hand to her mouth and getting herself back under control again before continuing, ‘Why you? I asked myself. Why not me? You worked for him and he never ever sleeps with his employees and yet he slept with you...and you’ve got a great figure and you’re very pretty but you’re not exactly supermodel material...and then you totally freak him out by having a baby and yet somehow he’s now crazy about the baby as well!’
‘Have you always been in love with him?’ Merry mumbled uncomfortably, grasping that, by Roula’s reckoning, Angel deciding to marry her qualified as an unbelievable and quite undeserved miracle.
‘When I was a teenager it was just a crush. He was my best friend. I knew all the rotten things Angelina has ever done to him and it broke my heart. I learned how to handle her to keep her out of his hair, to try and help him cope with her. That’s why she likes me, that’s why she decided that he should marry me if he ever married anyone. I’ve had other relationships, of course,’ Roula told her wryly. ‘But every time one broke down, I told myself it would’ve been different with Angel. He was my ideal, my Mr Right...at least he was until he dragged me onto that plane and shouted at me half the night!’
‘His temper’s rough,’ Merry conceded while frantically trying to work out how she had so badly misjudged the man whom she had married. It was obvious that Roula was now telling her the truth. Bitter jealousy had driven the blonde into an attempt to destroy Angel’s marriage.
‘And he’s like the elephant who never forgets when you cross him. He’ll never forgive me for causing all this trouble,’ Roula muttered with weary regret.
‘He’ll get over it,’ Molly said woodenly, wondering if he would ever forgive her either.
‘I’m sorry. I’m truly sorry,’ the blonde framed guiltily. ‘I know that’s not much consolation in the circumstances but I deeply regret lying to you. I didn’t think it through. I told myself you’d probably got deliberately pregnant and planned the whole thing to trap him. I could see he was happy on your wedding day but I wouldn’t admit that to myself and if anyone merits being happy, it’s Angel.’
‘I think we can forget about this now,’ Merry commented uncomfortably. ‘I can’t put my hand on my heart and say that I forgive you, but I am grateful you explained why you did it and I do understand.’
‘Fair enough,’ Roula sighed as she opened the door to leave.
Merry tensed when she saw Angel poised across the hall, straightening to his full predatory height, shrewd dark eyes scanning her like a radiation counter.
‘I told the truth,’ Roula told him flatly. ‘Can I leave now?’
‘You’re satisfied?’ Angel demanded of Merry.
She nodded in embarrassed confirmation.
‘I’ll have you returned to the airport,’ Angel informed Roula curtly.
Merry took advantage of his momentary inattention to head for the stairs at a very fast rate of knots. She wanted to splash her face, clean her teeth, brush her hair and ditch the pyjamas with the pink bunny rabbits on them. Then she would work out what she had to say to him to redress the damage she had done with her lack of faith. Possibly a spot of grovelling would be appropriate, obviously a heartfelt apology...
She was caught unprepared and halfway into a pair of jeans when Angel strode into the bedroom. He thrust the door shut, leant his long, lean frame sinuously back against it and studied her with brooding dark eyes.
‘I’m sorry... I’m really sorry,’ she muttered, yanking up the jeans. ‘But she was very convincing and I don’t think she’s a bad person. I think she was just jealous and she got a bit carried away.’
‘I don’t give a damn about Roula or why she did what she did,’ Angel declared impatiently. ‘I care that even after being married to me for weeks you were still willing to threaten me with the loss of my daughter.’
Merry lost colour, her eyes guiltily lowering from the hard challenge of his. ‘That was wrong,’ she acknowledged ruefully. ‘But you used the same threat to persuade me into marrying you...or have you forgotten that?’
‘My intentions were good. I wanted to persuade you to give us a chance to be a proper family. But your intentions were bad and destructive,’ Angel countered without hesitation. ‘You wanted to use Elyssa like a weapon to punish me. That would have damaged her as much as me.’
‘No, I honestly wasn’t thinking like that,’ Merry argued, turning her back to him to flip off the despised pyjama top and reaching for a tee shirt, having decided for the sake of speed and dignity to forgo donning a bra. ‘Even when I was mad at you I accepted that you are a great father, but I assumed you would make any divorce a bitter, nasty battle.’
‘What made you assume that?’ Angel asked drily. ‘I didn’t even ask you to sign a pre-nuptial agreement before the wedding. That omission sent the family lawyers into a tailspin but it was a deliberate move on my part. It was an act of faith formed on my foolish assumption that you would respect our marriage as much as I did.’
Merry reddened with more guilt. He really knew what buttons to push, she reflected wretchedly. It hadn’t occurred to her that he hadn’t asked her to sign a pre-nup before the ceremony, but in retrospect she could see that that had been a glaring omission, indeed a very positive statement, in a marriage involving a very wealthy man and a reasonably poor woman. His continuing coldness was beginning to unnerve her. He had never used that tone with her before. He sounded detached and negative and he was still icily angry. She glanced up, scanning his lean, strong features for another, more encouraging reading of his mood, and instead noted the forbidding line of his wide, sensual mouth, the harsh angle of his firm jaw and the level darkness of his accusing gaze.
‘But the instant we hit the first rough patch in our marriage you were ready to throw it all away,’ Angel condemned.
‘A long-term mistress is more than a rough patch,’ Merry protested helplessly. ‘I believed Roula because you introduced me to her as a friend that you trusted.’
‘She’s the sister I never had,’ Angel asserted with sardonic bite. ‘The thought of anything of a sexual nature between us is...repellent.’
And the last piece of the puzzle fell into place for Merry, who, while believing Roula, had not quite been able to grasp why Angel had never been tempted into having a more intimate relationship with her. After all, Roula was a beauty and had to share a lot with him. But if he saw the blonde in the same light as a sibling, his indifference to her as a woman was instantly understandable and highly unlikely to ever change.
‘I’ve seen a lot of divorces,’ Angel admitted. ‘In my own family, amongst friends. Nobody comes out unscathed but the children suffer the most. I don’t want my daughter to ever suffer that damage, but neither do I want a wife who runs like a rabbit at the first sign of trouble.’
‘I did not run like a rabbit!’ Merry argued, hot-faced. ‘Maybe you’re thinking of what you did after I told you I was pregnant!’
‘I took responsibility. I ensured your financial needs were covered.’
‘But you weren’t there when I was throwing up every morning and trying to drag myself into work to keep my job.’
‘You didn’t need to keep on working. Your allowance would have covered your living costs.’ Angel hesitated before asking with a frown, ‘Were you sick that often?’
‘Every day for about four months, often more than once a day. And then one evening I started bleeding and I assumed I was having a miscarriage. After that, I resigned from my job and went home to stay with Sybil.’
Angel levered his long, lean frame lithely off the door, moving with that innate grace of his towards her, his lean, dark face troubled. ‘You almost lost Elyssa?’
‘Well, I thought I was losing her and I panicked and went to the hospital, but it was just one of those pregnancy mishaps that seem more serious than they