by Lynne Graham
CHAPTER SIX
ANGELO slid lithely out of his limousine and studied the ivy-clad prettiness of Flora’s detached village home. There were three cars parked in the driveway. He frowned, wondering how many guests she had staying and how she was coping.
But then, such matters were none of his business according to Flora, he reflected with a grim light clouding his vivid blue eyes. Over the past two months it had become increasingly plain to him that Flora intended to keep him at a distance where he could neither interfere nor offer his assistance. His phone calls had met with stilted impersonal responses from her that told him virtually nothing. His attempt to pay her a monthly allowance to enable her to take life a little easier had been roundly rejected as well.
Angelo was bewildered by her attitude. Nothing about Flora Bennett added up and Angelo hated mysteries. If the private investigator’s report he had received on Flora and her sister two years ago had been on target, cold hard cash should have paved an easy path to Flora’s heart. She should have been eager to fit in with his plans and reap the generous rewards of pleasing him. That she was not eager or even willing told him that either the report had got her wrong or she was playing a much more clever game of deception than he had so far had cause to suspect. Yet would a materialistic woman turn down the opportunity to move in with a billionaire and live in the lap of luxury? And why would she refuse his financial help? Or was that a ruse to come back later through the offices of a court of law and sue him for a final settlement amounting to many, many thousands of pounds? That was perfectly possible, he acknowledged grimly.
His suspicions about Flora’s motives did not make it any easier for him to handle the mother of his future child. Furthermore, for the first time in his adult life, Angelo was dealing with a tricky relationship with a woman instead of turning his back and walking away, deeming her too much trouble to be worthy of his time and patience. He was not enjoying the process either, for her every rebuff infuriated him.
Indeed the problems created by Flora’s continuing hostility were matched by the widespread disruption of Angelo’s once regimented and perfectly composed mind. Angelo was uneasy with the unfamiliar feelings of frustration and anger regularly assailing him. His concentration was no longer what it was, nor was his famously single-minded focus zeroed in on business goals alone. All of a sudden, he was suffering from moments of abstraction. He was also noticing every pregnant woman and every redhead in his vicinity. He was even more disturbed by the fact that he had not slept with a single woman since Flora. Celibacy agreed with Angelo even less than mental turmoil. Sex had always been his foolproof means of unwinding from his demanding schedule. Sex had never been any more complicated for him than a good workout at the gym. But Angelo had recently become worryingly impervious to the sexually sophisticated women who had once entertained him most effectively outside working hours. His highly active libido had taken a hike and he had no idea why or what to do about it.
He hit Flora’s doorbell, knowing in advance that his uninvited visit would be as welcome as a snow shower in summer. In an unusually disorganised and last minute decision the night before, Angelo had reached the end of his patience and he had flown over to England too late at night even to call Flora. The door of her home was opened by a stranger and the hall was confusingly awash with more strangers. He counted three middleaged couples, presumably Flora’s current boarders.
‘Where’s Flora? ‘ he asked.
‘Upstairs in the bathroom … she’s not well,’ one of the women informed him. ‘We’re getting ready to leave.’
’Without our breakfast,’ a disgruntled older man pronounced.
‘If you’ll give me a few minutes to check on Flora, I’ll sort that out for you,’ Angelo declared, his concern at the news that Flora was unwell prompting him to take the stairs two at a time. It took him a minute or two to establish which door led to the bathroom.
That achieved, he rapped loudly on the solid wood. ‘Flora? It’s Angelo. Are you all right?’ he asked urgently.
Flora was very far from being all right. White and shaking, she clung to the edge of the sink to steady her wobbly lower limbs. She felt like death warmed up and her brain was woozy, thoughts coming only slowly. Why on earth had Angelo come to see her again? She felt too sick to protest as she usually would have done. Sickness had a way of making one concentrate only on the immediate. In any case, Angelo was so determined that protest would have been a waste of time and energy. Like a steamroller chugging unstoppably downhill Angelo just kept on rolling no matter what she said or did.
