by Lynne Graham
‘I wouldn’t have got in touch with you again for anything less serious,’ Elvi added defensively. ‘You thought we didn’t have anything to worry about but we do...’
‘Yes, clearly,’ Xan agreed, struggling to come to terms with her announcement at the same time as he came up with a solution. It was the way he worked. He saw a problem and he immediately set out to fix it and fast. A baby, the kind of little entity he had imagined would enliven his middle age, rather than his wild-oats-sowing years. Bang went his perfectly planned future! But thinking on his feet was second nature to Xan and flexibility was a key skill. There had to be a resolution that would cover their situation.
‘I don’t want a termination and I don’t want to put my child up for adoption either,’ Elvi declared, deciding to lay all that out for him upfront before he got any ideas.
‘I suppose the odds of conception were more promising than I was prepared to contemplate,’ Xan commented reflectively, stalking deeper into the room as he pulled out his phone to let his driver know that he would be a while. ‘I am one of seven children, after all.’
Her knees wobbling as her extreme tension faded, Elvi dropped down like a stone into a leather seat and clasped her hands tightly together on her knees. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘We’re adults. We’ll deal with it,’ Xan asserted without hesitation.
Elvi resisted the urge to admit that she didn’t feel much like an adult at that moment because she was in unfamiliar territory and apprehensive of a future as a single parent. Both admissions, however, sounded defeatist to her. Even worse, all the angst in the air was preventing her from taking any pleasure at all in her conception. Instead of feeling excited at the prospect of becoming a mother for the first time, she felt guilty, as though her body had done something it shouldn’t have done.
Xan was thinking at top speed and already acknowledging that there was no magical solution to their plight. A child would be born, his child, his responsibility. But regardless of the support he gave to his child’s mother, he would only be an occasional parent, who received scheduled visits. He would never be fully involved because he and Elvi would be leading separate lives.
And that would be where the problems started, he conceded reluctantly. He was very much aware of the consequences children suffered after a relationship breakdown when parents led separate lives. It had most often been Xan, as the eldest, who had been required to deal with his siblings when any of them had gone off the rails as adolescents. His father had been a useless parent, his priority always to move on selfishly to the next new woman in his life, leaving the children of his past relationships to sink or swim alongside their resentful, embittered mothers.
Xan knew he could walk away and be a parent from a safe distance, leaving Elvi to deal with the burden of childcare. But if he did that, he would be no better than the father he had despised. In any case, he wanted his child to have everything he and his siblings had been denied: stability and security and parents who watched over them. If he didn’t want a parade of stepfathers or stepmothers disrupting his child’s life he had to be tough and accept that he had only one sensible option open to him, he reasoned tautly. And unpalatable as the prospect of marriage might appear, there was, nevertheless, nothing more attractive to Xan in that moment of hard realism than the concept of having the right of unrestricted access to Elvi. For that benefit, he acknowledged, he was willing to make considerable sacrifices.
‘We should get married,’ Xan breathed harshly, shaken by the inescapable conviction that marriage offered a security for his child that he could not achieve by any other means.
‘Don’t be silly,’ Elvi mumbled straight away, thinking he was trying to lighten the atmosphere with an ill-judged joke.
Xan settled hard dark golden eyes on her. ‘Marriage is still the best framework in which to raise a child.’
‘But you don’t want to marry me!’ Elvi countered impatiently. ‘So why talk about it?’
‘Let’s not get into personal feelings,’ Xan advised very drily, noticing her bra through the filmy top, his body tensing like a schoolboy’s in response and decimating his pride. He swung away from that alluring view before continuing, ‘More importantly, we now have a child’s future to consider and we must do the best we can to ensure that our child enjoys the best possible start in life.’
Disconcerted by that unexpectedly serious assessment, Elvi glanced away from him uncomfortably. ‘People don’t get married just because they’re parents these days. I’m amazed to hear you talking like this.’
