by Lynne Graham
On the exact same day, Erin was tackling a difficult personal matter with Sam. They were standing in his temporary office, the larger original room having been taken over by a team from Donakis Hotels, who were working to ensure a smooth changeover of ownership. The sale was complete. Sam was only still making himself available for consultation out of loyalty to his hotel group and former employees.
The older man knitted his brows, a shocked look in his blue eyes. ‘Cristo Donakis is the twins’ father?’ he repeated in astonishment.
‘I felt I should mention it. My mother has been telling people and I wanted you to hear it from me, rather than as a piece of gossip,’ Erin admitted stiffly.
‘But when you met here neither of you even admitted that you knew each other.’
‘I hadn’t seen Cristo since we broke up and my natural inclination was to keep my personal life private.’
Sam Morton dealt her a hurt look that made her flush with discomfiture. ‘Even from me?’
‘When I walked into your office that day and saw Cristo standing there it was such a shock that I wasn’t exactly thinking straight,’ she said apologetically. ‘I’m sorry. Maybe I should have come clean afterwards but it was very awkward.’
‘No, you’re quite right. Your private life should be private. I assume it was Cristo you were working for in London?’
Erin nodded. ‘I resigned when we split up.’
‘I should have made that connection from your original CV. But Donakis let you down badly when you were pregnant,’ Sam completed drily.
‘There was a misunderstanding,’ Erin declared, her eyes evasive. ‘Cristo had no idea I was pregnant and there was no further communication between us.’
‘But you tried very hard to get in touch with him,’ Sam reminded her.
‘It was just one of those things, Sam.’
Sam’s nostrils flared. ‘So, he’s forgiven for putting you through hell.’
‘It’s not like that. Cristo knows about the children now and we’re trying to work through that as best we can.’
‘Are you getting involved with him again? No, scratch that!’ Sam advised abruptly. ‘I have no right to pry.’
Erin thought about Italy and screened her expressive eyes. ‘I don’t know how to answer that question—it’s complicated?’ she joked uneasily.
‘I hope it’s the right thing for you. I’d hate to see you unhappy again,’ Sam pronounced feelingly. ‘You gave Donakis one chance. Who’s to say he deserves another?’
Well, her mother for one thing, Erin reflected wryly as she caught up with her emails ten minutes later. In her mother’s eyes, Cristo had gone from being the most reviled womanising male in Europe to being a positive favourite. And all within the unlikely space of a mere ten days! His regular visits, his interest in the twins, his good manners, his tactful ability to defer to her mother’s greater knowledge when it came to the children, his insistence that Deidre Turner join them when they went out to eat had all had an effect. Cristo had shone like a star at every opportunity and was piling up brownie points like a miser with a barn full of treasure chests. Erin, on the other hand, was finding the new order confusing and hard to adapt to.
Cristo was no longer her lover. That weekend in Italy, that single night of passion, did in retrospect seem more like the product of her imagination than anything that had actually happened. Now Cristo visited their home to see Lorcan and Nuala and stayed in one of his newly acquired hotels when he was in the area. He was wary and deep down inside that fact hurt Erin. She could remember another Cristo, a guy who had raced through the door to greet her eagerly when he’d been away for a while, unashamedly passionate, openly demonstrative, not picking his words, not hiding behind caution. This new Cristo was older and much cooler. He was polite, even considerate, but reserved when it came to more personal stuff. Even the confidences he had unexpectedly shared with Erin in the park still troubled her.
His wife’s termination had deeply wounded Cristo and possibly made him think more deeply than many men about what a child might mean to him. Now Erin was seeing the results of that more solicitous outlook in practice, for Cristo undoubtedly wanted to do as much as possible to help her with their children. When he visited, he played with them, took them out with Erin in tow and had even helped to bathe them one evening after Erin fell asleep on the sofa after work. He was demonstrating that he could be a hands-on father and the kids were already very partial to his more energetic presence. Erin was impressed but more than a little concerned as to where all this surprising attention was likely to lead.
What did Cristo really want from her? Acceptance of his role? Could it be that simple? Could Cristo, for possibly the very first time in his life, be playing it straight? Or was there a darker, more devious plan somewhere in the back of his mind? Cristo Donakis did not dance to other people’s tunes. He always had an agenda. Unfortunately for Erin she was unable to work out what that agenda might be and what it might entail for her and her children. In addition she was especially worried that Cristo still harboured serious doubts about her honesty. It was time she tackled Sally Jennings, she reflected ruefully. Somehow she had to prove her innocence of theft. But would Sally even agree to speak to her? It occurred to her that it might well be wiser to arrive to see Sally at Cristo’s flagship London spa without a prior announcement of her intent. She decided to take a day’s leave and tackle Sally. Would she get anywhere? She didn’t know but it was currently the only idea she could come up with.
The phone by her bed rang at six the following morning and, ruefully knuckling the sleep from her eyes, Erin sat up in bed. ‘Yes?’
It was Cristo. ‘Erin?’
‘Why are you waking me up at this time of the morning?’
