by Abby Green
Innocent.
Except she’d never been innocent. She’d been scheming the whole time, just reeling him in, waiting for an opportunity to secure her future, debt-free.
Bile had risen up inside Alexio after all these months, just as it had that awful day. Immediately he’d had to get out of there.
And now here he was, looking over the inky blackness of the sea. Thoroughly disgusted with himself, Alexio felt the lure of work—even though he meant to be avoiding it. But he knew he wouldn’t sleep, and especially not in that bed. It had been a terrible idea to come here. He should have gone to the farthest corner of the world and he vowed to do so the next day. He’d wanted to check out the potential of setting up in South East Asia anyway...
When he went into the office and sat down heavily on the chair he saw an unexpected white envelope sitting squarely on the blotter. Saw the writing in a feminine scrawl.
It was never about the money.
Feeling something in his belly swoop and his skin prickle, Alexio picked up the envelope. As he did so something fluttered out. The torn pieces of the cheque he’d left for Sidonie in a fit of tumultuous anger and disgust. If she wanted the money so badly then he’d give her some. But now he felt dizzy. Disorientated. He opened the envelope and more and more pieces fell out. Nothing else.
It was never about the money.
He hadn’t even checked to see if or when she’d cashed it. He’d just assumed that she had. He hadn’t wanted to know. But she hadn’t. She’d left that day and taken a torturous eleven-hour ferry to Piraeus. His last contact from her had been via a message relayed to him by one of his Greek assistants whom he’d instructed to meet her at the port with a plane ticket for a flight to Dublin.
She’d not taken the ticket and had said succinctly, ‘Tell Alexio Christakos he can go to hell.’
The message had been relayed with great trepidation by the employee after Alexio had instructed him to tell him her words exactly.
Alexio had put it down to anger that he’d thwarted her plans. He’d felt vindicated. But now he felt sick. Why hadn’t she just taken the cheque?
Holding the jagged remains made a conflicting mix of things rush through him. Not least of which was the poisonous suspicion that this was a desperate ruse to pique his interest—make him go after her to find out why. So that ultimately she might get even more money.
Even now Alexio could feel anticipation spiking in his blood just at the thought of seeing her again, but...damn her...had she counted on this?
He felt something underneath him then, and shifted slightly to find that he was sitting on Sidonie’s tatty university sweatshirt. She must have left it behind that day. Her pale face and wide, stricken eyes came back to him—the way she’d flatly agreed with him that, yes, she’d set out to seduce him on the plane. Something about that felt off now. His gut twisted...
She had protested her innocence. But he’d been so incensed he’d been unable to feel anything but the bitter sting of betrayal and anger at his own weakness for her.
Emotion, hot and impossible to push down, made his chest go tight. Without even thinking about what he was doing he brought the sweatshirt up to his nose and breathed deeply. Her scent, still faint but there, hit him like a steam train, that intriguing mix between floral and something spiky.
Galvanised by something that felt like a combination of panic and desperation, Alexio stood up and went into the bedroom. He hadn’t opened the closet doors yet but now he did. All of the clothes were still hanging there. The clothes that he had ordered to be delivered for Sidonie before they’d arrived. She’d taken nothing. Not even the dress she’d worn to the club that night.
He could hear her voice as if she was there right now: ‘Well, at least I won’t have to worry about washing my knickers out in the sink. I’m sure your housekeeper would be horrified.’ This time Alexio heard and recognised the over-brightness of her voice and his sense of discomfort grew.
* * *
‘You’ll have to do it again. It’s not good enough.’
Sidonie fought down the urge to scream and smiled as if her boss wasn’t a sadistic control freak. There was nothing wrong with the way she’d made this bed in the five-star hotel where she worked for minimum wage three days a week.
‘No problem.’
‘And please hurry—the guest is due to arrive within the hour.’
Sidonie sighed deeply and stripped the bed in order to make it again. She ached all over and she longed for a hot bath like the one she’d had the other night. She hadn’t had the time since then, because she’d taken on a full-time waitressing job in a Moroccan restaurant near the apartment six evenings a week. Her boss there had no qualms about hiring a pregnant woman, unlike the boss of the café where she worked the other two days a week when she wasn’t at the hotel.
Finally her shift was over and she stretched out her back, instinctively putting a hand over her small bump, feeling the prickle of guilt. She knew she shouldn’t be working so hard but she had no choice. A small voice taunted her. You could contact him. But she slammed her locker door shut in the staff changing room.
No way. Not going there. The thought of crawling to Alexio for help was anathema. She never wanted to see his cold, judgmental face again.
But when she emerged from the staff entrance at the side of the hotel and walked to the top of the lane his was the first face she saw. Shock held her immobile. He was leaning nonchalantly against the bonnet of a gleaming sports car, with his hands in his trouser pockets and his legs crossed at the ankles. Then he saw her and tensed, straightened up.
She blinked, but he didn’t disappear. He was looking right at her with those golden-green eyes. For an awful treacherous second emotion rose in a dizzying sweep inside Sidonie. Her blood grew hot in her veins and her breath shortened. Her nipples tingled. All the signs of a woman in the throes of a lust that had lain dormant.
