Bound by Her Rival's Baby
Autorzy
Maya Blake
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17,2K
Rozdziały
12
In this contemporary retelling of Romeo and Juliet, Maya Blake dazzles with this enemies to lovers surprise pregnancy billionaire romance, part of the Ghana's Most Eligible Billionaire's miniseries! A forbidden night… A baby bombshell! Billionaire Atu Quayson is the rebel in a family that exudes power and influence. Unexpectedly pulled back into the Quayson empire, Atu must persuade Amelie Hayford, daughter of his father's fiercest rival, to sell her family's beach resort — to the enemy! Why, wonders Amelie, does she feel such a wild attraction to the one man who is completely off-limits? Surrendering to the intense heat raging between them was inevitable. What they didn't expect were the explosive consequences. And now Amelie has to find the words to tell Atu she's pregnant... with his heir! Previously published.
CHAPTER ONE
‘EXCUSE ME, SIR. Your eleven o’clock appointment is here.’
Atu Quayson looked up from the blueprint he’d been scrutinising, his eyes narrowing on the personal assistant quivering in his office doorway.
He was going to have to replace her. She was far too timid, too skittish to withstand the brutally demanding work environment he excelled in.
He was a driven man and a taxing boss.
Some called him impossible. Others labelled him an arrogant brute to work for. Maybe there was truth to it. Atu simply saw himself as the direct product of his upbringing and made no excuses for it.
Why, then, had he allowed his mother to talk him into hiring her? His lips twisted. Yes...a friend of a friend of a friend’s daughter, whose many professional qualities had been lauded, only for him to discover differently within a day of her installation in his office.
He stopped himself from gritting his teeth.
Perhaps, as his mother had archly suggested, the problem was him. And, while he would never admit it to her, he was beginning to entertain the possibility that she was right. That his bitter and austere view on life was bleeding onto his hapless subordinates.
But that was a problem to be tackled later.
‘I don’t have an eleven o’clock appointment.’
His tone didn’t invite testing or defiance. He’d learned early in his professional life to memorise his daily schedule in case he needed to be flexible when new opportunities—or extraneous instances like his mother’s interference—arose. He’d specifically cleared his diary until midday, when he met with his team of architects as he did every other Wednesday. A quick glance at his wristwatch confirmed that meeting was still an hour away.
Julie’s—or was it Janet’s?—eyes widened. ‘Oh...um... I’m sorry, sir, but she’s very adamant that you see her.’
His hackles rose higher. ‘She?’ Suspicion of his mother’s hand in this too swirled acid through his gut. On top of everything else, he didn’t need the once-a-month, stay-out-of-my-business verbal skirmish with his mother, a battle he usually fooled himself into thinking he’d won, only to discover she’d merely retreated to plot her next move.
‘Did this person give you a name or a reason why she feels entitled to see me?’ He made no effort to hide his disgruntlement.
Her fingers twitched a few times, then went into full-on hand-wringing. ‘She said you would know what it was about. And her name is...’ She stopped and cleared her throat, patently terrified to utter the name. ‘Her name is Amelie Hayford, sir.’
Atu jerked upright, the unpleasant sensation in his gut thickening until his whole being was immersed in a soup of acid. Immersed in memories he didn’t like to recall today or ever.
His heart slammed against his ribs, each beat echoing the surname no one in his family willingly spoke aloud. Not unless it was absolutely necessary. Unless it was a reminder to stay the course.
For the sake of vengeance.
For the sake of stoking the fires of retribution that kept his father alive even now, on what doctors whispered was his deathbed.
‘What did you say?’ His voice was an unsheathed blade and real apprehension shifted in the PA’s eyes.
She cast a furtive glance over her shoulder, then whispered, ‘A-Amelie...Hayford, sir,’ as if lowering the decibels of her response would minimise its impact.
It didn’t. Her confirmation merely increased the roiling inside him, shaking loose several pertinent questions.
Would she really dare?
Why hadn’t she been stopped by Security at the entrance to his building?
How had she made it all the way to his penthouse office?