‘A deputy editor I’m friendly with has just called me with a tip-off. Apparently there’s a story in the pipeline about you, me and the twins. The publication he named is particularly sleazy so I don’t think the article will contain anything that your family or mine would want to read.’
Erin’s face froze. ‘But why? Who on earth would be interested in reading about us?’
‘Erin …’ Cristo sighed, mustering patience for he was more accustomed to dealing with people who took tabloid attention in their stride and even courted it for the sake of their careers or social status. ‘I’m a very wealthy man, recently divorced …’
Lorcan darted through the bedroom door, scrambled under the duvet with his mother and tucked cold feet against her slim thighs. His sister was only a few steps behind him.
Erin was squashed up against the wall as Nuala joined them in the bed. ‘If it’s true, if there is going to be a story, there’s nothing we can do to prevent it.’
‘Yes, there is,’ Cristo contradicted. ‘I can get you and the children out of that house and put you somewhere the paparazzi can’t get near you for a photo opportunity. Then I can organise a PR announcement concerning my new status as a father and, once that’s done, the press will lose interest.’
Erin breathed in deep. She certainly didn’t fancy the press on her doorstep, but she was much inclined to think that he was taking the matter too seriously. ‘Cristo, I have a job. I can’t just drop everything and disappear.’
‘Of course you can. You work for me now,’ he reminded her. ‘Pack. I’ll make the arrangements. A car will pick you up to take you to the airport.’
‘But I haven’t agreed yet.’
‘I will do whatever it takes to protect you and the twins from adverse publicity,’ Cristo cut in forcefully, exasperation lending his dark deep drawl a rougher edge. ‘I don’t want some innuendo-laden piece appearing in print about us.’
‘We had an affair. I got pregnant. It’s not that unusual—’
‘Trust me,’ Cristo breathed. ‘You’ll be accused of having been a married man’s mistress and that is not a possibility I want to appear in print.’
A flash of temper and distaste at that prospect rippled through Erin because that was als
o a humiliating label that she did not want to be lumbered with. ‘OK. Where are you planning to send us … assuming I agree, which I haven’t yet,’ she reminded him.
‘Greece … specifically, my island.’
Erin rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, so you now have an island all your own?’
‘I inherited Thesos from my father when I was twenty-one.’
‘Well, you never mentioned it before,’ Erin remarked curtly, wondering how much else she didn’t know about him while trying to think frantically fast. ‘Look, I’ll consider going to Greece for a few days if you really think it’s necessary—’
‘I do.’
‘But before I leave I want the chance to speak to Sally Jennings. She does still work for you, doesn’t she?’
There was a moment of silence before Cristo responded expressionlessly, ‘She does. She’s now the deputy manager at the spa. Why?’
‘And I’m sure she’s very efficient. She was when I was working there,’ Erin commented stiffly. ‘I’ll call in on the way to the airport. I don’t want her to know I’m coming. I’ll drop the twins off with you at your office.’
‘There’s no need. I’ll meet you in the hotel foyer. But I don’t think this is a good idea, Erin. Very few people know about the money that went missing. I handled it very discreetly. I don’t think it’s wise to start making enquiries again this long after the event.’
‘This is the price of me going to Greece,’ Erin countered flatly. ‘I see Sally in London before I go or I don’t go at all.’
‘But that’s bl—’ Cristo retorted in a seething undertone.
‘Blackmail?’ Erin slotted in with saccharine sweetness. ‘You’re preaching to the converted, Cristo. Guess who taught me the skill?’
‘If I facilitate this meeting at the spa, you’ll come to Greece with me?’
‘Of course I will. I keep my promises.’ Erin came off the phone a minute later, feeling re-energised, and swept the twins out of bed to get dressed. It was past time she began calling some of the shots. Cristo became unbearable when he got his own way too much. But she was rather touched that he was willing to go to so much trouble to whisk them away from the perils of too much press interest. Honestly, Erin thought ruefully, sometimes Cristo could be naïve. Did he really think she couldn’t cope with journalists on the doorstep or some nasty article that tried to make her sound more exciting and wicked than she was? She was not that vulnerable. Life had taught her to roll with the punches. In any case the idea of travelling to Cristo’s private island intrigued her. He was finally going to take her to his real home and naturally she was curious.
Her mother got up while the twins were eating their breakfast and, when she realised that her daughter was to leave the house in little more than an hour to travel abroad, she urged Erin to go and start packing. Before she did so, Erin rang work and requested a week’s leave.
‘Do you think you’ll meet Cristo’s parents?’ Deidre asked hopefully.
Erin grimaced, in no hurry to meet Appollonia Denes, who had cut her off on the phone while making it very clear that she did not think Erin was good enough for the little boy she had raised to adulthood. Cristo had been born into a substantial fortune, the only child of two young, rich and beautiful Greeks, both from socially prominent families. Vasos and Appollonia had become Cristo’s guardians when he was orphaned at the age of five, after his birth parents died in a speedboat accident. Vasos had been a trusted employee in the Donakis empire and Cristo’s godfather. The older couple had had no children of their own. Erin recalled that Cristo had mentioned Appollonia having a nervous breakdown and during that phone call she had decided that the older woman was more than a little off the wall. So, she hoped she wouldn’t be meeting the older couple. Things would be challenging enough without having to deal with people who had disliked and disapproved of her even before they had met her. No doubt Vasos and Appollonia would find the news that she was the mother of Cristo’s twins a source of severe embarrassment and dissatisfaction.
