Mistress By Blackmail(61)
He threw his head back and swallowed the last of his liquor. Then he eyed her. Cold steel with not an ounce of give. “It isn’t pertinent.”
Her heart dropped when she met his gaze and heard his words. “It is.”
He set down the glass on the cabinet with cool precision. Leaned on it as if he were unperturbed by anything around him. Folded his arms across his broad chest with admirable composure.
“It is,” she said once more, trying to batter a wedge in the formidable wall he was building around him.
“You want me to confess about my lovers? My experiences with them?” His lip curled with dismissal. “So you can dissect me? Understand me?”
“N-no, I only want—”
“Know what I feel and think,” he continued.
“I only want to—”
“Understand how to manipulate me?”
Each word sliced her like a steel blade. Her throat tightened. Her dreams for them dwindled. “I just want to help you.”
“I do not need help.” His voice clipped with icy pride. “I do not need you.”
The clutch in her throat moved up, into her eyes. “You n-n-needed me last night.”
“Did you think it was special?” he jibed.
“Yes.” She was sticking her neck out, confronting her fear of trusting him. But she had to. The memory of her mum, of what she’d become for a man was no match for the surging, spreading love she felt for this wounded man standing before her. Her love for him compelled her to say the one word that would give him a weapon if he so desired. “Last night was very special.”
He desired. Not her. The weapon. “Then you were wrong.”
She stared at him, no more words in her.
“It was nothing more than sex.” His face was tight, his gaze fierce. “Nothing more than taking my brother’s leavings for a night. A brother who apparently is the worst lover on earth. Your lack of skills says that clearly.”
A short cut of anguish burst from her mouth.
“It was not what I’d expected. Was it an act, I wonder? Or did you merely let your other lovers take you without your participation?”
The breath hurt her lungs as she gasped.
However, it didn’t stop him from slicing her one more time.
“Never mind,” he continued. “I don’t need to know since it won’t happen again.”
The last, tiny piece of her heart bled to death. There really wasn’t anything more to say, was there?
She lifted her chin to meet his stony eyes with her tear-filled ones.
And then she walked out of the room.
Chapter 13
He’d told her far too much.
Marcus paced around the long terrace that wound around the entire penthouse. The cold wind whipped the snow and sleet on his face, wet droplets sliding down his cheeks like tears. Yet the burn of their fight heated his skin.
He’d given her too much. He’d given her something of himself.
A part of his past.
A part of his soul.
The realization roared its horror inside. Never, not for years and years, had he revealed anything like he’d revealed to her. Sweat broke out over the entire length of his body. The sweat of fear.
“Dio,” he muttered. “Io sono un pazzo.”
Si, he was a fool of all fools. To babble on about his childhood. To give her even a slice of his past. To try and explain or express anything about his emotions.
To show her a piece of a wounded heart he’d long ago thought dead.
Marcus clutched the icy railing and leaned down to take in the snow-laden street below. Taking in a deep breath of freezing air, he felt the temperature of his body cool.
But not his long-denied emotions and heart.
He still wanted her with desperation. This filled him with disgust yet the knowledge beat in his loins. In his awakened heart. He’d walked into the damn kitchen and had succeeded in hanging onto his determination to stay away from her for…what? Ten seconds? If she hadn’t said no, they would be in bed right now. Of that he was sure.
He glared at the city lights. “Stick to what you decided to do, pazzo.”
Stay away from her. Keep things cool and distant. Pay attention to what was important. The wedding. The business deal.
“Cooking for me,” he scoffed. “Madonna in cielo.”
What should have struck him with revulsion had instead struck a chord deep in his dead heart. The sight of her standing by his stove, with her bright-red jumper and jeans hugging her petite figure, had brought forth a welling emotion.
Not one he cared to define.
Pushing away from the railing, he paced down the terrace once more.
Crazy. He was crazy to want to know what she was thinking. Why the hell had he suddenly developed this mad need to see inside her brain? See what made her tick? Why of all women was it this little sprite who promoted this insane desire to know everything about her?