“It’s the truth.”
“No, the truth is that you’ve lied to me since the day we met. The truth is that you stood before my cousin and brother and proclaimed our intent to marry, and then you sealed your treachery by using my body.” God, the thought that he could hold her so tenderly, make love to her like that, all the while knowing how he was betraying her—it made her ill.
He seemed to be fighting to control his patience. “I have never used your body. You gave yourself to me willingly, Flora. More than once.” He pulled her a little closer and lowered his voice dangerously. “Bargain or not, I would never let you go. We belong together, don’t you see that?”
Tears burned in her throat as she looked at the man she’d thought she loved. At the man she’d given her heart. She couldn’t stand it. It hurt so much. The walls closed in around her. She felt as if she were being backed into a corner. Her darkest fear had come true: She was being forced into marriage.
“Don’t do this,” she pleaded.
He looked at her stonily. “It’s done.”
“It doesn’t need to be. Not if you don’t say anything.” They were the only people who knew of this irregular marriage. If neither of them chose to press the claim, no one would ever know. “Please, let me go.”
His eyes softened. “Flora, I…” He hesitated, but only for an instant. “I can’t. I want this marriage, and not just to free my brother. I love you. I know you are hurt, but it will pass—and you will see that this is for the best.”
His face was racked with torment, but she was immune. It was all an act. He was every bit as ruthless as she’d first thought. A coldhearted chief who would do anything to win his prize.
She took a step away from him, seeing him clearly for the first time. His betrayal cut like a knife, eviscerating her love for him as cleanly as if it had never been.
She was killing him. Lachlan felt as though he’d taken a whip and lashed it across her back. He’d hurt her, splayed her open, and made her bleed. Even knowing that this was how it had to be did not lessen his feeling of responsibility. The pain that swam in her eyes and trembled in her voice was infinitely worse than he’d imagined. He knew how much she hated being forced into anything, but he’d hoped that she would at least try to understand his predicament.
He’d tried to stay calm in the face of her wild accusations, but it was becoming increasingly difficult since she stubbornly refused to listen. His instincts not to tell her of his bargain with her cousin because of her reaction had proved correct, but knowing that he was right didn’t make this conversation any easier.
“Please,” she begged. The soft plea tugged at his heart. “If you care for me at all, don’t—”
“Care for you?” he exploded, wanting to grab her and shake the truth into her. “Have you been listening to anything I’ve said? Iloveyou. Do you think I want to hurt you? This is tearing me apart. Since the day you slipped the dirk into my side, nothing else has been more important than making you mine.”
“That’s possession,” she said dully. “Not love.”
“You’re wrong. I’ve done nothing but try to prove my love to you since the moment I realized what you meant to me.”
“You’ve proved nothing except that you are an accomplished liar.”
His mouth tightened as he fought to keep a tight rein on his control when he wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and force her to listen to him—in the way she could not deny. She was slipping away from him, and he’d never felt so damn helpless. He had to make her understand. He grasped her by the shoulders and stared deep into her eyes, forcing her to listen. “I love you. I’ve never said those words to another woman in my life. I’m not one of your eloquent courtiers—if that isn’t enough for you, I don’t know what more I can say. I did what I had to do to save my brother and my clan. I wish that you had not been involved, but you were, and I can’t change that.”
“You didn’t love me enough to give me the truth. I thought I’d found someone who wanted me for myself—not for what I could bring them.”
“I do want you, Flora.”
“But I can never be sure.” She looked at him, her heart breaking in her eyes. “God, I trusted you. I thought you were different.”
He was tired of her inability to see past her own blind fears. It wasn’t simply her happiness that was at stake here. “Do you think I wanted to lie to you? You don’t know how badly I wanted to tell you the truth.”
“But you didn’t.”
“Damn it, Flora. You are so stuck in the past and caught up in your own romantic fantasies that you can’t see the real world. You see everything as black and white, but it’s not so simple. Sometimes you have to make hard decisions, that’s what I do—I’m chief. But you have no concept of duty or what it means to be in charge and responsible. My brother’s life is at stake. What would you have me do?” She looked at him blankly, and he continued, “John is in the pit prison now because I was so damn scared of losing you that I tried to make a last-ditch effort to free him—just so I wouldn’t need your cousin’s help. So you couldn’t accuse me of ulterior motives like you are doing right now. But the rescue failed, John was tossed in the pit, and I had no choice but to rely on your cousin. Don’t you see that my brother is suffering? Every minute John spends in that hellhole could be his last. Argyll has the writ that will set him free. Would you see him die for your pride?”
She flinched as if he’d struck her. His brother’s plight had penetrated her hurt and anger in a way his declarations of love could not. He knew her compassion and her tender heart. She would not jeopardize his brother’s life, not even if it tied her to a man she despised.
He knew he’d won, but there was no satisfaction, only despair, in his victory.
She stood stiffly before him, her face a waxen mask. But it was the hollow look in her eyes that sent a trickle of alarm running through his veins.
“You will have your writ,” she said dully.
Relief swept over him…for only a moment.
“But I’ll never forgive you for this.”
