“Three months? You think she can keep his interest that long?”
“She’s not even that pretty. Why’s he settling?”
“She’s not bad.”
“No, but she’s not nearly his caliber.”
“I heard her uncle is paying him a hefty sum to marry her.”
“I kind of feel sorry for him. You know she’s a starfish in bed.”
They all laughed long and hard over that one. I crept back to where I had come from, while waves of humiliation and shame washed over me. My face was burning.
I need to be alone.
I searched for an escape route so I could get a handle on my emotions. It didn’t even make sense that I wanted to cry. Why was I so upset?
A warm hand grabbed my arm. “Where are you going?”
Axel’s deep voice reverberated in my ear as he pressed his body against the back of mine.
“I just need a moment,” I managed to say.
He swung me around so he could look me in the face. His gray eyes assessed me. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” I avoided his gaze.
He looked over my head at the crowd behind me, as if he was trying to determine what had upset me. “Tell me.”
I stared up at his face. They were right. This man was lethally good looking. Everything about his face was symmetrical and masculine, from the rugged jawline to the angular cheekbones and unfairly long eyelashes. He was way out of my league, and I wasn’t even being hard on myself. It was an honest assessment. The man was as close to a ten as I’d ever seen.
I watched him closely as I asked, “Do you ever question what we’re doing?”
He flinched slightly. “No.”
“All of this started because of a lie.” My voice hitched. “My lie, and now your life is ruined.”
He took my hand and moved us to the corner, where we could speak privately. Then he lifted my chin, forcing me to look him in the eyes. “What’s going on? I thought we were doing good.”
“It makes no sense that someone like you would marry someone like me.”
“What happened? I was only gone for a few minutes.”
“It doesn’t matter.” I had heard the honest truth of what people felt, and it was deeply humiliating, even though I couldn’t quite articulate why.
His eyes held a trace of concern. “It matters.”
At first, I had viewed Axel just as some guy who worked for my uncle. Then he was the man who’d kidnapped me back homeagainst my will. Then he became a dangerous liability, someone who walked out of a cornfield covered in someone else’s blood. There had always been something about him that I was objecting to or fighting against.
Now that I saw him through the eyes of the rest of the world, the truth snapped into focus.
He was out of my league, and I looked ridiculous pretending otherwise.
I knew it was stupid to even care about this kind of stuff, but I already felt sensitive about everything, and this only made it a hundred times worse.
“What?” He looked bewildered by my expression.
“No one is buying this.” I waved my hand between us.
