Greek’s Shotgun Wedding (The Diamandis Heirs #1)

Epilogue

Five years later

A S SHE CAME downstairs, careful in her high heels, Gigi smoothed down her dress. It was red, silky and it clung to every curve. It was right up Jace’s street while also being suitably festive.

It was Christmas Eve, but their children still had to wait a week for the seasonal bounty of gifts. In Greece, gifts were exchanged on the first of January, St Basil’s Day. Lyra, their four-year-old, was already so pumped up on Christmas cheer that another week of waiting for Ayios Vassileios might send her shooting for the stars. In respect of Gigi’s British heritage, one gift would be given to the children on Christmas Day.

Nikolaos, their two-year-old, was trying to scale the giant stuffed reindeer by the front door, his pyjamas at comical half-mast as he sidled past the table with the floral arrangement Electra had sent them.

‘Nikolaos!’ Gigi intervened before he could send the giant vase of flowers flying.

Lyra grabbed him, scolding him firmly.

‘It’s time for bed,’ Gigi told her children.

Actually, getting them into bed was like trying to herd cats up the stairs and into their respective rooms. Lyra chattered up a storm while grabbing the bedtime story she wanted and sliding below her duvet. She had inherited Jace’s black curls and Gigi’s blue eyes, his height and big personality laced with her mother’s intelligence. Gigi’s blood pressure had steadily dropped down to normal during her daughter’s pregnancy and Lyra had been a textbook delivery.

Evander and Marcus swore that Nikolaos was Jace reborn. He hurtled headfirst into everything. He was a fearless, lively bundle of restless energy, the child most likely to be found clinging with one hand to a cliff edge while still laughing. But the reverse side of that extrovert nature was a current of fierce affection. As his mother sank down on the side of his bed, her son wrapped both arms round her and squeezed hard before wriggling down under his duvet. A paw appeared on the other side of his bed and, seconds later, a little black and white head nosed out. It was Houdini.

The little terrier had come into the household shortly after Hoppy had passed away, so at least they had still had a pet when Mo followed Hoppy at the age of nine, which wasn’t a bad age for a wolfhound to reach. After Mo had come Roxy, a gangly, clumsy wolfhound puppy, who was so laid-back she was horizontal most of the time. Gigi tucked her sleeping son in and carefully scooped up Houdini to take him out to the landing. Tilly, strolling along towards them, pounced in front of the terrier and hissed, prompting Houdini to make a break for the stairs.

Humphrey and Snowy still lived on Faros and Humphrey even had a lady companion but Electra’s fond hopes of the pitter patter of little tortoise feet had yet to be realised. Electra had had a minor stroke the previous winter and they visited her on the island most weekends. They had bought the house in which Jace had initially told Gigi that he loved her and, after that first deliriously happy winter there as a couple, they had updated where necessary and the house had slowly but surely turned into their much-loved home. Even with staff, it remained a somewhat messy, chaotic household that often took in rescue animals for a little while, particularly when the shelter was oversubscribed. Evander would look pained while he stayed over Christmas and he would earnestly suggest new and better ways of doing things. And they would listen politely and then go on much as before. Marcus, however, could sit in the middle of a hurricane without turning a hair.

Gigi still worked full-time at the shelter although she also took long breaks to enable them to have holidays. And they had ranged far and wide over the years, satisfying Gigi’s desire to explore foreign climes, while also embracing all the time they could to enjoy simply being a couple. She saw her father most weeks and had since attended two of her brothers’ weddings, the christenings of their children and their birthday parties. She was now fully accepted as a member of the Georgiou family circle and enjoyed a comfortable relationship with her stepmother, Katerina.

Loving Jace had brought Gigi more happiness than she had ever dreamt might be hers. She had her career, her children, but most of all, she had Jace and, although she would never admit it to him, her world revolved around him. He loved her and she felt that love every day, even when he wasn’t able to be with her. He would phone or he would leave a note somewhere for her to find or send a gift.

