Billie glued her lips together in a mutinous line. As far as she was concerned taking part in any further discussion concerning Calisto would be humiliating for her and she had no intention of going there.
‘I want a divorce,’ she repeated steadily. ‘I want my life back and my new life will naturally be here in England.’
‘Is that a fact?’ Alexei interposed with a scantily leashed savagery of tone that made her turn back to stare at him.
‘Well, why would I want to live on Speros any longer? At least I can get a job here,’ she pointed out squarely.
‘You’re talking about taking my child away from me as if it means nothing,’ Alexei condemned in an aggressive undertone.
‘But we can’t stay married just for Nicky’s sake,’ Billie protested helplessly. ‘I want more, I need more than some empty charade of a relationship. I’m not prepared to spend the rest of my life paying for the mistake I made on the night of the funeral.’
‘If you live in England, I will see very little of our son. I consider my role in his life to be as important as yours. You’re being unreasonable and unfair. Nikolos needs both of us.’
Billie could hear his continuing surprise at the way she was behaving and she wondered why he expected her to be reasonable when he had been so very judgemental and inflexible since she had fallen off her pedestal with a crash on their wedding night. Right at that moment, after enduring all the stresses and strains of an inordinately long and eventful d
ay, she was at the end of her tether. She was too tired to argue with him, for he would keep up the pressure and refuse to quit until he wore her opinions down and she knew that she could not afford to allow that to happen this time around.
It would be a ghastly joke to divorce Alexei and end up living as his ex-wife on the island of Speros. What life would she have there? Once again she would be living on the edge of his life, watching him with Calisto or some other woman, and for the sake of her sanity she just couldn’t do that any more! A fresh start far away from Alexei and his influence was what she needed, not a rehash of the past when constant exposure to him had enslaved her and ruined her for any other man. So as far as where she lived was concerned she was fully convinced that she had no choice but to be unreasonable as he called it.
A huge weariness that encompassed Billie’s entire body was gaining on her steadily. She let her heavy eyelids slide shut and thought longingly of having Nicky in her arms again. The love of her child would surely fill the giant black hole where her heart used to be. Without Alexei around to upset and distract her, she would be able to concentrate on being a mother. That thought was the very last thought she would later remember.
Billie woke up slowly the next morning. It was just after eight and a twinge of guilt assailed her because Kasma would already have given Nicky his morning feed. The pillow beside hers was pristine and untouched and she knew that once again she had slept alone. Alexei had put her to bed in her unexciting white cotton underwear. She wondered with a sudden savage pain if he had smiled when he saw what she wore underneath her clothes and recalled her warning on that wedding night that had gone so terribly wrong. No, Alexei had probably not been any more in the mood to smile the night before than she had been, she acknowledged unhappily, sliding out of bed and heading into the bathroom for a quick shower.
In fact Alexei, she conceded ruefully, was much more concerned for Nicky’s future in the event of a divorce than she would ever have believed. His own parents, of course, had maintained a stable relationship, setting their only a child a good example. She pictured Alexei as she had seen him with Nicky only two days earlier, their son lying trustingly asleep in his father’s arms. Alexei had proved to be much more hands-on with his son than she had expected as well. Indeed he had accepted Nicky straight away and had immediately wanted to get to know their child.
Of course she recognised the importance of a father in her son’s life! She wasn’t stupid, nor was she so selfish that she wanted to keep Nicky all to herself. She would make every reasonable effort to share their son with Alexei, but he was primarily based in Greece and she was not prepared to continue living abroad for his benefit. Was that so heinous a crime?
As Billie got dressed she was still rationalising the decisions she had reached the day before. Alexei no longer respected or trusted her. They had no relationship left to save. A quick divorce would be a better solution to their predicament than a long dragged-out marital breakdown. Why shouldn’t Alexei spend more time in London? Was that so much to ask of him? Surely they could both be good and effective parents even if they lived far apart?
Still stressing about the serious conclusions she had made after the trip to Paris, Billie went up the flight of stairs to the nursery, which was traditionally and inconveniently sited on the top floor of the house. She walked into the room, which was empty, and crossed it to knock on the door of the bedroom that Kasma was using. When there was no answer she opened the door. There was no sign of Nicky’s nurse or of her belongings. Indeed the bed had been stripped. Her brow furrowing, Billie went back out onto the landing. The housekeeper was emerging from her self-contained flat on the other side of the gallery.
‘Did Kasma take Nicky out for a walk?’ Billie asked the older woman.
The housekeeper looked surprised at the question. ‘Mr Drakos flew out at dawn with Kasma and the little boy…’ Her voice faltered as Billie went white and closed her hands tight round the stair rail. ‘Is there anything wrong, Mrs Drakos?’
Billie didn’t know what she said, but afterwards she went back into the empty nursery to get a grip on herself and on the shocking news that Alexei had simply taken their son out of the country with him without her permission. She looked down into the cot and finally noticed that, strangely, her mobile phone was lying on top of the disturbed bedding. She lifted it and registered that it was flashing because it had an unopened message.
‘Call me,’ ran the text, and it was from Alexei. He must have deliberately placed the phone there for her to find it.
Call him? She wanted to throw the mobile through the unopened window, tear the room apart and scream her fury loud enough to be heard in Greece! Call him? She was so shattered by what he had done that she could barely think straight. He had kidnapped Nicky and taken him abroad without her knowledge, indeed knowing that she had other plans. How dared he? How flipping dared he? Denied her son when her arms ached for him, Billie was overwhelmed by the sudden fear that Alexei was already making a bid for custody of their child. Her heart seemed to skip a beat and she felt sick as she pelted downstairs to check her handbag for Nicky’s passport. As she had expected, it had gone.
CHAPTER EIGHT
‘WHAT the hell have you done?’ Billie yelled down the phone the minute her call was answered. ‘Where is Nicky?’
‘Here at our house in the South of France with me. He’s about to have lunch. He’s fine.’
That Alexei and her son were in France took Billie aback and she could only dimly assume that there was some advantage to that location that she had yet to work out. ‘You kidnapped him…how could you do that to me?’
‘My jet is waiting at Heathrow for you. I’m sure it won’t take you long to pack,’ Alexei countered without remorse.
Barely able to vocalise, never mind think, Billie was trembling with rage and distress. ‘If you were standing here in front of me, I honestly believe I would kill you!’ she hissed at him and she flung the phone down on her bed, folded her arms and stared at it with rampant loathing.
Arrogantly ignoring everything she had said the previous day, indeed clearly impervious to her wishes, her opinions and her feelings, Alexei had removed his son from his mother’s care and taken him to another country.
It was a shocking move that filled Billie to overflowing with dark, fearful foreboding for the future. As a gesture it was uniquely effective, for in that one outrageous act of aggression Alexei had contrived to jerk all her strings at once as though she were nothing but a puppet he was able to control.
Billie was truly shattered. It honestly had not occurred to her that Alexei might fight dirty from the word go. She had assumed they could be civilised—at least in the initial stages of a separation. She had most definitely not been prepared for a war in which no holds were barred to break out so fast. Why had Alexei taken their son to France? Was there some legal advantage in doing this? For the first time in her life Billie regretted not following her mother’s guidance and approaching a divorce lawyer. In business, Alexei always took keen advantage of legal advice and she was convinced that Alexei would have sought a professional opinion of what he had just done before he did it. She wished she could have grabbed at the comfort of believing that he was too stupid to appreciate that such behaviour might be held against him in a divorce court when it came to discussing his access to their son. But having worked for Alexei for so long and seeing at first hand how in touch with events and boundaries he always was, she could find no consolation in that line of thought.