Kitabı oku: «Demanding His Billion-Dollar Heir», sayfa 3

CHAPTER THREE

MARIA SHIFTED ON the seat to relieve the pins and needles that were creeping around the base of her spine. Her knee tapped an incessant rhythm, partly because after three and a half hours of sitting there, she really needed to go to the bathroom.

The foyer of the office building in Switzerland was immaculate—all concrete and steel—but faintly cold in the encroaching evening’s darkness. The silver letters of Montcour Mining rose high above the reception desk she’d not been allowed to pass. Her knee bobbed away, which the blond haired male receptionist misunderstood and took as a sign of impatience.

She’d studied every inch of the two large canvasses bracketing the broad wooden-fronted desk. Rothko. In all probability real rather than reproduction. She deduced this not from the fine artistry, but more from the research she had done to discover Matthieu’s last name and location.

It had been three months since she’d seen him. Two since she’d started to feel the waves of nausea that had completely taken her by surprise. One month since one little blue line had changed her life for ever, and only a few days since she’d had the first scan that truly confirmed that her life—their lives—had changed for ever.

Maria had thought she’d have to spend hours trawling through reams of pages on the Internet and had already considered reaching out to Princess Sofia, who had patronised the charity where Maria had met Matthieu for a list of attendees that night. Having reunited with Theo, Sofia had forgiven Maria for her indiscreet argument with Theo. It had been swept under the carpet with happiness and love that shined from the couple on their wedding day.

In the past, thinking of such a thing would have brought her the sharp agony of unrequited love—but that was before Matthieu and before... Her hand unconsciously swept over her abdomen. She avoided another glare from the frustrated receptionist, by focusing on the beautiful modern chandelier suspended from a ceiling that rose at least ten stories high. The lights fiercely illuminating the space, yet tempered and golden hued to soften the impact on the eye. The building screamed money. But then when a person was as wealthy as Matthieu Montcour it could be afforded.

She supposed that many would have considered themselves lucky to be tied to such a wealthy man. She was not one of those people and instead was more concerned about how he might feel being tied to her.

She had left his suite in Iondorra that morning and returned to find a furious Sebastian ready to read her the Riot Act for disappearing the night before. But he’d taken one look at her and when she had asked to go home, he’d relented and taken her back to her flat-share in South London.

For a month she had lost herself in days full of work, her jewellery making and her part-time coffee-shop job. But her nights? They were lost to dreams of Matthieu and the pleasure he’d wrung from her body.

In Camberwell, the daily reality of her life trudged on and he became something almost mythical to her, fantastical and almost imagined. She’d not said a word about him to Anita, or Evin, her two flatmates, who she’d met in the first week of her Foundation Course.

After the staunchness of her Italian schooling, Camberwell had been both a breath of fresh air and truly liberating. She fell hard for the heady mix of cultures, the strange juxtaposition of houses worth millions and council estates worth almost nothing. She felt as if it suited her life, having known both sides, extreme wealth and sudden shocking poverty after her father’s near bankruptcy and subsequent exile from Spain.

She risked a glance at the imperious receptionist banging away on a keyboard as if it might make her disappear. But Maria wasn’t going anywhere.

One month ago, after the third week of being unable to hold in her nausea, Anita had handed her a pregnancy test, given her a small smile, a pat on the arm, a cup of tea—so very English—and left her to it. Maria barely remembered the following two days. She had been numb with shock and battered by so many unanswered and unanswerable questions, and only one thought had remained constant. Remained true.

I’m keeping the baby.

She promised herself that once she reached three months, once she’d had her first scan, only then would she tell Matthieu.

The clipped sound of stiletto heels machine-gun-fired across the marble foyer, drawing Maria into the present. An obscenely glamorous woman in an ankle-length wool coat with a fur trim swept an about-turn to face a trio of sheepish-looking men in suits.

‘That man is absolutely impossible. No wonder they call him a beast.’ The last word was hissed, as if to be conveyed in a whisper, but rang like a bell.

Maria had no doubt as of whom she was speaking. Not after her Internet search of Matthieu. She’d had two words. His name, and mining—his ‘professional interest’. She hadn’t held up much hope, but she’d been wrong. A second after she’d hit enter, the screen had filled with the image of his face—a stern headshot, his piercing golden eyes so intense she’d felt a blush rise to her cheeks as if he could see her searching for him.

‘No wonder he’s as rich as Croesus, when he’s that tight-fisted with his business interests.’

Maria had discovered that too. Reportedly he was the fourth richest man in Europe. And it had shocked her. Clearly he had been wealthy, must have been to gain entry to the gala, but reports stated that his net worth was near eight billion. Billion.

