by Heidi Rice
‘When did you discover he was yours?’ he demanded, clearly affronted by my failure to claim my son.
‘How do you know I did not always know and chose to ignore him?’ I asked.
‘Because I know you better than you think, Alexi,’ he said, his eyes narrowing. ‘You pretend to have no morals, but you are not a man to ignore his own flesh and blood.’ He glanced to where Belle and his wife stood together, still deep in conversation. ‘And the way you look at the boy’s mother suggests she is much more to you than one of your casual conquests.’
The statement struck me square in the solar plexus because it was a truth I had been determined not to acknowledge until this moment. And it explained perfectly why I had been reluctant to claim the boy.
Fear.
Fear that claiming my son would only increase my need for his mother.
My hunger for Belle had not dimmed, and the more time we spent together, both as parents and lovers, the more it seemed to strengthen the bond—and only increase the chemistry that made me constantly want her.
And I hated that need.
After my brother’s death—hell, even before it—with every woman but Belle I had been able to shut off my emotions. To keep them under lock and key.
I had no desire to do that with my son. He was a part of me, a part of Remy, and he could be better than both of us, with none of the scars we had borne from our own upbringing, if I made the effort. And with Belle’s help I knew I could be a good father to him.
But with Belle? I didn’t want to need her in any way other than the physical. It made me feel vulnerable and insecure, exposed and weak in a way I hadn’t felt since I’d been a boy...and I had watched my mother climb into her lover’s convertible and disappear into the night without a backward glance.
‘You’re right,’ I murmured.
Why was I giving Belle this kind of power over me? Claiming the boy had no bearing on my relationship with her. We’d already established that before we’d embarked on this affair. I’d made her no promises, nor had she asked me for any.
The strange spurt of envy returned, still making no sense. I didn’t want her to ask me for more than I was willing to give. Why the hell would I?
‘I am?’ Dante said, obviously surprised by my capitulation.
Ignoring him, I strode across the lawn towards Belle and my son. The boy let go of his mother’s hand and ran into my arms. I hoisted him up and his small fingers gripped my neck.
‘Mr Alexi, I showed Jean-Claude the Galanti X,’ he said, shoving the model under my nose. ‘He said it was cool.’
‘Of course he did,’ I said, catching Belle’s eye. ‘Belle, could I talk to you—and Cai—alone for a minute?’
Her face flushed and Edie grinned. ‘I told you so,’ Dante’s wife murmured as a knowing glance passed between the two women.
I had no idea what had been said, but I suspected I had been the subject when Belle’s face heated even more.
‘Yes, of course,’ she said.
‘If you need some privacy,’ Edie said, her grin spreading, ‘there are some steps leading down to a private cove behind the Japanese pagoda. Dante and I always go there when we need some alone time...’
I nodded and gripped Belle’s hand, giving her no time to change her mind. Cai was excited at the sight of the beach, and after I had carried him down the steps I put him down and took off his shoes so he could paddle in the water.
‘Only get your toes wet, Cai,’ I told him. ‘It’s dangerous to go in too deep without me, okay?’
He nodded. ‘Yes, Mr Alexi,’ he said as he sped off. I sighed.
‘What is it, Alexi, is something wrong?’ Belle asked, her concern clear even though she had been careful not to show it in front of Cai.
‘There is nothing wrong. I simply wish to get your permission to tell Cai who I really am.’ I smiled, trying to hide my own nerves. ‘I’m tired of being called Mr Alexi.’
‘Okay,’ she said. ‘I think he’d be thrilled,’ she added. Although, she didn’t look thrilled. ‘But why now?’ she asked.
Because I’ve been a coward. Because it’s way past time. Because I’ll have to let you go soon. And before I do I must take this next step.
But I couldn’t say any of that without exposing myself. So I settled for telling her the one truth I could acknowledge.
