He inclined his head. “For those as well, but the most compelling reason was that I was in love with you.”
Her legs felt weak. She folded her arms and leaned on the piano.
His smile deepened, and he went on, answering her unvoiced questions, “I think I loved you from the first instant I laid eyes on you—when you walked into my mother’s drawing room—although I admit it took me a little while to realize what it was I felt, and by then, I was too deeply enthralled to retreat. Put simply, I didn’t want to.”
His eyes had remained steady on hers throughout his revelations, allowing her to confirm that all he was saying was the truth.
Stacie gnawed her lower lip. One thing she knew about love was that, once it bit, it never, ever, let go. If he truly was in love with her—as she was with him…
He glanced at his fingers on the keys, then looked up and, again, met her eyes; this time, his gaze held a challenge. “What would have happened if I’d confessed at the time that I loved you?”
“I wouldn’t have married you.” The truth fell from her lips without thought.
His smile took on an edge. “I rest my case.”
Her head was spinning; not only was she feeling giddy but also as if the world as she’d known it had shifted beneath her feet. Exasperation wasn’t far from her surface. “Men like you,” she insisted, “aren’t supposed to readily embrace love.” She uncrossed her arms and flung up her hands. “You’re supposed to need to be dragged, kicking and screaming, to it. Instead, you appear to have taken falling in love in your stride.”
“Don’t be fooled.” His tone sharpened. “I had my moments of resistance, but your brothers seem to thrive on the curse—I couldn’t see any reason why they should be unique.”
She felt her lips involuntarily twitch and slapped her fingers across them. She stared at him. She didn’t want to think of what lay ahead—of the glorious future filled with happiness that would not now be theirs, of the forever they would now not have, due to the darkness that lived inside her—but she had to be realistic. For his sake, for the sake of the child she carried, she had to face her reality and act, before it was too late. Now she knew he truly loved her, her inner malevolence would inevitably rise and blight everything—just the thought was enough to shred her heart.
Holding his gaze as those thoughts—that certainty—filled her mind, she quietly stated, “You don’t understand.”
At the sight of all Frederick saw in her eyes—the rising anguish, the expectation of pain, the hovering shadows of despair, defeat, and devastation—he stopped playing and, fisting his hands, fought not to leap up and seize her and hold her. Instead, he evenly replied, “Don’t understand that you fear that you will use me loving you to manipulate and emotionally attack me, causing me infinite pain and grief?”
When she blinked, clearly astonished, he simply arched his brows.
After a long moment of staring, her lips firmed, and she nodded. “Yes. That’s exactly what my mother did—she drove my father to his grave by breaking his heart again and again, just because she could. She couldn’t resist exercising the power his love for her gave her over him.”
He’d thought long and hard on the best way to challenge and overturn a long-held belief and had concluded that unrelenting logic was his only real option. “Your mother was an arch manipulator, and she used those skills to harm your father, correct?”
She frowned, then nodded.
“And you believe you’ve inherited her manipulative traits.”
“There’s no belief involved. I’ve been manipulating others since I could talk—and arguably, even before that. It’s second nature. My only saving grace is that, to date, I’ve striven never to harm others by doing so.” Her face set, resolution and determination writ large in every line. “I made a vow on my father’s grave, one I’ve held to unwaveringly ever since. I will never become—I refuse to become—my mother.”
He allowed a gentle smile to curve his lips. “Please know I’m relieved to hear that.”
Temper lit her eyes, and she lost her rigid composure and hotly—a trifle desperately—declared, “It’s no laughing matter! And you shouldn’t be relieved! There’s nothing to say that, earlier in her life, Mama wasn’t as I have been, and that her…unquenchable desire to hurt Papa only surfaced after she realized he loved her—when she learned she could hurt him in that way. I’m exactly like Mama in so many ways. How do I know—how do you know—that one day, I won’t find the temptation to manipulate you and hurt you purely because I can too much to resist?”
At last! “I know because I know you. Because I see you as you truly are, not as you fear you might become.” He held her gaze levelly. “There’s so much in your view of yourself that’s wrong, I’m not sure where to start my rebuttal. But perhaps we should cut to the heart of your worry—I’ve loved you from the first, yet how successful have you been in manipulating me?”
Stacie scoffed; he was a typical, misguided, arrogant male. “If you recall, I manipulated you into performing for the ton again, entirely against your wishes.”
His smile returned, his expression confidence personified. “Think again, sweetheart. It’s a well-known fact that you can’t manipulate someone who knows all about manipulation themselves.”
“Then why did you agree to do it?”
“I believe I mentioned I was in love with you—I was also deeply attracted to you. I decided complying with your wishes was the easiest way to get what I wanted—to spend more time with you. That music was your price only made the decision easier.” He paused, then spelled it out for her. “I only ever did what I wanted to do. You never successfully manipulated me—I merely allowed you to think you did.”
She frowned at him. “Why would I believe that?”
His smile turned wry. “Aside from knowing in your heart that it’s true? If you seek further proof, all you need do is ask anyone who knows me well—George, Percy, my mother, my sisters, even Emily. All will tell you that I am not, and never have been, susceptible to manipulation, that it’s utterly impossible to make me do anything I don’t wish to.” He held her gaze. “Never. Not ever.”
She continued to frown at him as she tried to work her way through his assertions, tried to see where he was leading her…
At that very moment, he was endeavoring to manipulate her.