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But Nina’s father, the rich and powerful Dmitri Palitov, was another matter entirely. His protection of his daughter was absolute, and he would not look kindly on anyone who dared to threaten Nina’s happiness.
Michael knew that Rafe was more than capable of taking care of himself; it was Eva Foster for whom he now felt concern...
‘I hope you’ll forgive me if I’m still a little sceptical as to the accuracy of your accusation!’ Michael now rasped scathingly.
While inwardly his heart was beating erratically, and his thoughts racing, as he tried to think of some way to come up with some proof that Eva Foster was wrong for the second time in regard to the identity of the twins’ father.
Except...
Until Rafe met and fell in love with Nina, he had played fast and loose with dozens of beautiful women— something Michael had warned him about on more than one occasion.
And there was no changing the fact that Rafe had been here at the Paris Archangel fifteen months ago.
Most importantly of all—despite her initial mistake in having thought Michael was Rafe—Eva Foster seemed very certain of the name of the man responsible for having fathered her niece and nephew...
‘Be as sceptical as you like,’ she came back evenly. ‘We’ll both know the truth once I’ve had a chance to speak to your brother.’
That was what Michael was afraid of! ‘Obviously he isn’t in Paris at the moment.’
‘I suppose you’re now going to tell me that I need not have put myself through the trauma of flying to Paris with the twins,’ she drawled self-derisively, ‘because Rafe is currently at the London Archangel gallery?’
Michael was having trouble speaking at all, his thoughts were so chaotic. Unusual for him, but then this situation was beyond anything he’d ever had to deal with before.
One thing he was sure of, and that was that he didn’t want Eva Foster roaming about, here or in London, repeating her accusations to anyone else. Not till he’d had the chance to talk to Rafe. Something Michael had no intention of doing for the next two weeks, at least!
‘No.’ He spoke softly. ‘I’m not going to tell you that.’
‘Please don’t tell me he’s at the New York gallery!’ Eva groaned. She couldn’t bear even the thought of flying all the way to New York with six-month-old twins who were cranky most of the time because they were both teething. Although to look at the two of them now, both sleeping like little angels, no one would ever believe it!
‘No, I’m not going to tell you that, either...’ Michael D’Angelo answered slowly.
Eva looked at him between narrowed lids, finding it impossible to read anything from his closed expression; those black-on-black eyes were completely without emotion, the harshness of his features set into hard, uncompromising lines. ‘And we’ve already established he isn’t here, either, so where is he?’ she prompted suspiciously.
‘Unavailable.’
Her brows rose at the terseness of Michael D’Angelo’s answer. ‘That isn’t an acceptable answer, I’m afraid.’
His mouth tightened grimly. ‘It’s the only one you’re going to get for the moment.’
Eva eyed him shrewdly. ‘Why “for the moment”...?’ she finally prompted guardedly.
This woman was too astute for her own good, Michael recognised impatiently. For his good too. And most certainly for Rafe’s!
‘It just isn’t,’ Michael bit out between clenched teeth.
Obviously this woman hadn’t seen the photographs in the Sunday newspapers of Rafe and Nina’s marriage on Saturday, no doubt because caring for six-month-old twins didn’t leave her a lot of time for doing anything else. But Michael knew that he couldn’t keep that truth from her indefinitely.
Eva Foster bristled. ‘I need to speak to him urgently.’
He nodded. ‘Anything you have to say to Rafe you can say to me.’
‘Having already made that mistake once, I don’t think so!’ she bit out.
Michael’s nostrils flared his impatience. ‘I will naturally pass on your...concerns, to my brother, when I next speak to him, but other than that—’
‘No,’ Eva Foster stated firmly as she stood up abruptly. ‘That simply isn’t good enough, Mr D’Angelo,’ she answered his questioningly raised brows. ‘I need to talk to him now,’ she insisted, ‘not after you next happen to speak to him.’
Michael had to give this woman credit for tenacity—all five feet and a dot of her!
That determined glitter in those violet-coloured eyes said she wasn’t about to back down any time soon either, not from him, or her demand that she speak to Rafe. ‘I’ve already said that isn’t possible.’
Her eyes flashed. ‘Then I suggest you make it possible, Mr D’Angelo!’
‘I don’t care for your tone,’ he bit out harshly.
Eva shrugged. ‘Then maybe you should stop trying to prevent me from speaking with your brother.’
Michael bit back his own anger. ‘The twins are now six months old, so why this sudden urgency to speak to the man your sister told you was their father?’
‘He is their father,’ Eva insisted stubbornly.
And why the sudden urgency...? Because Eva, much as she had tried, much as she hated having to admit defeat, knew that she just couldn’t cope any more without help. Financially. Or emotionally.
