by Trish Morey
‘I’ll be okay, Nick. I’ll probably have my period before you get on the plane.’ She shrugged. ‘Simple as that—problem solved.’
‘No. You should come with us. Back to Greece.’
She rubbed her forehead with one hand and stepped into her room. She couldn’t face him like this, naked under her skirt. By the time he’d followed her in she had slipped back into her panties. Somehow it made her feel she was more in control.
‘Back to Greece? Why should I do that on the off-chance I could be pregnant? I can’t just traipse off to Greece on a whim. I have a life here. Responsibilities. My parents are coming for Christmas—how can I just abandon them? It will be hard enough explaining why Jason has gone—how can I just take off too? Have you just changed your mind about me coming over so that I can look after Jason for those times you won’t be there? Or maybe you just like having your sex on tap. Let’s face it, I fall so easily into your bed lately—not that I can pretend I don’t enjoy it—there’s bound to be a bit of sex on the side in it for you.’
He hesitated a fraction, and Alex would just about have sworn she could see the machinations taking place in his mind.
‘So marry me,’ he said at last. ‘Come as my wife!’
CHAPTER TWELVE
‘IS THAT a proposal?’ She shook her head, disbelieving.
After everything that had happened the idea was too ridiculous. Everything he had done to date suggested he wanted to get as far away as possible from her. He didn’t want her to come to Greece to look after Jason and it was patently clear he didn’t really want her for his wife.
All this because of the minuscule chance she could be pregnant? Did he still not trust her to the extent that he would marry her rather than risk her hiding another secret pregnancy?
Hadn’t he learnt anything?
‘It makes perfect sense,’ he said, as if his mind was made up. ‘You will come to Greece with us. It solves all our problems. We will marry, either here or in Greece. It makes no difference to me.’
‘As it makes no difference to me where we will not marry.’
‘You are refusing to marry me? You surprise me. You would have security—our child, our children would be provided for. Isn’t that what you want?’
Security. She laughed. Financially she’d be secure, sure. But her heart? How could that ever feel secure, knowing his was lost to her for ever? ‘No, Nick. I don’t want that.’
‘Then what?’
‘It’s ironic, but the only thing I want from you is the one thing you’re incapable of giving.’ She paused, picked up the photo of the three of them the stranger had taken that day at the zoo, all smiling, looking for all the world like the happiest family on earth—and it was all a fraud.
She put the photo back down onto the dressing table and sighed. That family didn’t exist—couldn’t exist—in the vacuum that was his heart.
‘I love you, Nick. And all I ask is that you love me in return.’ She looked up into the swirling depths of his eyes, saw the tangle of emotions at play, and knew the answer she wanted wasn’t there.
‘Alexandra…I admit I underestimated you. You’re a good mother. I have a lot of respect for you.’
‘But you don’t love me. You don’t trust me. At times I think you even hate me. I can’t think why you want to marry me—unless it’s to keep me so close there would be no chance I could take Jason away from you again.’
Nick’s face hardened and grew dark. ‘Then don’t come!’ His voice boomed in the small room. ‘I will take Jason to Greece and you will stay here alone. Alone and bitter. Maybe then you will appreciate—’
There was a movement behind Nick, at the door—a sound—a cry. A glimpse of a face, crumpled and agonised, and then he was gone.
‘Jason!’ Alex shouted as she burst past Nick and out of the room. He was already powering through the front door, his legs like pistons, and his sobs tore at her heart as she tried to catch up.
How much had he heard, standing by the doorway? She had love—her son’s love—and pride was going to lose it for her. Stupid pride that wouldn’t allow her to be with her son just because his father didn’t love her. What the hell was wrong with her?
Over the front verandah he flew, across the patch of front garden and past the car waiting in the driveway. Matt’s father’s car—they were back early.
‘Jason! Stop!’
Out of the corner of her eye she saw Matt’s father step out of the car, the question on his face, but there was no time to acknowledge him, no time to explain what was wrong, as Jason sprinted away down the footpath. Behind her the screen door slammed. Nick had joined the chase.
