Deceived (28 page)

“Josie,” he said.

She slowly turned. “My lord,” she said, her tone icy.

“I have come to ask for a dance, Josie,” he said, holding out a hand so those around them could see.

“I don’t want to dance,” she replied in a low tone.

Mary, Gemma and Serafina all flinched at her refusal and each took a small step back as they pretended to go into deep conversation so as not to intrude upon this private moment any more than they had to.

“People are watching,” he said softly. “Take my hand, Josie. Do it this once and I promise you, I will not demand it again.”

She stared at his outstretched hand for a very long moment. Then she sighed. “I don’t know that your promises can be trusted, but what choice do you give me?”

Then she set her palm in his.

Even through her gloves, the jolt of awareness that touching her gave him was enough to make his knees shake. God, but he wanted to carry her out of this room. He wanted to kiss her until she could no longer deny him. He wanted to hold her until she never wanted to leave.

But in this moment, what
he
wanted didn’t matter. This moment was about her.

He guided her forward to the dance floor and they moved into the gathered couples.

“I hope it’s a country reel,” she murmured under her breath.

But instead the strains of the waltz rose up around them. Evan smiled. Thank God for small favors. He placed a hand on her hip and with the other positioned her hand, and they moved into the steps together.

“This will be easier if you look at me,” he said softly after the first few steps.

“I would prefer not to,” she said, but she did lift her gaze and found his. He caught his breath at how beautiful she looked.

“I have missed you.”

Her lips thinned into a frown. “Don’t lie anymore. You have already gotten all the information I have to share. There is no need to make us both into fools.”

“I am a fool,” he said, holding her gaze even as he maneuvered her. “But you never were.”

“I was the worst fool,” she whispered, and the way her voice broke cut him to his core.

“I’m so sorry,” he said. “Please hear how sincere that is.”

“I hear it,” she admitted, and for a moment he was lifted by hope. “But I’ve noted your sincerity before and been so very wrong. How can I do anything but doubt myself and you now?”

He hesitated. “I deserve that, Josie. But won’t you let me call on you tomorrow? Won’t you let me try to make everything up to you?”

She was silent as the music carried on and they danced around and around. But the song was more than half finished. Their time together was running out.

“Please,” he urged.

She slowly shook her head. “I know you won’t understand, Evan. You couldn’t. But I have spent my life not feeling like I was important. And with you, I thought I was. But then the truth came out and I knew that no matter what you said or did, you would never have wanted me if I hadn’t been useful through the information I had. I can’t pretend that isn’t true. And I can’t face the pain again. Especially with you. You who I…who meant something.”

The song slowed and then stopped, and the dancers began to leave the floor. Josie stared up at him, her pale face reflecting all the pain he felt, all the pain he’d caused.

“It was never meant to be us,” she whispered. “That future was false from the first moment you spoke to me. Later we will work out what happens next. But for now, I can’t go back. Back is too painful. You don’t have to torture yourself, Evan. But just be happy that you can let go.”

“I don’t want to let go,” he murmured, hardly able to breathe enough to speak with the weight of her leaving on his mind.

“Then I will,” she whispered, and turned to go.

He snaked a hand out and caught her wrist gently, refusing to let her walk away.

“Not like this,” he said.

Josie stared at Evan’s lean, tanned fingers wrapped around her wrist like a beautiful manacle and she shivered. Why couldn’t he just allow her this escape? Why did he have to keep pursuing her? Out of what? Honor? Guilt?

She didn’t want that.

“Evan, we’ve had our dance,” Josie said under her breath, trying to keep the smile on her face for the increasingly interested crowd when inside she was screaming. “Our last dance. And I’m going home. So please stop pretending to give a damn.” He opened his mouth to speak, but she finally pulled from his grip. “Please.”

She turned away and walked from the dance floor. Her hands were shaking, her heart aching, but this was what she had to do.

“Jocelyn, stop!”

She was at least ten feet away when Evan shouted those words. She froze, watching as the rest of the ballroom stirred, looked at her, looked behind her. What was he doing? Was she not humiliated enough?

“Please stop!” he repeated just as loudly. “And look at me.”

Her cheeks burned as she faced him in one sweeping turn. “What are you doing?” she asked through clenched teeth.

Women were whispering behind their fans now, men were grinning as they looked at her. It was a nightmare. A horrible memory of her very worst nights in ballrooms just like this. Even worse, it was
Evan
creating this pain.

On purpose. When she had already told him just a short time before that she didn’t want this.

“You will not let me declare myself in private,” he said as he took a step toward her. “So I have no choice but to say these words before the world. Perhaps it’s better that way.”

“How can this be better?” Josie said, shaking her head as she prayed for the floor to open up and devour her.

“Because then
everyone
will know the truth, not just you,” he said. “Please let me speak.”

“You will do what you like, why bother asking for permission?” she snapped as she folded her arms and steeled herself against this further humiliation.

She caught a glimpse of her mother standing along the dance floor edge with Mary and Edward, Audrey and Jude, and Mary’s sister Gemma and her husband Crispin Flynn. All of them looked shocked, though her mother’s face was twisted in equal horror to her own. Perhaps now that Josie was publicly humiliated, her mother would let her cloister herself in the country for good, at last.

