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Xavier swore under his breath. “Stay there. I’ll phone Elizabeth.”
He disconnected the call and tried Elizabeth’s mobile number. It rang out. A cold slick of alarm permeated his chest. She wasn’t home and she wasn’t answering her mobile. Was it possible she’d done what he’d have never thought her possible of?
Had she run?
I will make your life a living hell if you don’t do everything I ask of you.
He’d thrown the promise at her with cold precision, meaning every single breath of each word. He still did.
But he could see how inflammatory that warning was now, how likely she would be to react against it and run from him. How she would choose to keep her son to herself for the rest of her life.
An image of the boy in his bed came to Xavier – he saw their child as an innocent angel, fevered and divine, with that curling hair and thick black lashes, and the groundwork for a face that would one day lose its youthful chubbiness and be replaced with chiseled autocratic features that belonged to his father, his grandfather, and all the Salbatore men before him.
Joshua Jones.
This was not the name of a Spanish scion.
He wrapped his hand around his phone so hard it could well have broken, and then he dialed her again. Still no answer.
He prowled the corridor, waiting, his mind coldly turning over each and every possibility, each act that Elizabeth might have committed, and he focused his ruthless energy on just how he’d discover her. On how he’d punish her and destroy her for taking Joshua away yet again.
The ringing of his phone pulled him from the dark turn of his thoughts. He answered, his voice a grim bark in the silent house.
“Salbatore.”
“They’re here,” José responded. “A cab just pulled up.”
He swore harshly. So they had run. And changed their minds? Or forgotten something? “Bring them to me at once.”
It took twenty minutes. Longer than it should have given they were only a suburb or so over. And the whole time, he prowled in the front entry of his Kensington house, his eyes fixed on the door, his expression grim.
Finally, José arrived, his expression showing he’d had his own arguments with the future Mrs Salbatore.
Xavier was furious, but then, the sight of Elizabeth walking through the door to his home holding their child on one hip did something completely unexpected to him. His body seemed to weaken at the picture they made: this woman, their child, his house. It was all so primal but he felt the strangest rip of ownership and possession. Of pride. Misplaced, yet fierce.
Before he could speak, she lifted a finger to her lips and he realized their son was sleeping. And pale.
A frown crossed his face as he bid her to silently follow him. He led the way up the stairs and at the first floor landing turned left, showing her the way to the room he’d set aside for Joshua. He ached to reach forward and carry the child, not to lighten her burden, he assured himself, but simply to hold his son close to his chest.
She moved to the bed and Xavier followed, pulling the bedlinen back so she could lay their son down. She wriggled the little shoes off his feet and then straightened without a word. But it was an angry silence. She was furious!
Fascinated, he moved a few steps behind her then paused, watching as she ran down the stairs and hoisted a tatty backpack over one shoulder. She took the steps two at a time as she returned, and slipped past him, into Joshua’s room, without making eye contact.
From the backpack, she retrieved the same panda bear teddy Joshua had been sleeping with tucked under his arm the night before, and nuzzled it to his side. She pulled something else out, plastic, which she unfolded to show a sea-sickness bag. She put it on the other side of him, and then she patted his brow and straightened.
Now, finally, she did meet his eyes, and the air in the room seemed to crackle and hum. An electrical storm was breaking around them, flashing with lightning and danger.
The scent of thunder was heavy in the air.
She moved past him and, whether accidentally or not, shoved his shoulder with her own.
He swallowed a gruff oath and followed her into the hallway. Much as he’d done the night before, he put a hand in the small of her back and propelled her forward, away from their son’s room, and into his study. It overlooked the back of Kensington gardens and a squirrel was prancing on the outside window ledge. He waited until she was in the room and then pushed the door shut, the silence of the act not belying the seriousness of the conversation they had coming.
“How dare you have your henchman strongarm me here?” She accused, the words trembling from her lips, trembling with anger though, nothing else. Nothing softer. Fury paled her face and hardened her eyes. “How dare you have me dragged here?”
He crossed his arms over his broad chest. “He would not have needed to do any such thing if you had maintained the schedule we’d agreed to.”
She blinked, shaking her head, her confusion obvious.