But it had come at such a terrible cost. She’d gasped as she’d read descriptions of the fire that had not only consumed the estate where Matthieu had lived as a child, but also his entire family. The one that had caused the scars she’d felt beneath the soft palm of her hand, hard and twisted, but somehow also defiant and magnificent. The sheer number of articles on the years of treatments was surpassed only by the fascination with the shocking amount of the life insurance heaped upon an eleven-year-old boy, making him unimaginably wealthy independent of his family’s business. Maria’s heart had broken at the grainy images from years ago of the small boy accompanied by his, then, legal guardian following behind five coffins: his parents, two uncles and one aunt. She couldn’t even conceive how devastating that must have been.

As the woman swirled back towards the exit, taking the suits and the drama with her, Maria was dragged into the present and stifled a wave of nausea as the woman’s sickly perfume reached her on the ruffled air.

The receptionist cleared his throat and stood, apparently having reached the end of his patience at housing the unwanted and uninvited guest in his domain.

‘I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to—’

‘Maria?’

Her head turned to the bank of elevators tucked off to the right of the reception desk to see Matthieu Montcour looking as shocked as she suddenly felt at seeing him in the flesh again after twelve weeks.

Matthieu watched her spring up from the sofa she’d been sitting on, a bundle of energy in the almost silent reception.

‘Where’s your bathroom?’ she asked breathlessly, her tone betraying her desperation.

‘It’s—’

‘I’m sorry, this isn’t how I wanted this to go, it’s just that I really...’ she did a little dip as if to punctuate her need ‘...really need the bathroom. Please don’t go anywhere, we need to talk, it’s just that I need the—’

‘Bathroom. Got it. Round the corner on the left,’ he said, gesturing with his arm.

She ran, literally ran around the corner, skidding a little on her boot heels as she rushed through the doors.

And he couldn’t help but laugh. A sound startling to his own ears, let alone his stiff receptionist.

He shook his head, trying to jolt himself free from the effect of her sudden and shocking appearance. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t thought of her in the last three months, thought of finding her, his fingers itching to type her name into the search engine on his computer. In truth, there hadn’t been a day—or night—that he hadn’t remembered her soft sighs, or the feel of her beneath him. The wrenching he’d felt that morning after, when he’d sneaked out of the room, leaving her asleep in the bed of his suite. Both hating himself and knowing that it was right.

But why was she here? What did she want?

Then a cold steel clamp choked his thoughts.

She knew. Who he was.

And just like so many women before him, Maria had come to cash in on his notoriety. Had thought to play on the vulnerabilities he’d accidentally exposed that night. The one night he’d offered her and no more.

Anger clenched his jaw. He had thought her different. He had thought her to be something...almost mythical in her purity. A purity that he had single-handedly taken that night. He should have known better. Had he not learned at seventeen what the female sex wanted from him?

The sound of her boots on the marble floor cut through his thoughts and he turned to find her looking up at him nervously, her hands twisting within each other, but valiantly bearing the weight of his scrutiny as he searched her expressive features for clues of her motivation for being here.

She was still breathtakingly beautiful. He’d half convinced himself that he’d imagined it. The shocking impact she’d had on him that night. The way that his pulse kicked up a notch, just being near her. The way his need rose within him to seize him by the throat.

‘Hi,’ she said simply.

He nodded, unable to trust himself to say more. To bring about the moment where she exposed her greed.

‘Can we...?’

‘Talk?’

She nodded, an almost sad smile on her features. And for a moment he almost felt sorry for her. Because while she obviously knew who he was, she clearly did not realise just who she was up against.

‘This way,’ he said, his words as clipped as the sound of their shoes as he led them to the last elevator.

He swiped his key card over the electronic plate and the doors swished apart revealing the mirror-lined lift that led only to the top floor where his offices were housed.

She silently followed him into the confined space and when he inhaled he was swamped by that scent of hers. Sage and salt, something so unique to her and that night that he had to fight against the sudden wave of desire that rose up within him from being this close to her.

He studied her in the mirrors, Maria determinedly looking ahead and not making eye contact, offering him the chance to take in her appearance. The night they’d met, she had been dressed in white lace. Now, she wore tight grey denim jeans and a black leather waterfall jacket that covered a loose T-shirt in a burnt-pink colour.

Her hair, loose again, fell in waves over her shoulders and down her back, the slight curls twisting strands of dark browns and reds, making him want to reach out and touch. But he stifled the ridiculous urge.

