you make your arrangements with me, not through your lawyers. You visit for an hour. Let’s not raise the bar too high, let’s keep it simple. I won’t let you take her out anywhere without me and I don’t want you arriving with some fancy nanny in tow.’
His dramatic dark eyes shone bright, a tiny muscle jerking taut at the corner of his wide, sensual mouth. He swung away, momentarily turning his back on her before swinging back and nodding sombrely in agreement with her strictures. But in those revealing few seconds she had recognised the stormy flare of anticipation in his stunning gaze, finally registering that he had been serious in his approach and that he did genuinely want to meet his infant daughter.
‘Tomorrow morning, then,’ Angel pronounced decisively. ‘We’ll take it from there.’
Take what from where? she almost questioned but she ducked it, worn out by the sheer stress of dealing with him. Inside herself she was trembling with the strain of standing straight and unafraid and hiding her fearful anxiety from him because she knew that Angel would pounce on weakness like a shark catching the scent of blood. ‘About ten,’ she suggested carefully. ‘I have someone to see at half eleven.’
Angel gritted his even white teeth, wanting to ask if she was seeing the boyfriend again, but he had no intention of being foolish enough to ask questions he had no right to demand answers to. She had been under covert surveillance for weeks and he would soon identify the boyfriend from the records he had yet to examine. His mouth quirked because he knew she would be outraged if she knew he was paying a private firm to watch her every move.
But, when it came to protecting a member of the Valtinos family, Angel had no inhibitions. Hired security was as much a part of his life as it was for his mother. Safety came first and his daughter would be at risk of kidnapping were anyone to work out who had fathered her. It was his duty to safeguard his child and he would not apologise for the necessity.
Merry opened the office door to urge him out and followed him to where the limousine sat parked. ‘I live in the cottage at the front gate,’ she informed him.
‘I thought you lived with your aunt,’ Angel admitted with a frown.
‘When I became a mother I thought it was time for us to get our own space. Sybil practically raised me. I didn’t want her to feel that she had to do the same for my daughter,’ Merry confided ruefully.
In the summer sunlight she studied Angel’s lean, strong face, marvelling at the sleek symmetry of the hard cheekbones and hollows that enhanced his very masculine features. He was a literal work of art. It was little wonder that she had overreacted to his interest and refused to accept how shallow that interest was, she told herself squarely, struggling to calm the stabs of worry that erupted at the prospect of having any further dealings with him.
She would cope. She had to cope. So far she had contrived to cope with everything Angel Valtinos had thrown at her, she reminded herself with pride. As long as she remembered who and what he was, she would be fine...wouldn’t she?
‘LETTING ELYSSA’S FATHER visit is the right way to go,’ Fergus opined, scrutinising her troubled face with concern before turning to gaze out to sea. ‘He treated you badly but that doesn’t automatically mean he’ll be a bad father. Only time will answer that.’
Merry went pink. As Fergus had combined picking her up with an examination of the latest arrival at the rescue centre, he had heard about the fuss created by Angel’s visit earlier in the day and had naturally asked her about it. She looked up at Fergus, drawn by his calm and acceptance of her situation, wondering if it was possible to feel anything or even trust a man again. Fergus stood about an inch under six feet. He had cropped brown hair and cheerful blue eyes and she had never heard him so much as raise his voice while she had already witnessed his compassion and regret when he was treating abused animals.
‘Are you over him?’ Fergus asked her bluntly.
Merry vented a shaken laugh. ‘I certainly hope so.’
And then he kissed her, wrapping her close in the sea breeze, and she froze only momentarily in surprise. Suddenly she found herself wanting to feel more than she actually felt because he was a good guy, ostensibly straightforward and as different from Angel as day was to night. Angel was all twists and turns, dark corners and unpredictability and she had never had any genuine hope of a future with him. Furthermore, Angel had never been her type. He wasn’t steady or open or even ready to settle down with conventional expectations. Feelings were foreign and threatening to Angel yet he bristled with untamed emotion. As Fergus freed her mouth and kept an arm anchored to her spine she realised in horror-stricken dismay that she’d spent their entire kiss thinking about Angel and her face burned in shame and discomfiture.
* * *
Angel sat in his limo and perused the photo that had been sent to his phone while he angrily wondered if he was a masochist or, indeed, developing sad stalker tendencies. But no, he had to deal with the situation as it was, not as he would’ve preferred it to be. Even worse, Merry had just upped the stakes, ensuring that Angel had now to raise his game. He wanted to stalk down to that beach and beat the hell out of the opposition. Because that was what Fergus Wickham was: opposition, serious opposition.
And naturally, Angel was confident that he was not jealous. After all, with only one exception, he had never experienced jealousy. He had, however, once cherished a singularly pathetic desire for his mother to take as much of an interest in him as she took in her toy boys. He had only been about seven years old at the time, he reminded himself forgivingly, and a distinctly naïve child, fondly expecting that, his having spent all term at boarding school, his mother would make him the centre of her loving attention when he finally came home.
Well, he wasn’t that naïve now, Angel acknowledged grimly. From his earliest years he had witnessed how fleeting love was for a Valtinos. A Valtinos bought love, paid well for its upkeep, got bored in exactly that order. His mother ran through young men as a lawnmower ran through grass. By the time Angel was in his twenties he was dealing with blackmail attempts, compromising photos and sordid scandals all on his mother’s behalf. His mother had tremendous charm but she remained as immature and irresponsible as a teenager. Even so, she was the only mother he would ever have and at heart he was fond of her.
But he didn’t get jealous or possessive of lovers because he didn’t ever get attached to them or develop expectations of them. Expectations always led to disappointment. Merry, however, was in a different category because she was the mother of his daughter and Angel didn’t want her to have another man in her life. That was a matter of simple good sense. Another man would divide her loyalties, take her focus off her child and invite unflattering comparisons...
‘You heard the pitter patter of tiny feet and literally ran for the hills,’ his brother Vitale had summed up a week earlier. ‘Not a very promising beginning.’
No, it wasn’t, Angel conceded wrathfully while endlessly scrutinising that photo in which his daughter appeared only as a small indistinct blob anchored in a pram. He had screwed up but he was a terrific strategist and unstoppable once he had a goal. He didn’t even need an angle because his daughter was all the ammunition he required. Was Merry sleeping with that guy yet? Angel smouldered and scowled, beginning for the first time to scroll through the records he had studiously ignored to respect Merry’s privacy. To hell with that scruple, he thought angrily. He had to fight to protect what was his.
* * *
‘So, how are you planning to play it with Elyssa’s father tomorrow?’ Sybil asked that evening, having tried and failed to get much out of her niece concerning the date with Fergus.
Merry shrugged. ‘Cool, calm...’
‘He’s impossibly headstrong and obstinate,’ her aunt pronounced with disapproval. ‘I only cocked the gun because I didn’t want him landing on your doorstep unannounced but he wouldn’t take no for an answer.’
‘He