The Millionaire's Love-Child. Elizabeth Power
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‘What?’ Annie prompted, aware.
‘The first time I saw you,’ he responded with a slight smile curving his mouth, ‘you were wearing that colour.’ His gaze fell briefly on the royal-blue top that shaped her upper body, and which clung to her tiny waist above the wide cream belt hugging her hips. ‘You seemed to epitomise everything that was bright and young and vibrant. You were wearing a vivid blue blouse with a tight black skirt and at least four-inch-high heels that made me wonder how you could even stand in them, let alone hold yourself with such alluring dignity.’
He hadn’t been able to take his eyes off her, she remembered, shocked even now to recognise the depth of excitement his interest had produced in her. But that was when she had been guileless, unaware of how easily a man could pledge his feelings, and how easily a woman could be snared by her own sexuality. That was when she had still been young enough to take her happiness as read, before Warren had jilted her, before she had reacted to his defection to his lovely model in the most humiliating way.
‘I suppose practice makes perfect,’ she said tartly, and wondered, with a sudden quickening of her pulse, if despite his marriage and all the time that had passed since, he could still be remotely attracted to her.
Then she decided it was just another ploy on his part to take her mind off the main issue when, still thinking about a whole host of things she would have been wise not to remember, she heard him say, ‘Here we are.’
CHAPTER TWO
IF SHE lived to be a hundred and fifty, Annie thought, she wouldn’t have believed it possible to find herself a victim of such a bizarre and cruel coincidence.
Because it was true. At least, that was what they were telling her. There had to be more conclusive tests, of course.
But how could her baby have been switched at birth with someone else’s? she agonised, forcing one foot in front of the other over the last flight of stairs down from the office where they had imparted the dreaded news. And not just someone, but someone she knew. Him!
He had intended to summon the lift, but she had insisted on taking the stairs. After the pain of being told officially that Sean probably wasn’t hers, she had needed to walk, to think, to try to recover some measure of stability.
Now, as Brant swung open the glass door to allow her into the brilliant June sunshine, she noticed the grim set of his jaw and remembered the anger he had unleashed on the two hospital officials to whom they had spoken. ‘If further tests prove conclusive, you will, of course, be instructing solicitors to sort out the custody issue,’ the middle-aged woman had said to Annie, as though she had been able to take it in—take anything in—right then.
‘Lawyers won’t be necessary.’ She had barely heard Brant’s succinct response, her brain still reeling from the cruel reality of it all. ‘We’re going to work it out for ourselves.’
Were they? At that moment, Annie could only let him conduct the interview, take control, even if she felt he was doing so against her paralysed will.
‘There’ll have to be an inquiry into how a thing like this could have happened,’ the woman’s male colleague tagged on, looking worried behind rimless steel glasses, which was when Brant’s temper had seemed to snap.
‘You’re darn right there will! And if you don’t instigate it after we’ve left this office, then I will!’ he had threatened. ‘It might be just a hiccup in the smooth running of your damned hospital, but it’s turned other people’s lives upside down—and someone’s going to have to answer for that!’
Which was an understatement, Annie thought as the door swung closed behind Brant now. Her world hadn’t just been turned upside down. Yesterday, and then last night when she hadn’t been able to sleep, she had felt as though it were hanging by a thread. Now that thread had snapped and it had come crashing down around her, choking, blinding her to all but its emotional chaos.
‘Come on,’ she heard Brant say gently, and felt a strong hand at her elbow. ‘I’ll take you for a drink.’
The café to which he took her was a small bistro within walking distance of the hospital. It wasn’t yet lunchtime, but the place was still humming with lively chatter.
‘I can’t believe this is happening,’ Annie murmured, after the waiter had served them their drinks at the only small table left for two. She lifted the tall, slim glass to her lips, feeling the bitter-sweet tang of the iced grapefruit juice she had ordered zinging on her tongue, piercing through her numbness. ‘I thought this sort of thing only happened to other people.’
‘We are other people—to everybody else,’ he remarked, his tone phlegmatic, the anger she had witnessed in him back at the hospital banked down now like carefully controlled fire.
Over the rim of her glass, Annie watched him pick up his cup of strong black coffee, her eyes reluctantly drawn to the sinewy strength of his hand. He was a stranger to her and yet she had known the caress of those strong hands, known the excitement of his crushing weight…
Rather unsteadily she returned her glass to its little slate coaster, though not before catching the disconcerting awareness in those all-seeing eyes.
‘Why did you take off the way you did that Saturday morning after that party?’ he was suddenly asking. ‘Without saying a word to anyone?’
She looked at him quickly. Why did he have to mention that?
‘Apart from ringing your boss at home and handing in your notice, no one seemed to know what happened to you—where you went.’
Toying with her glass, Annie felt her heart change rhythm. Had he asked? A slow, insidious heat stole through her veins.
She shrugged, the royal-blue top striking against the shining vitality of her hair.
‘I went to France,’ she told him, meeting his eyes levelly now. ‘Fruit-picking. I needed a change. A break.’ She had needed the time too. Time to recover her pride, and recover from the shame she had left back here in England. ‘When the harvest was over, I spent time backpacking round the south of France.’
‘Sounds idyllic.’
‘Oh, it was!’ It was easy to bluff, to pretend, now that her wounds had healed.
‘Why didn’t you tell me you were planning to go away?’
Because she hadn’t planned it. She had simply run. ‘There didn’t seem to be much point.’
‘Not much…’ A spark of something like annoyance lit his eyes. ‘After what we shared?’
She wished he hadn’t reminded her, but since he had, she lifted her small chin in an almost defiant gesture and asked, ‘What did we share, Brant?’
A muscle clenched in his jaw. ‘You even need to ask?’
What was he saying? Why was he even making such an issue of it?
Struggling for equanimity, she said with as much nonchalance as she could muster, ‘I was on the rebound. And you…’ You were in love with Naomi, her brain screamed at him, because you certainly married her soon enough afterwards! Pride hurting, she cringed as she heard herself asking the question burning through her from her bitter calculations. ‘Was she already pregnant when you made love to me?’
He didn’t answer for a moment. How could he? she thought woundedly, watching him pick up his spoon and toy absently with the dark liquid in his cup, though he had taken it without sugar.
‘Our boys were born on the same day.’ He sent a casual glance upwards towards two patrons who were passing their table, his eyes returning to the spoon he let drop into its saucer. ‘How do you answer that one, Annie?’
His tone might have been casual, but the intensity of his gaze impaled her, causing hot colour to flood into her cheeks.
He had been careful, of course. Unerring in his unshakeable