Betrayed by the CEO

by Clare Connelly

  It bore the name Clint Douglas, and the time of her appointment. The handsome man flicked his gaze over it then turned his speculative attention to her face again. “Come with me, please.”

  As they passed the receptionists, he lingered to say something but she didn’t catch his words. She was too busy staring at the view beyond the door of his office.

  “Wow,” she breathed out in admiration. She settled her bag into one of the leather chairs and moved across the tiles. The windows were floor to ceiling, and the outlook of Manhattan was, in every direction, spectacular.

  “You get used to it,” the man said, moving towards the table in the centre of the room. “Would you like a tea? Coffee?”

  “Scotch?” She joked, her lips trembling a little when she turned to face him. She walked unevenly to the table and sat down in the chair he indicated. “I shouldn’t joke about that. Not with you. I don’t drink.” Guilt made her strive for a more honest tone. “Not scotch, anyway.” She grimaced. “Not at this hour, at least.”

  Again, the tiny shift in his face that showed him to be laughing with her. “Coffee, then?”

  “Usually yes, I love coffee. But I think I’m about to jump out of my skin. I mean it. If I have any caffeine today, I’ll literally turn into some kind of nervous wreck. Or there’ll be a me-size hole in that wall over there.”

  He dipped his head forward to hide his smile. Clint Douglas was a reasonably recently hired divorce attorney at the firm. Though he was fresh, he was good. But not as good as Hendrix Forrester. Not many were. And Hendrix had an idea that this woman needed the best help available.

  He crossed one leg over his knee and reclined comfortably in his chair. The diminutive woman with the enormous blonde bun was right. Her anxiety was a palpable force. Her accent was British. He would have guessed she came from Northern London. “Why don’t you tell me what brings you here today.”

  A frown tugged at her lips. They were perfect lips. The thought came to him out of nowhere. It was unwelcome. They were no more perfect than any other woman’s. Except they were shaped like a cupid’s bow, and a shade of pale pink that he could see was natural, not filled in with cosmetics.

  “Don’t you have my file? I sent all those forms back a week ago.”

  His nod was slow. Thoughtful. “It’s on its way. In the mean time, it’s helpful to hear things in your own words.”

  “Of course.” She was instantly contrite. Apologetic even. It didn’t make sense. At least, it didn’t tally with the woman who’d made jokes about her handbag having a mind of its own. “I’m sorry.”

  He bit back the temptation to reassure her.

  “I need a divorce.” The way she said it was like stone hitting marble. Cold and decisive, with tiny shards of pain ricocheting through the room.

  “I see.”

  She pulled a face. “Somehow I doubt it.” Her fingers were rubbing together on top of the table. She stared at them silently. Her cheeks had paled. Her chest was rising and falling rapidly. She was struggling with how to say what she needed.

  “Go on,” he encouraged, unconsciously holding his own breath while waiting for her to continue.

  She swallowed. “My husband comes from a very powerful family.” She cleared her throat and forced her eyes to meet his. “He doesn’t want a divorce.”

  “Unfortunately for the gentleman in question, he’s not really in a position to deny you your divorce petition.”

  “No,” she shook her head, her eyes haunted. “But he can and will make it as difficult as possible, sir.”

  “Are you separated?”

  “Yes. We have been for almost three years.”

  Hendrix wondered about this woman’s secrets. He knew, sure as day followed night, that she was sitting on a bundle of them. “And financially you’re independent?”

  Something like anger sparked in her enormous blue eyes. “No.”

  “You still have access to the communal assets?”

  “No.” She bit down on her lip. “Maybe. I don’t know. I haven’t touched our credit cards or bank accounts since I left him.” Her lips parted as she breathed inwards. “In fact, I’ve been working very hard to save up for a deposit on a small apartment. But my husband is a vindictive man. When he found out I was planning to divorce him, he emptied my bank accounts and ran up my credit cards.” Tears sparkled on her eyes. “I have money, sir, but nothing I can access immediately. My husband is, he’s, my husband is…” she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to calm herself down. “Unless I have someone like you fighting for me, he’s going to take everything from me for good. Including my citizenship.” Her fingers were fidgeting relentlessly. “We have a daughter. Ellie. She’s just turned two. My husband hasn’t seen her. Not once. I was five months pregnant when we… when I left him.”

