CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER FIVE
‘G OOD HEAVENS ...’ Mel hissed when the cars that had met them off the helicopter drove them along a paved lane towards the giant villa studded with fancy pillars. It towered like a monolith on the heights of the hill on the island of Faros. It was Nic’s home on the island, not the even larger house at the other end of it, which belonged to his elder half-brother, Jace, and their grandmother. The house Nic had inherited had only been built in the first place because their father, Argus, had fallen out with his mother, Electra.
‘Prepare yourself for a very extravagant setting,’ Nic had advised humorously on the phone. ‘It’s my house now but it’s all grand Roman splendour. My father didn’t do good taste.’
The two cars came to a halt. Yes, two cars. Nic had hired three nannies, three , he explained because he didn’t want any nanny to feel overworked taking care of their children and he wanted every one of their babies to receive the very best care. Lexy’s head was still spinning at all the changes that had taken place in her world over the past two weeks. Yes, only two weeks, not only to refill her skeletal wardrobe and buy all the bridal finery, but also to organise what had sounded like a very big wedding. Luckily her input had not been much required aside from a couple of phone calls to establish the food she liked and the colours and flowers she preferred.
‘It’s like being on another planet,’ Mel had said at one point of Lexy’s rags-to-riches transformation.
Even better, she had told herself often, Nic had achieved all the arrangements with her by phone. A much safer way to maintain their tenuous at best relationship, she reasoned, keeping it like a straightforward business arrangement, an agreement, a deal . His money in exchange for what he deemed to be respectability, which was marriage and fakery. He had warned her on that score too that she would have to pretend that they were keen on each other.
And how difficult could that possibly be when he looked the way he did and she was challenged to take her attention off him when he was in the same room? Nor did it take into account the number of times when, purely for reference purposes, she had looked up some of those photos of Nic online and learned stuff about him that she hadn’t bothered to access when he had ghosted her eighteen months earlier. Like his name at birth had been the Italian Domenico and his mother, Bianca, had been a minor socialite in Rome when she’d first met his father. Little stuff, she consoled herself in explanation, that she had needed to know for the wedding and the people she would meet.
As the car drew up, she glimpsed an entire group of people waiting and her backbone melted like snow in summer. All those people, all those rich, important people, who had to believe that she was something she was not in Nic’s eyes. She smoothed damp palms down over her designer dress, a muted shade of green teamed with wedge heels, and began to climb out as the door opened. And then she glanced up and realised that it was Nic opening the door and her sense of relief at seeing him was so intense after so many days that it left her dizzy.
‘Nic...’ she muttered as she stepped away from the door.
‘Lexy,’ he said, a literal five seconds before he swept her into his arms, whereupon he lifted her up to him to overcome their difference in height and kissed her.
And it was everything she had tried to forget, everything she had refused to relive. It was as though he lit a torch inside her and it blazed out of control. It had been so long since she had been touched that way that she dropped into that kiss with all the self-preservation of a drowning swimmer. His lips moved over hers, soft and firm and so erotic her toes curled inside her shoes and they fell off without her noticing. She grabbed his head, rediscovering the luxuriant depths of black hair she had previously sunk her hands into with pleasure. His tongue twined with hers and breathtaking heat swept up through her, a slow-burn effect pooling warmth between her thighs. Her head fell back as she gasped in oxygen.
‘Get a room,’ an unfamiliar voice said nearby.
Sudden awareness flooded back to Lexy and she blinked, registering belatedly that she and Nic had a sizeable audience. Embarrassment swallowed her alive. ‘Put me down,’ she mumbled.
‘You lost your shoes,’ Nic dared to remind her, and as soon as he set her down she scrabbled at his feet to relocate them.
How had he noticed the shoes when she hadn’t even registered the wretched things falling off? She was mortified beyond belief. What a way to greet the in-laws! She understood, however, why Nic had gone in for the display. It was only part of the faking that he had mentioned would be part and parcel of the whole charade of marrying him. He expected them to look like a convincing couple and how else could he achieve that? Even so, had he had to fall on her like a ravenous beast the instant she appeared? Wasn’t that overkill?
