The Affair: One Night...Nine-Month Scandal

by Maya Banks

  ‘No. Don’t do that.’ He’d bought presents for the baby. Just when she’d thought he’d blocked it out of his mind, he’d been buying stuff.

  ‘All right, now I feel really, really horrible,’ Kelly confessed in a thick voice, and he gave a wry smile.

  ‘I wasn’t trying to make you feel horrible,’ he said gruffly. ‘I was trying to please you. That isn’t proving as easy as I thought it would.’

  ‘Thanks. That makes me feel even more horrible. What did you buy?’

  ‘Open them and look.’ Alekos gently spilled the parcels onto the bed and Kelly stared at the assortment of packages in disbelief.

  ‘There are loads of them. I’m having one baby, not sextuplets.’

  ‘I went shopping a couple of times when I flew to Athens.’ Looking distinctly uncomfortable, he undid another button on his shirt. ‘It’s possible I may have got a little carried away.’

  Touched that he’d thought about the baby during his hideously busy working day, and feeling more and more guilty that she’d misjudged him so badly, Kelly lifted the first parcel, which was large and extremely squashy. Ripping off the paper, she pulled out a huge brown bear sporting a red ribbon. ‘Oh. It’s gorgeous.’

  ‘I thought if I bought one with a blue ribbon you’d be angry with me for assuming the baby was going to be a boy, and if I’d bought a pink ribbon and the baby was a boy then we would have had to change the ribbon...’ His voice tailed off as he watched her face. ‘So I thought red was best. Is it OK?’

  Kelly, who had never before considered the purchase of a child’s toy to involve a complex decision-making process—certainly not for a man who made decisions involving tens of millions of dollars every day—was stunned by the agonies he’d clearly endured in making his choice. ‘It’s really lovely. Perfect.’ Noticing that the label said ‘not suitable for children under eighteen months’, she tucked it under the red ribbon so that he wouldn’t see it, and made a mental note to position the bear in a strategic point in the nursery where the baby could see but not touch. ‘I know the baby will love it.’

  She opened the next parcel and found another bear, identical to the first. Bemused, but extra-careful not to hurt his feelings, she smiled brightly. ‘Another one. That’s—great. Fantastic.’ What was he thinking? A bear for every day of the week?

  ‘You’re thinking I’ve gone mad.’

  ‘I’m not thinking that,’ Kelly lied, and Alekos gently removed the bear from her grasp and stared down at it, a strange look in his eyes.

  ‘My bear was the one constant in my life when I was little,’ he said huskily. ‘No matter how up and down my life, my bear was always there. I slept with him every night. And then one day I lost it. I took it to my grandmother’s, left it in the back of a taxi and never saw it again. I was devastated.’ He lifted his head and gave her a mocking smile. ‘Tell that to the press and you’ll ruin my reputation for good.’

  Hot tears scalded her eyes as she thought of the little boy losing his beloved bear. ‘I—I’d never tell that to anyone,’ she stammered, a lump in her throat. ‘But couldn’t you have got it back? Couldn’t they have just phoned the taxi firm?’

  ‘No one thought it was important enough.’ Alekos handed the bear back to her carefully. ‘I wanted our baby to have two identical bears, just in case. A spare is always useful. Maybe you can put one in a drawer or something. Then, if we have a crisis, we can sneak the other one into its place and avoid all that heartbreak.’

  ‘OK, we’ll do that.’ The tears spilled down her cheeks, and Alekos looked at her in horror.

  ‘Why are you crying? What have I done? Too many bears—not enough bears?’

  ‘It isn’t the bear,’ she sobbed. ‘I love the bears. Both of them. It’s the fact that you had to go to sleep without it. I keep thinking about you, just six years old having to choose between your mum and dad, and it’s just vile and hideous; it’s no wonder you’re a bit screwed up about things.’ Tears smeared her face and Alekos muttered something in Greek.

  ‘You’re crying over something that happened to me twenty-eight years ago?’

  ‘Yes.’ Kelly scrubbed her hand over her cheeks and tried to pull herself together. ‘I think being pregnant might be making me a little bit emotional.’

