Jane Porter - The Spaniard's Passion

The Countess practically beamed. She’d missed male company, too. “Thank you, Alonso. Very kind of you to say. And you are staying for dinner, aren’t you?”

Sophie’s blue eyes looked panicked. “I think he’s busy, Louisa.”

“Not that busy,” Lon corrected. “I’d love to stay.”

The Countess folded her hands over her stomach. “I’ll have Cook add another place to the table.” She turned to Sophie. “And Sophie, show Alonso the whiskey. If I remember, he likes a good drink before dinner.”

In the library Sophie watched Lon pour himself a neat shot. “It seems she’s developed a soft spot for you.”

Alonso capped the crystal whiskey decanter. “It’s the holiday season. She’s feeling nostalgic.” He sipped from his crystal tumbler. “I imagine Christmas is quite difficult for her.”

Sophie said nothing. She just took a seat on the slip-covered sofa and curled her legs beneath her.

“It must be difficult for you living alone with the Countess here,” he said far more calmly than he felt. On the inside he was growing angry. Irritated. He didn’t like losing his temper.

Other officers had kidded him that when pushed, he had an almost superhuman strength, and it was true, he could lift twice his body weight. Easily. Once in training camp he’d clean and jerked 600 kilos and others had just gaped. He’d told them it ran in his family, that his dad was a miner from Scotland, but it was only part of the truth.

His stepfather was Scottish, and a miner. His biological father was an Argentine aristocrat who killed himself by driving a hundred miles an hour into a tree. Drunk, of course.

It was Lon’s Argentine blood that got him in trouble.

Sophie shifted miserably. “Louisa’s been very good to me.”

Talk about laughable. The Countess had always treated Sophie like a second-class citizen. But maybe he was being too harsh. Maybe things had changed. “She looks well,” he said. “But how is she really doing?”

“She’s in remarkably good health, and of course, this time of year, she’s very focused on the ball.”

“Oh yes. The annual Wilkins Christmas Gala. I received my invitation last week.”

Sophie couldn’t hide her surprise. “You got an invitation?”

“I get one every year.” Lon answered with satisfaction. He knew, just as she did, that the Countess had never particularly liked him. “I’ve just never been in the country before.”

“You’re attending, then?”

He heard the wobble in her voice. She didn’t want him to attend. Interesting. “Should I?”

“No.” She flushed, and added quickly, “It’s just not your kind of party. Hundreds of people. Not enough food. I don’t think you’d even know anyone attending.”

“But it’d be worth it if I could see you.”

Sophie started to rise and then sat down again. She pressed her hands tightly to the sofa cushion. “Nothing’s going to happen between us, Lon. I’m not over Clive. I’m not ready for anything new—”

“I’m not new.”

How true, she thought, feeling her heart mash in her chest. He wasn’t new. He’d been part of her world for nearly fifteen years but fifteen years ago he hadn’t been right for her. Ten years ago he hadn’t been right. And even today, he wasn’t what she needed. “Please do not make this ugly, Lon. Do not force me to be rude.”

“You? Rude?” He laughed without humor. “You couldn’t be rude if you tried. You’ve made diplomacy an art form. You turned tact into a virtue. You can rest now, Sophie. You’re the martyr you always wanted to be.”

Her head swam. She sank her fingers into the old down-filled cushion. He was so good at wounding her. So good at finding the jugular. “And you, Lon, do you enjoy being deliberately unkind?”

He watched her delicate features tighten, her mouth pinching, her voice dropping so her words were barely audible.

She looked so fragile sitting on the edge of the over-stuffed sofa, so unlike all the cool, casual women he’d learned to fill his life with.

Sophie wasn’t cool and casual. She was rare, and beautiful, almost otherworldly, and he’d once wanted her so badly that losing her had been a death.

Yes. He had been deliberately unkind. He’d meant to hurt her. Deep down he still wanted her to suffer for choosing Clive instead of him.

He’d lost his heart the day he walked Sophie down the aisle, literally handing her over to Clive.

He’d never said it aloud, couldn’t even dwell on the memory, but he’d hated her for asking him to walk her down the aisle. He’d hated filling in for her father who was too ill to participate in the wedding. He’d hated that she’d even try to turn him into family…a surrogate brother or parent.

He didn’t want to be her father.

He wanted to be her lover.

“No,” he answered grimly. “I don’t enjoy being unkind. I just am.”

LON shook his head regretfully. “It seems as if I’ve enormous control, Lady Wilkins, except when it comes to you.”

“And you wonder why Clive felt uncomfortable around you after we married?” She choked, rising from the sofa.

No, he didn’t wonder why Clive felt uncomfortable around him—he knew. But he couldn’t tell Sophie that, couldn’t tell her anything of Clive’s secret past. Clive had never told her who he was—or what he’d become—and although Lon knew, he’d vowed years ago to protect Sophie from the truth. Because the truth would crush her, just as it’d crushed him.

Clive had been one of them, one with them. He wasn’t supposed to turn into a stranger…

Emotions hot, memories tangled, Lon marched toward her. “If Clive and I grew apart, it wasn’t due to my civility—”

“Or lack of,” she interrupted fiercely, taking a step backward. She didn’t have room to move. The sofa was behind her. Lon in front of her. “You were everything to Clive. He adored you. You know he did. You were his very best friend in the world. So why would he pull away from you? What happened?”

“We grew up.”

“It can’t be that simple. You had been best friends for years. You did everything together. Same boarding school. Same university. Same friends. He even applied to the Royal Air Force when you did.”

Lon’s blue gaze glowed down at her. “Maybe it was too much togetherness. Maybe Clive would have done better making new friends, surrounding himself with people. Because I don’t think I was that good for Clive. I don’t think I made him feel good about himself.”

They were heading into uncharted territory here. She knew Lon had been angry with Clive for a long time now and she needed to understand, just as she needed to understand what happened to Clive in Brazil. “Why weren’t you good for Clive? How did you stop making him feel good about himself?”

He hesitated, as if unwilling to go where she wanted to go. “We…changed,” he said finally. “We grew apart.”

She couldn’t let this go. This was part of the mystery surrounding Clive, part of the mystery surrounding the demise of her marriage. “Clive didn’t change. You must have changed—”

“Clive changed, too. Clive could be very complicated.”

Clive, complicated? Sophie didn’t believe it for an instant. Clive was the least complicated person she’d ever known. “You’re not making sense. I know you, Lon, I know you can be direct, but you’re speaking ’round the subject right now. You’re not telling me anything that I don’t already know.”

“And what good would it do you, to tell you why Clive and I had a falling out? How will it help?” He reached for her, adjusted the cream knit collar on her sweater dress. “We were friends, the three of us, and I don’t want to hurt him. I don’t want to hurt you.” His fingers brushed the side of her neck.