Chapter Thirteen
“OH, DARLING, YOU look so smart!”
Xander could hear the catch in Laurel’s voice as she beheld their son dressed in his new school uniform. He did look smart, and Xander confirmed Laurel’s proud exclamation.
It was the first day of term, and Xander had just returned from Greece.
He’d made it back there just in time for the Orthodox celebrations and was glad that he had.
The conversation with his father he needed to have was overdue.
He’d left it till just before setting off again for London.
It hadn’t been an easy conversation, and Xander had kept it as simple and as short as possible.
His father had said nothing, but his expression had been troubled.
Xander could understand why. He would need time to come to some kind of terms with it—deeply shocking though the news must have been to him.
For himself, though, now there was nothing to think about. He and Laurel had agreed on everything—and so had Dan.
Especially about getting married.
Xander had taken Dan aside right after the pancake breakfast and talked to him while Laurel went back upstairs in her dressing gown to shower.
“Dan, remember when you asked me, the day of the jamboree, whether I was going to be your mum’s boyfriend again? Well, how about—” he took a breath “—I go one better? How about,” he said, “if your mum and I got married? You,” he said, “could be my best man at the wedding.”
Dan’s face lit up. “When?” he said excitedly.
“Well, as soon as we can fix it,” Xander promised.
Relief filled him. Dan had no objections to make. But he double-checked all the same.
“Is that okay with you?” he asked carefully. “Me marrying your mum?”
Dan looked at him sapiently. “Well, you are my dad,” he pointed out.
Xander laughed a carefree laugh this time. Out of the mouths of babes…
“I am indeed,” he said. “And now we’ll be Mum, Dad and Dan. A proper family. Living together.”
“Here?” asked Dan.
“If we like,” Xander said. “Or we could be somewhere nearby, but bigger maybe. We’ll all spend time in Greece too, in the holidays. Let’s talk it over with your mum.”
They had, and it was agreed that for the time being, they’d keep the cottage. They had the wedding to book, Dan’s place at the new school to confirm, with term starting imminently, and his uniform to buy.
Now it was his very first day. They’d both taken him to see the school. It met strongly with Dan’s approbation, as Xander had been sure it would, and they’d met the headmaster and his future form teacher.
They drove him over now to start the new term. The other boys were streaming in, but Dan’s form teacher was waiting for him. She would take him in, introduce him to his classmates. Dan went off with her happily.
“He’ll be fine,” Xander said, reassuring Laurel.
He helped her back into the car, headed home.
It was a good word—home. It would be their main base, for Dan’s sake, though they would probably move to a larger house in the autumn.
He and Laurel were already scouting local properties.
He’d need somewhere with a dedicated study, not just working out of the dining room as he was currently doing.
He would also, he acknowledged, need to make regular trips back to Greece on Xenakis business.
His expression clouded a moment. It would be a balancing act, and not just in respect of business affairs, but family as well.
His father had gone very quiet since Xander had told him about Dan.
Will he accept what happened?
He just did not know. He became aware that Laurel’s expression had also clouded.
“I feel bad about Dan’s old school, Xan. They do their best under huge pressures. Now that Dan has the privilege of going to private school, I’d like—” she looked at him uncertainly “—to make a donation to his old state school in some way, provide some much-needed equipment, something like that.”
“I’ve no objection,” Xander said. “I think it’s a good idea—the same with your plans for your house.”
Her expression lightened. “I’m glad! Keeping it, but letting it at an affordable rent to a single-parent family.
Using the rent to pay my fees for my master’s.
” She smiled. “I’m so excited to be able to pick up my studies again!
And I would like to keep going with online tutoring too, and maybe do something voluntary, like museum work or stately home guiding or some such! ”
Xander cast her a look. “Leave some time for Dan and me,” he laughed.
She pressed his arm. “I’ll only work, and do my studies, when you work and when Dan’s at school,” she promised.
He cast her another look. A different one this time.
“Talking of while Dan’s at school,” he trailed, “I can think of an excellent use of our suddenly free time.”
Laurel cast him a look back. “Oh, yes?” she said limpidly. “And what might that be?”
He flicked another glance at her. A wicked one now. “You’ll find out soon, my adored bride-to-be, you’ll find out.”
She did, and being swept upstairs by her husband-to-be and made passionate love to in the middle of the morning was a heady experience.