She was gaining. He could outrun her in the end, but for now she was gaining ground, despite her slipons flapping, threatening to trip her up at each step.
Her lungs were choked, her heart beating loud in her ears, beating time with the thunder of the two motorbikes accelerating down the street. He looked back at her. She saw his face contorted, eyes squeezed in pain and chin back, as he tried to focus through the tears, and then he turned, blundering on past a parked car and dashing for the road.
‘Jason, no!’
There was nothing she could do.
He was so small. So small and so fast they’d never see him in time. Never expect a child to run out from behind the car. Never have time to stop, not this close.
But they might see her. She cut across the footpath and stepped onto the road.
‘Noooooo!’
Nick’s cry melded with the roar of the machines, the roar that became a storm as the black-leathered riders thundered closer—so close that she could see the panic hit their faces when they saw her on the side of the road, when they saw Jason frozen in fear directly in their path and when their reactions finally allowed them to attempt to stop.
It all happened so quickly. One bike snaked wildly as its rider battled to reign in the whining machine, finally coming to a screeching, smoking halt just inches from the white-faced boy. The other locked its front wheel, sliding out so both rider and machine screamed a path of destruction along the asphalt, tearing and scraping and mangling, and finally collecting the woman who had chosen to run the wrong way.
Not slow motion. Slow terror.
The slow, agonising terror of not knowing whether the woman who lay so still and lifeless on the ground was alive or dead. The terror of thinking…
He raced to her side. She looked like a doll—a beautiful sleeping doll, until he got closer and saw the blood pooling onto the road below her head and the leg buckled back on itself beneath her.
Nearby someone groaned and swore—the biker—and Jason, at last able to move, threw himself down next to his mother. Nick gathered the shaking boy into his arms and held on tight as running footsteps sounded behind him.
He touched the fingers of his free hand to her motionless white throat, desperately searching for a pulse. She had to be alive.
‘Call an ambulance!’ he yelled.
He hated hospitals. Hated their antiseptic smell, their long straight corridors, their stark, clinical quality. Hated the way that tucked deep down in the basement would be the morgue, that secret place where they hid the non-living, away where you couldn’t see them—unless it was your job to identify them.
Hospitals meant death.
Just stepping inside had made his gut clench in equal measures of revulsion and panic, and only the small, trembling hand he held had stopped him from turning around and walking straight out again. That, and the woman who lay somewhere behind closed doors. The woman who had risked her own life to save that of her son—their son.
The woman he loved.
But was it too late?
Anguish welled up inside him. She couldn’t die—not now—not when there was so much he had to make up for.
On the vinyl chair beside him in the cold, bare box that was the waiting room his son sobbed quietly. He undid the damp knot of their hands and wrapped his arm around the boy, nestling him in
against his chest. Jason sniffed and swiped his nose with the back of his wrist. Nick pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and passed it to him.
‘Do you think…? I mean, what happens if…?’ Nick squeezed his son closer as he blew his nose. ‘Is Mum going to die?’
Something deep inside Nick that had already been stretched to breaking point fractured as his son gave voice to the question that was his own greatest fear.
‘No.’ His voice was a bare croak.
‘How do you know?’ He lifted his tear-stained face and Nick’s heart nearly broke at the hope he saw flickering in his eyes—hope he wished with all his soul wasn’t false.
‘Because we won’t let her.’
The boy studied his face, as if judging whether he should believe him, then he blinked and sniffed again and looked back into his lap.
‘It’s all my fault.’
‘No. Don’t think that.’
‘But if I hadn’t run—’
‘No,’ said Nick, firmer this time. ‘It’s my fault. I was angry and said some stupid things to your mother. Stupid things I didn’t mean. That’s why you ran, isn’t it?’
The voice, when it came, was so thin and frail it sounded as if it would snap. ‘I don’t want Mum to be alone.’