  Hendrix had admitted to himself that the woman fascinated him. Now, he leaned the bulk of his frame closer to her. “How did your husband access your funds?”

  Her blue eyes lifted heavenward. “Stupidly I stayed with the same bank we’ve always used. I just opened a new account.” She looked at him dolefully, begging him with her enormous eyes not to judge her stupidity too harshly. “I thought that would be enough. His business is… considerably more important to the bank’s than mine. I suppose it took him a single phone call to arrange it.” Panic was rising. “But I have no money. No money for rent. And certainly no money for the deposit on the apartment I’ve found.” She squared her shoulders and stared across the long conference table. “I need him out of my life. But I’m…” Her face was pleading as she matched his posture, to lean forward over the table. “I’m scared.”

  Something wrapped around Hendrix’s heart like a vice. “You mentioned that your husband comes from a powerful family. Is that what scares you?”

  “Partly,” she murmured with an impatient nod of her head. “But it’s also him. He’s… capable of …”

  “Capable of?” Hendrix prompted, chasing the tail of the conversation.

  She shook her head. It was better to stick on point. “I just want it over. I want to be free of him. Can you help me?”

  Hendrix stood and moved towards the buffet. He poured a coffee for himself, and a sparkling water for the woman. She thanked him without touching it.

  “You are going to need to be a lot more fulsome with me, if you want my assistance.” He sat in the seat next to hers, telling himself it was so that he could comfort her with proximity. Up close, she smelled of vanilla and coconuts.

  “I’m not being dishonest.” She was defensive, but meekly so. She kept her head bent, her eyes averted.

  Hendrix placed a hand on the table, just near hers. “What did your husband do to you?”

  Her eyes flew to his. She reminded him of Bambi, so beautifully innocent and completely wounded. “Do to me?” It was a whisper. A question almost lost in the vastness of his office.

  “Did he hit you?”

  Chloe dropped her gaze, and moved her hands to her lap. “He wasn’t… I mean, I don’t think he was abusive, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Do you think a man can hit his wife and not be abusive?” He queried thoughtfully, watching expressions dance across her face.

  “What makes you think he hit me?” She asked with an admirable attempt at bravado.

  Hendrix didn’t want to frighten her, but he always employed whichever tactic would achieve his results fastest. It was how he’d got to the top of his profession in such a short time. He lifted a hand and swiftly brought it to within an inch of her face. She made a sound of panic and leaped out of the chair. The flight instinct was pronounced. Her chest was moving rapidly and her skin was as white as paper. Her hands, by her side, were quivering like feathers on the wind.

  Hendrix scraped his chair back and moved to stand in front of her. She was staring up at him with a mix of fear, confusion and anger.

  “Don’t do that again,” she said finally, her voice breathy.

  “I’m sorry,” he put a
hand on her arm. It was meant to be reassuring, but a swell of warmth assaulted him instantly. He dropped the contact as though he’d electrocuted them both.

  “I know what you need from me, Mr Douglas. But I’m worried.” There must have been a foot or more difference in their heights. She had to angle her head sharply to see him. She expelled a soft breath and spun away from him, focussing her attention on the picture perfect view beyond them. “How can there be such misery in a place as beautiful as this?”

  Her words were saturated with sadness.

  He followed her gaze, paying proper attention for the first time in years to the spectacular aspect his office enjoyed.

  “Do you still love your husband?”

  “Love him?” Her laugh was almost a sob. “I don’t know if I ever really loved him. At least, I don’t know how I could have.” She turned back to the lawyer. “Perhaps at one time, I thought I did.” She shrugged. “I was very young when we met.” She shook her head, her watery smile was laced with self-deprecation. “Like I said, his family is very powerful. Very rich. I guess I was impressed by that. More fool me, huh?”

  “The allure of wealth can be seductive,” he reflected sympathetically, thinking of the awe he’d felt, as a child, when he’d watched the filthy rich get about town. “You would not be the first person to be drawn to its flame.”

