Dark Angel

‘What…I…deserved? Are you telling me that I deserved to have you go behind my back to carry on with my stepsister?’ Kerry gasped strickenly.

‘Don’t you understand anything yet?’ Luciano demanded with derisive force. ‘Nothing happened between Rochelle and me that night or on any other occasion while we were engaged.’

‘But you lied about being there that night!’ Kerry almost shouted back at him in her distress.

Luciano subjected her to a withering appraisal. ‘I was sick and tired of the way you reacted every time Rochelle came anywhere near me. I drove over to Heathlands to see your father. Rochelle said he was due home. I waited about fifteen minutes and then decided it would make more sense to see him at the office. I knew you’d go into a real mood if I told you that I’d seen her, so I took the easy way out and chose not to mention it.’

Kerry was trembling but her face was stiff with discomfiture. He was forcing her to remember how much friction her insecurity over Rochelle had caused between them and how her own constant need for reassurance had taxed his patience. ‘It couldn’t have happened like that—’

‘It did.’ The very indifference with which Luciano spoke shook her faith in her own conviction of his guilt. ‘But it hardly matters now.’

But to Kerry it still mattered a great deal, and his explanation plunged her into confusion. Was it possible that Rochelle had lied to her? That it could all have been lies? That Luciano had decided not to mention his visit to Heathlands simply because he knew that she would have made a fuss when she learned that he had seen Rochelle there? She refused to believe that, refused to credit that she was listening to anything more than a clever story.

‘You o-owe me the truth…’ Kerry stammered in turmoil.

‘I owe you nothing but I’m not about to admit to something I didn’t do just to make you feel better,’ Luciano countered with lethal cool.

‘It’s not a matter of making me f-feel better!’ Tears of frustration flooding her eyes without warning, Kerry spun away, fighting to regain control of the tempestuous emotions he had unleashed. But it was as if he had yanked the very ground from beneath her feet. She needed him to admit that he had been unfaithful. To make her feel better? A choking sob clogged up her throat but mercifully remained there. If she had to face the unimaginable and terrifying alternative; that she had ditched him when he had done nothing, how could she live with that? How could she ever learn to live with that?

‘What…about….that…cuff-link?’ she pressed in near desperation.

‘I was always losing them.’ His attention welded to her bent head and pinched profile, Luciano was rigid with angry tension. He did not want to hear her stammer or see her tears. He resented being made to feel like a bully when all he wanted to do was get on with business. ‘The fact that your stepsister knew that we weren’t lovers? I imagine that she knew you well enough to make an accurate guess. Now, let’s leave the subject there.’

‘I can’t…’ Kerry admitted jaggedly as she lifted her head, bright blue eyes full of anguished appeal.

‘You must,’ Luciano traded with icy cool. ‘We have more important issues to deal with.’

Kerry could not dredge her mind as fast as he could from the past. ‘Luciano—’

‘To save us both from extending this meeting, I’ll cut to the base line. The repossession order on the castle will proceed.’

Kerry stared at him in shock. ‘You’re not even giving me a chance to—?’

‘To what?’ Leaning back against the edge of his fancy desk, Luciano surveyed her with grim golden eyes and a cynical slant to his beautiful mouth. ‘To witter on about great-uncles and the like and try to make me feel guilty about sins I never committed? Let’s not pretend that you came here today with any intent other than to try and make me feel bad. Business is business, Kerry. Wake up and join the real world.’

As he spoke, Kerry had become so pale that the sunlight coming through the windows made her hair glitter like fire illuminating snow. For a minute, he thought she might be on the brink of passing out on him. His aggressive jawline clenched as he sensed his own readiness to move forward and catch her. No, he wasn’t about to back down. Kerry had the fragile build of a fairy in a child’s story book, and could not help looking pathetic when she got bad news. But he was no longer the stupid bastard who had once been possessed by a need to protect her from every hurt, was he? So why the hell did he feel sick to his stomach?

Utilising every atom of courage she possessed, Kerry flung her head back, copper and russet ringlets cascading back from her taut cheekbones. ‘I already live in the real world. I wouldn’t have come here to try and persuade you to change your mind if I didn’t. All I’m asking for is more time—’

‘Kerry…’ Luciano trailed his heated gaze from the fiery gleam of her hair just as the pink tip of her tongue snaked out to wet her full lower lip. Desire exploded like a burning flare in him and ricocheted through every hard angle of his big, powerful frame. He wanted her but only on his terms. What his terms would be he had no idea but he had no intention of allowing lust to interfere with business. ‘I won’t change my mind.’

‘Do you realise how many people are depending on the castle to give them a living?’ Kerry prompted sickly.

While Luciano shrugged, he took note of that point. It would be foolish to antagonise the locals before he had even decided what to do with the castle. In the short term, he would instruct that staff should be retained and that any business-related arrangements dependent on the estate continue without interference.