  ‘Very possibly,’ Alekos said faintly, handing her a tissue. ‘Just a little bit. I was worried I’d made a mistake with the bears.’

  ‘The bears are beautiful.’ She blew her nose hard. ‘Both of them. And having a spare is a completely brilliant idea. I feel really bad now that I accused you of denying the baby when you’d already bought all that stuff. I want to make it up to you. I’m sorry I’m crying; I’m just so tired and I feel bad.’

  ‘You have nothing to feel bad about,’ he said softly, removing her tears with his thumb. ‘I know I’m not good at this. And it’s not surprising you’re tired after last night. I upset you badly. I know I’m doing it all wrong, but I am trying, agape mou.’

  ‘I know. What else have you bought?’ It was an agonisingly tender moment and Kelly opened the other parcels one by one, touched by the variety of things he’d purchased. There were more toys, clothes in neutral colours and books in both Greek and English.

  ‘I thought he ought to learn both languages.’ Alekos watched her face as she unwrapped parcel after parcel. ‘I want him to know that he is Greek.’

  ‘She.’ Kelly emphasised the word carefully as she stacked the books that undoubtedly wouldn’t be read until the child was at least four. She grabbed another tissue and blew her nose hard, not even wanting to think about how she must look. ‘She will also be half-English.’

  ‘It is going to be a boy, I know it.’

  ‘Even you can’t dictate the sex of the child.’ But Kelly was incredibly touched by the gifts. Most of them were completely inappropriate for a newborn, but it was the thought. ‘They’re all lovely, Alekos.’

  ‘Good. So, now I have proved to you that I’m thinking of the baby, and you have explained to me that you weren’t flirting, so everyone is happy.’ Dragging his eyes away from her bare shoulders, Alekos sprang from the bed and strolled towards the bathroom. ‘And now I’m going to take a long, cold shower because, while I agree with the theory of separate bedrooms, I am finding the reality rather hard to sustain. I’ll meet you on the terrace for breakfast once I have given myself frostbite.’

  Chapter 8

  Kelly stood with her hand on the door to the bathroom, listening to the sound of water running.

  Raising her eyes to the ceiling, she gave herself a lecture. What was wrong with her? Whether they had sex or not wasn’t going to have an adverse effect on how this relationship progressed. In fact, she was fast coming to the conclusion that the opposite was true: abstaining made it hard to think about anything but sex. It was like giving up chocolate: the moment you knew you couldn’t have it, it became impossible to think of anything else.

  Kelly opened the door before she could change her mind.

  Alekos stood under the shower with his eyes closed, the stream of water running off his broad shoulders onto his washboard-flat abdomen and down his hard thighs.

  Kelly gulped and quickly lifted her eyes, but that didn’t help much because then she just found herself looking at the perfect symmetry of his handsome face and the sensual lines of his mouth.

  Dropping her robe on the floor, she moved silently across the bathroom, walked under the stream of water and slid her arms around his waist.

  ‘I wondered how long you were going to stand there just looking,’ he drawled, and Kelly glanced up at him.

  ‘You had your eyes shut. How did you know I was standing there?’

  ‘I can sense you.’ His eyes opened and he gave a slow, dangerous smile. ‘That, and I heard the door open. Unless my housekeeper has suddenly developed a desire to see me nake
d, it had to be you.’

  Kelly was fairly sure that every one of his female household-staff harboured a desire to see him naked, but she tried to block out that fact.

  She gasped as water trickled over her shoulder. ‘You weren’t kidding about the cold shower. This water is freezing.’

  ‘You can take that as a compliment.’

  Shivering, her teeth chattering and her flesh covered in goose bumps, Kelly giggled. ‘Is it really that bad?’

  His answer was to guide her hand to the bold swell of his erection. ‘Bear in mind that this is with the aid of really cold water.’

  Kelly closed her hand over him and heard the breath hiss through his teeth. ‘I’d say the cold water isn’t working. Maybe we need to try something else.’ Turning off the flow of water with her hand, she dropped to her knees and took him in her mouth.