  She lifted her slender fingers to her temples and rubbed them in circles. “Our daughter Ellie is all I care about. And he knows that. My husband will use her to cower me. To control me.”

  Ellie. The name sparked memories in him. Times that were far simpler. When he and Eleanor had run, barefoot, through town, laughing until their sides hurt. She’d been Ellie then. Much younger, he’d taken care of her, and he’d adored her. As she’d grown, she’d become Eleanor. Only Eleanor; always Eleanor. Until she wasn’t anything except a collection of memories in his mind.

  “Your file doesn’t seem to have arrived. Would you remind me of your name?”

  “My name?” She dropped her hands to the back of the chair. Her nod was terse. “It’s Chloe. Chloe Ansell-Johns.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “I’m sorry,” his voice sounded strained to his own ears. “You mean to tell me you’re married to …”

  “William Ansell-Johns,” she murmured in agreement. “Yes. That William Ansell-Johns. The guy who owns all the sports teams.”

  The moment seared into his consciousness. His ears were ringing and he felt as though something sharp had jabbed into his gut. The man responsible for killing his sister had married this woman. This beautiful, demure, terrified blonde.

  “I’m sorry.” He shook his head in the hope he could clear some of the cobwebs away. “I wasn’t expecting that.”

  Her mouth was set in a grim line. “He’s disgustingly rich. The whole family is. They’ve money to burn, and I … don’t.”

  He tried to compose his features, but his mind was reeling. “How long have you been married?”

  “Five years.”

  He wanted to scream obscenities into his plush office. He wanted to punch something – hard – until it broke. He wanted to hurl objects against the wall, for the sheer satisfaction of releasing his pent-up anger.

  But he didn’t.

  He crossed back to the buffet. His hands were slightly uneven. He reached for one of the Danishes and put it on a plate. He was not hungry, but he needed a beat out of time to regroup.

  If this woman had been married to William for five years, then he’d cheated on her. With his sister. Whom he got pregnant.

  “What did you say your daughter’s name is?” He was shocked by how casual he sounded. Even his smile was benevolence itself, when inside, he was being churned by a passionate sense of outrage.

  “Ellie.” She folded her arms across her chest. Her eyes were an incredible shade of blue. A mix of sky and ocean, they were purely elemental. “She’s two.”

  He nodded, careful not to betray a hint of his feelings in his face. He carried the plate across and put it on the table. “A nice name. Is it short for anything?”

  She was distracted. She viewed this line of discussion as irrelevant chit chat. A preamble to the main subject. “Eleanor. She’s Eleanor.”

  He pretended to scan his notepad and then lifted his steady, dark eyes to her face. “I see. Quite old fashioned, isn’t it.” It couldn’t be a coincidence. That his sister’s lover had a daughter named Eleanor … it was a revolting insult. An outrage. And though it wasn’t Chloe’s fault, his anger had a wide-spray nozzle. He couldn’t contain it to William alone. They were all complicit in the tragic turn of events.

  “Yes.” Her smile was tight. She was becoming impatient. “The name was the only interest my husband took in the pregnancy. He wanted it to be Eleanor for a girl.” She closed her eyes on a soft sigh. “I liked it. I started to think of her as Ellie from that moment on, and by the time she was born, it had stuck.”

  His anger was consuming him from the inside out. Not slowly, like a worm; it was a flame, burning wildly throughout his soul. The earth wasn’t simply spinning; it was hurtling through space, and he was bound to it by the gravity of shock. He walked to the windows and stared out at Manhattan. Beyond the complex entanglement of concrete, steel and glass, he could see the green tips of Lady Liberty’s hat. The sun was blazing in the sky, casting her in gold; it was a ball of lava almost as hot as his temper.

  “In any event, Mr Douglas, I know my husband is going to be out for blood.”

  Her husband.

  An image of William Ansell-Johns came to him easily. His preppy face, permanently tanned, with bright blonde hair and the kind of good looks that might have seen him cast in a commercial for Ralph Lauren. The attraction had been easy enough to understand. Like him, Eleanor had grown up as one of the only financially stretched families in a town given over entirely to decadence and luxury. Being made to feel that she belonged by someone like William had been completely alluring. In the end, it had proven impossible to resist.

