Million-Dollar Love-Child

He’d cut her dead and she’d thought she’d die from the pain. She’d missed him so much.

‘Our relationship was over and talking about it after the event isn’t my forte.’ Luc gave a careless shrug. ‘Talking is something else that’s more of a woman thing than a man thing. A bit like guilt, I suppose.’

‘Well, just because you’re totally lacking in communication skills, don’t blame me now for the fact you weren’t told about your child!’ Her emotions rumbled like a volcano on the point of eruption. ‘I tried to tell you, but your listening skills need serious attention.’

His eyes hardened. ‘It’s a funny thing, but I always find that I become slightly hard of hearing when people are begging me for money.’

She stared at him helplessly. ‘He’s your son—’

He held out a hand. ‘So show me a photograph.’

‘Sorry?’

‘If he exists, then at least show me a photograph.’

She felt as though she was on the witness stand being questioned by a particularly nasty prosecutor. ‘I—I don’t have one with me. I was in a panic and I didn’t think to bring one.’ But she should have. Should have known Luc would ask to at least see a picture of his child. ‘I wasn’t expecting to have to prove his existence, so no, I don’t have a photograph.’

One dark eyebrow swooped upwards and his hand fell to his side. ‘What a loving mother you must be.’ His tone was dangerously soft. ‘You don’t even carry a photograph of your own child.’

She exploded with exasperation. ‘I don’t need to carry a photograph of him because I’m with him virtually every minute of every day and have been since he was born! I used your money to buy a little flat so that I could stay at home and look after him. And now he’s older I work from home so that I don’t miss a single minute of being with him. I don’t need photographs! I have the real thing!’

He inclined his head and a ghost of a smile touched his firm mouth. ‘Good answer.’

She shook her head slowly, helpless to know what to do to convince him. ‘You think I’m making all this up just to get money for myself?’

‘Frankly?’ The smile vanished. ‘I think you’re a greedy, money-grabbing bitch who wants five million dollars and is prepared to go to most distasteful lengths to achieve that goal.’ His eyes scanned her face. ‘And you can abandon the wounded look—it’s less convincing once you’ve already ripped a guy off big time.’

Her mouth fell open and her body chilled with shock. ‘Why would you think that about me?’

‘Because I already know you’re greedy,’ he said helpfully, checking his watch. ‘And now you’ll have to excuse me because I have a Japanese delegation waiting in another meeting room who are equally eager to drain my bank account. If they’re even half as inventive as you’ve been then I’m in for an interesting afternoon.’

She stared at him in horrified disbelief.

Was that it?

Was he really going to walk out on her?

She knew instinctively that if he left the room now, she wouldn’t see him again. Gaining access to Luciano Santoro was an honour extended only to a privileged few and she sensed that she was on borrowed time.

‘No!’ She stood up quickly and her voice rang with panic. Her feelings didn’t matter any more. Nothing mattered except the safety of her son. ‘You can’t just send me away! I’m telling the truth and I’ll prove it if I have to. I can get Rio on the phone, I can arrange for you to talk to the school, I’ll do anything, absolutely anything, but you have to give me the money. I’m begging you, Luc. Please lend me the money. I’ll pay you back somehow, but if you don’t give it to me I don’t know what else to do. I don’t know where else to turn—’

She broke off, her slim shoulders drooped as the fight drained out of her, and she slumped into a chair.

He wasn’t going to help her. The responsibility of being a single parent had always felt enormous, but never more so than now, when her child’s safety was threatened.

She wanted to lean on someone. She wanted to share the burden.

Luc stilled and his dark eyes narrowed. ‘For five million dollars you’d do absolutely anything?’

There was something in his tone that made her uneasy but she didn’t hesitate. ‘I’m a mother and what mother wouldn’t agree to anything if it meant keeping her child safe?’

‘Well, that’s a very interesting offer.’ His eyes scanned her face thoughtfully. ‘I’ll think about it.’

She bit her lip and clasped her hands in her lap. ‘I need an answer quickly.’

‘This is Brazil, meu amorzinho,’ he reminded gently, stretching lean muscular legs out in front of him, ‘and you of all people should know that we don’t do anything quickly.’

She caught her breath, trapped by the burning heat in his eyes and the tense, pulsing atmosphere in the room. All at once she was transported back to long, lazy afternoons making love on his bed, in the swimming pool—afternoons that had stretched into evenings that had stretched into mornings.

She swallowed as she remembered the slow, throbbing, intense heat of those days.

No, Brazilians certainly didn’t rush anything.

‘The deadline is tomorrow night.’

His eyes gleamed. ‘So many shoes, so little time. You think I will just give you the money and let you go? Is that what you think?’

She swallowed, hypnotised by the look in his eyes. ‘Luc—’

‘Let’s look at the facts, shall we?’ Lean bronzed fingers beat a slow, menacing rhythm on the glass table. ‘You clearly hold me responsible for seducing you seven years ago. You come into my office ignoring the past as though it is a vile disease that you could catch again if you stay close to me for long enough.’ His gaze swept over her. ‘Everything about you is buttoned up. You are wearing your clothes like armour, protecting yourself and the truth is—’ he leaned towards her, his dark eyes mocking ‘—you are afraid of those things I made you feel, are you not? You are afraid of your own response to me. That is why you deny your feelings. It is so much easier to pretend that they don’t exist.’

The breath she’d been about to take lodged in her throat. ‘I don’t feel anything—’

He gave a lethal smile. ‘You forget, minha docura, that I was once intimately acquainted with every delicious inch of you. I know the signs. I recognise that flush on your cheeks, I recognise the way your eyes glaze and your lips part just before you beg me to kiss you.’

Completely unsettled by his words, Kimberley rose to her feet so quickly she almost knocked the chair over. ‘You’re insufferably arrogant!’

Her heart was pounding heavily and everything about her whole body suddenly felt warm and tingly.

‘I’m honest,’ he drawled, swivelling in his seat so that he could survey her from under slightly lowered lids, ‘which is more than you have ever been, I suspect. It is so much easier to blame me, is it not, than to accept responsibility yourself? Why is it that you find sex so shameful, I wonder?’

She couldn’t catch her breath properly. ‘Because sex should be part of a loving relationship,’ she blurted out before she could stop herself and he gave a smile that was totally male.

‘If you believe that then clearly maturity has added nothing to your ability to face facts.’

Tears pricked her eyes. ‘Why are you so cynical?’

He shrugged. ‘I am realistic and, like most men, I don’t need the pretence of love to justify enjoying good sex.’

How had she ever allowed herself to become involved with this man?

They were just so different. ‘I—I hate you—’

‘You don’t hate me—’ his relaxed pose was in complete contrast to her rising tension ‘—but I know you think you do, which makes this whole situation more intriguing by the minute. You would so much rather be anywhere else but here. Which makes your greed all the more deplorable. You must want money very badly to risk walking into the dragon’s den.’

‘I’ve told you why I need the money and this situation has nothing to do with us—we’ve both moved on.’ Her fingers curled into her palms. ‘I know you’re not still interested in me, any more than I’m still interested in you.’

‘Is that a fact?’ His voice was a deep, dark drawl and he lounged in his seat with careless ease, contemplating her with lazy amusement. ‘And what if you’re wrong? What if I am still interested in you?’