Jenny dragged some air into her lungs and clutched Daisy against her, taking reassurance from her solid warmth.

Now that the moment had finally come, she felt breathless with panic.

Whatever had possessed her to come here? What madness had made her think that confronting Alex Westerling was a good idea?

Suddenly she felt like running but her legs were wobbling so badly that she couldn’t have moved even if there’d been anywhere to run to. And there wasn’t. He was blocking the only exit.

Moving at a leisurely pace that served to intensify her anxiety, the driver stepped out of the car and removed his sunglasses. And for the first time in her life, Jenny set eyes on Alex Westerling.

She stared at him stupidly.

She’d seen pictures, of course. He was one of the Westerling triplets and she’d seen his picture everywhere, along with those of his two sisters, and because she’d seen his picture so often she’d assumed that she knew exactly what he looked like. But she realised now that she’d somehow managed to merge the pictures with her own contempt for the man and in the process had managed to distort the truth.

And the truth was that the man standing in front of her was the embodiment of all the most extreme female fantasies.

The sudden increase in her heart rate came as an unpleasant shock.

Handsome didn’t begin to describe him. She’d met handsome men before and none of them had had the physical impact of Alex Westerling. Everything about him was exaggerated perfection—his shoulders were unreasonably broad, his eyes a startling blue and his bone structure more striking than any she’d seen before.

He was achingly, spectacularly good-looking—if you liked arrogant, powerful men who thought they owned the world, Jenny told herself quickly, trying to get her reaction under control.

He might be good-looking but he was still the heartless man who’d ruined her sister’s life.

And for the first time she was beginning to see how it could have happened. How her sister could have been led to behave in such a wanton and impulsive way. It wasn’t just his immense wealth and aristocratic connections that set Alex Westerling apart from other men—it was the raw, almost untamed masculinity that surrounded him like a cloak, an aura of power strong enough to make the most worldly of women act irrationally—and Chloe had certainly not been worldly.

He locked the car with a flick of his wrist and strolled towards her, his jacket slung casually over one broad shoulder.

Brilliant blue eyes focused on Jenny without a flicker of interest, as if he was totally accustomed to having strange females holding babies waiting on his doorstep.

Jenny felt her knees shake. She was hopeless with men like him. She never knew what to say and felt totally out of her depth. Alex Westerling was someone who mixed with models and actresses on a regular basis and she knew he wasn’t going to waste a second glance on a plain, flat-chested mouse like her.