Nick cursed inwardly. How much damage had he done? And how could he make it right?
‘Neither do I,’ he said at last, promising himself he’d do everything in his power to ensure she’d never be alone. Whatever it took, he’d make things right. ‘Neither do I.’
Heels clacked on the tile floor and the two of them looked up in the same instant. ‘Tilly!’ yelled Jason, jumping out of his chair and barrelling down the corridor. ‘Aunt Tilly.’ He buried his face in her jacket as she hugged him close. The smile she directed to Nick was thin and strained.
‘I came as fast as I could. Any word?’
Nick stood, shaking his head and raking hands through his hair. ‘Nothing. She was still unconscious when she came in. All we know for sure is she’s got a broken leg. They’re doing a brain scan and X-rays—checking for internal injuries.’
And it was taking for ever. Someone must know something. Why the hell couldn’t they tell them?
As if on cue a middle-aged man wearing scrubs pushed his way through the swing doors and looked around at them, his gaze settling finally on Nick.
‘You came in with Alexandra Hammond?’
‘That’s right.’ They all gathered close around the doctor. ‘How is she?’
‘Well, Mr Hammond, your wife is one very lucky woman.’
Collectively Nick and Tilly sighed their relief, expelling the breath they’d been holding.
‘She’s going to be okay, then?’ Tilly asked.
‘She’s sustained multiple fractures to her right tibia,’ the doctor continued, smiling at their relieved faces, ‘and she needed a few stitches to patch up that cut to her head. But other than that we can’t find anything too wrong with her. And you’ll be very happy to know she’s regained consciousness—though she’s going to have a bit of a headache for a while.’
‘Can we see her?’ asked Nick.
‘Well, we’ll be prepping her for Theatre to set that leg, but I think a five-minute visit will be in order.’
Jason gazed up at the doctor, a perplexed look on his face. ‘Excuse me?’
The doctor looked down at the child. ‘Yes, son. What is it?’
‘He’s not called Mr Hammond. His name is Nick Santos.’
The doctor looked back at Nick, confused. ‘You’re not next of kin?’
‘Not officially,’ he said.
‘He’s my father,’ offered Jason.
‘He’s family,’ said Tilly, nodding.
Nick smiled, hoping for the best. ‘Now I just have to convince her.’
She lay in the bed, bruised and battered, her eyes closed and her slumbering body attached to an array of equipment, beeping and flashing. Nick stood stock still, his progress arrested at the door as he watched their son edge slowly towards the bed. Ashen-faced, he crept up to his mother’s side, leaned over and kissed her gently on the cheek.
‘I love you, Mum.’
Everyone in the room seemed to hold their breath until Alex’s eyelids finally fluttered open, and though her blue eyes were dull with painkillers and shock the wan smile she returned was real enough. ‘Jason.’ She lifted a hand to reach him. ‘I love you, too.’
Tilly moved closer. ‘Hey, sis. Don’t you know it’s dangerous, fooling around with motorbikes?’ She planted a gentle kiss on the unblemished side of her sister’s bruised forehead. ‘Gee, you had us worried there for a while.’
‘The Simpson boy—is he okay?’ Alex’s voice was whisper soft. ‘I feel so bad…’
‘Don’t feel bad,’ said the doctor, finally following the party into the room and rechecking all the equipment. ‘His leathers saved him from any serious damage. And from what I’ve heard, right now I suspect he and his brother are more worried about what the police will have to say. Now, if everyone would like to excuse us, I think it’s time we were getting Alex over to Theatre to fix that leg.’
Nick cursed softly under his breath, but already the doctor had a hand under Tilly’s elbow, ushering both her and Jason towards the door. The doctor then made a move to remove Nick likewise.
‘No,’ he said firmly, but softly enough not to alarm Alex. ‘I must have just one minute alone with her.’
The doctor hesitated.
‘It’s important.’
