AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I wanted another way to lose myself, and I found I was the object of a flood of feminine interest. I didn’t know why.”
“You’re handsome,” she said bitterly. “Charming.”
“That wasn’t it. It was you, actually. My mother spread the tale of our young love and its tragic end. She titillated the ladies of the ton. Apparently there is something unbearably attractive about male pain.” His laugh was a bitter shell of humor that grated from his throat.
“The interest took its natural course and I found, to my extreme relief, that I could set your memory aside, could forget the sad state of my life, if only for a few minutes, a few hours, at a time.”
He looked up at her and saw that she’d finally turned toward him.
“I was entertainment for them,” he said. “And they were a distraction for me. I offered nothing except the use of my body for a short time. I never seduced, never promised. But, of course, my reputation precedes me.” His mouth twisted around the words. “I am a purebred stud. Unbroken. Spirited. Highly recommended for my gait if not my temperament.”
Kate sucked in a hiss of breath at his words. Her fingers curled in, forming fists.
“I made myself into this.” He let her see all the unflinching shame in his eyes. “I debased myself for a peace that I never even found.”
A dozen heartbeats passed. She said nothing. Why would she say nothing?
“I would change it if I could.” Looking away from her again, he stared down at his clasped hands. “I’d take it all back if I could, but I can’t. I can’t. I thought you’d never find out. I didn’t want you to find out.”
“I can understand that, at least,” she said. “I didn’t want you to know either, but the difference . . . The difference is that I was ashamed of something done to me. Your shame . . . it’s something you embraced.”
“I never wanted it. And I never want it again.”
Minutes ticked by. She stared at him, measured him, and apparently found him wanting. “I can’t do this, Aidan. I can’t.”
“Fine,” he made his mouth say. “But stay. I’ll leave you be. Only stay.”
She shook her head, and in that moment he hated her. He snarled, “You act so self-righteous, as if you’ve done nothing wrong. But you let them do this to you. They did not bind your hands and legs and ship you in a crate, did they?” Her face blanched to a sick white, and Aidan was horrified by his own words, but could not stop them. “You let yourself be put on a boat and shipped East like some prized mare.”
“You did not want me anymore!” she shouted. “And they were my parents. Who could gainsay them?”
“Christ, did you really think I wouldn’t help? Or were you still holding on to your stubborn anger? Either way you were a fool, Kate. If you’d run, if you’d come to me, I’d never have let them take you away.”
Her jaw trembled and her eyes filled with tears.
“We’ve both been fools for different reasons. But we both deserve this chance. We do. Please.”
The trembling in her jaw stopped and turned to steel. “No. We both wanted to go back, but neither of us is the same. Don’t find me again. We are not worth it.” She looped her fingers in the handle of the satchel and picked it up, and then she walked past him. Out the bedroom door. Down the stairs. Through the entry, and then she was gone.
Aidan stood staring at the open door, his heart dead cold in his chest.
“Mr. York?” Penrose’s voice asked weakly from the corridor. “Is something wrong?”
“Follow her,” Aidan said dully. “All the way to Hull. Just make sure she stays safe until she gets home.”
“Yes, sir.” To his credit, Penrose asked no more questions. He didn’t even protest that he’d only just arrived in town and needed a bath or new change of clothes. Penrose only shot Aidan a wide-eyed question with his eyes, and then he hurried out the door and disappeared in the same direction Kate had.
He’d have duties in Hull regardless. Aidan would no longer need a home there or an office. In fact, he’d never set foot there again.
Chapter 26
Kate sat very still in the train station, her ankles crossed and tucked beneath the bench. The next train to Hull didn’t leave for four hours and darkness was already falling. Still, she didn’t feel frightened. She felt cocooned. Sheltered by a gray pall that hung over her person. It would keep her invisible—she knew that from experience. People could walk past her without seeing her. They could look straight at her and feel nothing.
It was safe, and yet she didn’t want it. Not again. She didn’t want to spend years living with no feelings and hardly any thoughts. It had been a relief in Ceylon, but it was no relief here. She wasn’t a seventeen-year-old girl without options. And if someone tried to put her on a ship to Ceylon, she’d fight tooth and nail to stay.
Aidan had been right about that. She’d let herself be sent away out of weakness and resentment. She’d done what they’d told her to, and then they’d named her dead. Her father had gotten his secret dowry. Her husband had gotten a new governor of Ceylon. And Aidan had received the generous sympathy of a hundred stroking hands.
All she’d gotten was a false grave and the knowledge of how stupid she’d been.
