Heiress on the Run (Harlequin Romance) (8 page)

CHAPTER EIGHT

J
ERRY
HAD
SCAMPERED
back to his room before Dominic could get any coherent account of what had happened, which he supposed meant he’d have to trust Faith’s version of the story to be fully accurate. Normally, he hated only hearing one side. But on this occasion...he trusted Faith a hell of a lot more than the man he’d been doing business with for nearly three years.

‘Tell me what happened,’ he said as Faith let them both into her room, kicked off her ruined shoes and headed straight for the minibar.

‘Pretty much exactly what you think happened.’ She pulled out a small bottle of Scotch and reached for the glasses on the counter above.

‘I don’t know what happened,’ he said reasonably as he took a seat in the armchair. ‘All I saw was my client on the floor, practically crying in pain.’

Faith shrugged. ‘I stood on his foot.’

Dominic’s gaze dropped to the ridiculously high heels she’d discarded in the corner. The one with the intact heel certainly looked as if it could do some damage. ‘Why?’

‘Would you believe me if I said it was an accident?’ Faith poured the whisky evenly between the two glasses and handed one to him.

‘No,’ he said, taking a sip. Not as good as his, but not bad.

With a sigh, Faith dropped onto the sofa, curling her legs up under her. ‘He was drunk. He got...ideas. And he didn’t appear able to comprehend the word
no
.’

Dominic stopped, stared, his blood heating up. He’d kill him. How could he even think for a moment that Faith—Faith!—would want to...?

‘You don’t believe me.’ Glancing over, he saw Faith’s wide eyes looking at him with disappointment.

‘Oh I believe you,’ he said, the words scratchy in his throat. ‘And that bastard is on the next flight home.’ Pushing himself to his feet, he let his anger carry him towards the door, but Faith stopped him before he got there, her small hand on his arm, a touch he hadn’t expected.

‘He was drunk,’ she repeated. ‘And stupid. Very, very stupid. But I took care of it.’

‘You shouldn’t have had to.’

‘No, I shouldn’t. But, trust me, it’s not the first time it’s happened. Guys get ideas in hotels, for some reason. But I learnt to look after myself, and no one has ever got any further than a hand on my waist unless I wanted them to, I promise.’

She sounded so calm, so certain, that Dominic’s blood started to cool, just a little. ‘I still want to punish him.’

‘Oh, by all means,’ Faith said, giving him a lopsided smile. ‘Just find something more subtle than getting yourself arrested for grievous bodily harm, yeah?’

Dropping back down onto the couch, Dominic realised that he would have done. He’d have gone to that bastard’s room and pounded him to a pulp, without caring what the police would do, or what the press would say, what damage it would do to the business, to these negotiations. Three years of strategising down the drain, and the Beresford name on the front of every paper for all the wrong reasons again.

He couldn’t risk that.

He wanted to believe that he’d have done it anyway because he was a noble man who knew right from wrong. But, as Faith sat down beside him, her thigh close enough to touch his, he knew that gentlemanly behaviour had nothing to do with it.

He’d have hurt that man for touching Faith. Any other woman...he’d have reported it to Jerry’s superiors, to the police if it had gone far enough. But Faith...was different.

‘You okay?’ she asked, bumping her arm against his.

He gave a humourless laugh. ‘Shouldn’t I be asking you that?’

‘Probably. But I’m clearly fine.’

Dominic studied her, taking in her pale skin, and the spots of pink on her cheeks that were probably the fault of the whisky. ‘Are you?’

She gave a half-shrug, and took another sip. ‘Just a little shaken. I should have known better than to let him walk me back, really.’

‘This is in no way your fault,’ Dominic said firmly.

‘Oh, I know that. Trust me, I blame him entirely.’

‘Good.’ Leaning back against the sofa, Dominic began to imagine ways of making Jerry pay. At the very least, he was going to get every meeting request for every video conference until the end of time, whether he needed to be there or not.

‘You’re thinking of torture techniques, aren’t you?’ Faith curled her feet up under her again, twisting to face him on the sofa, and he couldn’t help but notice the way the skirt of that bloody black dress rode up her thighs. God, he was as bad as Jerry.