‘Lexy, meet my brother, Jace...and his wife, Gigi.’
‘Welcome to your own home,’ the slender young woman told her with a big, warm smile of apology. ‘I can’t wait for the wedding tomorrow.’
‘By the looks of it, neither can they,’ Jace quipped, and Lexy’s face turned an even hotter pink. ‘I was waiting for the movie cameras to start rolling.’
‘Yes, it was so romantic,’ the little silver-haired older lady who had joined them said brightly and Lexy found herself enfolded in a hug. ‘I’m Electra, Nic’s grandmother, but you can call me Yaya like my grandsons do.’
Nic led the way upstairs through a splendid marble foyer ornamented with grand and very large pieces of gilded furniture, a backdrop that would have looked more at home in a museum or a palace than on a small Greek island. Imposing and impressive it certainly was, but nothing about the ambience was comfortable or welcoming.
He paused at the door of an upstairs room and ushered her in. ‘For the children,’ he said with quiet satisfaction.
And there it was in front of her: the nursery of her dreams, complete with beautiful cots and all the pretty pieces of baby paraphernalia she had not been able to afford. Lexy gasped, fingering the edge of a polished wood cot, stroking a soft, smooth cotton cover. ‘Was this where you grew up?’ she couldn’t help asking.
‘No, I had this done specially for the triplets. This house wasn’t built until I was an adolescent. I’ve already made arrangements to have three separate bedrooms prepared for Ethan, Ezra and Lily for when or if you choose to divide them.’
‘My goodness, you’ve really been busy,’ she framed unevenly, taken aback that he was already thinking ahead into their babies’ futures.
‘I’ll show you our rooms,’ Nic murmured, a hand closing over hers as the nannies began piling in with the baggage carried by a uniformed staff member.
‘It’s all very formal here,’ she remarked.
‘My father’s preference, not mine. While we’re here, feel free to change anything. On previous visits, I preferred to stay with Jace and Electra in the other house,’ he admitted wryly. ‘This was never a happy place for me.’
‘Oh...’ And she wanted to ask questions and know more but was that really appropriate in a fake marriage? Just at that moment, her mouth still tingling from his, and gripped by embarrassment at how she had surrendered into that kiss with more enthusiasm than strictly necessary, she decided it was better not to ask and to respect boundaries.
‘This is you...’ As her luggage was trekked in past them by more uniformed staff, Lexy gazed wide-eyed at the vast bedroom, decked out in gold, and the extreme grandeur of the gilded four-poster, and she giggled. ‘Well, it’s not really me,’ she almost whispered. ‘I feel a little ordinary looking at this.’
‘My mother said she liked it, but then she was required to like it to please my father,’ Nic told her. ‘But she was a farm girl from a country town and I would suspect she must’ve felt a little overpowered as well.’
‘A farm girl?’ Lexy questioned in surprise before she could bite back the query. ‘But I read that she was a socialite—’
‘No, no. That was a face-saving fiction dreamt up by my father and aired because he could not have said that he had stooped to marry a farm girl, whom he met at a market.’
‘And obviously he fell for her there,’ Lexy completed.
‘He was married and supposedly crazy about Jace’s mother, so I suppose it depends on your viewpoint.’
‘I think you’re...’ Lexy hesitated.
Nic studied her expectantly. ‘I’m what?’
Lexy winced. ‘Possibly a little too overly negative about your father, but maybe he was an all-round horror of a man—’
‘That is how I see him. He was a man who did terrible things to a lot of people,’ Nic said tightly, sinking her stomach with that admission about his parent. ‘I operate very differently in business and in my own life.’
Lexy nodded, grateful to have not offended him. ‘On that note, I shall be comfortable in this bedroom even if the décor is a touch overwhelming.’