The oppressive, muggy August air seemed to seize the oxygen going into her lungs. For a second she felt so light-headed she thought she’d faint and she sucked in breath. It couldn’t be him, she told herself, in spite of his not disappearing. It was a mirage. An apparition from her imagination torturing her.
In a bid to convince herself of that Sidonie turned and started to walk down the street. She heard a curse behind her and then her arm was taken in a strong grip. A familiar grip. Immediately Sidonie reacted violently to the effect it had on her body and soul and whirled around, ripping herself free.
She looked up and felt dizzy again. It was Alexio. In the flesh. That gorgeous flesh. He had no right to look so gorgeous. She frowned. Even if he did look leaner than when she’d last seen him and even if there were lines around his mouth and face. Lines she recognised, because she saw them in her own mirror every day. But he was still gorgeous, and she was still aware of the woman who had just walked past and done a double-take.
Anger flared and she seized it like a drowning person might seize a buoy.
‘What do you want?’ she spat out, her belly jumping with panic and a mix of other things she didn’t want to investigate.
Sidonie vaguely noticed his open-necked light blue shirt and dark trousers and became very belatedly aware of her own woeful state of dress. Skinny jeans which she had to wear with the button open, flip-flops and a loose sleeveless smock shirt. Panic gripped her and then she reassured herself. He wouldn’t notice the bump.
The fact that he hadn’t come looking for her sooner stung her more than she liked to admit. She was pathetic.
That hatred burned bright within her, giving her strength. ‘Well? What do you want? As far as I recall I didn’t take anything on my way out of the villa.’
‘No,’ Alexio said heavily, ‘it’s what you left behind.’
Sidonie went blank for a moment, and then she saw that cheque in her mind’s ey
e and felt fury all over again. Suddenly it made sense and she said out loud, ‘You went back to the villa and discovered I hadn’t cashed your precious cheque?’
‘Yes,’ he admitted.
Sidonie didn’t like the way that made the fury diminish slightly. She’d assumed that he’d known all along that she hadn’t taken his money and that it had made no difference. But all this time he’d thought she’d cashed in. Still, that didn’t change anything.
‘And this...’
Sidonie looked to see him holding out her university sweatshirt and was immediately bombarded with memories of meeting him on that plane, feeling like a hick.
She took it from him and said cuttingly, ‘You came all this way to deliver my sweatshirt?’
A muscle in his jaw popped and Sidonie felt increasingly vulnerable.
She looked at her watch, and then at him, and injected her voice with false sweetness. ‘Look, I’d love to stay and chat, but I have work to get to—so if you don’t mind...’
She turned to walk away but he caught her arm again and Sidonie’s blood leapt. She stopped and turned around and said in a low voice, ‘Let me go, Christakos. We have nothing to say to each other.’
Except for the fact that he’s the father of the baby growing in your belly.
Sidonie ignored her conscience. She needed to get away from him before her composure slipped.
* * *
Alexio battled to control the lust that had almost felled him the second he’d laid eyes on Sidonie again. His libido was back with a vengeance. He felt the fragility of Sidonie’s arm under his hand. She’d lost weight—weight she could ill afford to lose. Her face was more angular...giving it a haunting beauty. Her eyes looked huge and there were shadows underneath. She was exhausted. He recognised it well.
He frowned. ‘Aren’t you just leaving work?’
She tried to pull her arm out of his grip but he had an almost visceral fear that if he let her go he’d never see her again. That glorious light golden hair was duller than he remembered, and scooped up into a bun much as it had been when they’d first met. Her neck looked long and vulnerable.
‘I have two jobs—daytime and evening. Now, if you don’t mind, I don’t want to be late.’
‘I’ll give you a lift,’ Alexio said impulsively.
He was still trying to get his head around seeing her again. His conscience pricked hard. She hadn’t taken the money and she was working two jobs. To pay off the debts. Debts that weren’t even hers. Because she had never wanted the money from him in the first place. The ramifications of this, if it were true, made Alexio reel.
This time Sidonie wrenched her arm free. She glared at Alexio and her eyes spat blue and green sparks at him. ‘No, thank you. I do not want a lift or anything else from you. Now, please, go back to where you came from and leave me be.’
She turned and hurried away, her bag slung over her body. She looked very young. Alexio was grim. No way was he going to walk away until he knew what she was up to. The fact that he was clearly the last person she wanted to see only made him more determined.
As Alexio battled not to go and grab her again, and watched her disappear down the steps of a nearby metro station, he took out his mobile phone and made a terse call.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THAT NIGHT WHEN Sidonie left the Moroccan restaurant she felt so weary she could have cried. It wasn’t helped by the state of agitation she’d been in all day after seeing Alexio. She’d kept expecting him to pop up out of nowhere again and she couldn’t forget how he’d looked so drawn. Intense. He hadn’t looked like the carefree playboy she remembered.
Still... She firmed her mouth. She’d done the right thing by sending him away. He had no right to come barging into her life again just because he wanted to solve the riddle of the mysterious uncashed cheque.
