“So you’ve said.” She inhaled a deep breath, watching him closely. “Nothing happened between me and Lord Ashhaven.”
Instantly, his eyes dropped to hers. “But I saw…”
“It was a test.”
His gaze narrowed. “A test?”
“I’m sorry,” she told him honestly, cherishing the feeling of finally revealing all that she felt to him. “I did not mean to deceive you. It was…the spur of the moment. But I needed to know.” She moved her hands across his chest, closer to his left side, to feel his heart beat frantically against her palms. “I wanted to know if it would affect you to see me with him, if it would affect you the same way seeing you with Abigail affected me.”
Below her hands, his heart skipped a beat.
“You see,” Charlaine began, willing her gaze to remain on his, to not look down and hide from him. “I love you.”
Again, his heart seemed to pause for the barest of seconds as though it did not dare believe, his gaze drilling into hers, his breath lodged in his throat. “You…” He swallowed, and his jaw tensed. “You promised to be my friend.”
Charlaine nodded. “I did, and I am your friend.” She sighed. “I meant what I said, but I cannot help how I feel. Why does it frighten you so that I love you? Do you not believe me?”
His gaze lingered on her face, the look in his eyes gentle, caring. “How can you be certain…?” His voice trailed off as his hand reached out to brush a curl behind her ear. The tips of his fingers trailed over her skin, and a shuddering breath left his lips, whispering of the deep emotions he seemed to fear like little else.
Charlaine’s fingers curled into the fabric of his jacket, holding him to her. “There is a fine line between friendship and love. Sometimes you stumble quite inexplicably from one into the other.” She sighed. “And sometimes you stumble back.”
Gritting his teeth, Nathanial nodded. “What if…?” He seemed unable to finish the concerns that lingered, concerns that had seized him ever since Abigail’s betrayal. He no longer dared trust in forever. He no longer dared believe that all would be well.
Instead, he feared that all that had happened might happen again.
“I’m not Abigail,” Charlaine told him vehemently, her gaze hard and unyielding. “Look at me and know that I’m telling the truth.”
“I know that,” he all but snapped back, one hand running through his hair, leaving it a disheveled mess. “But we started out the same way.” The muscle in his jaw twitched. “We were friends, and then we were…more than friends.” He inhaled a deep breath. “And then everything changed.” His gaze softened as he once more reached out a hand to brush a nonexistent curl behind her ear. Perhaps he simply wanted to feel her. “I lost her, and…” His gaze met hers and his jaw tightened. “I’d rather have your friendship than nothing at all.”
“But that is a lie, is it not?” Charlaine demanded, unwilling to let him run from this. “When you look at me, you don’t see a friend, do you?”
“Of course, I do!”
“Is that so?” she dared him, noting the way his gaze couldn’t quite hold hers. “Would a friend have stormed in here and attacked Lord Ashhaven?”
His shoulders tensed. “He was taking advantage of you. I merely intended to protect you. Is that not what friends do?”
A slow smile came to her lips. “Yes, friends protect each other, but only a man afraid to lose someone he loved would have struck another without so much as a single word.” Her fingers tightened on his lapels. “Tell me you weren’t afraid to lose me. Tell me.”
His jaw tightened, and his eyes closed in defeat. Still, he would not say a word.
“Then tell me why you left Abigail’s letter for me to find?”
His gaze snapped open. “I beg your pardon?”
“The letter she sent you,” Charlaine demanded as her mind slowly put all the pieces together. How she had not seen it before was beyond her. Perhaps her own fear of losing yet another whom she had come to love had blinded her to the truth as well. “When you ran away to Pembroke Hall, you left it in your chamber. Why?”
Nathanial cleared his throat. “I suppose I must have forgott—”
Charlaine laughed. “No, you didn’t. You took everything and left nothing behind. Only the letter. Why?”
His gaze dropped from hers and he inhaled a slow breath. “After what happened…at the lake,” he swallowed hard, “I needed you to understand that we would only ever be friends. I didn’t want you to reach out to me.”
“Is that so?” Charlaine demanded, getting annoyed with the way he sought to evade the truth. Was it truly that terrifying? “I believe there was another reason altogether.”
His gaze narrowed. “What reason?”
Charlaine pushed herself up onto her toes, her fingers still curled into the fabric of his jacket. “Did you want me to read it and get jealous?” He tensed, and she tightened her grip, her gaze fixed on his. “Did you want to see if I would fight for you?”
Chapter Forty-Eight
A New Beginning
That blasted muscle in Nathanial’s jaw twitched furiously, and no matter how hard he tried to remain in control, it seemed that all his efforts were doomed to fail.
And Charlaine knew it.
Her knowing eyes lingered on his, every once in a while darting to that blasted muscle that was like a beacon in the dark, betraying all that he felt. And she knew him well enough to understand. She knew how to read him. She knew what lived in his heart.
Perhaps better than he did himself.
A soft sigh drifted from her lips as she stood in front of him, her body all but leaning against his, warm and soft and so very alive. “I think after the way Abigail turned from you,” Charlaine whispered gently, her voice no longer accusing, “a part of you wanted to know if I would fight for you.”
Nathanial swallowed, remembering how worthless he had felt when Abigail had given away his father’s ring. Of course, she had known what that ring meant to him and, yes, it had cut him deep. That she would do this, knowingly, not bothered by the effect it would have on him had devastated Nathanial for, to him, it had proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that she had never cared for him.
That all had been a lie.
And he had felt like the most worthless fool to ever walk the earth.
Of course, now, he knew the truth. Now, he knew why Abigail had done all she had done then, and a part of him understood. A part of him knew that it had had nothing to do with him. Still, the fear to not be enough for another, to always be second best, a consolation prize because one could not have what one truly desired, continued to linger. It had snuck into his heart and taken root, and Nathanial knew not how to rid himself of it.
But he wanted to.
After all, Charlaine was not Abigail.
And quite plainly, Nathanial himself was no longer the man he had been mere months ago.
“I am here,” Charlaine told him gently, but firmly, her brown eyes holding his captive. “I’m here right in front of you and I’m fighting to keep you. Can you not see that?” For a second, her bottom lip seemed to quiver, an almost imperceptible sign that she, too, was battling emotions that threatened to overwhelm her. “Can you not see that I love you? Can you not see that the thought of losing you to another terrifies me just as much? Do you not know what I’m saying, what I’m asking, what I want?” She inhaled a slow breath. “If I’m wrong and you do not truly love me, I will release you. I promise.” A smile teased the corners of her lips. “But I don’t think I’m wrong.”