One Night...Nine-Month Scandal

‘Open them and look.’ Alekos gently spilled the parcels onto the bed and Kelly stared at the assortment of packages in disbelief.

‘There are loads of them. I’m having one baby, not sextuplets.’

‘I went shopping a couple of times when I flew to Athens.’ Looking distinctly uncomfortable, he undid another button on his shirt. ‘It’s possible I may have got a little carried away.’

Touched that he’d thought about the baby during his hideously busy working day, and feeling more and more guilty that she’d misjudged him so badly, Kelly lifted the first parcel, which was large and extremely squashy. Ripping off the paper, she pulled out a huge brown bear sporting a red ribbon. ‘Oh. It’s gorgeous.’

‘I thought if I bought one with a blue ribbon you’d be angry with me for assuming the baby was going to be a boy, and if I’d bought a pink ribbon and the baby was a boy then we would have had to change the ribbon…’ His voice tailed off as he watched her face. ‘So I thought red was best. Is it OK?’

Kelly, who had never before considered the purchase of a child’s toy to involve a complex decision-making process—certainly not for a man who made decisions involving tens of millions of dollars every day—was stunned by the agonies he’d clearly endured in making his choice. ‘It’s really lovely. Perfect.’ Noticing that the label said ‘not suitable for children under eighteen months’, she tucked it under the red ribbon so that he wouldn’t see it, and made a mental note to position the bear in a strategic point in the nursery where the baby could see but not touch. ‘I know the baby will love it.’

She opened the next parcel and found another bear, identical to the first. Bemused, but extra-careful not to hurt his feelings, she smiled brightly. ‘Another one. That’s—great. Fantastic.’ What was he thinking? A bear for every day of the week?

‘You’re thinking I’ve gone mad.’

‘I’m not thinking that,’ Kelly lied, and Alekos gently removed the bear from her grasp and stared down at it, a strange look in his eyes.

‘My bear was the one constant in my life when I was little,’ he said huskily. ‘No matter how up and down my life, my b

ear was always there. I slept with him every night. And then one day I lost it. I took it to my grandmother’s, left it in the back of a taxi and never saw it again. I was devastated.’ He lifted his head and gave her a mocking smile. ‘Tell that to the press and you’ll ruin my reputation for good.’

Hot tears scalded her eyes as she thought of the little boy losing his beloved bear. ‘I—I’d never tell that to anyone,’ she stammered, a lump in her throat. ‘But couldn’t you have got it back? Couldn’t they have just phoned the taxi firm?’

‘No one thought it was important enough.’ Alekos handed the bear back to her carefully. ‘I wanted our baby to have two identical bears, just in case. A spare is always useful. Maybe you can put one in a drawer or something. Then, if we have a crisis, we can sneak the other one into its place and avoid all that heartbreak.’

‘OK, we’ll do that.’ The tears spilled down her cheeks, and Alekos looked at her in horror.

‘Why are you crying? What have I done? Too many bears—not enough bears?’

‘It isn’t the bear,’ she sobbed. ‘I love the bears. Both of them. It’s the fact that you had to go to sleep without it. I keep thinking about you, just six years old having to choose between your mum and dad, and it’s just vile and hideous; it’s no wonder you’re a bit screwed up about things.’ Tears smeared her face and Alekos muttered something in Greek.

‘You’re crying over something that happened to me twenty-eight years ago?’

‘Yes.’ Kelly scrubbed her hand over her cheeks and tried to pull herself together. ‘I think being pregnant might be making me a little bit emotional.’

‘Very possibly,’ Alekos said faintly, handing her a tissue. ‘Just a little bit. I was worried I’d made a mistake with the bears.’

‘The bears are beautiful.’ She blew her nose hard. ‘Both of them. And having a spare is a completely brilliant idea. I feel really bad now that I accused you of denying the baby when you’d already bought all that stuff. I want to make it up to you. I’m sorry I’m crying; I’m just so tired and I feel bad.’

‘You have nothing to feel bad about,’ he said softly, removing her tears with his thumb. ‘I know I’m not good at this. And it’s not surprising you’re tired after last night. I upset you badly. I know I’m doing it all wrong, but I am trying, agape mou.’

‘I know. What else have you bought?’ It was an agonisingly tender moment and Kelly opened the other parcels one by one, touched by the variety of things he’d purchased. There were more toys, clothes in neutral colours and books in both Greek and English.

‘I thought he ought to learn both languages.’ Alekos watched her face as she unwrapped parcel after parcel. ‘I want him to know that he is Greek.’

‘She.’ Kelly emphasised the word carefully as she stacked the books that undoubtedly wouldn’t be read until the child was at least four. She grabbed another tissue and blew her nose hard, not even wanting to think about how she must look. ‘She will also be half-English.’

‘It is going to be a boy, I know it.’

‘Even you can’t dictate the sex of the child.’ But Kelly was incredibly touched by the gifts. Most of them were completely inappropriate for a newborn, but it was the thought. ‘They’re all lovely, Alekos.’

‘Good. So, now I have proved to you that I’m thinking of the baby, and you have explained to me that you weren’t flirting, so everyone is happy.’ Dragging his eyes away from her bare shoulders, Alekos sprang from the bed and strolled towards the bathroom. ‘And now I’m going to take a long, cold shower because, while I agree with the theory of separate bedrooms, I am finding the reality rather hard to sustain. I’ll meet you on the terrace for breakfast once I have given myself frostbite.’

Chapter Eight

KELLY stood with her hand on the door to the bathroom, listening to the sound of water running.

Raising her eyes to the ceiling, she gave herself a lecture. What was wrong with her? Whether they had sex or not wasn’t going to have an adverse effect on how this relationship progressed. In fact, she was fast coming to the conclusion that the opposite was true: abstaining made it hard to think about anything but sex. It was like giving up chocolate: the moment you knew you couldn’t have it, it became impossible to think of anything else.