‘My room is through the communicating door but it’s locked. I’m afraid I can’t conserve your privacy tomorrow night because there is no way Yaya will put a bride and groom into separate bedrooms and as they’re holding the wedding for us—’
‘It’s fine. We’ll survive,’ Lexy hastened to soothe even though her brain was exploding with confused questions.
This was the guy she had first met. Considerate, thoughtful and kind. Where had that guy gone during her barrage of phone calls, letters and office visits over eighteen months? Had Nic Diamandis simply panicked at the news of her pregnancy? Had he blocked her calls and dumped her letters because he couldn’t face the problems her pregnancy would create? What else was she supposed to think if she was no longer able to think of him as an inherently bad, irresponsible man who thought only of himself?
Of course, he couldn’t defend himself for such reprehensible behaviour, but if he was trying to make good now and make up for it, shouldn’t she at least recognise the effort he was making to redress the damage he had done?
‘It’s a family dinner this evening hosted by Jace and my grandmother at their place.’
‘What do I wear?’
‘Something long and glam,’ Nic advised as he departed again. ‘I’ll send in some jewellery for you to choose...a couple of things to use. My mother sent it here. Bang a ring on your engagement finger. It will look better.’
‘Your mother knows we’re fake?’
‘No, my mother thinks we’re real and that we ran out of time, choosing to skip the engagement phase,’ Nic murmured ruefully. ‘She’s a romantic.’
And I was as well, until I met you and then you let me down , Lexy reflected in suppressed anguish.
She had fallen in love in the space of an evening. Who did that? Which sane, intelligent woman would do that? But she had paid the price for that foolishness, hadn’t she? She had had many months to agonise over her disillusionment.
She went back to the nursery to spend time with her babies and get to know the nannies a little better. Beth, Susie and Indira were young, active and chatty and Ethan, Ezra and Lily were calm and content in their care, which was fortunate when it was the wedding tomorrow and they would see little of her, she reminded herself. For a while she strolled around the house, getting acquainted with rooms, and when she had wasted enough time, she went back to her room to dress for dinner.
A large handsome jewellery box sat on the dresser awaiting her. From Nic’s mother, she assumed, thinking that it was a very generous woman who just offered her own possessions to a future daughter-in-law she had yet to meet. A farm girl, fancy that. But possibly Bianca Diamandis mightn’t like to be reminded of her more humble beginnings and Nic should have kept that info to himself.
Thinking such thoughts, Lexy picked out a kind of blingy diamond and emerald ring and threaded it on her ring finger to try before setting it aside to wear. Evidently, Nic had told his mother that she didn’t own any jewellery. What a very kind gesture! She picked a slender diamond necklace for the neckline of the dress she planned to wear before heading for a shower and a thorough grooming.
Finding her babies already sleeping in their cots, she sighed, wishing she had made it in time for a goodnight cuddle, but she would be up very early the next morning to attend to them all. Fully gowned and feeling incredibly opulent but ill at ease in a long silvery blue dress with its mermaid skirt, which made it impossible to take anything other than very small steps, she descended the sweeping staircase to where Nic awaited her in a dinner jacket and bow tie, looking exactly as he looked in all those online photos.
Except just for once he lacked that recurring arm ornament, Angeliki Bouras, a woman who in normal circumstances Lexy would have asked a lot about. What was so special about the exquisite blonde apart from the obvious? Why did Nic’s relationship with her appear to survive when other women seemed to last mere weeks in his company? Unfortunately, Lexy was aware that she had no right to ask such nosy, personal questions of a man about to make a fake marriage to her.
Nic was enthralled by the vision of Lexy in that dress with diamonds glittering at her throat and on her hand. ‘You look amazing,’ he said.
‘I look like a gold-digger,’ his future bride told him tartly. ‘All got up in a designer dress sporting all this bling.’
