Theseus Discovers His Heir

And now her face did soften. Not completely—her cheeks were still clenched—but enough that her lips regained their plumpness. They almost curled into a smile.

‘You stepped in to help us,’ she said. ‘Whether you were there as a lie or not, in that one aspect it doesn’t matter. You did a good thing. I’ll try to hold on to that whenever I feel like stabbing you. How does that sound?’

A bubble of laughter was propelled up his throat, startling him. He quickly recovered.

‘I think that sounds like an excellent start.’

She rocked her head forward. ‘Good.’

‘But just in case you ever do feel like stabbing me I’ll be sure to hide all the sharp objects.’

The plump lips finally formed into a smile and something dark flickered in her eyes, but was gone before he could analyse it.

‘It’s a deal. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I believe this is the perfect cue for me to go back to my apartment and carry on reading Fiona’s work.’

‘Will you be ready to start writing in the morning?’

‘That’s very unlikely—I’m only two-thirds through and I still need to familiarise myself with the research papers. What I can promise is that I will have this biography completed by the deadline even if I have to kill myself doing it.’

She stepped out of the door, giving him a full view of her round bottom, perfectly displayed in the smart navy blue skirt she wore. What kind of underwear lay beneath...?

He blinked away the inappropriate thought.

Her underwear was none of his business.

But there was no denying the gauche young girl he’d known before had gone; in her place was a confident and, yes, a sexy woman.

It had been a long time since he’d considered a woman sexy or pondered over her underwear.

There was nothing wrong with admitting she had an allure about her. Thoughts and actions were different things. The days when he would already have been plotting her seduction were long gone. The Theseus who had put pleasure above duty had been banished.

The next woman he shared a bed with would be his wife.

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_6e87f966-ccc6-59db-8326-5bcd26d576b7)

JO GAZED AT the picture Toby proudly held up. Apparently it was a drawing of the two of them. It resembled a pair of colourful ants, one of which had been given long purple hair as his red felt-tip pen had run out.

‘That’s amazing,’ she said, trying not to laugh, and inordinately proud of his attempt at a family portrait.

‘Uncle Jon says he’ll scab it for you.’

She stifled another giggle at his word for scan. At some point she knew she would have to tell him when he mangled words and mixed them up—like using alligator for escalator and Camilla for vanilla—but for the moment it was too cute. She’d start correcting him properly when he started school in five months’ time.

She was dreading it—her baby growing up. They’d only been apart for one night so far, and this was already the second time they’d spoken via video-link. Thank God for technology.

She wondered how parents had handled time away from their children before video conferencing had been invented. A voice on the end of a phone was no substitute to seeing their faces as they spoke. Not that she would count her own parents in that equation.

She remembered going on a week-long school trip when she’d been eleven and calling home after three days only to have her mother say, ‘Is there an emergency?’

‘No, I—’

‘Then I don’t have the time to talk. It’s feeding time.’

And that had been the end of that conversation. In the Brookes household the animals came first, Jonathan came second, with Jo and her father vying for last place.

‘Sorry, sweet pea, but I have to go to work now,’ Jo said, infusing her words with all the love her own mother had denied her.

He pulled a face. ‘Already?’

‘We’ll talk again later.’ Theseus would be expecting her at any minute.

‘After lunch?’

‘Tell Aunty Cathy we’ll speak before you go to bed,’ she promised, knowing full well that Cathy would be listening to their conversation and would make sure Toby was ready for her.

‘Have you brought me a present yet, Mummy?’ Toby asked, clearly doing everything he could to keep her talking for a little longer.

‘I haven’t been anywhere to get you one yet, you little monkey. Now, blow me a kiss and shoo before you’re late for preschool.’

Toby did better than blow her a kiss. He put his face to the screen, puckered his lips and kissed it.

With her heart feeling as if it were about to expand out of her body, she pressed her fingers to her lips and then extended them to touch her screen. ‘Love you.’

Before he could respond the connection was lost. No doubt he’d leaned on something he shouldn’t have pressed when he’d leaned forward to kiss her.

Laughing whilst simultaneously wiping away a tear, Jo turned off her laptop.

She took three deep breaths to compose herself, then left her apartment, took four paces to the door opposite and entered her office, yawning widely.

‘Late night?’

Theseus’s voice startled her.

He stood in the archway that separated their offices, dressed in a navy suit and white shirt, without a tie.

She would never have imagined Theo in a suit, much less that he would look so unutterably gorgeous in it. On Illya he had lived in shorts, his golden chest with those defined muscles and that fine hair dusting over his pecs unashamedly on display.

But this man wasn’t Theo, she reminded herself sharply. He was nothing like him. This man’s lips seemed not to know how to smile. This man carried none of the warmth Theo had had in spades.

The only thing the two had in common was that same vivid masculinity. That vital presence. Her eyes would have been drawn to him even if she’d never known him as Theo.

‘I stayed up to finish reading what Fiona had written,’ she answered.

‘Was that necessary?’

‘I needed to find the rhythm of her work,’ she explained evenly. ‘I’ll need to replicate it if I’m to make the transition seamless for the reader.’

‘And are you ready to start writing now?’