Mediterranean Millionaires. LYNNE GRAHAM
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by the need to conceal her true emotions from him with a show of indifference. ‘We slept together and we shouldn’t have. I regret it very much.’
‘You didn’t regret it while you were doing it, pedhi mou,’ Andreas spelt out with dangerous bite. ‘So, what’s changed?’
‘I’m trying to be sensible for the baby’s benefit. I don’t want to be your mistress and I don’t think you’re facing how complicated things could get with a child in the midst of it all.’
Andreas pinned smouldering golden eyes of censure on her and proved that he was not listening. ‘This is about Campbell, isn’t it?’
Hope winced, for with that one question he fulfilled her every fear. ‘It’s not even me you want—’
‘What on earth is that supposed to mean?’
‘I think you just want to take me away from Ben to prove that you can do it. And, yes, you can do it. I’m no good at saying no to you…but that doesn’t mean I don’t know how dangerous you are to my peace of mind,’ she confessed gruffly.
Andreas dealt her a look of stark and savage impatience. ‘This is all nonsense. You fell into my arms…you came back to me—’
‘No…I had sex with you,’ Hope rephrased in a mortified undertone, her face reddening as she pushed out that contradiction.
Andreas studied her in angry disbelief. ‘Don’t be coarse—’
‘You had sex with me. Are you saying that meant anything special to you?’ Hope was striving not to look hopeful.
Put on the spot, Andreas refused to yield. His stubborn mouth firmed. ‘I’m not saying anything right now. It’s too soon.’
Unbearable sadness welled up inside Hope. ‘We don’t have any kind of a future.’
‘If that baby is mine, you’ll have a role to play in my life for years to come,’ Andreas pointed out impressively.
‘A backstage role that you define: a convenient mistress. I don’t want my baby to grow up and despise me. If there’s a chance that I could be the main event in some guy’s life…I want to be free to take that chance,’ Hope answered shakily. ‘And if I end up alone, so be it. I’ll take that risk.’
That was the definitive moment that Andreas appreciated that she had raised the stakes, changed the game, if game it was, and altered the rules without telling him. Either he offered her more or he walked away. He had never surrendered to blackmail in his life. Outrage slivered through him as he angled a brooding glance at the tumbled bed. Just two years ago Hope had been a clueless virgin. But this evening she had had rampant sex with him and then announced that she intended to keep her options open in case some other man presented her with a better deal. For some other man, read Ben Campbell, Andreas reflected in volcanic fury.
‘Please say you understand,’ Hope muttered tautly. ‘I want to try to be the best mother I can be—’
‘Naturally. If your child is mine, I’m willing to acknowledge the blood tie and accept a parental role.’ Andreas refused to think about how the advent of an illegitimate Nicolaidis heir or heiress would strike the more elderly of his conservative Greek family. ‘I will also cover all your expenses and settle money on both of you so that your future is secure. Those arrangements would be separate from any more intimate bonds we shared.’
Hope was very pale and her strained eyes lowered from his to hide her pain. ‘I’m not talking about money, Andreas.’
‘I didn’t suppose you were,’ he drawled flatly, his brilliant gaze cold and level, his handsome mouth set in a hard line. ‘But financial security is the most I intend to put on the table. I have no plans to marry you. Not now, not ever.’
She hadn’t been talking about marriage either. She had been hoping for some verbal acknowledgement of reconciliation between them and the hint that a degree of caring and commitment could exist in the future. But he was not even prepared to concede the possibility that over time something deeper might develop.
‘I wasn’t referring to marriage. There are options which go beyond mistress and don’t stretch as far as matrimony,’ Hope framed with weary dignity. ‘Please don’t be offended but I’m going to have to ask you to leave. I’m feeling incredibly tired and I’d like to lie down for a while.’
Belatedly noticing her pallor, Andreas descended from his icy tower of reserve at supersonic speed. Concern in his troubled gaze, he strode across the room. With careful hands he scooped her up and rested her down again gently on the bed. ‘Let me take you back to London with me. You don’t even need to get dressed. I could wrap a blanket round you,’ he heard himself suggesting.
‘Don’t fuss. I’m too tired to go anywhere,’ she muttered sleepily.
‘Theos…I think I should get a doctor to check you over,’ Andreas continued.
‘Don’t be daft. I’m only pregnant,’ she mumbled soothingly, heavy eyelids already drooping.
Andreas had always admired Hope’s robust good health. She was never sick. Any condition capable of flattening her to a bed before nine in the evening was the equivalent of a serious illness in Andreas’s book. She looked exhausted and the translucence of her skin lent her a disturbingly fragile air. Guilt threatened to swallow him alive. He tugged the bedding up over her and tucked her in as she slid over onto her side. He had subjected her to a great deal of stress. That had to stop right now.
He shouldn’t be throwing Ben Campbell up and upsetting her either. But had he been a substitute for Campbell in the bedroom this evening? he wondered rawly. Understandably, Campbell had backed off once he’d realised Hope was carrying Andreas’s child. That would have been a distinct turn-off for the other man. Was the fact that Andreas had been a substitute the reason why Hope had referred to their recent physical encounter as being just sex?
His mobile phone vibrated. He walked out to the landing and pulled across the door before answering it.
‘Where are you?’ Elyssa demanded stridently. ‘You’ve got to come and sort Finlay out!’
Andreas raised a wry ebony brow and said nothing. He had never made the mistake of interfering between his sister and her husband. Elyssa was volatile and could be quite a handful. Finlay might worship the ground his beautiful wife walked on but he was no pushover.
‘This is serious!’ his sister gasped and an uncharacteristic sob broke up her voice. ‘Finlay says he’s leaving me!’
Switching off his phone a couple of minutes later, a grim expression stamped on his darkly handsome features, Andreas strode back into the bedroom.
Hope’s feathery lashes fluttered up on drowsy turquoise eyes. ‘Sorry…did I drift off?’
‘Come back to London with me,’ Andreas urged forcefully. ‘I don’t like leaving you here alone.’
With a shake of her blonde head, she burrowed deeper into the pillow. Andreas adjusted the sheet again and resisted an almost overpowering need to just grab her up and stow her in the front of his car. His life had been so smooth when she had just done as he’d asked. Now everything was a battle and he hated it.
He needed an edge. He needed a country house, something Hope would take one look at and fall hopelessly in love with. Cue: listed building of historical interest, oak beams, walled garden, loads of bathrooms. At least it would be a good investment. He contacted a top city estate agent and passed on his requirements.
THE strident call of the phone wakened Hope the following day. In her dream she was wearing a billowing evening frock and drifting gracefully across a vast green lawn towards Andreas, who had never looked more like a movie star. Then all of a sudden