Down Jasper Lane (Amherst Island Trilogy)

“But I want you.” He glanced away, his lips twisting bitterly. “You don’t love me at all, do you?”

“I do love you, Lucas. I’ve always loved you as a—”

“A brother? Don’t say it, please.”

“You are very dear to me,” she whispered.

“But you don’t want to marry me,” he finished flatly.

“It wouldn’t be fair to you—”

“And in time?”

Even now Ellen was tempted to say yes. She could learn to love him, couldn’t she? She certainly liked him well enough, and the thought of losing him, as she would surely do if she rejected him utterly now, made her heart tremble within her. Yet she could not lie. Not now, not when Ruth had humbled her with so much honesty, not when life demanded so much more. “Not as you want,” she said, her voice so low she didn’t know if he’d heard her. “Not as I want to love my husband, should I ever have one.”

For a second, no more, Lucas’ face crumpled and then he straightened, his shoulders back, a small sad smile curving his mouth. “I see.”

Neither of them spoke. In the distance Ellen heard the baleful lowing of the cows waiting to be brought in, and the sudden, frenzied barking of her dog, Pat. The sounds of home, familiar and comforting, and yet she felt as if she and Lucas were in a world apart, suspended

in this disappointment and sadness.

Lucas let out a short laugh, pushing the hair from his forehead with long, slim fingers. “I thought it might be enough,” he said after a moment. “When I spoke to you in May, I thought all you needed is time. I was prepared to give you that.” Ellen could only nod, and Lucas managed a rueful smile. “But now that the moment is here, and I’ve declared myself, and I see how little you could give me, I realize I want more than a wife who may or may not come to love me in time. I just wish it could be you.”

“Oh Lucas,” Ellen choked, “you deserve someone to fall in love with you, head over heels.”

“I don’t know about deserve. But I couldn’t bear living side by side with you, Ellen, and knowing I wasn’t making you happy.”

Ellen brushed at her eyes with an impatient hand. At that moment she wished she was in love with Lucas, passionately, deeply in love, more than she’d wished for anything else. She wished she could change the leanings of her treacherous heart.

Yet she knew she couldn’t.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“So am I.” Lucas shoved his hands in his pockets and then looked up and stared straight at her, his eyes glittering. “Tell me, is it because of Jed?”

Ellen jerked back. “Jed?”

“I’m not blind. And I know you better than perhaps anyone else does. I don’t mean to sound arrogant in saying that, but I think I’m right. Do you love him?”

Ellen looked away. After Lucas had told her so much, he surely deserved her own honesty in return. “I thought I did, at Christmas,” she confessed unsteadily. “When I saw him with Louisa, I suddenly realized. It took me completely by surprise. I wasn’t expecting to ever...”

“Fall in love?”

“No, I wasn’t.” She turned to give him a small smile. “And now I’m not certain if that’s what it was, or if it was just hurt pride, or... I don’t know.” Her feelings for Jed were too complicated to explain or untangle. “But it doesn’t matter, Lucas, because that has nothing to do with you. What I feel for you.”

“Or what you don’t feel for me.”

She nodded sadly. “Yes.”

“Well, then. I suppose I’m sorry I asked.” His voice was gentle and resigned, but Ellen’s heart still ached.

“How long are you on the island for?” Lucas asked after an awkward pause.

“Only another few days. I’m going to New Mexico, to visit my father.”

He nodded slowly. “Then I suppose I won’t see you much until the autumn, when we’re both back in Kingston.” He shook his head, conscious of his slip. “Except you’re not coming back—what are you going to do, Ellen?”

“I really don’t know,” Ellen admitted, trying to smile.