Expectant Bride (12 page)

A stark little silence fell. Ellie's eyes had widened to their fullest extent. She couldn't believe that he had said what he had just said.

‘Most especially when I am considering your welfare,' he added gently.

Ellie trembled and compressed her bloodless lips. ‘You're not seriously asking me to…marry you?'

‘Very seriously,' Dio asserted.

‘But we hardly know each other—'

‘We know enough. I like you. I respect you. I desire you. What more is there?'

‘What about…love?' she prompted, striving for a detached tone.

‘What about our child?'

Ellie lost colour.

‘I
want
to marry you,' Dio told her with quiet emphasis.

‘Not really, you don't. People don't get married these days just because of an accidental pregnancy,' Ellie protested unsteadily, her heart beating very fast.

‘People like me
do
.'

Ellie swallowed hard. ‘Dio, I—'

‘You know it makes sense.'

‘Yes, but—'

‘We'll get married as soon as I can arrange it,' Dio incised with finality.

‘I'll think about it,' she returned unevenly.

Dio shot the Ferrari to a halt in front of the bookshop. Unsnapping her seatbelt, he reached for her, black eyes glittering. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself,
yineka mou
,' he told her. ‘Just
think
about it? Yet only last night you couldn't
wait
to—'

‘Dio!'
Ellie gasped, with a sound between an embarrassed laugh and a shaken reproach.

‘So either you're a wanton hussy who shamelessly used me for sex…or a decent woman with a delightful inability to resist me.'

Ellie went pink, but she was wholly mesmerised by his proximity. Involuntarily, she raised a hand, and with her forefinger traced the surprisingly forbidding curve of his wide, sensual mouth. ‘I can't…you know it too,' she acknowledged, utterly desperate for him to kiss her.

But, in spite of their proximity, Dio held back. ‘I'll call you tomorrow.'

As he freed her again, Ellie blinked in a daze. Dio wanted to marry her? Dio was
willing
to marry her, she rephrased. ‘I can't let you marry me!' she said abruptly.

‘I won't marry an argumentative woman.'

‘Don't tease about something so serious,' she pleaded.

His strong bone structure set hard. ‘You and I…it would work,' Dio intoned, his accent thickening.

‘Yes…but could you be happy?' Ellie pressed, her whole being centred on the awful wounding necessity of asking that question when all she really wanted to do was drag him off to the nearest church.

Dio groaned in frustration. ‘Obviously I should have proposed over a romantic dinner, with flowers and a ring—'

Ellie winced. ‘No, that sort of stuff isn't important.'

‘Then my proposal must've been excessively clumsy.' Gleaming black eyes rested on her taut, anxious face. ‘I want to marry you, Ellie. The only word I need to hear now is yes.'

‘Yes…' Agreement escaped from Ellie before she could bite it back.

‘Now that wasn't difficult, was it?' His shadowy smile rocked her heart on its axis, and then he turned away and
glanced at his watch. ‘Now I'm afraid I have to head straight for the airport. I'll be in touch tomorrow.'

‘What's wrong with tonight?' Ellie heard herself ask as she climbed out of the car.

‘I'll be tied up all evening.'

Hot-cheeked, Ellie nodded, closed her hands together to stop them reaching out to him and forced a smile. ‘OK…I understand,' she said, when she didn't really.

His departure seemed so incredibly low-key that she could not quite believe that he had asked her to marry him and that she had agreed.

Concentrating with a mind in a giddy whirl was far too much of a challenge that afternoon. In the space of an hour she had learned that she was expecting a baby and she had gained a bridegroom. It was too much to take in all at once…

Dio wanted to marry her. Did fairy tales come true? All right, so her father had been a creep, and on that basis she had judged the whole male sex. Only not Dio. Dio had taken her by storm. He didn't love her. But love could grow, she told herself urgently, determined not to pick holes in her own happiness. Happiness was a fragile thing, and Ellie hadn't known much of it. Dio liked, respected and desired her, she reminded herself. All that plus their baby would be enough to build on. She would make him happy. Whatever it took, she would make him the very best wife he could imagine…

 

At one the following afternoon, a limousine with tinted windows pulled up outside the shop. Ellie grinned, assuming that Dio had got back from Paris sooner than he had thought.

She immediately asked Horace Barry if it would be all right for her to take her lunch break. But a split second later she stiffened in confusion when a female figure emerged from the limousine. A tall svelte brunette sheathed in a pill-box-red suit. Helena Teriakos, she registered in bemused recognition, just as the other woman entered the bookshop.

The Greek woman focused on Ellie with cool dark eyes, her beautiful face expressionless. ‘Is there somewhere we can talk in private?' she enquired.

