‘And you’ve been trying to bed both of them! You’re a bastard, Dominic Thorne, and you can forget what I ever said about loving you! Right now I loathe and despise you, and I doubt that opinion will ever change!’ She flounced out of the bedroom, and continued on out of the apartment, hiring a taxi to take her home.
The drive to her father’s house seemed never-ending as she sat in hunched-up misery on the back seat of the taxi, her love and belief in Dominic in ruins about her feet. He had been using her, making her a pawn in his ugly game—and how easily she had fallen for it!
But never again, never again would she listen to his words of love or passion. If he could betray her father and Marie after having known them for the past ten years, then he would have no compunction about exploiting her own attraction to him. It must have been obvious to him from the first, and how useful it could have been to him. But she had ruined his plan, hadn’t been besotted enough with him to still want to sleep with him after she had found out he still intended marrying Marie. Admittedly he hadn’t been corrupt enough to pursue his seduction once he realised her innocence, but she had no doubt he would have overcome those scruples given time. He had wanted her completely and utterly in love with him, agreeable to his every whim. What a pity for him that he had failed!
It made her wonder what he could have done to Danny, his own brother, to make him want to attack him in that way. Danny had accused him of something; could it possibly be that he had finally found the courage to stand up to his brother about his engagement to Marie, to tell Dominic of his own love for her? To think that Dominic had gone that far, dazzled and captured Marie from his own brother merely for his own mercenary ends. The thought disgusted her. And what disgusted her more was that she had almost been a victim of his lethal charm herself.
To her dismay she wasn’t to be allowed to escape to the privacy of her bedroom to wallow in her misery. Marie’s bedroom light was on, and she called Sara in to speak to her.
‘You should be asleep,’ Sara scolded, sitting down on the side of the bed.
‘Ssh!’ Marie smiled mischievously. ‘Daddy doesn’t know I’m still awake.’
‘You’re feeling better?’
‘I was feeling better this afternoon,’ her sister admitted with a grin, ‘but I hate these business dinners of Dominic’s.’
‘I wish I’d known earlier,’ Sara groaned. ‘Headache or no headache, you would have gone.’
‘Was it ghastly?’
‘Yes! No.’ She shrugged. ‘Not really.’ Only the latter part of it!
‘I promise I won’t land you in it again,’ Marie giggled. ‘I just didn’t feel like being entertaining this evening.’
‘I’ll let you off this time.’ Sara frowned, remembering something that had been troubling her. ‘Marie, tonight when—when Dominic and I were leaving a man was just arriving. I think Dominic said his name was Simon Forrester.’
‘Simon?’ Marie’s voice sharp.
‘Yes,’ Sara watched her closely. ‘Dominic said he was a friend of Dad’s.’
‘That’s right, he is,’ her sister answered with obvious relief.
Sara bit her lip, deciding to take a shot in the dark and see if it paid off. ‘He also said he was a doctor.’ She watched Marie’s reaction, seeing her blanch.
‘Yes, he is,’ Marie’s tone was brittle. ‘Does it matter?’
‘Not really,’ Sara replied casually. ‘I just wondered whether he was here professionally or socially.’
Marie began to pleat the sheet between nervous fingers. ‘Why on earth should he be here professionally?’
‘I thought perhaps because of your headaches …’ She had thought no such thing. If Simon Forrester had been here professionally then it had been to see her father, and conveniently when she was out of the house.
‘No,’ Marie denied instantly. ‘I’m feeling rather tired, Sara, perhaps I should go to sleep now.’
‘Yes, of course.’ She stood up. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’ She bent to kiss her sister goodnight.