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“You’re hysterical.”
She pulled back to face him, her eyes wild and desperate. “See? You don’t deny it. For why would you come to the village? And make love to me? Why any of it? You do love me. Youalwaysdid.”
He shook his head and braced his heart. “Sir Alfred threatened to end my career if I didn’t bring you in.” The threat was true, but Lottie wasn’t the only one who was sentimental. Far from it. Alec would have gone searching for her the minute he learned what had happened, whether Sir Alfred asked him to or not. But it would do her no good to know that. “And even I’m not strong enough to resist a beautiful woman begging me to have her.”
“He could have sent someone else, though. It didn’t need to be you. Don’t you see what this means? He approves now. We can be together.”
The hope in her face was agonizing. It meant nothing of the sort. Sir Alfred had taken a gamble, to be sure, but he knew how deep Alec’s self-loathing went.
The trick to successfully telling a lie is to choose something that is either close to the truth, or something the other person might already be disposed to believe is true. One wrong move, and this house of cards would tumble.
Alec took a deep breath. He would not come back from this.
“No.” He spoke slowly. Calmly. As one might do with a small child. “All it means is that now he will need to find you a husband who won’t care that you’ve been ruined. I could have chosen you five years ago. But I didn’t then, and I won’t now. Nothing’s changed.”
She stared at him in shock for several excruciatingly silent moments while Alec’s heartbeat thundered in his ears. Then something flickered behind those wide green eyes, as if a light was being extinguished. Her Lottie light. Her body stiffened as she slid out of his arms.
When she finally spoke, her tone was even. Free of any emotion. “Yes. Of course.” Her face was as blank as her voice. The mask had returned.
Alec tried to ignore the icy regret currently clawing up his spine along with the clammy sheen of sweat that had broken out over his body and headed toward the door. “Your train will leave soon. I’ll send Valentina to help. Take her with you. If not for your own sake, then for hers.” He hesitated in the doorway and looked over his shoulder. Last time he had just left. But now…
“Goodbye, Lottie,” he murmured.
She winced, as if the very words themselves caused her injury, and he immediately strode from the room.
They would not meet again.
Chapter Nineteen
Alec entered the bar he and Rafe used as a meeting place. It was mostly empty given the early hour. Rafe was already standing in his usual spot at the end of the counter calmly sipping his coffee and joking with Gianni, the bartender. Beside him was a small glass of grappa.
“I thought you might need this,” Rafe explained unprompted as Alec approached. “Christ. You look like hell.”
Without a word, Alec picked up the glass and swallowed the contents. The warm burn cut through the numbness that had enveloped him for the past hour. Then he set the glass down, turned to Rafe, and immediately punched him.
“God damn it, man!” Rafe cried out, clutching the side of his face.
Alec turned to Gianni and pointed to his glass. “Another.”
The man simply nodded, not at all fazed by Rafe’s yowling, and went to retrieve the bottle.
“I suppose I deserved that,” Rafe said as he felt along his jaw. Alec had only clipped him. They both knew he could have hit him much harder. “But you could have told me who she was. I might not have—”
“—threatenedher?”
“I thought—”
“I know what you thought,” Alec bit off and turned away. In all the years they had known one another, Alec had never seen Rafe express anything close to the regret clearly etched on his face now. But it wasn’t enough to quell the anger churning inside him. Gianni refilled the glass, and he drank it as quickly as the first. “I appreciate your complete lack of confidence in my abilities, by the way. So tell me, who was the plant last night?”
Rafe hesitated. “Drakos.”
Alec let out a harsh laugh. “Is he even an olive oil magnate?”
“Yes,” Rafe said testily. “Mr. Drakos is an international businessman and a valuable Crown asset. You were acting strangely yesterday, so I called in a favor. Thanks to him last night wasn’t a complete loss.”
Alec shot him an expectant look. “Well? What of Madame Noir?”
Rafe wouldn’t meet his eyes. “Nothing useful. Yet,” he couldn’t help adding.
