He’d thought she’d been upset because of the pain!
She hauled in a huge breath, and swung to pace back to him.
Given he had, he was patently suffering from a burgeoning case of guilt, to which he was not entitled, and through that developing a sense of responsibility over her life, to which he was even less entitled.
Responsibility had always been a strong motivator for him, witness his devotion to his family and his country. If she didn’t act quickly to correct his thinking and dissolve any responsibility he was nurturing toward her life, they would shortly find themselves in a hideous state. He would try to make amends, she would refuse, her conscience would prick while her independence would kick, and he’d become ever more subbornly determined to put right his perceived wrong…it would end in animosity if not outright war, and that she definitely didn’t deserve or need. Neither did he.
She had to correct his understanding of the past, but without revealing the truth of why he’d hurt her.
Folding her arms, she lifted her head, and halted directly before him. “Very well.” She met his eyes. “As you’re so determined to revisit our past, let’s do so, but let’s get the facts correct. Thirteen years ago, I decided we should make love. Yes, you’d wanted me for years, but you wouldn’t even have suggested such a thing—I plotted and planned to meet you out riding, to inveigle you into the barn. Everything that happened that day happened because I wished it to.”
“You didn’t know how much it would hurt.”
“True.” She tightened her grip on her arms, and tried not to think about boxing his ears; he was so damned male. Holding his gaze, she went on, “However, I did know I was a virgin, and you”—she managed not to glance down—“were you. I wasn’t so ignorant I didn’t expect the experience to be attended by some degree of pain.”
“A considerable degree of pain.” His jaw was so clenched she was surprised it didn’t crack.
She shrugged, deliberately dismissive. “However one measures pain.” It had been more than she’d expected, but that hadn’t been what had hurt. “Regardless, it didn’t scar or scare me—I can assure you of that.”
His eyes remained narrowed, boring into hers. “You were hurt, upset—you almost cried.” He knew she rarely did. “If it wasn’t the pain, then what the hell was it?”
When she didn’t answer, he spread his arms wide. “For God’s sake—what did I do?”
The torment in his eyes—something he wouldn’t have felt let alone shown years ago—stopped her breath, stopped her from ripping back at him.
Lips compressing, she held his dark gaze. She couldn’t tell him the truth. If he ever learned she’d loved him…given their present situations, he might well press for marriage. He’d see it as an honorable obligation on the one hand and a suitable alliance for them both. And it would be suitable on many levels, except one.
She loved him still, and having to marry him knowing he didn’t love her would, for her, be hell on earth. She’d rejected her other suitors because they hadn’t loved her, and she hadn’t loved them. Now, after all her years of dogged independence, of refusing to marry without the love she craved, to be pressured to marry Charles of all men, and very possibly jockeyed into it…
Her eyes steady on his, she quietly said, “It wasn’t anything you did.”
Charles read her eyes, confirmed she was telling the truth. Confusion swamped him. After all these years, he was still at sea; he hadn’t understood then, and nothing had changed.
Except, perhaps, his persistence; this time he wasn’t going to play the gentleman and let her fob him off. Lowering his arms, he searched her eyes, casting about for some other approach, some other way to draw an explanation of what he didn’t know, and now desperately wanted and needed to know, from her.
Eventually, he quietly, evenly, said, “You haven’t answered my question.”
Penny blinked, thought back, fleetingly gave thanks as her temper sparked. She refocused on his eyes, studied them, narrowed hers. “What are you thinking? That what happened in the barn that day
blighted my life?”
“Can you swear to me that what happened that day hasn’t stopped you from being with other men?”
“Yes!” As belligerent as he was relentless, she faced him down. “I swear on my mother’s grave that the events of that day in no way influenced my decisions regarding my suitors. Or any of the others who offered to seduce me.” Her temper soared. “You are so damned arrogant! It might interest you to know that sex and men don’t rule my life—I do. I decide what I want and what I don’t. Unlike you, I don’t need sex on a regular basis to be happy!”
Charles couldn’t remember when last he’d dined at that particular table; he clenched his jaw and held back a retort.
She glared at him, then gestured dismissively and swung away. “If you insist on feeling guilty for causing me pain that day, then do so, but don’t you dare presume to assume responsibility for any other part of my life. My decisions were and are mine to make, my life is and always has been my own.” She paced back, met his eyes, lifted her chin. “ I decide who I’ll let seduce me.”
He held her gaze for a heartbeat, then reached for her, pulled her to him, and kissed her.
As always, desire leapt to instant life; between them, the flames whooshed, then roared. Penny knew what he was doing, what track his mind had taken; so be it. She relaxed into the kiss, gave him back fire for flame; pointless to attempt to do otherwise.
He broke the kiss. Lifted his head just enough to look into her eyes. “Why, then? You’ll let me seduce you—”
She opened her lips.
Brusquely, he shook his head. “Don’t bother pretending—we both know you will. You’ll let me, but not any other man. All those years ago, you wanted me to seduce you, you encouraged me—and yes, I remember every tantalizing, fraught, uncertain minute. And now…” His gaze was so hard, so sharp, she wondered he couldn’t cut through and see her soul. “Now you’ll be with me, but not any other man. Why?”