  Had she known about the baby? And if so, why hadn’t she told him?

  “Mar. Douglas?” She moved so quietly across the room that he didn’t realise she had come to stand behind him until she put a hand on his shoulder. “Is everything okay?”

  His eyes were pulled downwards, and now, he looked at her properly. Beyond his first impression of her as a beautiful, slightly chaotic woman, he saw something else. A woman William Ansell-Johns had married. A woman he’d loved, and possessed. A woman he possibly still loved. A woman he certainly didn’t want to lose.

  And Hendrix knew then, that he would take her from him. Hendrix Forrester, who had never found it difficult to have whichever woman he desired, would make it his mission to seduce William Ansell-Johns’s wife. And when the time was right, he’d relish revealing the facts to the man who’d killed his sister.

  “You’re miles away,” her smile was kind. She wasn’t accusing him, nor was she upset by his distraction. Despite her own perturbation, she had set it aside to enquire after him.

  She was kind. He filed that information away. He smiled at her, and he felt the immediate change in her. If he was seeing her in a new light, she was looking at him differently too. She dropped her hand quickly, as though his skin had burned her, then cleared her throat.

  “Why do you suppose your husband will oppose the divorce?”

  When Chloe was lost in thought, she had a habit of knotting her fingers together. She did so now, rubbing her knuckles pensively. “I confronted him. About the missing money. And he told me he’d happily return it to me. But only if I went back to him.” Her eyes held a bleak pain. “Only if I took Ellie back to the house, and lived with him again. As man and wife.”

  Ellie. He squared his shoulders. He was going to do this for Ellie. His Ellie, and the baby she’d never got to grow. “You don’t have to do that, Chloe.”

  She nodded, but he could see she was far from convinced. “I’m English,” she said, her lips twisting int
o a small grimace. “Obviously.”

  “Yes. I detected a hint of an accent.” He put a hand in the small of her back and guided her towards the leather couches near the windows. It was a seemingly casual gesture, but he knew she was feeling a spark of interest towards him. And he wasn’t going to let it fizzle. When she sat down, he chose to sit opposite, but kept his legs close enough that they were almost brushing hers.

  “I don’t want to be deported, Mr Douglas.” She held her hands in her lap.

  “You won’t be.” He leaned forward, fixing her in a vice-like gaze. “We can begin proceedings to apply for your citizenship. You have an American daughter. You’ve been married for longer than the minimum requirement. It’s a technicality. You will not be deported.”

  “But he said I will! He told me that I don’t have any money, and we can’t properly demonstrate that we joined our finances, and that he’ll do whatever it takes to get me shipped out.” She blinked her eyes shut, and Hendrix watched, fascinated, as a tear inked at the corner of her eye. Her voice was high pitched and breathy.

  Hendrix had little doubt that William Ansell-Johns had made all of those threats. Worse, he’d carry them out if she didn’t fall in with his plans. “Chloe, there’s been a misunderstanding. I’m not Mr Douglas. Clint is one of my associates.”

  “Oh.” She frowned, her confusion obvious. “Is he not well? I’m sure this is the time we were meant to be meeting.”

  “Actually, you came to the wrong floor. Clint is down a level.”

  “What?” She scanned his face, still obviously not quite understanding what was going on. “But I’ve been in here with you for almost half an hour. Why didn’t you say something?”

  He leaned further forward, his expression unwavering. “Because I want to help you.”

  Her throat knotted as she swallowed anxiously. “Are you a divorce attorney?”

  A breeze of amusement brushed across his features. He was handsome in a completely different way to William. She supposed, if she were completely analytical, she would say that no one of his features was particularly beautiful. His eyes were wide set, his brows thick and dark, his nose straight, his jaw square and stubbled. But combined, his face was both stunning, and interesting. He had an air of rebellion about him, despite the cut of his suit and the surroundings they were in. When it came to waging war, she thought he might fight like the warrior she’d first thought him to be.