‘Because I’m tired of not being able to kiss you and touch you in front of him,’ I murmured, and before she could evade me I dragged her into my arms, desperate to feel her surrender.
She gasped but her lips softened against mine as I covered her mouth. The kiss became hungry and seeking instantly, as it always did.
‘Why are you kissing my mummy?’
I ripped my mouth away first to see Cai standing in front of us, having returned from the water’s edge.
He tilted his head, more curious than accusatory.
Belle’s face lit up like a Christmas tree and she crouched down to talk to him eye to eye. ‘Cai, it’s okay, you don’t have to be afraid. Alexi and I are...’
‘Shh, Belle, let me explain.’ I touched her shoulder to halt the guilty tangle of words. ‘Come here,’ I said to Cai. The boy slung his arm around my shoulders as I knelt beside him in the sand, the way I had once seen him do with his mother. ‘I kissed your mother because I like kissing her,’ I said.
His nose wrinkled at that. ‘Why?’
‘Because she is special to me,’ I said, the fear returning as I realised the truth of those words.
‘Why?’ the boy asked again.
There were so many answers I could give to that question, but there was only one I could allow myself to acknowledge. ‘Because she is the mother of my son.’
The boy’s brow furrowed, and although I felt choked at admitting the truth to my son for the first time I could see I’d been too cryptic for a four-year-old to understand.
‘You are my son, Cai—and I am your father. I am sorry I haven’t been in your life before now, but I would like to be in it for a very long time to come.’
‘You’re my daddy?’ The boy’s eyes widened as he caught on, and then his gaze shifted to Belle. She nodded, and then sniffed, and I realised she was struggling to keep her emotions at bay.
‘Yes, I am,’ I said as the boy’s gaze shifted back to me.
‘Can I call you Daddy?’ he asked.
‘Of course,’ I said and he grinned.
‘Can I tell Imran?’ he asked. ‘His daddy doesn’t own racing cars,’ he added, the proud, sweet smile making my heart expand in my chest. I had been accepted, and all I had had to do was ask.
‘Yes, you can tell Imran. We will tell everyone together,’ I said. I gathered him close and hugged his small body to mine, but as I drew back he put his hands on my shoulders, a serious expression on his face, and asked, ‘Can you kiss my mummy more, so you can make me a baby brother, like Imran’s mummy made him?’
I coughed, shocked not just by the innocent request but the surge of heat it brought with it—at the thought of making more children with Belle. The sudden urge to see her belly round with my child, the way Edie’s was with Dante’s, brought the surge of envy I hadn’t understood earlier into sharp, too sharp, focus.
What I felt for Belle wasn’t just sex. It had never been just sex. I knew that. But suddenly the amount I did feel for her—the visceral desire to make another child with her—terrified me even more.
My ties to my son, and before him to my brother, I understood. They were my flesh, my blood. I owed them my honour, my loyalty and what was left of my heart that I still had to give.
But binding myself to a woman—wanting to make my relationship with Belle any more permanent than it already was—that could not happen. I could not allow it to happen. Because the only woman who had ever had such a tie to me had broken it at her earliest convenience. An
d almost broken me at the same time.
The panic tightened around my ribs. I couldn’t need Belle this much. I didn’t want to need her this much.
‘Cai, stop being so cheeky,’ Belle said, looking flustered.
‘Why is it cheeky? Imran said that’s what happens when his mummy and daddy kiss too much.’
I choked out a strained laugh at the child’s precocious explanation. But the claws digging into my chest were of fear. A fear I recognised from long ago, when my mother had deserted Remy and me after I had begged her to stay.
‘It’s cheeky because you shouldn’t keep asking Alexi for things,’ Belle said.
Cai leaned into me, his arms wrapping around my neck in a possessive gesture. ‘But he’s not Mr Alexi any more,’ he said. ‘He’s my daddy.’
I chuckled, attempting to let the surge of love for this bright, cheeky child overwhelm the rush of panic as I gathered him close and stood up. ‘Yes, but you should still always do what your mother tells you,’ I murmured.