The elevator drew to a stop and the doors opened, prompting him to gesture for her to go first, and then he realised how silly that was, when she pulled up short in the large area between three glass-fronted rooms. Two of which were meeting rooms, the third, his office.

He stepped around her and entered the latter. Immediately regretting not showing her to one of the large meeting rooms and ensuring that she would be ill at ease and more likely to reveal the truth about her intentions under such stark surroundings.

Instead, his office was completely different. Dark brown leather sofas faced each other, with a corner chair bracketing the end nearest the side wall. A discreet unit fronted the rest of the wall on the other side of a hidden door in the panelling that led to a bathroom and shower unit. A fireplace was hidden by the large corner chair—one that he never used and tried as much as possible to ignore behind the smooth dark leather. His father had loved it when this office had been his and, as much as he’d wanted to brick it up, he couldn’t seem to do so.

The opposite wall, in front of which was his desk, was covered head to toe in shelves full of books. Beautiful leather-spined tomes that gave the room an almost gothic feel, despite the sleek modern technology that covered the desk. Two large monitors fed into a discreet desktop hidden on a lower-level shelf just beneath the surface of the desk—a feature that had forced him to raise the desk a few inches in order to seat his long legs comfortably and without taking his kneecaps off every time he sat.

He turned to watch Maria take in the space.

‘Would you care for a drink?’ he asked, his hands unaccountably reaching for the bottle of whisky that had remained largely untouched for the three years it had been in his office’s wet bar.

‘Sparkling water, please.’

Where had the woman so full of words and even a bit of humour gone? Perhaps it was him. Was she picking up on his cynical reaction to her presence?

He poured sparkling water over ice, the cubes splintering and fracturing beneath the liquid in each glass. He passed Maria’s drink to her and was about to say some pithy salutation when she blurted, ‘I’m pregnant.’

The glass hovered before his lips, his fingers gripping it so hard, his knuckles turned white from his apparent shock. His eyes went from speculative to furious in a heartbeat and Maria inwardly cursed, wishing she’d had the courage to say it more gently, to warn him... Anything other than what she’d just thrown between them like an unexploded bomb. Only it wasn’t unexploded. It had detonated three months earlier, though neither of them had known.

‘Congratulations. Who is the lucky man?’

Maria frowned, both shocked and confused by his question.

‘What do you mean?’ she said, wondering why she was still holding the glass of water and he his, as if they were having a polite exchange rather than the fact he’d just implied that...that...

‘Well, given that we used protection, every single time—’

‘Wait, what?’

‘You cannot really expect to turn up here a convenient three months after our...encounter, and lay claim to my being the father of this miraculous child?’

She was speechless. She had imagined this conversation so many times, but this? Not what she’d expected. Encounter? He’d called the night they shared an encounter? Now she was angry. Of all the feelings she’d experienced thus far, since discovering the fact she was to have a child, anger had not been one of them. Until now.

‘You bastard.’

‘I think the press prefer to call me a beast, but I suppose that will do just as well.’

‘I shouldn’t have come here,’ she said, more to herself, rather than him. But it didn’t stop him from answering.

‘No, you probably shouldn’t have,’ he said, sighing as if she were an inconvenience rather than the mother of his child. ‘Many others have tried to lay claim to such a thing, and believe me, Maria, they were much more skilled at deception than you. And ultimately, they were proved to be the lying, scheming serpents that they were. I must say, I’m quite disappointed. I had thought you different.’

Maria shook her head. Both at the shocking hostility in his tone and at the awfulness that there had been women who had apparently tried to trick him in the past. In a second, all the things she thought they’d shared, the beauty of that one night she’d clung to as her world had morphed and changed before her eyes, burned to dust. She didn’t know this man. She was nothing to him. And she would never, never, force such a thing upon her child.

‘Not as disappointed as I am. I hope that your conscience is kind to you when you realise just how wrong you are,’ she stated, gathering her wits about her, and the scraps of her feelings from the floor. She placed the untouched glass down on the small coffee table, reaching into her bag to retrieve the black and white sonogram image of their, no her, child—the one thing that she could give him, the only thing, and, placing it beside the glass, she turned her back on him and stepped towards the door.

‘Wait.’

‘What for?’ she asked without turning, her back still to him. ‘For you to hurl even more insults at me? I don’t think so.’

‘Please.’

She turned then, not because his tone was pleading—which it wasn’t—but because she would give him this chance. She needed to. She found him standing by the coffee table, one finger on the corner of the sonogram. He wasn’t looking at her, but at it. The image of their child. She wondered what he saw in the grey shapes, the patches of darkness and the surprisingly detailed white figure of their baby. The head, the umbilical cord, arms and legs, all clearly visible.

