He’d arranged a marriage against his sister’s will.
Camille let her love for her friend bolster her resolve. “You mistreated her. Used her. It is whatyou’rebetter at.”
His flinch was violent.
Camille bit her tongue to keep from snatching the words back. Words were important, forever. Once spoken, they weren’t allowed back. She should have been better than anyone at choosing the right ones to use, but those horrible memories, unacceptablefeelingspounded at her armor from the inside.
Her legs readied to flee, unable to contain the overwhelming need to move when cornered. Too much more of her heartpounding and her ribs would be little better than powder under her linen dress.
Renard stepped close, seeming to battle over touching her or not. “You can’t run from me. Not anymore.”
The words were a challenge and truth. She couldn’t run from him, from what he’d done and what she’d lost. She’d deluded herself into thinking he wouldn’t find her. Not when he was her shadow, her dream. The connection that had forged between them was fate bound; escape had never been an option.
She pressed the emotion down, down. “Go home. You don’t belong here.”
He reached for her then. “We belong together. I’ve done nothing but search for you. I went mad with worry when I returned from the country and read your letter.”
She tore away, the cracks fissuring into yawning chasms. “I asked you to leave, resolutely, as you once said I ought to if I wanted you to stay away.”
“No, you wrote me a letter andranwithout a word. But wait, there was one more letter.” His gaze was so cold, it burned. “Three fucking words to tell me our son had died.”
Camille flinched at the accusation. She’d promised herself after she’d run that she’d never contact him, never give him any hope that any connection between them remained. But that night, the night the bleeding had finally stopped, and their child had been lost, she’d been too ravaged by grief to think straight.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “You shouldn’t have found out that way.”
He cursed softly, and all the anger seemed to go out of him. “I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean that.” He pinched his nose with his fingers. “I’m confused. I don’t understand what happened, Milly.” He gestured to the space between them. “You say you don’t want me, but your body is saying something different.”
Realizing she’d come within arm’s reach again, she drew back. His hand raised as if to stop her.
“Don’t touch me.”
His expression collapsed. “Milly. What is wrong with you? God, you’re looking at me like I’m a stranger.” He pressed that hand to his chest. “I’m sorry I yelled, but your letter, you disappearing, it destroyed me.”
Camille’s heart ached. She knew what it was to be destroyed by someone you thought you knew.
But the man she’d fallen in love with had been another man, one of her mind’s making. The man before her bore the same face, the same name, but hewasa stranger.
She plugged the worst of her bleeding heart and fought for the last ounce of control as she turned away, truth and lie so seamlessly tangled, she didn’t know which she spoke.
“Go home, Your Grace. I don’t claim to know you at all.”
“I won’t leave you.” He reached for her again.
“Please.” The word came out a sob. She couldn’t be touched, or she’d break. Not by anyone, but especially him. Not when she’d spent thirteen horrible months missing him. “Leave, Renard. And don’t come back.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Renard had imagined,rehearsed, every word he’d say when he’d found her again. Words of love, words of anger, words filled with youthful naivety and manly feeling.
But when at last he’d found her, beautiful and fine in a lady’s shirtwaist and dark skirts, the only thing he could manage was her name.
Of course, the anger and scorn came swiftly after. The past weeks worrying over Charlotte’s relationship to his best friend worsening his already wasting body, now more liquor than flesh and bone.
“I don’t claim to know you at all.”
Renard stared at the Camine Manor’s drive, having no recollection of opening the door and walking out; none of it mattered if he wasn’t walking towardsher.
His scuffed boots and worn trousers looked poor, even in comparison to the sunbaked gravel underfoot. The rest of his appearance was just as ramshackle, lacking all the pride of a gentleman.
