Vows They Can't Escape. Heidi Rice

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       CHAPTER THREE

      ‘YOU HAD BETTER be freaking kidding me!’

      Dane looked so shocked Xanthe would have smiled if she hadn’t been shaking quite so hard. That had certainly wiped the self-righteous glare off his face.

      ‘I’ve come all the way from London to get you to sign these newly issued papers, so we can fix this nightmare as fast as is humanly possible. So, no, I’m not kidding.’

      She flicked through the document until she got to the signature page, which she had already signed, frustrated because her fingers wouldn’t stop trembling. She could smell him—that scent that was uniquely his, clean and male, and far too enticing.

      She drew back. Too late. She’d already ingested a lungful, detecting expensive cedarwood soap instead of the supermarket brand he had once used.

      ‘Once you’ve signed here—’ she pointed to the signature line ‘—our problem will be solved and I can guarantee never to darken your door again.’

      She whipped a gold pen out of the briefcase, stabbed the button at the top and thrust it towards him like a dagger.

      He lifted his hands out of his pockets but didn’t pick up the gauntlet.

      ‘Like I’d be dumb enough to sign anything you put in front of me without checking it first...’

      She ruthlessly controlled the snap of temper at his statement. And the wave of panic.

      Stay calm. Be persuasive. Don’t freak out.

      She breathed in through her nose and out through her mouth, employing the technique she’d perfected during the last five years of handling Carmichael’s board. As long as Dane never found out about the original terms of her father’s will, nothing in the paperwork she’d handed him would clue him in to the real reason she’d come all this way. And why would he, when her father’s will hadn’t come into force until five years after Dane had abandoned her?

      Unfortunately the memory of that day in her father’s office, with her stomach cramping in shock and loss and disbelief as the executor recited the terms of the will, was not helping with her anxiety attack.

      ‘Your father had hoped you would marry one of the candidates he suggested. His first preference was to leave forty-five per cent of Carmichael’s stock to you and the controlling share to your spouse as the new CEO. As no such marriage was contracted at the time of his death, he has put the controlling share in trust, to be administered by the board until you complete a five-year probationary period as Carmichael’s executive owner. If, after that period, they deem you a credible CEO, they can vote to allocate a further six per cent of the shares to you. If not, they can elect another CEO and leave the shares in trust.’

      That deadline had passed a week ago. The board—no doubt against all her father’s expectations—had voted in her favour. And then Bill had discovered his bombshell—that she had still technically been married to Dane at the time of her father’s death and he could, therefore, sue for the controlling share in the company.

      It might almost have been funny—that her father’s lack of trust in her abilities might end up gifting 55 per cent of his company to a man he had despised—if it hadn’t been more evidence that her father had never trusted her with Carmichael’s.

      She pushed the dispiriting thought to one side, and the echo of grief that came with it, as Dane punched a number into his smartphone.

      Her father might have been old-fashioned and hopelessly traditional—an aristocratic Englishman who believed that no man who hadn’t gone to Eton and Oxford could ever be a suitable husband for her—but he had loved her and had wanted the best for her. Once she got Dane to sign on the dotted line, thus eliminating any possible threat this paperwork error could present to her father’s company—her company—she would finally have proved her commitment to Carmichael’s was absolute.

      ‘Jack? I’ve got something I want you to check out.’ Dane beckoned to someone behind Xanthe as he spoke into the phone. The superefficient PA popped back into the office as if by magic. ‘Mel is gonna send it over by messenger.’

      He handed the document to his PA, then scribbled something on a pad and passed that to her, too. The PA trotted out.

      ‘Make sure you check every line,’ he continued, still talking to whomever was on the other end of the phone. He gave a strained chuckle. ‘Not exactly—it’s supposed to be divorce papers.’

      The judgmental once-over he gave Xanthe had her temper rising up her torso.

      ‘I’ll explain the why and the how another time,’ he said. ‘Just make sure there are no surprises—like a hidden claim for ten years’ back-alimony.’

      He clicked off the phone and shoved it into his pocket.

      She was actually speechless. For about two seconds.

      ‘Are you finished?’ Indignation burned, the breathing technique history.

      She’d come all this way, spent several sleepless nights preparing for this meeting while being constantly tormented by painful memories from that summer, not to mention having to deal with his scent and the inappropriate heat that would not die. And through it all she’d remained determined to keep this process dignified, despite the appalling way he had treated her. And he’d shot it all to hell in less than five minutes.

      The arrogant ass.

      ‘Don’t play the innocent with me,’ he continued, the self-righteous glare returning. ‘Because I know just what you’re capable—’

      ‘You son of a...’ She gasped for breath, outrage consuming her. ‘I’m not allowed to play the innocent? When you took my virginity, carried on seducing me all summer, got me pregnant, insisted I marry you and then dumped me three months later?’

      He’d never told her he loved her—never even tried to see her point of view during their one and only argument. But, worse than that, he hadn’t been there when she had needed him the most. Her stomach churned, the in-flight meal she’d picked at on the plane threatening to gag her as misery warred with fury, bringing the memories flooding back—memories which were too painful to forget even though she’d tried.

      The pungent smell of mould and cheap disinfectant in the motel bathroom, the hazy sight of the cracked linoleum through the blur of tears, the pain hacking her in two as she prayed for him to pick up his phone.

      Dane’s face went completely blank, before a red stain of fury lanced across the tanned cheekbones. ‘I dumped you? Are you nuts?’ he yelled at top volume.

      ‘You walked out and left me in that motel room and you didn’t answer my calls.’ She matched him decibel for decibel. She wasn’t that besotted girl any more, too timid and delusional to stand up and fight her corner. ‘What else would you call it?’

      ‘I was two hundred miles out at sea, crewing on a bluefin tuna boat—that’s what I’d call it. I didn’t get your calls because there isn’t a heck of a lot of network coverage in the middle of the North Atlantic. And when СКАЧАТЬ