Sarah’s mind was reeling. All her assumptions were knocked in a mushy heap and what was emerging was too repulsive to accept. Dread clutched her heart, yet she had to ask, had to look at the can of slimy worms Peter Larsen had opened up. She could barely get her voice to work. The words came out faintly, strained through a welter of emotional resistance to hearing an even more damning statement.
“Are you saying my father threw races for a bookmaker?”
The satisfaction in the light silvery eyes blanked into shock. “Tareq didn’t tell you?”
Sarah felt the blood draining from her face. “It wasn’t just loss of heart and…and stress…”
“But you must know,” he argued, more to himself than to her. “Surely Tareq asked me to leave so he could tell you in private how far your father had abused his trust…”
He was recalling the morning at the Como Hotel, the fateful morning when the bargain had been struck. It rushed back on Sarah, too. “Why did he keep it from me? If my father was crooked…taking bribes…”
Peter Larsen passed a hand across his face, muttered something vicious to himself, then recomposed his expression to impervious reserve. “I do beg your pardon, Miss Hillyard. It seemed reasonable to set your mind at rest.”
“Please…I want to know…”
“You must excuse me. I have been unforgivably indiscreet.”
It was true then. Had to be. It was written all over Peter Larsen as he strode from the room, tight-faced, stiff-backed, patently appalled at what he had let slip to her. He’d almost certainly go straight to Tareq and relay what he’d done. And then what?
Sarah felt sick. Tareq’s words came spinning back to her…a matter of trust. Trust abused beyond trusting again. And Tareq knew it. Had known all along while she’d pleaded a case for lenience, for understanding, for mercy on a man who, unbeknownst to her, had criminally cheated him.
He’d sent Peter Larsen out of the hotel room right at the moment when he should have revealed the truth. If he had gone ahead and done it, as Peter had assumed, the result would have been…Sarah concentrated hard on thinking back, remembering her state of mind. The truth would have swept the mat out from under her feet, would have smashed any grounds for giving her father a second chance. She would have died of shame and given up, faced with her father’s crooked dealings with a bookmaker.
But Tareq hadn’t wanted that result. He had posed the bargain, pressing her to accept, using his knowledge of her, using everything at his command to get her to accept.
For what purpose?
In the light of all that had followed in these past six weeks with him, Sarah still didn’t know. Tareq had her so confused, it was driving her crazy wondering what he wanted of her. She was sick to death of his testing and teasing and tantalising behaviour. She wanted answers. And she was going to get them.
Now!
SARAH DIDN’T BOTHER knocking. Nothing was going to stop her from having a showdown with Tareq. She opened the library door and marched in, breathing fiery determination.
Peter Larsen swung around, opening a clear view of his employer friend, seated at the splendid mahogany desk he favoured. Sarah ignored the trusted trouble-shooter, her gaze fastening directly on the sharp blue windows to Tareq al-Khaima’s unfathomable soul.
“I want to talk to you. Alone. And without delay,” she stated, unshakably intent on getting her own way. Tareq was not going to dominate this encounter!
He rose from his chair, languidly unfolding to his full height, insufferably confident of controlling everything. “Thank you, Peter,” he said, not the slightest trace of any acrimony in his tone. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Of course there was no cause for Tareq to be upset by the indiscretion, Sarah savagely reasoned as Peter Larsen took swift leave of them. the bargain had been struck and there was no going back. Tareq was sitting pretty on whatever he was sitting on. Except he wasn’t sitting anymore. He was strolling around the desk. By the time the door behind Sarah was closed, he was propped casually against the front edge of the desktop, perfectly at ease.
The urge to smash his smooth facade raged through Sarah. How many deceptions was he juggling in the super-clever mind behind that handsome face? The feeling of being a pawn in a game she was not allowed to see put a violent edge on her churning emotions.
“I wouldn’t have asked you to cover up criminal activity,” she hurled at him. “If I’d known my father was intentionally cheating you, I would not have come to you at all.”
“But you still would have wanted what you did achieve, Sarah,” came the perfectly chosen pertinent reply. “Your father given a chance to redeem himself, and the security of the children assured as far as it can be.”
In other words, everything else should be considered irrelevant. Sarah dug in her heels. “And just how far have you gone to achieve that, Tareq? How far do you go to get what you want?” she demanded heatedly.
He replied with calm logic, completely unruffled. “I find that people usually listen to reason when the profit and loss are laid out to them. Irrefutable facts do have impact.”
“You withheld facts from me,” Sarah pointed out, her eyes flashing resentment at his cavalier way of doing what suited him with her.
“I didn’t want to hurt you,” he said with heart-twisting simplicity. “You were innocent, Sarah.”
But she was hurt, hurting non-stop from his keeping things from her and his arbitrary withdrawals that drove her into a deep trough of frustration. This confrontation wasn’t really about her father. It was about attitude and honesty and the direction of this journey they were supposed to be taking together.
“I’m not a child, Tareq,” she protested. “I’d rather be faced with the truth than be protected from it.”
The moment the words were out, Sarah was struck by the realisation that Tareq had been treating her like a child all along, a grown-up one to some extent, but still to be indulged and protected as though she were a complete innocent.
“What good would it have done?” he asked.
“I don’t need you to make judgments for me. Nor decisions,” she retorted, smarting over how many things had been arranged for her—without discussion—by her self-appointed keeper. “It’s so intolerably patronising!”
“Sarah…” he chided.
“Don’t use that tone of voice to me,” she exploded, hating the sense of being relegated to some lesser level of understanding. “What right do you think you have to take over my life as though you know best?”
That stopped him from giving his soothing little smile. His eyes glowered, some dark emotion climbing over sweet reason. “I have tried to do my best by you, Sarah,” he growled. “If you don’t appreciate it…”
“Why don’t you try appreciating I can think for myself?” she retaliated, cutting off his self-serving argument, finding it so intensely provocative, she stormed off around the room, savagely muttering, “Doing his best for me. Doing his best. Doing his best.”
It didn’t matter that it was probably true. It was what a parent said to a child. Her frustration with their relationship boiled over. She glared at him—this man who held himself back from her while subtly laying siege to her heart—and the need to strip him of his formidable control clawed through her.
“You obviously see me as a little girl to be pampered and given treats,” she mocked, her hands flying around in scornful gestures. “Never mind that I’m twenty-three years old and