Pollyanna and the Greek Billionaire (Innocent and Betrayed, Part 2) (7 page)

“Thank you,” she said, thinking ruefully that Kyr and the other two were so much alike they could pass as triplets. More than the fact that they were all handsome, powerful, Greek alpha men with more money than they needed, they were also emotionally guarded, bordering on paranoid. She could count in one hand the number of times she had seen a smiling photo of any of the three on the Internet.

“Are you throwing a private party then?” Damen asked.

“Yes, but you’re not invited.”
 

“Kyr!” Pollyanna shook her head in dismay.

Ignoring his wife’s protest, Kyr picked up Dio and dumped him on Damen’s lap, doing the same to Ella for Stavros. Then he stepped back. “Starting now, you two are officially on babysitting duty.”

Damen’s jaw dropped while Stavros gaped in sheer disbelief.

“Our nanny’s down with a flu, but I’m sure you wouldn’t want us to cancel our celebration because of that. Right?” But he didn’t bother waiting for an answer. Pulling his wife to his side, he walked towards the doors, warning his children over his shoulder, “Be good.”

“Yes, Papa,” Dio and Ella said obediently, but they were also giggling, as if they had been instructed with a secret mission to give their godfathers hell once their parents left.

Kyr whisked his wife away amidst her faint protests, and together with his sad-looking cake, he took her hand and told her they were heading to their yacht.
 

The question in her eyes was also easy to interpret, and he answered with a smirk, “Just the two of us. I wouldn’t want anyone to know how hot you are for my body.”

She turned red, even as she lied in protest, “I’m not!”

But then he gave her a smoldering look under hooded lids. Her knees knocked against each other, and she found herself clutching his arm tightly to keep her balance.

He laughed. “Case closed,
psaraki
.”

“I hate you,” she mumbled.

“You hate me probably as much as you love that I’m yours.” Even though he was clearly taunting her, the seductive note in his voice still had her feeling hot and bothered. Releasing her hand, he tipped her chin up.
“Ne?”

“Ne,” she agreed glumly, but it was hard to stay miserable when her husband’s sexy dark laughter played in the night like an invisible caress on her body.

Holding her hand again as they resumed walking, he asked her how her day had been while he had been slaving away in the kitchen because of his wife’s cruel demands.

“Cruel?” she couldn’t help scoffing.

He nodded emphatically, just because he had a lot of fun provoking his wife.

“I’m cruel?”
Shaking her head at her husband’s sheer gall, Pollyanna muttered, “You’re the one who’s cruel, forcing me to study French.”

His lips compressed. Well, that
had
been cruel, considering how much his wife hated studying. But he had persuaded her to do so, telling her that it was one way they could still have adult conversations around the twins, who were at an age that they already understood most of what was being said around them, either in Greek or English.

Polly spied the look on her husband’s face and cried out, “See! I knew it! You
are
cruel!”

“You can’t deny having a third language helps—”

“But it didn’t have to be French,” she accused him.
 

Ah, God. He did his best to control his mirth.

“You know it’s
super
hard—”

This time, Kyr could no longer help it, his laughter escaping him. “
Super
hard,
psaraki?
Truly?”

She realized then how childlike she had sounded, and the color in her cheeks deepened. “It just slipped. Stop laughing. Seriously, it’s not funny.” Deciding to change the subject, she said quickly, “Do you know the twins and I visited my godparents today?”

And just like that, he had no desire to laugh at all. But because he knew it would look suspicious, Kyr managed to keep his smile in place as he said blandly, “No, I didn’t.”

She hesitated. “You’re not still mad at them, are you?” Even though her godparents and husband were always civil to each other, there was no denying that nothing had really changed between them either.

He ignored the question, saying, “Did the twins have fun at the farm?”

Accepting with a private sigh that it
still
wasn’t time to ask what had gone wrong between them, Pollyanna answered, “Yes, they did. They always do, and this time more so because Nono taught them how to plant tulips in the greenhouse.” She paused. “Things got a little awkward though, when I saw Nona crying in her bedroom. I didn’t mean to, but…” She bit her lip.

Her shamefaced look made his gaze narrow. “Spill it, psaraki.”

“She didn’t want to tell me what was wrong, but when she left to join the twins outside, I couldn’t help it.” She paused, then added in a small voice, “There was a letter on her bed, and I just wanted to see what was in it that made her cry.”

Tension coiled inside his body, and he knew right away what it was about. He started to tell her he no longer wanted to hear anything, but it was too late.

“It’s her daughter,” Pollyanna whispered. “Or I think it is because they do have the same last name, and well…the letter said Nona’s daughter is getting divorced.”

Chapter Seven

For the twins, a preschool designed to meet international standards had been built on the island, and Kyr had taken on the responsibility of driving them to and from school. Normally, Dio would be the first one to leave his side upon reaching school, but today was different. Ella was the first one to kiss her father goodbye and skip into class while Dio stayed behind, a visibly troubled look on his face, and with his hands clasped behind his back, the young boy looked too much like a brooding miniature of Kyr, it was uncanny.

Crouching down, he asked, “Is anything wrong?”

His son didn’t speak right away.