Flora opened the door a crack and clung to the handle for support. Angelo pressed the door wider open and she stepped back awkwardly. She was so much more colourful and somehow real than other women, he thought helplessly, immediately admiring the flame colour of her bright hair against her creamy skin and the sheer leggy elegance of her tall, slender figure. And his libido, which had steadfastly refused to react to a single one of the nubile models whose numbers were stored in his mobile phone, suddenly took high-voltage flight. That surge of intense sexual arousal froze Angelo in place and the source of it so much took him aback that he then viewed Flora with instantly cooler and more critical eyes. Just as quickly he saw the change in her and consternation took hold of him instead.
‘I’m fine … I’m just suffering from nausea,’ she told him wryly. ‘Welcome to the reality of being pregnant.’
But Angelo was shocked by her shadowed eyes and pallor and he recognised from the sharpness of her cheekbones and the loose fit of her clothing that she had lost a good deal of weight since he had last seen her. ’Dios mio, you look terrible,’ he breathed, backtracking from his opinion a mere sixty seconds earlier when just a welcome glimpse of her warm familiar colouring had instantly convinced him that she looked terrific.
Pain pierced Flora as she still secretly cherished the memory of him calling her beautiful. This revised opinion hit her hard, even though she was aware that she looked less than her best in jeans and a shirt with not even a dash of make-up to brighten her up. Angelo, on the other hand, looked absolutely effortlessly gorgeous. The breeze had tousled his thick black cropped hair and scored colour along the splendid line of his high cheekbones, accentuating his superb bone structure. Even this early in the day his golden skin was beginning to shadow with dark stubble across his stubborn jaw line and round his wide sensual mouth. He was more casually dressed than she was accustomed to seeing him in jeans and a fine expensive sweater worn with a very masculine jacket. Her mouth running dry, she was quite overpowered by his magnetic presence for a couple of minutes.
‘You should lie down for a while,’ Angelo instructed.
‘I can’t,’ Flora groaned. ‘I have guests waiting for their breakfast downstairs …’ And she was dreading the prospect, having already learned that certain cooking smells could make her feel horribly nauseous.
‘I will deal with them. Go to your bed,’ Angelo urged with impressive assurance.
Flora had never seen Angelo as a guy likely to be handy in the kitchen and she hovered uncertainly. ’But …:
‘Go and lie down,’ he said again, stepping to one side to thrust open the door to the room he had already identified as hers.
The sight of her comfortable bed was all the pressure Flora needed at that moment and she crossed the corridor to gratefully collapse in a heap on top of the duvet. Her weary limbs were heavy as iron. She was so tired, indeed she was convinced that she had never been so tired in her whole life. The bouts of constant sickness that seized hold of her at all times of day and the exhaustion of continually feeling unwell had conquered her stubborn spirit as nothing else could have done.
Angelo closed the door on her and rang the country hotel he had checked into late the night before. Within minutes he was ushering Flora’s paying guests out to his limousine and instructing his driver to take them to the hotel for their breakfast. Everybody more than happy with that new arrangement, he returned to Flora and e
xplained what he had done.
Flora studied him with thoughtful green eyes, reluctantly impressed by his adroit handling of the situation. She would have enjoyed seeing him wielding a frying pan in her kitchen, but the shrewd organisational and negotiating skills he had just displayed were in all probability basic van Zaal business traits.
‘I appreciate that I know very little about pregnant women,’ Angelo said with enormous tact, keeping quiet about his current bedside reading, which would in fact have proved that he knew much more about being pregnant than Flora did. ‘And naturally I’ve heard of morning sickness, but I really don’t think it’s normal for you to be feeling this ill. You should see a doctor.’
‘I already have,’ Flora sighed wearily, turning over and tucking her hand below her cheek as she made herself as comfortable as possible. ‘My GP says that some women suffer like this and that hopefully it will slacken off soon.’
‘I would still like you to agree to see Natalie again,’ Angelo imparted.
Already drifting off to sleep, Flora gave him a rare nod of assent, pathetically willing to consult anyone who might have the power to make her condition a little more bearable. Right at that moment, she felt as though her pregnancy had taken over her entire life, sapping the energy and confidence that she had always taken for granted.
