Expectant Bride Page 16

  Here they were on the very first day of their honeymoon and Helena had already practically torn them apart, she reflected with a shiver. Dio had indeed been outraged by such lurid invasive publicity. And, whether she liked the role or not, Ellie now knew that she had become Dio’s Achilles’ heel. He was a very proud man, and she didn’t want him to be any less proud. But they had had yet another violent and destructive argument and she had got precisely nowhere. How many more could they afford to have before Dio decided that their marriage had no future?

  Ellie was far along the beach, sitting in the shade of a rocky outcrop, when she saw Dio striding towards her with lithe, long-limbed grace. He was carrying a picnic hamper.

  ‘I did ask to be on my own,’ Ellie reminded him gently.

  ‘You’ve been on your own for three hours, pethi mou.’ Black eyes held hers levelly. ‘Now you need to eat.’

  ‘Did the book Nathan made the mistake of giving you tell you that too?’

  His lean, strong face clenched. ‘So I want to be with you…is that a crime?’

  Involuntarily, Ellie softened. ‘No, I want to be with you too.’

  ‘Only not enough to come back to the villa.’

  Ellie considered that point and sighed. ‘I have to admit that sometimes I really get a kick out of making you run after me.’

  Dio looked startled. Then an appreciative laugh escaped him. ‘I have never heard a woman admit that before.’

  ‘Don’t be slow, Dio. I’m only admitting it because we’re married.’

  His shimmering smile turned her heart over, and Ellie finally reached a decision. Dio might not recognise Helena’s capacity for malice, but men were slow to recognise female cunning and Helena was clever. More importantly, Dio seemed quite happy with the wife he had. He wasn’t behaving like a male who had given up the woman he loved. Or was he simply more pragmatic than she was prepared to acknowledge?

  A frown drew Dio’s level dark brows together. ‘What are you thinking about?’ he demanded.

  Ellie gave him an innocent look. ‘You,’ she said with perfect truth.

  A look somewhere between male pleasure and wariness formed on Dio’s bronzed features, sunlight turning his eyes into reflective mirrors. ‘Your expression seemed rather hostile—’

  ‘I was just thinking that I want us to hang onto our marriage,’ Ellie assured him piously.

  The wary edge evaporated. Dio was now free to rejoice in the happy notion that he was at the heart of her every thought. And, yes, she noted with surprise, he liked that idea. She watched the slumbrous smile slowly curve his mouth. Only then did she acknowledge that he was indeed the very centre of her world. Perhaps it wasn’t a good idea to let him know that.

  ‘These days you need to work really hard to keep a marriage afloat,’ she added.

  ‘But we don’t have any problems,’ Dio stated with a definite aggressive edge.

  Ellie busied herself rooting about in the incredibly elaborate picnic hamper and concealed the amused glint in her gaze. He was keen to deny the possibility that they did have a problem. And, having vented her spleen in setting Ellie up for that newspaper article, what, realistically, could Helena possibly do to hurt either her or their marriage in the future?

  ‘My reaction to that squalid newspaper article was unreasonable,’ Dio announced with real vigour.

  Ellie glanced up. ‘Was it?’

  ‘There’s scandal in my background too,’ Dio assured her.

  ‘Stop trying to make me feel better,’ Ellie told him drily.

  ‘My grandfather was temporarily disinherited for marrying my grandmother.’

  ‘Polly and Lefki’s sister?’ Ellie queried in surprise. ‘For goodness’ sake, why?’

  ‘She was an island girl. Her father was a…’ Dio hesitated. ‘Well, he kept goats,’ he completed, rather grittily.

  ‘He kept goats?’ Ellie gasped incredulously.

  ‘Don’t say it…’ Dio warned.

  But for the next few seconds Ellie was quite incapable of saying anything. Recalling the way she had once compared Dio to a goat-herd, she started laughing so hard she flopped back on the sand. ‘I’m sorry, Dio…I just love it!’ she told him chokily.

  ‘I knew I could rely on you to be tactful.’ Leaning over her, Dio gazed down into her beautiful laughing face, black eyes flaring to smouldering gold.

  Ellie trembled and raised her fingers to trace his hard jawline. ‘How hungry are you?’ she whispered unevenly.

