The Chatsfield Short Romances 6-10. Carol Marinelli
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really hearing him above the roaring of blood in her ears Chloe stared at him completely dumbfounded. ‘You know who I am.’
His eyes narrowed as if he was trying to work out the answer to a complex puzzle. ‘Ah, yeah. Was I not supposed to?’
‘When? When did you figure it out?’ she demanded.
He cocked his head and his brow furrowed in that cute way that made him look like he wouldn’t hurt a fly. ‘The minute I saw you outside the hotel. What’s going on?’ His frown deepened. ‘Were you actually trying to pretend to be someone else?’
‘No,’ she snapped, smacking the palm of her hand against her forehead. How was it that she kept making such a colossal fool of herself in front of this man? ‘Your PA got it wrong not me.’
‘So why didn’t you correct her?’
‘I didn’t see the point. I wasn’t expecting to see you for more than five minutes.’
‘Ah,’ he looked at her with a combination of guilt and wariness. ‘And you weren’t going to tell me.’
‘Why bother?’
Liam’s mouth flattened into a straight line. ‘I have to say I’m struggling to get my head around this.’
His firm gaze swept over her, reminding her that she was still standing between the legs of a guy she was supposed to be rejecting. She was truly pathetic. ‘I have to go. Excuse me.’
Before she could move Liam snagged her wrist. ‘Chloe?’
She shook him off. ‘How could you know it was me? I look completely different now.’
‘No you don’t.’
Chloe stared at him. Was he suggesting she still looked as bad as she used to?
‘Fiery red hair, incredible blue eyes with tiny gold flecks, long legs. Breasts.’
Chloe tried not to feel warmed by his words and scoffed. ‘All girls have breasts.’
‘True, but since moving to Hollywood I’ve learned that not all girls have real breasts.’ Chloe felt her cheeks heat as his eyes dropped to her cleavage. ‘I always thought you had magnificent breasts.'
Appalled by how affected she was by his words, how aroused, she just wanted to run away and hide. Forever this time. She stepped back from him again. ‘Please Liam. I know what you want but I don’t want it.’
‘Not now that I know who you are, you mean.’ His eyes grew as stony as chipped emeralds. ‘Tell me, what were you going to do, Chloe? Have sex with me as Candy and then bolt.’
‘No.’
‘What then?’
Chloe squared her shoulders. ‘I wasn’t going to have sex with you at all.’
‘Ah.’ Somehow he’d moved so that he was standing in front of her again, his chest inches from her own. ‘Payback then.’
‘It’s no less than you deserve,’ she felt stung into retorting.
‘I know.’ The anger she had felt in him moments ago ebbed away. ‘I was an utter jerk to you back in high school, but I didn’t invite you up here to have sex with you. I invited you here so that I could apologise.’
Chloe scrunched her brow in confusion. ‘So what was all this?’ She waved her hands in the direction of the champagne. The chocolates. The condoms. ‘If you don’t want me then it really was for someone else.’ She knew she sounded accusing but she was so confused by her own rioting emotions that she was struggling to think clearly. ‘This was never for me, it was–’
‘Chloe, I do want you. Hell.’ He grabbed hold of her elbows. ‘Dammit, would you stop trying to get away from me and listen.’
‘No.’ She shook her head violently, determined not to embarrass herself any more with him. ‘I want to go. I don’t want this.’ She forced herself to hold his stare. ‘You. I don’t want you.’
‘I’m sorry, but it was you who stroked my chest before.’
‘It was an accident.’
His look told her he knew that had been no accident. ‘You did it twice.’
‘I have to go.’
Liam tightened his hold on her. ‘Stay.’
Chloe looked at him and knew that years of hurt and humiliation were reflected in her blurry eyes. ‘You had a bet with your friends that you could make me fall in love with you,’ she cried.
‘Yes. And I’m sorry I did that to you.’
His honesty and the sincerity of his apology floored her and it must have shown because he laughed. ‘You weren’t expecting me to confess my part in it?’
No she wasn’t.
‘I admit that I initially invited you out as part of a dare,’ he began slowly, ‘I was… I was messed up at the time but I promise you that I had nothing to do with the proposal or the video. In fact I had my father take it down from the internet as soon as he could.’
Chloe wrapped her arms around her waist. ‘So your friends improvised. Big deal. I’m over it. I’m over you. I’m over your pity.’
‘What pity?’
Chloe really didn’t want to have this conversation but she only had herself to blame because she’d started it. She’d come here on some stupid mission for revenge that she should have known she didn’t have the wherewithal to pull off. ‘The pity I saw in your eyes the moment I threw my arms around your neck and said yes, I’ll marry you.’ She gave a self-deprecating laugh that rang hollowly in the quiet room.
‘That wasn’t pity you saw in my eyes’ Liam said quietly. ‘That was regret over my actions.’
She made a noise in the back of her throat. ‘God, I must be the village idiot. How could I have ever thought…’ She checked herself and shook her head, her hair falling around her face in soft waves. ‘Please forget you even know me and we’ll call this the end of it.’
‘Dammit, Chloe, I do not pity you.’
‘Sure.’
‘I’m serious about seeing you again. In fact I want you to come with me to the premiere of Time Could Wait tomorrow night.’
‘Your movie?’
‘Yes.’
‘The one that will be lined with about a gazillion women all screaming your name and throwing knickers at you.’
‘They don’t tend to do that anymore. And some will be screaming Bethany Lord’s name, but yes. That one.’
Chloe wanted to she realised. Really badly. Which was a very good reason why she shouldn’t. ‘No.’
‘Give me one good reason why not?’
Liam had widened his stance as if he was going into battle and Chloe wished for one brief moment that all that hard male perfection could really be hers. ‘Give me one good reason why I should?’ she countered.
‘I want to see you again and tomorrow I’m busy all day in radio interviews and then I have to fly to Paris for the next leg of the junket.’
She shook her head. ‘And what if someone recognises me from that awful prank?’
‘Then I’ll tell them what a stupid jock I was.’
‘And damage your pristine reputation?’
‘I don’t care about my reputation.’
Chloe knew her scepticism must have shown because Liam ran his hand through his hair in frustration. ‘I don’t. I learned a long time ago that