She stepped away, putting more distance between them, circling him. ‘But you had no intention of marrying me. That was a lie.’
He turned with her, following her as she tracked around him. ‘Did Catalina tell you that too?’
She swallowed. ‘Not in so many words. But it all made sense. I foiled your plans to dispose of me by asking you to release me from our deal. So you had to find another way to keep me dangling on your string. And what better way to do it than by telling me the one thing I most wanted to hear—the only thing that would stop me from leaving you? So you told me you loved me and wanted to marry me. When all you wanted to do was keep me close. Lure me back so that you could do the job properly next time.’
‘Leah, I have so much to answer for, but I would never do that to you. I asked you to marry me because I love you. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.’
His eyes were so deeply charged, so earnest, and she wanted to believe him, wanted to believe the words he spoke to her. ‘And you discovered this suddenly? In the space of time it took me to tell you I was leaving you? Not before, on the beach, when I confessed to falling in love with you, when I admitted to leaving you because I was afraid of what might happen to me? Surely that was the time to discover you loved me? But instead you pushed me away. Made me feel that I had lost you again. And all the time it was you who had lost something—the chance to get even!’
Unshed tears stung her eyes. Reliving the trauma of the past twenty-four hours was too much to bear. She spun around, not wanting him to see her agony, but he was there, holding her shoulders, his hands supporting her, his lips on her hair.
‘I didn’t know what to do.’ His voice sounded like gravel. ‘All I knew that day was that I didn’t want to share you with anyone. I wanted you all to myself. And I battled with what I thought I had to do because I wanted still to keep you. And that’s why I asked you why you’d left me. Because I had to understand what drove you away so that I could get angry all over again. But you told me you’d fallen in love with me…I had no answer for that.’
She sniffed. ‘You did get angry with me.’
‘Because I didn’t understand. And it wasn’t until you asked me to let you go that it all became clear. I couldn’t let you go because I loved you. It was the thing I had been struggling with all week—wanting to remain angry with you, but feeling something for you that blotted out the anger, took it all away. You have to believe me, Leah, I love you.’ He pressed his lips to her hair and she shuddered.
‘How can I trust you? How can I possibly believe what you say? Holding my brother to ransom so that you could blackmail me back into your bed was bad enough, but discovering what you had planned…How can I ever trust you?’
‘I know,’ he said, sounding sad, and dropping his hands from her shoulders so she felt suddenly bereft. ‘I know. I don’t know if it helps, but I wanted you to see this.’
She heard the rustle of paper and turned slowly around. ‘Here’, he said, handing her some papers.
She took them reluctantly. ‘What is it?’
‘Read it.’
She scanned the documents, noticing her brother’s name and the details about his loan, doing her best not to reel when she saw just how large the settlement figure had been. She’d been prepared for a six-figure sum after Alejandro’s warning, but a part of her had always been in denial, assuming Alejandro had wanted to put a bad spin on things. These documents proved otherwise. And yet why should it matter? Hadn’t she already paid her debt in full?
She shrugged. ‘It’s the loan discharge document. What are you trying to prove? I already know you paid off his loan. You had Jordan call me at that restaurant to tell me.’
He nodded in the direction of the papers. ‘Look at the date.’
She searched them then, turning frantically from the first to the second page until she found it. The date on the contract meant nothing until she counted back. ‘Hang on—this is the day before you arrived, before you made that deal with me.’ An uncomfortable tremor rumbled down her spine. She looked up, confused. ‘These papers are dated the day before we had dinner together and made that deal! You’d already paid off my brother’s debts, and still you held me hostage, letting me think you’d arranged everything that night.’
He nodded, his eyes shuttered. ‘It is true.’
‘But I spoke to Jordan that night I agreed to your terms. He must have known. Why didn’t he tell me?’
Alejandro lifted his shoulders. ‘How could I risk you knowing? I asked him not to. Under the circumstances, he was more than happy to comply.’
She shook her head, none of it making sense. ‘But why did you do it? You made out that if I didn’t do what you wanted you’d walk away, leave him to the mercy of the money-lenders.’ She waved the papers in her hand. ‘But you’d already paid them off!’
‘Guilty,’ he admitted. ‘And I’ve asked myself the same question. But he was your brother, and he was in trouble. There was no way I couldn’t help.’
‘And if I’d refused to come back to you?’
‘I know how much you love your brother. I cannot imagine what it must be like for him to have such a sister. God knows, I cannot imagine Catalina doing the same for me.’
She paused. The truth was starting to filter through, but she was still too fragile to believe it. ‘I don’t understand. You saved my brother because of me, before I’d even agreed to your deal?’
It was his turn to hesitate. ‘Sí. I didn’t want you hurt, and I knew how much you would be hurt if anything happened to your brother.’
And suddenly new hope burned fierce in her heart, growing, spreading, overwhelming her doubts. ‘You cared about me?’
‘Apparently.’
‘Even in the midst of blackmailing me?’