The Magnate's Tempestuous Marriage

by Miranda Lee

  The sudden silence from the bathroom coincided with his mood turning very dark indeed. Scott threw off his suit jacket and tie, flicked open the top button of his shirt before kicking off his shoes then stretching out on top of the bed. His stomach churned as he waited for his unfaithful wife to emerge, but his mind remained hard, and cold.

  * * *

  Sarah dried herself quickly, wrapping her wet hair in a towel before grabbing the long pink silk robe that she kept on a hook on the back of the bathroom door. Not an overly sexy garment, it was nevertheless pretty and very comfy with three-quarter-length sleeves in the kimono style. No way was she going to leave it behind. Pulling it on over her flushed nakedness, she tied the sash loosely around her waist before tossing the towel aside then drying her hair properly with her hair dryer, which was much more powerful and efficient than Cory’s. With a much better result, she thought as she ran her fingers through her long straight silky locks before opening the bathroom door.

  The unexpected sight of Scott lying on top of the bed brought a gasp of alarm to her lips. Despite his nonchalant pose—his hands were linked behind his head and his ankles were crossed—there was nothing nonchalant in his chilly grey gaze.

  ‘I gather you’re not staying, then,’ he drawled, his voice as cold as his eyes.

  Sarah could not find her tongue, fear drying her mouth and making her heart pound behind her ribs. She’d never been afraid of Scott before but she was at that moment.

  ‘No,’ she croaked out at last. ‘I...I just came to get my clothes.’

  Scott uncrossed his ankles then sat up abruptly. ‘There’s no need to sound so petrified, Sarah. I would never hurt you. Surely you must know that.’

  ‘You hurt me last Friday night,’ she threw at him.

  ‘Now you know that’s not true,’ he ground out, standing up and towering over her. ‘You enjoyed every moment of what we did last Friday night. Please don’t add hypocrisy to your adultery.’

  Her hand whipped up to slap him but he grabbed it before she could make contact with his face.

  ‘Come now, Sarah,’ he said. ‘Let’s try to act like adults here, shall we?’

  For a long moment she thought he was going to pull her against him. The intent was in his glittering grey eyes. Her already racing heartbeat accelerated further. When he released her, she could not decide if she was relieved or disappointed.

  A rueful smile twisted his mouth.

  ‘I suggest you go put some more clothes on and we adjourn to somewhere less...dangerous. I find myself unable to focus with you nearly naked like that. All I can think of at this moment is how much I still want you, despite everything.’

  Sarah’s mouth dropped open at his startling admission. Even more startling was the fact that she wanted him just as much. How perverse was that?

  It rattled her, this irrational but powerful urge she had to close the space between them, to reach up and kiss that hard, angry mouth of his.

  His eyes narrowed on hers, perhaps glimpsing the crazy jolt of desire in their depths. For suddenly, his hands reached out to grab her shoulders, dragging her against him as his head swooped.

  She could have fought him; could have been the ultimate hypocrite. But she didn’t, moaning under his quite brutal kiss, melting against his big strong body, her lips and her hips betraying her own frantic desire.

  Insane. All of it. Sarah knew he still thought she’d been unfaithful to him. But right at this moment she didn’t care what he thought. All she cared about was the here and now. And the here and now was turning her on to a degree that surpassed even last Friday night. She kissed him back with a quite savage need, telling him without words that she was still his, no matter what he believed.

  When he wrenched his mouth away, she groaned in protest, staring up at him with wide glazed eyes.

  ‘God, Sarah,’ he ground out, then kissed her again, obliterating every sensible thought with the wildness of his passion. His mouth stayed glued to hers whilst he stripped off her robe, tossing it aside with careless abandon. By then she was trembling violently, but not from cold. A large lock of hair had fallen across her face, and eyes. She stared through the strands up into his lust-filled face. It thrilled her, this knowledge. She was already lost to the mindless world he’d created last Friday night; a world of excitingly erotic pleasure, which didn’t seem to possess a conscience, only a craving for constant satisfaction.

