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Silas cupped her cheek, his eyes dripping with sadness. And pity. God, that was the worst. The one or two of his men who didn’t think she’d betrayed them, who weren’t pissed at her and didn’t hate her, pitied her instead. She didn’t know which was worse.
“Evangeline, listen to me, honey. Drake was wrong. Very wrong. I, along with the rest of Drake’s men, don’t believe for one minute that you betrayed us. And when he’s had time to calm down and think about it, he’ll know it too.”
“It’s too late,” she said, utterly broken. Utterly defeated, so much despair in her voice that even she couldn’t detect any sign of life in it. “He made it very obvious he has no caring, no feelings for me. That I’m merely an object, his toy to take out and play with when he’s bored. He doesn’t trust me even when I came to him and told him about the cop talking to me in the restaurant and even after I told him I would never betray him.”
She closed her eyes for a moment against the now-physical pain as the headache that had been brewing ever since the police had burst inside Drake’s office blazed through her head like wildfire. She put her hand to her forehead with a soft moan, her eyes still closed as she continued to vent everything she wanted to scream at Drake right now.
“I can’t live with a man who not only doesn’t trust me but has such a lack of regard and respect for me. Someone who would embarrass and humiliate me in front of all his men and reduce me to begging on my knees and refuse to listen to anything I had to say. I’d rather die than ever be back with him. He’s reduced me to nothing and I was a fool for allowing it to happen. A fool for loving him and thinking that my love was enough for us both or that he would one day love me.
“He has no heart. No capacity for love. His callous disregard for me and the fact that he wouldn’t even listen to what I had to say, wouldn’t allow me to defend myself, proved beyond a shadow of doubt that he does not and will not ever love me.”
She stared into Silas’s eyes for the first time, her anger yanking her from the numbness for a brief moment. His jaw was clenched tight as he absorbed every single part of her impassioned outcry.
“Any woman could fill the role I have in his life,” she said bitterly. “Because no woman will ever have the only thing that truly matters. His heart. His love. His trust. Maybe his wealth and power will be enough for other women. But not for me,” she whispered. “Never for me.”
The pain in her head was making her sick. And Silas was still standing there as she poured out her broken heart, waiting for her to tell him where she wanted to go. To hell. She was already there.
“I hate his money. I hate his power. And I hate that he’s always believed himself to be such a monster, and before today, I would not have believed it or allowed anyone else to believe it either. But what he just did . . .”
She took a long, steadying breath as more tears flooded her aching eyes.
“What he just did not only proved that he has no faith or trust or love in me. He proved that I was wrong about him. That I can’t trust him. That I never should have trusted him with the only things I have to give. My heart. My love. My trust. And my loyalty. I gave that all to him when I’ve never given it to another man. And it meant nothing to him.”
She broke down into horrific sobs, her hands flying up to cover her face. The pain sent nausea roiling through her stomach, and she gagged, desperately trying to keep the now-sour champagne from coming up.
“Evangeline, is there some place you want to go for the night?” Silas asked. “Your girlfriends’ place perhaps?”
“Oh God no,” she said in a horrified voice. “So they’ll know just how right they were and how stupid I was? Again?” Her eye twitched and she put her hand to her forehead again and swallowed back the convulsive retch. “I have nowhere to go, Silas,” she said with quiet despair. “You should know that. I depended solely on Drake. It will be a lesson learned the hard way to never, ever rely on any man ever again.”
Pain and sorrow reflected like a mirror in his eyes. Then he saw her wince again as the headlights from the car approaching stabbed through her gaze. His eyes narrowed as he homed in on the source of her discomfort.