We made our way up the steep steps from the beach back to the barbeque and I announced my relationship to Cai to the party guests. The surge of pride I felt at finally announcing our relationship was tempered by deep unease. And a desperate loneliness that only made the panic more acute.
We could never be a real family. We would never fulfil Cai’s wish for a baby brother or sister. Because I could not expose myself again to the same devastating betrayal I had suffered as a child.
Which brought me to only one conclusion. I would have to cut this tie to my son’s mother tonight, before it got the chance to cut me.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Belle
I GRINNED ACROSS the console at Alexi as he parked the Galanti GL8 in the garage under the house. Something wonderful, something immense, had happened today at the Allegris’ summer barbeque. Something I hadn’t expected but still felt so exciting, so new—unleashing all the feelings I had held in my heart for Alexi, not just for the last three weeks, but for the last five years.
When he’d announced to Cai that he was his father, with such tenderness, such humour and such understanding, it had felt as if the last bit of the wall between us was finally beginning to crumble.
But what had finally shattered it was the look he’d given me as he’d announced to everyone there that Cai was his son.
I hadn’t really realised how desperate I had been for him to make this final move in the last few weeks—weeks of awesome sex and even more awesome family outings—until he had finally said the words out loud to all the people who mattered to him.
Edie Allegri, with whom I had bonded instantly the minute I had met her, had been the first to congratulate me. And something she had said to me earlier—just before Alexi had stalked across the lawn to ask to talk to Cai and me privately—had been ringing in my head ever since.
‘Isn’t it odd?’ she had said with a knowing look in her eye that at the time had made me feel more than a little inadequate. Edie Allegri was a stunningly beautiful and an extremely confident woman. Not just confident in her career and her abilities as a mother but, from the way Dante looked at her, also one hundred percent confident in his love for her. ‘I’ve always thought of Alexi as handsome, charming and amusing, but also careless and shallow. I never could figure out how he had become so successful in the Super League when he didn’t seem to take anything seriously.’
‘Alexi takes the business of racing very seriously,’ I had said, jumping to his defence, but also confused by her description of him. I didn’t recognise it at all. Not only was he a brilliant businessman, but I’d always found him to be the opposite of careless and shallow. Our relationship in the last few weeks had been so intense, but even as a younger man he had always been serious. I knew he had a reputation as a playboy, but it had never really occurred to me what that might mean.
Before I’d had a moment to process the thought, Edie had smiled at me and added, ‘He also takes you very seriously, much more seriously than any of the other women he has introduced us to. He certainly seems to have bonded with your son.’
I had murmured some platitude about him being a good man, sick that I was still having to lie publicly about his real relationship with Cai.
But as I sat opposite him in the car now—after everything else that had happened since my conversation with Edie—the hope that I might be different from all the other women in his life came back. But this time it didn’t feel ludicrous or misplaced any more.
He had acknowledged Cai this afternoon, but by doing so it felt as if he had also acknowledged me. Intimacy had been growing between us these last few weeks—every time he touched me with such passion, every time he spoke to me with such respect, every time he strengthened his relationship with our son, while being sure to include me.
And the moment Cai had innocently mentioned getting us to ‘make him’ a baby brother I had seen the same flash of intense yearning in his eyes, when they had met mine, that was echoing in my heart.
Was it possible he wanted to make us a real family as much as I did?
I hadn’t dared hope for that. I’d been trying in these last weeks not to expect too much from him. Not to let all the old fantasies devour me again. But we had turned an important corner tonight and I was tired of being a coward.
I reached across the console to rest a hand on his arm as he turned off the ignition.
‘Thank you for today, it’s been...’ I laughed, so full of hope for the future I thought I might burst. ‘Pretty special for me and Cai.’
‘Good,’ he said, sounding oddly perfunctory.
