He nodded. ‘But she was good for him. She made him a better person. A nicer person...’
He paused, and she could see he was struggling to form a sentence.
‘You’ve been honest with me, and I want to be honest with you. I think my father would have left my mother to be with her, but I talked him out of it. I made him choose my mother and me over Della and Archie.’
Dora breathed out unsteadily, shocked by his words. So Lao Dan had loved Della.
For a moment she thought back to her sister’s sadness, and the heartache that had coloured the last year of her life. It could have been so different...
But would she have felt any differently, acted any differently, if she had been in Charlie’s position?
‘I don’t think you made him choose,’ she said slowly. ‘Your father doesn’t sound to me like the kind of man who would have had his mind changed by anyone. I think you probably just gave him permission to do what he wanted.’
He stared at her in silence. ‘I didn’t think about Della or Archie.’
‘Della was a grown-up.’ Her eyes met his. ‘She knew your father was married before she became his mistress and she made a choice. Maybe it didn’t work out how she wanted, but she didn’t have any regrets.’
Except one. Just once, after Lao Dan’s death, Della had admitted wishing she had done more to fight for him—whatever the outcome.
She cleared her throat. ‘And you love Archie now, but he wasn’t real to you then—any more than your dad was ever real to me.’
Clearly he felt guilty for making his father choose. That was why he had been so determined to get Archie back.
‘Now, everything you’re doing is for him.’ Something squeezed around her heart. Even marrying a woman he didn’t love. ‘You’re putting him first.’
‘So are you,’ he said, pulling her closer so that Archie was between the two of them. ‘That’s why we’re getting married.’
Breathing out, she leaned into him. It was why they were getting married, but for some reason she wished it wasn’t.
‘Yes, it is.’ She managed to smile up at him.
‘So let’s spend today together as a family,’ he said. He stared down at her, his dark eyes fixed on hers. ‘And then, this evening, you and I are going out. Just the two of us.’
‘Out?’
‘Now that we’ve told my family, I want to show off my fiancée to the world.’
She gazed at him, trying to evaluate his words, wondering what it would feel like if he meant what he said. But to think that way was pointless. She couldn’t bring herself to submit to that kind of vulnerability—particularly when Charlie couldn’t have made it any clearer that Archie was the reason they were marrying.
It was already dark by the time the limousine left the house for the Black Tiger that evening. But no amount of darkness could extinguish Dora’s luminous beauty, Charlie thought, gazing over at the woman sitting on his left.
Her blonde hair was loose and, reaching out, he caught a strand between his fingers. Turning, she looked up at him, her mouth softening into a smile and he felt his groin harden.
‘You look beautiful.’
More than beautiful. She was making his teeth ache.
His eyes travelled appreciatively over her body. She was wearing a silver dress that clung to her skin exactly where he wanted to touch her most.
It was only the presence of his driver and the bodyguard in the front of the car that was stopping him from pulling her onto his lap and letting his hands roam at will over all the curves and lines of her.
‘Thank you—you look pretty good yourself,’ she said softly. ‘So, where are you taking me?’
‘To the Black Tiger. I thought you might like to try your luck on the tables.’
She laughed. ‘That’s going to be complicated—awkward, even. I mean, if I win big, you lose.’
A pulse beat across his skin. ‘You’re going to be my wife; I win big either way.’