Zoe almost felt sorry for the other woman. Justin at his commanding, arrogant best was a formidable adversary, as she knew to her cost. When she had first run away to America she had been hurt and angry, but after his denouement of her character and morals at their last meeting in California her anger had turned to hatred.
She was here now for her son, and him alone. Otherwise she would not have willingly put herself within a million miles of Justin Gifford.
'Don't say I didn't warn you.' The woman shot a vitriolic glance at Zoe before storming out of the room, and some moments later Zoe jumped at the sound of the front door slamming.
'You will have to excuse Jess—she's very protective,' Justin said smoothly, before closing the space between them. 'And forgets her manners sometimes. Allow me.' His hands fell on her shoulders. She stiffened in instant rejection to his touch.
'Your jacket,' he prompted silkily, and slid the fake fur from her shoulders, his gaze flickering slowly over her slender curves, then sliding back to settle on her wide, wary blue eyes.
'Very nice, if a little slim,' he opined coolly.
Her eyes sparkled with resentment, but she dared not retaliate. She was here for a purpose. 'Thank you,' she said in a low voice.
He inclined his black head in acknowledgement and walked past her across the room to a drinks cabinet. He turned and glanced back at her. 'A drink? Whisky, brandy? You look as if you could use one.' His dark gaze raked over her from head to foot and back to her pale face.
'For heaven's sake sit down,' he said harshly, with the first show of emotion he had revealed since seeing her, and she realised that he was not as in control as he appeared. 'You look as if you're going to take flight at any second, yet you must have a purpose in being here.'
'Thank you,' she said inanely yet again. Her brain seemed to have stopped working. She forced her legs to carry her to the hide sofa, and sank on to it with relief. Seeing him again had reawakened all the old pain, the bitter sense of betrayal, and she knew she shouldn't have come.
Margy had been right. She should have simply called him from America, explained the circumstances and trusted to his compassion and better nature. Obviously he had a woman living with him—a very beautiful woman—and her idea of seducing him into, she hoped, making her pregnant before revealing the existence of Val hadn't a hope in hell of succeeding.
She briefly closed her eyes. But she was still going to try; it was a ridiculous long shot, but no sacrifice was too great for her son. She lifted her head, a determined gleam in her sapphire eyes, and found Justin standing in front of her, holding a glass of amber liquid in his hand.
'Thank you yet again,' she said easily, and took the glass, raised it to her lips, and swallowed it down. It burnt her throat and hit her empty stomach like a fire ball. She coughed and spluttered, the glass wavering precariously in her grasp.
He took it from her hand and smacked her on the back with some force. 'That was twenty-year-old cognac, meant to be savoured, not sloshed down like water,' he informed her drily, lowering his muscular length down beside her on the sofa.
'I r
ealise that now,' she said curtly when her coughing fit had subsided enough for her to speak. She glanced sideways at him. He had changed—he was leaner and harder, she thought. But considering that he was now almost forty he looked remarkably good. But then he had been a mature male when she had met him whereas she had been a girl. She knew she had changed more than he had; from twenty-one to nearly twenty-five was a big jump from a girl to a mature woman and mother.
He was wearing an immaculately tailored grey pinstripe suit, a white shirt and a silk tie in muted grey stripes—conservative to his fingertips. But it did not stop the powerful force of his sexuality hitting her just as hard as it had all those years ago the first time she had seen him. The old, familiar ache in her stomach, the rapid rise of her pulse—nothing had changed.
Justin had stopped patting her back, but whether by accident or design his long arm lay along the back of the sofa almost but not quite touching her shoulders; for a second she was tempted to relax back against him and pour out her desperate fear for their son.
'So, Zoe--- ' his smile was sardonic '—what are youdoing here? I can't believe it's because you finally missed me,' he drawled cynically.
'No. I was passing through London and I thought it might be nice to look you up. I called your chambers and they said you had left.' She forgot her own troubles for a moment, intrigued to know what had happened to her husband in the past few years. 'Why, Justin? I thought you were all set to become a judge.'
'I seem to remember you thought a lot of things about me, Zoe—none of them true, and I find your presence here today incredible to say the least.' His aura of hospitality vanished in a flash. His dark eyes narrowed assessingly on her small face. 'Cut the old pals act, Zoe, and give me the real reason for your visit,' he commanded arrogantly. 'I'm a busy man; I have no time for games.'
'Perhaps I thought we could be friends—we were once,' she said lightly. She could hardly blurt out that she had hated him for the past four years, she thought wryly, especially when she was planning on getting him into bed.
'You want to be my friend?' His eyes hardened. 'Now, why, I wonder, do I find that so difficult to believe?' He smiled at her mockingly over the rim of his glass and she felt a wave of heat surge up her cheeks. Deceit did not come easily to her.
'I know my appearing out of the blue like this must be a shock to you,' she offered. Gathering her scattered wits about her, she made a concentrated effort to disarm him. She turned slightly towards him and, fixing him with her dazzling blue eyes, continued, 'But in the past few years I have grown and matured a little, I hope, and it seems pointless for the two of us to be enemies.'
She forced a casual smile and deliberately lowered her tone. 'We did share a lot together.' She lifted one shoulder languidly against the beautiful blue jersey, exaggerating her cleavage. She saw his eyes flick down to her breasts and quickly away, and her heart leapt; she was getting to him, she knew.
'We had some fun,' she went on. Her knee brushed his thigh and she felt him tense. Heady with success, she ploughed on. 'And I'm sure Uncle Bertie would turn in his grave if he knew his two favourite people couldn't even speak to each other.'
She felt guilty using her uncle but desperate need called for desperate measures, and nothing was sacred in the fight for her son's life.
'Interesting and succinctly argued, my dear Zoe. You have grown up.' His arrogant glance trailed from the silky main of pale blonde hair down to where the low V of her dress exposed the tantalising curve of her firm breasts. 'I find I rather like the idea of you and me as friends—much more civilised,' he opined, with a hint of mocking amusement in his deep brown eyes.
'Yes, yes, it is,' she agreed, grateful for his easy compliance while not questioning it. His arm around the back of the sofa fell to her shoulders, and her stomach tightened in revulsion at his touch. Or was it revulsion?
'Good, I'm glad we agree, and it is good to see you.' He smiled lazily. 'It must be almost four years—we have a lot to catch up on.' Idly his long fingers massaged her shoulder, but her reaction was anything but idle. She tensed as she felt the old familiar ache ignite deep inside her, and his thigh brushing hers made her catch her breath.