  And with a ragged groan of very male appreciation, Dio shifted over her. His mouth swooped down on hers in a hot, sensual invasion that spoke for itself.

  Having carefully explored the sauna and gym complex in the basement of the enormous London townhouse, Ellie wandered on to study the fabulous indoor swimming pool, her eyes just getting wider and wider.

  ‘I think you like this place,’ Dio murmured.

  ‘Hmm…it looks even better than it looked on the videotape the agent sent out to us,’ Ellie confided.

  ‘Then all we have to do is move in.’

  Ellie spun round, her eyes lighting up. ‘You love it too?’

  ‘It seems to have everything, so we’ll buy it.’

  ‘It’ll make such a marvellous family home!’ Ellie threw both arms round Dio and then she frowned. Tilting back her head, she gave him an anxious, searching scrutiny. ‘You’re not buying it just to please me, are you?’

  ‘Would I do that?’

  ‘Yes,’ she sighed. ‘But this is where we’re going to live. It’s very important that you like it as much as I do. So give me your impressions.’

  Dio shrugged. ‘It’ll make a terrific investment—’

  Ellie groaned.

  ‘The location is excellent—’

  ‘Dio!’ Ellie exclaimed in frustration.

  He closed his arms round her, a slumbrous smile banishing his gravity. ‘You rise to every bait there is, Mrs Alexiakis. I love the house…OK?’

  ‘I’m sorry I made you go and see all the other ones, but I was scared we might be missing something,’ Ellie admitted. ‘Actually, the minute I saw this house on video I knew it was all my dreams come true, so I saved it to the last.’

  Ellie climbed back into the limousine in a state of near bliss. They had been married for over a month now. They had spent three glorious weeks on Chindos, and Ellie had been so happy, she’d felt as if she was walking on air. She had been afraid that their return to London might take some of the magic away, yet, even though Dio was now frantically busy after taking so much time off, nothing had changed between them. They had shared so much more than a bed on the island: visits to Polly and Lefki’s cosy little farmhouse, midnight swims, barbecues on the beach and so much laughter.

  Now she was amazed that she had got herself in such a twist over Helena Teriakos. The brunette had taken her revenge with that newspaper article. Apart from the odd unavoidable social occasion, Ellie reckoned that the other woman was more or less out of their lives. Indeed, there was only one cloud in Ellie’s world, and she knew it was a very selfish and unreasonable one.

  She had a guy who would trail round a baby shop without complaint. She had a guy who acted as if the merest breathe of wind might blow her fragile little carcass away. She had a guy who listened when she talked, who was still sending her flowers after the wedding, and who phoned her in the mornings even if he was seeing her for lunch. A guy who was caring and supportive and absolutely incredible in bed. She was a really, really lucky woman. So wishing that Dio would fall madly in love with her as well was positively greedy.

  Late that night, Dio strolled out of the bathroom in his penthouse apartment, towel loosely knotted about his lean hips, moisture still beading the curling dark tendrils of hair on his muscular chest. ‘Ellie…there’s something we need to talk about.’

  Blissfully engaged in appreciating him, Ellie sat up in bed and smiled before she registered that his lean, dark features had a very serious cast. ‘What’s wrong?’


  ‘There’s nothing wrong,’ Dio asserted wryly. ‘I’m flying over to Paris to see Helena tomorrow.’

  Ellie blinked in sheer shock.

  ‘Naturally I’m hoping that this won’t cause trouble between us,’ Dio continued levelly. ‘Since her father died I have been in charge of all Helena’s business interests.’

  At that second revelation, an appalled look froze Ellie’s fine features. ‘Why didn’t you tell me that before?’ she demanded.

  ‘To be blunt,’ Dio murmured steadily, black eyes challenging her now, ‘I really don’t think that a responsibility I accepted long before I met you is any real concern of yours.’

  Ellie turned pale. That wasn’t just blunt, that was brutal.

  Dio released his breath in an impatient hiss. ‘I want you to be rational about the fact that I meet up with Helena on a regular basis.’

  ‘Rational…’ Her husband met up with her most bitter enemy on a regular basis. That news was the equivalent of being slugged with a sandbag.

  Dio came down on her side of the bed and reached for her hand.

  Ellie snatched it back.

