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He’d married her knowing she was dangerous, knowing she was the only woman who’d ever reached past his defences. He’d married her without knowing where it would take them. And he had no reason to complain—she was giving so much of herself. She was passionate and compassionate and trying so hard to accommodate him, but it only made him more desperate. He didn’t want her to make an effort. He wanted her to love him, need him. Not the children or the home he could give her.
Him.
Inky hissed and hopped off the bed. Sam whimpered, wrapping her arms more securely around the pillow, and heat hit him like a pugilist’s blow to the sternum. He wanted to wake her, turn her to him, have her reach out to him as she did at night when weariness overcame his scruples and he gave in to the need to love her, holding the words so deeply inside him it was like swallowing a mace—every move made the spikes grind and gouge.
Instead he left the room and went down the corridor to see if his fool of a brother was still alive.
* * *
‘How was your visit to the ancestral pile?’ Rafe asked, putting down the book he’d been reading as Edge entered the room. With a grimace he realised it was Treasures of Siwa.
‘Depressing as always. Mother will be arriving tomorrow morning.’
Rafe groaned.
‘You are punishing me, aren’t you? Why the devil couldn’t she wait until I came to Greybourne?’
‘I told her. To which she responded, not without cause, that she was not at all convinced you would come. Perhaps now that the tyrant has expired she’s remembering her motherly instincts. Rather late in the game.’
Rafe sighed and smoothed the page he was reading.
‘Sam gave this to me.’
Edge straightened his back.
‘She came to see you?’
‘No, she came to see you and you lambasted her and stalked out, remember? I called her in and tried to soothe her, poor thing.’
‘Why don’t you give the knife another twist, damn you?’ Edge’s voice grated in his own ears.
‘I imagine you’ve been doing nothing but twisting it since you left. And before. You hurt her deeply, Edge.’
Edge could do nothing about his visceral satisfaction at those words. Good—because she is destroying me. He wasn’t proud of it, but it was there, like a starving hyena, grinning and waiting for its chance at the carcase because it was not strong enough to win its own prey.
‘You are right. I have no excuse. I will apologise tomorrow.’
‘I don’t think an apology will cut it.’
‘Why the devil did you have to interfere in my life in the first place? I was finally beginning to settle into...’
‘Into what? Into your comfortable little hole in Brazil? Doing nothing but writing books?’ Rafe waved the open book in front of him. ‘This is damn good, I grant you, but it was never meant to be everything. Deuce take you, you should be on your knees thanking me! You have the one person you have wanted in your life more than anyone else outside of Jacob and you are cursing me for pushing you into her arms. The best you could do was tie her to you with those books. You’re not only ungrateful, you’re a coward.’
Rafe could always unravel him. One of the very few people who could. He didn’t want to be unravelled because he was not certain he could gather himself together again. He dug his hands into his hair, tugging until it hurt, until his eyes burned. He could feel Rafe’s gaze on him. Probably pitying him.
‘I’m so tired, Rafe.’
‘I can see. I meant well, Edge. Everything you said about me is right. I never should have interfered.’
Edge shook his head.
‘I wouldn’t change it. It’s not enough, but it might have to be. I just need to...accept that and hope that with time her affections will grow. It was only... I didn’t know she had been in love with someone else so much that she gave up hope of loving anyone else. I don’t know why that hurt even worse than thinking of her with her husband. I’m trying to be sensible, but I can’t and it’s killing me.’
‘Why don’t you talk to her?’
Edge shoved his hands deeper into his hair. He wanted to be with Sam.
‘And tell her what? Dear Sam, I have been in love with you from the moment you fell on top of me eight years ago and wasn’t brave enough to admit it and spare either myself or my poor spoilt wife from an unhappy marriage that suited neither of us. I wove you into my life through those damn books because I couldn’t have you and the moment I saw you again I wanted you so badly I thought I was hallucinating when you proposed marriage.’
‘That will do to begin with. Don’t forget to mention you are a coward. That might clarify some things to her.’
