“Do you really hate me this much, Daisy?” His voice was low and cold. “How could you do it?”
“What?” she cried, bewildered.
“As if you didn’t know.” Leonidas gave a low, bitter laugh. “I should have known you would betray me. Just like everyone else.”
CHAPTER NINE
THE WELCOMING SMILE on his wife’s face fled.
She’d made such a lovely picture, snuggled in the rocking chair beside the nursery’s window, holding their sleeping baby, with the floppy golden dog at her feet.
Now Daisy’s beautiful face was anguished, the baby was wailing and Sunny was dancing desperately around Leonidas, wagging her tail, trying to get his attention.
He ignored the dog, looking only at his wife.
Turning away, she calmed the baby down, pulling out a breast and tucking her nipple into Livvy’s tiny mouth as comfort.
It shouldn’t have been erotic, but it was. Probably because he hadn’t made love to her in months. Leonidas tried not to look. He couldn’t let himself want her. He couldn’t.
He forced himself to look away.
She’d hurt him. In a way he’d never thought he’d hurt again.
He never should have told her about his past. Never...
As the baby fell quiet, falling asleep with her tiny hand pressed against his wife’s breast, Daisy finally looked up at him. Her green eyes narrowed.
“What do you mean, I betrayed you?”
Ignoring the dog still pressing against his knees, Leonidas glared back, but lowered his voice so as not to wake their child. “You spoke with Aria Johnson.”
“Oh, that.” She relaxed, then gave a soft smile. “I was trying to help. I know what the Picasso means to you, and I asked her to find it. I didn’t think—”
“No, you didn’t think, or else you wouldn’t have told a muckraking blogger that I cut into the painting with a pair of scissors!”
“What?” she gasped. “I never told her it was you!”
“Well, she knows. She just called me at the office. And if that weren’t enough she’s been looking into my mother’s past,” he said grimly.
Daisy went pale. She whispered, “What did she find?”
“My mother apparently had many lovers, both in Greece and Turkey. She tracked them all down, except for her last one, who apparently died with her in the earthquake.” He glared at Daisy. “One of the lovers knew how I was born. My mother must have confessed. So now that blogger knows I’m not really my father’s son, but the son of my drug-addicted uncle. She asked me to confirm or deny!”
“What did you say?” Daisy cried.
“I hung up the phone!” Clawing back his hair, Leonidas paced the nursery. Every muscle felt tense. “How could you have told her to look into my past?”
“I didn’t! I just told her to find the Picasso!”
He looked down at her, his heart in his throat. “Aria Johnson has a reputation. She can’t be bought off. All she cares about is entertaining her army of followers with the most shocking scandal she can find. And she always finds them. This is going to be all over the internet within hours.”
Daisy looked up at him miserably, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. “I’m so sorry. I was trying to help.”
“Help? Now the whole world is going to learn my deepest, darkest secret, which I’ve spent a lifetime trying to hide.” He clenched his hands at his sides. “I never should have trusted you.”
“I’m sorry.” She blinked fast, her face anguished. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I was trying to bring you back!”
“What are you talking about?”