Brazilian Escape: Playing the Dutiful Wife / Dante: Claiming His Secret Love-Child. Carol Marinelli

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СКАЧАТЬ he was referring to—had seen his face when he’d removed the condom.

      ‘It’s fine.’

      ‘Did you go to a pharmacia?’

      He closed his eyes when she didn’t answer, thought again of her in a home in the mountains, but this time he pictured her with his baby at her side and selfish hope glimmered.

      ‘How’s Hawaii?’

      He heard her pause, heard that her voice was a little too high as she answered him. ‘You know …’ She attempted. ‘Nice.’

      ‘I don’t know,’ Niklas said, and it was not about what he wanted, it was not about him, it was about keeping her safe. His words were harsh now. ‘I’ve never been and I want a postcard,’ he said. ‘I want you, tonight, to write me a postcard from Hawaii.’

      He was telling her what to do and she knew it.

      ‘Niklas,’ she attempted, ‘I still have some holidays left. I thought maybe next week …’

      ‘You want to be paid again?’

      ‘Niklas, please—’ She hated that he’d mentioned money. ‘I just want to see you.’

      ‘You’ve already earned your keep … go spend your money on holiday.’

      ‘Niklas … I know you don’t mean that.’

      ‘What do you know?’ His voice was black. ‘We were married for one day; we screwed an awful lot. You know nothing about me.’

      ‘I know that you care. I know when you saw me—’

      ‘Care?’ he sneered down the phone. ‘The only way I can get sex in here is if they bring in my wife—that’s it. I am sick of conversations, and you seem to want just as many of those as you give of the other.’

      ‘Niklas, please …’

      But he would not let her speak. He had to get her away from here. Did she not get that she could be in danger? He had no idea what was happening on the outside, had no idea what was going on, and he wanted her safely away—had to make sure she was safe.

      So again he drowned her with words.

      ‘Meg, if you want to come back and suck me, then do. But just so long as you know you mean nothing to me.’

      He slammed down the phone—not in fury but in fear. He put his hands through the door and felt the cool of the cuffs. His mind was racing. Since her visit, since getting the information that Miguel was working against him, his mind had been spinning, trying to work out what the hell was going on, trying to figure things out. But now he had a head full of her, and he had more to be concerned with than that she was still here in Brazil.

      He needed to speak with Rosa—had to work out what the hell was going on.

      As he was walked back to his cell his face was expressionless, but his mind was pounding like a jackhammer and he cursed under his breath in Portuguese as Andros made some reference to his wife, about his nice little family, and asked how scum from the streets had managed that. Then Andros pushed him up the stairs and Niklas cursed again, but in French this time.

      ‘Watch it, Dos Santos …’ Andros told him, sensing his prisoner’s rising anger and slamming him up against the wall.

      The move was not meant to overpower him, Niklas realised, simply to provoke him, because Dos Santos was an orphan’s name. Niklas went to swear again, in Spanish, but his brain was working quickly, far more quickly than his mouth, and in that second he knew what was happening.

      Dos Santos meant something different in Spanish.

      And it was a Spanish nun who had named him.

      Dos Santos in Spanish meant two saints.

      He had a twin.

      In that very second it was as if a bomb had exploded in his brain and he worked it all out. He knew instantly how he had got to be here. Knew that his double was out there and had been working with Miguel against him. And with a lurch of fear that was violent to his soul he knew that Meg was in serious danger.

      Niklas said nothing when Andros jeered again, just stood silent against the wall as Andros spoke filth about his wife. He stood still and refused to react as another guard came over. A decent guard this time, because there were plenty of them around.

      ‘Trouble?’ the guard asked.

      ‘No trouble,’ Niklas said, because he did not want to go to solitary tonight. He really needed to get to his cell.

      He stood compliant as his cuffs were removed and went quietly into his cell. There he met the eyes of Fernando, and for the first time since his arrival he spoke with the other man.

      ‘I need your help,’ Niklas said, for he had worked out what was happening and urgent help was required. ‘I need you to make contact on the outside.’

       CHAPTER TEN

      ANOTHER NIGHT CRYING over Niklas Dos Santos and Meg swore it would be the last.

      Part of her could almost convince herself that he was just trying to get her to leave, that that was the reason behind his cruel words, but the more sensible part of Meg soon talked herself round. Her sensible side reminded her that this was a man she knew nothing about—a man who had caused her nothing but heartache and trouble since the day that they had met.

      Hawaii sounded pretty good to Meg right now.

      A week lying on the beach concentrating on nothing but how best to forget him.

      It was well after lunchtime now, and Meg was still waiting for the travel agent to return her call. When she did, Meg would ask to be booked onto the earliest flight that could be arranged, and she packed her suitcase in preparation. Very deliberately she did not turn on the vast television to see how his trial was going, or to catch a glimpse of him on the news, because one glimpse of Niklas and she was lost to him—that much she knew.

      She wanted her divorce now, wanted to be the hell away from him, would not waste even one more single minute on him.

      But as she packed up her toiletries Meg threw tampons into her make-up bag and suddenly realised that it might be rather more complicated than that.

      She looked at the unopened packet, an Australian brand because she hadn’t bought any since she had arrived here, and tried to remember when she’d last had a period.

      She tried to remember the days in Australia before her life had been changed so dramatically by the visit from Niklas’s lawyers. No, she hadn’t had her period for a while.

      There should be the reassurance that they’d used condoms, but the last one hadn’t held.

      Could she be pregnant?

      Would she tell him if she was?

      Meg СКАЧАТЬ