Finally he looked up at her.

‘Do not lie to me about this, Maria. Do not test me.’

She shook her head. ‘I’m not. I’m pregnant. The baby is yours.’

‘How?’

Again, shaking away the doubt and confusion she had felt when she’d first seen that thin blue line. ‘Condoms aren’t fail proof, I wasn’t on any other kind of contraception. I...’ She shrugged.

‘You’re pregnant. The baby is mine.’

Maria nodded and Matthieu’s whole world shifted on its axis. He cast his eye back to the small black and white image on the coffee table. His child?

‘I’m...’ stunned, shocked...what? His mind was completely blank. Though the one thing he could recognise above the white noise roaring in his ears was that Maria deserved an apology.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, the sea of confusion and chaotic thoughts making his tone dark, guttural almost. The instant refusal that had risen to his mind had been both cruel and devastating. He hadn’t missed the way her already pale skin had turned almost bone white beneath his taunt. But it hadn’t been that that had convinced him that she spoke the truth. No. It had been her ready departure. So different from the crocodile tears and insincere desperation he’d experienced in the past. Maria had been willing to walk away not just from him, but from what many others had tried to secure. His money. His ring.

A ring he’d once sworn never to put on a woman’s finger. Never imagining for a second the need to do so. Never being so unfailingly irresponsible to sire a child that would, along with its mother, invade his carefully ordered life.

He gestured for her to sit and only after she had stiffly approached the sofa opposite where he stood, and sat, or rather collapsed slightly into the deeply upholstered leather, did he finally sit down too.

‘What is it you want?’ he asked, holding her gaze with the steel trap of his own, ruthlessly seeking out her intentions, almost willingly seeing hints of her avarice.

‘Nothing,’ she said, seemingly confused by his question. ‘I just wanted to let you know. You...have that right.’

He bit back a cynical laugh. He doubted the truth of her words very much. She might not be after his money or his ring, but there must be something. There was always something.

‘You waited three months?’ he said, accusingly, not having to work hard to do the maths. He’d known every single one of the days since he’d last touched her, kissed her, brought them both to orgasm.

She nodded. ‘The first three months are so...precarious,’ she said, shaking her head and shoulders, as if she hadn’t been alone to bear the weight of that knowledge, that fear that something could have happened, could have taken away their...their child.

The child he could see formed by light and dark in the small black and white sonogram on the table between them.

‘Did you think that I would try to change your mind? Is that why you waited?’ Not needing to work hard to find the fury at the possibility that she would think such a thing of him.

‘It wouldn’t have mattered. I’m keeping this baby, Matthieu, whether you want to be part of its life or not.’

‘I would never—’

‘How would I know that?’ she demanded. ‘I didn’t even know your last name.’

‘But you found out.’ The unspoken question in his mind rang loud, beating in time with his heart.

‘Only when I needed to.’ Her assurance, the promise offered by her words that she had not sought him out until she’d had to, melted the ire edging his anger, transforming it, lessening it—but only slightly. ‘Look, I respected what you said then about it only being one night,’ she pressed on. ‘I’m only here now to let you know, and to give you the chance to choose whether you would like to be in the baby’s life or not. Nothing more, nothing less.’

‘That simple?’ he asked, unconsciously echoing the conversation from that night.

‘I am beginning to see that where you are concerned, Matthieu, nothing is simple.’

He reached then for his water, not because he was thirsty, but to buy time. And he never had to buy time. He always knew what to say, how to react. Until now. Until her. He began to wonder if he ever had any choice in the matter at all. His body overriding all senses, all sensibilities.

Father.

He was going to be a father.

‘We will marry.’

The look on her face would have been comical in any other circumstance. The horror and shock overriding the fierce neutrality that she had presented in the last few moments.

‘No.’

That’s different. So many had tried to coerce themselves into his life, but of course Maria was different. He briefly wondered if this might have been part of some larger game, some grander scheme, but he decided not. There had been nothing about Maria then, or now, that indicated some ulterior motive. Wasn’t that what had driven him to her in the first place? Her innocence?

‘I don’t think you understand—’

‘No. It is you who doesn’t understand,’ Maria cut in. ‘That’s not why I came here. I have no intention of marrying you. I don’t want that, or your money. My only interest is the level of your involvement in my child’s—’

‘Our child’s,’ he said, interrupting her.

‘Our child’s life.’

‘And that is what I’m telling you, Maria. My interest will be deep, my level of involvement will be total.’