Page 30 of The Heir Affair (Claimed by a Greek #1)

She opened the crisp ivory paper, embossed with some kind of official seal.

Inside was a stack of legal documents—written in Greek.

The final page had her name typed across the top—as Poppy Brown Caras—and his signature scrawled across the bottom.

‘What is this?’ she asked, feeling clueless now, as well as scared.

‘It is a deed of ownership to this island. The land and all the property built on it. Parádeisos will become yours, as soon as we are wed. So, you may live here always, with our child.’

He wanted to give her this island? She dropped the papers on her empty plate, shocked, not just by the gesture, but also by the way it made her feel.

Terrified.

‘But that’s… It’s too much, Xander,’ she said, but her voice sounded as if it were coming from a million miles away—hollow and confused and unsure. ‘I—I can’t possibly accept it.’

The brittle smile became genuine, and all the more disturbing for it, the intensity in his expression making his blue eyes shine like diamonds in the torchlight. ‘Yes, you can, Poppy. It would be your due as my wife. And the mother of my heir.’

‘But, Xander. You can’t just give me an island.’

‘Of course I can…’ Standing up, he stepped to her and clasped her hand to tug her out of her chair.

He banded his arm around her waist, drawing her flush against him, until she could feel his erection, as insistent as the determination in his eyes.

‘You need a home, somewhere safe, for you and our child and this was always more your island than mine.’

The fist continued to punch her chest. His gift was so generous, and so over the top, but also somehow so Xander. So why did it feel like a bribe?

She cradled his cheek, trying to soothe the muscle twitching in his cheek. Trying not to freak out, not to overreact, not to let her own insecurities misinterpret what was really going on here.

Maybe this extravagant gift and the marriage proposal were simply the only way he knew how to tell her he loved her.

He turned his face to kiss her palm, nipping into the flesh under her thumb and making sensation sink into her sex, even as her nipples began to throb painfully.

‘Do you remember, you told me once this was the last place you were truly happy as a child…?’ he murmured against her hand. ‘Let me make you happy again, here. Parádeisos is yours, Poppy. But you must take my name—that is the deal.’

Her heart swelled against her ribs. Even as her panic increased.

It was a bribe. A bribe she could never accept, because it would mean they could never be equals. But the fact that he had remembered the dream she’d told him about that day and wanted to give it to her felt significant. And moving.

She tried to concentrate on that, and not the fear.

She threaded her fingers into his hair, to pull him to her.

‘I don’t need the island, I don’t want it, all I want is you, Xander,’ she whispered against his lips.

‘Make love to me,’ she managed, suddenly desperate to show him how she really felt about him, even if she was too scared to say it out loud.

‘Yes. Yes.’ He growled, then captured her mouth at last in a mind-numbing kiss.

Sweeping everything on the table onto the sand, he grasped her bottom and lifted her until she sat on the edge.

She ripped open his shirt, desperate to touch him and validate their lovemaking as he grappled with his flies to release the huge erection.

He pressed her to lie back on her elbows, her knees raised.

Then hooking her panties to one side, he plunged into the tight sheath, his hand clasping her hip as he thrust deep.

She writhed, impaled, the thick intrusion forcing her to take the full measure of him.

The climax rose up like a tsunami, sudden and frantic and shattering, sweeping through her like wildfire, scorching everything in its path—and burning away the doubts, the panic, in the bright, incandescent beauty of their physical bond.

He panted against her neck, the afterglow already like a drug as he rocked into her one last time and shouted out his own release.

She clung to him, letting him hold her, his breathing as ragged as hers, as their bodies shuddered through the final waves of the titanic climax.

She raked her fingers through his hair, feeling his hot breath on her swollen breasts.

‘I love you, Xander. So much,’ she said, needing him to know, ashamed of her cowardice.

The words seemed to float on the salty air and the funky smell of sex like a promise, a validation, until he stiffened. He raised his head, the huge erection still firm, still there inside her. But his expression looked haunted in the moonlight.

‘We will be wed tomorrow, then, Poppy. And the island will be yours.’

