Free Flora's Defiance by Lynne Graham Page A

and she was forced to look up at him, a necessity that rarely came her way, particularly not when she was sporting high heels. For a split second her mind wandered and she recalled how Peter, who had been the same height as her, had hated her to wear heels and stand taller than him.
    ‘You’re so tall for a woman,’ his mother had once remarked with a raised brow, as if a woman being so tall was somehow in the poorest possible taste.
    But then so many men preferred their women to be petite and delicate in stature, Flora reflected helplessly, thinking of how popular her sister, Julie, and her friend, Jemima, had invariably been with men. Being little was generally seen as cute and appealing. Being tall was somehow viewed as being less feminine and desirable.
    ‘Let’s go,’ Angelo urged, his hand curving to Flora’srigid spine. His beautiful sapphire-blue eyes had a stunned quality before he lowered his ridiculously lush black lashes to conceal his expression.
    ‘So you’re not quite as lucky as you think you are and, apparently, neither of us is infertile,’ Flora remarked drolly on the way out onto the street.
    ‘We’ll discuss this in private,’ Angelo pronounced crushingly.
    ‘It’s all right to be shocked,’ Flora told him helplessly. ‘I’m shocked as well.’
    But unlike Flora, Angelo wasn’t used to being shocked or put into a situation in which he was not in control of events. Suddenly, he appreciated, his life was yoked to Flora Bennett’s whether he liked it or not. That was, assuming she planned to
have
his child. He swallowed back his questions and chose silence while he marshalled his thoughts.
    In a world of her own, Flora sat in the limousine, struggling to adjust to the startling concept that in nine months’ time she would become a mother. Her brain reminded her that there were other options that ranged from adoption to termination. The prospect of having to make either tough choice filled Flora with instinctive recoil. Eighteen months earlier, her sister had refused to consider any option other than giving birth to and keeping her child. But then Julie had been in love with Willem and he had been very much involved in that decision.
    Yet Flora even now felt able to reflect that her own baby was already a part of her and, like little Mariska, would be her only other relative and the promising startto a new family circle. The very word ‘family’ warmed the chill of shock that still held Flora taut.
    All right, admittedly, the baby wasn’t planned, but life was all about rolling with the punches, wasn’t it? And just as she was prepared to reorganise her life to become Mariska’s mother she could hardly consider doing less when it came to her own child’s future. She had money in the bank, a comfortable home and a viable business. Those acknowledgements gradually sent greater calm spilling through Flora, a calm that soothed her ragged nerves and fears while she reasoned that she could have found herself pregnant in a much worse situation.
    Essentially it didn’t matter how Angelo felt about her being pregnant with his child, she ruminated, and having recognised that truth it was as though a heavy weight fell from her shoulders. She sat a little straighter in her seat and felt a good deal less awkward. She was convinced that she didn’t need Angelo for support and that belief acted like a shot of reassurance in her veins, for not needing a man for
anything
was a cause that lay very close to Flora’s securely guarded heart.

CHAPTER FIVE
    ‘W HERE are we?’ Flora asked in dismay, lashes fluttering in bemusement as she appreciated that—unbelievably—she had actually followed Angelo blindly out of his limo into a building and, from there, into a lift.
    ‘On the way up to my apartment. We have to talk,’ Angelo informed her, his wide sensual mouth set in a deadly serious line.
    At that point, Flora discovered that she had a deeply inappropriate desire to giggle. Angelo was