He operated from the top floor of his flagship Quayson Group hotel, located in the centre of Accra, for a reason—so casual acquaintances, unwanted guests and sycophants couldn’t drop in at will. It was also why his security was top-notch.
His fingers started to clench but he wilfully stopped himself from tensing. Displaying the sort of emotion that bubbled underneath his skin was no longer useful.
Emotion had torn his family apart. Twisted obsession and forbidden love had ripped through it, the disease infesting everything he treasured, leaving devastation in its wake and him with the searing belief that control, emotional austerity and dedication to professional goals were the only things that would sustain him.
So he inhaled deeply and returned his gaze to the blueprints spread out on his table. ‘Inform her that an appointment with me or anyone in my company needs to be assessed and agreed upon. Without exception. I’m not some fast-food drive-through she can swing past when the urge takes her.’
‘Perhaps you’d like to say that to my face?’ came a husky voice, making his PA jump.
Atu’s head snapped to the doorway a second before the owner of the voice came into view.
With a confidence he would have admired, had he not been caught in the vortex of memory, bitterness and, yes, shame, the tall, voluptuous woman swept past the distraught PA and entered his domain.
As if she had every right.
As if she was intent on proving she wasn’t still the timid child he’d grown up with, who’d lurked on the fringes of his close-knit friends and family group back when their families had been the closest of friends, instead of the vicious enemies they were now.
But hadn’t he had a taste of the confident, defiant woman even back then? Hadn’t she effortlessly punched through the brittle shell of anger and bitterness he’d built around himself that night eight years ago when, fresh from yet another row with his father, he’d crossed paths with her? Even then she’d sent him reeling hard, triggering an awareness that underneath her wide-eyed innocence a vibrant, passionate and confident woman lurked. One who’d burrowed beneath his guard...tempted him into a torrid episode that plagued him in imprudent moments.
Like now.
She moved towards him as if she owned the very air he breathed. And perhaps, on some level, she did. Because he was suddenly finding it difficult to take a breath, the captivating effect of her presence capsizing the smooth mechanics of his respiratory system.
He saw his PA reaching for the door to shut it, hurriedly making herself scarce, but his attention was wholly locked on the woman before him.
He ignored her question, attempting to catalogue the components of her that made up this curiously intriguing, highly unwanted package.
Faint gold and orange eyeshadow highlighted her big, beautiful eyes and flawless face. A face framed by the yellow and green patchwork making up her high kente headdress and the tasteful gold hoop earrings dangling from her lobes. Her chunky colourful necklace invited the gaze to the regal grace of her slim neck, sloping onto elegant shoulders, currently bare save for the thin straps holding up the knee-length bright yellow dress moulded to her body. Long, shapely legs tapered down to feet adorned with stylish gold heels.
She was a woman who knew which colours did her justice, and she’d chosen well today.
Advancing further, she extended one graceful arm, set down her handbag before bracing her hands on her hips. She cocked one eyebrow in challenge.
She’d come prepared for battle. Her suit of armour was her confidence. Her unflinching pride. The intelligence shining in her eyes. Perhaps even her stunning beauty. Although the first three would have cowed a less formidable man, the fourth was the thing that clinched a victory.
He wasn’t cowed. Because he couldn’t forget for one second what this woman and the blood that ran through her veins embodied.
The destruction of his family.
He folded his arms, resisting the urge to rake his gaze over her once more. To linger on those plump lips he’d tasted once eight years ago, in a moment of madness that still haunted him.
He might have abandoned the pursuit of the opposite sex for a while, to concentrate on his current project, and to save himself the trouble of his mother’s rabid matchmaking every time he so much as glanced at a woman. But he didn’t welcome his suddenly raging libido reminding him of that fact now. Especially not with this woman.
‘You’re brave. I’ll give you that. Arguably, foolish too. Either way, I recommend you turn around and use that door behind you while you have the chance.’
Her chin angled up higher, her stare growing bolder. ‘Or what?’
He cocked his brow in return. ‘Surely you can’t be that dense? We may not have seen each other in eight years, but surely you haven’t forgotten the circumstances of our last meeting?’
