Claimed For Makarov's Baby

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_b57e40bb-b6df-5ae4-a616-0056f780788d)

‘YOU CAN’T,’ SAID Erin fervently as the limousine gathered speed, and she turned to look at Dimitri, who was sitting like some granite-faced sentry in the back seat beside her. Sofia’s designer jeans were indeed too big but the baby-blue sweater hugged her nicely and now she was warmer she felt more in control. She made one last attempt to appeal to the Russian’s better nature, even if deep in her heart she knew he didn’t have one. ‘You can’t just turn up out of the blue and introduce yourself to a six-year-old boy and tell him you’re his long-lost father.’

‘Just watch me,’ he said grimly.

Erin heard the harsh note in his voice and was reminded of his fierce reputation. Not that he had minded. He always maintained that a fierce reputation kept fools at a distance and for a long time she had been flattered by that statement and its implication. Because she had been one of the few people he’d allowed to get close to him—and hadn’t that made her think she meant more to him than she actually did? Oh, the foolish longings of a rich man’s secretary!

‘Think about it, Dimitri,’ she said quietly.

‘What do you think I’ve been doing?’ he demanded. ‘I’ve done nothing but think about it since I was first shown a photograph of the boy.’

‘And when was that?’

‘Seven days ago,’ he snapped.

She nodded, determined not to let him sweep her aside with the force of his anger, knowing she had to fight her little boy’s corner here. For his sake. For all their sakes. ‘Leo doesn’t know you—’

‘And whose fault is that?’

A wave of remorse washed over her and suddenly her decision didn’t seem quite so clear-cut. Because Dimitri did seem different. The clear-eyed man in the pristine suit was light years away from the stubble-jawed and hungover man who used to arrive at the office demanding strong coffee. ‘Mine,’ she admitted. ‘But I did it with the best intentions.’

‘I don’t care about your intentions, Erin,’ he said, his voice dipping. ‘I just care about what is mine. And this child is my flesh and blood, too, not just yours.’

His unashamed possessiveness sent a ripple of alarm through her and Erin recognised that once a piece of information was out there, you couldn’t get it back. And you couldn’t control the outcome, either. Dimitri was here and—judging from the grim expression on his face—he was here to stay.

‘If you really care about him,’ she said, ‘then you must take it slowly. Imagine how it would feel if you suddenly exploded into his life without warning.’

‘You should have considered that before, shouldn’t you?’

The car drew up in front of a set of red traffic lights and a man on a bike raced past them, using the inside lane. Erin listened to the blare of horns which greeted the cyclist’s action as she thought how best to get Dimitri to see sense. He liked facts, didn’t he? Hard, cold facts. So present them to him.

She sucked in a deep breath. ‘You always used to say you had no desire to be a father.’

‘Given the choice,’ came his flat response. ‘Which I haven’t been.’

‘And what if that’s still true? You might meet him and wish you never had. It might reinforce all the worst things you ever thought about fatherhood. And if that were the case, wouldn’t it be hard for you to walk away and even harder for him to pretend that the meeting had never happened?’

Dimitri’s lips tightened as her words struck an unwanted chord, thinking how well she knew him—better perhaps than anyone else. What if he met the child, but could not meet the boy’s expectations? What if the boy wanted love from him—real love—and commitment? Could he take that risk, knowing that he could provide none of those things?

‘What are you suggesting?’ he demanded.

She met his gaze without flinching. ‘I don’t know you any more. I have to be sure that you’re no longer the man you used to be. You have to convince me that you’ve changed. I don’t want Leo mixing with gamblers or heavy drinkers, or witnessing a stream of women parading their bodies in front of him.’

His mouth twisted. ‘You mean you want to vet me?’

‘Can you blame me?’ she retorted. ‘But we also need to discuss what to say to him. If you’re going to meet Leo after all this time, we need to present a united front.’

Dimitri felt his body tense as she stated her demands. As if what she wanted was the only thing which mattered. There was no sense of remorse that she’d kept this information from him for so long, was there? Not a flicker of it...

Anger bubbled up inside him and suddenly he felt the need to lash out. Without thinking, he caught hold of her arms—thinking how slim they felt beneath the borrowed sweater. She jerked her head back in surprise so that the light caught the cheap, fake pearls which were woven into her hair. Her lips were parted, her green eyes were dark and, although her face was wary, he realised that she still wanted him. That in the midst of everything, there was desire. Of course there was. No female remained immune to him for long. He could feel sexual hunger pulsating in the air around them as his gaze flickered to the twin thrust of her nipples pinpointing against the soft wool of the sweater. He thought how easy it would be to burrow his hands beneath. To caress those hard little nubs with the skill which could sometimes make a woman come, just by doing that. For a nanosecond he was tempted beyond measure, his fingers longing to creep over those tiny mounds and play with them.

Until he remembered that this was the woman who had deliberately concealed his son from him. Who had written him out of her life as if he no longer existed. How could he possibly desire a woman like that? Abruptly, he dropped his hands, wondering if she was aware that disappointment was written all over her face as he did so. A flicker of triumph coursed through him as she bit her lip and he took a moment to enjoy her obvious frustration.

‘So what were you planning to do after your wedding?’ he questioned. ‘Were you coming back here to the café with your new husband to parade your shiny new ring for all to see?’

‘No. We’d...we’d planned to spend a long weekend at a hotel in the country. Chico took my suitcase down there yesterday.’

‘For your honeymoon?’ he scorned.

‘I suppose you could call it that. It was intended to make our marriage seem more authentic to the authorities, that was all.’

‘So Leo knows about the wedding?’

There was silence for a moment. ‘Of course he does,’ she said. ‘He likes Chico. We were... We were all going to live together in a lovely house in the country.’

‘A fake marriage to a gay man—with separate rooms, I presume?’ he said. ‘How the hell was that supposed to work?’

‘We would have made it work,’ she defended. ‘I was thinking about Leo’s future. About giving him the financial security I could never guarantee him!’

‘What kind of example is that to set for a child?’ he demanded bitterly, because he was discovering a nerve which was still raw, even after all these years. ‘Basing your life on lies and deception?’

Nervously, she glanced out of the window. ‘I don’t want to talk about it any more. At least, not now,’ she said, her voice growing strained. ‘Because we’re nearly there.’

He followed the direction of her gaze to the grey, treeless streets outside. ‘And will my son be there?’

She flinched a little, as if it hurt to hear him use the possessive phrase. Well, tough, he thought grimly. She was going to have to get used to a lot more than that.

‘No. He’ll still be at school. He won’t be back for a couple of hours.’

Dimitri flexed his fingers as he forced himself to think about practicalities, because he could see that she was right. He couldn’t just burst in, unannounced—and although it went against his every instinct, he could see that the process should be gradual. Yet his discovery about the boy could not have come at a worse time, because he was due to travel to Jazratan tomorrow, for some delicate end-stage negotiations with the Sheikh of that oil-rich land. It was a deal which had been a long time in the making, and Saladin Al Mektala was not a man whose presence you could postpone. But Dimitri recognised suddenly that this discovery was more important than any deal—and the realisation surprised him almost as much as the unexpected twist of his heart when he thought of his unknown son. Because he was a man who put business above everything—who never allowed his personal life to intrude on his material ambitions.

He glanced at Erin, but she wasn’t looking at him. Her head was bent and the fake pearls were glinting in her dark hair. He guessed he could start getting to know Leo when he returned from his desert trip, but he was reluctant to let her out of his sight. What if she disappeared while he was away, taking Leo with her? If she was determined for him not to meet his son, he wouldn’t put it past her. He wouldn’t put anything past her.