Elswyth said nothing; Silas seemed far away while he spoke, lost in a dark dream.
“He sent an assassin. Our anniversary dinner. I held her as she died.”
She thought she heard tears in his voice but couldn’t bring herself to look and see. She felt frozen there, the sweat cooling on her skin.
“It was my fault. I should have never married her. If I had not followed my passion… If I hadn’t yielded to my baser instincts… she would still be alive. But bastards can’t help ourselves, can we? I only wish he’d poisoned my dinner that night as well. But no—he needed me alive to make an advantageous match. To be another soldier he could move into position.”
“Silas…”
He placed a hand on her arm to quiet her. “Nothing you can say will make it better, Elswyth. I have spent so long wishing I had the courage to end my own life and join her. To deprive Lord Harrow of the pawn he created when he sired me.”
“It was not your fault, Silas,” Elswyth said. She pressed herself up on one arm, looking down at him. Tears streaked across his face, falling in the dirt. “You loved her, and you married her. That is not a baser instinct. That is a noble one. Lord Harrow is the only one to blame.”
“Or did I simply follow another whim? Fulfill another pleasure?” He sat up, pushing himself from the dirt. She could see where dried flower petals stuck to the sweat of his back.
“That is not you. I know you, Silas. You pretend to be careless. But deep down, you care more than anyone. You are good.”
He turned his face away. “I am sorry, Elswyth, but you are wrong. And I’ve done it again—I’ve taken your honor tonight.”
“My honor has nothing to do with my virginity,” Elswyth said. “And you took nothing. I gave it freely.”
“I have still deflowered you.”
Elswyth moved around him, cupping his face in her hands. He wouldn’t meet her eyes. “And I would let you do it again and again,” she said. “I would give you every flower I have, Silas. For a lifetime.”
His eyes flickered to hers. “You and I both know that we cannot be wed,” he said.
“Why not? Ours would not be the first love to cross the boundaries of race.”
“Society would shun you. And I have no money to help your family,” Silas said.
“I don’t care about money,” Elswyth said. “I don’t care about what society thinks.” Even as she said the words she knew they were true, despite everything. No, he did not have the money to help with her father’s medicine, or to give her a lavish life. And she would be shunned by society if she married him, which meant she might never learn what happened to her sister. These were things that she wanted, that she needed, but she realized now they were not all she needed. Somewhere along the way, she had grown to need Silas, too.
He turned his face away and then stood, leaving her kneeling there. She watched his silhouette in front of the forest pool, his broad shoulders heaving. His expression twisted between fear and longing.
“I’m sorry, Elswyth. I can’t.”
Elswyth reached for him but then pulled her hand to her chest. She felt horribly exposed then, kneeling naked in the dirt. Anger began to boil inside her, and she stood, grabbing her shift andcovering herself. “And yet you still bed me. What if I am pregnant, Silas, what then? Will you let another bastard into the world?”
“If it means keeping you safe…”
“From your father? Is that why you won’t marry me?” Elswyth asked.
Silas turned back to her, but said nothing. His face was drawn and drained of blood. Had he come to regret what he’d done so quickly? Had his passions stirred him to touch her, and only now, in the clearheadedness of release, had he realized just how repulsive she truly was?
“It’s more complicated than that, Elswyth.”
Elswyth began sliding her shift over her head, desperate to cover her scar. To think she’d let him see her—touch her—to think that she was just another conquest of his, some woman easily tricked.
“Is it so complicated, Silas? Or is that just your excuse—what you tell all the women you bed in the hedgerows? Is that what you told Venus?”
“This is different—”
“Is it? Or is that just what you do? Seduce some unwitting girl with a sad tale about your dead wife, leaving her with nothing but pretty words and a bastard in her belly?”
“No, Elswyth—”
She shook her head. “Mrs. Rose was right. Bastards make bastards.”
