Outsider by Diana Palmer Read Free Book Online

everything about me.”
    He didn’t challenge her mistake about his military background. “I never checked you out, for Pete’s sake, there was no reason to!” He pushed back a strand of faintly wavy black hair. “God! Seventeen! I thought you were older, experienced…!”
    Her face closed up. She couldn’t bear to remember the pain and humiliation of her first intimacy. She flushed as she fiddled with papers on her desk, for something to do.
    â€œSarina,” he began, trying to find the words to apologize. “You were in college. I thought you were in your early twenties. Considering your social status, and your background, and the age I thought you were—it never occurred to me that you didn’t have some sexual experience.”
    â€œYou didn’t care what I had,” she accused darkly. “You were furious that I’d, how did you put it, tricked you into marrying me by setting you up for my father to find us in a compromising situation. You couldn’t do anything to him, so you made me pay for it.”
    His eyes darkened with anger. “I was upset, yes. But I didn’t hurt you deliberately.”
    â€œReally?” She got to her feet, almost vibrating with anger. “It took four stitches!” she added with helpless venom.
    That didn’t register at first. Then it did. He vaguely remembered blood on the sheets, and had assumed that her period had started. But if it hadn’t…
    His face colored. He’d had a couple of neat whiskies to try to stop himself from touching her. It hadn’t worked. His control had been precarious at best, and he’d blamed her for putting Maureen out of his reach with their unwanted wedding.
    But he hadn’t meant to hurt her physically. He drew in a long breath. Alcohol had been responsible for so much tragedy in his life. He hadn’t realized it until he got into therapy and had his sins laid out by a psychologist.
    His tortured expression disturbed her. Sarina sat back down, avoiding looking directly at him. “It was a long time ago,” she ground out. “Never mind.”
    He searched for words to explain it, to tell her that Maureen had deserted him for weeks, for no reason that he ever knew. He’d been hurting inside and Sarina’s presence was like a healing balm. Then, the very day he found himself married to her, Maureen had tracked down his friend Tate Winthrop and got his number. She’d called to tell him that she was ready to get married now. He’d been livid. Sarina had tricked him. He wanted revenge…but even so, he hadn’t deliberately hurt Sarina. Or so he’d thought, all these years.
    He blinked. The psychologist had told him that most of his problems had resulted from a guilty conscience, but not to do with Maureen. He drank to forget how he’d treated Sarina. The shame was so great that he’d never told anyone about her, not even his best friend, Tate.
    Even now, when he looked at her, he remembered all over again how bright and lovely she’d been in those days. For one insane moment, in the midst of explosively delicious foreplay, he’d been tempted to let the marriage stand and let Maureen go her own way. The obstacles would have been impossible ones, though. He hadn’t known how old Sarina really was. But he did know that she was the sheltered daughter of a multimillionaire, while he was mixed Apache-Comanche and poor, to boot. Besides that, he was in a profession that could cost him his life any day. She thought he was in the military. He wasn’t. He worked for the CIA as a paramilitary contractor, a freelance agent who hired out as a counterterrorism and small arms specialist, to any government willing to meet his price. He’d been working for the American government when he met Sarina. He and Hunter had similar backgrounds, which was why they got along so well together. Sarina didn’t know.
    â€œThere