Nic grinned, that breath-stealing grin she remembered, and her heart hammered. ‘Maybe I’ve got a thing for sexy little gold-diggers...who knew?’
‘Stop it or I’ll laugh and I’m trying so hard to be refined and serene,’ she admitted.
‘They’re only people, good and bad, friendly or unfriendly. Wealth doesn’t make them one whit better than you and that’s the only difference,’ he said soothingly as he tucked her into a low-slung scarlet sports car and drove off.
The massive villa at the other end of the island had an elegance that his father’s house did not. Nic parked outside it and handed her out. ‘Show’s on now. Fake it until you make it.’
‘But you haven’t even told me what our story’s supposed to be.’
‘I kept it simple. Lost your phone number, lost touch, turned the city upside down trying to find you and then, bullseye, here you are with my children,’ Nic proffered lightly. ‘The love of my life.’
‘Do we have to exaggerate?’
‘The only people here who matter are my immediate family. Jace and Gigi. My mother, Yaya. Oh, yes, and my best friend, Angeliki.’
Wow, best friend, well, she hadn’t guessed that likelihood very well, had she? Relieved by that news, Lexy smiled. ‘I’ll do my best.’
But from the first frozen glance from Angeliki’s fine dark eyes, Lexy registered that the beautiful blonde might be her bridegroom’s best friend, but she was never going to be equally chummy with his bride-to-be. Clad in a fabulous bronze evening gown, the Greek heiress outshone every other female present and Lexy was relieved to be warmly hugged by Nic’s mother, Bianca, a diminutive brunette with a bubbly, positive personality and a bunch of chatter.
Bianca refused to be thanked for the loan of her jewellery. ‘I remembered how overpowered I felt by the Diamandis tribe just after Argus married me and I couldn’t have my daughter-in-law feeling the same way,’ she chattered cheerfully with an openness that was utterly unexpected in such a glittering array of high-society guests. ‘I’m relieved that my son saw through the facade of the often spoiled, entitled little madams he meets and married a young woman with a job and independence.’
‘That’s great,’ Lexy said weakly as she was enthusiastically grabbed into a hug, thinking that it was not the time to mention that independence and a proper job were a long way behind her since the birth of her sons and her daughter.
‘And if I promise to come really early and not interfere in anything bridal, can I please come and see my grandchildren tomorrow morning?’ Bianca continued winningly. ‘I’m just gasping to meet them, but I didn’t want to be too pushy and wait at Nic’s house today for the opportunity.’
‘You’re not being pushy at all,’ Lexy assured her. ‘You will be very welcome.
‘I like your mum,’ she murmured to Nic as they took their seats at the formal dining table.
‘She’s lovely, isn’t she?’ Jace’s wife, Gigi, volunteered cheerfully. ‘Next to Yaya, she’s a favourite. Neither of them judge or criticise or bitch.’
‘Electra Diamandis is a lady from head to toe. She has bred-in-the-bone class,’ Angeliki interposed crushingly from across the table.
Gigi rolled speaking eyes at Lexy and she almost giggled at the blonde’s snobbish intercession. The foolish woman didn’t seem to grasp that it was an insult to exclude Nic’s mother from such a compliment. ‘And Bianca is simply pure charm and warmth,’ Lexy commented.
The meal proceeded at a stately pace and Lexy noted that Angeliki rarely removed her attention from Nic, regularly addressing little witty comments in excluding Greek to him while studiously ignoring Lexy’s existence. No, definitely not friendship material.
It was a longish evening. There was a lot of meeting and greeting after the food was eaten. Lexy was flagging by the time Nic intimated that it was time to leave and she had gone out to the hall to retrieve her evening wrap when Angeliki approached her. ‘It won’t last—you and Nic,’ she spelt out thinly.
‘And I want your opinion because...?’ Lexy countered.
‘He only wants those children. I’m warning you that you’ll lose them if you go ahead tomorrow,’ Angeliki announced with the sweetness of a viper.
