There was a click and Dan vanished from the screen.
Freya clutched her forehead.
‘He’s lying, isn’t he?’ she choked. ‘Tell me he’s lying. You never said anything like that.’
‘He’s twisted my words,’ Jackson said desperately. ‘He said he hadn’t ever wanted to get married. He proposed because Amos tried to scare him off, not because of love. I was appalled that he’d deceived you and let it get so far. I said he should have been honest with you from the start, that he would hurt you more if he married you without love and let you down later.’
‘So you did say it?’ she demanded, aghast.
‘Not the way he made it sound. I meant that he should never have planned a wedding in the first place, not that he should back off at the last minute. But he seized on it as a way out. Don’t you see? It gave him an excuse to shift the blame. All right, I was clumsy and stupid, but not malicious. Please, Freya, try to understand. I never intended it to happen the way it did.’
‘What do you mean about him proposing because of Amos?’
‘Oh, heavens!’ He groaned. ‘Amos tried to make him back off, threatened him. Dan lost his temper and—’
‘And that’s why he proposed to me?’ she whispered. ‘That’s all it was?’
‘Yes.’
‘He never loved me at all?’
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘And you’ve known this all the time?’
‘I only found out on the way to the church. If I’d known earlier I’d have warned you, but it was too late.’
‘Too late to warn me, but not too late to make him run for it.’
‘I told you I never meant that to happen. I spoke clumsily.’
‘You’ve deceived me—’
‘No!’
‘I begged you to tell me why he ran, but you never told me the truth—’
‘I was as honest as I could be, but I couldn’t repeat all the things he said. Have you forgotten the terrible state you were in that day? There was no way I could tell you everything. It would have finished you off, Freya. Please be fair.’
But she was too distraught to be fair.
‘I trusted you,’ she choked. ‘Talked to you, told you things I’d never have told anyone else. And all the time you were laughing up your sleeve at me.’
‘That isn’t true. I was trying to do my best for you. I’m sorry if I got it wrong, but I meant well. Call me an idiot, if you like, but don’t call me a deceiver.’
‘I believed you,’ she whispered. ‘Relied on you. I thought you were being so kind to me.’
‘I felt terrible about what happened—how I helped to bring it about. I’d have done anything to make it up to you.’
‘Anything except tell me the truth. Be honest, Jackson, if you know how. You’ve been enjoying watching me be an idiot, haven’t you?’
‘No, I swear it. Freya. you’ve got to believe me.’
‘How can I? When I think of some of the things I said—how I trusted and confided in you. What a fool I must have sounded!’
‘No, I was the fool for damaging you so idiotically. But I did my best to help you survive it—all right, it was a poor best, but I tried. Why don’t we talk later, when you’ve had a chance to calm down?’
She had a feeling that a chilly bleakness had settled over the world.
‘You think I’ll see sense, don’t you?’ she said bitterly. ‘You’re wrong. Nothing will change. You won’t ever look different to me from the way you do now. Mean, spiteful, contemptible.’
‘Freya—’ He reached out for her hand but she snatched it away.
‘No, don’t touch me. I can’t bear the sight of you.’
‘Please don’t let this spoil our friendship.’
‘There never was a friendship,’ she whispered. ‘There never could be.’
‘Freya—’
He reached out for her again but she darted away. After a moment he heard her bedroom door shut and the key turn in the lock.
CHAPTER FOUR
ALONE IN HER room Freya slammed her fist down on the dressing table again and again. A storm had invaded her. Rage, bitterness, disillusion and misery fought for supremacy. They all won. She was trapped in their prison and inside her there was no escape.
But outside she could put distance between herself and Jackson. She hurriedly dressed, slipped quietly into the corridor, down the stairs and out of the door. She had no idea where she was going, except that a million miles away from him would not be far enough.
Once before the world had turned upside down, and she’d survived because of Jackson’s comfort and support. But that had been only an illusion. Instead there was a bleak, arid desert where the rest of her life must be lived.
She lost track of time but she must have walked for hours, because when she finally turned back the dawn was breaking.
Nearing the house, she saw her mother, standing at a downstairs window. As soon as she saw Freya she came to the front door.
‘Come along in,’ she said. ‘I saw you leave. You were running as though the fiends of hell were after you. I was worried.’
‘Sorry, Mum. That was inconsiderate of me, but I was ready to murder someone.’
‘Ah, yes, Jackson got Dan on a video link, didn’t he? I heard his voice. You still want to murder Dan?’
‘No, Jackson,’ Freya growled.
‘What? Did I hear that right? But Jackson’s been so nice to you.’
‘Jackson is a lying, scheming, deceitful louse. And, yes, you heard that right. I said it and I mean it.’
‘But he can’t possibly have done anything to justify that. He’s a fine, decent young man.’
‘I thought so too. That’s why I never realised what he’d really done.’
‘Whatever do you mean?’
‘It was because of him that Dan ran for it. He never wanted to marry me, and when they were heading for the church Jackson urged him to dump me then rather than later. So Dan got out of the car.’
‘Darling, I don’t believe this. Jackson would never do such a thing.’
‘He as good as admitted it. He says it was a mistake, but he doesn’t deny Dan left me because of what he said.’
‘Maybe that’s why he’s been so kind and helpful to you since then.’
‘Don’t try to defend him,’ Freya flashed. ‘He’s deceived me.’
‘But I don’t understand. Why did Dan propose if he didn’t want to marry you?’
‘Because Amos forced his hand,’ Freya said bitterly.
‘Never! He was against that wedding. There’s no way he ordered Dan to marry you.’
‘Of course not. He ordered him not to marry me. Dan proposed just to show Amos that he couldn’t be bullied. Then he regretted it, but he couldn’t find a way out. When he and Jackson were in the car Dan told Jackson what had happened, and my brilliantly stupid stepbrother said the one thing that could make it worse. Dan seized his chance