‘Corporate torture,’ he promised. ‘Entirely legal.’

‘Well, that’s okay then. Wouldn’t want my boss getting into trouble.’

Her boss. Of course that was all he was to her. And he wouldn’t even be that much longer. Once the Americans were on the plane home, she’d be gone. Onto the next job, the next adventure. He couldn’t even plan on calling her back next time he had guests in town; God only knew where she’d be by then.

Unless...

‘I meant to talk to you about that, actually.’ Or he would have, if he’d thought of it before now.

Faith’s eyebrows drew together. ‘About what?’

Dominic took a deep breath, and made his play. ‘About whether you’d like to make the boss thing a more permanent arrangement.’

* * *

Faith stared at him long enough that he started to go out of focus, then snapped her gaze away. Of course he was so impressed by her professional abilities that he wanted to keep her around. Nothing to do with her more personal attributes. She had to remember that.

But still...he did want to keep her around. Just the idea gave her a warm glow greater than anything she’d got from the alcohol in her glass.

Except, she couldn’t stay. The realisation made her wince into her whisky as she looked down so she didn’t have to see his face as she answered.

‘That’s...very kind...’ She scouted around her poor scrambled brain to find the right words, but Dominic was already talking again before she got to them.

‘It makes sense, right? I mean, I need a new tour company, one way or another, and I got to thinking that it would be easier if I just had someone on staff to take care of these things. Obviously we’d need to come to a more formal arrangement—you’d need an office in my building, and we’d have to discuss salary, relocation expenses and all of that.’

She wanted to say yes. It was a fantastic offer, something that would really let her build up her life as Faith Fowler. But how could she do it in the shadow of her family name? How could she risk living in London again, knowing that any moment they could find her and thrust her back into the limelight?

Dominic gave her an encouraging smile and she tried to return it.

Would it really be so bad, even if they did find her? She was a grown woman. They couldn’t make her go home. And with a stable job with Dominic, she’d never be reliant on them for money, or anything else again. This could be her chance at true independence.

Until Dominic found out the truth. No way he’d hang onto an employee who brought the paparazzi down on him for harbouring a missing heiress. And once they’d found her, all the stories would start up again, and the pictures of her leaving that damn hotel room would be back in circulation, and the rumours about her relationship with a married drug addict rock star...no. Dominic wouldn’t stand for any of that. Even if she could make him believe that the papers had it all wrong.

No. She couldn’t stay. There was no place for her in Dominic’s world any more, if there ever really had been. Getting close to Dominic...it was a mistake. One she was very afraid she might have already made. But there had to be a line, a point she couldn’t cross. She couldn’t fall in love. And so she couldn’t risk staying.

Besides, she told herself, she didn’t want to stay in London anyway. She wanted to see more of the world, more than just Italy.

Even if she’d rather see more of Dominic.

‘You’re going to say no, aren’t you?’

Faith gave him an apologetic smile, and he shook his head.

‘Is this because of the Lord thing?’

She blinked. ‘The Lord thing?’

Shifting to face her, Dominic’s expression was serious. ‘Yeah. I saw the way you were at Beresford Hall today. You hated every minute of it. So, what’s the problem? You hate the aristocracy?’

I was the aristocracy.
‘Of course not.’

‘So, what, then? Trust me, whatever it is, I’ve heard it before. That I’m an over-privileged, spoilt brat who only got where I am because of my family. That I’m stealing from the mouths of others by having so much. That—’

‘Dominic.’ Faith spoke as calmly as she could, placing her hand against his arm again. ‘I didn’t say any of those things.’

He sighed. ‘But you did hate being there today.’

No point lying about that one. ‘Yeah.’

‘So, why?’

Faith drew in a deep breath while she considered her answer. Obviously she couldn’t tell him the truth—that it reminded her too much of her own home. But he clearly wasn’t going to be fobbed off with a blatant lie, either. Besides, even if she couldn’t stay, she wanted him to think well of her when she was gone.

‘I guess I...I don’t know how to explain it, really. It made me feel uncomfortable. All that history and opulence.’

