further mention of it until the following Sunday morning, just as Drakon replaced his empty coffee cup and told her he was going to read through a new contract in his study, but Lucy shook her head, feeling her heart pounding nervously in her chest.
‘I’d much rather you didn’t.’
There was a split-second pause. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘Not today, Drakon. I wonder…’ she licked her lips ‘…would you mind coming swimming with me and Xander instead?’
‘Swimming?’ he demanded. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. At his age?’
‘They can start lessons as early as four weeks,’ she informed him calmly. ‘In fact, he’s had a couple at the new gym already but they’ve got a class this morning and it would be nice to have some company.’ She sucked in a deep breath. ‘I think you might enjoy it. And before you trot out all the reasons why that’s not possible—can I just ask what’s the point of being one of the world’s most successful men if you take less time off than the average factory worker?’
Drakon met her resolute expression and felt a flicker of mild irritation at the fact that she was so openly defying him. Yet he couldn’t fault her logic, no matter how much he’d like to be able to. In fact, there was little about his new wife he could fault—and hadn’t that been the biggest revelation of all? She was…
He studied her.
She was surprising. She was like the first soft shimmering of spring after the harshness of winter. Like a welcome sea breeze which whispered over your skin on the hottest day of the year. Her skills as a mother had never been in question because Drakon had known exactly what he didn’t want from someone taking on that particular role. His mouth hardened. He’d wanted someone as unlike his own mother as possible—without her brittle exclusion of her own children, and her all-encompassing absorption in her philandering husband, and her preoccupation with her own appearance. He’d wanted someone soft and caring and honest and true. Someone with a heart and someone with a conscience—and Lucy had ticked all those boxes, and more.
He swallowed. Much more.
He hadn’t been expecting her to keep surprising him as a lover, nor imagined he would find it difficult to drag himself away from the seductive sanctuary of her arms each morning. Sometimes he would even find himself glancing at his watch at the end of a working day and itch to get away, but he forced himself to work as late as he’d always done, because independence was key to his success. Wasn’t that one of the reasons why his Singaporean trip had provided such a welcome relief and the space he needed? Because no way was he ever going to rely on another human being and open himself up to pain.
Yet Lucy wasn’t asking for the world, was she? She wasn’t demanding emotional reassurance, or expecting him to bolster her unrealistic dreams about marriage. She simply wanted him to accompany her while she took the baby swimming. Not the biggest ask in the world.
‘What time do you want to leave?’ he growled.
‘In about an hour.’
‘I have a couple of calls I need to make first.’
‘Of course you do,’ she said, with a smile which somehow niggled him.
The gym was only a short walk away, reached through an oasis of a garden square which was new to him, but then, it was a long time since he’d taken a walk in London just for the sake of it. Feeling like a man who had just emerged from a long sleep, Drakon heard the unmistakable sounds of birdsong coming from the bare branches of a tree, before peering down at a carpet of snowy white flowers whose white tips were pushing their way through the grass.
‘Snowdrops,’ said Lucy as she followed the direction of his gaze.
‘I know they’re snowdrops,’ he snapped.
He was slightly disconcerted to discover mixed changing rooms at the upmarket gym—he hadn’t been in any kind of changing room since uni—and by the way Lucy thrust a pair of impossibly tiny armbands at him.
‘Could you put these on Xander?’
He looked at them with a frown. ‘Can’t you do it?’
‘Well, I can, of course—but I thought you might like to.’
What could he say in response? That he had no desire to do so? That the thought of touching the baby filled him with dread because he was so impossibly tiny? Especially as a nearby blonde was openly listening into their conversation, her eyes devouring him in a predatory way he hadn’t come across in a while. Was that because he never really looked at other women any more, other than to compare them unfavourably to Lucy? He shot the blonde a glance before disdainfully averting his gaze. She was practically falling out of some skimpy bikini and he thought how much sexier his wife looked, clad in a sleek one-piece which hugged her toned curves.
He turned back to the task in hand and stared down at the tiny baby who was now cradled in the crook of his arm. It was a nerve-racking experience to slide on the armbands and he wanted to lash out at Lucy for making him do it, when he looked up and met the soft understanding shining from her blue eyes.
‘You’re doing just fine,’ she said softly. ‘Babies are stronger than they look and all dads feel funny at first. I’ve seen men the size of mountains looking completely lost when confronted with a newborn. You just need to do it more often. You know what they say. Practice makes perfect.’
But Drakon could hear his heart pounding. Pounding in a way he didn’t recognise. Xander was wearing a hooded little towel which made him look like a miniature caped crusader, but nothing could detract from his vulnerability, despite the fact that he was over three months old now. Drakon stared into black eyes framed by impossibly long lashes. He had his father’s eyes. Niko’s eyes, he realised with a wrench. But they were his eyes too, for hadn’t he and his twin brother been identical, sharing almost the same DNA? He stared down again at his adopted son and something inside him turned over and started to melt.
And that was how it started. Insidiously at first, but with gathering force—like the fierce Meltemi wind which blew through his homeland every summer—Drakon began an emotional connection with the child he had adopted.
He tried to deny it. To convince himself his life wouldn’t change in any way because he didn’t want it to change. He would play the part of husband and father, yes. That had always been part of the deal. But he would play it from a suitable distance, for that was how he operated. He was there to support Lucy in her role of mother, because that was her primary role. At times he’d started to wonder whether she truly understood and accepted the boundaries within their relationship, then something happened which made it clear he was going to have to spell it out for her.
The episode in question occurred when he was returning from a day trip of meetings in France and found his limousine waiting for him at the airfield. Unusually, the chauffeur remained in the driving seat and Drakon opened the rear door himself, to discover Lucy sitting on the back seat waiting for him—a vision in a silky dress which matched her eyes and suede high-heeled shoes in exactly the same colour.
‘Hi,’ she said.
‘Hi,’ he said, his eyes narrowing as some unknown fear clouded his heart. Something to do with Xander, perhaps? ‘Is something wrong?’ he demanded.
‘No, nothing’s wrong. I just thought it would be fun to come and
