EPILOGUE

EPILOGUE

E LIANA SAT BACK on the sun lounger. Leandros’s was drawn up beside her, and both were shaded by a parasol against the warm early-summer sun. A little way away Miki was sitting in the shallow paddling pool that had now been added to the villa’s main pool. He was perfectly content, splashing away, playing with his fleet of colourful plastic boats, chatting to them.

Eliana smiled to see him. He was happy here—and so was his beloved ya-ya. Both had made the transition to her father’s villa—now hers and Leandros’s out-of-city home where they came for weekends.

They often invited guests like Chloe and her new husband, Andreas—Chloe had been delighted at her reconciliation with Leandros.

Miki and his ya-ya lived in the little lodge where her father’s housekeeper had once lived. Keeping them company was Sophie, who combined the roles of nanny for Miki and home help for his grandmother.

Hiring Sophie had been part of what had kept Leandros so busy before he’d descended on Eliana in Thessaloniki to lift her from that life into the life he wanted for her—as his beloved and adored wife. And as Eliana wanted Leandros for her beloved and adored husband, it suited them both.

And there was more that had kept Leandros busy then, which was bearing fruit now. Beyond the hiring of Sophie, and the repurchasing of Eliana’s father’s villa, his lawyer and his specialist financial investigator had been busy.

His lawyer had set in train Miki’s grandmother’s claim for formal adoption—which had gone through, with Eliana and Leandros named as guardians. Now Miki, Eliana knew with relief, would be safe from Damian’s father, should he ever discover he had a grandson.

As for the financial investigator—Leandros had told her what he had found out.

‘However closely Jonas had controlled Damian, it seemed odd to me that, with his having been so tragically killed in a car crash, there had not been some kind of life insurance pay-out. Well, there had—and I’ve been given proof of it. And proof of something more. The beneficiary, Eliana, was not Damian’s father. It was you—his wife. His widow. It’s a generous sum—a very generous one. Jonas kept it from you, but you have the legal claim on it—you can get it back.’

She had. But not for herself.

‘This is for Miki,’ she’d told Leandros. ‘His father’s legacy. Invest it for me, make it grow, and it will be his inheritance—set him on his way when he’s grown.’

She had been glad to do it—it had been the right thing to do.

For herself she had so much.

I have everything—I have Leandros. He is all I could ever want—rich, poor, or anything in between. Because now he is mine.

And she was his—now and for ever...for ever and now.

Her gaze went to him, the man she loved with all her heart and soul and always had.

He felt her gaze upon him and looked across at her.

‘It will be Miki’s birthday soon,’ he mused. ‘Four years old.’

He paused. Let his eyes rest on Eliana. There was speculation in them, and something more—something that made her heart turn over. As it so often did whenever he looked at her for any reason at all.

‘It could be time,’ he said slowly, ‘for him to have a stepbrother or stepsister. Sadly, he’ll always be an only child—but we can provide him with step-siblings. He’d like that.’

She reached for his hand. ‘He would,’ she said, ‘and so would I—and so would you. This house cries out for children—and I was so very happy here as a child.’

Leandros lifted her hand and casually bestowed a kiss upon it. ‘Then it’s settled,’ he said. ‘One stepbrother or stepsister coming up—the moment nature can provide it.’

Eliana laced her fingers through his, letting her thumb stroke languorously across his palm.

‘Nature might need a helping hand,’ she said lazily, suggestively. ‘A romantic setting might do the trick. What do you think?’

She eyed Leandros. He took the bait, just as she knew he would. They ran in harmony and always would.

‘Romantic setting, hmm...? Let me think...’ He furrowed his brow. ‘Call me predictable,’ he ventured, ‘but how does Paris strike you for romance?’

She gave a soft laugh. It had been their planned destination six years go, but they had never made it there. And then it had been the place where, miraculously, all the bitterness between them had been dissolved. And after that, just before Christmas, when the air had been crisp and cold, with chestnuts being roasted on braziers in the street and Christmas markets festooned with decorations, and all the great edifices of the city illuminated nightly, Paris had been where they had gone for their true honeymoon.

And now it would be their destination again.

‘Paris it is,’ she said contentedly.

And Leandros laughed and kissed her hand again.

Later on, when midnight approached and they retired to their bedroom and their bed, he kissed her all over—and then more than kissed her.

Afterwards, as they lay in each other’s arms, heart against heart, he cradled her.

‘Might as well get into practice for Paris,’ he said.

And that, thought Eliana, as sleep drifted over her and she fell, as she always did in his arms, into the sweetest dreams, was an excellent idea...

Read on for an extract from THE HUSBAND FOR THE HOLIDAYS by Dani Collins