  His hands slowly scooped her hair back from her face, bundling it into a tight bunch at the nape of her neck as he pulled her head back, his captive hold doing wicked things to her traitorous body. He glared down at her, his face flushed, his breathing ragged.

  ‘Don’t go thinking this means I forgive you,’ he threw at her.

  ‘I’ve done nothing for you to forgive,’ she managed to say. But he only laughed, then kissed her again, kissed her and touched her till she was beyond protest, let alone wordy explanations. When he scooped her up and dumped her sideways across the silvery-grey quilt, she just lay there, quivering with need whilst he hurriedly undressed. And then he was on top of her, and inside her, and she was making those animal noises again, holding him tight as she opened her legs wide and wrapped them high around his back. She moved with him, moaning his name and reaching for that moment when her flesh would shatter around his. Her climax came with a rush, making her cry out, wracking her body with wave after wave of pleasure. It was brilliant. Glorious. She gasped with the electric pleasure of it all.

  But the moment the tsunami of ecstasy began to wane, common sense blasted back into her brain, bringing with it the crushing reality of what she had just done.

  ‘Oh, God,’ she groaned, her tongue giving voice to her acute dismay. How could she have let him do that, believing what he still believed? How could she have enjoyed it, knowing this? At least last Friday night, she hadn’t known about those photos, or what Scott had been thinking.

  Her face crumpled as she agonised over what he was thinking now. Possibly that she was the worst person that had ever lived.

  His face betrayed a momentary confusion before his eyes grew cold once more. He withdrew abruptly, not looking down at her as he stood up and dressed. After that, he picked up her robe, his gaze scornful as he tossed it over her outspread nakedness.

  ‘I’m going into the kitchen to make coffee,’ he grated out. ‘Join me there when you’re decent. We need to talk.’

  Sarah squeezed her eyes tightly shut as she gripped the robe with both hands, already regretting everything, the heat of the moment fast becoming a distant memory. What on earth had possessed her? She couldn’t make sense of it. It wasn’t love that had propelled her into Scott’s arms just now. It had been something more basic than that. Something primal. Something that would not be denied. Was it just lust, or a cavewoman instinct that demanded she lay claim to her man in the way women had been doing since time began?

  That last explanation made some kind of sense, Sarah conceded as she put her robe back on and made her way reluctantly to the kitchen. But she didn’t like either thought. Because both made her vulnerable to Scott. He had to be made to understand that she could not stay with a husband who didn’t believe what she was about to tell him. She didn’t want his forgiveness. She wanted his trust!

  Sarah swallowed at the sight of her bare-chested husband busying himself in the kitchen. Lord, but he was a superbly built man, muscles rippling down his back, his arms, his chest. At the beginning of their relationship, she’d found his size somewhat intimidating, till he showed her just how gentle and tender he could be. After that she’d felt supremely safe in his arms. Not so any more. He no longer inspired that safe, secure feeling in her. Instead, when she looked at him, her whole insides quivered with a fear that was dangerously exciting. He was dangerously exciting. She wondered if this was what her poor mother had felt for her serial cheater of a husband. Sarah could see now that desire could make a woman weak. Weaker than love, in a way. It was a horrifying concept and one that she vowed to
fight.

  Such thinking forced her to ignore the stupid feelings that kept fluttering in her stomach. ‘Why aren’t you at work?’ she asked brusquely as she levered herself up on one of the breakfast bar stools.

  He turned and carried two mugs of steaming black coffee over to the counter.

  ‘I couldn’t work so I went looking for you,’ he said. ‘You weren’t at Cory’s so I came home.’

  Sarah refused to feel flattered by his leaving his precious office to search for her. ‘You could have called me.’

  He made a scoffing sound. ‘Don’t you think I tried? You had your phone turned off all weekend. Then, today, when I tried again, it was engaged.’

  She dropped her eyes to the coffee. ‘I was probably talking to Cory.’

  ‘Not Philip Leighton?’

  Her head jerked up, her eyes widening.

  ‘Don’t play the innocent with me, Sarah. I know who the man in those photos is.’

  Any confusion Sarah was suffering from suddenly changed to outrage. ‘My God, you had those photographs investigated, didn’t you?’