  ‘Can’t you even try to behave like a grown-up?’ Dio censured with stark impatience as he sprang upright again. ‘I accept that you felt insecure when we first got married—’

  Ellie parted bloodless lips. ‘Mr Sensitive—’

  ‘But now you’ve had time to settle down—’

  ‘You think so?’ Ellie breathed shakily.

  ‘I think you’ve got no choice,’ Dio delivered with sudden harshness, surveying her with cool dark eyes.

  ‘There’s always a choice, Dio.’

  ‘Not on this issue,’ Dio contradicted. ‘I will continue to oversee Helena’s business holdings for as long as she wishes me to do so. Our meetings will also continue. She’s a part of my life and you have to accept that.’

  ‘That’s not something I can accept.’ Ellie lifted her head high, colour burning in her cheeks. Suddenly she was furious with herself. ‘What an idiot I’ve been!’ she exclaimed. ‘All my life I’ve stood up for myself, but I wanted our marriage to work and I didn’t want to tear us apart.’

  ‘What are you trying to say?’

  ‘You refused to accept that Helena threatened me and tried to bribe me into having an abortion.’

  Dio raked long brown fingers through his tousled damp black hair and groaned out loud. ‘Oh, please, not that nonsense again!’

  ‘You don’t believe me. OK. Right. That’s fine,’ Ellie said jerkily, punching the pillows and lying down. ‘Nice to know where your loyalty lies, Dio. Nice to know that you married me thinking I was a liar—’

  ‘But kind of cute with it,’ Dio incised gently.

  ‘Don’t try to make a joke out of something this important!’ Ellie condemned. ‘If you go to Paris tomorrow, I’m leaving you!’

  Dio stilled. ‘No way would you leave me—’

  ‘Yes, I would! You trust her more than you trust me. So you make your choice,’ Ellie told him bitterly. ‘You get her out of your life, where she can’t hurt us any more, or I’m moving out! If you can’t give me one hundred per cent loyalty, I don’t want you any more!’

  ‘No problem,’ Dio said softly.

  Ellie listened to him walking out of the room, and then she leapt out of bed and hauled the door open. ‘I mean it, Dio!’

  Shorn of his towel and magnificently nude, Dio swung round and gazed back at her with outraged dark eyes. ‘You do as you like, but I’m going to Paris and I won’t be hurrying back.’

  All the pain inside Ellie mushroomed. ‘Dio…I’m not lying. Listen to me—’

  Dio stabbed a powerful hand in the air. ‘No, you listen to me! You don’t own me. You don’t tell me what I can do, where I can go or who I can be with. Is that understood?’

  ‘That—’

  ‘And when you’ve got this jealousy jag under control, call me. But don’t leave it too long. After all, Helena is a lot of things you’re not,’ Dio murmured in derisive retaliation.

  The angry colour drained from Ellie’s complexion.

  Dio said something vicious in Greek and strode back towards her.

  Ellie slammed the bedroom door in his face and depressed the lock.

  ‘Ellie!’ Dio thundered. ‘Open that door!’

  Tears running down her face, Ellie crawled into bed again and curled up in a tight ball. ‘A lot of things you’re not.’ Well, trust Dio to state the obvious. Only it wasn’t a matter of that, was it? In temper, he had revealed his true feelings, and the horribly wounding comparisons he obviously continued to make. Ellie shivered, acknowledging that the furious row that had blown up had drawn more blood than she had bargained on. Her own.

  Helena was rich, educated, classy, cool, controlled, clever. Her background was identical to his own. Of course, Dio admired and respected her. Unlike Ellie, Helena would have been a bride he could have been really proud of possessing.

  ‘The English rely on love… It’s more important to pick a life partner with intelligence,’ he had told her that very first night on the beach. But what had intelligence had to do with their shotgun wedding? Ellie muffled sobs in a pillow. For the past few weeks Dio had been very good at pretending to be happy. All those years of smoothie womanising, she supposed wretchedly. In his heart, Dio knew she was a very poor but pregnant second best. And Ellie knew that she couldn’t live with him knowing that…

  CHAPTER TEN

  SALLY PARKES’ anxious face lit up with a hugely relieved smile the instant she saw Ellie walking across the park towards her.

  ‘Thank goodness you didn’t stand me up!’ she gasped as she flew off the bench.