His big powerful frame alive with brooding tension, Angelo watched her sleep, his lean dark features set in tough lines and his jaw at an aggressive angle. He lifted a throw lying folded on a chair and shook it out to cover her up. Then he stepped out again to contact Natalie on his mobile phone and share his concerns. Nothing his friend said soothed his apprehension on Flora’s behalf.
Flora wakened when Angelo touched her shoulder and gazed straight up into azure-blue eyes surrounded by swirling ebony lashes. Her heart skipped a whole beat inside her chest. ‘How long have I been asleep?’
‘About two hours. I’m only waking you now because Natalie wants to see you this afternoon,’ he explained.
‘Have I got time for a shower?’ Flora sat up very slowly, too well aware that sudden movements were likely to bring on dizziness and nausea.
Freshening up with a shower lifted Flora’s spirits. As she got dressed she reflected that, although she had lost weight in recent weeks, her shape had changed and not for the better. With her trousers already refusing to button at her waist, she donned recent purchases, a skirt with a partially elasticated waist and a top in a larger size than she usually wore. Even though it was early in her pregnancy, her breasts had already swelled by a couple of cup sizes and her waist seemed to be vanishing even faster. Reflecting on those unwelcome alterations to her body, Flora grimaced, deciding that what attraction she had possessed was now very much on the wane. Praying that the sickness would remain at bay, she joined Angelo in the limousine.
‘Why were you trying to cater to so many people without help?’ Angelo asked her then.
A few weeks earlier, Sharon Martin, Flora’s parttime employee, had been diagnosed with cancer and the older woman was currently undergoing treatment. Flora had not managed to find a replacement for Sharon and, reluctant to cancel bookings at short notice, she had contrived as best she could to manage alone.
‘It’s been a struggle,’ she admitted reluctantly.
‘Yet you still found the time to spend several days in Amsterdam with Mariska,’ Angelo remarked.
‘She’s so young. If I don’t make the effort to see Mariska regularly, she’ll forget who I am,’ Flora pointed out ruefully.
Angelo answered a phone call and while he was talking Flora kicked off her shoes and curled up into a comfortable position, resting her cheek down on the cool leather back of the passenger seat. A blink of an eye later she was fast asleep again and he had to shake her awake at the end of their journey.
‘Sorry,’ Flora framed, politely shielding a yawn before finger combing her tumbled coppery hair back from her brow in some embarrassment. ‘I’ve a lot of sleep to catch up on.’
In the waiting room she watched Angelo, only to redden uncomfortably when she realised that he was watching her. On their previous visit to Dr Ellwood’s surgery, Angelo had very effectively tuned out of the proceedings and done as much business as if he were still at the office. Now his obvious disquiet touched her and stirred her conscience because she knew she had made things difficult when he had tried to stay in touch with her. If he had asked her why she would not have had a ready answer for him, because even she did not fully understand her often hostile attitude to him. What she did know was that when she focused on Angelo van Zaal’s darkly handsome features she felt intensely vulnerable and scared and that was more than sufficient to ensure she stayed away from him and avoided his influence.
Natalie called Flora into her surgery and discussed her symptoms before giving her an examination and a blood test. After that the nurse showed Flora into the small room where the ultrasound scanning machine was kept and helped her get up onto the couch in readiness.
‘Angelo wants to know if he can join us,’ Natalie told her, popping her head round the door.
Startled by that request, Flora started to sit up. ‘Er …’
But Angelo appeared in the brunette’s wake, and to object struck Flora as petty, particularly when she was about to receive her very first view of the baby in whom Angelo appeared to have an equal interest. She lay back down again while Angelo stationed his tall, powerful frame in a discreet location by the wall, his keen gaze welded to the screen while Natalie talked about what they could hope to see at this stage of Flora’s pregnancy.
