‘No, that’s not what I’m saying.’ She pulled her hands from his, swallowing past the unbearable tightness in her throat. ‘You’re a king, but don’t forget you’re also a man, and one doesn’t cancel out the other. How can a king make his people happy if he doesn’t even know what happiness feels like?’
His expression shuttered. ‘I don’t need to know. Happiness is irrelevant.’
‘It’s not,’ she said, unable to stop a tear from sliding down her cheek. ‘It’s important, and it’s only been in the past couple of weeks with you that I’ve realised how important.’
But he ignored her, glancing down at his watch. ‘I’m sorry, Guinevere. But this is a pointless discussion. I suggest we have it at a later date, and not in such a public place.’
He was right. Of course he was right.
Another tear joined the second, falling to stain the silk of her gown. ‘I don’t care if you don’t love me back.’ She had to say it so he knew. ‘I don’t care about me. I only want what’s best for you.’
Just for a second the cold diamond of his eyes flared as his gaze tracked her tears. ‘But you should care,’ he said suddenly, low and fierce. ‘And you should have someone who can give you what’s best for you too.’
She brushed away a tear, not caring where it fell, not understanding. ‘What do you mean?’
Tiberius muttered a low curse, that muscle in his jaw leaping. ‘I mean that I should never have married you, Guinevere Accorsi. You’d have been better off if I’d just let you go.’
Guinevere stared up at him in shock, her heart feeling as if it was full of broken glass. ‘But I wouldn’t,’ she whispered. ‘I would have been still hiding in the walls, too afraid to come out.’
He said nothing to that, only stared at her for one long, aching moment.
Then he turned on his heel and left her standing alone by the column.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Tiberius pushed his waythrough the crowd, abruptly unable to bear being in the ballroom any longer. A hot, painful feeling was pressing against his chest, making it feel as if he was suffocating, and he was desperate to get outside and breathe the cold mountain air.
He found some doors that led to an outside terrace and managed to get them open, stepping out into the clear night, his chest heaving.
But even taking deep breaths of the cold Swiss night didn’t relieve the burning sensation, or the tightness. It was as if something enormous was sitting on his sternum.
It was all to do with Guinevere, and he knew it.
Her dark blue eyes looking up at him as she told him that she was in love with him. The wild rush of joy that had filled his veins in that moment, and then the aching bitterness that had followed it, because love wasn’t for kings. Or at least not the kind of love that she deserved.
He’d hurt her, bastard that he was. He’d made her cry. He’d told her that she would be better off without him, and she would. She needed someone who could give her their whole heart, not just a small piece of it. She’d had nothing all her life—nothing but her brothers’ fists and her father’s indifference. It was incredible how her bright, warm, effervescent spirit hadn’t buckled under the fear and violence she’d experienced, or at least crumbled away.
But it hadn’t.
Despite how her father and brothers had treated her, she was undaunted. And he’d watched her turn from a mouse into a lioness, all beautiful, strong, brave and caring.
A woman like that deserved the entire world—not to be tied to a man who’d never be able to put her first. A man who’d never tasted happiness and had no idea what joy looked like. What could he offer her? Pleasure in bed, that was all.
He walked over to the stone parapet and gripped it, looking out over the lake at the mountains looming dark and forbidding in the night, the caps of snow gleaming.
He didn’t know where that left him.
Divorcing her felt impossible, and yet that was the only option he could see. The only option that would give her the freedom she needed and deserved. Freedom from him and from Kasimir.
Free to make her own choices—choices that hadn’t been forced on her the way he’d forced them on her at the very beginning, by demanding that she marry him, that she pay for her family’s crimes.
The pain in his chest deepened, excoriating him.
He couldn’t bear the thought of letting her go, and yet he had to.
To be a ruler required sacrifice, his father had told him. Both of his parents had made that sacrifice. And so would he.
He had to follow their example, otherwise what was he?
