Page 3 of Pregnant Behind the Veil (Brides for Greek Brothers #3)

Michail

The faint shriek of a siren travels up from the streets. Cool air shushes out of the vents. Somewhere a clock is ticking. My heart pounds against my ribs so hard it hurts.

I stare at her. She stares right back: calm, cool, collected. As if she hasn’t just dropped a bombshell that changes the entire course of my life.

Alessandra Wright. Stunningly beautiful, almost untouchable with elegant cheekbones and a well-defined jaw that serve as physical manifestations of her confidence, offset by large green eyes and full lips.

The beauty is the same. But the woman I knew as Lexi for one fleeting night let her auburn hair hang loose and wavy.

Alessandra has it bound up in a bun at the base of her neck.

Lexi smiled the kind of smile that made her eyes sparkle.

When Alessandra smiles, it’s a cold gesture, as if she’s ticking a box rather than expressing true emotion.

I have no idea who this woman is. The woman supposedly carrying my child.

Pieces of the puzzle start to fall into place. Ever since I walked into Alessandra’s office and realized the woman I’d slept with months ago was also Lucifer’s estate lawyer, I’d been trying to figure out what her end game was.

Now I know. The day I met her was the same day I met Lucifer Drakos for the first and last time.

My birth father. The man who told me how proud he was of my success, as if he’d had any hand in it, before adding that I could be even wealthier by marrying within a year of his passing.

The mask of suave, confident billionaire had slipped, revealing a weak cockroach of a man who threw a temper tantrum when I’d told him I’d rather go to hell than do anything he wanted me to.

It had been deeply satisfying to tell him no. But I hadn’t anticipated him having a backup plan already waiting.

Alessandra.

My gaze shifts from her face down to her stomach.

The desk impedes my view. If she’s faking it, her hoax will be short-lived.

A couple of calls will ensure she’s disbarred before the clock strikes midnight.

If it’s someone else’s child she’s trying to pass off as mine to get at my inheritance, I’ll sue her for attempted fraud.

Except as I stare at her, searching for any hint of deceit, doubt pierces my resolve. If she’s not lying, if Alessandra is truly pregnant with my son or daughter, there’s no way in hell I’m going anywhere.

Is she trying to emotionally manipulate me? Dangle the supposed baby just out of reach and rile me up so I’ll be more likely to agree to whatever her demands are? Whatever she’s doing, I won’t sacrifice an innocent child or leave them fatherless to satisfy my own vendetta against my birth father.

“I want a paternity test.”

She shrugs. Shrugs , as if we’re talking about the damn weather. “If you wish. Though it hardly matters.”

I swallow my fury before I let it take control of my tongue. “Hardly matters?”

The frigid ice in my tone has made more than one Fortune 500 CEO pale. Miss Alessandra Wright merely cocks an eyebrow.

“I’m not asking for child support.” Her eyes rake up and down my body, but not in the hungry way she devoured me with her smoldering emerald gaze before ripping my shirt off in Greece.

Now her assessment is clinical, disinterested.

“You don’t strike me as the fatherly type, so visitation won’t be an issue. ”

None of what she’s saying makes sense. My jaw tightens.

I don’t like not having answers. Not being able to rid myself of the craving I’ve been carrying for Alessandra since she disappeared from my bed is making me even crankier than usual.

Even now, despite the suspicion and anger on the surface, a different heat floods my veins.

Full breasts press against her blouse. The curve of her bare neck captures my gaze.

I imagine pulling the pins out of her hair and letting that fall of auburn cascade over her shoulders before I fill my hands with it.

Blood rushes to my cock. Desire and anger clash, heat my body to dangerous degrees. I haven’t been this close to losing control since our night together.

One breath in. Then a slow, measured release. I wait until my pulse returns to a semblance of normal. I’ll have to deal with this pesky attraction. But later. The immediate problem is determining if she’s lying. If she’s not, I have bigger problems to deal with.

Starting with wrapping my head around becoming a dad. Being a father may not have been a part of my life’s plan. But if Alessandra is pregnant, if the baby is mine, I will be there for it the way mine never was.

“ If you’re pregnant, and if the child is mine, I’m not going anywhere.”

Her eyes widen as she leans forward, the movement sudden and slightly frantic.

“What?”

“If the child is mine, I’m not letting you raise it alone.”

