And maybe she could have kept going if he hadn’t made the crack about her intimacy issues. A woman could only take so much.
“Let me clear up an apparent misunderstanding, William,” she said. “I wasn’t seeing you as a client. As far as I was concerned, our relationship was personal.”
“Of course it was.”
He’d switched his tone of voice with the agility of a trained actor. He sounded soothing and reassuring now. He came out from behind his desk and moved toward her. Instinctively she tightened her grip on the doorknob.
“I told myself your deep concern about my intimacy issues was a sign that you cared about me,” she said. “It was irritating, but I believed that you meant well. In fact, you might even have been correct with the diagnosis.”
He came to a halt in front of her and smiled a modest smile.
“Well, intimacy issues are my specialty, darling,” he said. “But if you’re not ready to discuss them, we can wait.”
“Here’s the thing, William. I wasn’t looking for therapy when we met. I was hoping for a serious, meaningful relationship. But now I know for a fact that you aren’t any good at relationships.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ll try to keep this simple. You are a lying, deceitful asshole.”
William looked as if he had been poleaxed. “What has happened to you?”
“Data happened,” she said.
“What?”
“I’m a businesswoman, remember? I thrive on data. I asked an investigator to look into your background.”
“What?”
The look of horror on his face would have been entertaining in other circumstances.
“Don’t take it personally, it’s routine for me.” She smiled. “I always commission a background check on my dates if things look like they might get serious. I was a bit late getting around to ordering the research on you because I’ve been so busy dealing with my grandmother’s estate. But the report came in this morning, and let’s just say that it doesn’t make you look like the kind of man I want to date.”#p#分页标题#e#
“Are you crazy?”
“Maybe. But that is no longer your problem.”
She started to open the door, but he moved much faster than she had expected and planted one hand against the wooden panel. When she tugged on the door she discovered that he was stronger than he looked. So much for judging a man by his size.
The trapped sensation threatened to explode through her. She fought it with logic. She was in no immediate danger. William’s receptionist was a few feet away in the reception area. Even more reassuring was the knowledge that her own personal hired gun, Jack Rayner, was in the hall outside the office, waiting for her. As far as she had been able to determine, Jack didn’t actually carry a gun, but he was definitely on her payroll.
She was not alone. She was not trapped.
“We both know it’s in your best interests to let me leave quietly,” she said. “You don’t want a scene. You will only make yourself look like a fool and worse if you actually try to keep me here by force. Think of your professional image.”
“You can’t hurl accusations around the way you just did and then walk out,” he snarled. “You owe me an explanation for this wild talk.”
“All right, here’s what I know about you, William. You took advantage of your position as a trusted therapist to seduce at least two of your clients in the past year.”
He flushed a dull, angry red. “That’s a lie. Who told you that?”
“Both women were married at the time you seduced them. Their husbands were also coming to you for counseling. Do you know what that makes you, William? It makes you a real bastard. If the women ever came forward, your career would go down in flames.”
“I don’t know who you hired to dig up dirt on me, but I can assure you the accusations are false.”
“How many female clients have you seduced? I know of at least two. But that’s definitely enough to suggest a pattern. Shall I ask my investigator to keep digging?”
“A client’s files are confidential. Your investigator had no right to hack into them.”
“Relax. He didn’t hack into any files. He just started asking questions. Here’s the thing about affairs, William. They never stay secret. Sooner or later someone always talks.”
He seized her arm, his fingers biting through the fabric of her dark blue blazer.
“Listen to me,” he said, his voice low and harsh. “I was providing therapy to those two clients. They needed to know they were still sexually attractive so that they would have the courage to realize that divorce was the correct decision. There was nothing personal about the relationships, certainly not on my end.”