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‘You almost sound as if you were the one as betrayed’

‘I was’ Laurel pressed her lips together, as if she’d revealed toohard ‘But clearly you don’t think I have any right to that feeling Clearly you think, even without knowing me at all, that I am one step up from a prostitute’

For a second Cristiano paused He could see Laurel was battling intense e it ‘I accept that you were young at the tiht not have been aware of your mother’s actions’

‘And yet you said you judged ed her,’ Laurel returned Her lips hite, her eyes huge, the only colour in her face those two bright spots

‘I said I had no reason to think you were different Proveif you can’

‘Why should I bother?’ she flung back at hi’ She rose froustabove everyone, judging their actions when you have no clue, no concept, of what our lives are really like And meanwhile your actions are just as reprehensible as my mother’s, or even those of Rico Bavasso’

‘Don’t compare me to that man,’ Cristiano warned in a low voice

‘Why shouldn’t I? You trapped me here—’

‘I rescued you’

‘You propositioned ed to escape Bavasso’s clutches’ She shook her head, her lip curling in genuine disgust She was repulsed by hi For the first ti, but whether she was playing one at all And right now he didn’t think she was He’d been trying to get her to be honest, and it seeoal It just hadn’t turned out at all as he’d expected

‘Your mother doesn’t matter to me,’ he said swiftly ‘We never should have talked about her in the first place She is not relevant to our discussions’

‘We talked about her because I’m worried for her safety, no o Can you please see that she is all right? Regardless of what you think of her, surely you have that much honour?’

Elizabeth Forrester had always struck Cristiano as the kind of woman who knew exactly on which side her bread was buttered, but for Laurel’s sake he nodded tersely ‘Very well’