Beneath her mask, her eyes darted from side to side as if measuring whether she could escape. She looked uneasy, and he hated that he was the one making her feel that way, but he had to hear the truth from her own lips.
“Do you love Griffin?” he demanded.
She squeezed her eyes shut. Her pulse throbbed in her throat. “What does that matter?”
“It matters. It matters quite a lot.To me.” Damn her. She was still not going to give him the truth, to admit she loved him.
Opening her eyes again, she slipped from beneath his arms and hurried toward the door. When she got there, she placed her hand on the knob and paused. “I’m truly sorry to have bruised your pride. But I…must go.”
“Running away?” came his mocking voice. “I didn’t peg you as a coward.”
Still facing the door, Meredith lifted her chin. “I’mnotrunning away.” She tried to sound defiant, but her voice was deflated. She knew he was right. Shewasrunning away.
“Where are you going then? To findGriffin?”
“No.”
He took a seat on the bed. “Tell me. Why were you here trying to get a stranger to make love to you if you’re in love with a man named Griffin?”
“I’m not in love with him!” she nearly shouted.
“Aren’t you?”
She whirled to face him. “Stop! We’re just friends. Griffin and I arejust friends.”
If she was going to take this all the way, then so would he. “You sound as if you’re trying to convince yourself as much as me.”
“I’m leaving.” She turned and opened the door, but he was behind her in an instant and quickly slammed it shut again with the palm of his hand.
“No, you’re not,” he whispered darkly in her ear, his hand still pressed to the door. “Not until I tell you what I tried to tell you the last time you were here.” He grabbed her arm and spun her around to face him as he ripped the mask off his face.
Meredith gasped.She squeezed her eyes shut, and tears ran down her cheeks. “Griffin,don’t.”
“Don’t pretend any more, Meredith,” Griffin growled. “I suspect you’ve known it was me all along.”
Her silence answered for her.
He lowered his head and whispered into her ear, “And it was me. You were withmeeach time you were here, not some nameless man. You wantedme. I just want you to remember that, Meredith, when you’re pretending we’re onlyfriends.”
He pulled back his head to look at her. Her eyes were filled with tears, but her jaw was tightly clenched. “Griffin, why did you do this? Why did you follow me here? Why did you pretend?—?”
“Ah, mock outrage?” His laugh was entirely humorless. “Did you honestly expect me to let you go to a pleasure club without ensuring your safety, Meredith? You know me better than that.”
She shook her head. “You didn’t have to do this. You didn’t have to tell me who you are. You?—”
“I what? Had to resort to a cheap device”—he flung the mask across the room—“to try to get you to admit you love me?”
She turned back toward the door. “I’m leaving.”
“I don’t hear you denying it though.”
Her voice was low, angry. “It doesn’t matter if?—”
“The hell it doesn’t.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Look, Meredith. The truth is when you married Maxwell, it devastated me. But you were dead set on marrying that old man. You actually thought you should do it for yourfather.”
Her chin quivered. “My father loved me.”
“Your father abandoned you and used you,” he shot back.
