Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fourteen
On an intellectual level , Alex knew that beyond the walls of his study the party was still going on, even if he couldn’t hear it over the chaos screaming through his head. But it hardly registered. All he could focus on was the conversation that had just taken place and still thundered through his thoughts.
He’d been absolutely right to cool things down with Olympia, he assured himself grimly as, through the window, he watched a firework shoot into the sky and explode into a shower of glittering stars. They’d been moving too far and too fast. If he’d allowed the relationship to continue as it was, he had no doubt he would have been signing himself up for untold misery.
So why did he feel as though he’d been gutted like a fish? Why did he feel he’d be haunted for the rest of his days by the devastation on her face?
He couldn’t seem to shake the points she’d made from his head. All he could think now was that the man he didn’t recognise wasn’t the one she’d turned him into, but the one he’d described as himself. That man sounded weak and powerless, and that wasn’t him. So perhaps he had been lashing out at her, which wasn’t fair.
And those observations weren’t the only ones spinning through his thoughts on some torturous, relentless loop. No matter how hard he tried to shut it up, an irritating voice in his head demanded to know whether, despite the discouraging risk–reward ratio of friends, he was really content existing in isolation.
Might he in fact use work to stave off loneliness? Why had he wanted to refute her repeated declarations that he was only interested in their baby? Where had the shudder he’d always experienced at the thought of being connected to her for years gone? And if he was really so averse to romantic commitment, then why had Olympia’s ‘we’s and ‘our’s given him such a kick these past few days?
Because he was in love with her.
The thought shot through his head like an arrow, and lodged in his brain. Every muscle in his body froze.
No. He couldn’t be. It was impossible. He’d spent his entire life avoiding such a fate. He’d seen the damage love could do when it failed. He knew how fickle and treacherous the heart was. He’d sworn never to hand responsibility for his well-being and happiness to someone else for them to destroy.
But that insidious little voice was once again hammering him with questions and demanding answers. What if love didn’t tear you apart but built you up? What if a heart could be steadfast and true? And what if that someone else didn’t wreck your well-being and happiness, but treasured and nurtured it?
How Olympia had felt about him before he’d ruined what had been developing he had no idea. Could she be in love with him too? Had the moment with the engagement ring been as significant for her as it had for him? She’d stood up for him. She’d convinced him that he could be the sort of father he was determined to be. He’d done the same for her, and he wasn’t finished. He wanted to prove to her that she was worth more than one or two nights—that she might be a handful but she was his handful. He wanted her in his life for ever, stirring up his boring staid existence like a tornado. He wanted this child of theirs to be the first of many, to create a big noisy family of his own.
But, by needing to keep himself safe—by being completely blind to not only what the Sheikh and Leo had seen, but also in his violent reaction to the engagement ring—he’d destroyed any chance of it. He’d put his fears, his needs, above all else, which meant that he was no better than his father. History was repeating itself and he was at the root of it, so he was the only person who could do anything about it.
Olympia was right, he thought, his head spinning, his chest tight. He did have to get over the issues he had with his father and Selene. He did have to let it go and focus on the family he could have, rather than the one he’d lost. As she had, with the past and the prenup. She didn’t dwell or stew. She moved on. She had more courage in her little finger than he did in his entire body. She was magnificent.
And he’d told her they were a mistake.
He’d told her she was just like her mother.
He was in love with her and he’d told her that he hated it.
What the hell had he done?
An image of her face, pale and wrecked, flashed before his eyes, and Alex felt an ice-cold sweat break out all over his skin. Nausea rolled up his throat. Whatever she felt for him, she cared enough to be hurt. He had to fix the mess he’d made. She was too important to lose. And to think that he’d assumed she’d be the one to screw up. How much more of a jackass could he be?
He surged to his feet and went in search of her. She wasn’t in the house. Or on the terraces. He found her down on the beach, surrounded by a group of guests, and never had he wanted to get rid of a bunch of people more. To the untrained eye, the smile on her face would be blinding. But to him it looked like a struggle. There was a sheen to her eyes that suggested she’d been crying, and the realisation that he’d done that to her cut him to the bone.
‘Olympia.’
‘Ah, here he is,’ she said smoothly, as if the conversation in his study had never happened. ‘Everyone was wondering where you’d got to.’
‘Just taking a moment to sort a few things out,’ he said, regret and the need to put this right battering him hard. ‘If you’ll excuse us, I’d like a word with my fiancée.’
‘We mustn’t neglect our guests.’
‘They can spare us for a few moments.’
‘Maybe later.’
‘This can’t wait.’
Before she could protest further, he took her elbow and steered her away.
‘Once again, you’re wheeling me away from a party,’ she said with a tonelessness that he didn’t like one little bit, but for which he had only himself to blame. ‘And look what happened the last time you did that.’
‘Best move of my life.’
‘What?’
Behind the tree he’d led her to, he let her go and rubbed his hands over his face, before thrusting them in the pockets of his trousers.
‘I apologise for earlier,’ he said gruffly. ‘I didn’t mean any of it. You were right. I was thrown by your mother showing up. I handled it badly. So very badly.’
She shrugged and stared at a point somewhere over his left shoulder. ‘It’s fine.’
‘It’s not fine. It’s not fine at all.’
‘It really doesn’t matter.’
‘It does. There’s more. So much more I have to apologise for and tell you.’