‘Ah, yes, this is what I suspected,’ Natalie remarked with satisfaction as she moved the transducer over the gel slicked across Flora’s stomach. ‘There to the left, is the first baby … see the heartbeat … and there is the second baby …’ for an instant the doctor paused and then drew in an audible breath before continuing ‘… and tucked in behind that one, is the third baby! My word, I already suspected that you might be expecting twins, but you’re carrying triplets, Flora. That’s probably why you’ve been feeling so very sick. Your hormones are in override.’
’Triplets? ‘ Flora parrotted, her voice sounding as squeezed as if someone were bouncing up and down on her lungs. ‘You mean that there’s three of them?’
A large hand closed over her nervously clenching fingers. ‘That’s amazing news,’ Angelo pronounced with admirable conviction.
Astonished, Flora tipped back her head to look up at him and noted that he was unusually pale. She reckoned that he too was shocked by Natalie’s revelation but simply better at hiding his reactions than Flora was. Flora was stunned and totally overwhelmed by the prospect of three babies rather than one. She had naturally imagined how she might cope if she won custody of Mariska but had calculated her niece would be a toddler at a different stage of development by the time she gave birth.
The news that she was carrying triplets turned all her careful plans for the future upside down. It would be a challenge to continue her bed-and-breakfast business and even parttime childcare costs would be huge. For the first few months of motherhood she would definitely have to live off the money in her bank account. On the other hand, that cash bonus was her only nest egg and with the needs of at least three children to meet in the future she realised that it would probably be wiser to try and work and save the money she currently had in the bank.
‘I can’t tell you the sex of the babies yet. It’s too early,’ Natalie Ellwood informed them cheerfully. ‘Are there any multiple pregnancies in either family?’
As Flora shook her head in a negative motion Angelo opened his mouth and then closed it again, deeming what he had been about to say concerning his own early history inappropriate. He knew that a multiple pregnancy carried greater risks and it worried him that Flora was already far from well. Registering that the news about their triplets had struck her dumb, he lifted her down off the couch with care and accompanied her back into Natalie’s surgery. Flora, still in complete
shock from what she had learned, was urged to avoid stress, rest more and eat little and often in an effort to regain the weight she had lost. If the sickness continued at the same rate, Natalie said she would need to go into hospital to receive treatment. Flora was shaken by that last warning because it had not once occurred to her that her health and that of her unborn baby might be at risk. Unborn babies, her mind adjusted, while she recognised that she would need all her health and strength to carry three babies as close to term as possible.
‘I would like to take you back to Amsterdam with me,’ Angelo pronounced before they had even left the building. ‘No, don’t argue with me … think of the advantages. You can stay in bed all day if you like. You won’t have to cook for yourself and everything will be done for you. You’ll have Mariska to fill your days instead of demanding guests.’
‘And Mariska will never ask me to cook a fried egg,’ Flora mumbled, striving not to get caught up in the lazy blissful imagery of the dream world he was describing. ‘I’m used to working and keeping busy, Angelo.’
‘But right now you need some time out to regain your health.’
It was true; there was no arguing with that reminder. Natalie had emphasised that tiredness and stress were very probably only making the sickness Flora was suffering from worse. And she knew she had lost more weight than was good for her. She would also have Mariska to keep her occupied. At that moment, the proverbial weak moment, an image of the picturesque streets and canals of Amsterdam and having meals cooked for her carried considerable appeal for Flora.
Angelo tucked her into the limousine. Although he had said and done nothing to reveal the fact, the prospect of becoming the father of four children had knocked him sideways. Only three months earlier he’d had no plans to have any children of his own. But now, he gazed down at Flora and, in one of those inexplicable moments of flawed concentration that currently afflicted him, he was immediately sidetracked by the view. From that angle the newly full rounded globes of her breasts and her shadowy cleavage were visible below the modest neckline of her cotton top. There was something incredibly powerfully erotic about that illicit glimpse and he remembered the taste of her and the fresh scent of her skin. That fast lust ran through Angelo like a river of lava and the swelling hardness at his groin became a greedy ache. A muscle at the corner of his handsome mouth pulling taut, he swung in beside her.