Although she had no intention of admitting the latter to the aloofly controlled and ultra-self-confident Michael D’Angelo, a man who looked capable of dealing with any situation...
How could a man like him possibly understand the crippling heartache that washed over Eva like a dark and oppressive tide whenever she allowed herself to dwell on the death of her sister Rachel, let alone how inadequate Eva felt, no matter how much she might love the twins, for the task of caring for two rapidly growing babies?
And all of that was apart from the fact that she simply didn’t have enough money coming in to be able to afford the care the twins needed now, or in the future.
There was no way Eva could go away on photographic assignments any more, because she simply couldn’t leave the twins for any length of time. Even taking local assignments, going back to the well-paid but monotonous photography of weddings and christenings was becoming problematic as the twins grew older, making it increasingly difficult for Eva to take them with her; brides tended to frown at having the photographer’s twin babies scream at their wedding!
And even if Eva could manage to find a child-minder that she trusted it was going to cost yet more money, and so eat into any of the fees she might earn from her work.
No, Eva had thought long and hard before seeking out Rafe D’Angelo, considered her options carefully, and, unpalatable as this alternative might be, she couldn’t see any other way out of this problem other than asking the twins’ father for financial help.
It wasn’t as if she wanted anything else from him, just a way of being able to care for the twins without having to worry where the next penny was coming from. But that was all she wanted.
After meeting and speaking with Michael D’Angelo, Eva was convinced the less physical interaction any of the D’Angelo family had with the twins—and her!—the better she would like it!
She gave a shake of her head. ‘It’s your brother Rafe I need to speak to, Mr D’Angelo, not you.’
Michael had no idea as to the thoughts that had been going through Eva Foster’s head these past few moments, but he did know they hadn’t been pleasant ones. Her face was once again as pale as bone china, those deep shadows under her violet-coloured eyes more prominent, and the fullness of her mouth appeared to be trembling slightly, as further evidence of her vulnerability.
An air of vulnerability Michael had a feeling this woman would hate intensely if she was made aware of it!
He narrowed his eyes. ‘Have you eaten anything today?’
She gave him a startled look at this sudden change of subject. ‘Sorry?’
He shrugged. ‘It’s almost lunchtime, and you’re looking a little pale, so I wondered if you had eaten anything today.’
She blinked long sooty lashes. ‘I— Yes, I believe I did manage to grab a piece of toast while I was feeding the twins their breakfast.’
No doubt she only managed to grab something to eat a lot of the time with two small babies to care for! ‘At your hotel?’
She gave a slightly derisive smile. ‘I believe you would call it more of a pension than a hotel. It was the best I could afford, okay?’ she added defensively as Michael’s frown deepened. ‘We can’t all live in penthouse apartments in major cities around the world and fly about in private jets, you know!’
There was no denying that Michael did exactly that, as did his two brothers. Which was no doubt one of the reasons Eva Foster had decided to seek out the twins’ father and ask for his help... ‘And where is this pension?’
‘It’s in a back street just a short walk away from the Gare du Nord,’ she revealed reluctantly. ‘Look, if I could just speak to your brother—’
‘I take it you intend to ask him for financial help when you do speak with him?’
Her cheeks flushed. ‘It’s my intention to remind him of his financial responsibility towards his two children, yes— Don’t look at me like that!’ she snapped sharply, her slender hands clenched so tightly together her knuckles showed white.
‘How am I looking at you?’ Michael prompted evenly.
‘As if you still think I’m some sort of gold-digger out to fleece your brother out of some of his millions!’ She gave a disgusted shake of her head. ‘It wasn’t easy for me to come here, you know.’ She began to pace the office restlessly. ‘The last thing I want is any contact with the twins’ obviously reluctant father—’
‘Are you saying that Rafe knows of the twins’ existence...?’ Michael looked at her through narrowed lids. If his brother had known of Rachel Foster’s pregnancy and not told him, or, more importantly, not told Nina...!
Eva Foster came to an abrupt halt. ‘I— No. I don’t think so.’
‘But you aren’t sure?’
‘Not absolutely, no.’ Eva grimaced. ‘But I’m assuming not. Rachel wasn’t exactly forthcoming on the subject, except to tell me the name of her lover, and that the relationship was over by the time she found out she was pregnant,’ she added heavily. ‘I was out of the country when Rachel first realised she was pregnant, and she never so much as mentioned it during our weekly telephone conversations. By the time I returned to England she was already five months pregnant and had been diagnosed with the cancer.’ She sighed. ‘Pressing Rachel for more details of the babies’ father, other than to tell me his name before she died, didn’t seem very important at the time.’
