Chapter Twelve #2
“We are not in agreement. I will not be a part of your revenge scheme.” Her eyes darted across the water, and for a moment she looked like a trapped animal. “I need to get to my sister.”
He had been waiting for this moment, but instead of feeling the satisfaction of finally hearing the truth, he felt his temper rising. “Is your sister in imminent danger?”
“Not exactly, but—”
“Then there is absolutely no reason to go to her that I know of.”
He had seen her anger and hurt, but the look of betrayal that crossed her face now shook him in ways he was not ready to think about.
“You would keep me here against my will?” she asked through gritted teeth.
“If it means that we can put an end to my father’s domination and put the power of decision-making into my hands so that I can steer this country in the right direction? Yes, I will.”
“This is exactly the way your father behaves,” she said, her voice louder. “Why do you think you know best?”
“Who do you suggest knows best? Edvin, my brother, who has mysteriously disappeared? Before that, he seemed to be following in my father’s footsteps.”
Livia threw up her hands. “No one person knows best. No one should have all the power, no matter how well-intentioned they are. We all have our personal feelings and blind spots. You want revenge, and I can understand why. But can you promise that none of your decisions will be tinged by that vengeance?”
Gustav didn’t answer as frustration roiled inside.
How could she ask him to give up what he had been working toward for years?
But even more disturbing was the fact that it physically hurt when she looked at him with betrayal in her eyes.
The urge to destroy everything around him, to let his anger consume him and everyone else, was almost overwhelming.
“I need to get to my sister before my parents. They are worried about her care, and they have tossed around the idea of finding a suitable marriage for her as well. This whole scandal is only going to—”
“Enough.” Gustav’s voice was cold and harsh, and Livia froze. But he had to stop this pain that he could no longer numb. “Are you going to stand by me?”
“I need to get my sister away from this.”
“I need you,” he thundered. “With me.”
“To complete your revenge plan,” she shot back.
“I cannot watch you suffer under this drive for revenge. Because that can never be satisfied. You will never make up for all that you have lost over the years, for the ways that your father made you feel like you were second best. You can never change how he allowed the world to characterize you as the Bastard Spare. Nothing will take that away.”
Her words rattled inside him, and it felt as if he she was exposing his deepest wound, the one that never quite healed.
“You and I could find a different life,” she pleaded. “I don’t even know what it would look like, but it could be far away from our parents. You have all of this.”
Livia gestured around at the boat, at the water, at the shore of the country that he loved and had still torn at his heart. “You can make your future whatever you wish to make it. But I won’t sit by and watch you destroy yourself over a past that can never be changed.”
“Then you have made up your mind,” he said, his anger seething inside him. “You’ve chosen not to stand by my side.” Then he let out a humorless laugh. “And how do you plan to leave?”
Livia’s face was red with anger. “Isn’t it always this way? That I am at the mercy of the people in my life who want to use me as a pawn?”
It was as if the anger inside him exploded.
“You are not a pawn,” he ground out. “You are my wife. You belong by my side.”
“Don’t tell me where I belong. If you want me by your side, then it has to be my choice, doesn’t it?”
He closed his eyes as her words shuddered through him, a truth he didn’t want to face.
When she spoke again, her voice was full of sadness. “You have to act like you want me to choose you.”
He opened his eyes again, and she stood in front of him.
He couldn’t force her to stay. He had strong-armed her into marriage and seduced her, and though she had come willingly into his bed, he had never given her the opening to come to him willingly.
He found that could not numb the pain inside him.
It felt as if something was breaking apart, and he refused to call it love. It could not be.
“You have made your choice,” he said, finding the hardness he needed in his voice.
Her expression fell, and he felt another stab of pain. If only he didn’t care that she hurt, this would all be so much easier.
“Go. Take my plane. Whatever you need. But don’t bother coming back. I will carry this out on my own.”
She sat down on the bench, and he could see tears in her eyes. Somehow this made it worse, so he looked away. He could not let this agony steer him.
“You can make a different choice,” she whispered. “You are better than vengeance.”
“I am the Bastard Spare. Weren’t you the one who decided I couldn’t escape who I am?” he shot back, his voice hard.
And he could see her face twist in pain, and though every inch of him wanted to comfort her, he knew that the last thing she wanted right now was his comfort. Because, in the end, she knew what he said was true.