Sharon Kendrick Collection. Sharon Kendrick

knowing what I had done with you?’ he demanded. ‘Knowing that I had betrayed him in the most wounding way it is possible to betray someone? God, I could hardly bear to look at myself in the mirror afterwards—I’m damned sure I couldn’t have faced Mark!’

      ‘And because of that, because of the guilt you felt, Mark didn’t get to see you before—’

      ‘Before your perfidy drove him to his death?’ he queried coldly.

      ‘Mark died of cancer, as well you know,’ she defended herself in a low, shaking voice. ‘You’re surely not going to accuse me of causing that?’

      ‘But such illnesses can be brought on by stress, can’t they?’ he observed cruelly. ‘And I really can’t think of anything more stressful than living with a woman who strays the way you clearly did. A wife, moreover, whose greatest pleasure in life appears to be having sex in bizarre places!’

      Romy hesitated. He was so determined to think badly of her that she doubted he would believe the truth even if she dared tell him. But it was suddenly terribly important to her that she attempted to explain. ‘Dominic,’ she told him quietly, ‘there’s a lot you don’t understand—’

      ‘The only thing I fail to understand,’ he bit back coldly, as if she had not spoken, ‘is why an intelligent man like Mark neglected to see through your two-facedness. Tell me, Romy, did you go straight to his arms from mine that day? Or did even your conscience get the better of you?’

      His grey eyes glittered hectically. ‘Did you rush back and take a shower before you saw him again? Washing every inch of your skin obsessively—afraid that the scent of love was lingering on your body like the most cloying perfume?’ he challenged coolly.

      Romy met the challenge in his eyes without wavering, though she reckoned that few women would have been able to withstand that withering look of contempt.

      But wasn’t it best to get all these bitter grudges out into the open after so long? Like sores left to fester, perhaps the only way for the two of them to find some kind of peace of mind was to give voice to the unspeakable, and let all the poison come spilling out.

      ‘Yes, I went back to my room and took a shower,’ she told him woodenly, remembering the way she had stared at herself in disbelief through the steam-covered mirror, her skin still pink and flushed, her body still trembling with unwilling delight at what he had made happen for her.

      ‘And you don’t think that was a sick way to begin a marriage?’ he demanded. ‘If you were getting up to things like that before the ceremony even took place then what the hell was it like afterwards?’ His eyes glittered with stark silver accusation. ‘How could you bear to live like that, for God’s sake, Romy?’

      Romy sighed. It wasn’t that he wasn’t listening; it was that he simply didn’t want to hear. ‘No one really knows what goes on in someone else’s marriage,’ she said slowly.

      His voice was cold and critical. ‘And maybe too many people go into marriage with the wrong attitude.’

      ‘Maybe that’s why you’ve never married?’ she suggested quietly, acutely aware that she held her breath as she waited for his answer. ‘If your expectations are so high.’

      He gave a smile laced with cynicism. ‘What are you implying, Romy? That no “modem” woman could tolerate the thought of living with a man old-fashioned enough to insist on sharing his bed with just one partner?’

      ‘What the hell are you suggesting?’

      His mouth twisted with disdain. ‘Please don’t insult my intelligence by trying to tell me that everything was hunky-dory between the two of you. Particularly given your track record, Romy.’

      She read the silent burning question which haunted his silver eyes and knew that however painful it might be she had to try to answer it for him. Though she ran the risk of him not believing her, of course...

      ‘Dominic...’ she began hesitantly. ‘I was never unfaithful to Mark after we were married.’

      ‘Just lots of times beforehand, huh?’ He casually tucked his white T-shirt back into his jeans, and Romy found herself having to suppress a shudder of awareness as she remembered just why he had to do so. And yet now they were standing talking to each other as though nothing had happened!

      ‘Although technically, I suppose, you weren’t actually unfaithful with me, were you?’ he ground out. ‘Since penetration did not take place. I suppose it’s all a question of degree, isn’t it, Romy? But I don’t think that I would be particularly happy if my best man had his hands all over my fiancée’s—’

      She lifted her hand then and slapped his face.

      Hard.

      And in the rather stunned silence which followed Romy stared up at him, her breath coming in short, defiant bursts.

      With a wry expression on his face Dominic lifted his hand to the dull red mark on his cheek, and began to rub the spot gingerly. ‘You little wildcat,’ he commented softly, but he sounded more amused than abused.

      ‘You deserved that,’ she told him firmly. ‘You know you did! Still, I shouldn’t have resorted to hitting you, Dominic.’

      ‘Yes, you should.’ He shook his head, the remnants of that reluctant smile still lingering around the corners of his mouth. ‘You should have done it a lot sooner, Romy. And maybe it’s brought me to my senses.’

      ‘What do you mean?’

      His face tensed. ‘Perhaps it’s about time I faced up to the fact that I can’t keep blaming you for what happened. That I ought to shoulder an equal share of the responsibility for what went on between us.’

      Suddenly he turned away to look into the middle distance, as if he was fascinated by the sight of the sunlight glancing off the lake. When he spoke, his voice was strangely sombre. ‘Of course, some people might say that you would be well within your rights to accuse me of having taken advantage of you that day.’

      Romy blinked. ‘That simply doesn’t make sense,’ she said.

      ‘Oh? And why not?’

      ‘Because if I was so hot for you, and so sexually frustrated—which was, I think, the suggestion you made earlier—then how on earth could you have taken advantage of me?’

      He uttered the words reluctantly, as if every one had been dipped in poison. ‘Because you were only nineteen!’ he ground out.

      Romy frowned. ‘Yes, I was nineteen,’ she agreed, now feeling rather mystified. ‘But that’s hardly jailbait these days, is it?’

      His face darkened. ‘And I was twenty-six.’

      ‘Well, that doesn’t actually put you in the category of ancient seducer either,’ observed Romy drily.

      She saw the undisguised surprise in his eyes, and was suddenly glad that she had not just taken the easy way out.

      Because it would have been so easy to agree with him and tell him that, yes, he had taken advantage of her. And maybe if he had suggested it at the time it happened she might have agreed with him.

      But she was older now, and hopefully wiser. And she was damned if she was going to come over as a victim!

      Everything that had happened between her and Dominic she had wanted to happen. And even though part of her had known that it was very wrong that had not stopped her from acting the way she had. Indeed, she doubted whether anything could have stopped her...

      ‘Thank you for that,’ he said quietly, and he obviously spoke from the heart, and Romy suddenly felt as though she was a non-swimmer who had landed in deep, deep waters.

      She needed to get away from him. Away from that speculative silver gaze which reminded her all too poignantly of just how much she still wanted him.

      ‘Good grief!’ she exclaimed in mock horror as she