Angelo had used her? How?
“You’re way off base. Tara didn’t have a company I wanted so much I was willing to drive a woman to her death to get it.”
The words should have given her comfort, but there was too much tension in them for her to take them at face value.
“I didn’t kill your mother,” Baron snarled. “She was weak. She sold you out for a body to warm her lonely bed.”
Angelo punched him and Baron went down. “Don’t you ever speak of her like that. She was worth a hundred of you and her only weakness was her inability to see you for the selfish blood sucker you are.”
Baron got up, grabbing the table for support and then wiped at his now bloody lip. “You think you’re so damn good, but what you’ve done to Tara is no different. You used her to get what you wanted, didn’t you?”
Angelo ignored the other man’s accusation and put his hand out toward her. “Let’s go, Tara.”
She shook her head. She’d refused to listen to Baron twice now, but she wasn’t walking away from the accusations this time. Her husband had withheld the name of his enemy and now she knew why, but she wanted to know more. Like why Baron was so convinced Angelo was using her.
“What did I have that Angelo wanted?”
“The chance to get revenge on me.”
“I already had that,” Angelo said deridingly. Then he turned to her again. “It’s time to leave. Now.”
“But you wanted it all,” Baron said before she could react to the chilly command in her husband’s voice. “You wanted to take away everything I valued.”
“You didn’t value me. You dumped me.”
“Tara.” It was Angelo again. Demanding.
But she was done doing things his way. “Leave if you want, Angelo, but I’m not going until I have some answers. And right at this minute I don’t trust you to give them to me.”
Baron’s look of triumph almost changed her mind. “My marriage was temporary. I planned to come back to you and Angelo knew it.”
The man was unhinged and incredibly calculating. He’d married his wife planning to divorce her? Tara shivered in revulsion. “You’re not serious.”
But she had the awful feeling he was.
Deadly so.
“Oh, yes, very serious. Your precious husband went looking for you the minute his private investigator found out that I was still keeping tabs on you.”
The room suddenly felt too warm and dizziness washed over her as the full implication of what was being said hit her.
“You were keeping tabs on me? Like some creepy stalker?” She turned to Angelo. “And you knew about it?”
Angelo’s mouth set in a grim line. “He’s had you under surveillance since you broke up. His private investigator had instructions with the incentive of a bonus to squelch any romantic entanglements you might try to get into.”
She glared at Baron, ready to finish what Angelo had started. “Who do you think you are, the Godfather?”
“More like a man who doesn’t care who he hurts to have what he wants.” Angelo’s voice dripped acid.
“How did you know about it?”
“Hawk.”
“Your friend from the wedding?”
“His private investigator,” Baron replied before Angelo could answer. “Tell her how you bribed my private investigator to keep quiet about your relationship with Tara.”
“I can’t believe you’ve been watching me all this time. That’s illegal, you miscreant.”
He looked at her like he couldn’t comprehend why she was hung up on that detail. She could have told him if he asked. The truth that was being revealed about her husband’s pursuit of her hurt so much, she simply could not deal with it. She felt like a million little knives were shredding every happy emotion inside her.
“Tara, Angelo only went after you to get back at me.”
Angelo cursed, a word she’d never heard him use, forcing her to acknowledge his presence and the pain slashing at her insides.
She turned from Baron, dismissing him from her mind as if he no longer existed and faced her husband. “The first time we met…you used my report as an excuse to see me, didn’t you? You already knew who I was and what I had been to Baron.”
Angelo’s jaw set with rock like tension. “Yes.”
“I told you.”
The sound of Baron’s voice was like nails scoring a chalkboard on her nerves. She rose from her chair, her body vibrating with unbearable tension and fury, and faced her ex-lover and her husband.
“Listen to me closely, Baron, because this is the one and only time I’m going to say this.”