The twins fell asleep in the limo that carried them to London, waking up with renewed energy to bounce up the steps of the Mobila hotel. Garbed in a grey pinstripe dress and jacket, her pale hair curving round her cheekbones, Erin was apprehensive as she walked into the opulent foyer.
‘Daddy!’ Lorcan cried, tearing his hand free of his mother’s to pelt across the open space.
‘Kisto!’ Nuala exclaimed, for she would not call her father Daddy, even though he had asked her to do so.
Erin focused on Cristo, seeing the manager of the renowned hotel anchored to his side and reckoning that so public a greeting from his secret children could scarcely be welcome to him. But Cristo was grinning, that wide wonderful smile she had almost forgotten flashing across his lean bronzed features in a transformation that took her breath away as he swung Lorcan up into his arms and smoothed a comforting hand over Nuala’s curly head as she clung to his trouser leg with toddler tenacity.
As Erin looked at the drop-dead gorgeous father of her children a tingle of heat pinched the peaks of her breasts to tightness and arrowed down into her pelvis to spread a sensation of melting warmth. All her hormones, she registered in dismay, were in top working order and threatening to go into overdrive.
‘Miss Turner.’ The hotel manager shook hands with every appearance of warmth. ‘What beautiful children.’
‘Erin, I’ve arranged for Jenny to look after the twins in the crèche while we’re visiting the spa,’ Cristo explained, and a young woman stepped forward with a smile and proceeded to chat to Nuala.
‘So, you’ve opened a crèche here now,’ Erin remarked, her professional interest caught by that idea because she had first floated it to Cristo.
‘It’s very popular with our clients,’ the manger advanced with enthusiasm. ‘Many of them have young children.’
‘The facility pays for itself,’ Cristo explained, a lean hand resting to Erin’s taut spine to lead her in the direction of the spa. She was filled with dismay at the realisation that he intended to accompany her, for she had not thought that far ahead and she was convinced that his intimidating presence could only injure her chances of success.
Momentarily. Erin glanced back anxiously at the twins. Lorcan was making a phenomenal noise with the toy trumpet the wily Jenny had produced while Nuala was trying her hardest to get her hands on the same toy.
‘Are you certain you want to go ahead with talking to Sally?’ Cristo pressed in a discouraging undertone. ‘I don’t agree with it. What the hell can you expect to gain but embarrassment from such a meeting?’
‘Sally is the only person who knows the whole story. I don’t have a choice,’ Erin replied tightly, her nervous tension rising as Cristo bent down to her level and the rich evocative smell of his cologne and him ensnared her on every level.
‘Don’t do this for me, koukla mou,’ Cristo urged suddenly, staring down at her as they came to a halt outside the door that now bore Sally’s nameplate. ‘It doesn’t matter to me now. A lot of water has gone under the bridge since then. You were young. You made a mistake and I’m sure you learned from it—’
‘Don’t you dare patronise me, you … you … you toad!’ Erin finally selected in her spirited retort. ‘And don’t interfere.’
‘Toad?’ Cristo repeated blankly.
‘I’d have called you something a good deal more blunt if I hadn’t trained myself not to use bad words around the children!’ she told him curtly, hastily depressing the door handle of the office before she could lose what little remained of her momentum.
Sally, a tall middle-aged woman with red hair and light blue eyes, was standing behind her desk talking on the phone. When she saw Erin, she froze, her previous animated expression ironed flat as she visibly lost colour.
‘Erin, my goodness,’ she breathed in astonishment, dropping the phone back on its cradle in haste and bustling round the desk. ‘And Mr Donakis …’
‘I would like your assurance that anything that is
said in this room remains between these four walls,’ Cristo said quietly.
Sally looked bewildered and then she smiled. ‘Of course, Mr Donakis. Take a seat and tell me what I can help you with.’
Erin was so nervous that she could feel her knees trembling and she linked her hands tightly together as she sat down. ‘I’m sure that you’re aware that the audit two and a half years ago threw up certain anomalies in the spa accounts …’
If possible, Sally went paler than ever and she dropped rather heavily back down behind her desk. ‘Mr Donakis did ask me to keep that problem confidential.’
‘Sally,’ Erin muttered, suddenly filled with a sense of utter hopelessness. What craziness had brought her here to this pointless encounter? There was no way Sally was going to offer up a belated confession of fraud with her employer present. ‘Perhaps you could leave us alone, Cristo.’
‘No, I have news to share first. I’m planning to have the account irregularities looked at again.’
The older woman’s face went all tight. ‘But, Mr Donakis, I thought that matter was done and dusted. You said you were satisfied.’
‘I’m afraid I wasn’t. And bearing in mind how helpful you were during the first investigation, I thought you should be informed before the experts arrive to go over the books again,’ Cristo completed.