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“I suppose you could have kidnapped her to be extra sure,” Phoebe pointed out with a wry grimace.
“It may yet come to that.”
“Oh?”
“She’s writing letters that contained thinly veiled threats, asking for what she sees as her share of an inheritance. If she doesn’t get it, my lawyer believes there’s a risk she’ll go public.”
Phoebe’s eyes swept shut. “And in the meantime, you have some bogus story about your dad and me to contend with.”
“Careful,agape.” He leaned forward, his eyes skimming hers. “It almost sounds as though you feel sorry for me.”
“I do feel sorry for you,” she responded without a moment’s doubt. “Discovering what you have about your dad, and in these circumstances, must have been incredibly difficult, for you and your brothers.”
“They don’t know yet.”
Her lips parted. “What? Why not?”
“Why burden them with this?”
Phoebe contemplated that. “I got the impression you were close.”
“We are.”
“So wouldn’t you rather lean on them?”
“I don’t need to.”
“Fine, you’re too big and macho to ‘need’ support, but what about their counsel?”
“You think they’d urge me to act differently?”
“Perhaps.”
“What would you have had me do?”
She pursed her lips. “Not accuse me of sleeping with him before I had a chance to explain?”
He pushed back his chair and stood, the lines of his body showing frustration. “I feel as though someone has shaken a bottle of soft drink and is now opening the lid. It doesn’t matter what I do, I can’t get the lid back on and I can’t stop the spray from going everywhere. I admired my father a great deal and yet he has left the most unholy mess behind.”
“And I’m a part of that?”
“Even if I were to play devil’s advocate for a moment, and to say that I believed your version of events—,” the moment of light-heartedness was short lived. “Which is not to say that I do, I’m speaking hypothetically,” he continued. “Just the appearance of the money he left you, the bronze sculpture in your possession, make it highly unlikely anyone else would believe your friendship was innocent. If there weren’t proof of Anna, then perhaps. But his character has changed now, beyond repair.”
“I’m collateral damage,” she murmured.
“Perhaps.” The word showed he was far from convinced. “If that’s the case, I would owe you an apology.”
“Wow. I’m shocked. You’re sounding almost human.”
“But it would also complicate things,” he said with a seriousness that took her breath away.
“Oh?”
“Believing you and my father slept together is all that’s stopping me from kissing you—no, from dragging you to my bed and making love to you until you can barely breathe.”
Her breath hitched in her throat as her eyes went rounder than saucers. She stood, but her knees knocked together and she had to press her fingers into the tabletop.
“I didn’t sleep with him,” she said uneasily.
