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‘Grace, I’m trying hard here,’ Leo growled in warning.
‘I have a check-up with the doctor booked.’
‘I’ll come with you and we’ll eat afterwards,’ Leo pronounced with satisfaction.
That wasn’t what Grace wanted at all. She felt like a ball being rolled down a steep hill in a direction she didn’t want to go. Leo was getting much too involved in her life but by sleeping with him again hadn’t she encouraged that? Torn in two by inner conflict, Grace lifted her chin. ‘When do you want me to see this property?’ she prompted.
‘I have a board meeting this morning but late afternoon around four would suit me. I’ll pick you up then.’
Grace wanted to tell him that she didn’t need his escort either but it was his property and she could hardly object. All too frequently in life, Grace had discovered that necessity and practicality overruled any personal preference. Barring a return to Matt’s guest room, she was technically homeless and in no position to dismiss an offer made by the father of her unborn child. She didn’t like that truth but she had to live with it, she told herself unhappily.
When she emerged from the unused bedroom she had taken her case into, fully dressed and composed, Leo had left and Sheila, the friendly older woman washing the kitchen floor, asked her what she would like for breakfast. ‘Housekeeping’ Leo had labelled Sheila with the casual indifference that spoke volumes about his privileged status in life. Grace ate cereal and toast at the kitchen table and learned all there was to know about Sheila’s four adult children, grateful for the pleasant chatter that took her mind off her problems.
There was a tight, hard knot inside Grace’s chest and it ached like mad. Over and over again she was still hearing Leo say, I don’t do love and romance...you’re a nice girl. Last night Leo had sung a very different tune, making her sound irresistible, giving her the heady impression that she meant more to him than she did while he smoothly talked her into an act of monumental stupidity. Of course, he had said all those things, demonstrated all that thrilling impatience before he got her into bed, and that told her all she really needed to know, didn’t it? she scolded herself with newly learned cynicism. He had fooled her, manipulated her, got what he evidently wanted and then withdrawn behind boundaries again. There was a lesson to be learned there and she had learned it well.
A light knock sounded on the bedroom door while she was repacking her case. ‘Grace...you have a visitor,’ Sheila told her.
Bemused by the announcement when even Matt didn’t have her address, Grace followed Sheila down to the hall to see a tall, very attractive brunette with a wealth of mahogany hair and dressed in a very fashionable outfit, who frowned at Grace in apparent astonishment. ‘My goodness, you’re not at all what I expected!’ she exclaimed, extending a slim beringed hand. ‘I’m Marina Kouros...and you can only be...Grace?’
CHAPTER SIX
‘YES. AM I supposed to know who you are?’ Grace asked the tall brunette awkwardly.
‘Leo didn’t mention me?’ Marina Kouros prompted.
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘Coffee, Miss Kouros?’ Sheila proffered from the kitchen doorway.
‘No, thanks...we’ll be in the sitting room,’ the brunette said with easy authority, strolling confidently ahead of Grace, making it clear she knew her way around the apartment before she paused for an instant to firmly close the door.
‘Why should Leo have mentioned you?’ Grace asked stiffly as she hovered by the wall of windows, insanely conscious of her worn jeans and plain chain-store sweater when compared to her companion’s expensive separates.
Marina’s discomfiture was, for an instant, too obvious to be misinterpreted. ‘Because Leo and I have been engaged for the past three years and we’re getting married in six weeks’ time...or, at least, we were until you came along.’
Grace’s jaw felt frozen and unwieldy as she struggled to speak through underperforming facial muscles. ‘Engaged?’ That single word was literally all she could squeeze out of her deflated lungs because her whole body felt as if it had gone into serious shock.
