She had wanted desperately to cry. To break down. To alleviate the pain pressing like a dead weight against her chest. But standing there in the sumptuous drawing room of Conan Ryder’s Regency home, where she’d come to return the last of Niall’s things, her tears wouldn’t come. She had felt only a numbing emptiness that had given her an air of spurious indifference—which had only cemented her guilt in his brother’s eyes, promoting what he’d decided he already knew: that she’d been cheating on his brother.
‘My brother was in trouble and you weren’t even aware of it—too wrapped up in your spending and your … boyfriend to notice.’
‘Oh, I noticed all right!’ It was a bitter little cry, torn from beneath the veneer of icy detachment she was feeling.
‘And you did nothing to help him.’
‘I was his wife—not his nursemaid!’ She realised how cold and brutal that sounded. She was trying to defend herself and failing miserably, wanting to scream at Niall for leaving her to face his family like this—alone. Hurt, angry, reproaching herself …
‘My mother has expressed concerns that you aren’t mature or responsible enough to look after a child—and quite frankly I agree with her. I want my brother’s offspring to grow up as a Ryder, under this family’s roof. Not in some other man’s home, bearing some other man’s name.’
‘She’ll grow up as I consider fit,’ she assured him, stung by the things her mother-in-law had said. But then Avril Ryder—whom, she noted, hadn’t emerged from her own wing of her eldest son’s exclusive residence—had never made any attempt to conceal her disapproval of her other son’s match. There was no way, though, that Sienna ever intended changing her child’s name—even if she did end up with another man in the far distant future. ‘You’re not her father, Conan,’ she reminded him coolly. ‘Even if you’d like to think you are.’
‘No.’ Derision curved his uncompromising mouth at that. ‘Fortunately I can’t claim to be among those to have had the pleasure.’
Her hand clenched with the almost uncontrollable urge to lash out at him, to feel the sting of her palm as it met the hardness of his cheek which might shake her out of this numbing misery. But she’d decided that enough damage had been done already.
‘I don’t have to stay here and take this from you,’ she responded quietly, hating herself for the tingle of awareness that had run through her at his blatant innuendo a moment ago. ‘But if you’re trying to make me feel cheap, then go ahead. I was never good enough for you, was I? Either of you,’ she’d added accusingly. ‘Is that why Niall made such a mess of things? Because he was made to feel he wasn’t good enough either? Because he felt so overshadowed by his much smarter, richer and generally more favoured elder brother?’
If he’d looked angry before, he’d looked livid then, his proud nostrils flaring, the skin above his upper lip white with rage. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he’d rasped.
‘Don’t I?’ She went on goading him, unable to help herself, needing something—anything—to ease the burden of confusing emotions that were ravaging her. ‘I know you did next to nothing to support him—in anything—and that when he came to you for help you refused him any financial backing! Well, don’t worry! We’ll be leaving tomorrow. You won’t have to put up with me soiling this family’s precious pedigree any more!’
‘You take Daisy away from here and you’ll have me to answer to. Is that clear?’
‘As crystal! What do you propose to do?’ she taunted. ‘Sue for custody?’
‘If it comes to it.’
‘On what grounds?’ she challenged, suddenly wary. ‘That I’m an unfit mother?’ Painfully she remembered the instances that had helped tar her with that particular brush—the circumstances that she couldn’t explain even if she wanted to.
‘If I find you wanting in that regard, I won’t hesitate in applying for Daisy to be made a ward of court, most certainly.’
From anyone else she would have considered it an idle threat. From Conan it merely struck the deepest fear into her heart.
He was rich and powerful enough to make any court take notice of charges he made against her. And though she doubted that the Ryders would ever be allowed full custody of her daughter, she still feared what he might try to do with his staggering influence and his money.
‘Well, perhaps I should marry my boyfriend!’ she threw back desperately, pandering to his previous accusation. ‘And then you wouldn’t be able to do a thing! Stay away from me, Conan!’
She’d stormed out of the house and their lives without another glance back, paying off her debts and setting up home in the little terraced house she’d managed to mortgage with the small amount of capital left over from the sale of the house she had shared with Niall.
But now Conan had turned up again, still as judgmental as ever, and with a lethal maturity only acquired by three more years of honing that indomitable strength of character alongside his superb masculine physique. Of increasing his wealth and power and making himself one of the most talked about entrepreneurs of his generation—both in the playgrounds of the rich and in his corporate life. It amounted to three more years of getting what he wanted. And he wanted Daisy …
When the doorbell rang, she almost dropped the iron.
CHAPTER TWO
SHADOW—so named because of the patch of black fur covering the whole of one side of his head and one floppy ear—was barking frantically at the front door by the time Sienna reached it.
‘Conan!’ She didn’t know why she sounded surprised. She had known he would come.
The dog was leaping excitedly up at him, with no regard for his designer tailoring, while Conan, with a face like granite, stood rigidly impervious, his nostrils flaring and his olive skin infused with something almost akin to anger.
‘I’m sorry. He isn’t usually like this,’ Sienna apologised, rushing forward to grab the dog’s collar. In fact, after bringing the six month old Shadow home from an animal rescue centre two years ago, she had been pleased when her pet had flown through obedience classes with the equivalent of a doggy distinction. Rather grudgingly though she decided that just the mere sight of a man like Conan Ryder was enough to make even a mere animal forget its manners.
‘May I come in?’
With every nerve on alert, still holding the dog’s collar, Sienna backed away to admit him.
Immediately the walls of the narrow passageway seemed to close in on all sides, the space between them shrunk by his imposing physique.
With a tightness in her chest, Sienna took another step back for an entirely different reason, releasing the dog which, after one brave sniff at the man’s black designer shoes, trotted off to the comfort of the living room.
Her mouth dry, Sienna demanded, ‘What’s this all about, Conan? Because if it’s about Daisy you’ve had a wasted journey. I thought I made my position clear this afternoon.’
For a split second something flared in his eyes. Anger? Retaliation? She wasn’t sure. But with that strong self-command she had always envied about him he brought it under control, only the muscle that pulled in his darkly shadowed jaw disclosing any other sign of emotion.
‘We parted on a rather bad note today. I thought it only right to try and rectify that.’
Oh, did you?
His dark head tilted towards