“What was said to you as a girl,” he began. “What was done to you by me and by so many in this room…Josie, you deserved better.”

Her mouth dropped open. “What?”

“You deserved better than the cruelty of these people, many of whom are not fit to shine your shoe.” He moved closer again. “I include myself in that group. That I, whether by accident or not, was any part of your pain is abominable to me.”

Josie shifted and her gaze flitted to the crowd. There were a few there who actually looked chagrined at his words. Some still looked cruel and triumphant. Her heart thudded so loudly she could scarcely hear above it.

But Evan continued, “When you came to Idleridge just before Audrey’s wedding, I admit I was not honest with you. And you deserved better then as well.”

There was a gasp through the crowd, but now Josie hardly heard it. Evan was staring at her so closely, his dark gaze holding her in place, reminding her of things both sweet and bitter. She could only look at him now, nothing else mattered.

“I am a liar, just as you accused me of being,” he continued.

She nodded slowly. “Well, at least you can admit it.”

“I can,” he said. “And I will add that I am not good enough to be with you, Josie. You are too fine and fair, too smart, too lovely, too kind to lower yourself to me. But we are married now, so you are bound to me despite all my failings.”

Josie tilted her head. Were those tears in his eyes? Just a sparkle of them as he stepped one more step closer? They
were
, and her heart all but stopped.

“What are you doing?”

“The biggest lie I ever told wasn’t the one I told to you.”

She sucked in a breath. “There were more?”

He nodded. “Just one. And I told it to myself,” he said. “And it was that I didn’t love you.”

She staggered slightly, but he caught her elbow and kept her from collapsing in front of half the
ton
.

“My saving grace, perhaps my only one, is that I love you, Josie. I love you with everything that is good in me. And even though I know you deserve better, I can only hope that there is some small part of you that might love me a little bit in return. That might see past the lie I told you on an evening that seems so long ago and see the truth in what I’m telling you now.”

She stared at him, unable to speak, unable to form a thought coherent enough to share. What he said was her fantasy, but was it true? Did he mean this declaration of love? Could he possibly?

She looked into his eyes, tried to find the lie, but all she saw was truth.

“Do I have to go to my knees?” he asked softly.

Before she could answer, he did just that, dropping before her in supplication. “Please,” he said.

“Oh God, say yes!” came an unidentified female voice from the crowd.

It shocked Josie into looking around. The room was all but silent, every eye on them. Evan was doing this not to humiliate her, but to atone. To declare himself in a way that was so public it had to be true. He was humiliating
himself
, not her, to put them on some kind of equal ground. Doing it forced her to feel what she had been trying to avoid, forced her to see what she thought was an illusion and forced her to speak to save him.

“I love you,” she whispered, then raised her voice so the leaning crowd could hear. “I love you, Evan. And while I hate what set us on this path, there is nowhere else I would rather be than here with you, as your wife.”

He stood up in one smooth motion. “Will you come home with me, then?”

She hesitated just a fraction of a second before she nodded. With a yelp of relief and pleasure, he caught her in his arms and then his mouth came down on hers, eliciting yet another gasp from the crowd, followed by a surprising burst of applause.

One Josie hardly heard and for once in her life didn’t care about. Because she was with Evan. She was with her husband and the love of her life. The man who broke their kiss, grinned down at her and then promptly tucked her hand into the crook of his arm and guided her from the ballroom without further comment or question.

Evan pulled Josie into his lap as the carriage began to rumble toward his London townhome and wrapped his arms around her, reveling in the warmth of her pressed to him. The pleasure and promise of her.

She gazed up at him, a small but hesitant smile on her face. “I thought we’d talked before about you standing up in front of the world and making defenses.”

He smiled as he smoothed his fingers across her cheek. Soft as satin, just as he remembered. “That was a declaration, not a defense,” he clarified. “And I had to do it, Josie. I feared you would walk away forever. I had to show you how much you mean to me.”

“Enough to humiliate yourself in front of family, friends, acquaintances and strangers,” she whispered.

“Well, I don’t consider it a humiliation,” he said. “I hurt you. And not just once. And I hate myself for that.”

“But did you mean what you said? That what started as a lie turned into truth?”

“I meant every word.” He stroked a thumb over her full lower lip. “Josie, I did approach you at first with the idea that you could help me find my sister. But with every moment we spent together, I knew that you meant more to me. When I touched you, when I kissed you, as I fell in love with you, that had nothing to do with manipulation.”

Her smile grew. “Say that you love me again.”

He leaned in and brushed his lips over hers gently. “I love you, Jocelyn. With all my heart.”

She wrapped her arms around him. “I love you too. Now show me.”

He drew back. “Right here in the carriage?”

She nodded. “Unless you are stronger than I am and can wait until we reach your home.”

“No, I am most definitely not strong enough,” he whispered before he devoured her mouth once more.

She opened for him willingly and he dove inside, tasting her sweetness, coaxing a moan from deep within her that seem to bind them with pleasure. He reached around as he drew her closer so she straddled his lap, and began to knead her backside through her pretty gown.