Xenakis's Convenient Bride(29)

Did he want her to be pregnant? It meant they could take up where they'd been and he could keep her longer than a few months.

Not that she was as warm to the idea.

Do you love me?

He had shied away from answering when she had thrown the question at him  and still wasn't ready to explore what he felt toward her. It didn't  matter. He couldn't ask for her heart either way.         

     



 

His phone buzzed, snapping him out of his introspection.

He started to set the device to Ignore, but saw it was an unfamiliar number. A premonition made him swipe to answer. "Yes?"

"Mr. Xenakis? It's Ian. The weekday doorman at your building. I see  there's a notation on your account that you'd like to be notified if-"

"Underwood is there?" Stavros nearly leaped out of his skin.

"No, sir. But a woman was here in the lobby just now. Wanda Abbott. She  asked me to ring your wife, but Mrs. Xenakis came down before I could  reach her. She was going out, but I overheard Mrs. Abbott say she and  your wife shared a connection through Mr. Underwood. Your wife took her  upstairs. I wasn't sure if that was something you wanted to be informed  about?"

"Definitely," Stavros said, already on his feet and striding for the door.



Calli was grateful when Wanda Abbott refused coffee or tea. She was  shaking too much to pour so much as a glass of water without soaking  herself in the process.

Wanda wasn't doing much better. She wore a tailored pencil skirt with a  classic sweater set, looking very much an Underwood, even though she  explained that she was only a second cousin by a half sister who had  married into the Underwood family. She had at least fifteen years on  Calli and even though she was perfectly made up and obviously took very  good care of herself, she looked every one of those additional years.  Her lipstick stood out on her pale features and her eyes were not only  weary but tortured.

"I had no idea there was anything about the process that wasn't  completely aboveboard," she said after dropping the bombshell that her  son, James, had been adopted shortly after his birth six years ago. "I  knew Brandon had fathered him, but we were told the mother had given him  up because she was too young. Brandon was only nineteen. I understood  why he wasn't ready to be a parent. I had had surgery in my teens that  left me sterile and we wanted children so badly..." Her eyes filled.

"My signature was forged," Calli blurted, needing to impress that into the woman.

"So the letter said. It didn't even occur to me such a thing could  happen. I was just too happy to have a baby." Wanda's gaze pleaded with  Calli for understanding. "We had already been on wait lists with  agencies for several years. I didn't take him because the Underwoods set  up a trust for him. I wanted him. He was such a gift."

Calli searched Wanda's expression, seeing again that plea for  understanding. That vulnerability that a baby created in his mother. She  probably wore the same expression. Don't take him from me.

"Brandon had his whole life ahead of him, they said. A career in  politics. That's why they wanted us to keep James's paternity  confidential. Brandon's mother comes to see him a few times a year, but  not even my sister knows." She dug in her handbag for a tissue, pushed  it up against her nose. "When the letter from your lawyers arrived, I  was beyond stunned. Devastated."

"I tried once before-"

"So my husband admitted, once I showed him the letter. He said the  Underwoods would make it all go away, that they had before. He was  furious I opened it. I thought it was about whether we could access  James's trust for our daughter's hospital bills. I haven't been myself  since she was diagnosed."

"I-What? What do you mean?" Calli pinched her clammy fingers between her knees.

"Our youngest has leukemia. We're not... Well, we're trying everything.  It's been difficult." Her eyes filled. "And then to get this news, that  we might have to fight to keep James-" She choked and jammed her fist  against her mouth.

Calli felt as though she stared down a train, but she was paralyzed.  Couldn't move. It was going to flatten her and leave her in pieces, but  she was tied to the tracks, unable to avoid it.

"My husband is going to kill me for coming here, but I had to. I had to  tell you that I didn't know. I would never do that to someone. And I  came to beg you, Calli. Beg you. You have every right to want to see  James, but now is such a bad time. I'm trying so hard to keep things  normal for him. He's usually such a happy boy, but lately he's been  acting out and he's not sleeping... He's worried about his sister."

The train whistle filled her ears. The clatter of its wheels grew deafening.

"He knows he's adopted. I've braced myself for this sort of thing,  always imagining I would graciously welcome his birth mother into our  lives..." Her tears overflowed and her shoulders began to shake. "I knew  people's feelings could change. But I just can't do this right now. And  if you started picking apart the adoption, tore him from the only home  he knows... It could do lasting damage. I'm begging you not to do that  to him, Calli."         

     



 

And there it was. At least now she knew he was loved. He had a mother who would do anything to spare her son pain.

"Could..." Calli had to clear her throat. "Could I see a photo of him, at least?"



Stavros was damn near propelled up the elevator by fury alone. It  coursed through him like rocket fuel. The door opened and he charged  into the penthouse to the anticlimactic sight of Calli curled up in the  armchair, looking at her phone.

"Where is she?"

"Who?"

"Underwood's minion."

She was inordinately pale. Her eyes were rimmed in red, but there was a  strange acceptance in her. She looked sober and grave, but resolved.  Like one of those religious icons who accepted life's brutality with  grace and humility.

"He did go to a loving family." She held out her phone. "She gave me some photos. He looks really happy."

Stavros took it and glanced at a boy with a cheeky grin, his eyes  endearingly familiar with their brown-gold color. He swiped to the next  one and saw the boy with his arm looped around the neck of a  fuzzy-headed, brown-skinned toddler.

"That's his sister. She's sick. Really sick." She took back the phone,  swept to another photo, adding in a small voice, "I hope he doesn't lose  her. It sounds like they're really close."

"She might be lying," he warned, still battle ready.

"She's not." She swiped for another photo, gaze greedily eating up the  image of her son. "She said she would send me updates. That she would  try to find a way for me to meet him, but that it probably wouldn't be  until they knew what was happening with her daughter."

"You're going to accept that?"

Her gaze came up. "She begged me, Stavros. She doesn't have any pride  where his well-being is concerned. Mothers sacrifice themselves for  their children. The most loving thing I could do for him, as his mother,  is not pursue my own interests over his. He's in good hands. At least I  know that now." She swiped the inside of her wrist against her cheek,  clenched her eyes hard then opened them wide, trying to clear the  wetness so she could see the screen.

"Calli." He sat on the ottoman and reached to circle her ankle with a comforting grip.

She clicked off the phone and tucked it against her breast. The sound was oddly loud. Significant.

"I'm not pregnant."

A wash of something went over him, far more profound than disappointment. Dread. Portent of pain.

"I see." He didn't know what else to say. He felt sick.

"It's for the best," she said without inflection.

His hand was still on her ankle, but he felt as though he was waving his  hand through smoke, trying to catch at her. She was nothing but vapor.

"I think..." Her brow flinched and she cleared her throat. "I think it  would also be for the best if we ended things here. Now." Her gaze came  back to focus on him, but it held an emptiness that made a protest rise  in his throat.

"You agreed to six months." His voice had to push past gravel in his chest.

"I don't care about the money. I don't want it. We both have what we  really wanted from this marriage." She clicked her phone and gazed at it  again. The yearning in her face was too acute to bear.

She didn't have what she wanted. Not really.

"Calli-"

"I have to leave before I get hurt, Stavros. Before I start believing I  belong here and that you and I have more than sexual attraction. Before I  fall in love with you."

He flinched at the word again, part of him thinking, Do it. Fall. But he  couldn't say it aloud. Couldn't ask that of her. Couldn't accept it,  even if she offered it.

"Take pity on me," she begged softly, touching his hand in a caress that  made all the hairs on his body stand up. "I'm not as strong as you  are."