The Man Behind the Scars(34)

And he had thrown her away.

* * *

It took most of the long night in a remarkably uncomfortable and  frigidly cold village with a mystifying Gaelic name and then three  separate trains to make it to Glasgow.

So far, Angel thought dully as she bought herself a much-needed coffee  in the busy rush of the cavernous Glasgow central station, survival was  not going particularly well. She had been cold and uncomfortable and  awake for hours. Her return to civilization in the form of the Glasgow  rush hour was overwhelming. She'd expected to feel safe, finally, away  from all of that oppressive natural glory. She'd expected to feel right  at home when she finally reached Glasgow. But instead, she missed the  quiet of Pembroke Manor. She missed the desolate beauty of the loch and  the far mountains. She missed the clear, fresh air in the cold mornings.

She missed him.

She took the first long sip of her coffee and almost burst into tears  when the flavor flooded her mouth, stale and insipid in comparison to  Rafe's personal family blend. She choked it down anyway, and was  abruptly furious with herself. She'd lived for twenty-eight years  without Rafe or his damned perfect coffee, and only a handful of months  with him. She would get on just fine without both. She would.

Pull yourself together, Angel, she ordered herself sternly. She jabbed  impatiently at the eyes that were damper than she felt they ought to be,  and started across the vast concourse toward the immense Departures  board to look for the next train to London. She hadn't thought about  what she would do when she got there. There was time enough on the train  ride south to think it through, she reasoned. She knew only that she  had to get out of Scotland. She had to put as much distance between them  as possible. Up above her, rain drummed down on the famous glass roof  that stretched for acres. She drained her coffee and then set off for  the appropriate platform.

She had the impression of him first, from a distance, standing halfway  down the platform-a tall, dark figure dressed all in black in the center  of the walkway, standing perfectly still as hordes of commuters  streamed around him. Some of them did double takes to look more closely  at his face, his scars, and it took her longer than it should have to  accept the fact that it was Rafe standing there, grim and quiet,  waiting.

For her.

Her stomach dropped. And then flipped.

She should have turned and run. Anyone with any pride would have done,  but Angel couldn't seem to help the masochistic streak that ran through  her and kept her walking toward him. She wanted this to mean something,  his being here. She wanted things she knew better than to name. She  wanted him-still-to her great and abiding shame. But this was Rafe, and  she knew better than to hope. Look where that had led her so far!

"Are you here to pick up your property?" she asked coldly. "Your  not-quite brood mare? Because I've quit that position. You'll have to  buy another one."

She came to a stop in front of him, rocking back on her heels and  tilting her head to look him in the eye. She couldn't read anything in  all of that chilly gray. She didn't know what she thought she wanted to  see. She shifted her bag on her shoulder, feeling something suddenly  that was surprisingly close to shy. Awkward. A complicated rush of  emotion worked through her, making her sway slightly on her feet. She  told herself it was only exhaustion.                       
       
           



       

He reached over and traced what she knew were deep bags beneath her  eyes, and his mouth tightened. She wanted to feel nothing when he  touched her. She wanted to be blank-cured of that devastating addiction  to him by the terrible things he'd said. But the same old fire danced to  life low in her belly, filling her with chagrin. And need.

"I'm sorry," he said simply, devastatingly.

It was too much. She couldn't process it.

She felt her face crumple slightly, and she batted his hand away,  fighting with herself until she got back under control. She felt  unbalanced. Commuters jostled all around them, bursting with hurry and  stress, but all she could focus on was Rafe, and the careening sensation  inside of her. As if all of her screws were coming loose at once and  she was in imminent danger of flying apart.

And then she felt nothing but the red-hot haze of rage. Everything he'd  said, everything he'd done, flooded into her, and she was no longer  frozen. She was no longer worried about losing him-she already had.

Which meant she had absolutely nothing left to lose at all.

"You can't just show up on a train platform and apologize!" she threw at  him, her voice some kind of strangled whisper, the anger taking her  voice away with its strength. "Do you think this erases everything? Do  you think it changes-"

"Angel."

Just her name, in that dark magic tone of his. It shouldn't have  affected her. She shouldn't have cared. All of the cruel things he'd  thrown at her whirled in a loop in her head, and the misery of it, of  this, threatened to swamp her. She should hate him. She hated that she  didn't, that she couldn't, and she focused it all on him.

"It was my mother, by the way," she told him, tears in the back of her  throat, distorting her voice. He blinked. "My mother is the one who ran  up that bill. She used my name to get the credit card. It was her  debt-but I knew she wouldn't pay it. She doesn't have the money and even  if she did, she has convenient amnesia when it comes to her debts. What  was I meant to do?"

"I believe you," he said quietly. "I do."

"Did I deserve those things you said to me?" she demanded wildly. "Did I  deserve the names you called me?" He moved as if to put his hands on  her upper arms, as if that might soothe her, but she twisted away.  "Don't!" she said sharply. "That won't work anymore."

She worried it would work all too well.

"Listen to me," he said, and that was the Rafe she knew, autocratic and  demanding, his hard mouth set in that granite line. She told herself it  only made her angrier.

"I don't want to listen to you," she retorted. "I've done nothing but  listen to you for months. You can listen to me for a change. I'm going  back to London. I don't want anything to do with you. I don't even want  your money. I don't know how I'll pay off that fifty thousand pounds,  but I'll manage it." Her mouth twisted. "After all, as you so kindly  pointed out, there's always money in prostitution, isn't there?"

He didn't answer, as the train that had been sitting next to them on the  track lurched into motion and started rolling out of the station. Angel  stared at it, anger pounding in her veins, too close to tears again and  far too off-balance. The train leaving was the last straw, somehow,  even though some part of her knew that there would be another one. There  always was.

But she wanted away from him. From the whole of Scotland. From manor  houses in the wilderness and Georgian townhomes in the heart of London,  countesses and earls and weeks of insulting contracts. From these past  months of her life, this crazy idea that should never have been made  real-this marriage. She wanted to pretend that none of this had ever  happened. That it hadn't touched her. That she was perfectly, happily  whole.

She wanted to be on that train.

"This is pointless," she muttered, turning on her heel and heading back  toward the concourse. She had no particular destination in mind, she  just wanted to get away from him, so she could clear her head. So she  could think.

"I love you," he said.

He didn't shout it. He simply said it, and still it slammed into her  like bullets. One, two, three. Angel jerked to a halt, dimly aware that  she was lucky the platform was now empty. There was no one left to watch  her bleed.

Her heart pounded. Hard and then harder. Something ugly and powerful  rolled through her, nearly flattening her, too big for her to contain.  Too much to tamp down, to hide. She turned around to look at him. Those  cold eyes, that dark, ruined face. How she loved him, to her detriment.                       
       
           



       

And she would never forgive him for this. Never.

"You would say anything, wouldn't you?" she threw at him, her voice  shaking. Rage and pain, mixed into something toxic. She thought she  might be crying again when he started to blur in front of her, and she  no longer cared. "You would tell any lie you had to tell. You don't care  about anything except that house of yours, and the heirs you want to  fill it with. You couldn't love me if your life depended on it. You  wouldn't know where to start."

"And what if my life does depend on it?" His voice was urgent, and there  was something in that gray gaze-but she couldn't fall for that anymore.  She couldn't let herself care. "I think it does."