Apollo studied the screen in horror. Two of them? Two babies struggling to make space in Pixie’s tiny body? How could that be? That had to make everything more dangerous.
Pixie yanked her hand from Apollo’s because he was crushing her fingers. She glanced up at him, reading the raw tension etched in his hard features. He wasn’t pleased. But then why would he be? He had only needed one child and two would presumably be more hassle and expense. The nurse wiped off the gel and helped her back to her feet. She took a seat for yet another blood test and shut her eyes tight sooner than see the needle while Apollo took up position behind her and rested his hands down heavily on her shoulders.
She told the consultant about her frequent nausea. He explained that that could occur in a twin pregnancy and that it should settle down by the end of her first trimester, but that if it began to impact on her health she would need support. He mentioned that the twins each had their own placenta, which lessened the chance of complications. The information he gave her was very practical and Pixie was happy to thank him and leave while Apollo demonstrated a dismaying eagerness to stay behind and talk to the medical team.
Apollo’s blood had run cold throughout his entire body when the word ‘complications’ struck him like blow. He felt sick. Mr Rollins informed him unasked that sex was still perfectly fine. Ironically, Apollo had never felt less horny and he was suddenly feeling very guilty. If anything went wrong it would be his fault. He had planned this pregnancy, done everything possible to make it happen and now that he had he was discovering that he had hitched a ride on a rocket that he could no longer control. Not since his troubled childhood had he been made to feel so helpless. By the time the medical team departed on the helicopter to head back to the airport, Apollo was in a seriously sombre mood.
Pixie settled down happily with a pot of tea on the shaded terrace with Hector at her feet. Two babies, my goodness, weren’t they going to be a handful? She was in shock but, after hearing her babies’ heartbeats, she was excited and pleased as well. She sipped her tea and wondered if the twins would be identical or non-identical and whether they would be boys or girls or even one of each. It was a huge relief to have something other than Apollo to think about.
Apollo strode out onto the terrace and surveyed her. ‘I can’t let you leave me,’ he intoned grimly. ‘I have to be part of this. They are my children too. I need to be sure you’re healthy and looking after yourself.’
‘What about what I need?’ Pixie countered, eyes narrowing as she looked back at him because he was standing in sunlight, tall and bronzed and muscular as a god in stature and so beautiful he didn’t seem quite real to her.
‘You need my support.’
‘No, I don’t. I’ve been independent all my life,’ Pixie traded without hesitation.
Apollo leant back against the low wall separating the terrace from the garden and tossed a squeaky toy at Hector, who bounded after it with glee. ‘I don’t want you to be independent.’
‘Tough. We made a business arrangement,’ Pixie reminded him. ‘Getting pregnant is my get-out-of-jail-free card and I’m playing it.’
‘You’re being unreasonable.’
‘I love the island. I like my life here but this is your house, your island and I don’t want to live in your house on your island,’ Pixie explained without apology.
Apollo breathed in slow and deep and practised a patience that he was in no way accustomed to practising. ‘We’ll discuss it after the party tomorrow.’
Her life had fallen apart, Pixie thought, suddenly losing the high of finding out that she was carrying two babies. She was about to become a single mum, which most poignantly was something she had once sworn she would never be. But that was life, she told herself, knocking you back on your heels and changing things without warning. And she would be a liar if she argued that she couldn’t have foreseen the breakdown of their marriage. After all, that breakdown had been foreseen in the pre-nuptial agreement she had signed and all the conditions for that breakdown laid out in advance. She had read the terms and she had even read the small print. She knew that she had rights and that Apollo couldn’t ignore them.
Apollo crossed the tiles towards her and studied her with gorgeous glittering green eyes. ‘I don’t want this marriage to end. I don’t want a divorce,’ he declared. ‘I don’t want you to leave Nexos either.’