I dismissed the flicker of concern. Alexi was a serious, intense guy. He’d never done gushing, or light-hearted, or certainly not with me.
He glanced back at our son fast asleep in his car seat with the toy car Alexi had given him that morning still clutched in his fist.
‘Let’s get him to bed,’ he said.
Need prickled over my skin and joy echoed in my heart as we exited the car together and Alexi lifted his newly acknowledged son out of his child seat.
We’d been through this ritual nearly every day for the last three weeks—putting Cai to bed together then retiring to my bedroom, where Alexi would invariably rip my clothes off in his urgency to feed the hunger which had been stoked to fever pitch as we’d avoided touching during the day.
Perhaps we wouldn’t do that so much any more, not now that Alexi had kissed me in front of Cai and explained the situation to him. I wondered vaguely if I’d miss that urgency.
I grinned at the silly direction of my thoughts as we closed the door on Cai’s bedroom after tucking him into bed and kissing him goodnight, the electric attraction buzzing in the air between us. Our hunger would always be volatile, exciting and full of heat—no amount of PDAs was going to defuse that.
But as I pressed myself against Alexi’s body and flung my arms over his shoulders—planning to take the initiative tonight—he jerked back and caught my forearms.
‘Don’t, Belle,’ he said, drawing my arms down to my sides. ‘We can’t, not tonight.’
‘Why not?’ I asked, shocked by the rigid expression on his face, especially as I could see the heat in his eyes and I had felt the beginnings of an impressive erection.
He gave my wrists a gentle squeeze, then let me go. He took a step back and raked his fingers through his hair. But he didn’t meet my eyes when he spoke. ‘I need to leave. I’ve got an early flight to London in the morning. And you’re starting work at Galanti tomorrow.’
‘Oh, I see.’ Although I really didn’t see. He had to leave early most mornings to avoid Cai finding us in bed together. My heart kicked into overdrive again at the joyful thought we wouldn’t have to hide that from our son any more because it was totally normal for children to know that their parents shared a bed. I grinned at him, despite my disappointment. ‘I’ll take a rain-
check, then,’ I said, trying out the flirtatiousness I was still learning. ‘And I appreciate you being so thoughtful about my new job. I’d hate my boss to think I was slacking on my first day after spending all night in bed with him.’
But as I leaned up on tiptoes to give him a teasing kiss, which I hoped would make him regret his decision, he pulled away again, his eyes strangely guarded.
‘I don’t think you understand, Belle,’ he said, his expression cold now, as well as rigid. He was starting to scare me. Why did he seem so distant all of a sudden? ‘There’ll be no rain-check. This is the end of our affair.’
‘What?’ I gave my head a shake, sure I must have heard that wrong. Had he just said...?
‘You’re going to be working for me, Belle, and I don’t screw around with my employees.’ His gaze raked over my figure—the heat in it somehow insulting. ‘However tempting.’
‘But...’
But I’m not just an employee. I’m the mother of your son, and I love you.
The admission exploded in my heart. It was the first time I had ever been brave enough to truly acknowledge it, even to myself. But it wouldn’t come out of my mouth, because right alongside it was the fear that had always stopped me from articulating it in the past. The fear that he would reject my love the way he had before. And that fear was real, raw and vivid now. As was the memory of the long-ago rejection I had struggled to recover from once before. I had thought it could never hurt as much again. I realised how wrong I had been as my heart shattered in my chest.
‘But what?’ he asked. ‘I thought you understood we were simply scratching an itch here. You’re not a child any more. You’ve slept with other men—you know how this works.’
But I haven’t slept with any other men and I don’t want to know how it works for you with other women. I thought I was different. I thought I was more.
The pleas died inside me, frozen out by the chill creeping through my body, the humiliation almost as excruciating as the pain. A pain I had to hide as best I could, or I would be reduced to nothing again, the way I had been once before. A nothingness I couldn’t afford to inhabit again because I had a son.
