Angels' Blood (Guild Hunter #1)(67)

He waved off her words as if they didn't matter. "I need to talk to you about your inheritance."

Elena's fist clenched. "You mean the trust my mother set up for me." She could've starved on the streets and Jeffrey wouldn't have given a damn.

Skin pulled taut over Jeffrey's cheekbones. "I suppose genetics do tell."

She was one step away from calling him a bastard but ironically, it was her mother's voice that held her back. Marguerite had brought her up to respect her father. Elena couldn't do that, but she could respect her mother's memory. "Thank God," she said, letting him take the insult as he would.

Swiveling, Jeffrey walked to the desk set below the windows on the other side of the room, his steps silent on the deep claret of the Persian carpet. "The trust matured on your twenty-fifth birthday."

"A bit late, aren't you?"

He picked up an envelope. "A letter was sent to you by the solicitors."

Elena recalled throwing the unopened piece of mail in the trash. She'd figured it for yet another attempt at coercing her into selling out the shares she'd inherited in the family firm-through her paternal grandfather, a man who'd actually seemed to love her. "They did a real knock-up job of following up."

"Don't try to pass off your own laziness on others." Walking back, he shoved the envelope into her hand. "The money's been deposited in an interest-bearing account under your name. The details are all there."

She didn't look down. "Why the personal touch?"

Pale gray eyes narrowed behind the spectacles. "Distasteful as I find your choice of occupation-"

"It's not a choice," she said coldly. "Remember?"

Silence that warned her to never again bring up that bloody day.

"As I was saying, regretful as your profession is, it does bring you into contact with some powerful people."

Her stomach soured. What the hell had she expected? She knew she meant nothing to her father. Still she'd come. Instead of lashing out as she might've done as a teenager, she kept her mouth shut, wanting to know exactly what it was he expected of her.

"You're in a position to help the family." A steely-eyed gaze. "Something you've never cared to do."

Her hand clenched on the envelope. "I'm only a hunter," she said, turning his words back on him. "What makes you think they treat me any better than you do?"

He didn't flinch. "I've been told you're spending considerable time with Raphael, that he may be open to suggestions that come from you."

She told herself he wasn't implying what she thought he was implying. Shaking inside, she met his eyes. "You'd whore out your own daughter?"

No change in his expression. "No. But if she's already doing it herself, I see no reason not to take advantage."

She felt herself go sheet white. Without a word, she turned, opened the door, and walked out. It slammed shut behind her. A second later, she heard something smash, the discordant splintering of crystal against brick. She halted, stunned at the thought that she'd evoked any kind of a response from the always controlled Jeffrey Deveraux.

"Ms. Deveraux?" Geraldine came running around the corner. "I heard . . ." Her voice trailed off uncertainly.

"I'd suggest you make yourself scarce for the next little while," Elena said, snapping out of her frozen state and heading toward the door. Jeffrey had probably lost it because she'd dared defy him, unlike the rest of his band of sycophants. It had had nothing to do with the fact that he'd called his daughter a whore to her face. "And, Gerry"-she turned at the door-"don't ever let him find out."

The assistant gave a jerky nod.

Elena had never been so grateful to be out in the noise of the city as she was that day. Not giving the door a backward look, she walked down the steps and away from the man who'd contributed his sperm to her creation. Her hand clenched again and she remembered the envelope. Forcing herself to calm down enough that she could think, she slit it open and pulled out the letter. This was her mother's legacy to her and she refused to let Jeffrey cheapen it.

The amount of money was small in the scheme of things-Marguerite's estate had been split equally between her two living daughters, and consisted of the money she'd made from the sale of her one-of-a-kind quilts. She'd never needed to use any of it because Jeffrey had insisted on giving her a huge allowance.

Masculine laughter, strong hands throwing her into the air.

Elena staggered under the impact of the memory, then brushed it aside-it was nothing more than wishful thinking. Her father had always been a stern disciplinarian who didn't know how to forgive. But, she was forced to admit, he had felt something for his Parisian wife-there had been that huge allowance, gifts of jewels on every occasion. Where had all those treasures gone? To Beth?

Elena didn't particularly care about their monetary value, but she would've liked to have just one thing that had once belonged to her mother. All she knew was that she'd come home one summer from boarding school and found every trace of Marguerite, Mirabelle, and Ariel gone from the house-including the quilt Elena had treasured since her fifth birthday. It was as if she'd imagined her mother, her older sisters.

Someone smashed into her shoulder. "Hey, lady! Get out of the f*cking way!" The lanky student turned to give her the finger.