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there’s no yet about it,’ she added firmly. ‘I’m only staying at his apartment for a couple of weeks,’ she insisted. ‘Just until his brother returns from his honeymoon. You were at the wedding on Saturday, too, so you know I’m telling the truth.’

      ‘About Darius being away on his honeymoon, at least, yes.’ He nodded. ‘If what you say is true—’

      ‘It is.’

      ‘Then it won’t be difficult to find someone else to take care of him while his brother is away so that you can move out in the next few days.’

      Not difficult at all, which was why Sam was so grateful to have this job at all; the Sterne family could have employed anyone to care for Xander, but they had chosen her, Andy had chosen her.

      ‘I can’t do that,’ she insisted, knowing she couldn’t let Andy down, or forget the fact that the money she earned these two weeks would pay her bills.

      Malcolm now eyed her thoughtfully. ‘You’ve changed, Sam; once upon a time you wouldn’t have dreamt of answering me back.’

      ‘Once upon a time I was stupid enough to think myself in love with you, too!’ she replied heatedly, knowing she shouldn’t antagonise Malcolm in the circumstances, but totally unable to stop herself from retaliating to that last jibe.

      His mouth twisted into the semblance of a smile. ‘But not any longer.’

      ‘That’s one of the reasons we’re divorced, remember?’ Sam eyed him warily.

      ‘I remember only too well.’ Malcolm’s mouth thinned. ‘I have never liked failure, Sam. And I definitely consider my marriage to you to be in that category.’

      She gave a pained frown. ‘And whose fault was that? If you had told me you didn’t want children then I would never have married you in the first place.’ Having long been an orphan, Sam had always wanted children of her own. She hadn’t just wanted children, she had ached for a family of her own, to love and care for, and to be loved and cared for in return. Instead she had got Malcolm.

      And Daisy...

      Daisy made up for all the pain, all the disillusionment of those unhappy years of being married to a man as cold and controlling as her ex-husband.

      She would do anything to protect Daisy.

      Anything at all.

      ‘I want you back in my bed, Sam, and I think you know me well enough to know that I’ll use any means at my disposal to achieve that,’ Malcolm informed her confidently.

      Almost as if he had been able to read her thoughts.

      And maybe he had. Malcolm already knew that Daisy was Sam’s weak spot, her Achilles heel. And now he was once again using that weakness to his advantage, in an effort to force her into resuming a relationship with him. A relationship that horrified Sam so much she felt physically ill.

      ‘No,’ she answered him woodenly.

      He arched mocking brows. ‘No?’

      ‘No,’ she repeated firmly.

      She had thought about this all weekend, finally accepting that she couldn’t allow herself to be browbeaten by Malcolm again, to be forced into becoming his mistress. She just couldn’t!

      There had to be some other way. Some way to stop his blackmail once and for all. There just had to be.

      ‘And if I insist?’

      Sam was breathing hard, her emotions in turmoil. But she couldn’t, she wouldn’t, give in to Malcolm’s blackmail. Because she knew that once it started it would never stop. Until one day she would wake up and find herself once again imprisoned, totally entrapped.

      She drew herself up determinedly. ‘You can insist all you like, Malcolm, but my answer will still be no.’

      He shrugged, his fingers once again tightening painfully about her wrist. ‘Obviously you would rather the two of us talked through our lawyers.’

      ‘I would rather—’ She broke off, her eyes stinging with unshed tears, knowing she had to get away, before she gave Malcolm the satisfaction of seeing those tears fall. ‘I have nothing more to say to you, Malcolm. And I have to go now,’ she added before he could speak again. ‘I have to drive Mr Sterne to his physio appointment.’

      ‘Have dinner with me this evening, Sam, and we can discuss this further then.’

      Sam repressed a shiver of fear. ‘I’m not going to do this, Malcolm,’ she told him shakily. ‘Not dinner this evening, not any of it.’

      He chuckled softly. ‘Give it time, Sam, and you’ll do exactly as I want,’ he drawled confidently. ‘You have until the end of the week,’ he added coldly. ‘After which I’m calling my lawyer.’

      Sam wrenched her wrist painfully from his grasp before opening the car door and climbing quickly out onto the pavement, slamming the door closed behind her, before turning on her heel and walking off in the direction of Xander’s apartment.

      All the time aware that her wrist ached abominably, her knees were knocking together, and her body was shaking in complete awareness of the fact that Malcolm had just demanded that she become his mistress by threatening Daisy.

      A demand, despite her defiance of him, that placed her as the fly to Malcolm’s spider...

      * * *

      Xander had been aware that there was something seriously wrong with Samantha from the moment she’d returned from walking Daisy to school earlier that morning. Her face was pale, her eyes almost feverish, and she was totally distracted as she went off to change into a red long-sleeved shirt before silently driving him to his physio appointment. The return journey had been made just as quietly.

      Xander was thoroughly worried by her uncharacteristic silence by the time they arrived back at his apartment just before one o’clock, and he now sat at the breakfast bar watching her as she moved about the kitchen preparing lunch. ‘Are you still angry with me for what happened on Saturday evening?’ he finally prompted gruffly.

      Events that had resulted in him spending two sleepless nights unable to banish thoughts of Samantha, who was lying in her own bed just a short distance down the hallway. He had wondered if she was also awake and thinking of him.

      Somehow Xander doubted that very much.

      Samantha had been so cool towards him on Sunday, so businesslike in her dealings with him today, even when helping him in and out of the shower this morning. An occasion when he had been unable to hide the arousal her touch incited in him. He might as well have been a block of wood for all the notice Samantha had taken of that!

      And that rankled.

      This whole indifference thing Samantha now had going towards him rankled!

      Okay, so he had read the signs wrong on Saturday evening, had realised almost immediately that he should have offered her comfort, with his arms and words, rather than kissing her. He was also aware he wasn’t feeling his best right now. His leg was still aching badly from all the extra activity on Saturday; the wedding, Daisy throwing herself at him, kissing Samantha. But he had never had a woman react towards him with such indifference as Samantha had been doing these past two days and nights.

      Maybe he was losing his touch?

      And maybe Samantha would just rather forget those kisses had ever happened?

      Wouldn’t that be a dent to his already bruised ego?

      ‘What?’ She turned to look at him blankly now, almost as if she had forgotten he was there for a moment, colour suffusing her cheeks as his words penetrated her thoughts. ‘Not in the least,’ she dismissed, her head now buried in the refrigerator. ‘I’d forgotten about it.’

      Her sudden blush seemed to indicate that it really had been the last thing on her mind.

      Oh,

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