‘You should’ve told me about Angie,’ Elvi countered without hesitation. ‘She’s much more relevant to this conversation than any we could have about Joel. Joel and I have only ever been friends. He’s the big brother I never had.’
‘Only it’s obvious that he cherishes far from brotherly feelings for you,’ Xan derided, his lean, strong face revealing not an ounce of discomfiture at her reference to his former girlfriend.
‘He said he does but I still find that hard to believe,’ Elvi confided, shaking her head in amazement. ‘I have to admit that I didn’t notice anything different in the way he treated me—’
Xan’s wide sensual mouth quirked at that admission. ‘You’re not vain and you wouldn’t have been looking for it. I saw how shocked you were. If I hadn’t I would have been wondering if you had been involved in some relationship with him behind my back.’
Elvi’s temper stirred at that insinuation and she lifted her chin and gave him a defiant look, her cheeks reddening. ‘Surely you could hardly have wondered that when you became my first lover?’ she dared. ‘Please don’t try to use that as an excuse for the violence you employed.’
‘I’m not looking for an excuse. I’m not sorry I hit him,’ Xan asserted immediately, springing upright to tower over her, the fine fabric of his tailored suit pulling against his strong muscular thighs and wide taut shoulders, distracting her when she least wanted to be distracted.
‘There was absolutely no need or excuse for violence,’ Elvi declared.
His lean bronzed features were taut and hard as he helped himself to a drink at the integral bar. ‘He crossed a line,’ he spelt out coldly. ‘You’re my wife. It was our wedding day. No man would listen in silence when another man threw a challenge of that nature at him.’
‘Joel did not challenge you!’ Elvi proclaimed in heated disagreement.
An ebony brow skated up. ‘It wasn’t a challenge when Joel said he would be waiting to catch you when I messed up?’
Elvi stiffened and flushed. ‘That was just one of those silly things a man says when he’s trying to save face. You should’ve ignored it—’
‘Consider me punching Joel as one of those silly things a man does when he’s angry,’ Xan advised lethally. ‘Your compassion for him is misplaced—’
‘No, it’s not!’ Elvi protested. ‘I felt horribly guilty when he said he loved me because I felt that I should’ve noticed something. I wished I’d told him about you, for a start, but I didn’t tell him about you because of the way our relationship started...the arrangement...we agreed.’
A faint line of colour scored Xan’s killer cheekbones, the distaste with which she whispered those two explanatory words hitting him hard. ‘Even when I wish I could, I can’t change the past, Elvi,’ he breathed in a driven undertone.
‘No, but you can ensure you don’t plough in and pun
ch one of my friends again over something you overheard in a private conversation. Joel went too far but you went in fists flying and there was no need for it,’ she told him stiffly.
‘There was every need. Now he knows his boundaries but, since the violence upset you so much, I can assure you that it won’t happen again,’ Xan conceded grimly.
Only a little soothed, Elvi threw her head high. ‘And you said I was yours,’ she reminded him doggedly. ‘I’m not. Putting a ring on my finger doesn’t transform me into property.’
‘You are mine,’ Xan delivered in contradiction. ‘Mine in a way no other woman has ever been.’
‘Angie?’ Elvi queried helplessly.
Xan compressed his lips. ‘I didn’t marry Angie or conceive a child with her.’
‘But you didn’t intend to do either of those things with me,’ Elvi pointed out flatly.
Xan merely shrugged a dismissive big shoulder. ‘Angie was my first love. We met at university. I fell hard for her,’ he admitted harshly, his lean, strong face grim. ‘I knew she was a material girl but it still didn’t occur to me that if my prospects appeared to go downhill, she would choose money over me. There were rumours even before my father’s death that his company was in trouble. Angie left me the same day the accountant confirmed that the family fortune was gone. She already had another man in her sights and within months she had married him and moved abroad.’
‘You had a lucky escape,’ Elvi told him staunchly. ‘In the light of her behaviour why on earth did you make such a fuss of her at your sister’s wedding?’
His spectacular bone structure pulled taut, amber-gold eyes shielded by his black lashes. ‘I had to let you go. I was very much in the wrong dragging you into my bed in the first place and the only possible recompense I could make, after I discovered the extent of your innocence, was to let you return to your life,’ he framed grittily. ‘I should have let you go free that first day but I still wanted you too much. On Thira, wanting you, needing you to that extent freaked me out. Flirting with Angie gave me an escape route and forced me to set you free and I didn’t have to tell you any lies—’
Elvi was stunned, listening in shaken silence to that unexpected confession because she had not appreciated how deep Xan’s guilt over making her his mistress went. ‘You make everything so complicated. You were behaving like one of those men who deliberately treats a woman badly to ensure that she breaks things off and saves him the trouble of doing it,’ she mumbled in bemusement.
To be fair to her, her brain was working on more than one thought train. She was still thinking about Xan’s surprising admission that needing her to such an extent had seriously worried him, which suggested to her that Xan had been feeling something more than lust for her, something strong enough to ignite his fear of a deeper commitment.
‘But I’ve got you now,’ Xan pointed out with unashamed satisfaction as he closed a powerful hand over hers and tugged her up out of her seat. ‘I won’t be treating you badly because I definitely don’t want you to leave me—’
‘You’re sure of that?’ Elvi checked. ‘No more Angies or major affairs lurking in your past?’
‘Not one. She burned me too badly. I protected myself after that,’ Xan confessed huskily, his attention locking to Elvi’s ripe pink mouth with smouldering intensity. That fast, he was aroused and aching for her.