On the other hand, although he had denied it she was convinced that there had to be a time limit to the duration of his interest in her. He wasn’t going to stay with her for ever—she accepted that, of course she did! A normal marriage? What would Lysander know about normal? He led a life of extremes. Extreme wealth, extreme power, extreme privilege. His track record for long-lasting relationships was nonexistent. He changed women as other men changed their socks.
Right now, at this very moment, she could only count on one truth: Lysander wanted her in his bed, and when he wanted something—anything—he was used to getting it. Her walkout had genuinely shocked him, but she also suspected that the challenge her departure had presented had increased her desirability by a factor of ten. Once Lysander had accepted that his wealth did not influence her, he had probably just offered her what he guessed would most appeal to her. And that had been a normal marriage, she reflected ruefully. But sooner rather than later, he would get bored.
‘I’m not used to seeing you awake this early,’ Lysander murmured lazily, breaking into her troubled reverie.
Ophelia jumped and spun round in a defensive movement.
A vision of bronzed magnificence, Lysander pushed his lean muscular length up against the crumpled pillows and frowned at her. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing’s wrong. In fact—’ Ophelia pasted a big fake smile on her face ‘—I’ve got good news: I’m not pregnant!’
His strong bone structure clenched. ‘How do you know you’re not?’
‘The usual way. I don’t need a test to confirm it. So, isn’t that a major relief?’ Ophelia commented in the same bright voice, while she wondered why he wasn’t responding as she had expected.
In fact, Lysander was wondering much the same thing. Perhaps it was her attitude he found offensive, although that was possibly too strong a term. Inappropriate, that was the word he needed, he decided. He didn’t like the fact that she should be so delighted that she hadn’t conceived his child.
‘If you had discovered that you were carrying my baby, I would have been pleased about it.’
Astonished by that claim, Ophelia studied him in open disbelief. ‘I doubt that. Only a few weeks ago you said you hoped there would be no repercussions—’
‘And you’re celebrating the fact?’ Lysander broke in, his dark, deep drawl harsh in tone as he sprang out of bed.
‘Have you got a problem with that?’ Ophelia didn’t know why he was angry with her and she thought he was being very unfair. She had told him what she thought he wanted to hear and for some peculiar reason she was getting an aggressive response.
‘Yes, I have,’ Lysander said in Greek, hitting the button that opened the doors onto the terrace.
‘Say it in English,’ Ophelia snapped.
‘Theos…I don’t like your attitude!’ Lysander slung at her, throwing her a blistering look of censure from his stunning dark deep-set eyes.
‘You didn’t want a baby. You don’t want to be a father. You made that very clear to me. No woman in her right mind would want to fall pregnant by a guy like you!’ Ophelia shouted back at him, tears prickling her eyes, stark bewilderment attacking her as she saw the anger he couldn’t hide.
She slammed the bathroom door so hard behind her that even Lysander flinched.
He swore under his breath and paid no heed whatsoever to the spectacular sunrise colouring the early morning sky. He drove long, impatient fingers through his sleep-tousled black hair. He couldn’t explain why he felt as he did. She was right: he had never had any desire to become a father. Yet when she had told him she wasn’t pregnant, he had experienced a stab of regret rather than relief.
Somehow he had grown accustomed to the possibility that Ophelia might already be carrying his child. It had not seemed so unlikely a result to Lysander. After all, they were both young and healthy. Recent events had made him gradually reassess his reservations about fatherhood.
Yes, his birth father had been a violent man. But why should he worry that he might have inherited that fatal flaw, when he was an adult who had long since proven his ability to control his temper? No doubt if he put his mind to it, he could be a great father. He might have no impressive example to follow in the role, but he certainly knew what not to do with a child. He was an intelligent man and adaptable. Life by its very nature was a process of constant change, Lysander reminded himself squarely. His broad shoulders lifted and settled in an easy shrug, his tension slowly ebbing away, until it occurred to him that Ophelia might be less keen on his change of heart.
