She had been so young. Of course, her husband would have expected her to be untouched. Had her parents suspected? Had they known? Mrs. Bridge had watched him suspiciously on several occasions. She’d interrupted them more than once as they’d hastily jumped apart and attempted to set themselves to rights.
“My fault,” Michael stated flatly. His face pressed against the tender skin just behind her ears. Tendrils of her hair caressed his face. So soft—his Lilly—so vulnerable.
Lilly shook her head. “No,” she denied. “We did not know, neither of us could have known.”
He held her tenderly. She stirred, as though to pull away, but he could not let her go. He wondered when she’d last been held. When she’d last been comforted by another human. He rubbed his hand along her back until she relaxed again.
“Lilly?” he prodded. And then, “Please? Tell me.” She’d never denied him anything before. In that moment, she was simply…Lilly. Nothing else mattered.
A shaft of moonlight settled upon her. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and then gave in to his request, voicing her memories.
“He hated that I was not…untouched,” Lilly began. “He would never treat me as his w-w-wife…He said, instead, I was his…his…” She began to shiver, and Michael held her tighter. “He refused to annul the marriage, he said, because of the scandal it would create for my family and for Glenda.”
As she spoke, Michael felt his eyes begin to sting.
“He came to my bed after I was asleep, but not in a loving way, not in a way…and he did things so I could not have a child…He…said he’d rather die without an heir than for a whore—there was nothing I could do! My father was ill, and there was my mother…and Glenda…” The tremors running through her grew stronger. She ducked her head away from him, as though filled with shame.
Because of him…
Because he’d not come for her…
And he’d blamedher…
It could have been an hour. It could have been a minute. Guilt and shock stole even his sense of time upon realizing what she’d gone through.
After what felt like a lifetime of silence, Lilly squirmed and pushed him away.
His arms dropped listlessly.
“It is useless to visit this, Michael. I am unharmed. It happened. It is done.” When she raised her eyes, they held resignation. There were no words to soothe her. Nothing he did now could change the past.
“I am alive, and he is dead,” she persisted. “And I am free. Free to live a peaceful existence with my aunt. It will be so much better than…before…I will appreciate it greatly. We will do simple things: shop, go to garden parties, and perhaps even travel to the continent. She has given mecarte blancheover her garden. I shall be content. You need not feel guilty, nor pity me, Michael. Please, leave me alone…Go to your fiancée. She is a lovely woman and probably wondering where you are this very moment.”
Of course, she was right. Her words made sense, even though his mind had not ceased echoing her words.
He invaded my bed, after I was asleep, but not in a loving way.
He did things so that I would not have a child.
There was nothing I could do!
Hatred toward Baron Beauchamp was only eclipsed by the loathing he felt for himself.
What a selfish cad! What a goddamned bastard he had been! So utterly irresponsible and selfish. He’d only considered his own pain at the time. He’d only considered what he had perceived to beherbetrayal.
No wonder her smile was brittle. Michael had taken herinnocence, and then that damned husband of hers had taken everything else.
What else had he done? He had to ask her, in case he had been informed incorrectly.
“You were not with child? You never carried my child…?” Sitting back on his heels, he implored her. How self-absorbed he was! He should not have left the matter of ascertaining her childlessness to somebody else. He should have gone to her himself! He’d made love to her! He’d promised her they would be together forever. He’d given up too easily, far too easily.
“No, Michael.” She shook her head. “There were times I had foolishly wished…but thank God, I was not.” An even more poignant sadness settled into her eyes, and she looked at her hands. “Iwas not.”
The unresolved issues from their affair were violent and messy. Seeing her, talking to her, touching her was akin to reopening a wound he hadn’t realized was festering. It was painful but, perhaps, necessary.
And then Lilly straightened her spine. Her eyes implored him. “When we were together at the waterfall…so many times I have returned there in my mind. My mother warned me about men, you see, that they would say anything…What I’m trying to say, to ask is was it…was I…When I couldn’t believe any longer that it had been about love and…” And then, “Michael, I have felt so ashamed of what I did. If it had not been love, then what was it?” Lilly covered her face with her hands. “Just tell me, even if you must lie, tell me it was more than that. I have spent years berating myself?—”
Her torrent of words stopped when Michael tore her hands away from her face. In fevered desperation, his mouth sought hers almost violently.
