A Past Revenge by Carole Mortimer Read Free Book Online Page B

like playing games,' her voice sharpened with displeasure, I thought we had settled this earlier in the week, Mr Andracas. Unless you wish to talk to me about the portrait or something pertaining to it I do not want to see you. Or hear from you,' she added pointedly.
    He punched one clenched fist into the palm of the other hand. 'Stop pushing me, Danielle.'
    'Pushing you? ' she repeated incredulously. 'What you're doing to me amounts to harassment.'
    'I want to see you, to be with you!'
    'To go to bed with me,' she scorned hardly.
    'That too if things worked out between us,' he acknowledged tautly.
    'Don't treat me like an idiot, Nick,' she snapped. 'Bed is your prime objective.'
    'And what's wrong with that?'
    'Nothing. If I were willing. But I'm not,' she bit out with contempt.
    'Do you have something against sex—'
    'Don't throw that one at me!' she derided with a humourless laugh.
    'You're driving me insane,' he ground out. 'I can't stop thinking about you.'
    She didn't reveal the surge of elation she felt at this further admission. 'Talk to Miss McDonald about it, not me.'
    His eyes narrowed. 'Does my relationship with Audra bother you?' he asked slowly.
    She gave him a scornful look. 'Only in so far as I feel sorry for her."
    'You what? ' he said in a hushed voice.
    He was blazingly angry now, she could see that. And she was wary of it. Insulting him within the safety of other people was one thing, here they were too much alone, Nick too much of a threat. But she couldn't, wouldn't, withdraw her statement. 'You don't love her, Nick,' she derided. 'You're just using her until someone else comes along.'
    His mouth twisted. 'Audra doesn't love me either. We have a—convenient arrangement.'
    'And I'm trying to tell you that sort of arrangement wouldn't suit me at all!'
    'You aren't giving me a chance!'
    She almost choked at the injustice of that remark. He had had his chance with her seven years ago, he would never get another one. 'No,' she agreed tightly. 'Because I know it wouldn't work between us. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going out in a few minutes.'
    'With Vaughn?' he rasped.
    'No, not with Lewis,' she met his gaze steadily, defying him to question her further.
    'Another man?'
    She thought of her promise to go to her parents' house tonight for her father's birthday. 'Yes,' she nodded.
    'All right,' Nick bit out forcefully. 'If that's the way you want it.'
    'It is,' she confirmed abruptly.
    'I'm not going to ask you again,' he warned harshly, his expression grim.
    'No,' she acknowledged mockingly without any real conviction as to it being true.
    'I don't go around chasing women like this,' he added disgustedly, more to himself than to her.
    She was sure he didn't, every woman he had ever wanted had been his for the choosing, even herself once. 'That's a welcome relief,' she taunted.
    He looked more angry than ever. 'I wish I knew what it was about you that haunts me,' he muttered.
    Her eyes widened. 'Haunts you?' she repeated in a soft voice. Surely he didn't recognise her as the girl he had once assumed was a prostitute and spent a few hours with?
    He nodded grimly. 'You're beautiful, and yet not breathtakingly so. And yet I can't get the image of your corn-coloured hair and green eyes out of my mind. You're destroying me, Danielle.'
    She knew her stubbornness in refusing to go out with him had angered him, but he was nowhere near being destroyed yet, because nothing penetrated the wall he had erected about his heart. And it was there that she wanted to reach him, wanted him to know the full pain of his own humiliation, as she had once done at his mercy.
    'You don't give a damn, do you?' he realised softly.
    She shrugged. 'I'm sure you'll get over it— probably when the next beautiful woman comes along.'
    He gave a defeated sigh at her stubbornness, something she felt sure didn't happened to him very often. 'I'd better go, then.'
    'Are you seeing Miss McDonald tonight?'
    'None of your damned business,' he