He stopped at a red light and looked at her. A fierce frown creased his brow as if he were trying to figure her out. "Believe it or not," she continued, "it shows in everything you do."
He shook his head as if he couldn't believe her, then he looked back at the light. "You know nothing about me." It was true and yet…
She was intrigued by him. Captivated. This man who wasn't a man called out to her and seduced her. All she had ever wanted in life was to be normal. To have a warm, loving home with children. A quiet life. He could offer her none of that. Yet when she looked at Kyrian, when she thought about him, the strangest things happened to her. It wasn't just lust.
There was something more. Something undefinable that made her heart just a little happier, a little more tender. Something about being around him that made her soar. She wondered if he felt that, too.
If he did, he kept it well hidden behind that tough exterior of his. "Can I ask you something else?"
He sighed irritably. "What the hell? You've asked me everything else."
She disregarded his caustic words. "Why did you become a Dark-Hunter?"
"I wanted vengeance at any cost."
"Against Theone?"
This time there was no mistaking the pain on his face, the slight flaring of his nostrils. His hand was so tight on the steering wheel that she could see his knuckles protruding sharply against his skin.
Amanda took a deep breath as she stroked Terminator's ears. She couldn't fault him for wanting revenge against a woman who had been so cold-blooded as to turn him over to his enemies. "Julian told me the gods give you twenty-four hours to exact revenge. What did you do to her?"
A tic started in his jaw and when he spoke, his tone was rife with anger. "For her, I turned my back on my family. I gave up a kingdom and hurt the people who truly loved me. Because of Theone, the last words I spoke to my parents were hurtful and cruel. And when they delivered the news to my father that I had died, the grief of it drove him insane.
"He flung himself from the window of my childhood room onto the courtyard stones below, where he died a broken man, calling my name. My mother never spoke another word again until the day she died, and my youngest sister sheared her hair off to let the world know just how much she grieved.
"Without me to lead our forces, the Romans invaded and took over my homeland. My people lost their dignity, their nationality, and suffered for centuries under Roman occupation."
Hunter glanced at her. “Tell me, what would you have done to my wife?"
Tears welled in her eyes as she listened to the pain in his voice. How she ached for him. Dear Lord, no one deserved such punishment because they had mistakenly thought someone loved them.
But what struck her most was that there was no mention of what Theone had done to him. He was only sorry for what it had cost his family and country. She wanted to touch him so badly that she wasn't sure how she refrained. Instead, she kept her attention on Terminator. Holding the dog the way she wanted to hold Hunter.
"I don't know," she whispered past the stinging lump in her throat. "I guess I would have killed her, too."
"One would think that, anyway."
A chill went up her spine. "You didn't, did you?"
"No, I didn't. I had my hands wrapped around her neck and was about to end her life when she looked up at me with those weepy, fearful eyes. One minute I wanted to kill her and the next thing I knew, I wiped her tears away, kissed her trembling lips, and left her there in peace."
He clenched his teeth. "So, you see, you sit beside the greatest fool ever born. A man who traded his soul for a vengeance he never took."
The full horror of his past hit her. After all he had suffered because of his wife, after all he had lost, he had still loved her. Greatly. No matter what Theone had done to him, in the end he had forgiven her. How could anyone have betrayed someone capable of so much love and loyalty?
Amanda couldn't fathom it. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be. As they say, I made my bed and I was crucified in it. I was the one who was blind and foolish. I realized too late that she had never, once, told me she loved me."
The regret and sorrow in his voice tore at her. "It wasn't your fault," she said as they headed into the Garden District. "She had no right to betray you."
"Theone never betrayed me. I betrayed myself."
Good Lord, he was strong. She'd never known anyone who was so willing to shoulder such responsibility on his own shoulders. How she wished for a way to reach through that iron wall he kept around himself.