Now as she picked her way down the stairs and heard the front door open, her blue eyes brightened. Jace came through the front door and she surged across the hall to greet him. ‘Happy Birthday!’ she carolled happily. ‘The kids are in bed...and dinner is ready.’

Jace held her back from him to better enjoy what she was wearing. ‘Like the dress...and the shoes,’ he confided. ‘Very sexy.’

Roxy sloped up to his side in her languid way and bumped his knee with her head before sprawling down at their feet in an untidy heap to go back to sleep.

‘That’s as much physical effort as she’s made all day,’ Gigi told him ruefully.

Houdini bounced out of a doorway and hurled himself at Jace, driven by frantic terrier energy. Gigi tugged Jace past the Christmas tree festooned in lights towards the dining room for their meal.

Before she could take a seat, Jace pulled her to him and said, ‘I was expecting to walk into a party here. How the hell did you dissuade Evander and Marcus from throwing the usual party open house?’

Gigi winced. ‘I didn’t. You’re still getting your big party tomorrow night on Faros...a whole family affair,’ she told him guiltily. ‘Tonight is just for us.’

‘Terrific planning, koukla mou .’ Jace ran a caressing hand across the pouting curve of her breasts and she quivered. ‘Can we take a rain check on the food?’

‘Er...’

‘Of course we can,’ Jace decided, bending down momentarily to sweep her up into his arms and head for the stairs. ‘Am I allowed to ask what my present is?’

‘Don’t be impatient,’ she told him with a secretive little smile as he settled her down on the big bed.

‘You look so beautiful in that dress,’ he said thickly, lean fingers tracing the pouting curve of her lips. ‘You wore red just for me.’

‘If you like to think so, Mr Diamandis.’ But it was absolutely true. Red was a colour that she always thought wore her rather than the other way round. Red attracted attention and she never liked that much, unless it was Jace’s attention.

He leant over her and crushed her parted lips beneath his, his tongue delving deep, and a little shiver of excitement gripped her. ‘I love you,’ he breathed huskily. ‘I’m saying it now in case I forget to say it later.’

‘You won’t,’ she told him confidently, lifting her arms to allow him to lift the dress over her head.

‘And my present?’ he teased.

‘I’m pregnant, just like you requested three months ago,’ she told him quietly. ‘And that is the only present you’re getting from me. Our third and final children will be born in the summer—’

‘Child ren ?’ he queried.

Gigi looked smug. ‘Always be careful what you ask for. We’re having twins, two little boys to keep Nikolaos on his toes,’ she told him.

With a huge grin, Jace wrapped both arms round her and hugged her tight. ‘Who is the most wonderful woman in the world? Best birthday and Christmas present ever !’

‘If I didn’t love you so much, I wouldn’t have agreed.’ The bedroom door shook a little as a small foot kicked it and a wail sounded. ‘Sounds like Nikolaos is looking for his father,’ Gigi teased.

She lay back on the bed like a shameless woman in her red lace lingerie and slowly relaxed while Jace cuddled his son and talked him back into bed. He reappeared in the doorway and she smiled at him, totally relaxed. He was gorgeous and he still took her breath away and made her tingle in secret places when she looked at him. He loved children. He had learned to hug. He never failed to make her feel good about herself. As he returned to her, she heard the pitter patter of Houdini’s little paws head for their son’s room and the nice cosy bed he had in there. Yes, Jace still wouldn’t have dogs in the bed but what he didn’t know didn’t hurt him.

Opening her arms to welcome Jace back, she was still smiling, a woman who had found love when nobody, least of all her, had expected to find it, with the male who had turned out to be the guy of her wildest dreams.

If you just couldn’t put down Greek’s Shotgun Wedding , then you’re certain to love these other emotional stories by Lynne Graham!

The Baby the Desert King Must Claim

The Maid Married to the Billionaire

A Contract for His Penniless Cinderella

Two Secrets to Shock the Italian

Baby Worth Billions