Emma’s lips parted. In her upset, she had said those words. She had revealed herself. She was surprised to find she didn’t regret that action. Now that it was out, she could explain better to him why she had to walk away.
“There are two parts to me, James,” she began, shocked her voice was calm and steady. “There is the girl who always hid away, sat along a wall, tried not be noticed, especially by a man like you. And she is strong inside of me. She tells me to deny my heart, to protect myself by lying to you. Lying to me.”
He moved toward her a fraction, and her hands began to shake. “And what is the other part?”
“The other part is stronger now,” she whispered. “The other part doesn’t want to live in shadows and with lies ever again. The other part tells me to confess the truth to you.”
“And what is the truth?” he pushed.
She let out a sob and bent slightly as she struggled to catch her breath. Finally, she straightened back up.
“That I love you, you great oaf,” she burst out, blushing at her directness. “Like a fool, I love you.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
James could hardly breathe. The power of Emma’s even stare, the power of her words, washed over him. Emma Liston loved him. Shelovedhim.
A terrifying and wonderful concept that all at once made his head spin and his legs tremble.
And yet she didn’t look pleased about that confession, nor did it change the fact that she had told him she didn’t want to marry him.
“Why are you a fool to love me?” he asked softly. “Because I am not worthy of your love?”
Her lips parted and she reached for him, touching him for the first time since they’d begun this conversation. She caught one of his hands in both of hers and lifted it to her chest.
“Great God, no, James. That is your father talking, not me.”
His heart lurched. “What do you know of my father?” he asked. She tilted her head and he shook his own. “Meg. She told you about him. About us?”
She nodded. “A little. But don’t be angry with her. I asked, I pried.”
“I’m…not,” he said slowly, and realized it was true. Very few people knew about his relationship with his father. All of them were people he trusted to his core. Emma certainly fit that description. “If we are to marry, which is a topic we still have to discuss, then you have a right to know. My father was…cruel.”
Emma sucked in a breath. “Meg said something similar.”
“He’d lost his first son, his first wife. They were the family he really wanted.” James fought the pain that accompanied those words. “We were a replacement. I never lived up to the original. I never earned the love he felt for his son. Histrueson.”
She gripped his hand tighter. “You were a boy, you should not have had to earn anything. Love is not a bartering tool, James. That he used it as a reward rather than a gift says everything about him and nothing about you. You deserved more.”
He looked down into her eyes and saw reflected there the life he would lead with her. A life of love and happiness, of protection, not just of him to her, but of her to him. He saw children and a chance to be the father he’d never had.
He saw his future, and in that moment he swelled with a desperation not to lose it. Not to lose her and the love she offered. The love he felt in return but had been hiding.
“Emma,” he whispered. “Lady Montague approached me on the terrace and she wanted to be my mistress.”
She made a soft sound of pain in the back of her throat that stabbed him in the heart, and moved to pull away from him. He clung to her hand, holding her in place.
“Listen,” he said softly. “Please look and me and truly hear what I’m about to say.”
Her breath came short, but she stopped struggling and looked at him with teary eyes. “Very well. What do you have to say?”
He swallowed hard. “I didn’t want her,” he said.
Her brow wrinkled. “But she is beautiful and popular, better matched to you than I would ever be. And everyone knows the rumors of her…her…experience. Many men take a lover and—”
“I don’t care,” he interrupted before she could waste any more breath on convincing him. “I don’twanther. I didn’t want her when she made the offer. And I told her so. I only want you.”
She blinked, rapid little flutterings, like a bird struggling to take flight. “But you’re…you. And I’m…me.”
