‘Are you making excuses for him?’
‘No, of course not,’ she denied, wondering if that was exactly what she’d been doing.
And, if so, why?
Already, Lukas was moving off the bed and she knew what he was about to say even before he said it; even as she scrabbled for the words to silence him, she knew she wouldn’t be able to get them out.
‘I should never have slept with you, especially after I assured you that I wouldn’t.’
‘It takes two, as they say,’ she managed, though her tongue felt altogether too thick for her mouth.
How could she reverse all this? How could they get back to where they’d been a few hours before? Even just an hour ago?
‘I warned you that I wasn’t a good man.’ Lukas was shaking his head. ‘I hurt people.’
‘What? No...that isn’t who you are.’
‘You don’t know me at all,’ he snarled suddenly, taking her aback. ‘You don’t know how bad the Rockmans are. It seems you don’t even fully appreciate how duplicitous your own father is.’
‘Then why don’t you tell me?’
He glared at her, and Oti couldn’t look away, even as she didn’t dare speak.
‘That man who spilled his seed into my mother claimed that I would never amount to anything, and he called me a bastard. The two things that man believes in are money and station in life. He tried to deny me both.’
‘You have more money than he could ever dream of,’ she told him abruptly. ‘As well as respect from your peers that he has never enjoyed. And my father?’
‘Your father is his last so-called friend. He is the one who allowed my mother to suffer as she did. And now he claims to have some proof of the affair my mother and Andrew Rockman were having for years. It would prove my mother truly believed he loved her, and that she wasn’t sleeping with anyone else. It would clear her reputation and finally set her free, Oti.’
And himself besides, by the sound of it, though she knew better than to voice it aloud. Instead, she took a moment to absorb that.
‘And you believe my father?’
‘I believe that he has something. If it hadn’t been for the things he said over thirty years ago, then Rockman would never have got away with painting my mother as some kind of unhinged, desperate woman. And your father may not be honourable, but he is self-serving. He would certainly have made sure he had something in his back pocket all these years. Otherwise Rockman would have stuck the knife in years ago.’
She paused as disbelief began to wind through her. But the more she considered it, the more she realised Lukas had a point. She’d always wondered what bonds had kept her father and the Earl of Highmount so closely tied all these years. She’d never believed they were friends in the truest sense of the word—but it made sense that her father would have kept something up his sleeve to ensure he always had the support of a family as powerful as the Rockmans.
‘You can’t really believe he’ll tell you, though. And betray Andrew? He values the Rockman name too much.’
Lukas’s expression was impassive and as hard as she tried to get a read on him, it was proving impossible.
‘It was a chance I had to take,’ Lukas answered evenly, and she hated that his tone was so neutral, so controlled. That he was shutting her out from whatever was really going on. ‘Your father is like a rat with a nose for the safest bet. He’ll go where the power is and, these days, I hold far more of that than the Rockman family. What better way to secure his support than to marry his daughter?’
‘So that’s his issue.’ Her voice trembled, though, and she couldn’t control it. ‘Not yours.’
‘I should have drawn the line at the man pimping his daughter out to me. At the very least, I should never have touched you.’
‘Because, of course, I had absolutely no say in the matter.’ She sat up on the pallet bed, her voice as bold as s
he could make it.
‘It’s hardly the point.’ Lukas didn’t look impressed. ‘I never should have put you in this position in the first place. I never should have come out here. This is your sanctuary.’
‘I like having you here,’ she murmured, but she knew he wasn’t listening.
‘It’s done, Oti. It’s over. I never should have slept with you. I told you it was a mistake.’
And then, tipping out his shoes, he pulled them on.