The Greek's Unknown Bride

For a second her heart palpitated. Maybe he’d come after her? Maybe one night hadn’t been enough?

He paused for a moment and then he said, ‘Because a month after that night, you came to my offices in London and you told me that you were pregnant with my child.’

Sasha stood up slowly, there was a roaring sound in her ears and she had to shake her head to clear it. ‘I’m sorry... I what?’

He spoke slowly. ‘You told me that you were pregnant with my child.’

CHAPTER FIVE

THE WORD SANK into Sasha’s head but didn’t make sense. Pregnant. She put a hand to her belly but it was flat. Something occurred to her and she felt her blood drain south. The glass fell out of nerveless fingers but she barely noticed Apollo stride forward to pick it up and take her arm, pushing her gently back into the chair.

She looked up at him. ‘Did I lose it?’

How could she not know if she’d lost her own baby? Was that why Apollo hated her? For losing their baby?

Both hands were on her belly now as if that could help her to remember something so huge...so cataclysmic.

But Apollo was shaking his head. ‘No. You didn’t lose it, because you were never pregnant in the first place. You deliberately lied about bein

g pregnant to get me to marry you, Sasha.’

She hadn’t been pregnant.

In the midst of the relief that she hadn’t forgotten such a seismic event, Apollo’s words sank in.

‘You deliberately lied. To get me to marry you.’

Sasha’s first reaction was denial. Rejection. She shook her head. ‘No... I wouldn’t have said that. I couldn’t have done something like that...’

‘But you did,’ Apollo countered curtly.

She was glad she was sitting down because she was pretty sure she would have collapsed otherwise. ‘I... I told you I was pregnant. But I wasn’t?’

He nodded. His face was impossibly grim.

She tried to make sense of it all, and also the gut-wrenching knowledge that he hadn’t come after her, because she’d been the one to go to him in the end. ‘But why would I do such a thing?’

His mouth went thin. ‘You really have to ask that question? We slept together and you saw an opportunity.’

He indicated with a hand. ‘Look around you. You hungered for a better life and you were going to use me to get it.’

A moment ago Sasha had felt as if her legs wouldn’t support her but now she stood again, too agitated to keep sitting. She paced back and forth. ‘But that’s...’ She stopped. ‘That’s an awful thing to do.’

‘Yes, it is,’ he agreed.

She struggled to recall any hint of what might have led her to do such a drastic thing but her mind stayed annoyingly blank.

‘Maybe I believed I was pregnant? Did we...use protection?’

His whole body bristled. ‘Of course. I would never be so lax. But I will admit that I didn’t check afterwards. There’s always a possibility of failure and you capitalised on that, sowing the seed of doubt in my mind.’

‘But how were you so sure I’d lied about the pregnancy?’

‘I had my suspicions when you showed no signs of pregnancy and then after an...incident you admitted it was a lie.’

‘An incident...?’

He nodded and paced away from her, turned back. ‘I was in London on business and came back after a panicked call from Rhea. You were hosting a party with some new-found friends.’