His Queen by Desert Decree(39)

‘It’s not happening. I’m out of here, bag and baggage,’ Molly told him roundly, grabbing up a suitcase and thinking better of it. ‘No, that doesn’t belong to me. None of it does. The clothes in these cases were bought with your money so they are not mine—’

‘Stop this...now!’ Azrael thundered at her. ‘You are not leaving me—’

Glittering green eyes struck his. ‘Watch me,’ she invited, sashaying out of the door again, carrying only her handbag.

‘You’re my wife—’

‘And you called me a lying gold-digger. I will not stay married to a man who thinks that of me!’ Molly spat back at him in rage.

‘If I have made a mistake I will make up for it,’ Azrael swore with touching faith in his own powers of persuasion. ‘But you are not leaving me—’

‘I am leaving you,’ Molly repeated with emphasis. ‘And you’re not allowed to make mistakes of that magnitude and be forgiven for them! There is no get-out-of-jail-free card here!’

‘I will not allow you to leave me,’ Azrael shot back at her with suppressed savagery, wondering why she was referring to a prison. ‘That option isn’t on the table. You are already my wife—’

‘Without my consent...remember?’ Molly reminded him doggedly.

Azrael voiced a very rude English word and snatched her off her feet. ‘I don’t care. You are not leaving me,’ he repeated stubbornly, ignoring her struggles as he carted her back into their bedroom and planted her down on the bed like a rock being settled firmly back into sand. ‘This is your home now.’

‘You can’t force me to stay here against my will and you know you can’t!’ Molly told him defiantly. ‘I’d scream the place down, I’d run away, I’d be a nightmare!’

‘Explain your “not dead” grandfather,’ Azrael persisted, lounging back against the door to prevent her from trying to leave again.

Molly dealt him a hostile appraisal. ‘Why should I?’

‘It would be the adult approach.’

‘You’re one to talk,’ Molly snapped. ‘You jumped straight to nasty conclusions.’

‘My past experiences with women have made me distrustful and cynical.’

Molly closed her eyes tight, furious at the idea of him ever having been with anyone else. It was a totally unreasonable reaction but that was how she felt: as if he was hers, body and soul. Such a possessive feeling was not something to celebrate just at that moment, she reflected with self-loathing.

‘Explain,’ Azrael demanded.

‘My grandmother, a widow, married Maurice Devlin when my mother was a baby. My mother’s birth father died before she was born, never mind my birth. Maurice has always been my grandfather and I rarely remember that we’re not related by blood,’ she confided truthfully. ‘He raised my mother as his daughter. When she died he continued to treat me as his grandchild and I’ve always thought of him as family...the only family I have.’

‘Thank you. That has clarified the situation,’ Azrael responded with dignity, torn between relief that his worst imaginings were groundless and anger that he, who prided himself on his cool head and judgement, could have put himself so much in the wrong.

Molly recognised the conflicting emotions chasing across his lean, darkly handsome face and noted the colour rising to accentuate his exotic cheekbones as he accepted the truth of her explanation. She wondered dimly what kind of behaviour his past experiences with women had entailed and crushed a curiosity that she knew would only upset her.

‘I am very sorry for my misapprehension,’ Azrael murmured gruffly. ‘I insulted you.’

He was defensive, wearing his Mr Grumpy expression again and, even aware that she was the injured party, Molly was impressed that he could rise above his pride to apologise. ‘I’m still annoyed with you,’ she admitted.

Azrael jerked his chin in acknowledgement and studied her with dark intense eyes. ‘I lost my temper—’

‘We all do from time to time,’ she parried, fighting an overpowering desire to wrap her arms round his lean, powerful figure and despising herself for it. ‘But I can’t overlook the speed with which you chose to believe the worst of me...that’s a dangerous level of distrust.’

A very faint spur of panic urged Azrael forward. There was so much he felt that he should be saying but he wasn’t used to saying such things and he didn’t have the words to explain that she brought something into his life he knew he could not bear to lose. He sank down on the side of the bed and used a long-fingered brown hand to cradle her cheekbone, his thumb tracing the edge of her full, sultry mouth.