The Price of Seduction

by Nina Blake

  “But we do see each other through the week. We have a meeting nearly every week.”

  Bree glared at him. “Business meetings don’t count. That’s not what I meant.”

  “Would you like me to drop everything and let business lapse? Is that what you’re suggesting?”

  “No, it’s just… It’s been such a strange set-up. I feel like I’ve been a weekend girlfriend, like I’m not there until Friday night and then on Monday morning when we both go to work, I’ve disappeared again. It’s like I don’t exist during the week.”

  “I can’t just forget about business. It simply can’t work that way. But there might be other ways. Do you think it’d work better if you moved in with me? Then we’d see more of each other.”

  That wasn’t what she wanted to hear. Only discovering this morning that she was pregnant, Bree hadn’t had time to consider what she wanted from the relationship but she knew what she didn’t want.

  She didn’t want such an unromantic proposition, that she move in with him because it was convenient. There was no mention of love or commitment or any kind of future together.

  Bree looked down at their hands still intertwined. “I wasn’t talking about living together.”

  Conrad let out a loose laugh. “Well you can’t have been talking about marriage.”

  She hadn’t felt nauseous at all for the last two months but she suddenly felt sick to her stomach. It appeared the idea of marrying her was so ridiculous it was funny enough to make him laugh. She wasn’t thinking about marriage and hadn’t brought the subject up because she hadn’t seen any sign that their relationship was heading in that direction.

  Now she knew it definitely wasn’t.

  “I didn’t say anything about marriage and I can guarantee you I’m not some little gold digger out for your fortune.”

  Conrad’s eyes narrowed. “But you were thinking about it, surely.”

  “Not at all. I was thinking about the next two months and where we might be then. I was wondering where we might be in twelve months and whether you’ll still be as happy as you are now. But I wasn’t trying to marry you off.”

  “Bree, I’ll make more time during the week, I promise. But other than that, why would we want to change anything? You give me everything I want from a woman. You’re intelligent and independent and passionate about your work. You know what you want.”

  She looked him in the eye. “There’s also the sex. Don’t forget that.”

  A sly smile crept across his face. “Oh, I haven’t forgotten that. We’re good together, you and I. Why change it when we’re on a winning formula?”

  Their formula had a new ingredient but Bree couldn’t tell him now, not after what he’d said. He couldn’t see past the next two months. They had no future together.

  What they had was amazing, mind-blowing sex and it seemed Conrad didn’t need much more than that. He didn’t envision a future for them together. When he had it so good, why should he?

  Still, she had to tell him she was pregnant but not now. She’d tell him tonight.

  Her mobile phone rang and she reached down to grab it from inside her bag at the foot of her chair. She recognised the number flashing on the screen. John Patterson from PCR in Melbourne had been phoning to try to convince her to take a position with his firm. One of his senior staff had gone into early labour and he needed someone to start work immediately but Bree hadn’t been able to give him an answer.

  If the job had been in Sydney she’d have snapped it up right away, as she’d decided she’d well and truly spent enough time with Olivia at Kelly Communications. But the job wasn’t in Sydney. It was in Melbourne.

  Bree switched off her phone and placed it on the table. Looking back up at Conrad, she tried to appear relaxed. “Sorry, I forgot to turn it off earlier. Conrad, I know we’re good together… ”

  He squeezed her hand. “We’re better than that.”

  “We’re still going to the ballet tonight, aren’t we? That hasn’t changed, has it?”

  “Of course we’re still going. The premiere. It’s going to be a big night.”

  Bigger than he knew.

  * * *

  From the moment Bree walked through the dark doorway at the front of the Surry Hills warehouse, she knew this performance by the Belvoir Ballet Company was going to be like no other she had seen.

  The invited guests were ushered down a long dark hallway, up a set of stairs and through a thick velvet curtain only to be surprised at the vision that lay ahead. No effort was made to hide the fact that this was a warehouse. It was a large barren room with hard surfaces, concrete floors, rough red brick walls and a high ceiling.

  The stage lay at the far end of the room, seats laid out in front of it in careful rows. This area was delineated from the foyer by strips of industrial chain hanging from the ceiling.

  It was intermission now and Bree took careful note of the room, reminding herself she must find out who the designers were so she could use them in the future.

  “They’ve outdone themselves this time.” Conrad leaned in close to Bree so she could hear him through the throng of the crowd. “This is their best production yet.”

  “It’s very avant garde. That’s the right term for it, isn’t it?”

  The choreography and dancing were as raw, passionate and unforgiving as the setting but she’d had trouble concentrating. Her mind was elsewhere.

  She’d felt nauseous all afternoon, ever since lunch, and her bladder needed to be constantly emptied. It had to be psychosomatic, as it wasn’t possible for these symptoms to set in so quickly.

  Nevertheless, she still needed the ladies room and excused herself to make her way through the crowd to the facilities located outside the foyer. It was quieter as soon as she walked through the velvet curtain onto the landing.

  Bree felt a man’s hand on her upper arm. “Fancy seeing you here.”

  She stopped and turned, her heart suddenly thumping from the shock of seeing him. “Trevor. I didn’t think you were interested in modern dance.”

