“Because I did not give you a choice.”
Because he meant too much to her. Because to let him stay would have meant risking everything.
“It is the reason I have not helped you to remember all that happened here,” she said with some reluctance. “It is the reason I cannot allow you to stay now.”
“You want me to leave?” he said, his tone revealing his shock.
“No. I have never wanted that. But I don’t want you to die. I don’t want to leave Herr Bruhn with no means to provide for the children. I don’t want to put their lives in danger, make them targets for someone who would want to use them to hurt me.”
His eyes widened. “I can speak for both Elliot and Alexander when I say we would never use innocent children as a means to hurt you.”
He did not understand. Only one person had the power to ruin everything. Only one person could take away all the things that meant so much to her. The longer Leo stayed at the castle, the greater the chance she would take him to her bed. In that moment of wild, reckless abandonment, her heart would be open, her thoughts transported freely to the one person she desperately wanted to keep in the dark.
“Then I thank you for putting my mind at ease,” she said to placate him.
Leo sighed. “There is still one more thing I’m struggling to understand.”
“What is that?”
There were many secrets he had no knowledge of.
He rubbed his chin as he narrowed his gaze. “You were prepared to die tonight. You stood with your arms raised to the heavens and waited for me to end it all. Why?”
It was never her life she feared for.
“Because we are living a nightmare. Because I have experienced paradise, cleansed my soul in its crystal clear waters, felt the brilliant rays of happiness warm my skin.” She closed her eyes and imagined feeling the glorious moment again. But her world was dark, bleak, hopeless. “When you have lost something so precious, life has little meaning.”
“What of the children?”
“I shall always provide for their material needs. But one day, I must leave them. They can never know what I am. As they grow, it will become more difficult for me to maintain a relationship with them. To lose someone through death is perhaps easier than to be abandoned by them.”
“I understand what it’s like to feel alone,” he said. “But do not underestimate the devastation caused when someone dies. I am living proof it alters people, moulds them into a person they might never have become if not for the loss. Yet for those who are forsaken, there is always hope.”
She gave a weak smile. “Then I should be thankful your desire for answers was more important to you than your desire for revenge.”
All this talk of death and loneliness made her feel tired, weary. She needed to quench her sudden thirst and the magnificent man before her always proved too tempting to resist.
“I must retire now.” She stood, and he did too. “Sylvester will escort you to your chamber. Will you come with me to visit the children tomorrow or are we to part for good this night?”
The raw emotion flashing in his eyes pained her. Oh, how she wanted to soothe his soul. How she wanted to show him the beauty to be found in their joining.
“I will come to see the children. I would know everything before I return to England.”
An icy chill penetrated her bones.
To tell him everything would inevitably bring the Devil to her door.
Chapter 7
Herr Bruhn welcomed them into his home. A look of relief and then suspicion marred his heavily lined brow. Leo smiled in the hope it would reassure him. After witnessing Leo wielding his sword, he did not blame the man for being wary.
“It is good to see you, Frau Lockwood,” Herr Bruhn said clasping the lady’s gloved hand.
Frau Lockwood, not Fraulein?
Leo wondered why the old man had used the title. It never occurred to him Ivana could be widowed. A wave of jealousy surged through his body at the thought she had loved a man enough to marry him. Or perhaps it was simply a case of her wishing to appear less vulnerable. Such stunning features would surely attract a gentleman’s eye, although woe betide any man who sought to take advantage.
The old man’s gaze flitted back and forth between them.