Page 74 of Modern Romance January 2025 1-4

Surely he didn’t intimidate her so much? She should be thankful he wanted an active role. Thankful too that he’d accepted her word that the baby was his. From what she heard, some men wouldn’t.

Maybe Lex hadn’t changed so much after all.

Portia sat. He took a seat beside her, but with a telling distance between them.

She should be glad, because being too close to Lex interfered with her thought processes. Yet an insubordinate part of her brain longed for the time when they’d have automatically snuggled up together, his arm around her, her head at his collarbone.

‘What sort of variables are you thinking about, Portia?’

She turned to see the martial light in his eyes had died. He looked approachable rather than intimidating. Nevertheless it was easier to stare out at the people crossing the green space.

‘If you want a role in our baby’s life for one thing.’

‘We’ve established I do.’

Portia drew a slow breath. ‘Well, that will be good for the baby. It just makes things a little complicated.’

It would have been a struggle raising a child alone, but at least she wouldn’t have had to negotiate decisions around custody and so on.

‘You really imagined I wouldn’t want anything to do with my child?’

She turned back to him. ‘I didn’t like to assume. I don’t really know anything about your life. For all I know you might be planning to marry some nice Greek woman. Raising a child might get in the way of that.’

‘No child of mine would ever bein the way.’ He spoke through gritted teeth. ‘And for the record, I wasn’t planning marriage.’

‘Because you’re a committed bachelor? Not everyone is cut out to have a family and children.’

There was stir of emotion in Lex’s expression but she couldn’t read it. ‘I’m not against marriage.’

‘Yet you haven’t married.’ Because what he’d once shared with her had been so special? Or because he’d outgrown the idea of romance?

Or maybe his single status has nothing to do with you.

‘I’ve been busy, building my business and a relationship with my family. That takes most of my time.’

‘Of course. I understand.’

His expression suggested he thought she didn’t, but it was a dead-end subject.

‘So the question really is how we parent between us. How involved you want to be.’

‘Totally. This is my child. I want total involvement. I would be there every step of the way.’

‘That may not be possible. We live in different countries and—’

‘It would be easy enough if we married.’

Portia breathed out through her nose, counting a slow breath before inhaling again. ‘Parents can raise a child jointly without living together.’

Those sardonic eyebrows lifted. ‘You envisaged freighting our child between England and Greece every week?’

‘I didn’t envisage anything! I didn’tknow! That’s what I wanted to discuss.’ She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to hold in frustration and nerves.

‘It would be easier if you moved to Greece.’

‘Or if you moved to London.’

He stared straight back at her, not bothering to voice the fact that his business was based in Greece. ‘I want to be there every day for our child. I don’t want what happened between my father and me. We were wrenched apart and missed all those years when we could have been together.’

---