“Ana,” he said. Voice soft. Careful. Non-threatening. I’d heard it before. That day, with the horse. The wild one. The one he’d tried to break.
“Just say it, Duke,” I hissed. No matter how gentle, how rough he was, I wasn’t going to break, no matter what this news was.
He didn’t abandon my gaze. “Andre is dead.”
Three words. I knew as an actress the power of words was in their delivery, in the meaning behind them. It was only talent that made words heavy, sharp, soft or light—in the movies at least. All it took was disaster to make words that damaging. And for me, disaster seemed to be all I had.
I swallowed the words. They scraped my mouth, my throat. All I tasted was copper.
“How?” It was only because I was an excellent actress that I managed the word to sound strong. Even.
Duke was struggling with the space between us. It wasn’t in his nature to stand there and watch me bleed, as hard as I was trying to seem untouched. That’s what I was. Bleeding. Wounded. Because I already knew the answer to my question.
Duke didn’t speak because I knew he didn’t want to hurt me more.
“It was Kitsch, wasn’t it?” I demanded.
Still, he didn’t speak. So this time, I stepped forward. Pushed myself into his face so he couldn’t avoid it. “It was my fault, wasn’t it? Because they thought he’d know where I was.”
Duke’s face turned stormy. “It was not your fucking fault. You need to get that shit out of your head. Now.”
He was wrong.
It was my fault.
Of course it was my fucking fault. Andre was dead because I made a choice. He was dead because I was a witness. He was dead because he was close to me. That wasn’t delusion. They were cold, hard facts.
11
I was pretending to sleep.
It just seemed easier, because it was the only escape from Duke. From his kindness. From his strong presence. His watchful eye. The fact he was worried about me.
That made it worse. If I allowed that to penetrate, it would become far too easy to use him as a crutch, to get used to him. Andre’s murder was a wound that would never heal, and Duke would eventually be gone from my life. If I let him in, if I let myself fall for him even further, there was no way I’d be able to stay upright when this was over.
So as soon as we rode back to the house, Duke suggested I shower. I did it because I’d been riding all day and I needed it. I needed the comfort of the shower stall to break down in—the water to wash away the salt from my tears—the only tears I’d ever shed.
Duke didn’t come and check on me, although I would bet he wanted to. He wanted to take care of me—in his own macho-man way to be sure—he wanted to save me. But there was no saving to be done.
He also knew me too well. So he didn’t come into the bathroom.
I took my time with my skincare routine, paying specific attention to every single step, filling my mind with it so I didn’t have room to think of anything else.
Duke was sitting on the bed, waiting for me. Of course he was.
He stood when I opened the door. He was holding two glasses, whisky by the looks of it.
I took mine without comment and downed it in one swallow.
He then switched glasses with me, giving me his, still not speaking. I did the same thing, letting the liquid burn my throat, hoping it would burn away this wretched sickness coming from my very soul.
It didn’t work.
Duke set both glasses down on the nightstand, then he looked at me. Carefully. He was dissecting me. He was deciding whether or not I was going to break down.
Maybe that’s what I was doing too, standing in the middle of the room, hair still dripping wet, damp body wrapped in a towel.
After a beat, Duke moved. He did it slowly, as if I were a horse, as if I hadn’t been broken yet and he was trying to talk with his body, let me know I didn’t need to be afraid.
I didn’t move, just let him settle in front of me, let him pull my towel off me. It pooled to the ground. He sucked in a harsh breath and it did something to me. It still did something to me, through these horrible feelings. My need for him cut through the deepest grief I’d known in my adult life. I didn’t know what that meant. I didn’t want to know what that meant.
So instead, I pulled him by the neck so his lips pressed into mine. I let him break me.
It was raining. Pouring.
I should’ve loved this, that the weather matched my mood, that it was a reasonable excuse not to go and ride or help out with any of the jobs on the ranch.