Disconcerted by that disdainful demand, Ellie flushed. ‘Sorry, what is—?'

‘We can talk in my car.' Spinning round, Helena Teriakos walked back out of the shop, evidently expecting Ellie to follow her.

Ellie hesitated. She didn't like being taken by surprise. Even less did she like being addressed as if she was a medieval serf. But Helena Teriakos was related to Dio, wasn't she? Certainly she had been swanning about that palatial villa on Chindos like a family member of no small importance. There had been that family photograph in Dio's apartment as well. And if Helena had suddenly taken the trouble to seek her out, it could only be because she knew that Dio had proposed and she had something to say on the subject.

Ellie lifted her jacket, slid into it and went outside. The chauffeur ushered her into the rear of the opulent vehicle. Ellie was very tense.

Helena Teriakos studied her with narrowed eyes and slowly shook her beautiful head in apparent wonderment. ‘A shop assistant and a cleaner! Dio really
must
have been distraught that night on Chindos! I confess that I wasn't pleased when he showed up with you at his father's funeral, but in the circumstances, I was prepared to overlook that small social indiscretion—'

‘Social indiscretion…?' Ellie queried flatly, her skin reddening beneath that derisive attack. She lifted her chin. ‘Why should you have to overlook anything Dio does?'

The Greek woman elevated a brow. ‘Men will be men. I'm fond of Dio, of course, but I don't have a jealous temperament. I'm not a sexually possessive woman either. I have always expected Dio to have a mistress after our marriage—'

‘
Your
marriage?' Ellie interrupted incredulously.

Helena Teriakos appraised her bewildered face and shaken eyes and laughed with sudden amusement. ‘You really
didn't
know, did you? Dio and I were practically betrothed in our cradles. We have known all our lives that we would eventually marry—'

‘No…' Ellie broke in shakily. ‘
No
, it's not true! Dio would have told me….' And then her voice just faded away into nothingness as she recalled that conversation on the beach.

‘Why should he have told you? You were just one more in a long line of little amusements, none of whom were destined to be of any lasting importance in Dio's life,' Helena retorted drily, watching all the remaining colour drain from Ellie's face. ‘Had you belonged to our social circle, you would have been aware that our friends and families have been awaiting an announcement of a formal engagement for some time now.'

The mists of sheer disbelief had now cleared from Ellie's mind. She was absolutely gutted, her sense of betrayal immense. Helena Teriakos, whom she had foolishly assumed to be a mere relative! She felt sick with pain and mortification. An arranged marriage. Only Dio had termed it, ‘picking one's life partner with intelligence'.
Of course
Spiros Alexiakis had had a bridal candidate in mind when he'd urged his son to marry! And Dio had said, ‘I'm not ready yet.' Too busy having a good time with a variety of gorgeous willing women to settle down into matrimony at the age of twenty-nine. But throughout Helena had been waiting patiently in the wings.

‘I just don't understand how you could accept Dio b-being with other women…' Ellie stammered helplessly.

‘Dio and I have bonds that you could never hope to understand. We share the same background, status and expectations. We are a perfect match,' Helena informed her with supreme superiority. ‘Unfortunately Dio rejoices in a rather touching but very destructive sense of humour. He believes that he has to marry you for his child's sake.'

Aghast that Dio had evidently admitted that she had fallen pregnant, Ellie felt horribly exposed and shamed. ‘Dio
told
you—?'

‘He flew over to Paris yesterday and spent the entire evening with me. Weren't you aware of that either?' A small scornful smile tilted the brunette's lips. ‘Believe me, he was quite devastated by his over-active conscience. However, I am a very practical woman. How much will it cost me to persuade you that an abortion would be in your best interests? Five hundred thousand pounds?'

Ellie gazed back at Helena Teriakos in appalled disbelief.

‘One million? I am an extremely wealthy woman and I'm prepared to be generous,' Helena spelt out with icy calm. ‘You can always tell Dio you had a miscarriage. I won't even insist that you get out of his life. You can still be his mistress. Believe me, you won't last
five
minutes as his wife!'

‘I don't want your money…and I'm not getting rid of my baby,' Ellie asserted strickenly, unnerved by the other woman's total lack of emotion.

‘But you can't possibly marry him! Can you imagine the headlines? “Dionysios Alexiakis marries a cleaner”?' Helena suggested with a little shudder of revulsion. ‘He's a very proud man. You'll be nothing but an embarrassment to him. And by the time the newspapers have finished hauling out the sordid circumstances of your birth and all your former lovers, Dio will have begun to hate you.'

‘What do you know about the circumstances of my birth?' Ellie demanded with a raw edge to her strained voice.

