Page 29 of Innocent in His Diamonds

She flinched. ‘Yes, you would be!’

‘Then what are you doing about it?’ he challenged.

About to speak, she froze, unprepared for the slap of realisation that she’d lived with her mother’s behaviour for so long she did silently accept it. ‘I don’t claim to have all the answers, but I know cutting your father off isn’t one of them.’

‘You’re right—you don’t have the answers. So don’t throw stones. And do not speak to me about what happened sixteen years ago. As of now, that subject is closed.’ His voice was taut with suppressed anger.

Whirling away, he strode to the window. His tense shoulders bunched as he slid both hands into his trouser pockets. Dappled sunlight framed his head in a golden halo. Ana stared, astounded by her inability to stop looking at him. But this time she saw past it to the hurt boy beneath. And her heart broke for him.

‘How can it be when it colours everything you do?’

A breath shuddered out of him. ‘Mon Dieu, Ana, I’m trying. Just let it go. Please.’

She swallowed hard and blinked back threatening tears. ‘Okay, I’ll let it go. For now.’

After several minutes he turned. ‘Your little stunt with the newspaper has paid off. I suggest you focus on what happens next.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means I’m relocating the ad campaign here,’ he said.

‘What?’ Surprise jerked through her. ‘Why? The venue in Scotland has been arranged and it’s all set to go.’

‘Since my presence is required where you are, I’d rather stay in a place where I can be guaranteed there won’t be a repeat of any suggestive newspaper articles. There’s very little press intrusion in Switzerland.’

‘So for the next three weeks I’m your prisoner?’

His eyebrows rose. ‘You’d rather return to London and feed more stories to the papers?’

‘I want to go home.’

Despite reassuring herself that she could control her feelings around him, her every instinct protested against spending any more time in Bastien’s disturbing company. The last shoot had overrun a whole week. If the pattern repeated itself she could be here for a long time, perhaps even until her trial. Here with this man who couldn’t fail to elicit intense, dangerous emotions from her.

‘That’s not going to happen.’

Anger exploded inside her. ‘You can’t do this!’

Her outburst brought a frown. ‘I’m willing to concede that the article may have helped save my company, Miss Duval, but I won’t be giving the press any more fodder for their gossip rags.’

‘Seriously—would you stop with the Miss Duval nonsense? It sounds ridiculous, considering we’ve...’ Ana faltered. Had she seriously been about to invite him to call her by her first name because they’d had their hands all over each other not once but twice in the last twenty-four hours?

She’d truly lost her mind.

‘Considering we’ve what? Been intimate?’

‘What happened between us wasn’t intimacy,’ she denied through stiff lips.

A grim parody of a smile curved his lips. ‘I agree. It was undeniably primal, and irritating as hell, but it was not intimacy.’

Somewhere deep inside her something cracked. Something she hadn’t even known existed. ‘No, it wasn’t.’

He gave her a quizzical glance before striding to his desk. He reached for a leather-bound file. ‘I’m glad we’re agreed. Tatiana will get the driver to take you back to the hotel. Be ready to leave at six.’

‘Leave? Where are we going?’ she asked.

‘My château. That’s where the shoot is now taking place. We’ll stay there until it’s wrapped. Oh, and Ana?’

‘Yes?’

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