she followed him towards the glass-walled lift, numbly aware of the brief nod of the hovering uniformed commissionaire as he greeted Dracco with a respectful, ‘Good afternoon, Mr Barrington.’
‘Afternoon, Bates,’ Dracco responded calmly. ‘Family OK?’
‘Yes, they’re fine, and young Robert’s over the moon about that job you got for him.’
The smile Dracco gave the doorman suddenly made him look far less formidable and reminded Imogen of the smiles he once used to give her. An almost unbearably tight pain filled her chest, which she firmly put down to the speed with which the lift was surging upwards.
‘Still scared of heights? Don’t look down,’ Dracco told her coolly. ‘Heaven knows why, but for some reason every architect in the city seems to have decided that glass-walled lifts are the in thing.’
Where once he would have made such a comment in a voice that was ruefully amused, now he sounded terse and cold. Well, there was no reason why he should show her any warmth, was there?
But why shouldn’t he? She had, after all, spared him the trouble of having to pretend that he had wanted to marry her or that he cared about her, and she had given him what he really wanted at the same time. In the letter she had sent to Henry renouncing her inheritance she had given Dracco complete and total authority to use the power that came with her share of the business as he saw fit.
In doing so, she had known beyond any kind of doubt that Dracco would uphold her father’s business ideals and aims. In that regard at least she had known she could trust him totally.
She had closed her eyes when the lift started to move, but unexpectedly the images, the memories suddenly tormenting her were even worse in their own way than the heights she feared. She would, she knew, never forgive Dracco for what he had tried to do; for the way he had tried to manipulate her; for the way he had abused the trust her father had placed in him.
The lift shivered to a silent stop.
‘You can open your eyes now,’ she heard Dracco telling her wryly.
As she edged out of the lift Imogen saw that they had stopped at the floor marked ‘Penthouse Suite’.
Penthouse suite. Her solicitor had roomed her in a penthouse suite? Discomfort flickered down her spine. She just knew that this was going to be expensive.
It had taken her a long time to get used to the shared dormitory she had slept in when she had first arrived in Rio, but when she finally found her own small apartment for the first few weeks she had actually missed the presence of the other girls. Now, though, she had to admit to relishing the privacy and the luxury of having her own bathroom.
‘I asked David Bryant to find me somewhere cheap and convenient for his office,’ she murmured as Dracco produced a key and unlocked the apartment’s door.
Imogen could see his eyebrows rise as he listened to her.
‘Well, he’s complied with both those instructions,’ he informed her. ‘His office isn’t that far away, and you’re staying here as my guest.’
‘Your guest?’
Imogen froze on the spot, staring at him with wide eyes, whilst Dracco pushed the door to, enclosing them both in the intimacy of the empty hallway.
‘Your guest?’ Imogen repeated starkly. ‘This is your apartment?’
‘Yes,’ Dracco confirmed. ‘When David told me that you’d specified you wanted to stay somewhere close to his office I told him that you might as well stay here with me. After all, there’s a great deal we need to discuss…and not just about your inheritance.’
He was, Imogen recognised, looking pointedly at her left hand, the hand from which she had removed the wedding ring he had placed on it, throwing it as far as she could through the open taxi window on her way to Heathrow, too blinded by tears to see where it landed, and too sick at heart to care.
‘You mean…’ She paused and flicked her tongue tip over her suddenly dry lips, nervously aware of Dracco’s iron gaze following her every movement.
‘You mean our marriage?’ she guessed shakily.
‘I mean our marriage,’ Dracco confirmed.
‘You know,’ he told her conversationally as he bent to pick up her lightweight case, ‘for a woman who is still a virgin, you look…decidedly unvirginal.’
Imogen tried to convince herself that the rushing sensation of faintness engulfing her was caused by the airlessness of the hallway rather than by what Dracco had said, but still she heard herself demanding huskily, ‘How…how do you know?’
‘That you are still a virgin?’ Dracco completed for her. ‘I know everything there is to know about you, Imo… After all, you are my wife…’
His wife!
Imogen felt sick; filled with a cold, shaky disbelief and an even colder fear. This was not what she had expected; what she had steeled herself to deal with.
During the long flight from Rio she had forced herself to confront the fear that had raised its threatening head in her nightmares in the days leading up to her journey. She had been terrified that somehow, totally against her will and all logic, if she were to see Dracco again she might discover a dangerous residue of her teenage love for him had somehow survived; that it was waiting, ready to explode like a time bomb, to destroy her new life and the peace of mind she had fought so hard for. But now! Now it wasn’t love that Dracco was arousing inside her but a furious mixture of anger and hostility.
So she was still a virgin—was that a crime?
‘You have no right to pry into my life, to spy on me,’ she began furiously, but Dracco refused to allow her to continue.
‘We are still married. I am still your husband; you are still my wife,’ he pointed out coldly.
Imogen turned away to conceal her expression from him. Married in the eyes of the church, perhaps, but surely not in the eyes of the law, since their marriage had never been consummated. And that certainly didn’t give Dracco the right to claim her as his wife in a voice that suggested… Wearily Imogen shook her head. Now she was letting her imagination run away with her. Thinking she had heard possessiveness in Dracco’s voice.
His words had given her a shock. Why on earth hadn’t Dracco had the marriage set aside? He, after all, loved another woman—her stepmother!
Even after all these years it still filled her with acute nausea and disgust to think of Dracco with Lisa. Her father’s wife and the man her father had loved and valued so very much. Had Dracco slept with Lisa whilst her father was still alive? Had they…? Had he…? Unstoppably all the questions she had fiercely forbidden herself to even think before suddenly stormed through her. The images they were conjuring up sickened her, causing a red-hot boiling pain in her middle.
All those years ago, Dracco had implied to her that he was marrying her to protect her, when all he had really wanted to protect had been his own interests!
Tiredly Imogen closed her eyes. She had come to England for one purpose and one purpose only and that was to claim whatever money might be owing to her. And to persuade Dracco to transfer her interest in the business into the name of the charity so that in future it could benefit direct from her inheritance. Anything else…
‘I haven’t come back to discuss our marriage, Dracco.’ Firmly Imogen took a deep breath, determined to take control of the situation. ’I’ve already written to David Bryant, explaining what I want, and that is—’
‘To give away your inheritance to some charity,’ Dracco interrupted her grimly. ‘No, Imo,’ he told her curtly. ‘As your trustee, there’s no way I would be fulfilling my moral obligation towards you if I agreed, and as your husband…’
She ached to be able to challenge him, to throw caution to the wind and demand furiously to know just when