Chapter One #3
It was a resolve he put into practice the very next morning from his office, making the necessary call before he could change his mind. Seeking final closure on a past he could only regret.
But when, the following week, the investigative agency got back to him, closure was the very, very last thing possible. And his rage, his fury, knew no bounds.
Laurel walked away from the school gate, having waved Dan in.
It was spattering with rain, and her head was bowed as she walked along the busy street.
Then, abruptly, her progress was impeded.
A parked car door suddenly opened right in front of her, blocking her.
As she made to swerve, a hand descended heavily on her shoulder from the back.
A figure leant out of the car towards her. A voice spoke.
Deep. Accented.
And familiar.
“Get in—”
Xander shifted back to his side of the wide rear seat of the car as his driver impelled her inside. She was staring at him, horror on her face. His driver closed the door on her, got back into his seat, separated from them by a glass screen.
“We,” Xander said to her, “will talk.”
He was being calm, very calm. It was necessary to be so. In the two weeks since receiving the report—comprehensive, conclusive, the photos alone convincing him, from the investigative agency—he had been busy. Extremely busy. And now he was prepared.
“We can talk here and now,” he continued, and his gaze lasered hers, dark and cold, “or we can do it at my lawyer’s office. Which do you choose?”
Her face contorted. “Go to hell!” She levered urgently at the door handle. Locked, it did not yield. Then turned her fire back on him. “This is assault and kidnap! I’ll see you in jail for it!”
“And I,” said Xander, his voice as cold and hard as his eyes, “will see you in court.” He paused. A deadly pause. “For the theft of my son.”
Laurel paled, faintness drumming through her. Her hand fell nervelessly from the door handle.
“My son—”
She heard Xander say the words again. Heard them as terror and dismay iced through her. She tried to speak, but nothing came. Xander was talking again. Each word a bullet, a knife thrust, skewering her. Drawing blood.
“For seven years I’ve known you to be a thief, but this—” He broke off.
Anger boiled up in her. Familiar anger. “I am not a thief!”
His hand slashed upwards in the air. “Enough! We are not here to rehash the past. It is the future that concerns me. The future of my son.”
She stared at him. Emotion was pounding in her, panic, but she had to keep it together. He was speaking again, but she could barely hear it through the faintness drumming through her.
“Do not attempt to deny he is my son. To lie to me! He has been fully investigated! The date of his birth fits, and his likeness to me is indisputable. If necessary I will insist on DNA testing to prove my paternity! I will also,” his voice hardened, “use to the law to establish my paternal rights, if you attempt to block me. Do not think that I will not—”
She couldn’t speak, couldn’t answer. He was ploughing on, dictating to her, implacability in his voice, cold dark fire in his eyes.
“From now on, I will be in his life. To be the father to him that you have denied him.”
“No! I don’t want you anywhere near him!” she burst out. “Stay away from him! Just stay away!” Panic and desperation fuelled her outburst.
He ignored it completely.
“He will have my name, and—”
“He’s got a name! My name, my father’s name!”
“He is my son, he will have my name. And,” he went on implacably, “I shall provide for him the life that should be his. As my son.”
For a moment Laurel saw in his eyes such black fury that she would have reeled from it had she not already been in pieces. Then they veiled again. His voice changed. Still cold but more measured. Brisk and businesslike.
“Accordingly, for the time being, I have rented a house for you, out of London, far more suitable for him than where he lives now. A prosperous village in Buckinghamshire, with excellent schooling, and easy access to Heathrow for me. You will move there immediately and—”
“No!” Laurel’s voice broke from her. “No, of course I won’t! I’m not uprooting him like that! How can you even think it?”
“I think it,” he bit back coldly, “because I wish it. He will live in far more affluence than you can afford! And why—” his mouth thinned, his eyes spearing her chillingly “—should you object? Just what is so preferable about your lives now to what I can provide?”
“I can’t…I can’t…” Laurel fumbled, emotions reeling, overwhelmed by what he was saying, overwhelmed just by what was happening to her, out of the blue, without warning, without any chance to arm herself…
She clenched her hands. “I can’t just wrench him away from everything he knows! And I can’t—won’t!—drop a bombshell into his life by you suddenly appearing in it! For God’s sake, I need time—”
There was desperation in her voice, and she gazed at Xander, stricken, total tumult inside her as if a bomb had just gone off.
