Greek Tycoon, Inexperienced Mistress

‘Nobody’s going to threaten you,’ another voice cut in, with rasping bite.

Atreus and Lindy swung round. Sergei Antonovich was poised several feet away. ‘Alissa has been worried about you and it seems she had good cause.’

When he saw the other man, Atreus became so tense he might have been chipped out of solid granite. ‘Sergei,’ he acknowledged grittily. ‘I appreciate your concern, but we don’t need an audience right now.’

The Russian tycoon sent Lindy a questioning glance. ‘If legal advice is required, you will have full access to any assistance you need.’

‘Thank you,’ Lindy breathed, tears prickling behind her eyes, because Sergei and Alissa had been so very kind and supportive when she was at her lowest ebb, and she really appreciated that. ‘But you don’t need to stay.’

Lindy stepped back indoors and wished she had controlled her temper enough to have stayed there in the first instance. Fighting with Atreus or letting other people get involved in what was a hugely private issue would only exacerbate the tensions between them. Leaving Atreus to follow her, Lindy moved back into the living room and resisted a provocative urge to ask him if Krista Perris knew where he was. ‘Would you like coffee?’

‘Yes. Exactly when did you get so friendly with Antonovich?’

‘He owns this place. My friendship is with his wife, Alissa. I have mentioned her to you several times. Alissa and I shared a flat a few years ago.’

‘I didn’t make the correct connection.’

Atreus watched her switch on the kettle in the light-filled kitchen. He breathed in slow and deep, studying her taut profile and the unfamiliar shape of her pregnant body. His baby? The thought struck him hard. Accidents happened. He knew that—of course he did. But how could any man know whose baby it was inside a woman? And, having been burned more than once by allegations, he was more suspicious and cynical than other men.

‘Is it my baby?’ he prompted, in a driven undertone.

‘Yes. It’s your baby,’ Lindy confirmed heavily. ‘And you don’t have any excuse that I know of to even ask me that question.’

‘Halliwell’s bow-tie was lying on your bedroom floor the last time we slept together,’ Atreus shared flatly.

Taken aback, Lindy studied him. ‘That was the night Ben and I went to a wedding party at Headby Hall. I let him have the bed and I slept on the sofa,’ she explained slowly. ‘You never mentioned the bow-tie at the time…’

His lean dark features hardened. ‘I didn’t see the point.’

‘I’m carrying your child. I expect you to trust me when I tell you something.’

‘That’s a tall order for me,’ Atreus admitted.

‘You expected me to trust you when you were photographed in the company of other women in London during our relationship,’ Lindy reminded him darkly.

Challenged, Atreus shrugged a magnificent shoulder and sipped his black coffee. ‘I’ve never lied to you.’

‘DNA tests can be dangerous during pregnancy.’ Lindy spoke in a curt, harried tone. ‘I won’t risk a miscarriage just to satisfy your lack of faith in my word.’

Atreus set his even white teeth together and said nothing.

In the uneasy silence Lindy began talking quickly and quietly. ‘I was ten weeks pregnant before I found out. We’d already broken up. Right from the start I knew I wanted this baby, but that you wouldn’t.’

‘You had no right to make such assumptions.’

‘Assumptions based on fact. You had already told me that you didn’t want a baby with me, and that you would only want one when you were married,’ Lindy pointed out doggedly. ‘So, based on those comments, I naturally made the assumption that you would want me to either have a termination or hand over my child for adoption.’

‘Never!’ Atreus bit out rawly. ‘Never would I have suggested such a solution!’

‘Well, I wasn’t drawn to those options either, and I couldn’t see any point in lowering myself to tell you that I had conceived,’ she admitted tautly.

His dark golden eyes were bleak. ‘In what way would you have been lowering yourself?’

Lindy recalled how she had felt when they broke up, and how much worse she had felt after that final time when they had shared the same bed. She swallowed hard. ‘You hurt me a lot. That Notice to Quit I received was the last straw. I just couldn’t face having anything more to do with you.’

Incensed with her version of womanly logic, Atreus swore in Greek under his breath. ‘Even though you knew I wasn’t behind that debacle over you staying on at The Lodge?’