  She didn’t need to understand Greek to pick up the shock in his tone, shock that quickly turned to a groan of pleasure as her mouth caressed the whole thick, velvet length of him. He was hot and hard, and she heard the harsh rasp of his breathing as she used her lips and tongue, driving him wild.

  ‘Kelly...’ His voice raw, he lifted her to her feet and looked down at her, his eyes narrow slits of burning desire. ‘You never did that before.’

  ‘That was before—this is now.’ The heat of his erection brushed against her belly and as his hungry mouth caught hers in a hot, sexy kiss a shudder ran through her.

  She wanted to tell him how she was feeling, but the words wouldn’t string themselves together into a coherent sentence.

  Alekos pressed her back against the wall of the shower and Kelly gasped as his hand slid between her thighs. She was trying to work out how to breathe and say his name at the same time when his fingers slipped skilfully inside her. As he touched in all the right places, sensation pooled in her pelvis and her eyes drifted shut.

  She was on fire, every single part of her was on fire, and she tried to tell Alekos that he needed to turn the cold water on again, but his mouth was devouring hers and she couldn’t catch her breath to speak.

  She wanted to tell him that she felt incredible—that he was incredible—but before she could speak, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her through to the bedroom.

  ‘I’m still wet,’ Kelly mumbled dizzily and he gave a slow, dangerous smile.

  ‘I know you are, agape mou.’ Gently pushing her legs apart, he slid down her body, proving his point.

  Aware of the hot scorch of the late-morning sun shining directly through the open doors, Kelly squirmed in embarrassment, but he ignored her attempts to close her legs, clamping her wrists together with one hand and using the other to do exactly as he wanted.

  With each caress, each skilful, intimate stroke of his tongue, he brought her closer and closer to orgasm. As Kelly wriggled and squirmed in an attempt to relieve the burning sensation in her pelvis, Alekos pinned her hips with his hands, subjecting her to something close to sensual torture.

  His tongue was slick and clever, his fingers skilled and knowing, and Kelly felt heat spread through her like a flash fire. Her climax hit with the shattering force, the pleasure pushing her higher and higher as she cried out his name and dug her nails into the smooth muscle of his shoulders. Her pleasure went on and on and he experienced every moment of it with her, his fingers buried deep inside her, his mouth tasting her pleasure.

  While she was still shaking in the aftermath, Alekos slid up her body, pushed her thighs still wider and entered her with a smooth, purposeful thrust that joined them completely. Kelly cried out his name as white-hot lightning shot through her, searing her body with sensations so overwhelming that she couldn’t breathe.

  He made a rough sound deep in his throat and then his mouth came down on hers, the erotic demands of his kiss sending the excitement spinning higher and higher. Cupping her bottom in his hand, Alekos lifted her and thrust deep, the slow, sensual movement of his hips creating almost unbearable pressure as he filled her.

  Kelly locked her arms around his neck, and when he lifted his head and looked into her eyes the connection between them deepened to something so incredibly personal that she felt something unravel inside her.

  Alekos slid his hand over her thigh, encouraging her to curl her leg across his back. Kelly did as he urged, feeling the sensations intensify as he drove deep, each skilled thrust propelling them both towards climax. The heat was unbearable; her nerve endings were sizzling and when the explosion finally came it took both of them down together. The power of it shocked her and she dug her nails into his shoulders again, her heart pounding, her body slick against his as he drove into her for a final time.

  Breathless, stunned, she lay there listening to his harsh breathing, feeling the tension in his slick shoulders. And then he gathered her against him and hugged her tightly. ‘Tell me I wasn’t too rough.’

  Feeling too weak to speak, all Kelly could manage was a brief shake of her head, and Alekos frowned as he pushed her tangled hair away from her face with a gentle hand.

  ‘I was too rough?’

  ‘You were perfect,’ she croaked and he gave a slow, satisfied smile as he rolled onto his back, holding her against him.

  ‘I was trying to be extra-gentle,’ he murmured, kissing the top of her head. ‘But you’re so much smaller than me.’

  Pressed against the hard muscle of his shoulder, Kelly was well aware of that fact. ‘You’re—it was—’

  ‘Incredible.’ His grip on her tightened. ‘You were incredible. Especially given the amount of light in the room.’