  Ellie dug her hands into the pockets of her jacket. ‘I really didn’t want to meet up with you like this, Sally. I only phoned you because I need you to pass on a message to Dio. I appreciate now that that was wrong of me—’

  ‘No! No way was it wrong!’

  ‘It was,’ Ellie sighed. ‘I didn’t want to write to Dio because I didn’t know what to say…and I didn’t want to speak to him personally. But I never should’ve involved you—’

  Sally groaned. ‘Ellie…Dio is frantic!’

  Ellie frowned. ‘Didn’t you pass on my message?’

  Sally gave her a wide-eyed look of wonder. ‘Like telling Dio you were safe and happy and planning on a divorce was going to make him less frantic?’

  Ellie flushed. ‘It’s for the best. Did you remember to tell him that I’ll let him see the baby as much as he likes?’

  ‘It wasn’t quite the consolation you seemed to think it would be,’ Sally responded. ‘I mean the baby’s not due for another six months.’

  ‘Well, I can’t help that,’ Ellie muttered flatly. ‘Is he still in Paris?’

  ‘No, according to Nathan he spent that week looking for you. Then he went off on the most dreadful drinking binge. Nathan dragged him home to sleep it off in our spare room—’

  Ellie stopped dead. ‘The most dreadful…what? Say that again?’

  ‘OK. Sequence of events: Dio wakes up and finds your note…right?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’d gone by then. I thought he would have gone on to Paris.’

  That very same night Ellie had thrown a few things in a bag and had crept out of the apartment, determined to avoid another harrowing confrontation with Dio. She had lost enough face in that earlier scene. All she’d had left was her pride. And she would only keep her pride by staying at a safe distance from Dio until she’d got her emotions under better control.

  ‘Well, if you’ll excuse me for saying so, most husbands wouldn’t get dumped and just go on like it was an ordinary day,’ Sally said rather drily. ‘Even stubborn, macho ones like Dio have some feelings.’

  ‘Look, you’re on his side because you don’t understand and you know him better than you know me—’

  ‘No, to be honest, I’ve just been totally gobsmacked by the way Dio’s been carrying on,’ Sally shared helplessly. ‘I never, ever
thought Dio would be sleeping off a hangover in our spare room.’

  ‘So he spent the first week looking for me…’ Ellie was hopelessly hungry for every tiny detail she could glean.

  ‘How do you think we found out you’d gone? He phoned Nathan. He was in a real rage at that point. You were lucky to stay lost,’ Sally confided.

  ‘I don’t understand him drinking…’

  ‘He just went to pieces the second week. He sat in that apartment just drinking himself into a stupor, and Nathan was worried sick about him. Dio doesn’t do things like that. You’ve really gutted him, Ellie…and I think that if you’d decided you wanted out, you could have been a lot more considerate about the way you did it.’ Sally gave her a challenging glance.

  Ellie tilted her chin, although her colour had risen. ‘I told him I was leaving.’

  ‘He didn’t think you meant it!’

  ‘It just wasn’t working for me.’

  Sally slowly shook her head with a bemused frown. ‘The day of your wedding, I honestly thought you were crazy about him, and when we had lunch the week after you got back from Chindos it seemed even more pronounced. It was “Dio this…Dio that…”’

  ‘I am crazy about him,’ Ellie mumbled ruefully.

  Sally fell still. ‘Then why the heck are you doing this to him?’ she demanded.

  ‘I suppose you’ve told her absolutely everything, Sally,’ Dio’s dark growl intervened with sardonic grittiness. ‘The big search, the unmanly despair, the buckets of booze and self-pity…’

  Both women whipped around. Sally hot-cheeked, Ellie pale as death.

  But Dio had eyes only for his estranged wife. As Sally backed away with a guilty grimace, his dark, deep-set gaze welded to Ellie’s pinched and shaken face and stayed there. ‘I’ve really messed up, haven’t I?’

  ‘Dio…can I give you just a little hint that that is not the right attitude to take?’ Sally prompted with a wince.

  ‘No…you don’t know what’s going on here and you’re not going to,’ Dio informed the redhead with bleak satisfaction. ‘Isn’t it fortunate that when I’m drunk I talk in Greek? No, Sally. What this is all about will be one mystery you never manage to solve.’