‘She dumped you for your own father?’ Imogen couldn’t disguise the shock she felt—and her horror—at his story.
‘After that I developed a sort of sixth sense where women were concerned. If they wanted money, there were plenty of other places they could find it.’
He made it sound as if it didn’t matter, as if he had just tossed those feelings aside. But there was so much control in his voice, in his expression, that Imogen knew he was concealing the full truth.
‘I only ever came close to making that mistake one other time.’
‘And then?’
His smile was hard, cold, a flash on and off, and then it was gone again, leaving his eyes like polished stone.
‘I don’t put my head in the noose a second time.’
Imogen flinched away from the cold darkness of the declaration. It echoed back through the years, taking her to a Corsican beach, the slow wash of the waves against the shore in her ears, the warmth of the sun on her back.
‘But—isn’t that what you’re doing now?’
She cursed herself for actually saying it. But she had to. After the way he’d opened up to her, she couldn’t just leave things as they were.
‘It will be. You’re giving me money—paying my family’s debts—that’s the inducement you’re using to get me to marry you.’
She was looking up into his eyes as she spoke and she saw the tiny movement as his head went back, the long, slow blink as he accepted what she had said.
‘But this time you’re not asking for it. I’m offering it to you. If it means I get you in my bed, then that’s a deal I’m prepared to agree to. And I want you, Imogen. More than I’ve ever wanted any other woman in my life.’
‘I don’t want…’
A blazing flash from those molten bronze eyes shrivelled the rest of the sentence on her tongue and made it die there unspoken.
‘Surely we’re past the time for lies? At least we know we’re compatible in bed, if nowhere else.’
His words threatened to choke off her breathing. If only he knew how much she wanted to be with him anywhere and everywhere—in bed, out of it; at home or away; in her life!
‘There’s more to marriage than sex.’
Raoul nodded slowly, though his eyes refuted her claim.
‘But it’s a good place to start—a very good place in our case.’
Unable to stay on the bed any longer, Imogen pushed herself upwards onto her feet so she could face him, eye to eye.
‘You think that because you’re hot in bed… Yes, I’m acknowledging that!’ she admitted as she saw the quirk of his arched brow. ‘I’d be a fool to deny it. But if you think I’d do that—for you…’
‘No.’ Another shrug. ‘Not for me. For your family, your father, the stud, the horses. You could even make sure that Adnan can save face.’
‘Oh, come on!’
How could she ever make it up to Adnan? How could he ever forgive her, or at the very least still tolerate her presence in his life? She might as well have renounced him to his face in public. Or turned and walked away from him at the altar.
‘How on earth could I do that?’
Raoul looked totally unmoved by her vehemence. Reaching out, he took her hand, lifted it between them, and the smile that slowly curved his beautiful mouth made a trickle of ice slither down her spine.
‘We were lovers,’ he said smoothly. So smoothly that she couldn’t interrupt him, no matter how she might want to refute his words. He had never been her lover, except in the physical sense. ‘Long lost lovers who had never forgotten each other, still cared for each other. Still lov—’
‘No!’ That was too much. How could he even use the word ‘love’ after all that had gone on?
‘Yes!’
He tightened his grip on her hand when she would have jerked away.
‘That is the only way it will work—for Adnan’s sake. Damn it, woman, you were prepared to marry him; you would have taken everything he was offering—surely you can do this for him now.’
Imogen wanted to deny what Raoul was saying. But she knew she couldn’t do any such thing. She couldn’t even refute what he was accusing her of doing, though not in the way he meant it. He made her pact with Adnan sound dark and materialistic. A greedy contract based on money and profit only. He knew nothing about the way her ex-fiancé had felt about his grandfather, the way she had wanted to help him fulfil the old man’s dreams.