‘Did you even listen to what I just said?’
‘You already know where I stand on that issue,’ Sergio breathed in a driven undertone. ‘Maybe you need to forgive yourself for what you did before you can come to terms with it. But right at this moment we have something more immediate to deal with—’
Her cheekbones flushed with annoyance, Kathy flew to her feet. ‘I can’t believe you just said that to me!’
An expression of hard resolve was stamped on Sergio’s lean, darkly handsome features. ‘You made a mistake when you were young and you had no family to support you. Many teenagers have made similar mistakes, put them behind them and gone on to live law-abiding lives just as you have done. You should be proud of that achievement.’
‘Stuff the pep talk! There’s only one little problem—I didn’t make that mistake in the first place!’ Kathy fired back at him. ‘You’ve never even let me tell you what happened.’
‘You avoid the subject like the plague.’
Kathy froze in surprise. She was dismayed that her desire to stay away from a controversial issue during their honeymoon had given him that misleading impression. And a heartbeat later she was furious with herself for being so craven.
‘Don’t treat me like your enemy. I’m trying to help you,’ Sergio spelt out grimly.
Kathy compressed bloodless lips. ‘I know.’
‘Will you agree to the statement?’ Sergio demanded.
Kathy turned as pale as a martyr at the stake. ‘No, never.’
Sergio dealt her a forbidding appraisal. ‘This problem will run and run. It won’t go away. It has to be dealt with.’
The expectant silence that stretched was like an icy hand trailing down her taut spine, but she defied that intimidation. Her apple-green eyes alight with resolve, she tilted her chin. ‘But not like this. Not with me making a fake confession and a fake apology for something I didn’t do. I served my full sentence because I wouldn’t lie and express remorse for someone else’s crime.’
Sergio surveyed her with cold, hard censure in his challenging gaze. The trauma of that moment made her stop breathing. Without another word, he turned on his heel and strode out of the room. Pulling in a jagged breath, she collapsed down on a seat and stared into space. What if this costs me my marriage? What if I lose him? Her mind was awash and adrift on terrified thoughts and fears.
It didn’t help that she could see his point. He had decided she was guilty at a very early stage of their relationship when he hardly knew her, and he was as stubborn as a mule. He had even got as far as explaining her criminal behaviour to his own satisfaction—youthful mistake, no family backup. In trying circumstances, he had not voiced a single word of blame or complaint. And now he was engaging in what he had called damage limitation in an effort to protect what little remained of her reputation. Determined to keep her safe from the paparazzi, he had marooned her on his yacht. He was doing what came most naturally to him: taking charge, making decisive moves to handle the crisis and trying to protect her, as well. But instead of being grateful for his advice, she was being unreasonable and refusing it. She dashed the tears from her eyes with a trembling hand.
An evening meal was served in the dining room. Although the table was set for two and she waited and the steward hovered in readiness, Sergio didn’t appear. She ate hardly anything and at her request was shown to a huge stateroom. Desperate to fill the time, she ran a bath in the amazing splendour of the marble bathroom. She had only lowered herself into the warm scented water when the door she had forgotten to shut opened wider to disclose Sergio.
A dark shadow of stubble roughening his hard jaw line, black hair tousled, his shirt hanging loose from his jeans, he had so much raw bad-boy appeal he made her heart bounce like a ball inside her chest. As she sat up in haste, hugging her knees to her breasts, he regarded her in nerve-racking silence.
‘I’m sorry…’ he said grittily.
Those two words were like the blade of a knife slicing between her ribs, as she didn’t know what was coming next. Even worse where he was concerned, she was in negative mode and expecting bad news. What was he sorry for? An inability to live with a woman publicly branded a thief?
Sergio shrugged a broad shoulder. His gorgeous tawny eyes were strained. ‘I don’t know what to say to you.’
Kathy was frozen there in the bath like an ice statue, the gooseflesh of fear breaking out on her skin and a clammy sensation in her tummy.
‘You see it was your fatal flaw,’ he added incomprehensibly.
‘What was?’
‘I’ve always had this theory that everyone has a fatal flaw. Yours was a criminal record,’ he shared. ‘It all connected, it made sense—’