A Past Revenge (11 page)

'I haven't
—
'

'Oh don't look so stricken, Danielle,' the other woman snapped impatiently. 'I would have done the same thing in your position, especially if I were after a big fish like Nick. Well you've lost him, I'm afraid,' she said casually. 'Better luck next time. Now if you aren't in the mood to work I may as well leave.'

Both of them knew that Audra hadn't come here with the intention of posing for her portrait, that her main aim had been to gloat over Danielle's misfortune.

Danielle wondered if the other woman would feel quite so triumphant if she knew that the baby had never grown into the beautiful little girl she had promised to be at birth, that far from being sent away Danielle's daughter had given up her battle to live only ten days after she was born, her tiny body too frail to survive any longer than that.

The baby had been born prematurely, the result of Danielle falling over in the street and starting off her labour pains. Her daugher had weighed in at just over two pounds, so small she looked as if she would fit into the palm of Danielle's hand—if she had been allowed to touch her, that is. For ten days Danielle had only been able to look at her daughter through the glass of an incubator, until the night they woke her gently to tell her that the frail little baby had given up the will to live.

If she had thought she disliked Nick before it had returned with a vengeance at the death of her daughter, despising him with a bitter hatred, as if it were all his fault that her beautiful baby had died, as if the fact that he had thrown money at her mother for the time they had spent in bed together had somehow been transmitted to the baby and made her life less than worthless, as if her daughter hadn't wanted to live when she had known she had been conceived for the price of two hundred pounds!

CHAPTER SIX

W
hen
Nick arrived late that afternoon she was completely composed again, had managed to rebuff the pushy attention of the two reporters that had called personally at her door for more information on the child she had once given birth to. After suffering Audra's vindictive glee earlier she felt confident enough now to deal with anyone who wanted to pry into her life.

She had expected Nick earlier than four-thirty, had thought he would be beating on her door demanding an explanation for the article they had printed about her today. When . he did finally arrive he seemed very subdued, not like his usual commanding arrogance, looking at her with a glowering expression.

'Can I get you a drink?' Danielle offered lightly.

'I've already had one,' he bit out, pacing the lounge, his hands thrust into the pockets of the trousers to the grey three-piece suit he wore, the jacket unbuttoned to reveal the waistcoat taut against his flattened stomach. 'I needed it,' he added grimly.

'Then sit down,' she invited smoothly, her light green blouse and black skirt cool as well as smart. She had prepared for Nick's arrival when she changed, wouldn't meet him as the loose-moralled woman the newspapers had implied that she was.

'I'd rather stand,' he grated, stopping his pacing suddenly to look at her with narrowed eyes. 'Is it true, Danielle?" he asked abruptly. 'Do you have a child?'

She met his gaze unflinchingly. 'No,' she answered with complete honesty.

He seemed to visibly relax, closing his eyes as he
sighed deeply. 'Thank God for that. I
⁵

'Now,' she added with soft emphasis, looking at him with cool challenge.

Nick stiffened, his eyes narrowing once again. 'What did you say?' his breathing was shallow, his face suddenly haggard as he took in what she said.

'Surely it's obvious,' she spoke with a casualness she was far from feeling, always very emotional when she talked about her daughter. 'I did have a child, a little girl, but she died, several years ago.'

'Dear God,' he groaned, one hand up to his temple in numbed disbelief. 'I didn't—I can't— Why didn't you tell me?' he rasped, angry with himself for being at a momentary loss for words.

She raised mocking brows. 'It isn't the sort of thing you blurt out over a drink one evening.'

'Damn you, you could have—
'

'What?' she looked at him with coolly unflinching eyes. 'It's none of your business what happens in my life, either now or years ago. Now is it?'

'Damn you—
'

'Swearing at me won't change anything,' she derided.

'Do you have any idea what it did to me to read something like that about you in that trashy newspaper?' he demanded furiously, glaring at her with accusing eyes.

'I know exactly what it was like to read something like that,' she said with cold deliberation.

'Hell, I'm sorry,' he shook his head in regret. 'I don't know what I'm saying. It was such a shock—It would be to anyone, you have to see that.'

'Only too well,' she acknowledged flatly. 'I've had people calling me and coming here all day who were just as shocked and surprised as you are."

His eyes narrowed once again. 'Were you married to the child's father?'

She almost choked at the irony of him asking such a thing. 'No,' she bit out.

His hands clenched into fists at his sides. 'Did you love him?'

'I thought I did, at the time,' she shrugged.

'Then why—
'

'He didn't feel the same way about me,' she explained coldly. 'I was just a body to warm his bed.'

'The bastard!' Nick looked positively violent, a pulse beating erratically to his jaw.

Danielle gave him a withering glance. Didn't Nick recognise the sort of man he was to realise when he inadvertently judged himself? It would seem not. 'Do you think so?' she asked pointedly.

'Of course I—Damn it, Danielle,' he glared at her as her meaning became clear. 'There's a little bit more than that involved in our relationship.'

'Is there?'

'You know there is. God, Danielle, I wouldn't leave you by yourself in a situation like that,' he rasped angrily. 'I wouldn't leave any woman like that,' he ground out.

Danielle could have hit him right then and there, could have pummelled his chest with her fists and told him that he
had
left her like that. But she didn't do either of those things, remained outwardly calm. 'No one is accusing you of anything, Nick,' she drawled. 'But the fact that I've had a child does seem to bother you?'

'Yes! No! It was shock, that's all,' he defended impatiently at her sceptical expression.

'You do realise who told the newspapers that story about me, don't you?'

'Audra,' he confirmed harshly. 'Her contract with the play has already been terminated and her replacement found.'

