Baby of Shame (11 page)

‘I was
there!
I witnessed every feminine trick and wile you played on me!’

‘I didn’t do anything!’ she protested.

He laughed, coarsely and derisively, leaning back in his chair, his meal totally abandoned now.

‘You left not one trick
unplayed
!’ His voice was excoriating.
‘The wide eyes, the breathy voice, the low-cut gown, the long blonde hair, the skin-tight dress.
All that eye contact and come-hither gazing you did over dinner. You asked to speak to me
privately
and came up to my suite without blinking! What the hell did you think you were going to do there? Present your business case? Quote me net present values and projected earnings? No, the only thing you were going to present me with was your body! Which you did—very lavishly—having first ensured you’d whetted my appetite for it to the maximum by spilling champagne over your breasts so that I could see them in their full glory. Then you came on to me like a—’

Her fist closed around her wine glass. She hurled the contents at him.

‘You
lying
bastard! It was
you!
You came on to me!
You—
’

She never finished. He was on his feet, towering over her across the table. The wine had splashed across his shirt-front, plastering it to his chest. His expression was savage. So
was
his voice and his words.

‘Don’t try and rewrite the truth!’ he snarled at her. ‘We both know what the truth is. You used me.
Calculatingly.
Deliberately.
For your own ends.’

She pushed her chair back, struggling to her feet. Her face was convulsed with fury.
Five long years of fury.

The crack of her hand across his cheek was like a pistol-shot. His head jerked back. His eyes were like twin satanic fires.
Burning with hellfire.

‘You
disgust
me!’ she hissed. ‘You dare to try and put the blame on me? The only,
only
reason I came to your suite was to try and get you to listen to my business case.
There was no other reason!
How dare you accuse me of anything else?’

His eyes flickered with that dark satanic light.

‘How dare I? Tell me, if you are so right and I am so wrong, how come you tumbled right down into my bed the way you did?’

Her eyes spat at him.

‘Because I was
stupid
.
Stupid and naive and…and…’ Her head sank. ‘Because I was stupid,’ she said again, her voice suddenly dull, and dead. She lifted her head again. It seemed as heavy as lead. Her whole body seemed as heavy as lead. What the hell was she doing, trying to justify herself to this man? She owed him nothing.
Nothing at all.
Her eyes rested on him. They were full of contempt and loathing.

‘It doesn’t matter whether you believe me or not. I only care about Nicky. He’s all I care about in the whole world.’

She stumbled away from the table, her legs jerky, her breathing like knives in her chest. She didn’t care. She had to get away—away. That was all.

He watched her go.
Adrenaline surging in his body.
He wanted to follow her and shake her until he had shaken the truth out of her—until she’d admitted what she’d done. But she was hardly able to make it to the door. Like a broken puppet with the strings cut.

When she had gone, leaving the door open, and he could hear her stumbling across the corridor that led to the bedrooms, he sat down heavily again. With a dark, vicious look on his face he reached for the wine bottle.

M
OONLIGHT
glimmered on the water. A chilly little wind played about his face. Wavelets lapped in the dark by his feet.

Alexis stared out over the sea, hands gripping the edge of the balustrade on the terrace. The boats of fishermen were dotted about, their lights luring the fish.

He was calm now.
Back under control.

But he had come very close to losing control completely.

It had been her defiance—her refusal to admit the truth about that night five long years ago. Insisting on her innocence—insisting she had never set out to exploit her sexual allure the way he
knew
she had. Oh, she had been skilful, all right—had he not had his illusions ripped from him in the morning he would have gone on being fooled by her.

Cold ran through him. He had come within a hair’s breadth of making an irreversible fool of himself over her. That morning, when he’d woken her with a kiss, her warm, soft sensuality had nearly persuaded him to abandon the business meeting in his diary and stay with her until his flight left at lunchtime.

He gave a harsh, self-mocking laugh.

Thee
mou
,
he’d been going to take her back to Greece with him! One night with her had been no way enough! He’d wanted far, far more than that.

How much more?

He stared out to sea.

That night had been something extraordinary, unique. She had been like no woman he had ever known.
Ardent, enraptured, giving herself to him so totally, so absolutely, that it had taken his breath away.

He had stood, he knew, on the shore of a sea, ready to plunge into its unknown depths and discover—

Discover something that had never existed for him before.

His palms clenched over the cold stone.

Instead he had discovered, in the
morning, that
he was simply a fool.

Manipulated by a woman for
her own
ends.

Just as his father had been.

Memory flickered in his mind. He put it from him, but it intruded again.

He saw it fresh in his mind’s eye.
Heard it.
Heard that crack like a pistol-shot, as clearly now as if the intervening decades had never been, as the palm of his father’s hand slashed across his mother’s face.