After a noisy pummelling session with his squeaky toy, Hector sneaked across the floor and hovered uneasily near Apollo’s feet before he gingerly dropped the toy there. Muttering something shaken in Greek, Apollo stilled and then he bent, scooped it up and threw it and Hector went careening after it. ‘He brought the toy to me. He finally brought it to me!’ he exclaimed in amazement.
‘I never said my dog had good taste,’ Pixie remarked, in no mood to be captivated.
* * *
The following morning, the day of the party, Pixie was following her usual routine of being horrendously sick when Apollo joined her in the bathroom. ‘Go away!’ she shrieked furiously.
‘No, this is my business,’ Apollo declared, crouching down to loop her hair out of the way and support her.
‘I hate you!’ Pixie snapped with pure venom because it was the last straw that he should witness her in such a state when all her defences were down, and there were many more such tart exchanges before her stomach settled again.
Having cleaned her up with unblemished cool, Apollo carried her back to bed. ‘Do you want me to cancel the party?’
‘You can’t. Half our guests are already on their way,’ she groaned. ‘I’ll be fine once Holly gets here.’
‘I haven’t had sex with anyone but you since we got married,’ Apollo announced just when she was least expecting any reference to that burning issue.
‘Don’t believe you,’ Pixie gasped, turning over on her side to avoid looking at him. ‘Nobody would believe you. I’m not stupid. It’s what you do, it’s who you are...you probably can’t even help it.’
‘It’s not who I am!’ Apollo bit out hotly from between clenched white teeth, his eyes emerald bright and accusing. ‘The least you can do is give me the chance to explain.’
Pixie closed her eyes tight and played dead. His sudden anger had unnerved her. She didn’t fear him but right then she didn’t feel equal to the challenge of such an emotive confrontation. In fact suddenly all she wanted was Holly’s reassuringly soothing presence. Tears stung her eyes behind the lowered lids.
‘Izzy is Jeremy Slater’s kid sister. Vito and I went to school with Jeremy. Although you haven’t met him yet, he’s a close friend. Izzy was at a dinner I attended. I’ve met her before and she asked me for a lift because she was visiting someone with an apartment in the same building as my London penthouse. I thought nothing of it,’ Apollo admitted grittily. ‘I wasn’t particularly surprised either when the paparazzi jumped out to photograph us when we arrived because Izzy’s every move is currently prime fodder for the tabloid newspapers.’
‘So, according to you, you simply gave her a lift,’ Pixie recited. ‘How does that explain her still being with you the next morning?’
‘She spent the night with whoever she was visiting. She phoned me first thing and asked me if I could drop her off on my way into the office. She was waiting for me in the lobby and we left the building together.’
‘When you were caught on camera again. Why didn’t your bodyguards intervene?’
‘Because I suspected that Izzy was using me to raise her own profile and, not having thought through the situation, I saw no harm in it and waved them back,’ Apollo ground out angrily.
His explanation covered the facts but his generosity towards Izzy Jerome’s craving for publicity when he himself loathed paparazzi attention infuriated her. Since when had Apollo not ‘thought through’ a situation? He must’ve realised how the press would present those photos, one taken the night before, the next early the next morning.
‘I’m sorry,’ she pronounced flatly. ‘I don’t believe you.’
The door thudded closed on his exit and only then did her tension ease a little yet she had never felt so empty. She had not realised that she could love anyone as much as she loved Apollo and she had not realised that losing someone could hurt so much that it hurt to breathe. And it was a lesson she truly wished she had not had to learn. She had lain awake a long time the night before. Apollo had presumably slept in another room and ironically his absence had distressed her as much as his presence would have done. It was as though she were being ripped slowly apart, divided between wanting him and not wanting him.
Vito and Holly arrived mid-afternoon. As soon as Pixie heard Holly’s bright voice echoing up from the hall she called down to her friend from the upper landing. Apollo and Vito looked up. Pixie reddened and waved to excuse herself for not having gone downstairs to welcome their guests.
‘I’m pregnant,’ she told Holly baldly. ‘And, yes, it was planned.’
‘Is that why Apollo is looking a little ragged round the edges?’