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Before she could react, before she could look down at him, his grip on her arm shifted into just a touch, merely asking her to pause.
It stilled her, that simple motion.
For all that she needed to escape his presence in this moment, she looked back to him.
“Someone hurt you. Made you into this.”
“This?”
“Sad and angry and willing to chop a man’s balls off. Tell me I’m wrong.”
One raw chuckle escaped her throat. “No, you’re not wrong. But what you’re really asking me is why do I live the life I do?”
His stare seared into her and he nodded.
She considered for a moment jumping out of the carriage—it was instinct. Run as soon as the questions got too pointed. But this was Evan. Somehow, he’d wormed his way into her mind, into her thoughts thispast weekto the point where she could think of little other than the man only inches away.
And heaven help her, she wanted him to know. Wanted him to know that once in her life she’d been innocent. Innocent and pure and deserving of the world. She wanted him to know what had happened to that gullible innocence.
Her hand flew into the air, flicking off his fingers from her arm and she fell into a heap on the thinly cushioned bench across from him. For long seconds she stared down at her lap, at the wrinkles of thedark blue muslin of her skirtstretchedacross her knees. “I was in love once.”
Her fingers brushed across her skirt, knowing the fabric wouldn’t unwrinkle, yet she followed the crooked creases, flattening them against her thigh. “I fell in love with a viscount. I would have been the perfect countess. My father was a baron and I was the eldest, so I was set to marry well. A dowry, the besttutors from an early age to teach me my notable accomplishments—drawing, French, music. Nothing practical of life, of course.My father was so proud of me. My mother was so proud of me. At the time, I was so proud of me.” The saddest smile crossed her lips. “I was set to make a splendid match which would carve the way for my younger sister to make an even more splendid match.”
Her head shook, the smile drifting into a frown. “But at some point—I do not know why—my father flipped. He became belligerent and started to drink and gamble. He was rarely home. It only took a year for him to lose everything of worth we had. Our dowries were the last thing to go. He was so sure he could use them to turn his fortune around. So desperate.”
“You were impoverished?”
“Yes. But that didn’t stop me from falling in love. I met the viscount at a house party—a childhood friend was generous and invited me to every function her family hosted and would lend me her clothes. It was during the darkest days for my father, but I thought if I could meet my match, that would cheer him. Bring him back to us. I actually thought it would be that easy.”
She swallowed hard. “It was at her family’s country house in Suffolk that I met him. There were so many guests and the viscount was one of them. He stood out—stood out from all the others and I fell in love with him. And he fell in love with me—not in love with the American heiress he was there to court.”
Evan sighed. “He was impoverished as well.”
“His estate was nearly sunk.” She nodded. “But there was nothing that could tear us asunder. Nothing. I was so young and so deeply in love that I didn’t care on anything but that love—on being with him. I was impoverished. He was impoverished. But we were so in love.”
She looked up at Evan, her voice even. “He needed to marry money. My dowry was long gone. But we were going to be together no matter what. So, he did court the American heiress and he married her only because I promised him I would become his mistress. Leave my family. Be his for all of time.”
Evan’s head shifted in one slow nod. Beyond that, there wasn’t the slightest reaction on his granite face. “How old were you?”
“Nineteen.”
“So, you became his mistress?”
“I did. I left everything I’d ever known. My father exiled me from my family, of course. A day later, he decided that the best spot for his neck would be in a noose in our stable. After he died, my mother didn’t even try to stop me from moving into the house the viscount had bought for me with his new wife’s money. My mother knew our options were limited. No money. No title left to trade on. Everything gone. She went with my sister to live with a distant cousin in Cheshire.”
His head shook slowly. “That is brutal. I’m sorry you went through that.”
“I am sorry for a lot of things that happened during that time. Some of the words I uttered that I can never take back. I was awful. My mother was worse.” Her hand flipped up from her lap, waving in the air. “And then it only took a year.”
Evan’s left eyebrow lifted. “What did?”
“One year for the viscount to tire of me. To fall out of love. To stop coming to my bed.”
“Bastard.”
She shrugged. “He fell in love with his wife, of all things. She gave him a boy, an heir. She gave him the money, the child, so why not fall in love with her? She was beautiful. Kind. It was right.” Her fingers lifted, absently playing with the bottom edge of the curtain pulled across the window. “I lied to myself for a long time about what was happening, about why he was pulling away.” She drew a quivering breath. “And then I…”
Silence filled the carriage, heavy between them.
