him to return to the clinic to deposit another sample...
Willa’s pointed throat-clearing triggered a wince. Turning, I lifted my chin and met her contemptuous stare.
‘I’ll stay,’ I announced, with as much firmness as I could manage, considering my stomach had gone into a thousand-foot free fall.
RETREAT. REGROUP.
For the dozenth time in what felt like the longest afternoon of my life, I shook my head.
‘You don’t agree, Mr Xenakis?’
I refocused on the leader of the Brazilian marketing team gathered around the conference table and wondered what I’d missed while my brain was stuck in that endless cycle of life-altering words uttered by the most captivating creature I’d ever seen.
I’m sorry... I’ve destroyed...everything.
To think I’d been convinced she was pranking me. Or, even more amusing, that she had latched on to an inventive method of getting my attention, since most feminine ploys left me cold these days.
My steep drop in interest in the opposite sex hadn’t gone unnoticed in recent years. Socialites who’d smugly decided they were an integral part of my healing process were scratching their heads, wondering why I’d permanently lost their numbers. Heiresses who’d eagerly and blatantly sought an alliance with the newly unengaged Xenakis bachelor were left stunned as every avenue of contact was firmly rebuffed.
It hadn’t even been worth the time to inform them that the thrill of the chase had stopped being, well...thrilling. That the eighteen months I’d spent sowing every wild oat I could had left me ashen mouthed and even more jaded than I’d been when I woke up in that hospital to the cruellest betrayal.
To think I’d imagined that was the worst moment of my life.
The stark reality of Sadie Preston’s presence in my penthouse—as per Willa’s confirmation, minutes ago—attested to that moment having well and truly been usurped.
Was this how my brother Axios had felt when presented with the noose-like proposition he’d faced almost a year ago?
No, Ax’s sentence was finite. It would end...or rather should have been ending in a matter of weeks, had his bride of fewer than twenty-four hours not fled from him and vanished without a trace, leaving him bewildered and stuck in limbo.
Christos. If he’s feeling even a fraction of what I’m feeling now...
But then the bride he’d acquired hadn’t been wanted. Whereas what Sadie Preston had taken from me was...priceless.
The dreaded cancer diagnosis which had precipitated my sperm donation in anticipation of radiation might have turned out to be a false alarm when I was twenty-five, but the scars marring my skin beneath my clothes were a reminder of why that visit to the Phoenix Clinic had turned out to be a pivotal, life-affirming event for me. A light in the bleak darkness of the blissful ignorance I’d lived in for almost a year, before the blindfold had been ripped from my eyes almost as ruthlessly as the accident that had attempted to rob me of my life.
Anger and pure, unadulterated disbelief flashed like lightning through my system. I shook my head again, aware that I was attracting bewildered stares from the marketing gurus I’d hired to promote the interests of Xenakis Aeronautics in Brazil.
It had taken a draining amount of mental dexterity to get through my other two meetings, and now a quick glance at the presentation slide brought me up to speed with what I’d missed. Or rather, what they’d missed.
‘This isn’t going to work. Besides being unexceptional, you’ve aimed it at the wrong demographic.’
The team leader nodded enthusiastically. ‘Which demographic were you thinking of, Mr Xenakis?’
I stopped myself from rolling my eyes. Was I required to do all their work for them? ‘You have the data from the beta test. From what I’m seeing, you haven’t bothered to consult it. I’m not seeing any application of the feedback we received from millennials with children.’
My chest clenched as another percussive wave of shock pummelled me. Children. Families. Fatherhood.
A state I’d never experience now, thanks to the actions of a redhead whose lips had dripped words of remorse but whose attitude vaunted defiance. Those startling green eyes had dared me to bring it on even as her bedroom voice wobbled with apology.
That little chin had been raised in silent combat, displaying the silken skin of her throat and a shadow of cleavage. And as for the other treasures hidden beneath her cheap, threadbare clothes...and that hair I wanted to wrap my fist around...
Theos mou. Get a grip.
It was searing shock that had stopped me from instructing Wendell to hand her over to the authorities as soon as she’d confessed her crime.
And shock was the reason she was in my penthouse while I bought myself some time to deal with the earth-shattering news. Besides, as much as I trusted my security chief, some things were private. And this matter couldn’t get more private.
Sadie Preston had essentially taken every last shred of hope for my future and trashed it. And the worst thing was that I hadn’t known how much the nebulous prospect of fatherhood had meant until any chance of it had been destroyed—first with betrayal and lies, and then with a careless press of the delete button on a computer.
My chest growing tighter, I jerked to my feet, the need to do something clawing through me. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I trust we know which direction we’re heading for in the campaign now?’ At their nods of assent, I headed for the door. ‘You have one week to get it right. Don’t let me down.’
Don’t let me down.
Was I wasting my breath, saying that? Was I doomed to be disappointed in everyone I put my trust in? Be it in personal stakes or in a supposedly exclusive, top-of-the-range clinic?
My mouth soured as I strode for the lift.
The Brazilian contingent only needed a little guidance—they’d come through eventually. If they didn’t, they’d simply be...replaced.
While I... Christos, I would never be a father.
I braced a hand against the wall, the weight of reality attempting to crush my shoulders.
So what if in the past I’d had my doubts about my potential effectiveness as a father? Xenakis men were many things, but exemplary fathers they were not. My grandfather had buried himself in work up to the point when he’d dropped dead of a heart attack, trying to save his near-bankrupt family. And long before that, my father had been denied his father’s favour, resulting in the neglect of his own family.
While we tolerated each other now, for the sake of the family business, I didn’t have a single memory of any bonding experience with my father. Boarding school had taken care of my formative years, followed by a gruelling apprenticeship