Ophelia was walking along the beach barefoot when Lysander appeared. The minute she saw him heading down the wooded slope towards her she fell still. Seeing him angry had unnerved her, because cool logic was the very core of his character. Wrenched from her contentment and made to feel insecure, she felt furious, bewildered and scared because she didn’t understand why he was so annoyed with her. But none of those emotions prevented her from reacting to his approach with a dry mouth and a fast-beating heart. Casually clad in trousers and a striped silver-and-white shirt that hung loose, Lysander was strikingly handsome.
Lysander saw the anxiety she couldn’t hide and an unsettling feeling nibbled down his spine. He didn’t recognise what it was and he didn’t like it, but he did recognise that it was his responsibility to take care of her and that he did not appear to be doing a very good job.
He shifted shapely hands in a soothing motion that was new to him. ‘I got used to the idea that you might be pregnant and I came round to it.’
Ophelia folded defensive arms. She felt as though, once again, she was being wrong-footed by his having switched sides without warning her. She was also furious that she had made the mistake of telling him what she thought he wanted to hear rather than what she truly felt. ‘How did that happen?’
Lysander rested metallic-bronze eyes on her. ‘I don’t know.’ A shrug was added for extra emphasis. ‘I really don’t know. It just happened.’
‘But you must know! I mean, you were so against it.’
Lysander stared moodily out to sea and shrugged again.
The silence dragged and dragged.
‘You know, sometimes I feel like I need to take a tin-opener to you to get words out of you!’ she exclaimed in frustration.
‘Maybe when…’ Lysander ground to a halt, bold chiselled profile clenched hard in the sunlight ‘…maybe I was concerned that I might take after my birth father and be an inadequate parent.’
Ophelia was so stunned by that amazing admission of potential imperfection and self-doubt that she didn’t know what to say. ‘Oh…’
‘But I only took the time to think about that aspect after I married you. Now I feel confident that I could meet the challenge.’ Lysander expelled his breath in a slow hiss. ‘Although I don’t know how you feel because I never asked you…’
Ophelia hunched her shoulders and studied her feet, bare pink toes digging into the soft sand. She was still in a daze. ‘I—’
‘I would like a child with you.’
Ophelia blinked once and then a
gain, and then looked up. Lysander was watching her intently and for once in her life she couldn’t find words. She was simply bowled over that he should want to have a family with her, for a child struck her as the ultimate commitment. Yet he was a male famed for his aversion to anything that would tie him down. For the first time she honestly believed that her marriage had a proper future and that her husband regarded her as something other than a novelty.
‘Me too,’ she framed inelegantly, her throat thickening.
His ebony brows pleated. ‘But you were delighted that you hadn’t conceived—’
‘Only because I thought you didn’t want a baby.’
His brilliant gaze narrowed. ‘It seems that I shouldn’t believe everything you tell me, hara mou.’
‘Cuts both ways,’ she fenced. ‘You’ve jumped ship too.’
Lysander hauled her slight body close with enthusiasm. She curved into him as faithfully as his skin. ‘Next month I’m throwing a party in London to introduce you to my friends.’
‘London?’ Unwittingly, her eyes shone like stars. ‘So I’ll be able to travel from there to Madrigal Court and get back to my garden.’
‘You miss it?’
Ophelia gave him a guilty nod. ‘It’s so beautiful here and the weather is wonderful and I’m happy, really I am, but—’
‘You’re homesick.’ Lysander required no crystal ball to work that out. Listening in on the rather one-sided chats she’d enjoyed with Haddock the parrot on the phone several times a week had proved informative, and she also checked with the horticulturist he had hired on the progress of her garden even more frequently. She seemed to have a personal acquaintance with every single plant she grew. He might have taken her away from Madrigal Court, but her heart and her spirit still lived there.
‘Maybe just a little.’