She was trembling, her teeth chattering almost loud enough to hear. There was nothing he could possibly say that would take away her sense of betrayal. She should slap his face and leave, and never look him in the face again.
But their baby.
Her joints hurt with heartbreak, pain rushing through her veins, pounding a toxic rhythm. Her heart shut down, and she went numb. Whatever he’d done, he was still her baby’s father. She had to tell him.
“I’ll give you one minute,” she choked out.
Leonidas gestured toward the ballroom’s double doors. She followed him out of the glittering, glamorous ballroom, away from the curious crowd, into the deserted foyer of the New York mansion. Wordlessly, she followed him up the wide stone staircase, to the dark quiet of the hallway upstairs.
She felt like a ghost of the girl she’d been. As they climbed the staircase, she glanced up at his dark shadow, and felt sick inside.
Discovering she was pregnant earlier that day, she’d felt so alone, so scared. Her first thought had been that she couldn’t raise a child without him. But now, Daisy suddenly realized there was something even more terrifying than raising a baby alone.
Doing it with your worst enemy.
* * *
As Leonidas led Daisy past the security guards in the foyer, up the wide stone staircase of his New York mansion, his heart was beating oddly fast.
He glanced back at her.
Daisy looked so beautiful in the emerald green cocktail dress, with high heels showing off her slender legs. Her long honey-brown hair brushed against her shoulders, over the spaghetti straps, past the low-cut neckline which revealed full breasts, plumped up by the tight satin. Against his will, his eyes lingered there. Had her breasts always been so big? Just watching the sensuous way she moved her hand along the stone bannister, he imagined being the one she touched, and he stirred in spite of himself.
But her eyes were downcast, her dark lashes trembling angrily against her pale cheeks.
Leonidas wondered what she was thinking. It was strange. He’d never cared before about what his lovers might be thinking. And with Daisy, he’d always been able to read her feelings on her face.
Until now.
She glanced up at him, her lovely face carefully blank. She looked back down as they climbed the sweeping staircase.
This was not how Leonidas had hoped this evening would go.
Thinking about it at the office, he’d pictured Daisy being dazzled by his mansion, by the glitter and prestige of his guests, by his wealth and power. He’d convinced himself that she would be in a receptive frame of mind to learn the truth. That Daisy would be shocked, dismayed, even, to learn his identity, but she would swiftly forgive him. Because he was so obviously right.
Daisy loved her father. But she had to see that Patrick Cassidy had been a criminal, protecting his accomplice to the end, refusing to say who’d painted the fake Picasso. What else could Leonidas have done but have his lawyer press charges? Should he have paid millions for a painting he knew was fake, or allowed someone else to potentially be defrauded? He’d done the right thing.
Obviously Daisy didn’t see it that way. He had to help her see it from his perspective. Setting his jaw, he led her down the dark, empty upstairs hallway and pushed open the second door, switching on the bedroom light.
She stopped in the doorway, glaring at him.
He felt irritated at her accusatory gaze. Did she really think he’d brought her into his bedroom to seduce her? That he intended to simply toss her on the bed and cover her with kisses until the past was forgiven and forgotten?
If only!
Leonidas forced himself to take a deep breath. He kept his voice calm and reassuring, just the way Daisy had spoken when she’d held that abandoned puppy in the alley.
“I’m just bringing you in here to talk,” he said soothingly. “Where no one else can hear us.”
She flashed him another glance he couldn’t read, but came into the bedroom. He closed the door softly behind her.
His bedroom was Spartan, starkly decorated with a king-sized bed, walk-in closet and a lot of open space. Through a large window, he could see the orange and red leaves of the trees on the quiet lane outside, darkening in the twilight.
Standing near the closed door, Daisy wrapped her arms around herself as if for protection, and said in a low voice, “Did you know who I was? The day we met?”
He could not lie to her. “Yes.”
She lifted pale green eyes, swimming with tears. “Why did you seduce me? For a laugh? For revenge?”