  Kelly’s face burned at the memory of his intimate exploration. ‘You didn’t exactly give me a choice.’

  ‘After your performance in the shower, erota mou, it is a waste of time pretending to me that you are a shrinking virgin.’ A sardonic gleam in his eye, Alekos ran his tongue over the seam of his mouth suggestively, and Kelly wondered how it was that she could still feel completely desperate for him.

  ‘Maybe you do need a bit more practice.’ She slid her hand slowly down his body, entranced by the differences between them. Her thigh was pale against the bronzed, hair-roughened length of his, soft against hard and strong, feminine against masculine.

  ‘Keep doing that and we won’t be getting up today.’ Alekos gave a slow smile and closed his hands over her hips, shifting her so that she straddled him.

  Feeling him pressed hard against her, Kelly gave a soft gasp. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I happen to like the view from here,’ he said huskily, his jaw clenching as Kelly took the initiative and slowly slid herself onto his erection.

  From this angle she was able to watch his face and she felt a flash of satisfaction as his eyes darkened. Slowly rotating her hips, she took him deeper, and this time she was the one who shackled his hands, pinning them above his head as she rode him.

  It gave her a sense of power, holding him there, even though she knew he could free himself in a minute and take control.

  Leaning forward, she licked at his mouth, smiling against his lips as she felt his strong fingers biting into her hips.

  ‘Theé mou, you feel incredible,’ he groaned, meeting each swirl of her hips with his own rhythmic thrusts. Kelly’s hair fell forward, forming a curtain as they kissed, their bodies moving together as everything grew sharper and hotter.

  She felt him tense beneath her, felt his grip on her hips tighten, and then his final thrust hurled them both forwards into an explosion of sensation. The intensity of her orgasm shattered her and she pressed her mouth to the sleek skin of his shoulder, sobbing his name as they tumbled over the edge together.

  * * *

  ‘Why four children?’ His mobile in his hand, Alekos leaned across and adjusted the angle of Kelly’s hat, making sure that her skin was protected from the burning heat of the sun.


  ‘It just seems like a nice number. I was an only child. I always thought childhood was probably easier if there were more of you. A sister would have been great, someone to laugh, cry and paint your toenails with. How about you?’

  ‘I’ve never felt much of a need for someone to paint my toenails with.’

  Kelly grinned and emptied another blob of sunscreen onto her leg. ‘I’m quite relieved about that, actually.’

  ‘Do you want me to rub that in for you?’

  ‘No.’ Blushing, she smoothed the cream over her leg. ‘Last time you did that, we ended up back in bed.’

  A slight smile touched the corner of his mouth and he watched her with lazy amusement. ‘And that’s a problem?’

  ‘No.’ Not a problem at all. He made her feel beautiful. ‘But I’m enjoying talking to you.’

  ‘I can talk and perform at the same time,’ he said silkily, and Kelly shot him a warning look, trying to ignore the immediate response of her heart.

  ‘Try and last six seconds without thinking about sex. Try really hard.’

  ‘If you’re going to flaunt yourself in a minuscule bikini, then you are asking the impossible.’

  ‘You bought me the bikini.’ But she loved the fact that he couldn’t get enough of her. ‘I don’t suppose I’ll be fitting into this for much longer anyway.’ From under the brim of her hat, Kelly sneaked a glance at him, testing the temperature of his mood, wondering if the reference to her pregnancy would upset the balance of the atmosphere.

  Alekos was frowning down at his mobile. ‘Excuse me. I need to make a call.’ He sprang to his feet and paced to the far end of the terrace, his shorts riding low on his lean hips, his feet bare.

  Unable to decide whether his sudden need to make a phone call was the result of her mentioning the baby, Kelly felt a flash of anxiety. Even after ten days of almost continuous love-making she still couldn’t completely relax. Electrifying sex and generous gifts hadn’t been enough to delete the dull ache of worry that gnawed away at the pit of her stomach. And her anxiety was not without foundation, was it? Alekos had made no secret of the fact he hadn’t wanted children. Even if she now understood and was sympathetic to the reason, it didn’t change the fact that this wasn’t what he would have chosen.