  ‘What on earth did you expect?’ Scott slammed back at her. ‘You wouldn’t tell me anything. You refused to offer any explanation.’

  ‘I’d have told you everything if you’d shown me those photos when you first arrived home. But you didn’t. You had to have your pound of flesh first, didn’t you?’

  ‘Perhaps I was distracted by the passion of your greeting,’ he said with cold anger in his eyes. ‘And the quality of your lies.’

  ‘My lies?’ Sarah was genuinely thrown. ‘What lies?’

  ‘You said you’d gone out at lunchtime last Friday and bought me a special anniversary present,’ he elaborated in rock-hard tones. ‘I knew for a fact that you were actually in a bar, then up in a hotel room with another man.’

  Her cheeks reddened with anger. ‘I did buy you an anniversary present,’ she insisted heatedly. ‘In a boutique on my way out of the hotel where I wasn’t doing anything to be ashamed of. I can show it to you if you like.’

  ‘It’s a little late for that, don’t you think? Unless I’m very much mistaken, we’re headed for the divorce court. I’m just grateful that we decided to put off having children for a couple of years. Thank God for the pill, is all I can say.’

  Sarah’s whole world stopped with his mentioning the pill; she couldn’t remember the last time she had taken it. Had it been last week, last month? The blood drained from her face at the thought of the possible consequences of her naivety and she groaned.

  ‘What is it?’ Scott said as he glared at her. ‘What’s wrong?’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  AS SARAH FACED the unfaceable, the blood continued to drain from her head, which had been in a total fog since all this started. But it wasn’t in a fog now. It was in shock.

  She’d fainted a couple of times in her life before. Neither time had been pleasant. But she remembered how she’d felt just before it happened. The clamminess. The sense that everything was tipping out of kilter. This time she recognised the symptoms before disaster struck, slipping off the stool to sit on the tiled floor with her head dropping down between her knees.

  ‘What in hell are you doing?’ she heard Scott ask in an alarmed voice. ‘Are you ill?’ he added, coming round to hunker down next to her. ‘Should I call an ambulance?’

  ‘No,’ was all she could manage. It was just shock and, yes, a lack of food perhaps. She hadn’t had any breakfast. Or lunch for that matter, Cory having gone to work this morning before she got up. He’d fussed over her yesterday, forcing her to eat and drink something. With him gone she’d neglected herself.

  ‘I’ll be okay in a minute,’ she added weakly at last. ‘Just feeling a bit faint. If you want to help then make me some toast. And put plenty of honey on it.’

  ‘Toast,’ he repeated, sounding totally flummoxed. But he stood up and his trouser legs disappeared so Sarah assumed he was doing as asked. Finally, she felt well enough to get up, but her legs were still shaky as she climbed back on the stool and reached for her coffee, grasping the mug with shaky hands. She’d begun to shake inside as well, still not having come to terms with what she’d realised a little while ago. It was said that fate was cruel. But it wasn’t fate. It was her own stupid fault.

  Sarah smothered a groan, her stomach contracting at the thought that a child might have been conceived after last Friday night. Her stomach contracted with horror at the thought. A baby should be born out of acts of love, not acts of black jealousy. She could also have conceived today, which wasn’t much better. But better than last Friday, she supposed. She’d sort of known what she’d been doing just now.

  Sarah shook her head in denial of this last thought. She hadn’t known what she was doing at all, had she? Not really. She’d been putty in Scott’s hands.

  Her eyes went to those hands as he spread the toast with butter first. They were large hands. Large and strong, with calluses on their palms from where he’d done hard physical work for many years. He hadn’t always been a businessman in a suit.

  ‘Feeling better?’ Scott asked as he placed the toast in front of her.

  ‘A little. Thank you.’ Avoiding his questioning eyes, she took a few bites of toast, swallowing them down with some coffee.

  Thirty seconds passed before he spoke again. ‘It’s time you told me exactly what happened at that hotel last Friday, Sarah. And I want the truth.’

  Sarah placed the mug back down on the white stone counter, took a deep gathering breath then glanced up at his large and uncompromising face.

