Detained

Neither was she. She sat down abruptly. She felt sick to the stomach. Her man from Tara was Will Parker. This man’s brother. Had to be. Though they looked nothing alike. She’d spent the weekend sharing orgasms and trading truths and dares with Will Parker. Lying, bastard scum. No wonder he wasn’t available.

She got to her feet again. “I think Will is here. I think he flew in on QF129 on Friday night.” She was yelling and she knew she needed to calm down, but she couldn’t believe it.

“Please lower your voice. Will’s movements are none of your concern, Ms Campbell. I can assure you he wasn’t flying anywhere,” said Peter.

“I think Will was detained by immigration on Friday—with me.”

“Ms Campbell,” said Peter, warning in his tone. “This meeting is over.”

Peter had moved behind his desk. Was he phoning security, was she going to be escorted out? Aileen was somewhere in the room. Darcy heard a door fly open.

“It’s not over till I get answers,” she shouted.

A familiar voice, slow and country, said her name for the first time. “Darcy.”

Peter snapped, “Stay out.”

And unexpectedly she was looking at Will Parker. Dirty blond, crooked nose, scarred chin. The boy from Tara, the man who’d learned from being beaten: the pirate, the liar, the seducer, the betrayer.

He walked into the room from a connecting office. He wore a pale blue dress shirt, one too many buttons undone, creased like he’d slept in it, no tie, suit pants and shiny shoes. She wanted to claw his eyes out. She wanted to throw herself in his arms.

Peter was saying, “Leave it, Will. I’ve got this. Go back to your office.” And Will Parker was looking at her as though the bottom might fall out of his world. He was right. She was going to rip it out.

He’d be smart to listen to Peter, but he didn’t acknowledge him or Aileen. It was like they were the only two people in existence. He kept coming across the room. Duplicity in motion. He said her name again. He wasn’t the man she’d spent hours naked with, the man she’d made clutch her like she was air he needed to breathe. He was a master manipulator.

He moved inexorably towards her. Somewhere a phone rang, Aileen’s. Then Peter was on Will, grabbing his arm, trying to block his advance. Will shook him off and stepped around him. When he was close enough to touch, Darcy shifted, leaned away, made a fist and punched him.

The sound of her knuckles connecting with his jaw was like a car crash.

Pain exploded in Darcy’s hand and inside her eyes. She spun away from him, tucking her hand into her chest, gasping at the shock of what she’d done. She’d never hit anyone and now she’d hit one of Australia’s richest men.

He could’ve stopped it. His arm came up, he saw it coming. He could’ve sidestepped. He walked into it. He let her hit him. She could hear Will yelling, “Stand back, get away, get ice.” He was somewhere behind her and she wanted to hit him again.

At the airport she’d told him she was a Sydney Herald journalist. She’d thought he’d worked out who she was when he’d installed her in the Palace Suite, but he’d known who she was right from the start.

Immigration hadn’t taken her passport. There was nothing wrong with her visa. The detention wasn’t real. Waves of revulsion rolled through her stomach. Bile rose in her throat. She doubled over to stop herself from vomiting. Aileen was at her side, handing her an icepack. She wrapped it around her hand. The cold gave her something to focus on.

“Darcy, are you all right?” It was Will. He needed to shut up, he’d said enough. “Darcy, talk to me.”

That was the last instruction Will Parker was ever going to give her. She turned towards him. “You bastard! You set me up.”

There was a red mark on his jaw where she’d hit him. But the intensity in his eyes was what arrested her. She read defiance and guilt and, underneath those emotions, the slow build of anger. She was not going to cry. He was not going to make her cry, or do anything ever again.

Peter was stalking about the room. “Will, are you all right?”

Will looked at him. “Get out.” His eyes found Aileen, “Both of you.”

Neither of them moved. Peter said, “I’m not going anywhere. We all need to calm down. Darcy, are you hurt?”

“Back off, Pete.”

“She just assaulted you.”

“I deserved it.”

“It’s assault.”

“She could probably have me for rape.”