Heard the word that went with the pistol-shot.
At five he hadn’t known what it was, but now he knew.

‘Bitch!’

All he’d known then was the fear.
The terror.
And the rage—the rage that had made him
rush
to his father, battering at his legs.

‘Don’t hit my mummy! Don’t hit her!’

His father had put him aside. His mother hadn’t even looked at him. Instead she’d simply lifted her chin, ignoring her reddening cheek, and opened her leather handbag with a click of her manicured scarlet nails. She’d dropped the piece of paper his father had given her inside. Then she’d given a little smile. Not to him.
To his father.

‘Goodbye, Georgiou,’ she’d said. ‘Enjoy the boy. After all, you’ve paid enough for him.
Even though he isn’t yours.’

She’d walked away, shutting the door behind her with a click.

He’d watched her go. He hadn’t understood.

He’d turned to his father.

‘When is Mummy coming back?’

His father hadn’t answered. Alexis had looked up at his face and it had been like stone. Suddenly his father had looked down at him.

The expression in his face had terrified him.

It had been filled with hate.

‘Never.’

His voice had been hard. Like iron. Then he’d walked away as well.
Into another room.
Another click of the door.

His five-year-old self had stood still for quite some time.

After a while, a servant had come and led him away.

But his father had spoken the truth. He had never seen his mother again.

It was strange, he thought now, three decades later, how pain could live like memory—quite blotted out, yet instantly there once more, like memory recalled.

His hands clenched, every muscle in his body seizing as if in spasm. He kept staring out to sea.

The pain was his—but it would never, ever be his son’s.

Again that fierce protective surge went through him. He would protect his son from all that could hurt him.

Like an echo, he heard in his head the vehement vow his son’s mother had given—
Nicky is my life. I will keep him safe till my dying day. I will not let you be the cause of a single tear, a single moment of grief or loss, a single moment of fear for him!

She’d sounded so vehement, so convincing. But had it all been calculated, fake?

Can I trust her? Trust her to love Nicky the way she claims she does?

That was the question that went round and round in his head.

He went on staring out to sea, the cold lapping at him.

And as he stared he knew, finally, that he
had
to know.

Had to know whether
Rhianna
Davies loved his son.

There was only one way to find out.
Only one way to know the truth.

Rhianna
was having breakfast with Nicky out on the sunny terrace. She felt tired and drained after the ugliness of the scene the night before.
Yet another scene.
Yet another vicious exchange of venom and hatred.

Yet Nicky, blessedly, was unscarred.

She watched him diligently throwing breadcrumbs to the tiny sparrows that darted from the balustrade to the paved floor to pick them up. He was chattering happily about watching the helicopter land that morning with Karen.
Rhianna
listened with half an ear, nodding and responding as necessary. But there was
a heaviness
in her heart.

He mustn’t be hurt. Whatever happens—however foul Alexis Petrakis is to me, however hard I have to fight back against him—Nicky mustn’t be
hurt.

There were footsteps approaching, and she looked away from Nicky.

Alexis came out on the terrace.

Nicky’s face lit up.

‘Can we play?’ he asked immediately, starting to slide off his chair. ‘I’ve finished my breakfast, Mummy.’

Alexis came up to him. He ignored
Rhianna
.

He smiled down at his son.

‘What would you like to play first?’

‘Swimming!
Football! Sandcastles!’ responded Nicky at once,
then
added as a dutiful afterthought, ‘Please.’

Rhianna
saw Alexis laugh, his face lightening.

She felt something clench inside.

It was that different person again, she thought. The one Nicky saw—but never her.

Would you want to? Why should you? Alexis Petrakis is nothing to you—nothing except your enemy. Don’t crave smiles from him.

Not that she would get them. Alexis Petrakis directed only one thing at her.

Condemnation.

He was speaking again—to his son.

‘We can do them all—but first you need to put your swimming trunks on and get Karen to put your
sunblock
on.’

Nicky was off like a shot.

‘Don’t forget to brush your teeth,’
Rhianna
called out after him.

‘
Bleah
!’ cried Nicky, as he ran indoors to find his nanny.

Rhianna
brought her gaze back, to find that Alexis was looking down at her.

Her expression stilled, became impassive. He was going to say something vile, she could tell. But then, when did he ever say anything to her that was not vile?

‘If you have finished your breakfast too, I should like to speak to you.’

She eyed him stonily, saying nothing.

‘In my office,’ said Alexis.

Now what?
she
thought bitterly. What else is he going to throw at me? Threaten me with?

She steeled herself. Her only option was to fight—every inch of the way.

