Million-Dollar Love-Child

He smiled an arrogant, all-male smile that reflected his unshakeable self-confidence. ‘We both know you couldn’t get enough of me.’

She gasped, utterly humiliated by the picture he painted. ‘That was before I knew what an unfeeling, cold-hearted bastard you were!’ She broke off in horror, appalled by her rudeness and uncharacteristic loss of control. What had come over her? ‘I—I’m sorry, that was unforgivable—’

‘Don’t apologise for showing your true colours.’ Far from being offended, he looked mildly amused. ‘Believe it or not, I prefer honesty in a woman. It saves all sorts of misunderstanding.’

She lifted a hand to her forehead in an attempt to relieve the ache between her temples.

It had been so hard for her to come here. So hard to brace herself to tell him the things that he needed to know. And so far none of it had gone as planned.

She had things that had to be said and she just didn’t know how to say them. Instead of talking about the present, they were back in the past and that was the one place she didn’t want to be. Unless she could use the past to remind him of what they’d once shared—

‘You cared, Luc,’ she said softly, her hands dropping to her sides in a helpless gesture. ‘I know you cared. I felt it.’

She appealed to the man that she’d once believed him to be.

‘I was very turned on by the fact I was your first lover,’ he agreed in a smooth tone. ‘In fact I was totally knocked out by the novelty of the experience. Naturally I was keen for you to enjoy it too. You were very shy and it was in both our interests for you to be relaxed. I did what needed to be done and said what needed to be said.’

Her cheeks flamed with embarrassment. In other words he was so experienced with women that he knew exactly which buttons to press. In her case he’d sensed that she needed closeness and affection. It hadn’t meant anything to him.

‘So you’re saying it was all an act?’ The pain inside her blossomed. ‘Being loving and gentle was just another of your many seduction methods?’

He shrugged as if he could see no problem with that. ‘I didn’t hear you complaining.’

She closed her eyes. How could she have been so gullible? Yes, she’d been a virgin but that was no excuse for bald stupidity. Sixteen years of living with a man like her father should have taught her everything she needed to know about men. He’d moved from one woman to another, never making a commitment, never giving anything. Just using. Using and discarding. Her mother had walked out just after Kimberley’s fourth birthday and from that moment on she had a series of ‘Aunties’, women who came into her father’s life and then left with a volley of shouts and jealous accusations. Kimberley had promised herself that she was never, ever going to let a man treat her the way her father treated women. She was going to find one man and she was going to love him.

And then she’d met Luc and for a short, crazy period of time she’d thought he was that man. She’d ignored his reputation with women, ignored any similarities to her father, ignored her promise to herself.

She’d broken all her own rules.

And she’d paid the price.

‘What did I ever do to make you treat me so cruelly?’ Suddenly she needed to understand. Wanted to know what had gone wrong—how she could have made such an enormous mistake. ‘Why did you need other women?’

‘I’ve never been a one woman kind of guy,’ he admitted without a trace of apology or regret, ‘and you’re all pretty much the same, as you went on to prove with your truly awesome spending spree.’

She flinched. This would be a perfect time to confess. To tell him exactly why she’d needed the money so badly. She took a deep breath and braced herself for the truth. ‘I spent your money because I needed it for something very important,’ she said hesitantly, ‘and before I tell you exactly what, I want you to know that I did try and talk to you at the time but you wouldn’t see me, and—’

‘Is this conversation going anywhere?’ He glanced at his watch in a gesture of supreme boredom. ‘I’ve already told you that your spending habits don’t interest me. And if you’d needed funds then maybe you should have tapped your other lover for the cash.’

She gasped. ‘I didn’t have other lovers. You know I didn’t.’

There’d only ever been him. Just him.

‘I don’t know anything of the kind.’ His eyes hardened. ‘On two occasions I returned home to be told that you were “out”.’

‘Because I was tired of lying in our bed waiting for you to come home from some other woman’s arms!’ She exploded with exasperation, determined to defend herself. ‘Yes, I went out! And you just couldn’t stand that, could you? And why not? Because you always have to be the one in control.’

