Page 60 of Cruel Heir

He’s right. I could have stayed. And yet—I didn’t.

I swallow hard, looking away from him. “I didn’t know if I wanted to stay or go,” I say softly. “You haven’t treated me better than my father has. You’ve reduced me to a tool, and object, just as I see that he did. But with you—”

I bite my lip. I don’t know what to say. “If I had stayed,” I murmur, “my father would have married me to someone else. Anyone he could find, sooner rather than later. I don’t know what sort of prospect that would have been for me—better or worse. I saw, finally, that my comfort and happiness wouldn’t have mattered to him. What would have mattered is the best means for salvaging what he wanted from me in the first place.” I let out a slow breath. “You were telling me the truth. I understand that now.”

Something bitter twists Andre’s mouth, an expression on his face that very nearly looks like regret. I hadn’t known he was capable ofthe emotion—and a part of me wishes that I still didn’t. It makes him look softer, more his age. “So you left with me because—better the devil you know, right?” He swallows hard. There’s resentment in his voice, but I’m not sure that it’s for me.

“I left with you because I made a promise,” I repeat softly. “And when I didn’t know what to do, I chose to stick with keeping my word. I did it because out of the two choices, it was easier,” I admit. It burns a little to admit it. But it’s the truth.

“It was easier to come back here with me.” He sounds as if he doesn’t believe me. As if he can’tlethimself believe me, just as I can’t let myself believe that his offer of a choice was sincere, and not simply another manipulation.

If I believe that, everything becomes different. I wonder if it’s the same for him.

When I turn and walk away, towards the stairs to go up to my room, I expect him to follow me. And I’m once again surprised, when he doesn’t.

—

I don’t go down for dinner, and there’s no message delivered to me to insist that I do. Instead, Celeste brings up a tray of food for me—herbed roast chicken and vegetables, with a thick piece of buttered, homemade sourdough bread. I’m startled to see her when she walks in—I had wondered if Andre would allow her to take care of me again. But she doesn’t give me a chance to say anything at all before she speaks.

“There were some rumors around the house that Don Leone met with Don Fontana today—and that you went with him.” There’s a faint accusation in her voice, and I can’t pretend that I don’t know where it’s coming from. That she isn’t wondering, the same way Andre is, why I didn’t stay behind with my father. Andre couldn’t have forced me to leave with him again. It’s not possible.

I also know she has different reasons for wondering—and justifiable ones for being angry with me that I came back.

“We did,” I say softly, not quite meeting her gaze as I look at the tray of food. It’s hard to work up an appetite right now.

“But you came back.” Her voice is flat, still with just that hint of accusation. “Lucia, it’s not my place to ask you why. But—”

“You don’t have to say it. You really don’t.” I can hear the tiredness in my own voice. The feeling that I don’t know what to say to anyone, when I don’t even fully understand myself.

“It’s easy to fall in love with a man who knows how to charm you, Lucia. Who knows how to hide his worst instincts behind a pretty face and actions and words. But Don Leone—”

“Iknow.” I look at her, finally, and I feel something crack inside of me when I see no anger on her face, only confusion. “You weren’t there in that room. You didn’t see how my father looked at me. How he spoke to me. Howclearit was that all my life, he’s been hiding from me how truly disposable I am to him. How Ineverhad any choices at all, not even the ones I thought I had. And Andre—” My breath comes out in a half-sob, confusion and longing and grief clutching at each other until it feels as if there’s a war in my chest. “Andre gave me the choice. To stay there, or to come back here with him. And I felt—God, I don’t even know how to explain it, Celeste! I felt safer here, with him. I have no idea what my father will do with me if I go back. No idea who he will marry me to next—whoever will take me, I suppose. But with Andre—something has changed. It’sbeenchanging. He’s fighting it. And now—”

Now, things have changed for me, too.I bite my lip, unable to find the right words. “I’ve been used by them both,” I say softly. “But now that I know both of their reasoning, I think—I think I understand Andre's better.”

There it is. The truth, out in the open—what I couldn’t say to him earlier, because once I’ve said it to his face, I can’t take it back. That, to both my father and my husband, I’ve been nothing but a means to an end, used to gain what they want most. But for my father, that’s only more power. More than he already has—which is already more than anyone else in our world. It would have cost him nothing to marry me to someone Iliked, as well as someone suitable. But hewouldn’t have considered it. He would have only done what he wanted.

Andre wants power, too. But he wants it as a means for revenge. To take back what was stolen from him—his choices, his future. And today, he tried to give that back to me.

“I’m sorry, Celeste,” I whisper. “I won’t ask you to risk anything to help me any longer. Not when I can’t be sure of what I want.”

She nods slowly. “There wasn’t much more I could do, anyway,” Celeste says ruefully. “Andre is keeping a much closer eye on us. But I’m glad you understand—I can’t put myself at risk, if you’re not even sure you want to go back. When youhada chance and didn’t take it.”

“I know.” I bite my lip. “I’m sorry.”

Celeste shakes her head. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” she says finally. And then she turns, and walks from the room.

I expect Andre to come to my room later. A part of me even anticipates it, although I tell myself that the silky shorts and camisole that I take out of the drawer have nothing to do with the possibility of him coming to my bed. But as I lie there awake, minutes passing as the house goes silent and I hear nothing, I wonder if I’ve misjudged him yet again.

It’s beendays. He hasn’t touched me since he came to my bed the morning after I seduced him in the dining room, and then left when I didn’t respond the way he hoped. I’ve never known him to have restraint when it comes to me, particularly now, when his need for an heir is more immediate than ever. When I haven’t had my pills for days, and the effects have likely started to wear off—not that I’m entirely sure how that works.

I hear footsteps in the hall, and I tense.Because I want him tonotcome to bed with me,I tell myself. But then I hear the door to his bedroom close, only silence following, and I realize that he’s not coming to my room.

Disappointment floods me, hot and sharp. I can’t pretend that the feeling is anything else. I think of what I realized earlier, talking with Celeste. That today, Andre tried to give my choices back to me.

I realize that he’s doing that yet again. That he’sbeendoing that, with every day that he’s stayed away from me.

Slowly, I sit up. Nerves curl in my stomach, ones that I didn’t have even that morning in the dining room. There’s no mistaking what it means if I go to him now. Even if I can’t tell him how I’m feeling, this will say it loudly enough for him to understand. He’s not touching me now, not even in the room with me. I can’t pretend that he’s forcing me to want anything that I don’t want all on my own.

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