The color drains from her face. Fear glints in the depths of her eyes before she shuts it off like she pushed a button.

I mentally curse. I’m good at reading people.

A skill I honed as a police officer and fine-tuned as I turned Sullivan Security into an international success.

Something’s off. Not once during our night together did I get a hint of any sort of manipulation.

The setup, too, is odd. She never contacted me, not once, between our night together and when I walked into her office.

If getting pregnant had been her goal, or seducing me into marriage, why leave before I even woke up and not reach out again?

I glance toward her office door. When I walked through that door the first time and saw her, the first thing I felt was a bone-deep relief.

There you are.

I’ve never lost my head over a woman. I enjoy them but keep them at a distance. But when I woke up after my night with Lexi to an empty bed, disappointment had settled in the pit of my stomach, a weight that shouldn’t have existed but persisted for weeks every time I thought of her.

A weight that had alleviated for a heartbeat when I’d seen her standing behind that desk, auburn hair tied back into a bun, her tall form clad in a navy suit with a skirt that clung to her hips and followed the lines of her long legs past her knees.

A weight that had crashed down even harder once I’d registered the blank expression on her sculpted face, her professional greeting.

To make the connection that the woman I’d been lusting after for the past few months was connected to Lucifer.

Funny how quickly lust and desire can turn to disgust, to wrath. I know how easily people can disappoint you. Yet I let my guard down for the first time in decades because I saw a sad, beautiful woman in a bar.

A woman who now looks anything but sad as she glares daggers at me.

“Let me make myself clear, Mr. Sullivan. This is my child.” Alessandra’s voice lashes out, a whip fashioned of ice. One hand moves to her stomach, an unconscious gesture that speaks volumes. My chest tightens. “Not yours, not ours, mine . I don’t need you and I certainly don’t want you involved.”

A knock cuts through the tension. My head snaps to the side. Alessandra turns toward the door. In that moment, I see the small curve pressing against the fabric of her dress.

Possessiveness grips my chest, a vise that tightens with every step she takes toward the door.

The same possessiveness that reared its head when I witnessed my half-brother Gavriil flirt with Alessandra during the will reading.

Then, I was able to dismiss it, harnessing my shock and fury to push away any of my former feelings.

But now, as my world narrows to her and that tiny swell, I want to go to her, tuck her away somewhere private before demanding answers.

My fingers curl into fists as she opens the door.

“Hi, Donnie.”

I blink at the sudden change in her tone.

Warm, welcoming. Her voice catapults me back to Santorini when our eyes first met, when she gave me a smile that made me want to possess her as much as it made me want to worship her.

When she said “Hi” in that husky voice that slid over me like hot silk, as if she’d been waiting for me all night.

“Just checking on you, Miss Wright.”

Donnie’s gaze darts to me. I stare back at him. The man had it out for me as soon as I stepped out of the elevator, greeting me with narrowed eyes and a flat voice as he directed me back to Alessandra’s office.

“We’re okay. Mr. Sullivan and I are just wrapping up. I’ll let you know when we leave.”

The smile in her voice stirs up a nasty swirl of jealousy. Ridiculous that I’m feeling anything over a minor kindness she’s showing a coworker old enough to be her father.

But it’s there. It’s there and damn it, I have to manage it.

Alessandra closes the door behind him. When she turns back to me, her face is once again set in that cool mask.

“Your coworkers seem to like you.”

Her mouth thins as she blinks once, twice. The mask slips just a fraction.

“They’re good people.”

“Yet you’re leaving.” I glance at the numerous boxes scattered around her office. “Because of the baby?”

A long moment passes, then she nods once. Unwanted guilt pricks between my shoulder blades.

“Kingston was never my forever plan. I hadn’t anticipated leaving so soon.” She looks around her office. “But I’ll handle it.”

“And you want nothing from me?”

The investigation I ordered on her the minute I walked out of her office three months ago revealed no unusual financial history, no outstanding debts.

In fact, Alessandra lived leanly given the salary she earned.

A one-bedroom apartment in Queens’s Astoria neighborhood.

A frequent traveler on New York’s subways.

She can afford to support this child on her own.

But I’ve met several women who could pay their own bills and still chose to come after my money. I don’t know what Lucifer promised Alessandra in exchange for trapping me: money, a better position, something else she desired.