‘It wasn’t about control.’ His gaze simmered, dark with all the volatility of his exotic heritage. ‘You didn’t need to leave. You were mine.’

And he thought that wasn’t about control?

‘You make me sound like a possession!’ Her voice rang with pain and frustration. She was trying to say what needed to be said but each time she tried to talk about the present they seemed to end up back in the past. ‘You treat every woman like a possession! To be used and discarded when you’re had enough! That’s why our relationship never would have worked. You’re ruthless, self-seeking and totally without morals or thought for other people. You expected me to lie there and wait for you to finish partying and come home!’

‘Instead of which, you decided to expand your sexual horizons,’ he said coldly and she resisted the temptation to leap at him and claw at his handsome face.

How could such an intelligent, successful man be so dense about women? He couldn’t see past the end of his nose.

‘You went out, so I went out.’ Wisps of hair floated across her face and she brushed them away with an impatient hand. ‘What was I supposed to do when you weren’t there?’

‘You were supposed to get some rest,’ he delivered in silky tones, ‘and wait for me to come home.’

Neanderthal man. She was expected to wait in the cave for the hunter to return.

Exasperated beyond belief, she resisted the temptation to walk out and slam the door. ‘This is the twenty-first century, Luc! Women vote. They run companies. They decide their own social lives.’

‘And they cheat on their partners.’ He gave a sardonic lift of his brows. ‘Progress, indeed.’

‘I did not cheat!’ She stared at him in outrage, wondering how such an intelligent man could be so dense when it came to relationships. She’d loved him so much. ‘You were the one photographed in a restaurant with another woman. Clearly I wasn’t enough for you.’ She gave a casual shrug and tried to keep the pain out of her voice. ‘Naturally I assumed that if you were out seeing other people then I could do the same. But I did not cheat!’

‘I don’t want the details.’

They were closing in on each other. A step here, a slight movement there.

‘Well, perhaps you should, instead of jumping to conclusions,’ she suggested shakily, ‘and if a sin was committed then it was yours, Luc. I was eighteen years old and yet you seduced me without even a flicker of conscience. And then you moved on without a flicker of conscience. Tell me—did you give it any thought? Before you took my virginity and wrecked my life, did you give it any thought?’

His dark gaze swept over her with naked incredulity. ‘You have been back in my life for five minutes and already you are snapping and snarling and hurling accusations. You were only too willing to be seduced, my flame-haired temptress, but if you’ve forgotten that fact then I’m happy to jog your memory.’ Without warning he closed lean brown fingers around her wrist and jerked her hard against him. The connection was immediate and powerful.

‘That first night, in the back of my car, when you wrapped that amazing body of yours around mine—’ his voice was a low, dangerous purr and the warmth of his breath teased her mouth ‘—was that not an invitation?’

The air around them crackled and sparked with tension.

She tugged at her wrist but he held her easily and she remembered just how much she’d loved that about him. His strength. His vibrant, undiluted masculinity. In fact she’d positively relished the differences between them. His dark male power to her feminine softness. Her good to his very, very bad.

He was so strong and she’d always felt incredibly safe when she was with him. At the beginning that had been part of the attraction. Particularly that first night, as he’d just reminded her. ‘I’d been attacked. I was frightened—’

And he’d rescued her. Using street fighting skills that didn’t go with the sleek dinner jacket he’d been wearing, he’d taken on six men and had extracted her with apparently very little damage to himself. As a tactic designed to impress a woman, it had proved a winner.

‘So you wanted comfort.’ His grip on her wrist tightened. ‘So when you slid on to my lap and begged me to kiss you, was that not an invitation? Or was that comfort too?’

Hot colour of mortification flooded her smooth cheeks. ‘I don’t know what happened to me that night—’

She’d taken one look at him and suddenly believed in fairy tales. Knights. Dragons. Maidens in distress. He was the one. Or so she’d thought—

‘You discovered your true self,’ he said roughly. ‘That’s what happened. So don’t accuse me of seducing you when we both know that I only took what you freely offered. You were hot for me and you stayed hot—’

‘I was innocent—’

His breath warmed her mouth and he gave a slow, sexy smile that made her heart thud hard against her chest. ‘You were desperate.’