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Exasperation finally had Bella’s head lifting, her glare ry ‘I didn’t actually leave Andrei, Muether I broke up with hi with other wo with me’
‘So you said But truly, Bella, all seriously wealthyeyes And Andrei isn’t just wealthy He’s a billionaire many times over I read on the internet that he’s just opened the most luxurious hotel in the world in Istanbul Just think what kind of life you could have as his wife He doesn’t care about those other girls It’s you he pursued and wanted You he would have proposed to, in the end’
‘No, he wouldn’t have, Mu kind’
‘Which is why I advised you to get pregnant He would have married you then A proud itimate child’
Bella shook her head, thinking ruefully she should have told her mother the truth about Andrei Yes, he was proud but was also totally selfish with absolutely no conscience He’d fallen in lust with her when he’d seen her on stage one night in New York, pursuing her quite ruthlessly—and roone to bed with hiht he loved her, and vice versa
Unfortunately, their sex life was not a great success Her fault, of course It was always her fault; all of her lovers over the years—and there’d been a lot less than the tabloids suggested—having grown bored with her after a relatively short while None of them could believe that she was actually quite shy in the bedrooin till she enty-one, and why it always took a very determined admirer to seduce her
When Bella had confronted Andrei with his unfaithfulness last year—his cavorting on the deck of his yacht with sos—he’d claimed that her lack of passion hy he had to have other wo to do all the erotic and exotic things he craved But he would put up with her being so a woman of her exquisite beauty on his arm in public He’d even offered to buy her an apartment in Paris, if she would overlook his other o out with him He’d actually been shocked when she’d told him their relationship—such as it as over Andrei was not used to rejection from the opposite sex
Of course, if Bella had told her mother all that, she would have said that she’d been a fool not to at least accept the apartment in Paris
She was indoht infuriating, with a rown up thinking Dolores onderful: a single ed fro holiday overseas; supposedly seduced by a married Swedish chap she’d met on the snowfields of Switzerland She’d refused to tell her disgusted parents the father’s name, refused to have an abortion, then refused to live under their roof by their rules Bella had admired that If it were true, that was She’d come to believe in recent times that ht not have been strictly true Still, it was true that Dolores had worked hard to give her daughter everything she’d needed She’d even e as a receptionist to pay for dance and singing lessons Though not with the kind of teacher she’d wanted for her talented Isabel
So when a new boss had arrived on the scene, an Italian ho’d been sent out to Sydney by his father to head the Australian branch of the family’s import business, Dolores had seen the answer to all her probleraphs Bella had seen, Dolores had been a very attractive woman back then Poor Alberto hadn’t stood a chance, and soon Dolores had acquired a husband able to provide everything for his new stepdaughter that Dolores had wanted Not only the best private tuition money could buy but also enrol arts
And the rest, as they said, was history
Bella looked at her mother and wished she didn’t still love the woman Impossible not to, she supposed She was her mother On top of that, she knew Dolores did love Bella back, even if she was a pain in the neck
‘Mu to Europe toto tell you where I’ alone Noant you to leave this room ASAP If you don’t, I will pick you up bodily and carry you out’ Which she could All those years of dancing had ht inches taller than her mother, who barely topped five feet Bella had obviously inherited her height and fair colouring from her Swedish father