“I can’t help you if you don’t let me know what’s wrong,” he said gently.

Dio chewed on his lip before saying reluctantly, “I saw Mama crying in the bathroom.”

Ah.

“I don’t like seeing Mama sad,” the boy added fiercely, his gaze bright with tears.

Kyr patted his son’s head. “I understand. I don’t like seeing Mama sad, too.” But the problem was, he knew the reason behind his wife’s sadness…and it was him.

Looking into his son’s eyes, he said seriously, “I’ll do my best to cheer her up when I get back home.”

Dio frowned, as if not entirely trusting his father was up to the task. “Promise?”

He almost smiled. “Promise.”

“Okay.” Dio’s reluctance was obvious in his tone, and watching his son enter the school’s premises, he knew by the way Dio still had his head bowed that the matter hadn’t been completely settled in his mind.

Returning to the limousine, he surprised his chauffeur by telling him to drive home instead of the resort. Settling back in his seat, Kyr closed his eyes, unable to stop himself from thinking back on the months that had gone past.
 

Several months had passed since her birthday, and he knew now that he had not been as successful as he thought he had in hiding his emotions from her.

She might not have known why he had changed, but she had noticed that he had changed.

And it started
, he thought heavily, the night of her birthday, when she had told him about Ana’s divorce.

That night, he had made love to her almost mechanically, arousing both of them with practiced ease, but Kyr had known his heart hadn’t been in it. He had hated himself for it, but he hadn’t been able to stop it.
 

Ana was getting a divorce.

The words had repeated over and over in his mind, and he had lain awake that night, thinking about a thousand what-if scenarios. They varied a lot, from Ana crying on his shoulder, to him pretending to bump into her in Beverly Hills. But one thing that all those scenarios had in common was that if he did anything to contact Ana, it would break his wife’s heart.

Even if he only wanted to talk to his ex, even if he would never betray Polly, he knew that his wife would never understand, and a part of him started to resent her for it.
 

The more rumors he heard about Ana’s controversial divorce spread, the more he wanted to talk to Ana, and the more he began to hate the shackles of marriage.

But of course he hadn’t told Pollyanna anything about it, because even he himself knew that he was being unfair.

When he came back home, panic stirred inside him when the butler told Kyr that his wife was not at home.

“And where is she?” It took everything in Kyr to keep his voice even.
If his wife had left him,
he thought,
what would he do?
 

Then he heard the butler say, “She is visiting her godparents, Master Kyr.”

“I see.” Relief had him swinging almost clumsily around as he sought to hide his expression from the other man.
She had not left him.
Kyr sucked his breath in.
But she could still leave him, if he didn’t make it up to her.

When he made it to the Floros, Ezio was waiting for him at the porch. “She’s at the greenhouse with the wife.”

He nodded stiffly and remained there, knowing that the older man had not waited for him for nothing.

“She was crying,” Ezio said finally.

“I’ll make it up to her.”

“Does it have anything to do with our daughter?”

He didn’t answer.

“You should tell her the truth before she finds out any other way,” Ezio warned quietly. “I know none of the locals will talk. They owe their livelihoods to you, and certainly we would never want to hurt her for anything.
But
secrets like this…they always end up exposed, sooner or later.”

He knew Ezio meant well, but Kyr also knew he would not be able to follow the older man’s advice. Pollyanna was just too sensitive. She would never understand, and he would never risk their marriage for anything.

When he entered the greenhouse, Dinah was the first one to see her and she automatically excused herself. He thanked her quietly, but his eyes were on his wife, and he didn’t miss the way she had flinched at the sound of his voice.

Ah, psaraki.

I’m sorry.

When he came to stand behind her, Pollyanna’s shoulders had already started to shake, and when he said rawly, “I’m sorry,” the way she audibly struggled to keep the sound of her sobs from escaping filled the greenhouse.

She moved as if to leave him, and he didn’t let her, hauling her to him. He tightened his arms around her, and he kissed her hair, saying hoarsely, “I’m sorry.”
 

She cried in his arms, shaking her head fiercely when he tried to make her face him.

“I’m sorry.”
 

“Tell me what’s wrong,” she sobbed, “what I did—”

“You didn’t do anything,” he said fiercely.

Then why had he changed,
Pollyanna wanted to cry out. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew something was wrong. He hadn’t cheated on her, somehow she was sure of that.
 

But something
was
wrong.

She just couldn’t make herself ask, feeling too relieved to have him back, terrified to lose him again.

This time, when her husband tried to turn her to face him, she let him, and the moment she saw his beautiful face, she started to cry again. It felt like it had been forever since she had seen that light in his eyes, and she knew that whatever had changed her husband, he was back, and he loved her again.

And maybe it was fate, maybe it was coincidence, but that night Kyr and Pollyanna conceived their third child.

The discovery left her shell shocked, but Kyr welcomed the news. For him, it felt like a message from God, telling him that he could start anew with his wife.

But when they emerged from the clinic, he had taken one look at his wife and knew also that some things didn’t change. The knowledge that she was expecting seemed to have flipped a switch inside Pollyanna, and her sunny nature disappeared with it.