The Heiress Effect (Brothers Sinister #2)

She gasped.

“So, yes, Miss Fairfield.” He looked over at her now. “You might think you know who I am. What I’m willing to do. I tell myself all the time that I’m not that man. That I wouldn’t be so awful as to cause harm to someone else. But I know better.”

She dropped her gaze from his. “You can’t blame yourself for what the other boys did.”

“It wasn’t the only time.” His voice was harsh. “Anyone in my position, anyone born without power, who aspires to more… Trust me, I didn’t arrive here by standing on principle my entire life. I’ve learned to keep my mouth shut when it must be shut, to do what a man in power asks because he asks it. I count myself lucky that I’ve survived as unscathed as I have. Don’t fool yourself, Miss Fairfield. I could hurt you. Badly.”

She didn’t say anything for a moment. But by the light in his eyes—that cold, serious gleam—he meant every word. His hand felt clammy in hers, but she squeezed it.

“And you are telling me this because…”

“Because I don’t think what is happening to you is right, Miss Fairfield.” His voice was tight. “Because no matter how many times I tell myself I would never do it, I cannot trust myself. The bait that is dangling before me is too tempting. I’m giving you a chance to run off before my ambition overwhelms my better judgment.”

She opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it once more. It made no sense, what he said. It made no sense, not unless…

She turned to him. “Are you always this starkly honest?” she demanded. But she knew the answer to that already. She had seen him in the group with the others—smiling, talking, always seeming to know what to say so that nobody looked at him askance. He knew how to belong with them. He couldn’t always be honest.

“You’re special.” His voice was low. “I resented Clemons. I rather like what I know of you.”

She looked up, and he reached out with his free hand and, very gently, drew a finger down the side of her face.

“There are so few people in this world to whom I dare tell the whole truth. I hate to waste a one.”

It wasn’t a frisson she felt. A frisson went only skin deep, just a prickle of hairs on the back of her neck. This was a full-body experience. As if the past years had tightened her internal organs into a snarl of emotion, and he had just convinced them to relax. She found herself tilting toward him, ever so slightly. Wanting that moment, that point of contact, to last and last.

He drew away, letting go of her hand. Her fingers felt suddenly cold. “You see,” he said, “even now, I’m doing it.” His voice was low, almost like a caress. “I’m telling you everything, but I’m making it worse, too. You should not let me touch you, Miss Fairfield.”

She didn’t want him to stop. Jane swallowed. “Oh,” she said. “Very well.” She turned away, unsure what to think.

“Good. Now you’re angry.”

She shook her head. “I suppose I should be. But I’m not, really. It doesn’t surprise me that you’d want to betray me. Everyone else already does.” She laughed again, but her laughter rang a little high to her ears. Too much like nervous giggling, and not at all like the half nausea that she felt turning in her belly. “So there you have it. You might betray me, but you’re my favorite betrayer thus far.”

He made a noise. “You should be angry, Miss Fairfield. You should push me away.”

“Mr. Marshall, haven’t you figured it out? I’m too desperate to be angry.”

It sounded bald and terrible in the night. But it didn’t sound pitiful—almost as if giving voice to the truth made her less vulnerable.

“Maybe,” she continued, “if I had a slew of true friends, I could afford to fly into a rage. But as it is, all you’ve confessed is that someone told you to do a cruel thing to me, and you have considered doing it. Most people don’t need to be asked to be cruel to me, and they do it straight away.”

“Damn it, Miss Fairfield. Listen to what I’m saying. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want the damned temptation hanging over my head. I don’t want to be the man who hurts a woman for personal gain. Slap me right now and have done with it.”

Jane shrugged. “Have your temptation, Mr. Marshall, and be welcome to it. I don’t expect anything of you, but at least for the moment I can pretend that I have a friend. That there is one person in the world besides my sister who cares whether I wake up in the morning. If you’ve never been without, you can have no idea what it is like to not have it.” She looked up at him, her eyes wide. “And to have him be a man like you on top of it all…”