‘I imagine not.’ Michael nodded. ‘Returned from where?’ For some reason he found himself more than a little interested as to why Eva Foster should have been out of her native England for several months.
She frowned. ‘Does that matter?’
He shrugged. ‘Just filling in the details.’
Eva shot him an irritated glare, sure that this man wasn’t usually a man who cared for ‘details’, that he usually left such trivia for other people to deal with; he commanded, others obeyed! ‘My work often takes me out of England. At least, it did,’ she added with a grimace.
‘Rachel was so ill the last six months of her life, and since then I’ve been caring for the twins on my own.’
‘You haven’t been able to work since your sister died?’
‘Not properly, no.’ It was the truth, so what else could she say?
‘What—?’
‘Look, my career, my life, none of this is up for discussion,’ she snapped irritably.
She loved the twins, adored them actually, not just for themselves, but because they were all she had left of Rachel.
But Eva had trained and worked hard to become successful in a career that was dominated by men, and these past nine months of being unable to do that career had taken their toll, on both Eva personally, and the respect she had worked so hard to achieve for her photography.
‘I disagree,’ Michael D’Angelo bit out coolly. ‘If—and it’s still a big if, as far as I’m concerned—’ he warned hardly, ‘it should transpire that Rafe is the twins’ father, then your career, and your life, would certainly both be very much up for discussion.’
Eva stilled as she looked across at him searchingly, a panicked fluttering beginning in her chest as she saw the hard, uncompromising jet of his eyes and the grim set of those sculptured lips.
She gave a slow, guarded shake of her head. ‘Rachel made me the twins’ legal guardian before she died...’
Dark brows rose. ‘And their biological father would naturally take precedence over their maternal aunt.’
That panicked flutter turned into a full surge as Eva’s heart seemed to be squeezed tightly inside her chest. ‘Are you threatening to take the twins away from me, Mr D’Angelo...?’
Whatever it was Michael was doing, he certainly wasn’t deriving any pleasure out of it. Inwardly he felt as if he were kicking an already starved and abused kitten.
Although this particular starved and abused kitten would probably spit in his eye as soon as look at him...
CHAPTER THREE
MICHAEL KNEW THE reputation he had, that most people believed him to be both cold and ruthless, an automaton without a heart, and in business perhaps that accusation was true. And no doubt many of his past lovers would also agree with that sentiment; several of the women he had been involved with over the years had accused him of lacking that particular organ when he had ended their relationship!
But Michael loved his family dearly—his parents and his two brothers, and now their two wives—and he would do anything he had to do in order to protect each and every one of them.
Even to the extent of browbeating a young, defenceless woman who only wanted to do what she believed was right for the only family she had left, namely her orphaned niece and nephew?
Unfortunately, yes.
But only because Michael didn’t feel he had any choice. Because he dared not allow Eva Foster to repeat this wild accusation to anyone else until he’d had a chance to speak with Rafe, and he wasn’t going to do that until Rafe and Nina returned from their honeymoon. And if the only way to achieve Eva Foster’s silence was to put the fear of God into her, by giving her the impression that Rafe, if he should be the twins’ father, might want custody of them, then that was what he’d do.
His brother was headstrong, yes, had deliberately earned himself the reputation of being something of a playboy these past fifteen years, but falling in love with Nina had changed his need for that armour. They were two very small, adorable babies, Michael acknowledged as he looked down at the angelically sleeping twins. The truth was Michael had absolutely no idea how Rafe would react to knowing, if it were true, that he had fathered twins with a woman other than Nina.
Michael only knew how he would feel in the same situation!
No matter what the cost to himself, to any other relationship he might have in his life at the time, Michael knew he would want his children with him. And Rafe, despite the outward differences in their personalities, was enough like him to feel the same way. Which was the reason Michael, at least, was convinced Rachel Foster hadn’t told Rafe anything about her pregnancy or the twins’ birth.
‘I’m merely stating a fact, Miss Foster,’ Michael answered her abruptly. ‘Not that I’m saying that would definitely be the case, only that you should consider it as a possibility.’
Eva didn’t want to even consider the idea of the twins ever being taken away from her!
Yes, she found it difficult, all-consuming, to care for two small babies night and day, but she would dare any woman in the same situation, even the natural mother, to deny that it was hard work.
And yes, caring for the twins had also put her career on semi-permanent hold.
But that didn’t mean she would ever willingly give them up.
The opposite, in fact; she knew she would fight tooth and nail to prevent that from ever happening.
She strode over to take control of the babies’ pushchair. ‘Perhaps I made a mistake coming here.’
‘I’m afraid it’s too late for that, Eva.’
She stilled, as much at hearing Michael D’Angelo speak her name in that husky, nerve-tingling tone as at the words he had spoken.