That harrowing day when two beloved people had been laid to rest, ironically and unfortunately in side-by-side burial crypts neither family had wanted to relinquish even in the face of their searing grief and loss.
Atu darkly mused what would be etched on their tombstones several lifetimes from now—the Quaysons and the Hayfords, two families who had vowed never to back down in destroying each other, even in death.
Shades of distress moved in her eyes, then disappeared in the next second. Atu wasn’t sure whether to admire her strength of will or add it to the grievance list carved into his family’s soul.
‘I’m not here to rehash the past with you. Your actions left me with no choice but to come here. Or are you going to claim equal denseness?’
He shifted as her voice washed over him. She spoke in the accented Ghanaian English he would be able to pick out in a sea of a thousand voices anywhere in the world. Throughout his long absences from his motherland, hearing the distinct accent had triggered a sense of home and comfort he experienced whenever he heard it.
But added to Amelie’s accent were British overtones—the result of having spent half her life studying and living in London.
His own speech was laced with the influences of a childhood spent in the States and then around the world, living the carefree life of the ‘spare’ while his much-beloved older brother revelled in being the heir.
Until it had all crashed to a bleak and devastating halt.
The reminder dragged him from his musings. ‘What do you want, Miss Hayford?’
She tensed, most likely in reaction to his formal address.
Their last interaction that fateful weekend eight years ago had started off as a terse conversation, riddled with mild threats and spiked accusations, mostly fuelled by one too many cocktails.
And then it had turned into something else. Something he preferred to forget. But not even then had he been this formal.
Again, she got her emotions under control rapidly.
Reaching into her bag, she retrieved a sheaf of papers. ‘My lawyers have informed you of my refusal to sell my resort to you on numerous occasions, Mr Hayford. And yet this arrived this morning.’
He allowed mockery to seep into his features and his voice. ‘I’m aware of what my lawyers are doing on my behalf. What’s your point?’
She slapped the documents on his desk. ‘Since I can only conclude that there’s been a break in communication, I’ve decided to tell you face to face. I’m not interested.’
‘Don’t the phones work in your backward resort? A shame you had to leave your little hamlet. Or have you moved back to the city?’
He knew the answer to that.
She lived near Saltpond, a thriving coastal city two hours west of Accra, while he resided in the capital. Accra was a rich and vibrantly diverse city, but it was also a relatively small city, made even smaller when one existed within the elite social circles he and his family inhabited. The same circles her family used to enjoy.
And when those two families were inextricably linked by personal tragedy, it was impossible not to be aware of one another. If she hadn’t come straight here, he would’ve known by lunchtime that she was in town. Unfailingly, his mother would have made it her business to inform him and every member of the family that a Hayford was back in her beloved city.
‘I’m not going to dignify your pathetic insults with a response,’ she said, shoving the documents at him before pivoting away from him, her hands clenched into fists.
Her movement highlighted her proud breasts and curvy hips, contrasted by her tiny waist, currently cinched in by a wide tanned leather belt bearing the hallmarks of the talents of the Northern Region of their homeland. Heat punched into him as he watched her, unable to drag his gaze from a body that was a siren song he was sure must draw most men.
Most men.
Not him.
He mentally doused the flames invading his groin, summoning the iron-forged willpower that had helped him withstand his father’s merciless censure for his part in their family tragedy and its ongoing dysfunction. The same dogged control that kept the vault of his guilt and regret intact.
To him, Amelie could only be an ornament that caught the corner of his eye. Intriguing for a vague little second, but forgotten about once he’d achieved his latest goal—acquiring the comparatively small Hayford Beach Resort and absorbing it into the latest Quayson Group project.
He refused to allow himself to dwell on those moments when he’d lost himself in the feel and taste of her, blindly and desperately seeking to forget the forceful demands of his father, the stark reminder that he would always be second-best. That he existed solely to be the wind beneath his more deserving brother’s wings.
Just as he refused to accommodate the twinge of regret about giving in to his weakness with Amelie that night.
Because she’d been using him too...
