“I swear it,” she said, her voice broken.Pain sliced through Rafe.But he had to make her hate him.He had to.
“If you say anything, so help me God, I’ll hunt you down and … hurt whatever, whoever you care about.”
She whirled around.“How can you even think …?”
“I think lots of things.And I know a hell of a lot about betrayal.I’ve learned not to expect one goddam thing.”
“And your friends?”she said bitterly.“Don’t you trust them, even though they’ve risked everything for you?”
He was silent.He had no answer to that question.He was so scared of believing in someone else, yet he had done that out of sheer frustration and desperation, and he was doing it again now with Shea.
But apparently she accepted his silence as a negative answer.“Where will you go?”
“That’s none of your business.”
She stared at him.“It will always be my business, no matter what you think.”
“That’s your problem, Miss Randall,” he said coolly, though he felt hot all over.He knew he was successful, though, in hiding that discomfort when he saw her face pale.
She started to say something, but he stopped her.He couldn’t hear it, or he might do something they both would regret.
“Clint will help you devise a story that will protect him and Ben.”
“What about you?”she whispered.
“I don’t give a damn what you say about me.”
“Do youwantto go back to prison?”
“I won’t go back, Miss Randall,” he said in a tone that said he would die first.
“Rafe?”
The sound of his name on her lips was nearly his undoing.He wanted to take her in his arms, hold her close, feel that warmth that only she had ever given him.He was tearing his own heart out by doing this, the heart he’d thought destroyed long ago.Now he wished he had been right.
He looked at her, trying to appear disinterested, something he’d learned well in prison.
He saw her swallow.He was terribly afraid that she might say what she wanted to say anyway, and he knew that might be the one thing that would break him.“You were a bed partner, Miss Randall.Nothing more.”
Tears formed at the edge of her eyes but didn’t spill over.“I don’t believe you.”
“Believe it,” he said, “but know that Clint had nothing to do with that particular part of your abduction.He’s a good man whose loyalty led him astray.”
“Are you protecting me too?”she asked quietly.“It seems you’re protecting everyone but yourself.”
“I don’t need protection,” he said roughly.“And don’t romanticize my actions.It looks like I’m through here.I’ve accomplished what I wanted.”
She shook her head.“No, you didn’t.I don’t know exactly what you planned, what you wanted, but it’s obviously not my father’s death.You could have killed him any time.”
“No one else will believe that,” he said.
Comprehension dawned in her eyes.“I’ll tell them you couldn’t have.You were here.With me.”
Rafe knew he had made a mistake.He had revealed something that gave her hope.It was a mistake he had to rectify, no matter how cruelly.“Every second, Miss Randall?And my men?In any event I’ve been responsible for a few other … robberies, and like I said, I have no intention of going back to prison.”
“I can’t just forget—”
“Consider this, then.I seduced Jack Randall’s daughter.I used you.It gave me some satisfaction.Now go back to your own life.”Rafe looked directly down into her eyes, forcing her to accept his words.
