Free A Tangled Affair by Fiona Brand

in, taking the heat out of the ache in her head and dragging her down into sleep. “I don’t want you here.”
    It was a lie. The virus had made her so weak that she was fast losing the strength to keep up the charade, even to herself.
    “I’m staying until I know you’ll be all right.”
    “I would like you to leave. Now.” The crisp delivery she intended was spoiled by the fact that the words ran together in a drunken, blurred jumble.
    She was certain the soft exhalation she heard had something to do with amusement, which made her even more furious. The mattress shifted as he planted a hand on either side of her head and leaned close. “What are you going to do if I don’t? Make me leave?”
    For a crazy moment she thought he was actually flirting with her, but that couldn’t be. “Don’t have to,” she mumbled, settling the argument. Her eyelids slid closed. “You’ve already gone.”
    Silence settled around her, thick, heavy, as the sedative effect of the pills dragged her down.
    “Do you want me back?”
    The words jerked her awake, but they had been uttered so quietly she wasn’t sure if she had imagined them or if Lucas had actually spoken.
    She could see him standing in her bedroom doorway. Maybe she had been dreaming, or worse, hallucinating. “I took codeine, not truth serum.”
    “It was worth a try.”
    So he had asked the question.
    She pushed up on one elbow. The suspicion that he was sneakily trying to interrogate her while she was drowsy from the pills solidified. Although she couldn’t fathom why he would be interested in what she really thought and felt now. “I don’t know why you’re bothering. Thank you for helping me, but please leave now.”
    He shook his head. “You’re…different tonight.”
    Different? She had been dumped. She had committed the cardinal sin of making love with her ex and could quite possibly be pregnant.
    “Not different.” Turning over, she punched the pillow and willed herself to go to sleep. “Real.”

Six
    T en days later, Carla strolled into the Ambrosi building in Sydney.
    When she reached her office, her assistant, Elise, a chirpy blonde with a marketing degree and a formidable memory for names and statistics, was in the process of hanging up the phone. “Lucas wants you in his office. Now .”
    A jolt of fiery irritation instantly evaporated the peace and calm of four days spent recuperating at her mother’s house, the other five in the blissful solitude of the Blue Mountains at a friend’s holiday home. “Did he say why?”
    Elise looked dreamily reflective. “He’s male, hot and single. Does it matter?”
    Nerves taut, Carla continued on to her desk and deliberately took time out to examine the list of messages and calls Elise had compiled in her absence. Keeping her bag hooked over her shoulder, she checked her calendar and noted she had two meetings scheduled.
    When she couldn’t stall any longer, she strolled to Sienna’s old office, frowning at the changes Atraeus money had already made to her family’s faltering business. Worn blue carpet had been replaced with a sleek, dove-gray weave. Fresh paint and strategically placed art now graced walls that had once been decorated solely with monochrome prints of Ambrosi jewelry designs.
    Feeling oddly out of place in what, from childhood, had been a cozily familiar setting, she greeted work colleagues.
    Directing a brittle smile at Sienna’s personal assistant, Nina—Lucas’s PA now—she stepped into the elegant corner office.
    Lucas, broad shouldered and sleekly powerful in a dark suit with a crisp white shirt and red tie, dominated a room that was still manifestly feminine as he stood at the windows, a phone held to one ear.
    His gaze locked with hers, he terminated the call. “Close the door behind you and take a seat.”
    Suddenly glad she had made an extra effort with her appearance, she closed the door. The sharp little red suit, with its short skirt and fitted V-necked jacket,