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‘Let me get this straight...you think that you have the right to insult and punish me for your experiences with other women, who lied and plotted to try and entrap you or make money out of their connection with you?’ Gaby slammed back at him wrathfully. ‘How fair is that?’
‘You forced me into this meeting,’ Angel derided, his stunning eyes awash with anger. ‘What else am I supposed to think?’
Gaby inclined her chin. ‘I didn’t force anything. I asked politely,’ she reminded him curtly. ‘This child isyourchild. Nor am I apologising for that when you must know as well as I do that no contraceptive method is totally safe. Let’s at least behave like adults here.’
‘I am dealing with this like an adult,’ Angel sliced in icily.
‘No, you’re not. You’reignoringthe situation by making the assumption that I’m lying,’ Gaby censured. ‘But, in only a few weeks I will give birth to your son.’
‘At which time you will doubtless contact a lawyer and make a legal claim, which will eventually go to court and a DNA test,’ Angel cut in drily. ‘Why would I waste my energy on the issue now?’
When he put it like that, Gaby could see his point when he was so utterly convinced that the child she carried could not possibly behischild. Even so, she loathed him for his attitude and knew she would never forgive him for it or for treating her like a con woman, meeting with him to scam and fleece him. ‘Well, I’ve done my duty by informing you of the situation and, considering your mindset, I have absolutely nothing more to say to you. Have a nice life, Angel. You’d have to be dying in a ditch for me to cross your path again!’
With that proud declamation, Gaby stalked out of the room with her head held high and moved back to the lift. When Petronella Casey walked back into the hotel suite, Angel was preoccupied with his thoughts, his lean, darkly handsome features shuttered. He was recalling his mother’s infidelity and his father’s weak inability to deal with her behaviour. Angel had vowed that he would never allow himself to be put in such a position, and as time had moved on, and he’d learned for himself how dishonest and untrustworthy women could be, his attitudes had only hardened.
‘Evidently you do not believe a word that that young woman said,’ Petronella remarked quietly. ‘Whereas I suspect that it might be wise to pay a little more attention to her.’
‘Of course Gabriella’s lying,’ Angel asserted with ringing confidence, doubt or insecurity rarely featuring in his decisive nature. But it was also only now occurring to Angel in that same moment that, if she wasnotlying, he had burned his boats with a vengeance. ‘She has to be lying, just like her predecessors. Hire a private investigation agency to look into her. I should take every precaution.’
‘Bear in mind that in spite of the barrage of paternity claims that you have endured,’ Petronella murmured in a diplomatic undertone, ‘sooner or later and by the law of averages there will possibly be a woman telling the truth.’
‘With respect, I hope you are mistaken,’ Angel breathed tautly. ‘The first male child born to me is automatically the heir to the throne. That is in our constitution and not something I can change.’
But the question had been raised and he could not ignore it, even if the prospect shot naked alarm through him. What if he were to become a father? How the hell could he ever handle that? He was the product of no parenting, who only knew what to avoid rather than what a father should do.
Gaby walked back into Liz’s home with tears walled up in a dam behind her scratchy eyes. She had never been so grateful that her friend was on maternity leave and still accessible rather than back at work. The blonde took one look at Gaby’s tight, pale face and immediately gave her a hug. ‘It wasthatbad?’ she whispered in dismay.
‘Yes. Plan A was a major fail, so I will move immediately to plan B,’ Gaby quipped a little chokily. ‘Angel is not planning to be supportive or involved in any way. He refuses even to recognise that thiscouldbe his child, so that’s that, then.’
‘He still has to pay child support, whether he likes it or not,’ Liz argued vehemently.
‘IfI can’t survive without his help,’ Gaby qualified. ‘But if Icanget by, he will never lay eyes again on me or his child in this lifetime.’
Just as Gabriella had spent troubled weeks striving to work out her future with a young child to raise, Angel had, possibly for the very first time in his life, been required to work through months of stress, inconvenience and ultimate disappointment. Why? Gabriella Knox had, to all intents and purposes, disappeared off the face of the earth and, with her, the child Angel now suspected washischild as well.
On his monthly trip to London to ensure that the investigation agency he had hired were still making the search for Gabriella a top priority, he learned that there had finally been a breakthrough and intense satisfaction gripped him, the frustration of the past nine months draining away to be replaced by a powerful need for action instead. Now all he had to do was seal the deal and he saw refusal on her part as so unlikely as to be virtually impossible...
Gaby smiled as the early-summer sunshine engulfed her in the garden. It wasn’t hot but it was infinitely preferable to another grey wet day. She tossed the clothes pegs and sheets into a basket to carry back indoors. The long winter at the isolated farm had provided a wonderfully therapeutic time out for her, calming wounded and tangled emotions, soothing the painful regrets and showing her the way forward.
And her way forward, she reflected fondly, was definitely through her son, Alexios. She set down the laundry basket for sorting later and padded into the cosy living area, which comprised kitchen, dining and sitting room. An elderly woman sat there in an armchair. Clara Paterson, her friend Liz’s godmother, was a widow in her seventies and recovering from recent minor surgery. Clara was currently waiting to move into a more compact property in town and Gaby was staying with her as a temporary housekeeper. Living in the Scottish borders while looking after Clara had given Gaby a comfortable peaceful home while she adjusted to being a new mother.
Not that Alexios, beaming at her from the rug at Clara’s feet, looked like much of a challenge, she conceded proudly. He didn’t bear much resemblance to her or, for that matter, Angel. Nobody in her family had had bright green eyes or black curls, but then, neither did Angel, so she had no idea whose ancestor had donated those genes. It didn’t much matter either, she reflected cheerfully. Whatdidmatter was that Alexios was a happy, healthy eight-month-old baby, already crawling and trying to talk to her. He had his father’s brash confidence and fearless approach to life, but he was infinitely more loving in nature. And Gaby had discovered that not since the death of her family when she was fourteen had she ever loved anyone or anything as much as she loved her baby.
The earth-shattering racket of a helicopter passing overhead barely made her blink because the house was only a few miles from a military base. A frown line pleated her brow, though, when the noise not only failed to recede but also increased and she moved to the front window, disconcerted to see a craft landing in the field beyond the wall surrounding the garden.
Clara peered out of the window beside her. ‘That’snotan army helicopter,’ the older woman commented knowledgeably. ‘And what’s that flag on the bodywork? I don’t recognise it...’
But Gabydid. The stripes of colour and the dragon logo featured on the flag of Themos. Her slim body froze inside her jeans and sweater, her pale aghast face suddenly washing with colour. ‘It’s Alexios’s father...he’s found us.’
‘About time too,’ Clara remarked calmly. ‘You can’t hide for ever with a child.’
‘But he didn’twantto know about Alexios!’ Gaby protested.
‘He’s a very stubborn young man but he’s had time to see the light. An alpha male can react badly when you plunge him into a situation out of his control,’ Clara commented.
‘Clara!’ Gaby exclaimed in surprise. ‘What do you know about alpha males?’
‘Probably more than you do,’ Clara quipped with a smile. ‘I was married to one for almost half a century and there’s not a day goes by when I don’t miss his bossy, bullheaded ways.’