‘I know everything there is to know about you, Ellie. Money buys information.' Helena dealt her stricken face a pitying appraisal. ‘You're in love with Dio. Thankfully I have never felt the need to indulge myself with such messy emotions. Well, make your choice. If you marry Dio, it'll end in the divorce court. True, you'll get the kudos of being his first wife, but you'll lose him completely.'

‘I'm not going to marry him,' Ellie framed numbly.

‘Now you're being sensible.' The other woman awarded her a cool smile of satisfaction. ‘When you trap a man into marriage, it can only end with him hating you. As for the child—you should learn by your own foolish mother's mistake. It didn't do
her
much good bringing you into the world, did it? All those pathetic years of loyalty, only to be rewarded by the sight of your father marrying a secretary half his age the minute he was free!'

Savaged by that cruel attack out of the blue, Ellie scrambled dizzily up and started to get out of the car. ‘I'm not listening to any more of this—'

‘The door's locked. I'm not finished yet. I do
not
want you to have this child—'

‘My child
is
my business!' Ellie exclaimed in angry distrust. ‘Now open this door and stop threatening me!'

With a languid hand, Helena Teriakos signalled her chauffeur. ‘Think about what I've said. I make a very bitter enemy, and you will discover that Dio has tremendous respect for me.'

Ellie practically fell out onto the pavement in her eagerness to escape. She hurried through the shop and upstairs to her bedsit. But when she got there the tears didn't come. Instead, the kind of outraged and inexpressible pain which Ellie hadn't felt since her mother's death began to mount inside her.

Dio had not been honest with her. She had been dragged into a situation in which she had no defence but that of her own ignorance. She was pregnant by a man who had been virtually engaged to another woman. She had unwittingly poached on another woman's territory and was now being blamed for the entire ghastly mess which had resulted. As for Dio…as for
Dio
, with his wretched sense of honour and his cold, malicious witch of a future wife—well, Helena Teriakos was welcome to him! And the sooner Ellie told him that, the better she would feel!

E
LLIE
heard Dio come home. She listened to him exchanging a handful of terse words with his manservant, no doubt learning that she was waiting to see him. Having come over to his apartment the instant she finished work, she had been awaiting his return for almost two hours.

And Ellie now felt like unstable gelignite. The more inconsistencies she recalled in Dio's past behavior, the more she understood, and the deeper her frustrated pain stabbed.

Dio strode into the airy drawing room, his lean, strong face grim, black eyes flat and unfathomable. He emanated stress and tension like a forcefield.

‘I understand that Helena paid you a visit,' Dio drawled icily, immediately knocking the ground from beneath Ellie's feet by admitting his knowledge of that fact. ‘It was a very generous act on her part, but only what I have learnt to expect from her.'

Thoroughly thrown by that opening, Ellie gasped. ‘A generous act? Are you out of your mind or just plain stupid?'

Dio stilled, his darkly handsome features emanating a freezing distaste that cut Ellie to the bone. ‘She offered you her support and assistance. You were rude and offensive. I did not enjoy having to apologise for your behaviour.'

‘Having to apologise for my behaviour…?' Ellie repeated almost incoherently, registering that she had seriously underestimated the older woman. Support and assistance? The abortion package? Helena had clearly got in first with her own version of events, and Ellie wondered why she herself should even care. ‘She offered me a million pounds to have an abortion.'

Dio studied her for a full ten seconds with widening black eyes full of sheer, lancing disbelief. ‘If you must lie, strive to come up with something more credible and less melodramatic,' he derided harshly. ‘Helena would never sink to such a level.'

Silenced by the level of assurance with which he made that claim, Ellie stared back at him with bitter anger. ‘You really do deserve her,' she breathed in a stark undertone, two high spots of red banishing her previous pallor. ‘And if she's so blasted special,
why
were you with me?'

Dio froze. ‘I will not discuss Helena with you, Ellie.'

‘What a pity you couldn't award me the same respect!' Ellie bit out, so mad with rage and pain she could hardly get the words out.

A slight rise of colour burnished the slant of Dio's stunning but rigid cheekbones. ‘The very least I owed Helena was a frank explanation.'

‘But you couldn't even bring yourself to refer to her existence around me. You must have known that I hadn't a clue
who
she was the day of the funeral!' Ellie condemned in an emotive appeal. ‘I thought she was just a relative—'

‘We are distantly related,' Dio conceded, tight-mouthed.

‘How very cosy. No wonder you didn't introduce me to her! That's some kinky, twisted relationship you two have…and if she was a nicer person, I might have pitied her for being that desperate to hold onto you!'