The afterglow faded, leaving her feeling shocked and strangely numb.

Hadn’t he heard what she’d said? Why did she suddenly feel as if her feelings didn’t really matter to him at all? Just her obedience?

She’d told him she loved him and, for a moment, he’d looked stricken.

He pulled out of her, then stepped away from her to rearrange his clothing.

He helped her off the table, held her when she wobbled, her knees becoming shaky as all her old insecurities crawled back.

Why wasn’t he looking at her? Why did the wreckage of the table setting—and all the delicious food, which had been swept onto the sand—feel as destructive now as the soreness in her sex, the feel of his seed on her thighs?

‘We will have to return to the villa to eat,’ he said, his voice gruff.

‘Okay,’ she said, not hungry at all, because the fist was punching her chest now in double time.

As they returned to the villa in the Jeep he’d taken to the beach he spoke of the arrangements for the wedding tomorrow. She listened in a daze, the damning evidence of how he’d manipulated her echoing in her head with every word.

How long had he been planning this? Why hadn’t he included her in any of the arrangements? Was this why he’d avoided talking to her about their future plans—because he’d always intended to ambush her with marriage?

When they arrived at the villa, he helped her out of the Jeep. But when he went to press his lips to hers, she shifted away from his kiss, suddenly brutally aware of how easily she’d let herself be used.

‘I will have supper served in our room and we can discuss the wedding,’ he offered.

She jolted. The persuasive statement was edged with demand.

‘I—I’m not that hungry. And I’m really tired.

’ That much at least was true because she’d never felt more exhausted and heartsore in her life.

She needed time and space to process all these emotions.

To make sense of what he’d done, before she told him she couldn’t go through with the wedding.

‘Would it be okay if I went to bed in my own room?’

He frowned, clearly not happy with the suggestion. But then he cupped her chin and lifted her gaze to his. ‘Is everything okay, Poppy?’

Nothing was okay, she realised, but even so the tiny bubble of hope refused to die. Forcing her to ask the question that mattered most of all.

‘After our marriage, where would you live, Xander?’

Maybe she’d got it all wrong. Maybe this didn’t have to be as bad as she thought.

Maybe he wasn’t trying to control her, or take her choices away from her.

Maybe he just wanted to make a much bigger commitment than she’d anticipated.

And she was the one freaking out, because she’d never been able to handle too much change, all at once.

‘My business is in Athens, Poppy,’ he said, the hint of frustration like a bolt to her heart.

‘And I must travel a lot. For this reason, I cannot live with you and the child here. But I would visit often.’ He cupped her bottom to drag her against him.

‘And when and if our chemistry ever dies, this will always be your home because it will belong to you.’

The hope she’d nurtured for two whole weeks burst like a popped party balloon inside her.

He wasn’t giving her Parádeisos because he loved her. He was giving her this island to get her to agree to this marriage, which he was using to control her. And rob her of the autonomy she’d worked so hard to earn.

He kissed her lips, his tongue pressing seductively against hers. She opened her mouth instinctively, unable to resist the desire even now. But when he released her, she rushed to her room.

She showered off the scent of their lovemaking, then packed her rucksack with shaking fingers.

If she’d had the courage, she would have stayed until the morning, she would have told him how she really felt about his proposal and argued the point with him.

But she felt too much like that broken child again, who had wanted her father to look at her as something other than a burden… And she couldn’t do it.

She’d told Xander she loved him, and he hadn’t even responded. The stricken look on his face kept coming back to her as she crept down to the dock in the moonlight.

The boat he’d taught her how to drive stood on the quay. She untied the line, and climbed on board, breathing a panicked sigh of relief when she found the key in the ignition.

She turned to glance up at the room where he slept, her heart shattering as she stroked the place where their baby was sleeping.

Eventually she would have to contact him, once their child was born.

As she turned the key, punched the ignition, and let the boat drift at half speed out to sea, her heart felt fragile and exhausted.

She loved Xander. She would probably always love him. But she couldn’t stay, when she was convinced now he would never love her in return.