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      An hour later Rhiannon prowled restlessly around her bedroom. It was large and spacious, with a wide balcony overlooking the sea. Annabel sat on the floor, playing happily with some seashells Rhiannon had found in a decorative bowl.

      There was a light knock on the door, and with her heart rising straight into her throat she called out, ‘Come in.’

      Lukas opened the door. He’d changed from his business attire, was now dressed in jeans and a white cotton shirt open at the throat. Those few undone buttons revealed a tanned column of skin that Rhiannon couldn’t seem to tear her gaze from.

      ‘Have you found everything to your satisfaction?’ he asked, and she jerked her eyes upwards towards his face.

      His hair was damp, brushed back from his face, his eyes sparkling silver as he smiled with a wry amusement that caused her face to burn with humiliated realisation.

      He knew how he affected her, and he thought it was amusing. No doubt he had women falling for him all the time, and he obviously had no problem putting them in their place. Rejecting them.

      ‘Yes, fine,’ she said shortly.

      He glanced at her still unopened suitcase by the bed. ‘You haven’t unpacked.’

      ‘We’re not going to be here for long.’

      ‘Perhaps not,’ Lukas agreed. ‘But it would be more comfortable, certainly, to enjoy a short stay.’

      ‘Before I’m booted out?’ Rhiannon interjected. ‘Sorry, I don’t feel like complying.’

      Lukas shrugged, ran a hand through his hair. Rhiannon watched as it flopped boyishly across his forehead; she resisted the urge to brush it back with itching fingers.

      ‘Suit yourself,’ he said. ‘I only thought you might want to be comfortable.’

      ‘I don’t want to be comfortable,’ she snapped, even though she knew she was being childish.

      Lukas’s eyes flashed. ‘You should—at least for Annabel’s sake. Surely it is in her best interests for both of you to be relaxed and comfortable during your stay here? It is, in fact, your responsibility,’ he continued in a harder voice, ‘to be so.’

      Rhiannon’s mouth pursed in annoyance. ‘It’s all about responsibility, isn’t it?’

      For a half-second Lukas looked nonplussed. ‘Of course it is.’

      ‘Not love.’

      His eyebrows rose. ‘Who am I supposed to love?’

      ‘Annabel!’ Rhiannon cried, too angry and despairing to be embarrassed that he might have actually thought she meant herself. ‘I came here so she could find her father…a father who would love her!’

      ‘But I am not her father,’ he reminded her. ‘And I cannot love a child I’ve never even seen before. Not right away.’

      ‘Especially one that is not yours, I suppose?’ Rhiannon finished, and he shook his head, dismissing her jibe.

      ‘If Annabel is Christos’s child—which I believe she is—then I will make sure she is cared for. Absolutely.’

      Rhiannon’s mouth dried. Absolutely. It was a word that didn’t allow for difficulties, differences. Flexibility. It was a cold, hard, unyielding word, and she didn’t like it. ‘I didn’t want it to be like this,’ she finally said after a moment, her eyes averted.

      ‘I understand. But this is now how it is. How it will be remains for me to decide.’

      ‘You,’ Rhiannon said, ‘and not me, I suppose?’

      Lukas shook his head. ‘I don’t know what you want from me. If you came to the Petra resort to find Annabel’s father, you succeeded. You did your duty. Now you will leave the rest to us.’

      ‘I’m not going to leave it up to you,’ Rhiannon protested. ‘Annabel is my ward, not yours. Any decisions that are made will involve me.’ Her voice came out more strident than she intended, and Annabel looked up anxiously. Rhiannon bent down, soothed her with a few hushing motions.

      ‘The only decision that has been made so far,’ Lukas said, with a deliberate patience that warned Rhiannon he was close to losing his temper, ‘is for you to remain here until the question of paternity is resolved. All I’m asking now is that you stay here, in comfort, not snapping and biting like a fish on a line, and enjoy a few days in what most people consider to be paradise.’

      Rhiannon СКАЧАТЬ