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“So you still don’t know where he is?”
He shook his head. “He wrote me a letter to say he would come home when he could manage it. I’ve been waiting for his return. And then you showed up.”
She smiled faintly. “With my bloodthirsty relations in tow.”
“Precisely.”
“That’s why you kept hiding the truth—because you were worried about what I might do to you?”
“And what you might convince Knighton to do. I had to be free to arrange Morgan’s pardon, you see.”
She thought on that a moment. “So it was all that simple—the kidnapping and the lying and the games.”
He nodded, holding his breath, waiting for the ax to fall.
“I thought it might be something like that.”
He approached the bed, certain he’d misunderstood her. “What?”
She shrugged. “At first I’d assumed your motive had been financial, even though you hadn’t demanded any of the ransom Crouch wanted. But once we saw the extent of your estate, I had to abandon that idea. I did speculate that you might have come by your wealth through smuggling, but even back then you never seemed much a part of the smugglers. And Griff’s investigator learned that you’d never joined any other gang.”
Sitting down next to her, he chose his words carefully. “So you’re not angry.”
Her clear eyes met his. “That depends.”
“On what?”
“The answers to some questions.”
His heart sank. He should have known he wouldn’t escape so easily. “Ask away.”
For the first time since he’d begun his explanations, he glimpsed uncertainty in her face. “When you first came to Stratford, you…approached Helena. Why? I daresay if she hadn’t been so suspicious of men in general, you and I might not be sitting here having this discussion, for she would have been the one to go with you.”
She looked so vulnerable that his heart lurched in his chest. “I doubt that. It wasn’t in your sister’s character to elope. I figured that out soon enough.”
She sighed. “But you could tell that it was in my character.”
A sticky point, and he could see how she’d view it. But he wasn’t about to prevaricate now. “Back then you were a romantic soul, sweeting, and I’ll admit that I thought you’d be easier to influence.” With a frown, she bit her lower lip, and he added hastily, “But I can honestly say I was relieved when Lady Helena rebuffed my advances. Relieved and alarmed.”
“Alarmed?”
Reaching up, he stroked a line from the apple of her cheek to her lush, sweet lips. “Terrified, more like. I didn’t want to unsettle either of your lives more than necessary. I planned to act the gentleman, and I knew that a long trip with Helena wouldn’t tempt me to misbehave. I knew equally well that a long trip with you would do precisely that.”
Her gaze shot to his. “But throughout that trip you ignored me and treated me like a child. And the one time I asked you to kiss me, you refused flat out.”
“Exactly. The alternative was to lay you out in the carriage and have my wicked way with you.” When she continued to look skeptical, he cupped her cheek, caressing her pouting lower lip with his thumb. “I spent most of that trip burning for you, sweeting. That day you asked me to kiss you…I suffered a thousand agonies imagining what it would be like to bury my hands in your hair, turn your face up to mine, and kiss you senseless. I wanted you from the beginning. Very, very badly. I only felt safe in kissing you when I knew I was leaving you behind. And that’s the honest truth.”
Her eyes slid shut as if to block out the sight of his need. “Then why didn’t you take me with you instead of leaving me? Why didn’t you simply marry me? If you’d told me all of this, I would have forgiven you. I wanted to forgive you then. I wanted to believe in you, even after your betrayal.”
“I had to go look for Morgan, don’t you see?”
“At first, perhaps. But once you heard he was dead, why didn’t you come to me in London and ask me to marry you then?”
“And risk my life? What if I’d told you the truth and you’d decided to drag me through a trial?”
Her eyes flew open, full of outrage. “I wouldn’t have done that!”
“How could I be sure? And even if you didn’t want me hanged, Knighton would have done all he could to see it happen. At the very least, he would have sought to ruin me.” He left the bed and went to stand by the fireplace, bracing his hand against the far end of the mantel as he stared into the flames. “Besides, I knew you were safe and well in London. I figured I had no right to upset you after what I’d done. I wasn’t even sure you would have me. So what point would there have been in disrupting your life?”
