Here, in this little village church, where she had been supposed to marry Adnan today. That was why, when he hadn’t been able to find her back at the house, and everyone had told him that she was nowhere to be found, he had known exactly where to come. Exactly where he’d find her.
‘Spare me the flattery!’ Imogen protested now and he couldn’t help but smile at her vehemence.
But what was hiding behind that determination? It could be the effect of the shadows in the church, the pitiful light of the hazy sun shining through the stained glass windows, but she looked pale and drawn, as if she hadn’t slept at all well. That was inevitable, he would have thought, after the way they had parted last night, the way her life had exploded in her face in the midnight confrontation in his room.
It was what he had aimed for; the reason he had come here in the first place—so why did it leave him with a raw sense of dissatisfaction rather than the ultimate triumph he had looked for?
‘No flattery—honestly,’ he reassured her. ‘I never speak anything less than the truth.’
‘The truth, huh?’ Her chin had come up, her luscious mouth tightening in defiance. ‘Then tell me the truth about why you’ve followed me here today. What part of “if I never see you again in my life, it will be way too soon” did you not understand? Why are you still in Ireland and not on your way back to Corsica?’
It was a question he’d been asking himself ever since he’d woken—after probably as bad a night’s sleep as she’d had.
He’d intended to go. He’d planned on packing his bag as soon as he’d woken and clear out of the house, out of her life. But it was as he’d headed for the bathroom that the second and third thoughts had started to hit him.
The first was the result of seeing the belt lying on the floor on the far side of the room, close to the door. A long, thin strip of scarlet silk, it was the belt from the robe that she had tugged so tightly round her. It had obviously slipped free as she had stalked out of the door, tossing what she had clearly intended to be the last words she’d ever speak to him over her shoulder as she went.
When he had picked it up it had slithered in his hands, like a satiny snake, reminding him of how it had felt to have that silk underneath his fingertips, and the warmth of her skin beneath that. He’d resorted to the long, icy shower he’d needed earlier in the evening, but had found that it brought him no release from the intense pulse of unappeased desire that had tormented him. It had lingered all through the night, making him toss and turn until he’d woken in a tangle of sheets, his mind hazed with hunger, his body sheened in sweat. His last thought before falling into what had passed for sleep had been of Imogen, as had his first thought on waking.
‘I never was very good at taking orders. And I came to see how you were doing.’
It was the truth. Well, at least it was part of it.
He knew he couldn’t leave without seeing her again, without making a move to turn the hot dreams that had plagued his night into a reality. At least for as long as it took to get this burn of hunger out of his system. It was time to acknowledge that he hadn’t been able to forget Imogen in the time since he had walked away from her on the beach at Rondinarra. That had been part of why he’d come to Ireland the first time, filled with dark fury after seeing that revealing photo of her and her sister in the gossip columns. Then he’d learned that her father was looking for a partner in his stud, and that had stayed him when he’d been about to rush into turning on Imogen the bitter rage he had felt at her actions. It had become a much larger part of why he’d stayed, to watch and learn, and later he’d made the approach that should have brought him here as a potential business partner.
Whoever had said that revenge was a dish best served cold had no idea how it could feel when that cold revenge was mixed with the revival of a blazing, white-hot sexual need that it seemed only Imogen could create in him.
‘Well, now you can see I’m still standing.’
Imogen made her way out of the church, refusing to allow herself even one regretful glance back.
‘So you can go and pack your bags—’