His eyes narrowed, for he did not like that hint of sarcasm in her soft English voice. He did not like it one bit. ‘I have come here to discuss your extraordinary claim.’
For a moment there was silence and Melissa knew that she could dance to his particular tune all evening. Both skirting around the inevitable with nothing being achieved except more and more layers of confusion. She looked into his amber eyes, knowing that she should probably feel cowed by his mighty presence in her humble home. Or slightly ashamed at the ease with which she had let him seduce her for a second time. But in truth she felt neither. Motherhood took as much from a woman as it gave—but what it infused you with more than anything was the urgent need to fight for what was your child’s right.
‘Except that it’s not so extraordinary now that you’ve seen him, is it?’ she questioned quietly.
Her cool challenge took him slightly off guard. ‘Meaning what, precisely?’
‘You can’t deny the eyes.’
‘The eyes?’
He’s deliberately misunderstanding me, thought Melissa despairingly. ‘I’ve never seen eyes that colour on anyone else but you.’
He gave a short and bitter laugh. ‘You might have trouble standing that up as a valid argument in a court of law!’
‘C-court of law?’
Sensing her sudden uncertainty, he struck. ‘Of course. You must surely have thought through the fact that this is not an ordinary paternity claim?’
‘I don’t…I don’t understand.’
‘Don’t you?’ Casimiro saw her bewilderment and felt a rush of triumph. Let her have something else to fill her head with other than thoughts of his memory loss! ‘Did you really imagine that you could approach a king…’ he paused, deliberately ‘…and announce that you had given birth to his son—and that he and all his people would rejoice at the news?’
‘I thought…I thought…’
‘What did you think, Melissa?’ ‘That you might be—’
‘What?’ he demanded. ‘Pleased? Delighted? The proud papa eager to introduce his offspring to the world?’
His cruel comments deflated her growing sense of defiance, but her mother-love could see nothing but joy in her little boy. ‘I thought that you would be pleased, yes—once the initial confusion had died down.’
‘Initial confusion?’ he echoed furiously. ‘Are you out of your mind? Do you have any idea what this is going to mean?’
She stared at him, remembering his initial assessment of his son. Is this how he always greets guests? How callous was that as a reaction—when confronted for the first time by the delicious little scrap which was Ben? And suddenly, Melissa thought that maybe no father was better than this father—because what child deserved a man who seemed incapable of any kind of real feeling?
‘It needn’t mean anything at all,’ she said fiercely. ‘You’re not happy about the news—fine! I’ve done my duty and told you—but we don’t need you, Casimiro. We’ve managed without you up until now and we can manage without you again. Your wish is about to come true. You can go away from here now and forget about what I’ve told you and we will never bother you again.’
A grim smile hardened his mouth. He waited—because she was playing the inevitable game of the successful negotiator: the long, long pause before naming terms. ‘So how much?’ he questioned softly.
‘How much?’
‘Do you want me to pay you?’
There was a moment when she really didn’t understand what he was talking about. When he might as well have been speaking in Greek. Until she saw the cynical golden gleam from his eyes and then she cottoned on, her heart lurching in her chest.
‘You think I’m blackmailing you?’
‘That’s a rather dramatic way of putting it, Melissa. I think that “buying your silence” is the generally more acceptable term in these circumstances.’
Acceptable? Acceptable? Melissa found herself remembering the old childhood rhyme: Sticks and stones can break your bones but words can never hurt you. Who were they kidding? Words like the ones Casimiro was firing at her felt like poisoned arrows firing straight into her heart. ‘You think that I want money from you?’
‘Well, don’t you?’ he questioned coolly, his gaze flicking around the room in a disparaging assessment. ‘I think that if I were in your position, I would.’
Suddenly Melissa saw her home through his eyes. The tired furniture, which no amount of bright cushions could disguise. The too-low ceilings and the windows which had obviously been low-budget when they’d been put there—but which now badly needed replacing. It was cheap. Everything in the place was on the cheap—which was why she was living here. But what would this cold-hearted beast of a man know about poverty?
‘I don’t want your money!’ she said proudly. ‘I don’t want anything from you!’
‘Well, we both know that’s a lie,’ he drawled. The amber eyes gleamed at her in provocative taunt and Melissa felt colour flaring in her cheeks. How base of him to allude to that frantic coupling back on Zaffirinthos—when she’d welcomed him into her body even though he clearly despised her and all she stood for.