AllFreeNovel
Share Us
As always, my instinct was to make sure she was all right. Sweep her into my arms and tuck her into bed, keep watch over her. But there was a reason I had to keep myself in check when it came to her, so I stayed rigidly where I was instead.
It did not enhance my mood.
I called one of my house staff to deal with the mess, and ten minutes later everything was clean, I had new shoes and Jenny was sitting bolt-upright in an armchair, a glass of water sitting on the table beside her.
She wore a cheap, chain-store black dress and cheap, chain-store black pumps, and her fingers clutched at the faded black cardigan she’d thrown over the top.
I hated everything about her outfit, since it indicated the dire state of her finances and I hated that too.
Yet again I berated myself for not sending her money over the years, to help her out. Even though I’d been trying to distance myself from her, I could still have helped her out financially.
Not that she would have accepted it. Catherine, her mother, was a gold-digger extraordinaire, and Jenny had always sworn she’d never be like her.
Jenny’s dark brown hair was gathered in an untidy bun on the top of her head, with little tendrils falling down around the back of her neck and her small ears.
She was very pale as she released her death grip on her cardigan and twisted her hands together in her lap instead, looking down at them, her long, dark and surprisingly thick lashes almost brushing her soft round cheeks...
She was soft and round everywhere, her cheeks, her rosebud of a mouth, the lush curves of her breasts and the generous swell of her hips and thighs.
I remembered how soft she was, so hot beneath my hands that night in the garden here, in the grass near the roses. She’d gasped my name and sighed into my ear. She’d been everything I’d imagined her to be, everything I’d fantasised about...
Heat shifted inside me, a thread of dark fire licking around the cracks she’d already made in my armour.
I’d repaired them and had thought I was now proof against the physical desire she always seemed to cause whenever she was in my vicinity, but apparently not.
The fury sitting in my gut coiled and twisted, demanding release, but I ignored it.
I could not feel this heat around her. It was dangerous. It had always been dangerous and that night, when she’d overwhelmed my tenuous control, only proved it.
Keeping myself firmly in check, I elected not to sit, standing by the unlit marble fireplace instead, and looked down at her, waiting for her explanation. I wanted to know why she hadn’t come to me when she’d found out she was pregnant and why she was here now, because it wasn’t just to farewell my father.
Even Catherine, her mother, my father’s erstwhile second wife, whom he’d divorced a few years earlier, hadn’t turned up for that.
Not that her reasons mattered.
I already knew what I was going to do about it.
‘I’m waiting, Jenny,’ I said, trying to curb my impatience. The situation with Valentin needed attending to and people would be waiting for my response. However, I had to secure this situation first. ‘I assume you’re going to tell me why you are here, if it’s not to inform me of your pregnancy.’
Her long, delicate fingers wrung themselves in her lap. ‘Does it matter?’
The clear, sweet sound of her voice hit me like a shock, though it shouldn’t have. It wasn’t as if her voice was unfamiliar to me, not when she had been a fixture in my life for the past twelve years.
She’d mostly been at boarding school in England, but when she hadn’t been, she’d been here, small, bright-eyed and full of life. A kitten in the den of a wolf. My father wasn’t known for his kindnesses, and even though I knew showing concern was a weakness he’d exploit at any opportunity, I couldn’t help the concern I felt for her back then.
She was a child, and very vulnerable, and I knew better than anyone how my father loved to manipulate children.
I’d been nineteen, and working hard for Silver Inc, and even though I’d been travelling a lot on company business, when she’d been there I’d done my best to keep an eye on her.
Then one day I’d come home to find a woman standing in front of me instead of a girl, and everything—every single part of my life—had changed.
But perhaps it was best not to think about that.
‘No,’ I said, and it didn’t matter. I would have found out about her pregnancy anyway, and the end result would have been the same. Olivia was gone, yet she was here, and that made my decision an easy one.
My intention had always been to have a wife, and then children I would guide into adulthood. Heirs to inherit Silver Inc and ensure its future. Olivia had fitted the bill perfectly to produce those children. Mainly because I felt nothing for her except respect.
I didn’t love her. I didn’t want her. She generated absolutely no heat in me whatsoever.
