Disappointment lanced at her skin like a million pin-pricks. ‘And she had four other women to back her up, all with virtually the same tale to tell!’
Now anger turned to disbelief. ‘You think I too
k the virginity of all five of them?’ he queried incredulously.
‘I only know about Rosie!’ she snapped. ‘I didn’t ask for a blow-by-blow account of just how far you went with the others—and will you stop smirking like that!’
‘You have an unfortunate way of phrasing yourself,’ he said drily.
‘Well, whatever happened, you certainly made them angry enough to want to get their own back,’ hissed Fran. ‘Or are you saying that they all made up their stories?’
‘I’m saying that they have pretty fertile imaginations! Or have you never heard the expression “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned!”?’
‘What? A couple of scorned women I could believe! But five against one? At least! Oh, come on, Sam! The odds are pretty stacked against you!’
‘Hell,’ he murmured savagely. ‘You really enjoy believing the very worst about men, don’t you, Fran? Did your marriage do that to you? Did you decide to despise all men because one of them had let you down?’
Fran looked at him. ‘Why don’t you just tell me what happened?’
‘I didn’t lay a finger on any of the other four!’ he told her softly. ‘Did they look like the kind of women I’d be intimate with?’
She owed it to him to be one hundred per cent truthful here. ‘Well, er, no. They didn’t.’
‘Even though they virtually offered themselves to me on a plate! Shall I tell you what really happened, Fran? Shall I?’
Fran nodded uncertainly.
‘They all worked at Gordon-Browne when I was there—and they made no secret of the fact that they all found me sexually desirable.’
Which she could understand.
‘Let me tell you—it was like having a permanently dark, dank cloud in the building with their dreary attempts at non-stop flirtation! They used to come on to me like second-rate hookers!’
‘Then why didn’t you have them sacked?’
‘Because sacking four women would have been more hassle than it was worth! Imagine having to endure an unfair dismissal tribunal! Imagine all the publicity they would stir up by going to the newspapers,’ he glowered pointedly. ‘And by that time I had decided to go freelance anyway so it wasn’t going to be my problem any more. Besides, there was an exquisite kind of irony about telling them I was leaving and to see their hard, desperate little faces as they realised they would never see me again!’
Fran bit her lip as she realised that his version made far more sense. She believed him, that was the trouble. Every single word. Once she had seen the four women for herself, she had never really been able to imagine him being intimate with any of them. They simply weren’t in the same league as Sam.
He narrowed his eyes at her. ‘So why did you do it, Fran? I thought we got along fine together. Why think so badly of me? Why try and make a fool of me?’
Did he have a better nature to appeal to? ‘Look,’ she sighed and held up her hands in defence. ‘It was a joke which—I agree—got out of hand. But it ended up doing you a favour, didn’t it? I’m the one who looks like they’re going to lose out. The bidding—which you began—raised an enormous amount of money for the hospital. No one thinks any the worse of you—’
‘Other than my reputation as a stud being enhanced, you mean?’
‘Okay, you may get a few offers!’ she quipped recklessly. ‘So what? You’re now in the position of being able to pick and choose from any opportunities which may come your way as a result!’
Sam could never remember feeling quite so angry in his entire life. ‘So you’re completely unrepentant?’
She saw from the furious glitter in his eyes that she may have gone one step too far. ‘Not completely, no,’ she admitted. ‘I certainly wouldn’t do anything like that again!’
‘Well, hallelujah!’ he murmured.
There was a pause.
‘So if that’s everything?’ she said warily.
Sam almost laughed. ‘Everything? Honey, I haven’t even begun!’