LITMIR.BIZ

       CHAPTER SEVEN

      AS SHE PREPARED for Ariston’s visit next morning, Keeley stared at her white-faced reflection in the mirror and gritted her teeth. This time she wouldn’t lose her temper. She would be calm and clear and focussed. She would tell him she couldn’t possibly marry him but that she was willing to be reasonable.

      She washed her hair and put on a loose cotton dress and a sudden desire to impose some order made her give her bedsit an extra-special clean—busying herself with mop and duster. She even went down to the local market and bought a cheap bunch of flowers from the friendly stallholder who implored her to, ‘Cheer up, love! It might never happen!’

      It already had, she thought gloomily as she crammed the spindly pink tulips into a vase as she waited for the Greek tycoon to arrive.

      He was bang on time and she hated her instinctive reaction when she opened the door to see him in an exquisite pale grey suit, which today didn’t make him look remotely uncomfortable. In fact, he came over as supremely relaxed as well as looking expensive and hopelessly out of place in her crummy little home. She didn’t want to shiver with awareness whenever she looked at him, nor remember how it had felt to be naked in his arms, yet the erotic images just kept flooding back. Was she imagining the faint triumph which curved those cruel lips of his—as if he was perfectly aware of the way he made her feel? He can’t make you do anything you don’t want him to, she reminded herself fiercely. You might be carrying his baby but you are still a free agent. This is modern England, not the Middle Ages. He can hardly drag you up the aisle against your will.

      ‘I’m hoping you’ve had time to come to your senses, Keeley,’ he said, without preamble. ‘Have you?’

      ‘I’ve given it a lot of thought, yes—but I’m afraid I haven’t changed my mind. I won’t marry you, Ariston.’

      He said something soft in his native tongue and when he looked at her, he seemed almost regretful as he sighed. ‘I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this.’

      ‘Come to what?’ she questioned in confusion.

      ‘Why didn’t you tell me about your mother?’

      She felt the blood drain from her face. ‘Wh-what about my mother?’

      His gaze slid over her. ‘That she’s living in a care home and has been for the last seven years.’

      Keeley’s lips folded in on themselves because she was afraid she might cry, until she reminded herself that she couldn’t afford the luxury of tears—or to show any kind of vulnerability to a man she suspected would seize on it, as a starving dog might seize on a bone. ‘How did you find out?’

      He shrugged. ‘The gathering of information is simple if you know who to ask.’

      ‘But why? Why would you go to the trouble of having me investigated?’

      ‘Don’t be naïve, Keeley. Because you are the mother of my child and you have something I want. And knowledge is power,’ he added as his sapphire eyes bored into her. ‘So what happened? How come a middle-aged woman has ended up living in an institution where the average age is eighty, unable to recognise her only daughter when she visits?’

      Without thinking, Keeley grabbed the arm of the nearest chair before sinking into it before her legs gave way, as they were threatening to. ‘Didn’t your investigators tell you?’ she questioned hoarsely. ‘Didn’t they gain access to her medical records and tell you everything you needed to know?’

      ‘No—they didn’t. I don’t think it’s morally right to do something like that.’

      ‘How dare you talk to me about morals?’ she bit back. ‘I’m surprised you even know the definition of the word.’

      ‘So what happened, Keeley?’ he questioned again, more softly this time.

      She wanted to tell him it was none of his business but she suspected that wouldn’t deter him. And maybe it was his business now, she realised, with a wrench to her heart. Because her mother was the grandmother of his child, wasn’t she? Even if she would never realise that fact for herself. A sudden wave of sadness engulfed her and she blinked away another hint of tears before he could see them. ‘So what do you want to know?’ she questioned.

      ‘Everything.’

      Everything. That was a tall order. Keeley leant her head back against the chair but it took a couple of moments before she had composed herself enough to speak. ‘I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you my mother’s fleeting fame as an actress was quickly replaced by the notorious reputation she gained after that...’ she stumbled on the words ‘...that summer at your house.’

      His mouth hardened, but he didn’t comment. ‘Go on.’

      ‘When we arrived back in England she was approached by lots of tabloid newspapers and the tackier end of the magazine market. They wanted her to be a torch-bearer for the older woman who was determined to have a good sex life, but in reality they just wanted a gullible fool who could shift a few extra copies in a dwindling retail market.’ She drew in a deep breath. ‘She talked at length about her different lovers—most of whom were considerably younger. Well, you already know that. She thought she was striking a blow for women’s liberation but, in reality, everyone was laughing at her behind her back. But she didn’t notice and she certainly didn’t let it deter her. And then her looks began to fade...quite dramatically. Too much wine and sun. One crash diet too many.’

      She stopped.

      ‘Don’t stop now,’ he said.

      His voice was almost gentle and Keeley wanted to tell him not to talk that way. She’d misinterpreted his kindness once before and she wasn’t going to make the same mistake again. She wanted to tell him that she could deal with him better when he was being harsh and brutal.

      She shrugged. ‘She started having surgery. A nip here and a tuck there. One minute it was an eyebrow job and the next she was having goodness knows what pumped into her lips. She started to look...’ She closed her eyes as she remembered the cruelty of the newspapers which had once courted her mother so assiduously. The snatched photos which had been only marginally less flattering than the awful ones she’d still insisted on posing for, usually dressed in something cringe-makingly unsuitable—like leather hot pants and a see-through blouse. How quickly she had become a national laughing stock—her face resembling a cruel parody of youth.

      And how ultimately frustrating that she had been too blind to see what was happening to her.

      ‘She started to look bizarre,’ she continued, not wanting to appear disloyal but now the words seemed to be rushing to get out because

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