Clare Connelly - Claiming My Hidden Son / Bride Behind The Billion-Dollar Veil

‘Calypso Athena Petras. But I believe she responds to Callie.’

Beside me, Neo smirked again. ‘A dramatic name for a dramatic situation!’

I balled my fist and attempted to breathe through the churning in my gut. First they’d forced my grandfather’s business into the ground, until he’d broken his family right down the middle by working himself into an early grave. Now this…

‘Show me the agreement.’ I needed to see it for myself, find a way to assimilate what I’d been committed to.

My father slid the document across the desk. I read it, my fingers clenching as with each paragraph the noose tightened.

Twelve months of my life, starting from the exchange of vows, after which either party would be free to divorce.

Twelve months during which the Petras family who, by a quirk of karma—if you believe in that sort of thing—had fallen on even harder times than they’d condemned my family to would be free to capitalise fully on their new status of wealth and privilege by association.

My lips twisted. I intended to have my lawyers draft divorce papers before I went anywhere near a church.

I exhaled, knowing my subconscious had already accepted the situation.

‘Don’t overthink it, brother. You’re thirty-three next month. This will be over by your thirty-fourth birthday. If you bite the bullet,’ Neo offered helpfully.

Slowly, I dragged myself back under control. ‘I’ve worked too hard and too long to restore our family back to where it belongs to lose it to a greedy opportunist. If there’s no other way…tell Petras we have a deal.’

My father nodded, relieved, before he sent me another nervous glance. The kind that announced there was something more equally unsavoury to deliver.

‘What now?’ My patience was hanging by a thread.

‘Besides paying for the wedding, we also need to present the family with a…a dowry of sorts. Petras has asked for Kosima.’

I surged to my feet, uncaring that my chair tipped over. ‘ Excuse me?’

My father’s face tightened. ‘No one has stepped foot on the island since your grandfather passed—’

‘That doesn’t mean I want to hand it over to the son of the man who caused his death!’

A flash of pain dimmed his eyes. ‘We don’t know that to be strictly true.’

‘Don’t we? Did you not see for yourself the pressure he was under? He only started drinking after the problems with Petras started. Is it any wonder his heart failed?’

‘Easy, brother,’ Neo urged. ‘Father is right. The house is rotting away and the land around it is nothing but a pile of weeds and stones.’

But I was beyond reason. Beyond furious at this last damning request.

‘Grandpapa loved that island. It belongs to us. I’m not going to hand it over to Petras. Isn’t it enough that he’s imposing this bilious arrangement on us?’

‘Is it enough for you to drag your heels on this last hurdle?’ My father parried.

Unable to remain still, I strode to the window of the building that housed the headquarters of Xenakis Aeronautics, the global airline empire I’d headed for almost a decade. For a full minute I watched traffic move back and forth on the busy Athens streets while I grappled with this last condition.

I sensed my brother and father approach. I didn’t acknowledge them as they positioned themselves on either side of me and waited.

Waited for the only response that I could conceivably give. The words burned in my throat. Left a trail of ash on my tongue. But it had to be done. I had to honour my grandfather’s request, no matter my personal view on it. Or I’d risk everything he’d built. Risk mocking the sacrifice that had taken the ultimate toll.

‘Tell Petras he has a deal.’

My father’s hand arrived on my shoulder in silent gratitude, after which he exited quietly.

Neo chose more exuberant congratulations, but even then I barely felt him slap my shoulder.

‘Think of it this way. For twelve months you’ll be free of all the scheming socialites and supermodels who’ve been falling over themselves to extract a commitment from you. I’ll happily carry that burden for you instead.’

‘Unless you wish to date one of those supermodels whilst sporting a black eye, I suggest you leave my office immediately,’ I growled.

My brother’s laughter echoed in my ears long after he’d slammed the door behind him.

But long before the echo died I made another silent vow to myself. Petras and his kin would pay for what they’d done to my family. Before the stipulated year of marriage was out they’d regret tangling with the Xenakis family.

‘SMILE, CALYPSO. IT’S the happiest day of your life!’

‘Here, let me put some more blusher on your cheeks…you’re so pale. Perhaps a bit more shadow for your beautiful eyes…’

Beneath the endless layers of white tulle that some faceless stranger had deemed the perfect wedding gown material and gone to town with my fingers bunched into fists. When the tight clenches didn’t help, I bit the tip of my tongue and fought the urge to scream.

But I was past hysteria. That unfortunate state had occurred two weeks prior, when my father had informed me just how he’d mapped out the rest of my life. How it was my turn to help restore our family’s honour.

Or else.

The cold shivers racing up and down my spine had become familiar in the last month, after a few days spent in denial that my father would truly carry out his intentions.

I’d quickly accepted that he would.

Years of bitterness and humiliation and failure to emulate his ruthless father’s dubious acclaim had pushed him over the edge once and for all.

The soft bristles of the blusher brush passed feverishly over my cheeks. The make-up artist determined to transform me into an eager, blushing, starry-eyed bride.

But I was far from eager and a million miles away from starry-eyed.

The only thing they’d got right in this miserable spectacle was the virginal white.

If I’d had a choice that too would have been a lie. At twenty-four I knew, even in my sheltered existence, that being a virgin was a rare phenomenon. At least now I realised why my father had been hell-bent on thwarting my every encounter with the opposite sex. Why he’d ruthlessly vetted my friendships, curtailed my freedom.

I’d believed my choices had been so abruptly limited since the moment my mother fell from grace. Since she returned home the broken prodigal wife and handed my father all the weapons he needed to transform himself from moderately intolerable to fearsome tyrant. I thought I’d been swept along by the merciless broom of wronged party justice, but he’d had a completely different purpose for me.

A purpose which had brought me to this moment.

My wedding day.

The next shudder coagulated in my chin, making it wobble like jelly before I could wrestle my composure back under control.

Luckily the trio of women who’d descended on our house twenty-four hours ago were clucking about pre-wedding nerves, then clucking some more about how understandable my fraught emotions were, considering who my prospective husband was.

Axios Xenakis.

A man I’d never met.

Sure, like everyone in Greece I knew who he was. A wildly successful airline magnate worth billions and head of the influential Xenakis family. A family whose ill fortune, unlike mine, had been reversed due the daring innovation of its young CEO.

It was rumoured that Axios Xenakis was the kind of individual whose projections could cause stock markets to rise or fall. The various articles I’d read about him had boggled my mind—the idea that any one person could wield such power and authority was bewildering. To top it off, Axios Xenakis was drop-dead gorgeous, if a little fierce-looking.