  ‘The truth,’ she repeated, sounding calmer than she felt. For Sarah wasn’t at all confident that he would believe her. He might think she was making it all up. Still, if that was the case, then she could suggest he speak to Phil. Phil would back her up.

  Half an hour ago, she would have told him to stick his demand for the truth, but things were different now. The possibility that she might be having Scott’s baby had changed everything.

  Sarah gulped, then started. ‘I went there with Phil to meet a private investigator who had some information about you.’

  ‘Me?’

  ‘Yes, you. Phil approached me that morning in the staff room and told me he had it on good authority that you were having an affair with your PA, Cleo.’

  ‘What? That’s ridiculous and you know it!’

  Sarah wasn’t going to be put off by Scott’s bluster. ‘Is it? Cleo’s an attractive woman. On top of that she’s a widow.’

  An angry colour slanted across Scott’s high cheekbones. ‘I am not having an affair with Cleo. As for her being a widow, I’ll have you know that Cleo is still very much in love with her dead husband. She would never even look at another man, let alone sleep with one.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  He looked totally flummoxed. ‘Well... I just know!’

  ‘You know because you talk to her,’ Sarah pointed out harshly. ‘Which is more than you ever do with me.’

  ‘For pity’s sake, we just talk about business, not personal things. We spend a lot of time together.’

  ‘I am well aware of that,’ Sarah said drily.

  ‘Look, this is all getting off the point, which is supposed to be you explaining the content of those photos.’

  ‘I’m just getting to that. I was supposed to meet up with this PI in the hotel bar. But he didn’t show up. While we were there, waiting for him, Phil got a call saying that he was tied up watching someone from the balcony of his hotel room upstairs and couldn’t come down right at that moment, suggesting we come up instead.’

  Scott gave her a sceptical look. ‘That doesn’t make sense, Sarah. Why couldn’t he just tell you whatever he had to tell you over the phone?’

  ‘Phil said he didn’t like using mobile phones to relay sensitive information, especially when dealing with celebrities.’

  Scott made a scoffing sound. ‘So I’m a celebrity now, am I, as well as an adulterer?’


  Sarah felt her face flushing. ‘I know you’re not an adulterer, Scott. The man told me there was absolutely no evidence of your having an affair with Cleo, or any other woman; that he’d watched you for weeks and—’

  ‘Watched me for weeks? Good God, what is this? Who hired this guy? Oh, I get it. Leighton hired him, didn’t he?’

  ‘Well, yes, he did. Look, I know it all seems a bit odd but it wasn’t my idea. Phil’s a divorce lawyer and was worried about me after he heard the rumours. He asked his usual investigator to look into it without consulting me.’

  ‘Touting for business, was he? Or was it something more personal than that?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Haven’t you wondered yet who might have sent those photos, Sarah? Blind Freddie can see that if what you say is true, then it had to be a set-up. Luring you to the hotel like that. Getting you to go up to a room. Tell me, was the PI actually in the room when you got up there?’

  Sarah frowned. ‘No...not at first. He left a note saying he had to step out and follow someone for a few minutes. He didn’t arrive till some time later.’

  ‘Making it look like you had enough time to have sex with Leighton before you left.’

  Sarah’s frown deepened. ‘But that would mean that...that...’

  ‘That Leighton was the person who set it all up,’ he finished for her.

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Why do you think? He’s probably in love with you.’

  ‘Oh, that’s ridiculous,’ she denied heatedly. Yes, he had invited her out to dinner during the week she’d worked under his mentorship. But only the once. She’d quite enjoyed his company but there’d been no chemistry between them. At least on her part. Then she’d met Scott and Phil had become just a friend. Quite a good friend, actually. Sarah often ran into him in the staff room where she occasionally gave vent to her annoyance at how often Scott went away on business. He was always very sympathetic. Still, it was probably her fault that he thought something had gone wrong with their marriage. But she could see nothing in his behaviour to warrant believing he had romantic feelings towards her. He never flirted, or gave her lustful glances. He never stepped out of line. Ever!