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Robert expected to feel victory, or joy, or even relief after his talk with Becca. He had her right where he wanted her. Revenge was within his grasp. Instead, all he felt was sick to his stomach. As he laid out on the leather settee in his office, arms draped across his eyes, Robert wondered what could be causing his illness. It had lingered since the day before, since his visit to Becca’s house.
“I’m not accepting any visitors,” he growled when a shadow fell across him. “I told the front desk to cancel all my appointments today.”
“Is your conscious giving you a headache?”
The sound of Becca’s voice jolted him up so quickly he almost fell off the settee. Blinking rapidly to let his eyes adjust to the bright natural light in room, Robert couldn’t see her clearly. He used the palms of his hands to rub them, hoping that would make it better. Then, when he saw how angry she was, he wished he hadn’t.
“My conscious?” he asked, wondering which of his transgressions she was referring to. He had such a long list by now.
“Yes, or do you just no longer feel such emotions as guilt and shame for your behavior?”
Robert tried to remember if he had been drinking that morning. None of what she said was making sense, but he was certain he hadn’t had a drop of whiskey in days.
“What is it that I’m supposed to feel guilty for?”
Next thing he felt was a rolled-up newspaper smacking him on the side of his head and falling into his lap. It was from the day he visited her.
“Have I graced the gossip pages again?” He picked the paper up to have a better look. “You know how they enjoy slandering my name in ink. You know better than most that it isn’t always true.”
“Perhaps you should read the details before you begin to blindly deny it.”
Robert slowly stood up, expecting it to cause her to move away, but she stood her ground. There were only a few inches separating their bodies, but he felt her holding back from him. She was standing rigid, with her head tilted up to look at him. Her hands were clutching her purse in front of her and her jaw was tightened, without a hint of a smile. She still smelled delightful, but he was on his guard and chose to ignore it.
“Are you wanting to stand here and watch me read the entire paper?”
She grabbed it from his hand, spreading it out enough to show him the society pages. That’s where he saw the article that he knew was the problem. He felt his stomach sink.
“Where did he get this information?” Robert felt his heartbeat pounding harder in his chest.
“He said he overheard it. We both know how well that young man is at eavesdropping.”
Robert tried to think of when he had last discussed his intentions toward Becca but he couldn’t remember.
“Don’t know what to say?” Becca asked, her voice cutting through his thoughts.
“Becca, this isn’t what it seems. The man twisted my words and made this story up to gain attention.”
“He knew details that he couldn’t have guessed at. Things that only you and I would know about.”
“He could have guessed.”
“About the theater?”
“It was a very crowded rooftop.”
“About me visiting you... the night we made love?”
Robert felt his pulse skip a beat for a moment. He hadn’t told anyone about her spending the night with him. “Could he have been following you?”
“He doesn’t mention the part of the story that would ruin my reputation, so I doubt it. Why would he leave out the most salacious part if he knew?”
Robert walked around her, not able to stand her stark aggression any longer. He went to the window and leaned against the frame. As he reached down to open it, clarity dawned on him.
“He was waiting outside my window.” Robert muttered the words to himself, temporarily forgetting her presence.
“While you were bragging to someone about your plans for revenge.”
He turned back around to face her, barely able to breath when he saw the broken look on her face. The wet look of tears shimmered in her blue eyes, but he could see she was forcing them not to fall. She was flushed with anger and her lips were pressed together tightly.
“That’s not what this was,” he said, holding his hands out, the paper still clutched in one of them, “I was asking a very trusted friend for advice. I was lost and I needed guidance.”
“It doesn’t sound like you were confused. It sounded like you knew exactly what you were doing, from the moment you came back.”
“I didn’t...”
Robert felt the lie choking him in the back of his throat. He had told so many that it was second nature, yet he couldn’t lie to her now.
“You didn’t what? Intend to break my heart? Lure me in with your kindness and charm? Seduce me...”
“I never intended to take you to bed.” That much was the truth. “You were the one who came to my rooms. You were the one who wanted to stay.”
“You fooled me into feelings for you that I shouldn’t have had. Was that your form of revenge?”
“Becca, you can’t believe what he wrote. He has been trying to soil my name since I returned. “
“He never lied,” she said, her chin wobbling as she spoke, making his chest ached. “He made implications about us, but he never actually lied. He said that you were sent away to protect me and my reputation, which was the truth. He said that we were spending a great deal of time together since your return, which was very much the truth.”
“So you are going to just take his words that I was out to destroy you?”
“No.” She took a deep breath. “I want you to admit to me. I want you to look me in the eyes and tell me the truth. The full, honest to God, truth.”
Robert felt his palms beginning to feel sticky with sweat, so he jammed them into the pockets of his suit pants. He had face hardened gunslingers and heartless business man. They frightened him less than this petite woman with tears streaking down her cheeks.
“Robert, did you intend to break my heart?”
Those words cut into him deeply. He opened his mouth to deny it but the words wouldn’t come out. He wanted to reassure him that the newspaper man was wrong about him, but gazing into the depths of her blue eyes he couldn’t.
“I wanted revenge when I returned.” He found that the sound of his confession felt like relief to him. “I was angry at you for not loving me a long time ago. I wanted to show you that I deserved to be love. I wanted to make you love me and then...”
“Break my heart.”
She didn’t ask that as a question but made the statement softly, in a whisper. He would have felt better if she shouted at him, but the sound of her painfully whispering made him ache.
“It is true, then. You had been planning to hurt me all along. “
He was so busy being focused on her tears that he wasn’t prepared for her arms, which lifted and pushed hard against his chest. She managed to hit him with the palm of her hand in the middle of his ribs, knocking the wind from his lungs. It propelled him backward, where he stumbled and fell back onto the settee with a loud thud. He sat there gasping for breath and wondering where she had learned to do that.
“You should be ashamed of yourself!” Now she was yelling at him. “When people used to tell me what a bad apple you were, I always defended you. I always told them that deep down, you were a good man. It seems I’m a much bigger fool than I realized.”
She spun around, letting her skirts twirl around her feet. She was going to leave and he instinctively reached out to stop her. Just as he felt her hand on his grasp, she yanked it away from him.
“I hope you leave,” she yelled at him. “This time, don’t ever come back!”
With a slamming open of the door, Becca stormed out of the office. Robert sat there, stunned by the effect it had on him. It wasn’t just the loss of his revenge, but the loss of her that hurt. He had been so focused on stealing her heart that he hadn’t noticed that she still held his.