep in separate rooms because part of me agreed with your reasoning.’
‘Oh.’
‘Yes, oh.’ Visibly tense, he removed his cufflinks and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. ‘I admit that the sex between us does cloud judgement. I know I hurt you four years ago, but I am determined not to do it again, which is the other reason I agreed. I am trying to do as you asked and respect the boundaries you set for our relationship.’
‘It’s very unfair of you to suddenly start being so reasonable just because you know I’m angry,’ Kelly muttered. ‘And don’t think for a moment that it changes anything. Even if you’re behaving like a reasonable person on the surface, I know you’re still trying to pretend this whole baby thing isn’t happening.’
He threw her a shimmering glance. ‘I thought that the idea was that we focus on the relationship. You told me you didn’t want to be with me just because of the baby—that it had to be right for us. I agreed. So I’ve been focusing on us. I bought gifts for you because I wanted to spoil you, but you interpret that as me ignoring the baby. If I’d bought gifts for the baby, you would have said that I was only trying to fix things because you were pregnant.’
Kelly swallowed and scraped her hair behind one ear. ‘Maybe,’ she said in a small voice. ‘Possibly. Perhaps. Are you saying I’m unreasonable?’
‘No.’ He breathed out unsteadily. ‘But I’m trying to point out that I can’t win. Whatever I do can be misinterpreted if that’s what you’re determined to do. You don’t trust me, and I don’t blame you for that. In the circumstances it would be odd if you did. I know I have to earn your trust. I’m trying to do that.’
‘You’re turning this all around to make me feel bad. And none of that explains why you behaved like a caveman last night over dinner. You virtually thumped that guy! I know he was incredibly boring, but that’s no excuse. I don’t like violence.’
‘And I don’t like men trying to poach my woman.’
‘You’re very possessive.’
‘I’m Greek.’ Alekos gave a dangerous smile. ‘And, yes, I’m possessive. That is one accusation I am not denying. Nor am I apologising. The day I smile on you flirting with another man is the day you know our relationship is dead. I will fight for our relationship, agape mou, even if that means offending your non-violent principles.’
Reluctantly fascinated by that unapologetically male, territorial display, Kelly found that her heart was pounding. ‘I wasn’t flirting with another man. I wasn’t even enjoying his company,’ she squeaked, a strange weakness spreading through her limbs as she eyed his pumped-up muscles and darkened jaw. ‘If you want the honest truth, he was the most boring, creepy person I’ve ever sat next to.’
His eyes glittered dark and deadly. ‘You were laughing and smiling. I’ve never seen you so happy.’
‘You told me it was an important business meeting. I presumed you wanted me to be polite! And I was happy because, up until the point where you completely lost your mind, I really thought we were doing OK. You were being really nice to me; you called it our home, not my home, and I thought that meant we were making real progress, and—’
‘Our home?’ Alekos interrupted her, a curious look in his eyes, and Kelly gave a little shrug.
‘That’s what you called it: “our home”. It made me feel all warm and fuzzy.’
‘Warm and fuzzy? This is the same feeling you got from giving away a lump of money to a good cause, no?’ Looking slightly dazed, Alekos jabbed his fingers into his hair and Kelly chewed one of her fingernails, wondering whether it was even possible for two people so different ever to understand each other.
‘You made us sound like a pair,’ she mumbled, trying to explain. ‘A couple. We were an us. I honestly thought things were going really well, that’s why I was happy. And when I’m happy I smile.’
His attention caught by that frank declaration, Alekos studied her intently. ‘I presumed you were happy because of him.’
‘I was happy because of you.’ Kelly twisted the bedcover in her fingers. ‘But don’t get big-headed, because believe me it didn’t last very long. You were completely vile during that dinner. And actually I feel pretty unappreciated, I can tell you, given that I worked so hard to be nice to him for your sake.’
‘For my sake?’
‘You told me it was an important meeting. I worked very hard to be nice to them and not let you down. And I was doing really well until you said that thing about the baby.’ Remembering how she’d stalked out of the restaurant and left him to handle them on his own, Kelly covered her face with her hands, mortified. ‘Now I feel bad. Which is horrible, because actually n
inety percent of this was actually your fault.’
‘I completely agree.’
Taken by surprise, Kelly peeped through her fingers. ‘You agree?’
‘Yes, I was monumentally insensitive. Until you pointed it out, it hadn’t occurred to me how easy it would have been for you to misinterpret my reluctance to discuss the baby with strangers—but now I see that, yes, of course you were going to feel that way after I’d told you that I didn’t want children.’ Alekos yanked the bow-tie away from his neck and dropped it on top of the jacket. ‘I have been up all night, trying to find ways of convincing you that I do want you and the baby.’
Distracted by the cluster of dark curls at the base of his throat, Kelly gulped. ‘Up all night? Gosh, poor you, you must be so tired. Perhaps you’d better have a nap or something.’
‘Sleep is not at the top of my list of priorities at the moment. Sorting this out is more important.’ Alekos paced over to the chair where he’d deposited the parcels. ‘I do think about the baby. Just to prove it to you, I thought it was time to deliver these: I’ve been buying them over the past few weeks, but I was afraid that if I gave them to you you’d take it the wrong way.’ Filling his arms with the brightly wrapped boxes, he gave a rueful smile. ‘It seems that by not giving them you took it the wrong way, so there doesn’t seem any point in waiting.’
‘What are they?’ Kelly stared at the precarious tower of gifts in fascination. ‘If that’s jewellery, then you’re going to need a bigger girlfriend.’
‘It’s not jewellery. None of this is for you. I bought gifts for the baby.’
Kelly blinked in amazement at the mountain of carefully wrapped presents. He’d bought gifts? For the baby? ‘I—I’m not even two months’ pregnant. We don’t know what sex it is...’
‘I did the wrong thing?’ Alekos was as tense as a bow. ‘I can take them back.’