Danielle felt a jolt of shock at how coldly ruthless he could be, and then chastised herself for feeling surprised by anything he did. What had happened between them last night changed nothing, his unselfishness then had just been another ploy to get her into bed with him. She could cope with her lapse better herself if she could believe that!

'She hoped to destroy my interest in you once and for all,' he continued grimly.

'And would it have done?' Danielle kept her voice even. 'If my child had been alive?'

'The situation doesn't arise, does it,* he dismissed without emotion.

'But would it?' she persisted in being given a straightforward answer, already convinced she knew what it was.

Nick looked angry at being pushed in this way. 'I want to be your lover,' he grated. 'Not become a surrogate father to some other man's mistake!'

Danielle felt a strange stillness come over her, a cold anger that made her hands shake before she put them into the pockets of her skirt out of view. If she hadn't done that she may have given in to her earlier impulse to hit him! 'Surrogate father to some other man's mistake'! How dare he, how dare he say such a thing about
their
daughter?

The final barrier had been removed from the revenge she had once planned to take on him, the secret of her daughter's birth no longer a secret, and no one, not even Nick himself, had any idea that he was the father. But that was all going to change, and very soon!

'As you've already said, the situation doesn't arise,' somehow her voice managed to sound normal.

'No,' but he still didn't sound too happy about this unexpected development in their relationship. 'Do you still see him, this man?' he looked at her with suspicion. 'The father of your child?'

'Occasionally,' she answered truthfully.

'And do you still—feel anything, for him?' Nick rasped.

'Only contempt,' she scorned.

'Then none of this changes anything between us?'

It changed everything, if he did but know it. Instead of refusing to go out with him she now intended accepting his invitations. When, and if, he made any more. And she felt sure he would. 'I didn't realise there was anything to change,' she mocked.

'You know that I want you!'

'Yes.'

'Then I don't want any more games between us,' he pulled her into his arms with savage determination. 'Will you have dinner with me tonight?'

He was so sure of himself now, so confident of her answer, that she would have loved to slap him down one more time. But her revenge was in earnest now, and she had every intention of beginning his hell as soon as possible. 'Of course,' she accepted softly. 'And what do you suggest I do with the portrait of Miss McDonald?'

'Throw it away,' he rasped. 'She certainly won't be needing it now!'

She would find much pleasure in disposing of the portrait of the woman who had deliberately set out to destroy her, but professional pride dictated she couldn't do that. 'It's almost completed, I'll send it to her.'

'Forget about Audra,' he ordered curtly. 'She's no longer important in either of our lives.'

No, the other woman had used all her leverage now, and Danielle could dismiss her as easily as Nick did. 'I'll have to change if we're going out to dinner,' she told him huskily, conscious by the rigid hardness of his body pressed against hers that he might have a change of plan in mind.

'I have to shower and change too.' He gave a rueful smile. 'I came here straight from the office when I couldn't stand the hell of imagining you the mother of another man's child any longer.'

Danielle stiffened. 'The fact that my child died doesn't alter the fact that I was her mother. I loved my daughter very much,' she rasped coldly. 'I wanted her to live more than anything else in the world.'

Nick looked as if she had physically struck him. 'You wanted the child of a man you despise?'

'She wasn't responsible for the man he was, I wanted her alive and well!'

He pushed her away from him as if he daren't touch her any more. 'I'll be back in two hours and we'll go out to dinner.' His movements were as coordinated as usual as he walked to the door. 'Be ready to go when I get back.'

'Nick,' the quiet control of her voice stopped him leaving. 'I won't be treated as you did Audra McDonald,' she told him with challenge. 'I'll go out to dinner with you tonight, but I won't be ordered about like one of your minions. I'll also try and be ready by the time you get back, but I'm not guaranteeing it, do I make myself clear?'

Anger gleamed in his eyes at her stubbornness. 'Only too well,' he bit out. 'I'll see you later.'

Danielle waited until he had left before relaxing the rigid control she had held over her emotions. That the subject of her child was one Nick didn't want to talk about was obvious; he preferred to just dismiss it from his mind, to even pretend it had never happened.

She had wished that too for a time after she realised she was pregnant, but as she sensed the life growing inside her, imagined the tiny baby
she
had created with her love, she had begun to want it, desperately. Her parents had been very supportive after they got over their initial shock, even more so in the weeks following the baby's death, convincing her that her life had to go on, encouraging her career as a portrait painter.

But if Nick thought her illegitimate child changed her moral beliefs he was going to be in a for a shock. She had made love with him once, and since that night there had been no one. And there would be no one else after him this time either.

She was expecting Lewis when he arrived half an hour later, had known from his call that afternoon that he would be coming round, which was why she wasn't sure if she could be ready on time for Nick. Lewis may only stay a short time, but he may stay longer.

He looked a trifle harassed as she let him in. 'I came round as soon as I could, but I seem to have been caught up in meetings all day. Are you all right?' he gave her a worried look.

'Fine,' she looked puzzled.

'I think you should sue the damned papers,' he muttered angrily. 'They shouldn't be allowed to get away with printing such lies. That rubbish they printed yesterday about you and Andracas was bad enough, but I think they went too far today.'

'Lewis
—
'

'I hope you've been in touch with a good lawyer,' he was very indignant on her behalf. 'They shouldn't be allowed to get away with printing slander like that.'

'Lewis, sit down,' she encouraged gently, not quite knowing how to tell him that none of what they had printed had been slanderous.

He made no effort to sit. 'If I'd realised my persuading you to take this commission when you would rather not have done would lead to such hurtful lies being printed about you I would have turned the damned thing down myself. The newspapers take a perfectly innocent incident and turn it into whatever they want to. It can't go on.'

'Lewis, it's the truth,' she said quietly.