26. Chapter 26 #2
“No, nothing like that. Nothing happened.” She fell quiet again and pondered the contents of her cup. Finally, she said, “Talking with Luci…brought up memories of…of Vincent.”
“Vincent?” Something like the sharp pain of a dagger sliced through his chest. “Your lover?” He shouldn’t be jealous of this man from her past, but he was and it was because that man had been the only man she loved.
She nodded. “Luci had an affair with M. Marceau, the singing master. I warned her away from him from the beginning, but she wouldn’t listen. I can’t really blame her because I didn’t listen, either.”
“You were warned away from this Vincent?”
“He was a coveted music instructor and I was his star pupil. He started offering me private lessons because he believed in my potential.” She snorted.
“I understand now that it was his way of getting close to me. It wasn’t long before he confessed his love for me and we kissed.
Soon after we did more than kiss. Another student, a close friend of mine at the time, tried to warn me, but I thought she was jealous.
I was stupid. I wouldn’t listen to anyone because I thought my heart was smarter than all of them.
It wasn’t long before I realized he had been sleeping with other girls, too. That wasn’t even the worst of it.”
“What was the worst of it?”
“He was married with a family back home in Vienna. We had discussed getting married and me going with him to Vienna. We’d talked about spending our lives together.” She shook her head in disappointment. “I didn’t know any better.”
David set his cup on the table next to the settee. “Jenny,” he began, trying to find the words. “You weren’t stupid. He tricked you. He made you think those things.” He took her free hand.
She shook her head. “I should have known better.”
“Why would you? How old were you?”
“Seventeen.”
“And he was older? Married with children?”
She nodded.
David’s molars clenched and he forced himself to relax his jaw. Anger coursed through him so swiftly that for a moment, he couldn’t see the room around him. He saw her and that bellend Vincent and he wanted to punch him in the face.
“He used you, Jenny. He told you what he knew you wanted to hear.” She didn’t answer and just stared at him with an almost smile hovering around her lips. “What?”
“I know all that,” she said. “Now, anyway.” Then, more gently. “Are you angry?”
He let out a sharp breath. “Bloody hell.”
She laughed and set her mug down next to his, before scooting over on the settee to sit closer. She drew her knees up under her nightdress and her toes pressed against his thigh, her shins against his arm.
“Thank you.”
What the hell was she thanking him for ?
“For your anger,” she elaborated. “But it’s fine.
I understand all that now, really I do. It’s been years since then.
” She touched his arm as she spoke and he felt the tension start to drain from him.
It started in his neck and shoulders and went down his back and hips until he felt languid and soft.
“I want to punch him. To hurt him.”
“I did too for a while, but that was a long time ago. He can’t hurt me anymore.”
David stared at her, wanting that to be true, but he didn’t believe it was. “Can’t he, though?”
She cocked her head to the side in question.
“You were crying,” he said.
She shook her head. “Not about him. About the girl I was.”
He took in a breath and reached out to pick up a piece of her hair that fell over her shoulder.
He twirled the deep brown strand around his finger, watching it catch the light and denying himself the pleasure of bringing it to his nose to inhale her scent.
He was very aware that he didn’t have her yet.
He needed to tread carefully, but the question needed to be asked.
“Isn’t he why you’re afraid of me? Of us?” he asked.
“I’m not afraid.” She stiffened, and he knew the statement was a lie.
She was afraid that he’d turn out to be like Vincent.
David hated that at one time she might have been right.
He’d never lied to a woman to get her to sleep with him, but despite his intentions, sex sometimes led to feelings for him and he wasn’t always able to stop the progression.
“You think I’ll hurt you as he hurt you.”
She stared at him, something poignant welling in her eyes. “I’m not afraid of that.”
“Really?” She was lying .
“I’m not afraid of that because it’ll never happen. I should have known better with Vincent, but I didn’t and he hurt me. I learned my lesson after that. I don’t let men get close enough to hurt me, especially men like you.”
Those words were like a blow straight to the core of his beating heart.
“Men like me,” he repeated because he couldn’t form an original thought as the ache reverberated within him.
He dropped his arm and his hand covered her toes.
They were like pieces of ice. He covered them with his palm and let the cold ground him.
“You trade in sex and hedonism in exchange for not feeling anything deeper.”
She didn’t say it like an accusation but it felt like one. He studied her earnest gaze and knew that she was speaking to him from the heart but every word carried the barbs of a war mace.
“That’s not who I am,” he whispered. It might be what he did— what he’d done —but it wasn’t who he was.
She gave him the gentlest of smiles and touched his face. “I never entered this marriage to change you. We both had our reasons and, when it’s time, we’ll go our separate ways. You’ll always be free to be who you are with me.”
“Our separate ways?”
She nodded and a creak from the corridor had her glancing toward the door. “I should go. If it’s Luci, she’ll be disoriented.”
He could only watch as she rose and hurried to the door. The very thought of divorce felt so wrong that nausea churned within him. He couldn’t divorce her any more than he could chop off his own hand. He needed her now in ways he was only just starting to understand.
An icy chill rushed down his spine. “Jenny, wait,” he called but it was too late .
She hurried out into the corridor, murmuring to someone, Luci he presumed, and closed the door behind her.
She was determined they lead separate lives, but he didn’t want that any longer.