It was impossible, just impossible, to believe that this was happening.
Her heart was pounding, lungs constricted, shock ravening through her.
Shock, dismay…and emotions beyond those.
Emotions she could not bear to acknowledge…
Something changed in his face, and he gave a curt nod.
“Very well. For now you can tell him this move is just a holiday, let him get used to it first. As for my appearance in his life—” his voice seemed to catch for a second, then he resumed “—I leave you to tell him about me. You can bring him to meet me when you have told him, and we will take it from there.”
She saw him reach inside his jacket pocket and withdraw a card, handing it to her. “My contact details,” he told her. “Text me when you have told him about me, and let me know an appropriate place for me to meet him.”
She took it with nerveless fingers, faintness—disbelief, dismay—still drumming through her.
“And one last thing.” Through the pounding of her heart she heard him speak again.
“Do not attempt to cut and run.” His night-dark eyes bored into hers.
“You stole my son from me once. You will never—” his mouth twisted, and the barely suppressed rage in his voice was audible “—do so again. However much of a thief you are.”
Abruptly, he tapped on the glass divide, and a moment later she heard the click of her door unlocking.
She stumbled out, and the car moved off into the traffic.
For one endless second she could only stare blindly after it.
Then she started to shake uncontrollably. His words were knifing in her brain.
However much of a thief you are—
Memory, hideous and ugly, drowned through her.
Xander had been frowning. “It’s a nuisance, but I’ve agreed to pick up a passenger, a…friend…of the family, when we dock at the next island, and drop her off at Piraeus.”
Laurel hadn’t minded, not at first. But Olympia had been cool and condescending towards her. Towards Xander, in contrast, she was familiar—and possessive.
Xander was moody, tight-faced. Polite towards Olympia, but nothing more.
To Laurel herself he was noticeably withdrawn, clearly not emphasising their relationship to the other woman, obvious though it was.
But Olympia had been intent on making things clear to her.
Very clear. At dinner that night, she’d drawn attention to the ruby-and-diamond bracelet around her wrist.
“I’m wearing your present to me, Xander.
” She’d held up her forearm. She’d turned to Laurel.
“Xander gave it to me for my last birthday.” She’d glanced back at Xander, smiling still.
“I do so love rubies. Perfect for an engagement ring too!” she’d trailed.
Her expression was transparent, her purpose obvious – to imply that just such a ring would be Xander’s next offering to her. .
Would it? Is that what Olympia was to him? Laurel’s eyes had gone to Xander. His face had frozen, his mouth compressed. He’d said nothing, giving her no clue either way. Olympia’s limpid gaze had switched to her now, and Laurel felt she must say something…anything. Inside her, a hollow was forming.
“Rubies certainly suit your colouring,” she’d said politely, as innocuously as possible.
“Thank you.” Olympia had bestowed a gracious smile on her. “I expect you would prefer something a little more…straightforward. Diamonds are always so…appropriate.”
Her carefully pronounced English hadn’t needed a translation: “Appropriate as a pay-off for a female like you when her time is up. As yours is—”
Laurel had retaliated. How could she not?
“Oh, I don’t know. I doubt I’d say no to a ruby-and-diamond bracelet like yours!” she’d said lightly. Unthinkingly…
It had been the following day, as they’d entered the Saronic Gulf sheltering Athens from the open Aegean, that Olympia, a troubled expression in her face, had announced at lunch that the bracelet had gone missing.
A search had ensued, crew interrogated, Olympia’s expression increasingly troubled. Xander’s increasingly black.
Laurel had kept out of it. It was nothing to do with her.
Until she’d walked into the state room, and seen her suitcase on their bed, Xander about to lift the lid.
“What on earth are you doing?” Laurel’s voice had been sharp.
Xander had looked at her. Said nothing. But there was something in his face that sent a chill through her. Which showed a man she did not know.
“Do you have any objection to my looking?” he’d asked. His voice had been tight.
Her voice was even sharper. “Yes, of course I do! How could you even think to think of looking?”
He hadn’t answered, only flipped open the lid. There wasn’t a great deal inside, just clothes Laurel didn’t deem worthy of a luxury yacht, a pair of walking shoes for rough terrain, not needed on voyage, a couple of books, some toiletries.
And, carefully layered into a folded T-shirt, a ruby-and-diamond bracelet…