A Baby on the Greek's Doorstep

‘You look ravishing,’ he murmured on the way out of the church, dark eyes sliding over the shapely silhouette that the elegant gown somehow accentuated, noting the way the fine silk defined the lush plumpness of her breasts and the full curve of her derrière, and more than a little surprised to realise that he was categorically aroused by the prospect of taking his bride to bed, even though he was furious with her for the choices she had made. Bad choices, wrong decisions, the sort of mistake he had to expect from someone as youthful and inexperienced in the world as she was, he reminded himself grimly.

‘Your parents are brilliant,’ she told him chirpily. ‘You lucked out there. Neither one of them asked me a single awkward question.’

‘Wait until you meet my three brothers, none of whom are known for their tact,’ Tor parried smoothly.

And the car swept them back to the enormous villa, where a throng far larger than Pixie had anticipated awaited them in a vast room with ornamental pillars that could only have been described as a modern ballroom. ‘You married someone who’s got a freaking ballroom!’ Denny gasped in her ear. ‘And his mother is still calling this affair “a very small do”!’

Possibly by Sarantos standards it was small, Pixie conceded as she was tugged inexorably into a receiving line to meet their guests and the long procession of names and faces quickly became a blur. Personal friends, business acquaintances, family friends and relatives. Tor’s three brothers were remarkably like him in looks. There truly was a very large number of people present and the only light moment of the experience for Pixie was when Isla appeared with her son and Alfie made a mad scramble out of her arms to reach his mother, smiling and chattering nonsense. Dressed in the cutest little miniature suit she had ever seen, Alfie was overjoyed at the reunion and it was a shock to her when, after giving her a hug, he twisted and held out his arms to greet Tor as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

Her baby boy was growing up and there was room in his little heart for a father now, and the immediacy of Tor’s charismatic smile and pleasure at that enthusiastic greeting from his son warmed Pixie as well. It was just at that moment that a tall dark man appeared in front of them and Tor froze, his grasp on Alfie tightening enough that the baby complained and squirmed in his hold.

‘Pixie, this is my half-brother, Sevastiano Cantarelli... I didn’t realise you were attending,’ he said flatly.

‘I was determined to drop in and offer my congratulations. I can’t stay for long,’ Sevastiano responded in his low-pitched drawl. ‘It means a lot to Papa.’

‘Yes, yes, it would,’ Tor acknowledged with a razor-edged smile as the other man moved on past, as keen to be gone, it seemed, as Tor was to see him go.

‘If you would simply tell your family the truth, you wouldn’t have been put in the position of having to entertain him,’ she whispered helplessly.

‘Don’t interfere in what you don’t understand!’ Tor countered with icy bite and she paled with hurt and surprise and looked away again, suddenly appreciating that she had spoken too freely on what was a controversial topic in Tor’s life. He might have spilled his guts the night they first met, but alcohol had powered those revelations, she reminded herself doggedly. His reaction now was a disquietingly harsh reminder that she was still an outsider, a virtual newcomer in Tor’s world, not someone who should have assumed that she had the right to wade in and offer an opinion on a matter that private and personal.

CHAPTER EIGHT

A PERFECTLY CATERED MEAL was served by uniformed staff. Speeches were made by some of Tor’s relatives and he translated them for her.

‘You’re very quiet,’ Tor murmured then. ‘I was rude earlier. I’m sorry.’

‘No, sometimes I have no filter and it was a sensitive subject.’

‘Let me explain,’ Tor urged, skating a fingertip across the back of her clenched fingers, letting her know that he knew that she was still as wound up as a clock by his rebuke. ‘For various reasons, Sev didn’t get to know our father until he had grown up and their relationship now means a lot to Hallas. My mother has become very fond of him as well. If I spoke up, it would tear them all apart. My father is a very moral man and he would feel he had to choose between his sons and exclude Sev. What good would that anguish and disappointment do any of us now?’

‘Your attitude is generous.’ Pixie was impressed by his unselfish, mature outlook while recognising the sense of family responsibility that he had allowed to trap him into silence. ‘But if your family had understood what you were really going through back then, they might have been able to offer you better support.’

‘All of that is behind me now,’ Tor insisted with impressive conviction. ‘Meeting you gave me something of a second chance.’

‘No, Alfie did that,’ Pixie contradicted without hesitation.

Tor gritted his teeth at that response but said nothing. Knowing that he was to blame for every low point in their relationship was a new experience for him and not one anyone could have said he enjoyed. His bride wasn’t in love with him, didn’t think he was the best thing ever to happen to her and didn’t even particularly crave what he could buy her either. His rational mind argued with that appraisal, reminding him that Katerina’s supposed love, which, ironically, he had never once doubted, had been an empty vessel. Love didn’t need to have anything to do with his marriage. And Pixie was naïve, honest though, loyal, everything Katerina had not been. For the very first time, he mulled over the truth that Katerina had lied to him and conducted an affair with another man that had begun even before their marriage. Three years of lies including Sofia’s birth, he reflected angrily, and even the anger was new because he was making comparisons and he saw now so clearly that his first marriage had been all wrong from the very outset.

So, this time around, Tor reflected grimly, he wasn’t compromising, he wasn’t making any allowances for misunderstandings or mistakes. He was going to be who he was, tough, and when it came to telling his wife that she had gone wrong he was going to grasp that hot iron and go for the burn.

* * *

‘Where are we going?’ Pixie questioned breathlessly some hours later as she climbed out of the car down at the small harbour. ‘And what about Alfie?’

‘Alfie and his nanny will join us tomorrow. We can manage one night without him...right?’ Tor arrowed up a questioning black brow as he bent down, curving an arm to her spine, and even in moonlight she felt the heat of embarrassment at being exposed as an overprotective mother.

As her gaze clashed in the moonlight with those stunning dark glittering eyes of his, her heart jumped inside her chest and her lower limbs turned liquid. His fierce attraction rocked her where she stood and almost instinctively she leant into him for support, literally mortified by the effect he could have on her because the feelings he inspired in her were so powerful and so far removed, she believed, from his reaction to her.

‘It would be cruel to lift Alfie out of his cot at this hour,’ she agreed, deliberately stepping back a few inches from him, striving to act cooler.

‘Especially after he was exhausted by his social whirl.’ Tor’s expressive mouth quirked as he recalled his son being passed around like a parcel between groups of cooing women during the reception. Alfie certainly wasn’t shy, and his unusual combination of golden curls and dark eyes attracted attention as much as his smiles and chuckles. ‘At least he wasn’t scared and shaken up like he was the day Jordan abandoned him,’ Tor completed, knowing he would never forget the sight of his son clawing his way up his mother’s body and clinging in the aftermath of an ordeal that had visibly traumatised him.

Pixie gasped a little in surprise as he bent and simply lifted her off her feet to lower her down into the launch tied up by the jetty. She winced at his words though, wishing he wouldn’t remind her of her brother’s lowest moment and worst mistake. ‘You still haven’t said where we’re going... You said I di

dn’t need to get changed and now I’m wearing a wedding dress in a boat.’

‘To board a much larger vessel,’ Tor sliced in, indicating the huge yacht anchored out in the bay and silhouetted against the starry night sky.

‘You own a yacht?’