‘Elvi...’ Xan exhaled in an impatient hiss. ‘I’m talking like this because I know what I’m talking about! Children thrive only when they feel secure. In all the years I was growing up I never felt secure because there was nothing stable about my home life. It was constant upheaval and change and I had no control over it. A new wife or lover would move in, turn the house on Thira upside down with different rules and then it would happen again...and again,’ he told her in a roughened undertone, loathing the need to speak about such personal experiences.
‘What you’re really telling me is that even your father’s many marriages didn’t give you or your brothers and sisters security,’ Elvi pointed out ruefully. ‘So, how could us marrying possibly be the answer?’
Xan threw his arrogant dark head high, his jawline clenching. ‘Unlike my father, I’m willing to make the effort for it to work.’
‘But you said to leave personal feelings out of this and that doesn’t work either because a marriage is based on two people living together,’ Elvi argued. ‘And I couldn’t live with you.’
Xan stiffened in astonishment at that claim, a winged ebony brow climbing. ‘What do you mean? You couldn’t live with me? Why not?’
The look of outrage in his stunning golden gaze failed to intimidate Elvi, who believed that any talk of Xan marrying her was total nonsense. ‘Xan, have you forgotten how you behaved at your sister’s wedding?’ she asked tightly. ‘You got bored with me within forty-eight hours and wasted no time in switching your interest to Angie. You’re volatile—’
Xan gritted his even white teeth, incensed by the condemnation. He had had good reason to behave as he had but he was not prepared to share those reasons with her. ‘I am not volatile,’ he breathed, anger lacing his dark deep drawl with warning.
Elvi was tempted to tell him that possibly he bore more of a resemblance to his womanising father than he liked to think, but she resisted the urge because infuriating Xan would only create more problems. He couldn’t really be serious about his suggestion that she marry him, she reasoned in bewilderment.
‘You’re just not the faithful type,’ she said, unable to prevent that belief from leaping straight off her tongue. ‘And I couldn’t cope with that.’
Dark colour laced Xan’s killer cheekbones. He was in a rage and battling to contain it. Women had been angling for a marriage proposal from him since he’d made his first billion. He knew that the lifestyle he could offer was his biggest attraction. He had always assumed that when he finally proposed he would be trodden on by his choice of bride in her haste to get him to the altar before he could change his mind. He had never once envisaged rejection. After all, Angie had been a different case, ditching him at a time when he appeared to be a poor financial bet. That Elvi could summarily dismiss him in the husband stakes as volatile and likely to be unfaithful incensed him.
‘It may surprise you to know that I have never been unfaithful to a sexual partner,’ Xan grated. ‘My lovers don’t overlap. I like clarity and candour in my personal life.’
Elvi coloured uncomfortably, wondering whether she could believe him. To be fair, he had been blunt with her from the outset about the limits of their arrangement. He had not told her any lies or broken any promises. But even so, his behaviour with his first love at his sister’s wedding had hurt Elvi and continued to nag at her like a sore
tooth. Perhaps she was too rigid in her outlook, not having had any former loves in her own past, she conceded ruefully.
Evidently, Xan had not seen Angie Sarantos since their breakup and naturally he had been curious. Furthermore, his familiarity with the other woman had only underlined the fact that they must once have been very close. Equally, there had been no sin in his enjoying Angie’s company. There had been no stolen kisses, indeed nothing that Elvi could label an actual betrayal of trust. True, Angie had cherished a strong desire to win Xan back but Elvi could hardly blame him for the brunette’s aspirations.
Elvi released her breath on a slow hiss. ‘I was judging you and I shouldn’t have been,’ she admitted stiffly. ‘The trouble is I still don’t know you well enough to know if I can trust you.’
‘You can surely trust that I want to do the best I can for our child,’ Xan argued in a driven undertone. ‘Thee mou, Elvi...asking you to marry me was a major act of trust for me! And how else can we share our child? We need that framework... I’m not very good at sharing but if you’re my wife, I will adapt.’