Dominic frowned. ‘Uncomfortable? Why? I mean, I’ve had people be angry about the privilege, had people be jealous or bitter. But why uncomfortable?’

‘Does it really matter?’

‘It does to me.’

He was very close now, closer than even Jerry had been before she maimed him. When had she shifted so close? When had the hand on his arm become a gentle caress rather than a calming gesture? When had his thigh pressed so closely against her legs, his arm along the back of the sofa just behind her?

She didn’t ask why it mattered to him; it was enough that it did. And she wanted him to know the truth, to have one moment of honesty from her before she left, taking all her lies and secrets with her.

‘It made me feel trapped. Like all that history, tradition, expectation were weighing down on me, instead of you. Like there was no room for you to be yourself or explore what you wanted. Because the family name, upholding what that means, would always make you follow a certain course. That’s why it made me uncomfortable.’

* * *

Dominic stared at her, realising too late that he was close enough now to see every fleck of green and brown in her hazel eyes. He could kiss her without moving more than a few centimetres.

But he wouldn’t. Because of Jerry, because she was leaving, and because the very basis of his life made her ‘uncomfortable’.

‘That’s not how it is.’ Sitting back, he slid his arm back along the sofa, tucking his elbow in at his side, keeping his hands far away from her tempting skin. ‘What I’ve done at Beresford Hall...that’s all me. When my father died, he left things in a less than ideal condition.’ Had she ever heard the story? he wondered. Everyone he met in society knew; he could see it in their eyes when he was introduced. After all, it was such a good story—the Lady of the Manor who went wild, running off to the Med with a billionaire tycoon, leaving behind two children and a distraught husband. A husband who barely got over the loss enough to look after the children, let alone the estate. Who could blame people for telling it over and over again?

Of course, they didn’t see beyond the pictures in the society pages. His mother, living it up on some yacht, flaunting her adultery, her betrayal. And his mother never had to see what it did to the family she left behind. How Sylvia cried and screamed and then went silent for two long months. How the husband she left behind faded to a shadow of a man.

Or how Dominic dealt, every day, with the photographers and the journalists, at the door and on the phone. And with the constant humiliation of every single person in his life knowing how little he meant to his own mother.

It came up less in the business world, at least—one reason he preferred to keep his focus on building up the business and the brand, rather than attending the compulsory charity galas and events that he’d inherited with the title. But did ordinary people really care? Did Faith?

She raised her eyebrows at him. ‘Less than ideal? What does that mean?’

Did it matter any more? The shame he burned with at the memories? Had he done enough, finally, to set it all behind him? Would he ever?

Faith was still waiting for an answer, though. He swallowed down the last gulp of his whisky, enjoying the slight burn in his throat. ‘After my mother left...my father checked out of life,’ he said bluntly. ‘He didn’t care about anything any more. Not even the scandal my mother left behind. The estate suffered.’ He shrugged. ‘When he died, he left us with nothing but our name.’

‘And you fought back from that.’ Faith’s eyes were wide as she watched him. ‘You built up the estate, the business...’

‘I saved the family name,’ he corrected her. ‘The rest was incidental.’

‘It meant that much to you. The name, I mean.’

‘Yes.’ He glanced away. ‘It was all I had left, after all.’

She was silent for a long moment, but when he looked back her gaze was still fixed on him. Her teeth bit down on her lip, a flash of white in the dim lamplight of the darkening hotel room, and he wondered what it was she wanted to say. And whether she’d decide to say it.

‘My father,’ she said finally. ‘He was—is—the world’s most charming man. But...he gambled. Still does, I imagine. He...lost. A lot. Even if he’d never admit it. Life had to go on as if everything was normal, like we were as good as—better than—everyone else. Even if we couldn’t afford to buy my school uniform. That’s one of the reasons I moved away. I didn’t want to watch him destroy himself, or our family.’

The words caught him in the chest, and it took him a moment to identify why. That was, he realised, the first real thing she’d ever told him about herself. He knew about the tours she’d led, the people she’d met. He knew her opinion on subjects as varied as clothes and theatre and London traffic.

And now he knew something of her. A small token, before she left him.

It wasn’t enough.