‘But I don’t want to hear it,’ she said, her gaze finally meeting his, shaking him to the core with its emptiness. ‘In fact, I don’t want to hear anything you have to say. I’m not interested in your apologies or anything else. I’m done, Alex. You wanted me gone and I’m going. The minute this party’s over, I’m leaving. This is the last time we’ll speak until the baby’s born. We can communicate through our lawyers when necessary.’ She glanced over her shoulder. ‘Now I really must get back to the party.’
She disappeared before he had time to blink, let alone think. He could barely breathe through the panic that gripped him at the thought that he’d blown it for good, let alone muster up a response. But as the fog in his head cleared, he was filled with the resolve that had made him a billionaire before he hit thirty.
If she thought this was the last time they spoke, she could think again. They would not be communicating through lawyers. She was leaving over his dead body. And she would absolutely hear what he had to say.
* * *
Back in the thick of things, Olympia took a surreptitious look at her watch. Half an hour to go. Half an hour until this ridiculously painful charade was over and she could go home.
If she’d known how difficult it was going to be to endure the congratulations and the increasing raucousness of the occasion she’d have remained holed up in the bedroom, because there was absolutely nothing to celebrate. But at least she’d stayed strong when Alex had dragged her off for a word. At least she hadn’t broken down and begged him for a second chance. She’d never have got over the humiliation.
It was bad enough that she hurt so much, she thought, her throat aching from all the lumps she’d had to swallow down. She was so stupid for letting him get to her. For caring what he thought about her. She should have got used to rejection by now. She should have remembered that affection was never freely given. For years she’d avoided transferring her neediness onto a man for fear of the inevitable rejection, but she’d done it anyway. She was her own worst enemy in practically every way there was.
The music ground to a halt. Everyone hushed. She turned to see Alex behind the DJ’s decks, holding the microphone and staring straight at her and, oh, God, what was going on now? Was he about to reveal that the engagement was off? Was her reputation once again about to be decimated? Where could she run? Where could she hide?
‘I’d like to propose a toast,’ he said, and she thought despairingly, to what? A lucky escape and freedom? The ruthless destruction of someone he hated? ‘To my bride-to-be, Olympia Stanhope, with whom I’m head over heels in love.’
Her heart stopped. Her breath caught in her throat. All the blood rushed to her feet and she very nearly swooned. But these were just fine words, she reminded herself, and he wasn’t to be trusted, not after the cruel things he’d hurled at her in his study. He wasn’t in love with her. He couldn’t be. It made no sense.
‘She won’t believe that,’ he said, as if he could read her mind. ‘I haven’t made it easy. In fact, I may well have made it impossible. I’ve said some terrible things, and the apologies I owe her are too many to count. But I will address every single one of them, however long it takes, if she’ll give me the chance.’ He visibly swallowed and, when he continued, it was with a crack in his voice. ‘Olympia, you are the strongest, bravest woman I’ve ever met. You are clever and resourceful and you don’t give up. You have repeatedly blown me away with your willingness to face challenges head on, and our child will be so lucky to have you as its mother. I don’t deserve you, I am aware of that, but if you’ll forgive me for being such a self-centred jerk, I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to. I will do everything in my power to make you love me as much as I love you. This is what I wanted to tell you. All this and how very sorry I am for screwing things up.’
He stopped and put down the mike, the silence deafening, and suddenly all eyes were on her. But she didn’t know what to do. She didn’t know what to think. Her heart was beating too fast in her chest and her head was spinning so wildly her vision blurred.
But her inner voice of reason, the one that had got her through the many struggles she’d had with her insecurities this past week, was trying to make its way through the chaos. It was insisting that maybe actions spoke louder than words. That maybe he’d been more thrown off balance by her mother’s appearance than she’d thought. He was so supremely confident, such a tower of strength, that he appeared invincible. But he wasn’t. No one was.
He’d just declared how he felt about her in front of two hundred people. He’d spun the party better than she ever could. He’d addressed her every fear and laid it to rest. All that envy for the baby who had his attention, and her siblings who’d found the happiness she’d never thought she deserved. Well, maybe she did. No. Not maybe. She did .
And suddenly, with the last of her defences crumbling to dust, Olympia couldn’t stand being so far away from him any longer.
Her heart raced as she set off in his direction, the agog guests parting for her like the sea. He met her halfway and stopped. But she didn’t. She walked right up to him, threw her arms around his neck and kissed him with every single thing she could now allow herself to feel for him, oblivious to the whoops and cheers around them.
He held her tight as if he never wanted to let her go, and she could feel the thundering of his heart against her own. ‘I’ve never had anyone fight for me like that before,’ she said dizzily when they broke for breath. ‘I’ve never had anyone on my side.’
‘I’ll never leave it.’ His eyes were dark, glazed with passion and emotion, but his expression was grave. ‘I’ll never stop fighting for you, agape mou . I’m so sorry for everything I said. I didn’t mean any of it. You were right. I was lashing out. I was terrified. All my adult life I’ve feared the destruction love can cause. But not anymore. I don’t want to be in hock to the past. I intend to make peace with Selene, who you are nothing like. It’s beyond time. I want to look to the future, a future that includes you and our baby and hopefully many more. Since you came into it, my life has been so much more exciting, so much more everything. I love you. Very much.’ He stared into her eyes, and she could see in his a flicker of uncertainty, a vulnerability that indicated his sincerity and intensified the emotion filling her up. ‘Do you think in time you might be able to feel the same?’
‘No,’ she said, smiling up at him, leaning in for another kiss drenched in love. ‘Because I already do.’