All that mattered was the present. Pursuing his goal without the distraction she represented was why he kept his dealings strictly between their lawyers.
Her pacing brought her close once more, and he saw the moment she spotted the draft blueprints he’d been reviewing. Faint apprehension flickered over her face before being eradicated by utter derision.
‘You’ve had blueprints done on my resort? You’re getting a little bit ahead of yourself, aren’t you?’ she taunted.
‘Not at all. In fact, my team is running a little bit behind schedule.’
Chocolate-brown eyes rose to his, anger sparking in the depths. Against the brown, the stark white of her eyes stood out sharply, highlighting her glorious mocha skin. It was several shades lighter than his own dark mahogany hue, and whatever make-up she’d applied made it gleam in the sunlight slanting through his windows.
Hell, she glowed with a vitality that made his fingers itch to explore her. He was sure this kind of radiance was reserved for some goddess. The kind that caused men to lose their minds. The kind of power her own sister had wielded against his brother. And look how that had ended.
Tragedy, devastation and the rabid quest for vengeance.
‘Oh, and you can call off your spy,’ she added with a snap. ‘I know you conned my deputy manager into spilling company secrets. His employment has been terminated. And, just so we’re clear, my resort isn’t for sale now or in the foreseeable future.’
‘Then why did you meet with investors from Dubai last month?’
Stunned surprise flickered in her eyes but her chin rose higher. ‘That’s no one’s business—especially not yours or your deplorable family’s.’
Fury sparked in his gut. While he had his own issues with his family, an inexplicable vein of loyalty had kept him anchored to them even as he’d enjoyed his hard-won freedom on the other side of the globe. That loyalty remained alive and well.
‘Watch your tone,’ he growled, all mockery wiped from his voice.
She didn’t back down. ‘What are you going to do? Have your security throw me out? I’ll remind you that you’re not the only one with connections. You currently have several deals in delicate stages. Think how it’ll look if you’re embroiled in a scandal. And, trust me, anything but a seemingly cordial meeting between us will make it onto social media within the hour. Are you willing to risk adverse publicity and displease your business partners?’
Her threats ignited a different fire inside him. He’d always relished a challenge, and even this brief skirmish—and he intended it to be brief, because every second in her presence reminded him of those forbidden minutes when they’d tangled together—roused the spirit of the Fante warriors who’d sired his bloodline and hers.
‘I won’t need my security to help me throw you out. I’ll urge you to recall our family history. Remember how the Hayfords have fared against the Quaysons so far and consider the likelihood of you coming out on top of whatever scheme you’re proposing.’
Her throat moved in a delicate swallow, but her gaze remained defiant. ‘And that’s a source of pride for you, is it?’ she jeered, her nose very much in the air.
He recalled then that, while his family could boast an impressive pedigree, Amelie Hayford’s progenitors were actual royalty. And with every flash of her eyes and haughty proclamation, the echoes of her regal forebears shone through.
Not that it mattered one iota in this time and place, he assured himself sternly. Her sister’s emotional manipulation of his brother was partly the reason Fiifi was no longer alive. The reason his father was steeped in bitterness and his family irreversibly set on vengeance. Because someone had to pay, didn’t they?
It was why he’d returned to the family fold after years of being labelled the black sheep—a title he’d nonchalantly shrugged on, another layer to add to the many denigrating layers his father had seen fit to saddle him with.
As for Amelie herself—perhaps if he hadn’t let his base instincts take over that night, he would’ve been able to stop...
Enough!
This meeting had run long enough. As had the unsettling memory-dredging. ‘It’s time for you to leave. And I’d advise against talking to the press or making any precipitate moves against me or my company.’
Her eyes flashed. ‘Tell me you’ll stop sniffing around my business and you won’t need to see or hear from me for the remainder of your despicable life.’
For some absurd reason, the thought of never seeing her again chafed—as if he’d brushed up against sandpaper in the dark. ‘I’ll have to disappoint you. Your little resort falls into my expansion objectives. Whether you make my acquisition of it hostile or civil is entirely up to you.’
‘Civil?’ She spat the word as if it was poison. ‘You don’t know the meaning of the word.’
