Liam hesitated. He wasn’t pumped about the idea of revealing his most intimate thoughts to anyone, let alone a man who was virtually a stranger.
But wasn’t a fool.
Luc Angeli could be his biggest obstacle or his greatest ally when it came to winning Holly’s forgiveness.
“I wanted her to come to me,” he said, scrubbing his hands over his face. God, he missed Holly. Even though they’d shared less than twenty-four hours together, he’d become accustomed to having her near. Now he didn’t know where she was. Or even if she was okay. Dammit. “To accept that she loved me without having to expose Theodore. Foolish, I suppose.”
“No, not foolish. Hell, I even admire the sentiment,” Luc assured him. “But right now you have to hope she can forgive you long enough to explain.”
Liam turned, and with one violent jerk of his arm sent the empty beer bottle sailing into the fireplace.
It exploded into a thousand shards, representing the pieces of his broken heart.
“Shit,” he breathed.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Holly ordered the taxi to take her to the Playhouse.
In part, because she was afraid that Liam would follow her to her apartment. But mainly because she needed the comfort of her best friend.
Thank god Sasha had come in early to deal with paperwork.
With her usual efficiency she had Holly whisked into her small office and a plate of fudge brownies shoved into her hands.
Now Holly paced the hand-woven carpet that matched the surprisingly delicate Louis XIV furnishings. The rest of the club was so…modern and bold and intensely sensual. It was always a shock to get a glimpse of the traditional, hardheaded businesswoman beneath the dominatrix façade.
“Men suck,” Holly muttered, licking the chocolate from her fingers.
She’d had three brownies, but everyone knew that the calories didn’t count when a man had pissed you off.
Leaning against the desk, Sasha was casually dressed in yoga pants and oversized T-shirt.
Her usual uniform of black leather and tight bustier would be put on before the customers started to arrive.
“Preaching to the choir, sister,” she assured Holly.
Holly turned to pace to the other end of the office. “A woman would have to be an idiot to trust them.”
“True.”
“They claim to love you and then…” With a dramatic motion, Holly slammed her fist into the palm of her hand. “Bam.”
“Love?” Sasha didn’t bother to hide the shock in her voice. “Are you referring to Liam?”
Holly glanced at her friend in confusion. “Of course.”
“He actually said the L word?”
A renegade warmth flooded through Holly’s heart at the memory of Liam’s expression as he’d insisted he loved her. He’d looked so…fierce. So desperate for her to believe him.
Abruptly she slammed the door on the painful image.
“Focus, Sasha,” she snapped, speaking more to herself than her friend. “He set me up to be jilted.”
“Technically, Ted was the one who jilted you,” Sasha gently pointed out. “The selfish dick.”
Holly halted her pacing to glare at her supposed friend.
What was wrong with the woman?
She’d come here for a thorough, epic male-bashing session.
“You’re not defending him, are you?” she asked.
Sasha reached for a brownie, nibbling at the corner. “No, I’m just pointing out that it wasn’t Liam who asked you to be his wife while he was making babies with his mistress. Or decided to make a fool of you by not showing up for his own wedding.”
Okay. It was true that Liam hadn’t been the one to jilt her. But he was at least partially responsible for her being so publically humiliated.
“He should have told me,” she said.
“Absolutely,” Sasha readily agreed.
“Instead he—”
“Gave you a night of mad, crazy passion and told you he loved you?” her companion interrupted with an overly innocent smile.
Holly threw her hands up in exasperation. “Sasha.”
“Sorry.”
Holly frowned. Her friend didn’t sound very damned sorry.
In fact, Holly was beginning to suspect that Sasha was feeling unexpected sympathy toward Liam.
“You don’t think I have a right to be angry?” she demanded.
“Hell, a woman always has a right to be angry,” she assured Holly. “And I totally intend to kick Liam’s ass when I see him. He should have told me what Junior was up to. I wouldn’t have hesitated to share the jackass’s secret life.”
Holly grimaced. She didn’t doubt for a minute that Sasha would have relished the opportunity to expose Ted as a faithless, spineless, pathetic worm.
“That I believe.”
Sasha took another bite of brownie. “Did you tell him that you loved him?”
Holly stiffened at the unexpected question. “What?”
“You said that Liam confessed his love,” Sasha pressed. “Did you say it back?”
What the hell? Holly shifted from foot to foot, feeling ridiculously exposed.
“What makes you think I love him?”
Sasha lifted her brows. “Don’t you?”
Damn. This wasn’t going at all like it was supposed to.
Well, the brownies were predictable. And no doubt Sasha had a bottle of vodka chilling in the small fridge next to the bar.
But instead of jumping onto the we-hate-Liam bandwagon, her friend was bringing up all sorts of stuff she didn’t want to think about.
“He makes me crazy,” she at last confessed.
“Good crazy or bad crazy?”
Holly wrinkled her nose. “Both.”
“And that scares you?”
Scared her? It terrified her on a bone-deep level.
“Yes.”
Sasha swallowed the last of her brownie before licking the chocolate from her lips.
“Why?”
It was a question that Holly had never been able to answer.
Oh, she had a dozen excuses.
Beyond the fact he’d taken her father’s business, he was too arrogant. Too bossy. Too vibrantly male.
But over the past few hours she’d been forced to acknowledge the real reason she’d found him so frightening.
“Because he matters.”
Sasha frowned at the unmistakable edge in Holly’s voice.
“Why would that scare you?”
She hunched her shoulders, suddenly wishing she hadn’t eaten so many brownies.
She had a queasy sensation in the pit of her stomach.