Dio rested glittering dark golden eyes on her that burned like lasers. ‘I will not listen to you abusing Helena. You don't understand what you're talking about.'

A torn laugh escaped Ellie. ‘And if it's anything to do with you, I never will, will I? But it really doesn't matter any more. I trusted you. I thought you were a free man. I would never have got involved with you had I known about
her
.'

‘Helena and I are not lovers,' Dio delivered grimly. ‘Before last night I had never actually discussed marriage with
her. But there was a strong understanding between our families that at some time in the future we would marry.'

‘Why the heck didn't you just marry her when your father wanted you to?' Ellie demanded bitterly.

‘I resented the pressure being put on me. I should emphasise that Helena played no part in creating that pressure,' Dio imparted flatly.

Saint
Helena, safe on her pedestal of perfection, Ellie reflected sickly. And what had she herself been but a last little fling that night on the island of Chindos? A physical release, a momentary distraction from his grief? ‘That night we spent together…you already
knew
you were going to go ahead and marry her.'

‘Ultimately I always expected to marry Helena. No matter how much you resent that reality, I
can't
alter it,' Dio asserted with bleak emphasis.

‘But you weren't honest with me. You never gave me a choice. I can't ever forgive that. And now that I do know about her, I find it absolutely disgusting that you were planning to set me up as your mistress before you even married her,' she admitted, with a quiver of repulsion at such naked calculation. ‘What's the point of marrying someone you can't even be faithful to?'

Dio threw up both hands in a sudden sweeping gesture of violent frustration. ‘The last twenty-four hours have been unadulterated hell for me. I am in no mood to stand much more from you,' he vented rawly. ‘Whether you like it or not, Helena is the wounded party in this situation. I have hurt her pride and let her down, but she voiced not a single word of reproach.'

‘Yes, she's a very clever woman, much cleverer than I am.'

‘Cristos…'
Dio blazed back at her. ‘How can you be so bloody spiteful? It is
you
whom I am going to marry now!'

Ellie stooped to lift her bag with a trembling hand and
then straightened to survey him with eyes empty of all emotion, for she was drained. ‘I wouldn't have you as a gift, Dio.'

Dio shot her a look of volatile black fury. ‘I swear that I will strangle you before I get you to the altar!'

‘I mean it,' Ellie told him quietly, watching a sort of stunned light begin to make inroads into his anger as he absorbed her determination. ‘Yesterday I was panicking, and foolish enough to grab at your offer of marriage. But your loyalty is with Helena, not where it should be, and I'm not becoming part of some nasty triangle—'

‘You are being totally unreasonable!' Dio condemned harshly.

‘No, I'm being very sensible.'

‘You are carrying my child—'

‘And that's the only reason you asked me to marry you…it's
not
enough.' And, sidestepping him in a sudden move of desperation, Ellie walked swiftly out into the hall.

‘There is more than that between us,
pethi mou
,' Dio growled in her wake.

‘I can get by without the sex too,' Ellie told him witheringly, although even the sound of that dark, deep drawl pulled at her senses.

‘Come back here!' Dio grated. ‘This is ridiculous!'

Ellie glanced back at him, her lovely face pale as marble and just about as unyielding. ‘No…what was ridiculous was that we ever got together in the first place.'

‘Ellie—'

‘
Please
, give me some space,' she urged with charged emphasis. ‘Don't phone, don't come near me. Maybe when the dust has settled on all this we can talk about the baby…just not now.'

 

For the next week Ellie functioned on automatic pilot. Locked into the need to conquer her desperate craving for
Dio, even when she hated him like poison for hurting her so much, she felt totally detached from the rest of the world.

In spite of her request that he leave her alone, Dio phoned every day. On each occasion she put the phone straight back down again, refusing to speak to him. The truth was that she didn't trust herself yet, even on the phone. She was far too vulnerable.

Finding out about Helena Teriakos had devastated Ellie with guilt, jealousy and mortification. Discovering that Dio trusted Helena infinitely more than he trusted her had literally torn Ellie apart at the seams. How much in touch with his own emotions
was
Dio? Did he even appreciate how much he already cared about Helena Teriakos? Once he had resented the pressure put on him to marry her. Wouldn't it be ironic if Dio was only now truly valuing Helena because he had had to face the prospect of giving her up?

All she herself could ever be to Dio was a very poor second best. If she hadn't conceived, Dio would never have offered her more than a casual affair. ‘A little amusement,' as Helena had so succinctly put it. That had made Ellie feel about an inch tall. It hurt even more to frankly acknowledge herself outclassed by the competition. Helena
belonged
in Dio's elite world. Dio could marry the woman his father had selected and feel very good about doing so. A gorgeous, accomplished, intelligent, rich and classy ice cube, who was
fond
of him and didn't even care if he kept a mistress. Maybe a lot of guys would be happy to marry a woman as understanding as that, Ellie reflected with helpless bitterness.

