Good God. It would destroy her.
“We’re wrong,” he said quietly, remembering the vulnerability he glimpsed in her regarding the school and her mother. “We can’t do this to Mariah.”
“You knew when you agreed to help with this project that it would mean the destruction of St Katharine’s,” Winslow reminded him, sitting up in his chair. “You knew the role you would play in bringing it about.”
“I did.” But Christ! He’d thought the project didn’t have a prayer of coming to fruition, knowing how fickle the king could be. He’d thought of the destruction of the school and the neighborhood as something distant and abstract, no more tangible than any other grand plans tossed about by gentlemen over drinks and cigars.
And it wasn’t until recently that he understood the truth about Mariah. It wasn’t the school or the company that mattered to her. It was what they represented—being close to her parents, returning to those happy days before her mother died, having her father’s nearness and protection.
Destroy all that, and they might as well extinguish the fire in her soul.
“I did everything you asked,” Robert admitted, praying that Winslow would listen and understand. “I tracked down the owners, found out the property values, traced bills of sale and liens—for God’s sake, I set up everything so that we could make a profit when St Katharine’s is torn down and the docks go in.”
And every step of the way, he’d been certain that he was doing the right thing. That he’d secure the partnership and his reputation as one of England’s most successful men. But that was before Mariah got under his skin, before he realized how important the area and school were to her. Before he realized that he cared about her.
“But this—what this will do to Mariah…” He sucked in a deep breath and shook his head. “I never—”
“Robert?” Mariah whispered.
He wheeled around. Mariah had opened the door while they’d been arguing, and neither man had heard her.
She stood in the doorway, close enough to have overheard, and a horrified look darkened her face. One that told him that she fully understood now exactly why Winslow Shipping had been interested in acquiring so much property in St Katharine’s. Why her father chose him of all the businessmen in England to bring into the company.
She stared at him, as if she couldn’t believe…Then she breathed out, so softly he almost couldn’t hear her but felt the painful slash of it through his heart, “You bastard.”
She spun on her heel and walked away.
“No!” he said firmly, rushing after her and grabbing her shoulders to stop her, to make her listen. “It’s not what you think.”
She fought to twist out of his hold, but he refused to let her go. “All those properties, the church—” She choked out, “The school. All of it destroyed and flooded, the children abandoned…and you knew.”
God help him, he’d known all along. “Mariah—”
“You knew!” Her angry cry reverberated through the office, and the assistants stopped what they were doing to stare. In the office behind them, Winslow rose to his feet. “No—oh so much worse than simply knowing…” Her voice lowered to a pained whisper. “Dear God, you made it happen!”
He couldn’t deny it. He’d done exactly as she accused, and he respected her too much to lie to her. But he could make her understand why. And why he was now completely done with it.
He took her arm and pulled her into the corner, where they would have privacy to talk. But she flinched and shrank away. The anguish in her green eyes nearly undid him.
“Listen to me, please,” he urged. If they had any chance at a future, she had to trust him. “I can explain.”
“All that time we spent together, what we did—” She pressed the back of her hand to her lips as humiliation flushed her cheeks. She breathed out past her fingers, “You used me.”
His head snapped back at that, stunned. He forced out in a low voice through clenched teeth, “I did not use you.”
But she said nothing, her silence a damning accusation.
His heart slammed against his ribs. Everything he’d worked so hard to obtain during the past two years was suddenly spinning out of his control, and he felt as if he were now grasping at straws blowing in the wind. The more desperately he tried to hold on, the more they slipped through his fingers.
“I care about you, Mariah.” He tried to keep from hurting her the only way he knew how, by stating the truth. “Very much.”
“But you care about the partnership more,” she accused in a heart-wrenching whisper. “Even now, even after all we shared…” She gave an anguished shake of her head. “You’re still trying to prove yourself to your father.”
He bit out a curse of frustration. “It isn’t as simple as you—”
“Then end the project right now,” she challenged. Twisting free of his hold, she ran through the office to his desk and snatched up the papers lying there. “Destroy all your notes, tear up all the sales offers—do it!” She shoved the papers at him. When he wouldn’t take them, she thrust them into his arms. “If St Katharine’s means anything to you—if I mean anything to you—” Her voice choked with desperate hope. “Then walk away.”
And with that, to completely end all possibility of proving himself to his family.
As he stared at her, unable to do as she wanted, the silence reverberated between them like cannon fire. The wounded look of betrayal on her face cut through him. A look so raw and anguished that it stole his breath away.
In that moment’s silence, he knew he’d lost her.
She stepped back and raised a hand to keep him away. “You told me how much this partnership meant to you, how you’d do anything to prove yourself.” Her rasping voice broke with emotion as she struggled to fight back the sobs. A tear spilled down her face as she whispered, “But I underestimated how far you were willing to go.”
“You’re wrong.” Dear God, why wouldn’t she believe him? He tossed the papers aside and reached for her shoulders. “Mariah, listen—”
She slapped him, so hard that the crack of her hand against his cheek echoed through the office.
“Congratulations, Carlisle,” she choked out as she wrenched herself away from him. “You’ve proven yourself a true beast after all.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Oh, she’d been such a fool!
Swiping at her eyes with the back of her hand, Mariah stopped in the basement hallway of the Gatewell School and leaned against the wall.
Breathe…just breathe…If she focused on the simple act of breathing, then perhaps she wouldn’t crumple to the floor in tears.
But each beat of her heart brought a jarring stab of self-recrimination inside her hollow chest of how stupid she’d been to fall for Carlisle’s charms. And oh God, what she’d done with the man! How she’d behaved no better than a wanton, foolishly believing that he found her desirable and beautiful. That he’d cared for her…
She squeezed her eyes shut, thanking heaven that the school was quiet for once, that the children were at their studies upstairs and the basement was silent except for the faint noises coming from the kitchen. But even that moment’s calm wasn’t enough to fight down the emotions churning inside her, so much so that she pressed her hand against her stomach to keep from being sick.
Oh, what a goose she’d been to trust him! To so blindly give herself to him—worse, to have fallen in love with him…only to have her body used and her heart shattered. Dear God, how would she ever recover?