Ashley wanted to be ill. “Why did he want the island? It doesn’t make sense. My father didn’t care about property. He rarely used this island.”
The anger whipped around Sebastian. “He wanted something else and tried to use the island as a bargaining chip.”
“What?” Ashley couldn’t shake off the dread. “What did he really want?”
“My mother.” His voice was cold and harsh. “Jones said he wouldn’t take the island if he could take my mother to bed instead.”
The words drew blood like the lash of a whip. She could easily imagine her father trying to make a deal like that. She’d seen him try many times. And he occasionally succeeded. “Is that why you slept with me?” she asked.
“No,” he said in a raspy voice. “I took you to bed because I wanted you and I couldn’t stop myself.”
She wasn’t going to believe that. Not anymore. He had already proven that she had no power over him. He didn’t stop himself because he wanted to continue playing the game.
“Don’t lie to me,” she warned. “It was an eye for an eye. My father tried to blackmail your mother into bed. You did the same to me. Only you were successful.” Because apparently she had a price.
“My father wasn’t going to let Jones touch my mother. She was his wife. The mother of his children. He should have killed that man for suggesting it.”
“And I was a spoiled heiress living the life you should have had,” she whispered. She gripped her bag until her knuckles turned white. She wanted to get out. She needed to escape before she said too much or crossed the line.
“Put down the bag,” Sebastian ordered. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“I believed every word you said,” she said and scoffed at her ignorance. “You said you would look after me if I got pregnant. I actually thought you meant it.”
“I still mean it.” Sebastian froze and his gaze quickly traveled down the length of her body.
“Don’t worry, Sebastian. I’m not pregnant. Or was that part of the plan too?”
He took a step toward her. “I would never do that to an innocent child.”
Ashley backed away. She didn’t trust herself around Sebastian. She’d already made a few assumptions and poor choices. He had the ability to make her forget her best intentions with one simple touch. Worse, he knew it.
“But you would do it to me because I couldn’t possibly be innocent. I’m Donald Jones’s daughter, right? I must be punished.”
“Let me explain,” Sebastian said as he reached for her.
“No! Don’t you touch me. You no longer have that right.”
He held up his hands. “Listen to me. When we thought my mother was dying, she made a request. If she survived the surgery, she wanted to live out her remaining years on Inez Key.”
Ashley remembered Patricia’s faraway look when she’d talked about her home. She was remembering Inez Key. It had been lovingly re-created in the watercolors her husband had painted. It was the paradise she had lost.
“Oh, well, that makes all the difference,” Ashley said with heavy sarcasm. “Your mother wanted the island. That excuses the fact that you seduced me and stole my home.”
“I’m not making any excuses,” he said as he watched her reach the door.
“No, you don’t think you need to. You were only getting justice, right?”
“What he did—”
“My father stole the island from you. You stole it from me,” she said as she swung open the doors and fled down the stairs. She heard Sebastian’s footsteps behind her. “My father wanted to humiliate your parents by blackmailing Patricia into bed. You blackmailed me and tried to humiliate me by making me a mistress. My father’s action drove you into poverty. Your actions leave me homeless and broke. Have I missed anything?”
“I had no plans for revenge,” Sebastian said as he followed her. “My goal was to buy Inez Key and make it my mother’s home.”
“Oh, you didn’t plan to repeat history,” she said as she marched to the front door. “You accidentally fell into the same pattern that my father followed. What a relief! You don’t know how happy it makes me feel that you are exactly like Donald Jones.”