She got to her feet carefully. The pain in her lungs was easing day by day, but her muscles had tensed at the coming ordeal.

He led the way back inside, across the hall to a room she had never been into. As she followed, at her slower, halting pace, she
realised
why. It was his space. A sleek PC dominated a large desk. Alexis Petrakis was already behind it. A maroon leather folder lay on the surface of the desk in front of him.

A bad feeling started to pool inside her.

‘Sit down.’

His manner was different this morning, she thought. She didn’t know why, but it was. And there was something about it that made her feel very, very uneasy.

Impassively she lowered herself to the chair in front of the desk.

Was this deliberate intimidation?
she
wondered. Making her sit meekly while he
lorded
it behind his desk? Well, she would not be intimidated.
Must not be.

‘I have a proposition to put to you.’

His voice was inexpressive. So was his face. His eyes were shuttered.

He flicked open the folder. There was a document inside, and a piece of smaller paper on the top.

It was a
cheque
,
Rhianna
could see.

‘I am prepared,’ said Alexis Petrakis, in a voice devoid of emotion, ‘to hand over to you the sum of twenty million pounds. In exchange you will sign all custody rights to my son to me—in perpetuity. Doing so will make you a very rich woman.’ He paused. ‘As part of this exchange you will be available to Nicky, on demand, for as long as he wants you. However, there will be certain restrictions on your freedom of action. You will not be permitted to contact the press, you will not be permitted to lead a life that will cause embarrassment or distress to my
son,
and all your contact with him will be under supervision—either by myself or my nominee.

‘The sum of twenty million pounds will be held for you, in a high-yield investment portfolio, the interest from which will be yours to spend as you will, and the capital sum, compounded over the years, will become yours outright on Nicky’s majority. By this arrangement you will gain a highly luxurious lifestyle, with the expectation of a very generous fortune in fourteen years’ time, yet Nicky will be assured of the continued presence of his mother in his life, while he wants that.’

He paused again,
then
went on, his voice still completely businesslike, as though he were unveiling normal terms and conditions. ‘This document, which I have had flown here this morning, details the financial disposition I have just outlined. Feel free to peruse it carefully.’ His voice drained of expression even more. ‘In addition, I am prepared to issue this
cheque
, cashable immediately, as a gesture of good faith on my part, for your co-operation in this agreement. It is in the sum of two million pounds and is yours outright.
Right now.’

The obsidian eyes rested on her. Nothing showed in them whatsoever.

For one beat of a heart,
Rhianna
paused. Then, in a composed voice, she spoke.

‘May I see?’

Silently, he pushed the folder across to her. His face was like carved stone. Still nothing showed in his eyes.
Nothing at all.
And yet something was there. She could see.
Something.

But she did not know what.

Nor did she care.

She lifted the
cheque
, drawn on his personal account at a historic London private bank. She glanced at it,
then
set it aside. Then she picked up the document underneath, leafing through it.

Then she replaced it on the table. Put the
cheque
on top of it. She picked them both up again and, with jagged, violent movements, tore them into fragments, scattering them on the gleaming polished surface of the desk.

She got to her feet.

Slowly, succinctly, banking down every single sign of any emotion in her whatsoever, she spoke.

‘I will say this to you very clearly. So
that even
someone as vile as you can understand. My son is not for sale. Not—for—sale. And if you
ever
make such an attempt again, I will—’

She broke off. Emotion erupted within her.
Unstoppable.
Overpowering.
Hatred poured from her like a dark, black tide.

Forcibly she took a sharp, scything breath that cut her lungs like glass.

‘You are a monster,’ she breathed.
‘A sick, degenerate, disgusting monster.
There are no depths that you would not stoop to. It makes me ill to breathe the same air as you.’

She fumbled her way to the door, reaching for the handle blindly. But as she did there seemed to be a great, crushing heaviness bowing her down. So great she could not bear
it,
could not breathe.

Oh, God—that such a man should have fathered Nicky. Prepared to buy
his own
son from her. Thinking he was for sale.

That she would sell her son to him.

How can I bear it?
she
thought, the heaviness crushing her. How can I bear Nicky being near such a man? Being his son?

There was something thick in her lungs, in her throat.
Something that was choking her, filling up in her, trying to break out, spill over, escape.

But she mustn’t let it escape. Not here, not now, not in front of such a man.
Such a monster.
Who had fathered her son and now wanted to buy him.

Her hand closed around the handle, but she could not turn it.
Could not move.
Could only feel that choking, cracking feeling in her lungs, her throat.

She leant against the door panel, weakness convulsing through her, making her shake and tremble.

The first sob tore from her even as Alexis thrust back his chair, and hurried to her.