A Perfect Cornish Escape by Phillipa Ashley Page 0,106
team had been investigating him and they handed over their findings to the police. What I find most amusing is that it was the old expenses fiddle that got him in the end. He’s done much worse, but I’m sure a lot of stones will be turned over now he’s been caught out. He has plenty of enemies. We’ll see what comes crawling out.’
‘I’m assuming you had no idea of the kind of man he was?’
‘Do you need to ask that?’ She was a little hurt.
‘No. I’m sorry I did. He must have hidden his real nature well.’
‘He fooled me. My pride was hurt and it still is. I’m angry with myself that I fell for someone who I thought …’ She still felt the sting of betrayal. ‘Who I thought would never use me like he did.’
‘I know that,’ he said gently.
‘Even so, I’m not sure how I was so taken in, and yet I was.’
‘You’re as human as the rest of us. Don’t think you’re not. People always amaze me. The strongest will clutch at a drowning relative to save themselves; the smallest, oldest, seemingly the frailest will show enormous strength …’
‘Really?’
‘Yes, but we don’t use that in our PR.’ His brief smile melted away. ‘How do you feel about this … finally being vindicated?’
‘It’s … hard to say. I suppose I should be doing a dance and whooping but I don’t feel like doing that as much as I might have once expected.’ Tiff could not deny that she’d thought she loved Warner back then, and she couldn’t openly revel in his misfortune … but she wasn’t sad for him either.
But she knew too that the real reason behind her sadness was sitting right in front of her. She hadn’t known that tearing herself away from Dirk would have hurt so much. That a pound-shop Heathcliff was the man she loved. She was also painfully aware that she was only putting off the moment when she had to confess all to Dirk. ‘My contact is the editor of the Post. She didn’t only call me to warn me that Warner had been dropped in it. She had something else to tell me.’
Realisation flickered in his eyes. He’d guessed … ‘Somehow I had a feeling you might say that,’ he murmured.
‘She also offered me a job.’
He waited before replying, measuring his words. ‘I see. Is this because you’re now back in favour?’
‘I wouldn’t put it like that; this editor – Yvette – told me at the time that she thought I’d been done an injustice. She believed I’d been set up, but there was no proof so she couldn’t justify taking on a disgraced reporter, not to mention she didn’t have a job for me. She has tried to help along the way; she’s the one who’s been running my freelance stories and, as you know, she came up with the auction lot.’
‘Yours is a world I will never understand.’
Goosebumps popped up on Tiff’s arms. He’d hit the nail on the head. The gulf between their worlds was huge and about to widen. She could see no way of bridging it.
‘Is the job offer anything to do with the exclusive about Marina?’ he asked.
‘That played its part, I’m not going to lie to you, but if you think for one moment that’s why I did it, then you aren’t the man I thought you were.’
‘What man is that, Tiff?’ He fixed her with those dark eyes that made her shiver with lust. They were also eyes that let her know there was no hiding from him.
She held up her palms. ‘No, no. I’m not feeding your ego …’
‘It would make a change.’ His smile was chilly but his expression softened quickly. ‘You’d be a fool not to accept it.’
‘Then I’m a fool.’ She laughed. ‘I’m not sure I can accept it.’
‘It’s not quite as simple as that …’ she murmured, unable to frame her feelings in words. Seeing Dirk now, feeling that their relationship had moved to a new level, she suspected that he was the reason she’d told Yvette she still needed a little more time to think over the renewed offer. How ironic it was that the door back to her old life – a better version of her old life – had opened again, right at the moment when she’d felt that she and