Defiant Mistress, Ruthless Millionaire(26)

Yet, despite that, Bruce had given Suzanne happiness, even if only for a  short time. And it said a lot that his mother had never once run his  father down. Never once apportioned blame. To her dying day, he knew she  must have loved him and that kind of love was a gift, no matter how  long you shared it.

An ache started deep in Josh's chest. He'd had the chance to know that  kind of love. Callie had offered it to him, and he'd cast it back in her  face like a handful of bad stock options.

Josh strode to the nearby taxi stand. He couldn't afford the time to  retrieve his car from the parking lot nearby. Too many mistakes had been  made already in the name of greed. He wasn't about to make another.





Thirteen


Callie ignored the demand of her doorbell. She wasn't in the mood for  theological discussion or the latest multibuy bargain card. Not  today-not ever.

Since she'd been summarily suspended from Palmer Enterprises, she'd  lived in a kind of limbo-lacking even the energy to bother to dress each  day. And underlying her miserable existence lay a sense of loss and  pain and "what ifs," making sleep patchy at best during the darkest  hours of the night.

The door chimed again, and still she ignored it.

"Come on, Callie. I know you're in there."

Josh? What did he want? Hadn't he made his position clear enough  already? Whatever it was, she wasn't up for any more emotional abuse.  She'd ignore him. Eventually, he'd go away.

This time when the doorbell rang it was continuous. Her eardrums  vibrating with the noise, she pounded down her stairs and flung her  front door open.                       
       
           



       

"What? Ready to go another round with me? Well, I'm all out of fight so get out of my face."

"Last time we talked you wanted to tell me your side of things. I wasn't ready to listen to you then. I am now."

"Oh, so everything is all on your timetable. I'm so sorry," she said,  her voice dripping with a sarcasm that did little to mask the pain  throbbing through her at the sight of him. "I don't have time in my busy  schedule of unemployment."

"Callie, please."

Josh stepped across the threshold, forcing her to back up to avoid the  breadth and strength of him. She should feel threatened by his mass, but  instead all her traitorous body wanted to do was plaster itself against  him. Feel his heat and hardness and envelop herself in it until she  felt no pain, only sensation.

The snick of the front door closing made her take another step back.

"Tell me," he prompted.

There was a note of sincerity in his voice that gave her pause. He  wasn't the kind of man to ask if he didn't mean it and he also wasn't  the type to leave until he got the answers he sought. With a shrug of  resignation, she led him through to her kitchen, where she grabbed her  kettle from its stand and shoved it under the tap.

"Coffee?"

"If you're having some."

She grunted and dealt with the necessities of getting coffee ready.  Instant, not percolated. She wasn't going to any bother for a man who'd  chewed her up and spit her out twice in the past month. And she'd let  him. She'd set herself up that second time by going to him. By hoping  she could appeal to his better nature. The nature she knew dwelled  inside the focussed businessman who dominated his market like some  feudal lord.

Eventually, she pushed a mug across the kitchen table toward him, paying no regard to the brown liquid sloshing over the sides.

If she'd had any pride left it might have bothered her that her hair was  a tangle of unbrushed chaos and that her sleep shorts and tank top had  seen better days. Her attire was a far cry from the nightgown she'd worn  the last time they'd made love. A tight knot wadded up deep inside her.  She didn't want to think about that night, about what they'd shared.  About how they'd given to one another, and taken-both overcome by an  insatiable hunger.

She'd had plenty of time to think about that and she was done thinking.  She knew she'd acted foolishly, impulsively. But she'd loved him with  her heart, her mind and her body-and he'd taken that love and used it  against her.

"Where do you want to begin?" he asked, taking a sip of the coffee and  ignoring the drips from the base of the mug that splattered onto his  Armani suit.

"Why now, Josh? You weren't interested before," she hedged. She wasn't  in a hurry to rip the scab off the emotional wounds that had finally  healed and been tucked away.

"Because I was wrong. You were right. I realise that now. I was driven  by anger and frustration over something I knew next to nothing about.  Something I didn't even have the maturity to understand. It did twist me  up inside and make me bitter and both unwilling and unable to see  anything from anyone's point of view but mine."

He put his mug down on the table and sighed.

"I did what you suggested. I read the letters again. Really read them  this time. How I didn't see what my mother meant to him the first time  around I'll never understand."

"You were too lost in your own grief. You can't be too hard on yourself."

"Whether that's true or not I should never have let it guide my entire  life. It turned me into someone I don't even like anymore."

"I still love you." The words slipped from her mouth before she even realised she'd said them aloud.

"I don't deserve your love, Callie. You deserve better than me, more than what I can give you."

"Josh, if you could have given me your love in return that would have  been enough. I know what it's like not to have love. My parents never  wanted children. When I came along, it certainly wasn't the unexpected  bonus their friends told them it was. They gave me the bare necessities  of life, barely tolerated me when I was around. Sure, they made certain I  was fed and dressed and sent to school. But they never wanted me.

"They loved each other and yet they hated each other, too. Their  relationship was symbiotic and destructive at the same time. They both  drank, excessively, and they did recreational drugs, too. My mother was  the worst. She'd lash out when she was angry and she was angry a lot of  the time. When she didn't get the response, or the respect, from me she  believed she was due, she'd change from shouting and verbal abuse to  physical violence. My father did nothing to stop her.                       
       
           



       

"The day I turned fourteen, she beat me worse than she'd ever done  before. They had to call an ambulance, but neither of them came to the  hospital with me. When the doctors saw my injuries they called the  police, but by the time they arrived at our house my parents had left.  No one knew where they had gone. I'm assuming they fled the country. We  didn't have the border control then that we do now."

Callie fell silent, remembering the visit from the social worker telling  her that she'd now be a ward of the state and remembering her silent  vow not to be under anyone's control ever again.

"Anyway, as soon as I was well enough I checked myself out of hospital  and hit the streets. It wasn't hard to disappear in the underground  community, to learn when to duck and hide and when it was safe."

"Social services never looked for you?"

"They probably did, but it didn't take long before I became adept at my  new lifestyle and it was easier than what had been before. I survived  for two years before things got seriously dangerous for me. That was  when Irene's people found me."

"More dangerous than living on the street? Callie, you were what by then? Sixteen?"

She looked at Josh across the table. For all the hardship in his  upbringing he really had no idea how gruelling life could really be. At  least he'd had his mother.

"My last winter on the street was more difficult than the previous two.  Wetter, colder-just altogether more miserable. There was a guy I was  soft on. He didn't live on the streets but he spent a lot of time there.  That should have been a warning to me, but it wasn't. Anyway, he'd  always been out of my league but this one night he actively sought me  out and he offered to take me back to his place for the night. I knew  exactly what that meant-and I hate to admit it now-but I was so cold, so  tired and so darn hungry I would have done just about anything for  warmth and clean sheets that night. So I went with him."

Her voice faded away on the memory, on the bitter cold and desolation.  She became aware of heat encasing her hands. Of Josh's silent  encouragement and support chasing away the fear and the bad memories.

"I found out later that he wasn't as young as he looked. But he used his  youthful appearance to scout for young girls and had quite a business  running with them once he got them totally dependent on him and the  drugs he pushed. I was one of the lucky ones. The police raided the next  morning and I was sent to one of Irene's facilities."