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‘What are you doing here? And what have you done to my guests?’ she demanded.
The hostility in her tone was nothing he’d ever imagined hearing from her lips. But he was happy to hear it. Happy to have it match his own.
‘We need to talk; they were in the way. I got rid of them.’
Money was an incredible thing. It had been both his saviour and his destroyer, but this time he was going to use it to help him get what he wanted...what he needed.
The woman holding his daughter moved into the hallway behind him, drawing Mary’s attention. He watched as the mother of his child rushed past him, forcing him to back out of her way, and swept their daughter up in her arms.
They made a striking image, Mary’s dark head buried in the crook of their daughter’s neck. He’d so desperately wanted to hold his child the first moment he set eyes on her. But the woman employed by Mary had raged that she wouldn’t let her be held by a stranger. Christe mou, was this how he started as a father? Being denied the right to hold his child? Anger crushed his chest.
‘Thank you, Siobhan. You can go now.’
‘If you’re sure?’ the young girl asked, casting him a doubtful look. After a quick nod of reassurance from the woman holding his child, the girl brushed past him, letting loose a low tut as she did so.
Dimitri locked his gaze with Mary’s. If looks could kill...
* * *
It was all Anna could do to take him in. Dimitri filled the entire doorway, looking like the devil come to collect his dues. Tall, broad and mouthwatering. Anger slashed his cheeks and made a mockery of the taut bones of his incredible features. The long, dark, handmade woollen coat hung almost to his knees, covering a dark blue knitted jumper that, she knew, would stretch across his broad shoulders perfectly. Broad shoulders that she’d once draped with her hands, her fingers, her tongue. Even the sight of him drove away the bone-deep chill that had settled into her skin from the rain. Her body’s betrayal stung as it vibrated, coming to life for the first time in three years, just from his proximity. Desire coated her throat while heat flayed her skin.
He looked as if he’d just stepped from the pages of a glossy magazine. And there she was, soaking wet, an old, hideous luminous-green waterproof jacket covering ill-fitting jeans and a T-shirt that was probably indecently see-through from the rain. But it was his eyes, shards of obsidian and hauntingly familiar, so like the ones she’d seen every single day since her daughter had been placed in her arms. Though they had never been filled with such disdain.
‘You have five minutes.’ His voice was harsh and more guttural than she remembered. Cursing herself silently, she forced her brain into gear.
‘For what?’ Anna asked, thinking that this was an odd way to start the conversation she’d spent years agonising over.
‘To say goodbye.’
‘Goodbye to who?’
‘Our daughter.’
CHAPTER TWO
Dear Dimitri,
I didn’t mean for it to be like this.
INSTINCTIVELY ANNA CLUTCHED Amalia tightly to her chest.
‘I’m not saying goodbye to my daughter!’
‘Don’t play the put-upon mother now.’
Dimitri had taken a step towards her and Anna took a step back.
‘You,’ Dimitri continued, ‘who only two days ago blackmailed me with news of her. The transfer has been made, but I’ve come to collect. Because there’s no way I’m leaving my daughter in the care of an alcoholic, debt-ridden liar and cheat.’
Anna’s head spun. So much so, it took her a moment to realise that he had somehow mistaken her for her mother.
‘Wait—’
‘I’ve waited long enough.’
Anna watched, horrified, as another man appeared
in the doorway. A man who had ‘legal’ stamped all over him. It didn’t make a dent in Dimitri’s powerful tirade.
