"Charity, please." Ross began to follow her. She man aged to smile, still avoiding his eyes, hoping the others wouldn't notice anything wrong.
"I'd like some time alone, if you don't mind," she said as pleasantly as she could.
She made it into the bedroom, closed the door and leaned against it, her eyes closed. She wouldn't cry. This wasn't, she insisted to herself, a crying matter. It was a joke, really. She ought to be laughing.
She took a deep breath and opened her eyes. She needed time to think, and she knew there wasn't much of that. Someone would come in any moment, just as they always did. She was going to have to think this through very quickly.
Ross sat staring after her, oblivious to the arguments that swirled around him. He felt sick. It was his own fault. She should never have found out this way. He should have gotten to her more quickly with the truth.
How could he expect her to ever trust him again? He wasn't ordinarily a liar, and he didn't ordinarily resort to any means to get what he wanted. But how could she think otherwise?
"Damn!" he muttered harshly.
The others stopped and stared at him, stunned, but he didn't notice. Rising from the couch, he strode toward the bedroom and rapped quietly at the door before entering.
"Charity?"
There was no answer. He pushed the door open. No lights were on, but he could see where she lay on the bed. Entering the room, he quickly shut the door, leaving the lights off. It would be easier to talk in the dark.
"Charity?" he said softly.
She didn't answer, and he could tell that she was upset. How was he going to explain everything so that she would understand? How was he going to tell her that what had started out as a trick had turned into something very dif ferent? He didn't want to lose her.
He walked slowly to the bed and sat gingerly on its edge. "Charity, I know you don't want me here right now, and I don't want to sit here making excuses for what I've done, but this is what I was trying to tell you just before your aunt interrupted. It's what I've been trying to tell you for days."
He waited. She didn't speak, make a sound or even make any movement to show that she'd heard.
"I'll admit that this started out with my trying to get close to you in order to plead my case for a business ven ture. When I was sitting in my sister's agency and you made that call, asking to hire a husband, I thought that the chance of a lifetime had dropped right into my lap. You'd been holding out on me for so long, not even taking phone calls, and here I finally had a chance to get close to you, to really talk to you, to convince you of how good my ideas were going to be for your restaurant."