for one of their own, if only to suck him dry.
And then, emerging out of the bleakness of that time, he’d found Katia—or she had found him. Playboy of the year, bachelor of the year; he’d been awarded so many of those meaningless titles he couldn’t remember them all. But she had wanted him above all others and they had been so absorbed in their own special world that nothing else had mattered. Or so he had thought. Not until much later when the foundations of his world had once again been torn apart …
He shook his head, wondering at the insanity that had driven his actions then, knowing he should know better now. For it had to be a form of insanity to be contemplating what he was doing, to be undertaking what he was doing.
Even now he’d primed Gabriella perfectly; she was still thinking about Venice even though he’d said nothing to encourage her after that first exchange. Even now she was still thinking it through, working out the angles, making it possible in her own mind, making it her own decision.
Even now it could still happen—and he could get her to Venice and clear of Paris before the news of Consuelo’s inevitable arrest broke. For Consuelo would be arrested, nothing was surer.
But right now, looking into Gabriella’s eyes flickering brandy-gold in the lamplight, he wasn’t so sure of anything else. The way she looked at him …
She wasn’t the girl she had once been. She was a woman now, and his body was reacting the way a man’s body did to a woman he desired.
He shook his head, trying to dispel those images. ‘You were no doubt better off without me.’ As you would be now.
She reached over, took his hands in hers. ‘I’m sorry. How about we make a deal? How about we don’t think about the past? Maybe it’s time we let it go. You yourself toasted to a new beginning, so can’t we just leave it at that? Can we let the past go and start again?’
If only it were that easy!
His past was him. It was his past that had made him, shaped him and moulded him, even broken him along the way. It had made him who he was now.
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