  “There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

  Her eyes shot down to his hand on her arm, then back up to his face. “You can take your hand away now.” She waited until he’d done so before she continued. “I’d love to chat but I’m in a bit of a hurry.”

  “Bree, don’t be like that. I haven’t seen you for months. Surely you can let the past go.”

  “It’s got nothing to do with the past and a lot to do with the present. I’ve got to go to the ladies room and you’ve got to get back to Shannon, don’t you?”

  Trevor shook his head slowly from side to side, his eyes burning her with the intensity of his gaze.

  “You’ve broken up with her, is that it?” she asked.

  “Yes, I broke it off with her but there’s more than that. A lot more. It had something to do with you.”

  “Surely you’re not going to tell me you broke up because you still have feelings for me.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m going to tell you. You can read me like a book. You always could.”

  She looked him in the eye. “I’ve been doing a lot of ‘reading’ lately but I’ve finished with trashy novels that promise much and go nowhere. I’m onto high-end literature where the characters are memorable and have morals. Something you’d know nothing about.”

  “Why are you trying to be hurtful?”

  All she wanted was to be rid of him, once and for all. “I’m going to tell you one last time, I’m not interested in you, Trevor. It was over a long time ago and it’s staying that way.”

  “Do you really think that rich bastard is so much better than me?”

  Trevor spoke the words before she’d had time to turn away. Insulting her was one thing. Insulting Conrad was quite another.

  Her eyes were two whips. “He’s twice the man you’ll ever be.”

  “He’s a murderer.” Trevor whispered the words but she heard them clearly.

  “How dare
you. Don’t be ridiculous.”

  Bree spun around but he grabbed her arm again and as she pulled it from his grasp, he continued in a low voice. “Did he tell you about Rebecca? Did he tell you what he did to her?”

  She couldn’t leave it there, couldn’t let him get away with this. “Of course he told me about her. What’s it got to do with you? How do you even know about it?”

  This didn’t make sense. Conrad told her he’d got Rebecca pregnant but as far as she knew there was no connection with Trevor. Conrad certainly hadn’t mentioned his name in connection with her and surely he’d have told Bree if that were the case. Trevor was her ex-boyfriend, after all.

  “She needed a friend and she confided in me,” Trevor explained. “With what she was going through, she needed to talk to someone and Conrad wasn’t listening to her.”

  “What on earth are you talking about?”

  “She was pregnant and very much alone.”

  “Trevor, I really don’t care what you’ve got to say.”

  “Because you won’t like it. Because you know he’s been hiding it from you.”

  She was riveted to the spot, unable to turn away.

  Trevor continued. “She was pregnant. You know that much, I’m sure. But he wanted her to get rid of it. He didn’t want that baby and he didn’t care what he had to do to make it go away.”

  “She miscarried,” Bree said weakly. “He told me she miscarried.”

  “That’s what he told you, is it? He forced her to have an abortion. He didn’t care that there was a baby inside her and she wanted to keep it.”

  “What do you mean he forced her? She could have said no.”

  “He’s not the kind of man you say no to. He has money to buy whatever he wants. I don’t know what he threatened her with but she was scared. Scared for her life perhaps.”

  Bree thought of the child inside her and her face scrunched up into a contorted frown. “What kind of doctor would perform the procedure if the woman didn’t want it done? That just doesn’t sound right to me.”

  “Doctors are just people, you know. They can be bought, especially with the kind of money he’s got.”

  She remembered the ultrasound picture in Conrad’s wallet. She believed he kept that picture to remind him of the child he lost and loved. Was it possible he kept it as a reminder of a mistake he planned never to make again?

  “Then why didn’t he make her terminate the pregnancy sooner?” she asked.

  “She didn’t tell him. She kept it a secret. I told you. He’s a murderer.”

  When he used that word again, his accusations struck her as completely unbelievable. She knew Trevor had no integrity, would stoop at nothing. He was making it up.

  “Trevor, I know why you’re here,” she said. “I know why you’re saying these things, making this all up. Yesterday was settlement day for Il Bosco. Conrad won the deal you wanted to seal for your client. You couldn’t stop him from winning that deal and when you saw me you thought you’d take revenge. You can’t have Il Bosco but you have the last word. And I know your client has been charged with stealing the rock art. Everyone knows. You said I could read you like a book and I can.”

  “I’m not going to tell you there are no hard feelings about that deal but just think about it for a minute. How can I possibly be making it all up? How can I possibly know Rebecca was pregnant and then lost the child?”

  Bree’s mouth fell open. “Someone told you. You worked it out.”

  “Someone did tell me. Rebecca. Because she was desperate and didn’t know what to do. I’m sure neither of them told anyone else.”

  Taking a step back, Bree’s eyes fell to the floor in front of her. Trevor couldn’t be making this up. How else could he know about Rebecca’s pregnancy? They would hardly have advertised the fact.

  Bile rose in Bree’s throat, nausea sizzling in her stomach, as she pushed her way into the ladies room and tried to pull herself together.

  What kind of man was Conrad Savage?

  She had to think. She had to clear her head, work out what to do. She wanted to run down the stairs and fly out of the door, have the whole world disappear, but running would do her no good.

