He exhales. “I don’t say things like this. But you’ve been in my head, every hour. I don’t?—”
He breaks off, his jaw tight.
My throat closes. I’m breathless, weak in the knees.
This man.This candid, gruff, maddening, honorable, infinitely lovable man.
“Alex…” I begin.
His composure slips. “I don’t function right without you.”
“I’ve been missing you, too,” I whisper. “Every night. Every day. You’ve ruined me for dignified solitude.”
Something shifts in his eyes. Relief. Hunger. Need. For a dizzying second, I want to melt against him, let him hold me, kiss me senseless, erase every sleepless night since he left Fort Vauclairt.
But guilt slams into me—cold, suffocating. I yank my hand away as if burned. My body stiffens.
How can I love him while hiding something this big?
How can I let him love me while lying about his father’s death, about Geoffroy, about the title and estate that should have been his all along?
I stumble back a step, breathing unevenly.
Confusion flashes across his face. “Eva?”
“I can’t,” I blurt, the words slicing out before I can soften them.
His expression darkens. “You can’t what?”
I press my hands to my temples. My heart slams against my ribs. This secret is rotting me from the inside out. Every breath feels like inhaling toxic fumes.
“I can’t do this.”
His voice drops. “Do what, Eva?”
“Pretend.” The word scrapes my throat raw. “Pretend that nothing happened. Pretend I can love you without telling you the truth.”
He straightens. Shoulders rigid, mouth thin, he waits for me to explain. And in that silence, the dam breaks.
“It wasn’t an accident,” I blurt. “Rodolphe, your father. Geoffroy killed him.”
The room goes deathly still.
Alex’s jaw locks, but he doesn’t say anything. I wish he’d yell, smash something, anything but bottle his rage.
I grip the back of a chair to steady myself. “They fought. Geoffroy pushed him down the stairs. It wasn’t planned, but it was… enough.”
Alex stays silent, his ironclad composure scary.
Then he growls, “I always knew Geoffroy was a nasty piece of shit.”
My heart screams to go to him, to take his hand, to cup his face. But I don’t move.
He curls his fists at his side. “I knew even before you told me how he treated you. So, this… this makes sense.”
“I should’ve told you sooner.”
His eyes narrow. “How long have you known?”
