Two Can Play (Celeste and Dominic) novel Chapter 223

Chapter 223

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“You cannot blame yourself for trusting your own family.”

“I can and I will.” He shook his head slowly, his eyes meeting mine. “I am just grateful did not sleep with Imelda. If I had, if I had woken up and found her in my bed, do not know what I would have told you. I would have lost you. Just like that.”

I stared at him, my fingers tightening around his. wanted to say the words out loud but they stayed trapped in my chest, a vow! made to myself in the silence of my own mind. Even if you had slept with her, Dominic. Even if they had forced you into that bed and made you do things you did not want to do, I would have stayed. I would have held you through it. Because I will never let you go. Not for anything. Not for anyone.

“You did not sleep with her,” I said instead. “That is what matters.”

He smiled at me, a soft and vulnerable smile that made him look younger, less like the powerful man who commanded rooms and more like the man who had kissed me on his balcony and told me I was beautiful.

“I love you, Celeste.”

“I love you too, Dominic.”

He pulled me toward him, his hands cupping my face, and he kissed my forehead, a gentle press of his lips against my skin. Then he pulled me into his arms, his chest warm against mine, his heartbeat steady in my ear, and I let myself melt into him, let myself believe that this was real, that we were real.

The sound of a camera shutter broke the moment.

I turned my head so fast my neck cracked and saw a man standing in the doorway, dressed in a white lab coat, a camera in his hands. He was pointing it at us, his finger still on the button, and when he saw me looking, his eyes widened.

“Hey!” I snapped, scrambling off the bed. “Who are you? What do you think you are doing?”

The man turned and ran, the door swinging shut behind him. I chased after him, my feet pounding against the hospital floor, and I threw the door open just in time to see my bodyguards coming around the corner.

“Catch that man! He was taking pictures of us!”

The bodyguards took off after him without a word, their strides long and powerful, and I stood in the doorway, breathing hard, my heart pounding. I went back inside the room and Dominic was sitting up, his face alert, his eyes sharp.

The color drained from the man’s face. “Wait, wait, please. I will talk. I will tell you everything.”

“Then talk.”

“It was your grandmother,” he said, looking at Dominic. “She hired me this morning. She told me to follow Celeste, to get pictures of her being… intimate with you, She said she wanted to release them online, to show everyone that Celeste is a married woman who is cheating on her husband and chasing after Dominic Ford because of his money. She wanted to destroy her

reputation.”

I stared at him, my mind struggling to process what he was saying. “She hired you this morning?”

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