to be an ordeal. So think before you answer. Don’t make cheap retorts just for the sake of trying to score points. Show him you mean business. Because you do.
‘I’m here to give you the facts,’ she said. ‘Because I thought it was your right to have them. That you needed to be aware that there were consequences to what happened that afternoon.’
‘A little dramatic, isn’t it? Just turning up here like this. Couldn’t you have called first to warn me?’
‘You think I should have done that? Really?’ She tipped her head to one side and looked at him. ‘I didn’t have your number because you deliberately didn’t give it to me, but even if I’d managed to get hold of it—would you have spoken to me? I don’t think so.’
Alek considered her words. No, he probably wouldn’t, despite his faintly irrational desire to see her again. Through Vasos, he would have demanded she put everything down in an email. He would have kept her at an emotional distance, as he did with all women. But he was beginning to realise that the whys and wherefores of what had happened between them were irrelevant. Didn’t matter that she’d broken a cardinal rule and invaded his workspace. There was only one thing which mattered and that was what she had just told him.
And this was one reality he couldn’t just walk away from. He asked the question as if he were following some ancient male-female rule book, but if his question sounded lifeless it was because deep down he knew the answer. ‘How do I know it’s mine?’
‘You think I’d be here if it wasn’t? That I’d be putting myself through this kind of aggravation if it was someone else’s baby?’
He tried telling himself that she might be calling his bluff and that he could demand a DNA test, which would have to wait until the child was born. And yet, once again something told him that no such test would be needed, and he wasn’t sure why. Was it the certainty on her pale face which told him that he was the father of her child, or something more subtly complex, which defied all logic? He could hear the door of the prison swinging shut and the sound of the key being turned. He was trapped. Again. And it was the worst feeling in the world. He remembered that distant fortress and his voice sounded gritty. Like it was coming from a long way away. ‘What do you want from me?’
There was a pause as those shadowed grey eyes met his.
‘I want you to marry me,’ she said.
WITH NARROWED EYES, Alek looked at her. ‘Or what?’ he questioned with soft venom. ‘Marry you or you’ll run blabbing to your journalist friend again? This would be a real scoop, wouldn’t it? Pregnant With the Greek’s Child.’
Meeting the accusation on his face, Ellie tried to stay calm. She hadn’t meant to blurt it out like that—in fact, she hadn’t really been planning to say that at all. She had meant to tell him that she was planning to have the baby and would respect whatever decision he made about his own involvement. She had intended to imply that she wasn’t bothered one way or another—and she certainly wasn’t intending to control or manipulate what was happening.
But something had happened to her during the awkward conversation which had just taken place in the alien surroundings of his penthouse office. With the air-conditioning freezing tiny beads of sweat to her forehead and her cotton dress clinging to her like a dishcloth she had felt worse than ugly. Surrounded by the unbelievable wealth of Alek’s penthouse office suite, she had felt invisible.
She thought about all the women she’d seen leaving the building—clipping along in their high-heeled shoes with not a hair out of place. Those were the kind of women he dealt with on a daily basis, with their air of purpose and their slim, toned figures. Where did she fit into that world, with her cheap dress and a growing belly and a feeling that she had no real place of her own?
Because she didn’t have any real place of her own. This was his world and neither she nor her baby belonged in it. How long before he conveniently forgot he had sired a child in a moment of ill-thought-out passion? How long before he married someone classy and had legitimate children who would inherit everything he owned, while her own child shrank into the shadows, forgotten and overlooked? Didn’t she know better than anyone that unwanted children usually stayed that way? She knew what it was like to be rejected by her own father.
And that was her light-bulb moment. The moment when she knew exactly what she was going to ask for. Her ego didn’t matter and neither did her pride, because this was more important than both those things. This was for her baby.
‘I’m not threatening to blackmail you,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ve told you until I was blue in the face that the whole journalist thing was a stupid mistake, which I don’t intend on repeating. I just want you to marry me, that’s all.’
‘That’s all?’ he echoed with a cruel replica of a smile. ‘Why?’
‘Because you’re so charming, of course,’ she snapped. ‘And so thoughtful and—’
‘Why?’ he repeated, a note of steel entering his voice—as if he suspected that behind her flippancy she was teetering perilously on the brink of hysteria.
‘Isn’t it obvious?’ With an effort she kept her gaze steady, but inside her heart was pounding so loudly she was certain he must be able to hear it. ‘Because I want my baby to have some kind of security.’
‘Which doesn’t need to involve marriage,’ he said coldly. ‘If the baby really is mine, then I will accept responsibility. I can give you money. A house.’ He shrugged. ‘Some baubles for yourself, if that’s what you’re angling for.’
Baubles? Baubles? Did he really think her so shallow that he thought jewels might be her motivation? ‘It isn’t,’ she said, her cheeks growing pink, ‘just about the money.’
‘Really? Woman claims money isn’t her sole motivation.’ He gave a cynical laugh. ‘Wow! That must be a first. So if it isn’t about the money—then what is it about?’
Distractedly, she rubbed at her forehead. ‘I want him—or her—to know who they are—to have a real identity. I want them to bear their father’s name.’
She saw the darkness which passed over his face like a cloud crossing the sun.
‘And I might not have the kind of name you would want to associate with your baby,’ he said harshly.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
But Alek shook his head as the old familiar shutters came slamming down—effectively sealing him off from her questions. Because marriage was a no-no for him—right at the very top of things he was never going to do. And although he’d shaken off his past a long time ago—he could never entirely escape its long tentacles. They reached out and whipped him when he wasn’t expecting it. In the darkness of the night they sometimes slithered over his skin, reminding him of things he’d rather forget.
His parents’ marriage had been the dark canker at the heart of his life, whose poison had spilled over into so many places. The union between a cruel man and a woman he despised so much that he couldn’t even bear to say her name. His mouth hardened. Why the hell would he ever want to marry?
Alek’s success had been public, but he’d managed to keep his life private. He had locked himself within an emotional shell in order to protect himself and he rarely let anyone get close. And hadn’t that been another reason for his anger with Ellie? Not just because her indiscretion had tarnished his hard-won business reputation, but because she’d broken his foolishly misplaced trust in her.
‘Maybe I’m not great husband material,’ he told her. ‘Ask any of the women I’ve dated and I’m sure they’d be happy to list all my failings. I’m selfish. I’m intolerant. I work too hard and have a low boredom threshold—especially where women are