He bit his tongue against reminding her that things between them hadn’t always been hostile. That for a handful of minutes one memorable night she’d melted in his arms. She’d moaned his name and pressed her alluring body against his.
He clenched his gut against the unwelcome reminder. ‘Really? What do you call showing up unannounced in my office, throwing down ultimatums?’
‘You left me no choice. Stop coming after what’s mine and I won’t make any unannounced visits. Your actions are drawing unwanted attention and I won’t have that.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘What kind of attention?’ he breathed.
He’d seen off the Dubai delegations, easily interesting them in his much more lucrative projects in Cape Town and Malaysia. Just as he’d seen off the Lebanese conglomerate and the US one before that.
Even without his father’s zealous interest in acquiring the small resort on the beautiful southern coast of Ghana—simply because it was a Hayford property and, after a decade-long endeavour, the last meaningful Hayford holding and therefore the final thing standing in the way of the Quaysons accomplishing their revenge—Atu’s own assessment of the resort and, more importantly, its potential had sparked an interest he’d been unable to ignore.
If he could achieve both his aims in one go, all the better.
‘That’s none of your concern,’ she snapped, reclaiming his attention.
Her breathing had grown shallower with her agitation, dragging his focus to the pulse racing at her throat. To the impressive swell of her breasts and the rich, enthralling scent of her perfume. That maddeningly intoxicating mixture of shea butter and coconut that pulsed from her skin.
An image lit up in his head, of him burying his face in the curve of her neck, inhaling her scent while stifling a groan. Then gliding his tongue over that speeding pulse, being rewarded with her hitched breathing. Just like he’d done that night.
Awuradzi Yesu.
Thankful the curse hadn’t slipped free of his control the way his thoughts were running rampant, he turned away from her, pinching the bridge of his nose when she continued speaking.
‘There are literally miles of beachfront properties along the south coast. Why are you obsessed with mine?’
He faced her again, attempting not to fixate on the plumpness of the mouth that had spoken the words. ‘You’re in a prime location, with rich tourism within shouting distance. It’s also an easy trek from Accra. I’d be a fool to overlook it.’
Her nostrils flared in anger. ‘So you’ll take it by force?’
For the briefest second, he experienced a pang of something eerily close to guilt. Then he shook himself free of it. ‘Hardly. My lawyers have made you several very generous offers.’
‘All of which I’ve turned down. Doesn’t that tell you something?’
‘It tells me you’re stubborn. It also tells me you’re in danger of finding yourself out of your depth if you cling to that stubbornness.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
He allowed himself a small smile. ‘You really think I’m going to lay all my cards on the table?’
Again, she easily smothered any trepidation she might feel. ‘I have the blessing of the chief. Saltpond runs in my blood. Local support alone will ensure you lose any takeover bid.’
‘You might have his ear, but what I offer will be far greater than any advantage born out of clansmanship.’
‘And what’s that?’
Atu decided it wouldn’t hurt to demonstrate a fraction of the clout he wielded. ‘Your resort employs how many? Sixty? Eighty?’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘Ninety-five,’ she bit out.
He stopped himself from smirking in triumph. Deep down, he hadn’t wanted this task. Hadn’t wanted to be here in Accra at all. He’d been perfectly happy in Malaysia, far away from the bitterness and the zealous family vendetta and politics. He had been fine leaving the running of the questionable family empire to his father.
In his resort on the Desaru Coast, he didn’t have to see the cruelty-tinted grief etched into his father’s face, the not-so-secret light in his parent’s eyes that told him he wished things had turned out differently that night.
That perhaps even the wrong son had been taken...
Better still, there he wasn’t reminded daily of his own disagreement with his father that day which had blinded him to everything else. Of the fact that if he’d focused his attention outwardly, instead of dwelling on the dejection churning in his chest, he would have noticed Fiifi was drinking too much. That the woman his older brother had purported to desire above all else had an agenda of her own...
He shook himself free of the grappling hooks of the past and laid down the bare facts for the woman standing before him.
