“So you said. Proof is to arrive within the hour, or something like that…” She waved her hand in an airy gesture.
“Right,” he gritted out between clenched teeth.
She really had to stop baiting him. “Let’s say I believe you. Why would your brother marry your fiancée?”
“As I told you last night, your and my relationship came as a great shock to my family.” Pain crossed his features. “The photographer did his homework and had chapter and verse on our year-long association. My brother was appalled on Phoebe’s behalf. She’d been made to look a fool, something his perception of our family honor could not tolerate.”
“So he married her? Wouldn’t your intended marriage have been just as efficacious?”
“No. I was the philanderer, the one caught with my pants down in public so to speak.”
She swallowed a smile at the imagery. Dimitri Petronides in such a vulnerable position was something she’d give a great deal to see. “I can’t believe you agreed to let your fiancée marry your brother.”
“He convinced her to elope with him. Her pride was saved. Our family honor was saved and now I am free to marry you.”
He looked for all the world like he expected her to leap for joy and congratulate him on his good planning. She would have rather dumped his coffee in his lap. “Charming. You can marry your pregnant mistress now that the virginal bride-to-be has flown the coop. Thanks, but no thanks.”
“Do you think our son will thank you for denying him his heritage, his Greek family, his role as my heir?”
“We don’t have to be married for you to make our son your heir or for you to be part of his life. You can have access.”
“Of what good is this? You live an ocean away. How can I be his father with two continents and an ocean between us?”
“I don’t know.” She stood up wearily. She had to get ready to go to work. She had an assignment in two hour’s time across town. “You’ll have to forgive me for not having all the answers just yet. You ditched me three months ago, certain the baby I carried was not yours. I haven’t been thinking in terms of parental sharing and visitation rights.”
He stood as well. “Where are you going?”#p#分页标题#e#
“I have an assignment in a couple of hours. I’m going to get ready.”
“I told you I am not allowing you out of my sight.”
“Then come along,” she offered sarcastically, “but I’m going to work.”
She came to rue those flippantly uttered words. Dimitri insisted on doing just that. In addition, he refused to take a cab, but had his car called, along with his two bodyguards. It had been a while since she went out with security men in tow, a little over three months to be exact.
Dimitri refused to wait in the car while she did the short translation job for the group of French tourists. She walked beside the tour guide, translating the woman’s rapid dialogue concerning the Empire State Building into French while Dimitri and his bodyguards brought up the rear of the line.
It would have been a comical sight if she wasn’t so tired and stressed. By the time she slid into his car for the ride back to his hotel, she was disgustingly grateful she hadn’t had to wait in line for a taxi. She didn’t even have enough energy to enjoy looking at the city’s Christmas decorations out the limousine’s window. Commenting on her drooping appearance, he insisted on stopping for lunch at one of Manhattan’s upscale Italian restaurants.
Alexandra walked back into the main room of the suite from her bedroom just as Dimitri was turning from the fax machine, several sheets of paper in his hand. She’d avoided him since their return by the simple expedient of taking a nap. For some reason, she’d slept better than she had in ages.
Dimitri waved the papers before her. “Proof.”
“Proof?” She was still a little rummy from the nap and didn’t know what he was talking about until she looked down and read the top sheet. “Oh.”
She put out her hand for the sheaf of papers and he gave them to her. The first one was a marriage license. It was in Greek, but she was now almost as conversant in that language as she was in both English and French. She easily translated the names and the male listed was Spiros Petronides, not Dimitri.
The second one was a photo of Spiros and Phoebe in wedding regalia. Phoebe looked a little shell-shocked. Spiros looked arrogantly satisfied. Typical Petronides male.
The third was a letter from Spiros affirming Dimitri’s account of the situation. This one was in English.