She would never forgive him for delving into her private life, seeking out her most painful memory and then throwing it in her face as an accusation. He hadn’t been remotely interested in listening to her protest her innocence because he’d been all too ready to believe she was just as guilty as her mother. Although Sidonie winced slightly when she thought of the misfortune of him hearing that phone call when he had.
As Sidonie approached Tante Josephine’s apartment she saw a familiar low-slung vehicle parked outside. Clearly out of place in this run-down area of Paris.
Her heart thumped erratically. The car was empty. Sidonie looked up and could see the first-floor apartment’s lights blazing. Tante Josephine was usually in bed by now. Sidonie had a horrific image of her beloved Jojo being confronted by a tall, dark, intimidating Alexio and stumbled in her haste to get in.
When she almost fell in the front door she saw an idyllic scene of domesticity. Her Tante Josephine was perched on the edge of a chair, holding a cup of tea, and Alexio was seated opposite her on the couch, drinking a cup of coffee.
Tante Josephine put down her cup and stood up, her small matronly bosom quivering with obvious excitement. Her cheeks were bright pink. Sidonie could have rolled her eyes in disgust. The Alexio charm offensive had struck again.
Her aunt took her hands as she came in and Sidonie shot an accusing look at Alexio, whose face was unreadable. But something in his eyes made her heart jump. It was dark. Hard. As it had been on that day.
‘Oh, Sidonie, your friend called by earlier. I told him he could wait here for you and we’ve been having the most pleasant chat.’
Alexio stood up then and made the small apartment laughably smaller. He looked pointedly at her belly and said, in perfect accentless French, ‘I believe congratulations are in order?’
Sidonie went cold. No. Her aunt couldn’t have... But she was notoriously indiscreet—especially with strangers...
Sidonie looked at her with horrified eyes but Tante Josephine, having the nous to suspect that something had just gone very wrong, fluttered nervously and said, ‘Well, it’s past my bedtime. I’ll leave you young people to catch up.’
And then she was gone, leaving Sidonie facing her nemesis. The air was thick with tension.
Sidonie lifted her chin and waited. It didn’t take long.
‘You’re pregnant?’
She tried not to be intimidated by the murderous look on Alexio’s face. She’d never allowed herself the indulgence of daydreaming about this scenario, but for a man who didn’t even want a relationship, this was pretty close to what she might have imagined.
‘Yes,’ she confirmed starkly, reluctantly. ‘I’m pregnant.’
Alexio went pale under his olive skin. His voice sounded rough. ‘Whose is it?’
Sidonie gaped at him. She’d also never envisaged that he would doubt the baby was his. She started to speak but a flash of anger rendered her speechless again. Incensed, she stalked over to him and planted her hands on her hips, looked up into that remote hard-boned face.
‘Well,’ she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm, ‘I did have a threesome shortly after you cast me out of your life like a piece of unwanted luggage, so it could be Tom, Dick or Harry’s baby. But we won’t know until it’s born and we can see who she or he looks like.’ She was breathing hard.
Alexio just looked at her.
Growing even more incensed, Sidonie stabbed at his chest with her finger and tried to ignore how hard it felt.
‘It’s yours, you arrogant jerk,’ she hissed, mindful of Tante Josephine. ‘Cold-bloodedly seducing another billionaire hasn’t exactly been high on my priority list lately.’
* * *
Alexio looked down into that furious face and felt numb. He welcomed it. His solicitor had failed to mention the very poignant fact that Sidonie’s aunt had mild mental health issues.
And now...now the baby. His baby. Ever since Tante Josephine had excitedly informed him that Sidonie was expecti
ng a baby, Alexio had felt as if he’d swallowed nails.
At first he’d told himself it couldn’t possibly be his: they’d used protection every time. He’d been fanatical about it. Except for when they’d come home from the club and made love in the car, unable even to walk the few steps into the villa. That night was almost sixteen weeks ago now. Sixteen weeks of living in a blur. And now suddenly everything was in focus again.
Disgust at the memory of his lack of control that night had curdled his insides as Sidonie’s aunt had chattered on, blithely unaware of the bomb she’d dropped. And then Sidonie had come in, looking panicked. Guilty.
The knowledge that she was telling the truth sank into him like a stone, casting huge ripples outward. He wanted to walk out through the door and keep walking. The sum of all his fears was manifesting itself right now in this room. He wasn’t anywhere near ready to contemplate bringing a child into the world. Not after the childhood he’d endured.
A child had perhaps existed in his future life—far in the distant future—along with his perfect blonde wife. He had vowed long ago to make sure that no child of his would see the ugly reality of marriage, because any union he would have would be a union of respect and affection—not one punctuated by cold silences, bitter rows, possessive jealousy and violence.
‘Well?’ Sidonie demanded, hands on hips. ‘Aren’t you going to say something?’
Alexio’s gaze narrowed on her and he realised he wanted to say plenty—but most of it involved his mouth being on Sidonie’s. And then his gaze travelled down and he saw the small proud bump evident under her light jacket and the black clingy top she wore. Something within him seemed to break apart. Crumble.