‘When I take over your resort and implement my expansion plans, I’ll generate over three hundred jobs. I’ll elevate the whole area and create healthy competition with the resorts in Cape Coast and Takoradi. Do you truly believe your chief will pass up such an opportunity?’
Doubt crept into her eyes and lingered for several seconds before she dismissed his words. ‘He’ll see through all that to the truth—that you’re just in it for the profit.’
His eyebrows spiked. ‘And you’re not? Are you running a charity?’
‘I provide a personalised experience, tailor-made for every guest. I’m not a faceless corporate giant that simply offers a place to lay your head for the night and charges a fortune for it.’
‘You haven’t done your homework properly if you believe the Quayson Group is just another run-of-the-mill chain hotelier.’
Her lips pursed. ‘Stuff your corporate spiel. And stop trying to paint yourself as some altruistic businessman with the best interests of the ordinary man at heart. I’ve first-hand knowledge of the kind of man you are, remember?’
The force of their history ploughed through the space between them. For a single raw moment their combined grief and loss thickened in the air.
Then she pivoted and sashayed to where she’d dropped her bag.
He would have had to be dead from the neck down to stop his gaze from sliding down to her round, firm buttocks and her supple hips.
His mouth dried and he bit back a curse. He had a weakness for voluptuous women, and while, at twenty, Amelie Hayford had retained some aspects of girlishness, at twenty-eight she was all woman, with an hourglass figure that reminded him he was profoundly male and at risk of announcing that he was aroused by the very epitome of the goddess now taking command of his office.
‘I thought you weren’t here to dredge up history?’ he replied, with more bite than he’d intended. ‘But if you’re in the mood for that, I can remind you of another time you played out of your league.’
She tensed, then sent him a searing glance over her shoulder. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ she said a little too hurriedly. Too breathlessly.
Again, her chest rose and fell with her breathing, stirring his blood a little too fast.
She riled him.
Every Hayford riled him and his family in some way. But since that night when he’d let his emotions get the better of him, Amelie had been able to burrow deep under his skin, as if she had special dispensation from the gods to add an extra layer of hell, fashioned just for him.
He wasn’t desperate to examine that particular layer—wasn’t sure he wanted to discover what the unwanted ingredient was.
He especially wasn’t interested in discovering if it was anything like what his brother had suffered from. Some had labelled it weakness. Others had called it obsession. Whatever it had been, it had driven Fiifi over the edge.
He, Atu, was above that. Had striven to keep himself from that kind of unnecessary entanglement. He wasn’t about to start now.
‘Count yourself lucky I don’t have the time or inclination to refresh your memory.’
For a handful of seconds her eyes widened, her lips parting in a single breath. Then she faced him fully, spearing him with a fierce look from far too enchanting eyes. ‘Luck has nothing to do with it. I’ll just keep reminding myself that okoto nwo anoma. Isn’t that how the saying goes?’
He tossed the proverb in his head, striving to maintain his cool. A crab doesn’t birth a bird. Meaning he was culpable in whatever sins she laid at his family’s feet.
‘Again, while I’d love to compare notes on which one of us bears the most blame in our little family drama, I’m afraid I’ll have to pass. I have a meeting in five minutes.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘Don’t try me, Atu. I’m warning you.’
His name on her lips caused a deep rumbling inside him, like a shift of the tectonic plates that formed his existence. It pooled in latent heat in his groin and slowly intensified as they faced off.
In that moment, he realised that, no, he didn’t resent this project thrust upon him as much as he should. Perhaps, subconsciously, he even relished it. Because, for good or ill, he wasn’t going to let this go.
Hell, maybe this would be the purge that drove the dark shadows from his life.
The final slice of retribution for his family.
Especially for the brother he’d let down.
Maybe then he’d be free of the guilt and shame. Maybe then his father would even look at him without rancour from the cold embrace of his deathbed.
Whatever the reason behind it, the spark had ignited in him, and now grew to a burning flame of purpose.
He was going to conquer this thorn in his family’s side once and for all.
And by coming here, Amelie Hayford had put herself in the centre of his war of redemption.