I’m not very good at sharing. That careless admission sliced through Elvi’s thoughts like a blade and released a sudden flood of apprehension. Xan’s father, Helios, had not wanted to share his child either. Although he had ditched his first wife, he had insisted on retaining custody of their son. How could she have forgotten that she was dealing with a man raised almost exclusively by his father?
And what if she too became superfluous to Xan’s requirements? What if the way she chose to raise their child failed to meet his expectations? What if he decided that he wasn’t seeing enough of his child? How many rights would she have as an unmarried mother on a low income? And how the heck would she ever contrive to fight such a very wealthy and powerful man?
Sheer panic at the threat of such future developments stirred nausea in Elvi’s tummy and turned her entire skin surface clammy. Wives had more legal rights than single mothers, didn’t they? Surely a wife could not be brushed aside in the same way? Out of pride and hurt, Ariadne had simply chosen not to fight her ex-husband for custody of her son, but Elvi knew that she would have fought to the death before surrendering her own flesh and blood. If such a battle ever became necessary, she decided that she would be safer and stronger as Xan’s wife.
Xan scanned Elvi’s troubled blue eyes and the hands she was unconsciously twisting together on her lap. Guilt sliced through him. In using Angie as an excuse to extract himself from his affair with Elvi, he had done much more damage than he had ever intended. The consequences were only hitting him now. Elvi was wary, distrustful and reluctant to even reach for the security of a wedding ring. Angie would’ve grabbed the ring and laughed all the way to the divorce court and a fat financial settlement. But then, he conceded wryly, Angie and Elvi had barely a thought in common. He had only appreciated that contrast when Angie had sworn viciously at him when he’d told her that he wasn’t interested in reliving their past after his sister’s wedding. Angie had been enraged, not hurt. She was hard as nails, bitter over the choices she had made and as much a stranger to the softer, more feminine emotions as a rock.
With difficulty, Elvi dragged herself out of the freezing grip of extreme apprehension and drew in a slow, steadying breath before looking across at Xan. There was a brooding, distant look already etched on his lean, breathtakingly handsome features and she imagined manipulative wheels were already turning at speed in that dynamic brain of his because Xan was programmed to fight and win. If Plan A failed to deliver, he would waste no time in moving on to Plan B and heaven only knew what Plan B might entail.
‘If you honestly believe that marriage would be the best option for our child,’ she muttered shakily before she could lose her nerve, ‘I agree.’
Xan studied her in astonishment because she had performed a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turnaround in the space of minutes. ‘You’ll marry me?’ he pressed with a frown.
‘If that’s what you want,’ Elvi stated more firmly.
What had changed her mind? Xan scanned her with questioning dark golden eyes and then tossed pointless curiosity on the back burner. She would marry him and he would have both her and his child. For the moment that was enough, he told himself stubbornly. Did it really matter that she would want much more from him than any other woman ever had? Elvi would want him to change and cuddling would be the least of it. Ultimately, Elvi would want love and that worried him because he really didn’t think he could give her love. He could be loyal and faithful but the thought of loving anyone, when everyone he had ever loved in life had either let him down or abandoned him, sent menacing cold chills running through Xan.
‘The first thing we will do is visit a doctor to have your pregnancy confirmed,’ Xan decreed. ‘You’ll come home with me to the penthouse tonight—’
‘No. I’ll stay with my family until we get married,’ Elvi interrupted tightly, shying away from the thought of returning to that intimate setting with him. ‘And if I agree to see a doctor, it has to be alone.’
‘Let’s not quibble about the details, moli mou,’ Xan urged softly, his spectacular golden eyes gleaming like priceless ingots as he appraised her, already trying to picture her swollen with his child. The image shocked him by turning him on hard and fast, something primal in him reacting to that concept with spontaneous vigour.
‘I guess not,’ Elvi muttered uncertainly, meeting the blaze of his scrutiny and stilling like a mouse suddenly scenting a predator stalking her. Colour banished her pallor, heat curling between her thighs in a wanton surge that embarrassed her. ‘But there’s something I should explain to you before you meet my family.’
