‘Abbie, where the hell are you?’ Her father’s irate tones seemed to fill the house. ‘Have you received any of my messages? This is important.’
It was strange how just hearing his voice made her nervous. She supposed it was all those years of conditioning—of being afraid to ignore his commands.
Wrapping her dressing gown more closely around her body, she reminded herself fiercely that her father no longer had a hold over her—he couldn’t hurt her any more.
‘Do you hear me, Abigail?’
He probably wanted to summon her back to Vegas to host one of his parties. She shuddered at the thought. She’d escaped from that life over two years ago—she would have thought he’d got the message by now. His bullying blackmail tactics no longer worked. She wasn’t going back.
She was on her way across her bedroom to switch off the machine when she heard him mention a name—a name that made her freeze and the world start to zone out as darkness threatened to engulf her. Damon Cyrenci.
For so long she had tried to block that name out of her mind, pretend he had never existed. And the only way she had been able to do that was by filling her every waking hour and making herself so bone-tired that personal thoughts were a luxury. But, even so, sometimes in the silence of the night he would come to her as she slept and she would see his darkly handsome face again. Would imagine his hands touching her, his lips crushing against hers, and she would wake with tears on her cheeks.
‘I’ve lost everything, Abigail—everything—to Damon Cyrenci, and that includes the stables because they are part of the company’s assets.’
Through the turmoil of her thoughts, Abbie tried to concentrate on what her father was saying. The stables were hers, weren’t they?
‘And he’s on his way out there now to look over his property.’
The words hit her like a hurricane at force five. Damon was on his way here! Her heart raced—her body felt weak. Damon—the love of her life, the father of her child, the one man she had given herself to completely. The memories that went along with all those facts twisted inside her like a serpent intent on squeezing her very soul. And along with the memories there was a fierce longing—a longing that had never really gone away, a longing that she had just learnt to live with.
She sat down on the bed behind her; it was either sit down or fall down. Damon was coming here. It was all she could focus on.
What would he look like now, what would he say to her? Would he still be angry with her? What would he say when he discovered he had a child?
Had he forgiven her? The wrench of yearning that idea brought with it was immense.
As the phone connection died, she buried her head in her hands.
She remembered the day she had first met Damon. She remembered that the blistering heat of the midday sun had come nowhere near matching the heat he had stirred within her. She remembered shading her eyes to look up at him as she’d climbed out of the pool. He was tall—well over six-foot-four and he had been wearing a lightweight suit that had sat perfectly on his athletic build.
‘You must be Abbie Newland?’ he had said quietly, and the attractive accent had added fuel to a fire that had quietly and instantly started to blaze inside her.
He was ten years older than Abbie, Sicilian, with thick dark hair and searing, intense dark eyes, and to say he was good-looking would be an understatement of vast proportions. He was quite simply gorgeous.
‘I’m Damon Cyrenci. Your father said I would find you here.’
The disappointment inside Abbie was almost as intense as her attraction for him. Because this was the man her father had ordered her to date. The command had infuriated her, but she wasn’t at liberty to refuse; her plan had been to snub him, then just walk away. Then she could honestly tell her father that he hadn’t invited her out. But, as soon as her eyes met with the handsome Sicilian, her body didn’t want to comply with that idea at all.
‘Do you want to join me for a drink?’ He nodded over towards a bar that was cocooned in the tropical shade of the gardens.
‘Maybe just for ten minutes,’ she found herself saying. ‘I haven’t got much time.’
‘Why, what else have you got to do?’ The question had been asked with a glint of humour, and it had been apparent right from the outset that he had judged her as little more than a social butterfly.
She didn’t really blame him. To the outside world, that was probably exactly how her life appeared, but the remark still smarted. She wanted to tell him that appearances could be deceptive, that she was in fact trapped within her gilded cage, forced to dance attendance on a father whose every whim was her command. But of course she didn’t—he wouldn’t have been interested and anyway, if word got back to her father that she had said anything, the consequences would have been dire.
So somehow she just forced herself to shrug. ‘Let’s see. I’m the rich, spoilt daughter of a millionaire—what else could I be doing this afternoon?’ She slanted him a sardonic look. ‘Apart from lying in the sun, shopping and visiting the beauty salon, you mean?’
He smiled, unapologetic. ‘Must be a tough life.’
‘It is. But someone has to do it.’ Although she tried to sound flippant, something of her annoyance or distress must have shown in her eyes, because suddenly his tone softened.
‘Shall we start again?’ he asked, and held out his hand. ‘I’m Damon Cyrenci, and I’m in town to negotiate the sale of a chain of restaurants owned by my father.’
She looked at the hand he held out, and she hesitated a moment before taking it. What exactly was her father up to? she had wondered. What harm would following his orders do?
Then her eyes met with Damon Cyrenci’s and she told herself that, no matter what her father was up to, this man was more than capable of looking out for himself.
‘Abigail Newland.’ The net was cast as she placed her hand in his. She liked the touch of his skin against hers, liked the feeling in the pit of her stomach when he smiled.
She remembered having dinner with him that night. She remembered him kissing her, a searing, intensely passionate kiss that had made her long for so much more.
She had dated him for five short weeks, but with each meeting her feelings for him had intensified. Her hands curled into tight fists just thinking about the way he’d made her feel. But because of the situation she had always forced herself to pull back.
Damon hadn’t been used to a woman pulling away from him, and somehow it had made him all the more determined to pursue her.
Yes, the net had been cast—but she had been the one caught in its fine weave, because somewhere along the way in those few short weeks she had fallen in love with Damon Cyrenci.
The phone rang again, interrupting Abbie’s thoughts, and she listened as once more the answer machine cut in.
‘Abbie, please pick up the phone.’
Abbie just sat numbly, listening. She hadn’t spoken to her father since her mother’s death just over two years ago. And, no matter what was at stake, she still couldn’t speak to him now.
‘This is about revenge, Abigail—and you are next on Cyrenci’s list. He knows what you did—knows you were perfectly complicit in his father’s destruction.’ Her father’s voice was abrasive. ‘But luckily I’m still thinking for both of us. I told him about Mario. He was shocked and angry, I could see it in his face. But the child gives us a bargaining chip—it means he doesn’t hold all of the aces.’
Abbie felt sick inside. She hated her father—hated the sordid, horrible way he even thought.
The