That weekend, Horace Barry's nephew, Joe Barry, phoned to tell her that his uncle had flu and wouldn't be in. Ellie was run off her feet. On the Sunday afternoon she went to see Meg Bucknall, to explain that she wouldn't be returning to her job at the Alexiakis building again.

Meg ushered her into her small cosy front room with a real smile of pleasure. ‘You really do know how to get the
gossip going into orbit, Ellie. I think you're making a wise decision, though. I'll miss you, but you'd have to put up with some stick if you did come back. Some of the younger girls are just eaten with envy.'

‘If they knew how I was fixed right now, I don't think they would be,' Ellie fielded wryly. ‘It's all off, Meg…was never really on, to tell you the truth.'

‘He's turning night into day at the office right now. Half the top floor staff are having to work the same hours. They look worn out, and I heard them muttering that he's in a really foul black mood—'

‘I don't really want to hear about Dio, Meg,' Ellie shared, having paled at those edifying titbits.

‘Just one little question,' Mega almost pleaded. ‘Did
you
dump
him
?'

Not having expected so personal a question from the older woman, Ellie stared.

Meg flushed guiltily. ‘It's just that's what we're all hoping. The word is he's never been dumped before, but he could do with being taken down a peg or two.'

‘Meg…it would take an attack with an axe to dent Dio's ego,' Ellie retorted.

A surprise awaited her when she arrived home again. Her employer's nephew, a portly pompous man in his early fifties, was seated in the tiny rear office behind the shop, going through the accounts. Standing up, Joe Barry smoothed his sparse hair back from his brow. Ignoring her enquiry as to his uncle's state of health, he disconcerted her by admitting that he had come over in the hope of finding her at home.

But it was what he had to say next which really shook Ellie up. He informed her that his uncle had retired and that he was now taking charge of the bookshop.

The bottom fell out of what remained of Ellie's world. Struggling to come to terms with the shock of that blithe announcement, she frowned. ‘But you already
have
a job.'

‘I'm taking early retirement. I intend to plough a good deal of money into remodelling this place. However…' He paused, pursing his lips. ‘I'm sorry to say that your services will no longer be required.'

‘I beg your pardon?' Ellie practically whispered.

‘I have no need for a full-time assistant.'

The silence hung there.

‘Are you aware that your uncle had already agreed to sell me the business?' Ellie asked starkly.

Joe Barry dealt her a rather smug appraisal. ‘My solicitor assures me that without a witness or anything written you would find it virtually impossible to prove that such a ludicrous agreement ever existed.'

‘But that's
not
—'

‘My uncle should've told you weeks ago. You can't blame me for the fact that he couldn't face telling you that he had changed his mind,' the older man told her impatiently. ‘Naturally he would prefer to see the shop stay in the family.'

Ellie held her upper body very stiffly, but her legs were trembling. The prospect of buying the shop had been like a life raft, and now she felt as if she was sinking.

‘You'll receive everything due to you, of course. I'm giving you a month's notice,' he continued, ‘and I'll expect you to move out of that room upstairs at the same time. You've never had a tenancy agreement, and I require that room for other purposes.'

‘I'll be out of here sooner than that,' Ellie framed with bleak dignity.

‘Well, I must admit that that would suit me
very
well!'

He had the hide of a rhinoceros. Awarding her a relieved look, he closed up the books and departed, humming under his breath.

It was only six o'clock. Ellie sank down at the foot of the stairs. Five years of minimal holidays, low pay and all those extra hours keeping up the accounts. And at the end of it?
One month's notice. What an idiot she had been, dreaming her stupid dreams! There were other businesses out there, but precious few would be within her financial reach. It was time to take stock and make fresh plans. She splayed her fingers over her still flat tummy, thinking about her baby, trying
not
to think about his father.

She was climbing the stairs when the bell went. With a sigh, she turned back. She looked out of the shop's window and simply did not credit the sight of the male grinning at her. Ricky Bolton.

‘Come on, Ellie…open sesame!'

Maybe he would give her a laugh. Dio had been notoriously low on giving her a laugh. Ellie unlocked the door. ‘How did you find out where I lived?'

Ricky kept on grinning, all white teeth, suntan and bold blue eyes. He exuded a buoyant conceit as powerful as an aura. ‘I stole a look at your personnel file before I moved on. I've been meaning to call by for ages, but you know how it is—'