Gasps sounded.
Elysse started, wiping her wet face with her fingers, looking up. A pair of women stood at the other end of the hall. They were frozen, staring at her in shock.
Suddenly Elysse realized how she must look and what they must be assuming. She knew that her hair was coming down, her face was tearstained, and her skirts probably dirty. Any rational person would just think that she had been accosted—and she had.
She recalled William Montgomery’s hands and mouth and she felt even more violently ill. Why hadn’t she listened to Alexi, who was her oldest and dearest friend? What would have happened if Alexi hadn’t come outside and intervened?
“Miss O’Neill,” one of the ladies began.
No one could know about the horrid events of that evening! No one could know that she had allowed a kiss and that it had turned into something more, and that William Montgomery was now dead! Crying out again, she whirled to flee back down the corridor. Alexi was rushing up it.
She had never needed anyone more! She shouldn’t have left him alone outside with Montgomery’s body! She rushed to him. Alexi seized her arm, their gazes locking. Then he jerked his head and turned, dragging her back down the hall with him. Behind him, she heard both women in a frenzy of whispering.
Oh, God.
She was ruined now.
Alexi pushed open a door and they fled inside the room there; he closed and locked it behind them.
Trembling, her heart pounding with sickening force, she managed, “They know.”
“They know nothing,” he said, pulling her into his arms.
Elysse cried out, collapsing against his chest, her cheek against his lapel. He held her, hard, in a bearlike embrace.
When he spoke, his mouth moved in her hair. “Tell me you’re all right, Elysse. That he didn’t hurt you.” His tone was raw.
She was crying now, incapable of speech. She reached for his shoulders and clung as never before. He rocked her. Why had she allowed William Montgomery to kiss her? Why had she ever even considered his suit? The events of that evening began to replay in her mind—her terrible, endless flirtations; her argument with Alexi; the awful, aggressive kiss; and the fatal confrontation she had just witnessed between the two men.
“I am so sorry,” she wept. “I never meant for this to happen. Oh, my God! Alexi!” She looked up at him. His face was spinning. She felt faint. The horror was consuming.
He clasped her face in his hands. Tears shimmered in his eyes, too. “I know you didn’t. Damn it, Elysse. Why did you go outside with him?”
She buried her face against his chest. She didn’t want Alexi to ever know that she had allowed Montgomery to kiss her.
“I would never let anyone hurt you.”
It was so hard to think—all she could remember was that William Montgomery had turned into a beast and he was now dead and it was because of her. “This is my fault, isn’t it? Because I played him—because I went outside with him. Because I didn’t listen to you.”
Alexi’s face hardened. “Stop!” He pulled her tightly against him. His taut body was shaking as wildly as hers. “He had no damned right to kiss you—he knew you were trying to fight him off!”
His embrace felt so safe. She had never been so scared. All she could think of now was that she was safe, finally. But Montgomery was dead—because he had been fighting with Alexi over her. Surely Alexi would not be blamed? Elysse didn’t speak, breathing hard, fighting the tears, her cheek pressed against his chest. She wrapped her arms around him. “It was awful. Don’t let me go,” she managed. She wished they could stay that way, in one another’s arms, forever.
Images whirled wildly in her mind. She would never forget the sound of his skull hitting that stone staircase! Worse, those two ladies had seen her in the hallway. She started to cry, soundlessly.
Alexi was in trouble and she was ruined….
His grasp tightened. She didn’t know how long they stood there that way, each grappling with their own demons. She finally became aware of his harsh breathing, which sounded suspiciously like choked sobs, and her own heavy, anguished breaths. The sound of a shutter banging against the house filled the night. A clock was ticking loudly in the corner of the room. The trembling of Alexi’s body had slowed. Her own wild shaking had not.
Slowly, she looked up.
He slid his hand up her jaw, then into her hair. His cheeks were damp. “We need to get you home.”
“I’ll be fine,” she whispered. “It was an accident, Alexi, wasn’t it? Everything was an accident!”
He inhaled loudly. His gaze blazed through his tears. “I warned him not to take liberties.” Agony flickered in his eyes and she knew he was thinking of what she had suffered. “I wanted to kill him, Elysse.”
“What are we going to do?” More tears fell, slowly but steadily, an outpouring of torment and guilt.
He caught her face in his hands. “I’m going to take care of everything,” he said.
Their gazes locked. Suddenly the nausea roiled, too much to bear. She ran across the room and retched in a small wastebasket. A man was dead because of her foolish flirtation. This was her fault, not Alexi’s!
“Can you stand?”
She nodded and he helped her to her feet. She didn’t realize she was still crying until he brushed his thumb across her cheek, as if to stop the flood. “I want you out of here,” he said roughly.
She wanted nothing more than to run away and hide—forever, if possible. “How can I leave you now? After what happened? I can’t stop thinking about…him.”
“In time you’ll forget—we both will,” he said, not meeting her gaze.
She knew Alexi well enough to know neither one of them would ever forget—he was lying to her, to make her feel better. “Yes. Because it was an accident.”
He met her gaze abruptly, and she thought about the fact that the men had been shipmates and friends—and that the pilot had saved Alexi’s life. Stricken with guilt, she looked away.
“I need to think, Elysse.” Alexi’s tone was rough and raw. “Montgomery is dead—and the body is outside.”
And suddenly her mind came to life. Could Alexi be accused of murder? Could he wind up in prison? The future flashed vividly in her mind—a sensational murder trial, her reputation in ruins, Alexi behind bars.
“Stay here. Don’t move. I mean it!” He whirled for the door.
Elysse followed him nervously. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going to get my father—and yours.”
She seized his arm. “My father can’t know!”
He faced her and said, “Devlin has to know.”
Elysse gasped as Alexi strode from the library. Then she shut the door behind him, leaning on it, breathing hard. What were they going to do? Alexi couldn’t be charged with murder! It had been an accident!
But she was the only witness to the fight. Everyone knew how close Alexi and Elysse were and how close their families were. She might not be believed. How had this happened? She had liked William Montgomery. She thought of his forceful kiss, his disgusting touch. Hadn’t he known she wanted him to stop? More tears welled. She should have never walked outside, alone, with him!
“Elysse,” her father cried, stepping into the room. “Alexi said there is a problem!” As his glance moved over her, he paled impossibly.
Her mother, Cliff and Alexi were with him. Alexi shut the door and locked it.
She