Robyn Donald - His Pregnant Bride - Pregnant by the Greek Tycoon / His Pregnant Princess / Pregnant - Father Needed

‘Did you fall, Nicky?’ Her matter-of-fact tone and manner had a soothing effect upon the crying child, who stopped to catch his breath. ‘Poor you,’ she said, rubbing the obvious bruise that was developing on the child’s forehead. ‘Did you hurt yourself anywhere else, sweetheart?’

Nicky shook his head. ‘Granny will be cross…’

‘No, I’m sure she won’t.’

‘She will,’ the child, whose tears had subsided, retorted positively. ‘Who are you?’ he asked, poking a chubby hand in the direction of the stranger.

‘Gracious!’ Ruth exclaimed, realising for the first time that the tall Greek had followed her into the room. He was standing there frozen. The only flicker of movement in his body was supplied by his stunning eyes, which were trained on the child in her arms.

Without replying, he continued to draw air into his lungs through clenched teeth, like a man who had forgotten how to breathe. As he squatted, bringing his face level with the toddler, she saw that his gloriously golden skin had acquired a greyish tinge. She saw his lips move; nothing came out.

‘Gracious!’ she added once more and with feeling. The physical similarity between father and son was truly startling… Nicky began to cry again.

‘Nicky…your name is Nicky?’ The tearful boy nodded his head.

Georgie walked in through the open door weighed down by supermarket carrier bags filled with groceries. A car, she reflected wistfully, would make life a lot easier, but her budget didn’t run to such luxuries.

‘ Big boys don’t cry, Nicky .’

She froze, the blood draining from her face. It was a voice Georgie would never, could never, forget.

It was a voice she heard in her dreams and her nightmares.

She stood there oblivious to the eggs that had broken when she’d dropped her bags and were now running stickily over the carpet.

This isn’t happening .

Her first instinct was to run as fast and as far away as possible. She subdued her selfish reflex…she couldn’t run and leave Nicky. Anyway, running would have been futile if Angolos wanted her. A shudder slid down her spine. When Angolos wanted something he was totally focused and implacable.

Only Angolos didn’t want her; he had made that perfectly clear.

Her heart was hammering in her chest and her feet felt as though they had lead weights attached as she moved towards the living-room door. Her head was spinning but one question amongst the many that chased one another around in her mind was uppermost.

Why had Angolos turned up now?

‘I’m not a big boy. I’m lit…ul. Go away!’

Georgie heard the childish treble and her shoulders straightened. Leave him alone, she wanted to yell as she rushed impetuously forward.

She might prefer to walk into a lion’s den than voluntarily enter a room that held her husband, but, as she had learnt within two seconds of his birth, for Nicky she would do the unthinkable. Her own needs and desires would always be secondary to her son’s best interests…it was being a mother.

As she stepped through the door she almost collided with Ruth, who had offered to look after Nicky while she caught the last post and picked up some groceries and while her mother was staying with Robert. The woman barely seemed to register her presence.

Georgie’s eyes moved past her and gasped. Having enough volts to light up a county pass through her body could not have felt more shocking than looking at father and son.

‘Oh, my!’ she whispered. His hair still curled on his neck the same way .

She had never denied to herself the startling resemblance between Nicky and his father but now seeing them side by side it was impossible for anyone to ignore. The sight of the long, lean figure balanced on his heels in front of the child wiped every thought from her head… She felt desire clutch low in her belly.

She grimaced in self-disgust. It appalled her and, yes, scared her that, even after all this time and everything he had done to her, she still only had to look at him to be reduced to a screaming mass of hormones.

Georgie took a deep sustaining breath and lifted her chin. ‘Come here, Nicky,’ she said quietly.

She was aware that Angolos’s attention had slewed towards her. The hand she stretched towards her son had a perceptible tremor, but she studiously ignored him and kept her eyes trained on Nicky’s tear-stained face.

It was only a moment before the child responded, but during that moment she had to fight back the impulse that urged her to rush over and physically tear him away from the man whose hands lay on his shoulders. Her clenched hands relaxed as Nicky aimed himself at her like a small but determined heat-seeking missile.

Angolos rose to his feet in time to see Georgie bend forward, her softly waving hair spilling across her face. She pushed the silky hank impatiently behind her ear.

‘What have you been doing, darling?’ Her attention on the child, Georgie didn’t see the spasm of something close to pain that contorted her estranged husband’s dark, autocratic features as he watched them.

‘He had a slight accident. It was my fault…I only left him for a moment,’ Ruth interjected.

‘With Nicky a moment is all it takes,’ Georgie responded as she hugged her son to her. ‘Isn’t it, champ?’ she said, brushing the curly dark hair from his brow as she straightened up with the child’s body pressed close to her own. She saw the bruise and sighed. ‘In the wars, I see.’

She knew that pretending Angolos wasn’t there wasn’t exactly a long-term solution to her present predicament, but it was the only one she could think of. Angolos, all six feet four of him, was there barely a metre away from her, looking even more devastatingly attractive than she remembered…Her brain just refused to deal with the reality of the situation.

The muscles in her face ached as she forced a tense smile. ‘Now, why don’t you go with Auntie Ruth?’ She caught the eye of the older woman, who gave an understanding grimace.

‘I’m really sorry about this, Georgie.’ Her soft apology was accompanied by a sideways look towards the tall man who was silently watching.

‘It’s not your fault,’ Georgie said, handing over her burden. ‘This will only take a minute,’ she promised, staying one step ahead of her rising panic by sheer force of will alone.

A silent sigh of relief passed through her body as they left the room.

‘Do you always reward him for misbehaving?’ Angolos’s eyes were flat and icy as they scanned her face.

Georgie waited until she judged the child was out of earshot before responding and opened her eyes. ‘What would you do—beat him?’

Her sneering suggestion made his face tauten with anger. ‘Children need to know what the boundaries are. It makes them feel secure.’

‘Hearing you throw around terms like security in connection with Nicky…’ She swallowed back the anger that made her want to scream at him and hammer her fists against his chest. Her voice dropped to a low, scornful whisper. ‘You lost any right you might have had to criticise the way I bring up my child when you effectively disowned him.’

Angolos’s head reared as though she had struck him. ‘I would never knowingly disown my son.’ His low, uneven voice throbbed with sincerity. His mesmeric eyes locked onto hers.

‘I stand corrected. You accidentally disowned him, which makes it all right, then.’ She went to the door and yanked it open. ‘You were just passing, I suppose, so feel free to carry on doing just that.’

‘You want me to leave?’

Georgie, her expression stony, fixed her eyes on the wall directly ahead. ‘The only thing I want more is for you to be kidnapped by aliens, but I’m realistic, I’ll settle for the former.’