‘Very well,’ the doctor conceded with a brief nod. ‘Just one minute.’ He moved back to the bed. ‘Alex, it seems your Mr Hammond wants to have a quick word with you.’
Nick moved to the side of the bed and sat down on the edge, picking up Alex’s hand and holding it gently within his own, so as not to disturb the canula taped into the vein.
‘Oh, Nick,’ she said, finally opening her eyes. ‘It’s you. I thought my father must be here.’
It was an acknowledgement. Not a greeting. Not a welcome. She was protecting herself, and it stung that she would need to. But it was no wonder. After the way he’d treated her, he didn’t deserve more.
Then a tiny wrinkle appeared between her brows. ‘But why did he call you Mr Hammond?’
A wry smile came to his lips. ‘I suspect the good doctor believes I am your husband.’
‘Imagine that,’ whispered Alex tightly, turning her head away.
‘I’m imagining,’ said Nick, drawing her chin gently back to face his. ‘And I’m hoping.’
‘You are? Even after me turning you down before?’ She hesitated, biting her lip. ‘I keep thinking this is all my fault. If I’d agreed to marry you then the life of our son would not have been threatened—none of this would have happened.’
He shrugged. ‘You could have said yes then. But whatever has happened I would much prefer you to say yes now.’
‘After all this—how can you say that?’
‘Because now, unlike before, when I demanded that you marry me, now I would like to ask you, not tell you what to do. So you can decide for yourself. And so we can give Jason a real family, with a mother and a father who love each other.’
Alex’s eyelids flickered. ‘But…but that would mean…’
‘Exactly.’ He smiled and touched her face with his fingers, stroking her skin so that she leant into his gesture.
‘I love you, Alexandra. The bitterness I felt at losing my family wouldn’t let me see that until now. I had no way of realising just how much I loved you until I’d nearly lost you. And now I know I cannot live without you, without your love. Please don’t make me.’
He dropped down suddenly beside the bed, onto one knee. ‘Alexandra Hammond, my love, my destiny, will you marry me?’
Misty tears filmed her eyes as the impact of his words hit home.
‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Yes, of course I will marry you.’
His lips curled up, almost in grateful thanks, and he kissed her the
n, so gently and so sweetly, but with such innate power and emotion that a tear squeezed from her eye as her soul recognised that this was right, that the two of them belonged together and their love was for ever.
EPILOGUE
‘CATCH me, Dad!’ Jason screamed with laughter as he ran along the stony shore, Nick in hot pursuit, as the sun shone down on them from the limitless Aegean sky. It was a perfect Cretan early spring day, the weather fine, with the promise of rain coming later.
Alex watched from her recliner chair, laughing along with them as Nick made unsuccessful dive after dive for his son. It was so good to watch them play together.
But her happiness went deeper than that. Watching the two of them, the two loves of her life, she knew that things could not have turned out better—for all of them.
Jason loved Nick; that was so clear. It was as if his every dream had come true. She thought back to her wedding day, after the ceremony, when Jason had asked Nick if he could call him Dad. Nick had shaken his hand solemnly and thanked him, and told him he could never have received a better wedding present. Then he’d hugged him tightly and she’d seen the sheen blur his eyes even as he’d blinked it away.
As she blinked it away now, laughing again as Nick made one last rush, collecting a screaming Jason up over his head and declaring himself the victor. Jason giggled and squirmed in his arms before being tossed over Nick’s shoulder and escaping to the shore to look for treasure from the sea.
Nick ran up puffing to her side, his glossy olive skin rising and falling in a way that held her mesmerised.
Even after being married for two months she was still struck by the beauty of the man, his sheer masculine form, that always brought a rush of blood and lust through her veins.
She shifted position slightly, noticing his own appreciative gaze on her. He made her feel so beautiful, so incredibly sexy, merely with a glance or a smile.
He squatted down alongside her and kissed her, one hand caressing her once damaged leg, sending sparks through her skin.
‘Is your leg all right? Can I get you anything?’
