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“Since I know the precise day the babe was conceived, I can figure it out quickly enough.”
“And just when was this precise day?”
“In Wrexham, over two months ago.”
He’d been so very ill there; he hadn’t protected her. “Were you ravished there? You went out alone and a man attacked you? You can admit it to me, Daria. I won’t blame you, I swear it. Come, tell me. Were you ravished there?”
“No. You didn’t ravish me.”
“You tempt me to beat you, Daria. I order you to cease spinning your tales.”
“When you were sick, you became delirious and you were dreaming of a woman—no, women—whom you’d bedded in the Holy Land. I . . . well, I cared for you and I decided that I wanted you to be the man who would teach me what this is all about.”
He could only stare at her. “You’re telling me that I took you—a virgin—and have no memory of it?”
“You believed I was Lila.”
He drew back, stunned to his toes. “Lila,” he repeated quietly. “She would have been naught more than a fevered dream. I couldn’t have made it into something remotely real; I couldn’t have taken you in her place, not unknowingly. It’s absurd. I couldn’t ever mistake you for her in any circumstance. You aren’t a thing like her.”
“No,” she said sadly, turning from him, “you appeared to care for her mightily. And there was Cena, too.”
“Cena,” he repeated, feeling like a parrot. Roland shook his head. This was lunacy, all of it, her lunacy, and she was trying to draw him into it. “Listen to me, Daria, and listen well. I don’t remember any of this, and I’m not lying. I can’t believe that a lady—a virgin—would allow me to breach her maidenhead without marriage—nay, you claim you even assisted me to take you?
“And just how many times did I—a man fevered and ill and tossing about out of his skull and evidently as randy as a goat—just how many times did I take you, Daria?”
“Just once.”
“Ah, I see. And as a result of that mating, you are now with child.”
“Yes.” Daria was beginning to wonder if she could still believe herself. He’d demolished her quite thoroughly.
“And you expect me to believe this? Truly? Why are you doing this to me? What have I ever done to you to deserve such treatment? Why are you lying to me? Ah, I doubt not I was so fevered that I dreamed myself in other places with other people and that I may have spoken of people in my past, Lila and Cena included.”
She looked at him. She was weary. She supposed it was the babe she carried that was pulling on her. She had nothing more to say, no proof to give him, no other arguments to present. He thought she was going to speak again, and slashed his hand through the air.
“No, Daria, no more. I’m tired of your lies. And now you’ve managed to seduce the king and queen with your charming innocence, though you and I both know it is all false. God, how could I be such a fool? Again and again it would appear, only this time you make me—the villain, a liar without conscience.”
“I’m only telling you the truth.” He looked at her as if he hated her, and Daria felt such pain that she couldn’t bear it. She’d known he wouldn’t believe her, but still the reality of his feelings made her raw. She turned on her heel and broke into a run. She cared not where she ran, only that she get away from this man who despised her.
“Damn you, I’m not through.”
But Daria didn’t slow even at his furious shout. She felt a stitch in her side but didn’t stop. When his fingers closed about her arm, she cried out and turned on him, her fists pounding his chest. “Let me go. What care you where I go? Or what I do?”
“I don’t,” he said, his voice calm now. “Well, that’s not precisely true. I do care. However, I told you once, I believe, that your uncle didn’t want you back if you were no longer a virgin. And it’s very easy to determine that, as you must remember.”
She closed her eyes over the memory of the earl thrusting his finger inside her, pressing against her maidenhead. She shivered with the memory of it, the humiliation of it made more awful because Roland had been there, watching.
“I fancy your uncle would kill you were you to return to him now, for he would want your inheritance if he couldn’t have the land from Ralph of Colchester. You’re nothing but an encumbrance to him now, Daria, nothing more. But you know that, don’t you? Thus the reason for all your tales
? You’re simply trying to save yourself.”
“And what am I to you?” She regretted the words the moment they were out of her mouth. Her face blanched.
He gave her a brutal look. “A mission to be accomplished, a possession to be returned to its rightful owner. Once valuable chattel, Daria, but now you are worthless.”
“Stop it.” She slapped her hands against her ears to shut out his words.
He clasped her wrists, pulling them away. “Tell me the truth, Daria.” He shook her. “I’ll help you, I swear it, but you must tell me the truth.”
