A REASON FOR MARRIAGE

“Of course not,” she gasped tremulously, her eyes now amber pools of hurt. “That really isn’t fair, Simon. You not only flirted with me outrageously the evening we met, but once you realized who I was from my brother you also ensured I had no choice but to come here for our appointment. If anyone forgot about Mark, discarded him, then it was you!”

His mouth twisted derisively. “Have you seen him again since that evening?”

“No,” she breathed shakily.

“Why not?”

Sara flinched at the coldness in Simon’s tone. At the subject of this whole conversation. “How can you even ask me that?”

Simon raised mocking brows. His inner frustrations this past three weeks was making him determined to get some sort of response from Sara. Even if it was a negative one. “Because if you haven’t been seeing me, and you haven’t been seeing Mark, then I’m interested to know who it is you’re hurrying off to meet this evening. Your ex-fiance, perhaps?”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Her face had paled to the color of delicate white porcelain.

“Is that what I’m being?” Simon grated tautly.

“Where Bruce is concerned, yes! Simon , you were there-you saw my reaction to seeing Bruce again.”

“I saw your reaction to seeing his pregnant wife,” he corrected harshly. “Which isn’t the same thing at all.”

No, it wasn’t, Sara acknowledged heavily. Not the same thing at all.

Bruce had called her, as his parting comment that evening about ‘being in touch’ had promised that he would, and requested that the two of them meet in a suitably neutral coffee shop. A suggestion to which Sara had declined and then he’d shown up at her office the next day to apologize. He’d told her he wanted a truce, but Sara suspected that he was up to one of his schemes and so she’d told him that there was no need for that as she had truly moved on. They had an agreement that they would both stay out of the other’s life, and if they met again socially would at least be polite to each other. Nothing more, but nothing less, either.

It wasn’t perfect, but it was far better than the anger which had burned so strongly between them before Sara had realized she was allowing her life to be ruined because of her failed engagement. She didn’t even care about Bruce enough to have any emotion towards him, including anger.

It was a realization which had made her determined to put that part of her life behind her and move on to whatever kind of future might be in store for her, rather than the future she had so neatly planned out for herself.

In a perfect world Sara knew that future would have included Simon-the man she had come to realize these past three weeks she very much had feelings for…. Not those bedazzled feelings she had felt for Bruce, but the feelings of a mature woman who knew what and who she was, and also knew how and who she wanted.

Sara had no idea how or when it had happened. Perhaps when Simon had defended her so gallantly in front of Bruce. Or perhaps it had been the gentleness of his care when he’d rescued her from the bathroom and taken her back to his apartment, before undressing her and leaving her to sleep alone in his bed. Or during that wild and glorious lovemaking the following day, the memory of which still caused Sara to tremble just thinking about it.

Or maybe, just maybe, it had happened the first moment she’d set eyes on him at Senator Ashcroft’s cocktail party… It didn’t really matter when or how it had happened, only that it had. She had very strong feelings for Simon Hamilton.Upstodatee from Novel(D)ra/m/a.O(r)g

Completely. Utterly. And he was obviously still as disgusted with her as he had been three weeks ago. She gave a weary sigh, accepting that perhaps she did owe Simon at least some answers to his questions. “I did meet Bruce again after his father’s party-”

“You met him?” Simon echoed incredulously. “He’s a married man, about to become a father, and the two of you still sneaked away together behind his wife’s back-”

“It wasn’t like that!” Sara protested painfully.

“No?”

The look Simon gave her down the long length of his aristocratic nose spoke of his disgust. “Then tell me what it was like, Sara,”

Sara had absolutely no doubt that the past three weeks-with the two of them skirting around each other, being outwardly polite and inwardly a seething mass of emotions and unanswered questions-had been leading up to this confrontation. A confrontation she had no idea whether or not she was ready for, but she accepted it was coming anyway.

“Did Bruce tell Emily about your meeting?” Simon pressured.

“I have no idea,” she answered honestly. “He may have done. There’s no reason why he shouldn’t have.”

Simon gave a disgusted snort. “I can think of plenty of reasons a man wouldn’t tell his heavily pregnant wife that he was going off to meet his ex fiance,”

“I said it wasn’t like that!” Sara glared at Simon. “And I didn’t sneak off to go anywhere with him!” she snapped angrily when she saw how the censure in Simon’s eyes had deepened. “He showed up at my office unannounced, despite the fact that I told him that I didn’t want to see or talk to him. He said he wanted to apologize and call a truce between us, but I didn’t really care because I don’t trust him and I didn’t want his apology because it meant nothing to me!”

Her voice was louder now and Simon could see that tears had pooled in her eyes. He moved closer to touch her. This wasn’t what he’d wanted. He’d never intended to hurt her or make her cry.

He reached out, “Sara I’m -”

She moved out of his reach and his hand dropped back to his side, “No! Don’t touch me, Simon,” she said. The tears dropped now, and she wiped them away furiously with her palm, “I don’t need you or anyone else to protect me from anything or anyone. I’ve been doing very fine before you came along and I will continue to do so. Please find someone else to finish the rest of your apartment because I won’t be doing it anymore!” she concluded, and then she stormed out, leaving Simon rooted to the spot where he stood, knowing he’d screwed things up very badly.