Page 118 of A Secret Scottish Escape

His muscles slid under his warm skin and I moaned, causing Rafe to draw me even tighter to him.

I wanted to make all his pain and torment go away. No one deserved to feel so twisted with guilt and remorse, especially someone like him.

Our pace became more frantic, our breathing urgent as we greedily kissed over and over.

It was only when a ragged squeal of tyres broke the silence of the night that we sprang apart. Yellow headlights dazzled out of the dark, like two angry eyes.

My heart stilled as Hazel came stumbling out of her car. Her features were pale and contorted. “I knew it!” she screamed at our startled expressions. “I just knew it!”

Chapter Sixty-Two

“Knew what?” challenged Rafe. “What are you talking about?”

Hazel jabbed an accusing finger at me. “Snow White over there. She’s another poor, deluded bitch who has fallen for the Rafe Buchanan charisma.”

I tried to placate her. “Look, Hazel, it’s terrible what happened to your sister…”

“And it was his fault,” she barked, eyeing Rafe. “Like a coward, he left her to die in that car!”

“Hazel, I didn’t want to leave Emily. I tried to get back into the car to pull her out, but rescuers held me back.”

She took a few deliberate steps closer, her light eyes wide and unwavering. “Oh, don’t give me that! She died in that accident and you walked away.”

“Oh, for pity’s sake,” I ground out. “I didn’t lie to you about Rafe.”

I turned my head around to look at him, but he was already thundering towards her.

Hazel shrank back at the sight of Rafe’s clenched jaw.

He loomed over her and whipped his handsome face to the left. The night breeze rippled through his black hair.

Hazel’s eyebrows rose towards her hairline when she saw Rafe’s vivid wound. “I sustained this during the accident. I don’t want pity. I just want you to know that I didn’t walk away unscathed.”

Hazel’s jaw grew slack while Rafe went on to explain that he had also attended Emily’s funeral. “You just didn’t see me,” he confessed. “None of you did. But I can assure you I was there.”

Hazel struggled to focus as she digested what Rafe had just told her. She took a breath before unpredictable anger and disbelief reared up in her again. “But where did you go? After the accident, I mean. You just vanished.”

Rafe glanced over at me. “I felt guilty about it all, as though I didn’t deserve to be happy. Emily was gone and I couldn’t save her. Why should things just go on as normal for me?”

A slow realisation began to tease me as I watched Hazel take a step towards Rafe. Her expression seemed to be melting in front of my eyes, like raindrops on a sunny day.

She continued to study him. “I had no idea,” she murmured, drinking in his face. Then she reached out a hand and began stroking his arm.

Rafe, surprised by her sudden tenderness, sprang away.

“You know,” she carried on, oblivious to my dawning expression only feet away, “we’re two lost souls, aren’t we, Rafe? We have so much in common, you and I.” She dropped her gaze to the ground, before raising her eyes back to him. “We both lost Emily.”

Hazel played with a few strands of red hair that had escaped from her up-do. “You must have realised how I always felt about you. I knew I shouldn’t have, what with you being with my sister, but…” She allowed the rest of her words to vanish into the dark air. “I always hoped you would notice me.”

My thoughts returned to that photo I’d found.

All the pieces of this tragic jigsaw were moving into position.

Hazel was in love with Rafe. She always had been.

Chapter Sixty-Three

Rafe looked utterly confused. “Sorry?”