‘Morgan was a long way from forty when he died,’ she supplied through numb lips.
Ari nodded. ‘According to his line manager, he asked for that clause to be amended in favour of receiving the double bonus and he never reinstated the original clause. Therefore, you are not entitled to receive funds.’
* * *
Ari watched her expression go from shock to disbelief to anger, then back to disbelief. She opened then shut her mouth. Then her gaze narrowed suspiciously.
‘Please tell me you’re not toying with me or making this up because...because of...’
‘For someone who seems intent on making me believe our incident is behind you, you seem to leap back to it at the slightest opportunity.’
‘I wasn’t... I just...I can’t believe Morgan would do that to his parents.’
To his parents. Not to her. The curious statement set off alarm bells in his brain. He didn’t like alarm bells. They reminded him that he’d refused to listen to them clanging long and hard in the years before his father’s real character had been brought to light.
They reminded him that in the end he’d lived in false hope that the father he’d looked up to wouldn’t attempt to throw him to the wolves to save himself.
‘You think that the husband you were so happy to betray was less than honest with you? Need I point out the irony there?’ he bit out more sharply than he wanted to, the memory of betrayal and devastation growing rawer by the minute.
‘I didn’t betray Morgan.’ Again an expression a lot like pain crossed her face. He hardened himself against it. Much like he’d hardened himself against thinking about her all the way through his meeting. A meeting he had barely been able to control because he hadn’t been able to tear his mind away from the fact that she was here, in his living space, touching his things, leaving the hypnotically seductive scent of her body all over the place.
Theos, what had he been thinking, offering her the use of his apartment when he could just as easily have sent her across the street to the luxury guest apartments they used for visiting executives? Because he hadn’t wanted to risk her strutting into another bar, catching the eye of another hungry predatory male and offering them a taste of what she’d offered him.
Stasi!
The admonition did nothing to lift his mood. ‘I have no interest in lying to you, nor do I take pleasure in prolonging this meeting. You came here seeking information. I’ve provided it. What you do with that information is now up to you. I suggest you come clean with your in-laws and find a way around it.’
Her eyes darkened further as she stared at him. ‘Find a way around it, just like that? You think it’s that easy?’
He shrugged. ‘I fail to see how any of this is my problem.’
She raised both hands and slid them through her long vibrant hair—hair she’d released from its tight bun at some point in the last few hours.
Ari found himself helplessly following the seductive ripple. Heat speared through him as he watched her pace to the window and back to where he stood, her agitated, breast-heaving breathing doing incredibly groin-hardening things to him.
She glared at him, the beginning of fire sparking those amazing green eyes. ‘Surely I should’ve been informed of this change in his contract since I stood to lose from the amendment?’ she railed at him.
The blatant statement of avarice made bitterness surge through him. Arion’s father had torn their family apart, ripped it from its very foundations. All because of greed for money, carnal pleasure and power.
In the three months since his last encounter with Perla, he’d tried to blot the chaotic memories her actions had brought from his mind. He’d told himself that reacting to her the way he had at Macdonald Hall was because he’d been caught on the raw.
But, watching her now, he felt the same insidious desire creeping through him, damning him for being weak and helpless against his body’s reaction to her.
When he’d finally been brought to justice, his father, although he hadn’t shown an ounce of contrition, had confessed that he hadn’t been able to help himself in the face of temptation.
A wave of despair washed over Ari now as he contemplated that perhaps he had a similar trait.
Hell, no!
But even that thought wasn’t enough to stop his gaze from dropping to the hectic rise and fall of Perla’s breasts as she paced his living room.
An image of her perfect rosy nipples and how they’d tasted in his mouth smashed through his mind.