Lexy merely nodded and turned away to unfurl her evening wrap and cloak her bare shoulders. But her tummy had turned over at that warning and she told herself off for being affected by a woman who very obviously wanted Nic for herself. So much for this particular female best friend, a relationship that could only work if there was a lack of attraction on both sides.
‘You seem troubled,’ Nic commented as he tucked her back into the car after a long trail of goodbyes.
‘Not at all,’ Lexy said stoically, resolved not to run telling tales, which would likely be poorly received. Unlike Angeliki, Lexy could read people, and Angeliki might want Nic but she could see that Nic did not want her back, in spite of her beauty and her lithe, shapely sexiness. ‘It’s just been a long day and I’m very tired.’
The next morning was Lexy’s wedding day and she was still tired because she had lain awake a long time worrying that there was truth in Angeliki’s nasty suggestion. How far could she trust Nic in believing that he would not try to remove her children from her care in their eventual divorce? And in truth, that was not yet an answer she could give. Yet, bearing in mind her financial struggles over the past eighteen months, she did not believe she had a choice because it was her duty, just as much as it was his , to ensure that their children had a more stable, secure home. But she could not credit that Nic would want to risk hurting his children by depriving them in any way of their mother.
She found Bianca Diamandis down on her knees in the nursery playing with the triplets and sensibly clad for the occasion, so she wasn’t too bothered about wearing a dressing robe herself. Sitting down on the rug with Bianca, she helped Ethan, Ezra and Lily get to know their grandmother. As she returned to her room, she met Nic in the corridor, tall and darkly handsome in a cotton sweater and tight jeans.
He held a finger to his wide firm lips in a silencing gesture. ‘Bride and groom aren’t supposed to see each other before the church,’ he told her.
Lexy flushed and disappeared into her bedroom again, deciding that so far she wasn’t doing very well in the ‘faking it’ stakes because until now the concept of such traditions had passed her by. Mel awaited her, having ducked out of the dinner the night before because she had said she wouldn’t be comfortable in such lofty company. But Lexy was tempted to tell her that she had felt perfectly comfortable, with the single exception of Angeliki’s shrewish approach.
Her beautiful gown hung awaiting her but a small procession of professionals was due first to do her hair, her make-up and her nails.
‘So, how do you feel about this now?’ Mel prompted, for her best friend was not entirely sure she should trust Nic enough to believe that he would only do right by her and his children.
‘Moderately hopeful,’ Lexy confided. ‘He’s making an effort and I can see it. It may be happening a bit late in the day, but you can only applaud a guy brave enough to say that he’s quite happy for me to marry him for his money.’
‘Either that or he’s a very devious character,’ Mel remarked, predictably less tolerant as a lawyer, having stood by Lexy during her worst experiences during the crucial eighteen months of Nic’s absence.
The bridal preparation team arrived then and there was no time for further personal conversation. Within a couple of hours, Lexy was viewing herself with Bianca’s diamond tiara anchoring the short veil she wore to the back of her head, letting her dress, which she loved, do its thing without further embellishment. She had reasoned that it might well be her only wedding gown ever and, with cost no object, she had shopped for her fantasy. Fashioned of sequinned silk tulle and delicate embroidery, it had the slender silhouette of an Edwardian tea dress with a fitted boat-shaped bodice and long tight sleeves, shaping her figure without burying her in loads of fabric that would only accentuate her lack of height.
‘You look stupendous,’ Mel told her dreamily.
As Lexy paused at the foot of the aisle in the large village church, she viewed the packed pews and lifted her head high. One of Jace’s uncles had offered to fill in for her absent father, whom she had not bothered to invite, but Lexy had politely declined the offer because she was giving herself away, not depending on some male figure to take charge of her.
But as Nic turned his proud dark head to look at her, she felt a reaction she knew she shouldn’t feel to the seemingly stunned appraisal he was dealing her. Gosh, he was good at faking it, she thought in admiration. Really, really good...