“We’ve seven missing years to make up for,” Xander said, his voice husking as his mouth came down on hers. “And I intend to make them up very—” he kissed her “—very—” he kissed her again “—very thoroughly indeed.”
His gaze held hers, and Laurel felt her heart catch with the love melting in his eyes. In hers.
“Sounds good to me,” she smiled, as she slid her arms around him to kiss him back and to give herself to the bliss that awaited her.
Xander had not exaggerated that he was going to make up for those seven missing years. Hunger filled them both, and then hunger of a different kind. But lunch was a sketchy affair, and then Xander was sweeping her back upstairs.
“You’re insatiable!” she laughed as they collapsed down upon the waiting bed yet again.
His dark eyes glinted gold in their depths. “Always,” he promised her.
But satiety came in the end—for now, at least. As they lay there, limbs tangled and entwined, Laurel propped herself up on her elbow.
“We can’t be late picking Dan up from school,” she warned him. “We should shower and get dressed.”
Xander’s eyes glinted gold once more. “Good idea,” he said with enthusiasm.
“Separately,” said Laurel.
The glint in Xander’s eyes came again. “So, you remember our showers on the yacht, do you?” he remarked wickedly.
“We showered together to save water,” Laurel answered primly, and disappeared into the en suite to the mocking echo of Xander’s laughter. Saving water had not been the only benefit of those shared showers.
She emerged shortly, despatching Xander in her place, trying not to be distracted—too much—by the sight of him strolling past her in all his masculine glory and nothing else as she got herself dressed.
After remaking the tumbled bed, she headed downstairs.
As she did, the doorbell sounded, and she went to open it.
A man in late middle age stood there, with greying hair and something about him that made her stare. A taxi hovered at the kerb beyond the garden fence.
“Can I help you?” she asked politely.
The man’s eyes were on her. She could not read their expression. But there was something about him definitely.
“I am Paulos Xenakis,” the man said. “Is my son here?”
Xander froze at the sound of the voice. He stepped out of Laurel’s bedroom, fully dressed now, and stared down the stairs. What the hell?
“Babas?” he exclaimed. Dad?
He vaulted down the stairs, disbelief filling him.
Laurel stood aside. She was obviously as bewildered as he was. But she was also, Xander could see at a glance, tensely apprehensive.
His father’s eyes went to him. They were completely unreadable. “I need to speak to you,” he said to Xander in Greek. Then he changed to English, and his unreadable eyes glanced at Laurel. “To both of you.”
Xander tensed as visibly as Laurel. “You’d better come in,” he said slowly.
He and Laurel stood aside, and Paulos Xenakis walked in. Behind him, Xander could see the taxi move off. Laurel went into the sitting room, and Xander ushered his father there as well.
In the sitting room Laurel turned to the older man. “Won’t you sit down?” she said politely.
Paulos nodded. “Thank you,” he said, unsmiling. He lowered himself to one of the sofas. Xander drew Laurel down beside him on the facing sofa. She sat, back straight, hands folded in her lap. Xander cast her a brief flickering smile, his hand patting hers, as if for reassurance.
But it was hard to feel any reassurance. Nothing about his father’s appearance like this, his manner now, his unreadable expression, boded well.
Xander steeled himself.
This would not be good.
Laurel sat uneasily, hands gripping each other. She knew Xander had told his father about her and Dan.
He won’t welcome it—an illegitimate grandson with a thief for a mother, she thought bleakly.
His expression now confirmed it. It was like stone. She felt Paulos Xenakis’s assessing eyes on her, felt her tension mount, and Xander’s too, sitting beside her.
Then he spoke, addressing her directly, speaking in accented English.
“I am here,” he said, “because my son has told me about you. How he had an affair with you before he married. Telling me that he ended it when he discovered you had stolen a valuable bracelet from the woman who became his wife. That you have always denied taking it, despite his condemnation of you. You returned to England and unknown to him bore him a son, a son you never told him about.”
His voice was heavy, as if, Laurel thought, he was a prosecuting judge setting out the brute facts of the case.
“I no longer believe—” Xander made to interrupt, but his father’s raised hand silenced him.
The dark eyes, so like his son’s, returned to Laurel, resting heavily upon her. “My son believed only you could have taken the bracelet, that Olympia was innocent, nor could any of the crew, all security vetted, have taken it.”