He dropped his hand in surprise. “Final betrayal? What are you talking about?”
“As I was trying to say, I know what you were doing in London. I know who you were seeing and why.”
He felt a flicker of unease. Now he got it. Somehow, she’d discovered what his original plan had been. He couldn’t very well deny it. So how could he make her understand that he’d changed his mind? That, when he’d received the missing pieces to the puzzle which was Indra, he had no intention of using them against her, only of making sure that there was no existing threat which could harm her.
“It’s not what you think.”
She gritted her teeth and her dark eyes flared even darker. The passion within them almost made him forget her anger. She took a step closer.
He held up his hands to pacify her. She knocked them away.
“Don’t you hold up your hands to me! I’m not an animal. I’m not someone you can pacify with a few cheap gestures!”
Sebastian was taken aback. He’d never seen her like this before.
“It’s not what you think,” he repeated.
She made an indignant grunt. “Sure, I’d expect someone as arrogant as you to know what it is I think.”
He gritted his teeth against the insult. But she was right, of course. “I’m forced to when you don’t tell me why you’re angry.”
“Youusedme, Sebastian.” Her eyes glittered with tears. “You gathered knowledge about me, my family, about our business. Until yesterday, when you put all the pieces together and formed a plan.”
“You need to hear what I have to say.”
“I’ve given you plenty of opportunity to speak, but you won’t. And I know why. Because you don’t know how much I know and you won’t be telling me anything beyond it. But, as I know everything now, I’ll tell you. As soon as you witnessed my shock and grief over hearing that Russian accent, you knew you had me! And don’t try to deny you didn’t.”
He had no intention of denying anything. Not yet, anyway. “It’s true. I suddenly figured out what exactly was going on. But that Ihadyou? How did Ihaveyou?”
“You had all the ammunition you needed toblackmailme.”
He felt the blood run from his face and he could see she’d noticed. “Blackmail?” He could only repeat the word which he had, at one time, been intent on.
“Yes, blackmail.”
“That, Indira, isnotmy intention.”
She blinked, shocked. “I don’t believe you. You want me out of your life and what easier way than to tell me to go—otherwise you’ll make public all that you know. You know that such knowledge could lead to my death.”
He gritted his teeth as he tried to figure out how to deal with this complexity. He hadn’t imagined she’d be one step ahead of him.
“It’s true that I wanted to know as much about you as I could.”
“To blackmail me,” she repeated.
He lowered his voice in a vain attempt to lessen the impact of the now unpalatable words. “To blackmail you. At first.” It seemed nothing less than the truth would do.
But then the hurt struck her eyes, and a tear rolled onto her cheek. He tried to take her in his arms, but she pushed him away. “Don’t touch me!” Her face was flushed with fury even as the one tear became many.
He held out his hands in surrender. After the darkness of his original intentions, he needed to show her he wasn’t about to hurt her.
“I won’t! But you must listen to me.”
She’d walked away, but turned to face him and stopped for a moment. “You dare to tell me what to do? You stand there, after telling me you are going to blackmail and—”
“I’m not going to—”
“And you demand that I listen to you?” She walked towards him and he nearly recoiled from the fierce look in her eyes. “I will never listen to you again! Because you’re right, I will have to walk away. Your blackmail is impeccable. I have no other choice but to walk away if I want to live. And I want to live. Make no mistake about that. Even”—she gulped and looked around—“if I have to live away from my home.”