Пиппа Роско – Claimed For The Greek's Child (страница 7)
As Mary reluctantly lay down on the sofa, Anna stuck her head over the bannisters. He raised a hand to stop her from coming further down the stairs, knowing that her reappearance would spark another round from the woman on the sofa.
Anna’s eyes were sad as she mouthed the words ‘thank you’ to him and disappeared. And just for a moment he felt sorry for her. Because she had no idea what was about to happen.
He waited until Mary Moore fell into a comfortably drunk sleep and pulled out his mobile. David answered on the second ring.
‘I need you to do a couple of things for me. I need indefinite management cover for the bed and breakfast and a list of rehab clinics as far away from this village as humanly possible, and I need both by ten a.m. tomorrow.’
‘Sure thing. Anything else?’
‘Yes. Tell Flora to get the house prepared for anything a two-year-old might need. And after that, I want you to start working on a watertight prenup.’
ANNA FLIPPED OUT the bed sheet, the whipping sound it made before it settled over the mattress making her wince. She was exhausted, having barely slept the night before. Every time she’d closed her eyes she’d seen Dimitri standing between her and Amalia as if it were a prophecy foretelling how she would, from now on, see her daughter—at a distance and with him separating them. If not that, then she’d been tortured by the memories of her own pleasure as Dimitri had teased orgasm after orgasm from her innocent body.
But when she woke, all she could think of was her mother. It had been years since Mary had turned up at the bed and breakfast that far out of control. A twinge cramped her stomach. This hadn’t been the life she’d wanted. Once she’d dreamed of escaping the small village, whose inhabitants had been hostile towards them from the moment Mary had been forced to raise her child alone. Anna had fantasised about studying art and sculpture, perhaps even at the University of Glasgow. It had been a hope that she’d cherished as she’d worked at the bed and breakfast saving every penny she made to put towards tuition fees. That Anna had somehow managed to follow in her mother’s footsteps—becoming, instead, another single mother—had sealed their fate. Undesirable. Unwanted. The cautionary tale that locals told their children. And what a cautionary tale it was. Only the masochistic would want Dimitri Kyriakou arriving on their doorstep to claim what he felt he was owed.
By the time the sun had peeked around her curtain that morning, she’d realised she needed a plan. She needed to take back the control that was slipping through her fingers like hot sand.
This was the last of the rooms that needed cleaning after the hasty departure of her guests the night before. If she was lucky, she’d be able to pull some new clients from the horse racing meeting in Dublin in a few days’ time.
Thankfully her mother had left before Anna had brought Amalia down for breakfast. It was the one showdown she hadn’t been prepared for. Where her mother was concerned, Anna realised that she no longer had any defences left. How could her mother have done that, knowing Amalia was in the house? Clearly all the talk of rehab—the apparent reason she’d taken the money from Dimitri in the first place—was a... Anna wasn’t ready to call it a lie, more of a thin spider’s web of fiction that broke under the weight of addiction.
Rehab had been a mythical promise she’d heard over and over again throughout the years. A place the woman wearing her mother’s skin would go, and upon her return would be her real mother gifted back to her. The mother who had once been a bright, powerful, creative woman with a deep well of love to give and not enough pools in which to store it. But her mother was one problem. Dimitri was another.
There were a hundred different ways she’d imagined their reunion, and not one of them came remotely close to what had happened the night before. Recalling the night they’d spent together three years before, she realised that she’d been wearing her mother’s shirt—the one with the name Mary Moore sewn onto the pocket. And, with her mother’s record, would
She felt, rather than heard, a presence behind her. Siobhan was downstairs with Amalia, so there was only one person it could be. Only one person had ever had that effect on her body. It had been the same way the first time she’d laid eyes on him. A feeling that the world had ever so slightly tilted on its axis, a feeling that nothing would ever be the same again. It started on her forearms, as if she were held there between powerful hands, raising the hairs beneath the imaginary touch. It licked up her spine and across her neck. And then Anna cursed herself for being fanciful.
‘What are you doing?’ Dimitri asked, sounding as sleep-deprived as she.
‘Preparing the rooms. I may get some walk-ins later. The weather is good, and the races are on...’ She trailed off, knowing that she had to address what had happened with her mother. ‘About last night—’
‘Does she live here?’
‘My mother? No.’ Anna shook her head vehemently, instantly understanding his concern. ‘No. It’s been years since she turned up here like that.’
‘Who else do you employ here?’ It wasn’t perhaps the question she’d expected. She’d imagined Dimitri would haul her over the coals for her mother’s appearance. Anna was still trying to gather her thoughts from the breakneck speed of his inquisition. She still hadn’t turned to face him. She needed just a moment more to gather her strength.
‘Siobhan helps out when we’re at capacity. Which we would have been today, had not all my customers been removed to a hotel in Dublin.’ With this she finally turned to take in the broad expanse of the man who had no damn right to look that good after a night in the smallest room she had.
Instantly regretting it, she turned back to the room, picked up the cleaning basket and made her way into the en suite bathroom. She put on the rubber gloves and spread a healthy squirt of bleach on the scrubber as if she could clean away either the sight of him or him completely.
She got onto her knees, realising that this was perhaps the most ridiculous way to have a conversation, but, needing something to do with her hands other than throttle the man behind her, she pushed on.
‘I’ve been thinking, and I would like you to have a relationship with my—
There. She had managed to get the words from her mind to her mouth without crying, or sounding weak. She needed him to agree to this.
* * *
For a moment, just as he had done the night before, he felt almost sorry for her. She had no idea that her life was about to change irrevocably. But from the first time he’d heard of his daughter, Dimitri knew that he wouldn’t settle for visitation rights. He wanted his daughter with him. All the time.
He was man enough to admit that the knowledge that he currently didn’t have any legal rights to his child was nothing short of terrifying. The fear that had gripped him in those first moments of this shocking discovery had been nothing like anything he’d ever experienced.
‘I don’t want you to miss out on things,’ Anna was saying as she furiously scrubbed at the toilet, before picking herself up off the floor and turning—still with her back to him—to the sink.
‘You don’t want me missing...’ His sentence trailed off as incredulity hit him hard. ‘What, like the first sonogram? The first sound of my daughter’s heartbeat? Tell me, Anna,’ he said, reaching out to pull her around to him, so that he could look her in the eyes, so he could see the truth written there in them when she answered his next question. ‘Does my daughter even know the word
He regretted touching her the moment his fingers hit the bare skin of her arm beneath her short T-shirt. He tried to ignore the flames that licked out at him from just one touch; he tried to ignore the rush of memories he’d held at bay for the last two days. He had to. Instead, he focused on the mounting horror in Anna’s eyes.
‘What? Did you think I wouldn’t have wanted to be part of those things?