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‘I didn’t—’
‘Yes, you damned well did!’ Ruthlessly, he cut across her words, advancing towards her as he had done so many times before, only this time his face was not softened by desire. This time it was hard and cold with fury. ‘Maybe in the past, my behaviour might have justified you making such a negative judgement because, God knows, I’ve certainly been no angel. But there are limits to what I would consider acceptable behaviour.’
‘Luis—’
‘Do you really think I would be willing to replicate that kind of massive betrayal, after what I told you about my mother?’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said woodenly.
‘Even if you could think so little of me, do you really think so little of yourself? Haven’t you learned anything, Carly? That sex is not wrong and that you can be just as confident and as beautiful as you make up your mind to be.’ He shook his head. ‘But you’re still allowing yourself to be that same scared woman underneath, aren’t you? Still so eager to believe the worst about yourself. What’s making you do that? Do you miss the cloak of invisibility you wore for so long? Do you find it so terrifying to be out in the real world that you’re looking for some excuse to escape from it again?’
She shook her head as his accusations rained down on her like spiky little hailstones. And even though she wanted to blot out what he was saying to her, somehow she was finding it impossible. Was she an emotional coward, eager to think the worst about everyone because it was easier that way?
Or was he?
‘Maybe you’re right,’ she said, pushing her hair out of her face. ‘But if I’m having difficulty adapting to normality maybe that’s because none of this is normal. I feel like someone who has jumped into the wrong end of the swimming pool. I’m out of my depth and I don’t fit in. Not here. Not anywhere, really.’
‘Then find your depth,’ he said grimly. ‘You’re an intelligent woman. Don’t tell me that you’re planning to go to medical school at the age of twenty-three and then start playing the shrinking violet again. You are capable of so much, Carly. Of anything you want, if only you have the courage to reach out and grab it.’
Carly sucked in a deep breath, terrified that tears were going to arrive just when she least needed them. Because although his words were intended as an encouragement—and they were—they were also intended as a farewell. Her lips wobbled for a couple of seconds before she could trust herself to speak. ‘You’re very good at dishing out advice, aren’t you, Luis? But I wonder how good you are at taking it.’
He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Why, is this now going to become some kind of tit for tat?’
‘It’s more about redressing the balance than scoring points,’ she said, hating the sarcasm she heard in his drawled response, hating this new distance between them which was growing bigger by the second. ‘You wonder why I was so eager to jump to the wrong conclusion about you wanting my sister? Well, why shouldn’t I think something like that, when you told me emphatically that you didn’t think men were capable of fidelity?’
‘Now you’re twisting my words.’
‘Am I? Or am I just putting my own interpretation on them?’ She stared at him. ‘Because I don’t think that you do believe that, not really. I think that’s just your excuse for staying away from commitment.’
‘My excuse?’ he demanded.
‘Yes.’ Her voice dropped to a whisper. ‘I think you were hurt so badly by what happened with your parents. I think you felt completely betrayed by your mother’s friend and your father and maybe even by your mother, too, for allowing herself to fade away and leave you. I think the pain was so bad that you vowed never to let anyone get that close to you again. So you didn’t. You lived the life you could, the life which was expected of you, the playboy with all the different homes and all the different women. But no matter how many there were it was never enough, was it? They could never fill that hole deep inside you. At the end of the day, you were still all alone. And you always will be if you carry on like this.’
‘That’s enough!’ he bit out and suddenly he wanted to lash out at something. Anything. He wanted to smash his fist into that marble statue on the opposite side of the terrace and see it lie in shattered pieces. He wanted stop the hurt which was enveloping him in something so dark and clammy that suddenly he couldn’t breathe properly.
‘You may be planning to major in psychology, but so far you’re way off course!’ he snapped. ‘Is this supposed to make me want you, Carly? Am I supposed to be grateful for this brutal character assessment of yours? To be so in awe of your unique insight that I will somehow see the light? And what do you suppose will happen next, hmm? Play out the scene for me, querida, so that I can see it for myself. Do I now drop down onto one knee and ask you to become my wife?’
The breath dying in her throat, Carly stared at him. His caustic words were like having a blade rammed straight into her heart, but she told herself that maybe he’d done her a favour. Because hadn’t this liberated her from any dormant hopes she might have nurtured, no matter how much she’d tried to deny them? Wouldn’t she now be free of the fantasy that, deep down, Luis might actually care about her?
She shook her head. ‘I may have been innocent,’ she said slowly. ‘But I’m not stupid. And if ever I was going to marry anyone it certainly wouldn’t be a man who didn’t even have the courage to look at himself properly.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘You accuse me—me—of lacking in co
urage?’
She shook her head. ‘Oh, I’m not talking about the kind of courage which made you put your foot down on the accelerator and take your car through a gap so tiny that most men wouldn’t have seen it. I’m talking about the emotional courage to face your demons and put them to rest. Just as I’ve had to do. I’m sorry I said that about Bella—that was just a lingering hang-up from my own past. I had no right to accuse you of that, and I should have been strong enough to stand up to her.’
But she knew why she hadn’t answered Bella’s question about her involvement with Luis and why she hadn’t dared stand up for herself. Because she didn’t believe in the strength of what she and Luis had together. She hadn’t wanted to see the pity or the glee in her sister’s face when it all ended. And it seemed that her instinct had been right.
‘Anyway,’ she continued. ‘At least this has given us the ending we both knew was inevitable, even if it hasn’t been quite as amicable as we might have wanted. We both know that I can’t go back to being your housekeeper.’
There was a long pause before he spoke. ‘No. I guess you can’t.’ He flicked her a glance from between narrowed black eyes. ‘So what will you do?’
She took a moment to compose herself. To behave as if they’d been talking about nothing more controversial than the weather. And didn’t some stupid part of her wish that he’d fought a bit harder to get her to stay? ‘I’ll find another job until next September. I should have all the funds I need by then to take up my place.’
He frowned. ‘But you told me that there was a deferred space available now. So in theory, you could go this September—if you had the funds.’
‘Which I don’t.’