Xan hadn’t even thought of meeting Elvi’s family. He had merely vaguely assumed that they would attend the wedding. Her mother, his former maid, he thought now with a faint shudder, and a thief into the bargain.
‘It’s time you knew the truth about the theft,’ Elvi told him with determination.
CHAPTER NINE
XAN LISTENED IN stunned silence while Elvi told him the story about her kid brother’s accidental removal of the brush pot from his penthouse apartment. Anger sparked, flared and climbed to an extraordinary height inside him.
‘So, let me get this straight,’ Xan urged with lethal derision. ‘I was cast as the baddie in this scenario right from the start. You couldn’t trust me with the truth, your mother couldn’t and even my own head of security, who clearly worked out the truth from the beginning, couldn’t trust me to do the right thing!’
‘It wasn’t like that, Xan—’
‘It was exactly like that,’ Xan retorted crushingly, his volatile temper flaring like a comet over the lowering awareness that everybody but him had known what was going on. ‘You all presupposed that I would visit my wrath on your little brother and would refuse to believe his version of what happened.’
‘We didn’t want to take the risk that you would react the wrong way,’ Elvi admitted heavily.
‘Diavole...well, I’m reacting very much in the wrong way now!’ Xan slung at her in a raw undertone. ‘You all conspired to keep the truth from me.’
‘No, that’s untrue!’ Elvi argued, leaping upright. ‘My mother worked it out when the police found the brush pot in our home and she immediately owned up to protect Daniel. There was no discussion, no conspiracy and Dmitri simply guessed what had happened because he was there that day. I had to tell you before the wedding, Xan. I’m sorry you’re annoyed but I couldn’t let you go on believing that my mother is a thief.’
Still furious, Xan released his breath in a measured hiss even as he reflected that that word, ‘annoyed’, barely covered his reaction. Even as he controlled his scorching anger, however, he was understanding another, even less palatable side to what he had belatedly learned: he had taken his rage over the theft out on a complete innocent. Although no actual crime had been committed, he had intimidated
Elvi into becoming his mistress. There was no escaping that harsh fact. His unjust treatment of her bit deeper than ever. His conscience would never be clear on that score because, not only had he railroaded a virgin into his bed, he had also been careless enough of her well-being to get her pregnant.
Xan’s long brown fingers curled into potent fists of frustration. It was another dark day for him, he acknowledged bitterly. Was there to be no end to the constant revelations of his sins, his oversights, his mistakes? Had some greater force thrown Elvi into his path simply to trip him up and teach him that he was as fallible as every other human being? Cocooned by wealth and arrogance, he had believed he was untouchable and far too clever to be seduced by temptation. But one fatal moment of weakness had overwhelmed him with the kind of messy consequences he had successfully avoided all his life.
Elvi was that weakness and his inability to resist Elvi had directly led to the conception of his first child and would soon be followed by a shotgun marriage. Without warning, Xan was viewing life through a changed lens and feelings he had suppressed for years were surging to the fore and destabilising him. He didn’t do self-doubt and castigation but Elvi’s arrival had changed everything, transforming him into a man he barely recognised.
‘You have my promise that in the future I will treat your family with every respect,’ he ground out flatly.
‘I appreciate that,’ Elvi admitted quietly.
Xan gazed at her, hunger rising spontaneously from the ashes of his anger. He didn’t understand how she could do that to him, make him flip from rage to a sexual craving so deep and strong it made him ache. He wanted to take her home with him and possess her over and over again until that ferocious, uncontrollable need was finally sated. And all that desire meant was that once again he was selfishly in the wrong because the unwitting object of his desire was pregnant and fragile.
Elvi met Xan’s dark brooding gaze and butterflies leapt and danced in her tummy, emotions and responses she struggled to contain assailing her, making her feel hot and foolish and giddy. ‘If it’s any consolation, I’m sorry I didn’t feel able to tell you the truth sooner.’