November Harlequin Presents 1(122)

‘It’s time you left. Time you were out of here—now,’ he added more forcefully when she simply sat back in her chair and stared at him, her mouth very slightly open, those beautiful eyes now blinking hard in shock as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

‘But…’

‘Andreas…’ Leander put in but Andreas ignored him and addressed his words straight into Becca’s stunned face.

‘Did you hear what I said?’

‘Oh, I heard all right…’

Becca was having to struggle to keep control of her voice enough to answer him. Her heart had lurched so hard, so violently when Andreas had come into the room that just for a moment she had thought she might actually faint from the shock of it. But even as she recovered a whole new tide of emotions had swept over her, a sense of apprehension so fierce as to be almost total panic being uppermost amongst them.

What was happening? Why was Andreas behaving like this? Earlier that afternoon, upstairs in his room, he had been distant it was true, but polite enough. Now he was in a dark, icy rage, his handsome features set into a mask of total hostility and rejection that made the panic come worryingly closer, her heart fluttering disturbingly and her thoughts whirling out of control.

Had he remembered what had happened? Had something she’d done betrayed her so that Andreas had realised the true situation between them and had now come downstairs in savage rage to turn on the wife he had rejected so brutally twelve months ago and force her out of his home once again?

‘But I’ve only just unpacked.’

‘Then pack again,’ he commanded, eyes like cruel lasers fixed on her confused and worried face.

She knew this mood of old and it frightened her. When he was like this, then Andreas had no intention of yielding anything—he would not be swayed in any way. Harsh memories of the way that he had flung almost exactly those words at her a year before now resurfaced and threatened to take all her emotional strength away at a blow.

At last the haze in her mind was easing enough for her to be able to see him clearly but just the sight of him was enough to rock her composure once again.

His pure white shirt was worn casually loose, clinging to broad, straight shoulders and falling softly over the leather belt at his waist, the narrow hips. The fine cotton contrasted sharply with the hardness of taut muscle underneath, the pale colour throwing the golden tones of his skin into sharp, devastating contrast. His jeans had been worn and washed so many times that they were faded and rubbed, actually beginning to rip in places, and clinging with an almost sensuous closeness to the long, powerful legs. The hems were frayed where they fell over long, narrow feet, the toes curling slightly on the polished wooden floor. He looked much more like some untamed, unsophisticated Greek shepherd, or perhaps a fisherman, rather than the urbane and powerful multimillionaire he actually was. And, when he was dressed as simply and as casually as this, it was the sheer physical power of the man that hit home hard and strong, knocking her off balance fast with his appeal to the most primitive, most basic part of her female nature. Her blood was pulsing in her veins so much that she almost missed it when he spoke again.

‘Pack up and get out.’

‘But you said—’

‘I know what I said and I’ve changed my mind. I don’t need a woman in my life and certainly not one who’s going to spend her time flirting with the rest of my staff.’

Flirting…

Well, at least there was one tiny hint of something that might give her a hope that all was not lost. Flirting, he’d said. So if a touch of jealousy was his problem, then perhaps the game was not up after all. Perhaps there was still a chance that he hadn’t realised the truth about who she was.

It would be a bitter irony if he had. After the moment of weakness when she’d fled the bedroom in a panic, she had finally managed to get a grip on herself. It was the thought of Daisy that had done it. The memory of the tiny, frail little body she had last seen inside a hospital incubator, wires and tubes seeming to be attached to each tiny limb, to every inch of the baby’s skin. She could still hear in her head the doctor’s voice, giving them the terrible, the soul-destroying truth.

Daisy was a desperately sick little baby. To save her life she needed a vital operation—an operation that was so new, so experimental that only one surgeon in America had ever performed it successfully. If they could find the money…

Becca shuddered inwardly as she recalled the overwhelming despair that she and Macy had suffered at that moment. There was no way…no way but one.

Daisy’s plight was what had brought her to speak to Andreas in the first place. Surely, even hating her as he did, her ex-husband could not harden his heart against the tiny girl. If only she could stay here long enough for him to regain his memory so that she could ask him for help. That image had stiffened her spine and brought her downstairs fired by a new determination to succeed. It had even given her the courage to tell Leander a version of the truth. That Andreas had been asking for her and so she was here to take care of him.