  She could run all she liked and the child inside would go with her wherever she went.

  Bree had to find out the truth.

  Until then, she would tell Conrad nothing.

  * * *

  “You haven’t seemed at all yourself tonight,” Conrad said as they left the building after the performance. “Come to think of it, you seemed a bit out of sorts at lunch today too. Are you okay?”

  “Fine,” Bree replied as they strode in the direction of his car. “Maybe I’m coming down with something. I don’t know.”

  They walked in silence, the crowd thinning the further they got from the warehouse. Suddenly Conrad sensed something was wrong. There were still a few people around but there was a distinct set of footsteps behind them. Despite their own brisk pace, these footsteps were getting louder and faster.

  He touched Bree’s arm gently, then stopped and turned.

  “Daniels.” He spat the name out. “You’re not following us, are you? I didn’t think even you’d be that tacky.”

  “I just wanted a word, that’s all,” Trevor Daniels said.

  Conrad passed Bree the car keys from his pocket. “Get in the car and stay there.”

  If he’d had more time, he’d have phrased his words more carefully. She took the keys without question and moved away. He kept his eye on her until she safely reached the car at the far end of the street.

  “Okay, Daniels,” he said. “You’re probably in a bad mood because you lost the Il Bosco deal so just come out with it. Whatever you’ve got on your mind, spit it out.”

  His lips curled to a sneer. “Do you think I’m angry because we lost that deal? You don’t know me very well.”

  “Actually there’s a lot more to it than that. Your client is out on bail, isn’t he? He wanted to buy Il Bosco for the rock art but he couldn’t pull together his finances. Still, he had enough money to get in the blasting experts and steal the rock art. Pity he couldn’t get away with it.”

  “He was just a client. Do you think I give a toss about him?”

  “No, but you care about yourself. You tried to make sure you kept your hands clean, didn’t you? You’ll be disbarred for this. You know that, don’t you?”

  “We’ll just have to wait and see about that.”

  Conrad’s mind flicked back to the past. To Rebecca. To the child she carried.

  To Trevor Daniels driving her to the abortion clinic.

  “I know you better than you think, Daniels,” he said.

  The man’s eyes narrowed. “There’s something you never worked out. You think you’re so smart but you couldn’t work it out. All those years ago. It was my baby.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The child Rebecca was carrying. You knew it wasn’t yours. You worked that out eventually. I’m sure you’ve wondered whose baby it was. Don’t try to tell me you haven’t.”

  His words were a knife to his stomach. Conrad grabbed the lapels of Daniels’ jacket. “You’d better make this good.”

  “You think you’re such a big man but you’re only good for my left overs. I had Rebecca first and I had Bree before you did too.”

  Conrad increased his hold. “Cut the crap. Tell me about the baby.”

  “Rebecca was pregnant before you started seeing her. I’m sure you worked out that much. She was pregnant with my child and she tried to take you for a patsy. The child she got rid of was mine. I made her go through with the abortion, drove her there, made sure she didn’t back out.”

  Disgusted, Conrad let go of Daniels’ jacket. Conrad hadn’t even known Rebecca was thinking of an abortion until she told him after the fact.

  He’d screamed at her, his grief unbelievable, digging into him, clawing away at him from the inside.

  They’d gone out for two mont
hs and he’d believed the child was his. When he’d found out the tiny foetus that had been growing inside her was gone, it had felt like part of his heart had been ripped from his body.

  It was bad enough to lose a child through natural causes but to find out she’d done that to their child through her own design was unforgivable.

  At the time, he hadn’t known she was actually just over three months pregnant which meant the child couldn’t be his. Still, his grief and anger were as real as if the child had been his.

  She’d only told him the truth to shut him up. He knew that now. But finding out the child wasn’t his hadn’t make it easier, not then. It hadn’t diminished his grief. He’d already experienced the loss.

  That was when she told him Daniels had driven her to the abortion clinic but she’d insisted he was just a friend in whom she’d confided. It was the first time he heard the man’s name, a name he’d never forget as long as he lived.

  Could it be true that Trevor Daniels had fathered that child, then forced the young woman to abort the pregnancy?

  He looked at him and knew it was true.

  It was three years ago but Conrad felt that same pain again, the grief, the anger, the gut wrenching loss.

  He was a powerful man but when Rebecca told him what she’d done he’d felt completely defenceless. His guard had been down, his emotions exposed in full view.

  Never before or since had he felt that sense of powerlessness, knowing that no matter what he did, it wouldn’t make any difference at all. The deed was done and nothing would change that. He was one of the richest men in Australia but he felt worthless because he couldn’t buy his way out of this pain.

  And now Daniels was bringing it up out of his own petty need for revenge because his career was in tatters. That man had no idea what he’d done, how low he’d sunk, how many lives had been damaged because of him. What’s more, he didn’t care.

  Conrad pushed him in the chest.

  Daniels stumbled back, then stepped forward again. “It’s too late.”

  The smug, superior look on the man’s face was too much for Conrad. His fingers were already curled into a fist. He sent a big right hand straight into the middle of Daniels’s face.