"If you can do it, so can I!" she yelled back.

He was so angry he reached for the closest branch he could find. She understood; she paled and backed up. "You wouldn't."

"Someone has to have the honor," he said furiously. His heart was still racing in pure terror, he realized. He wasn't sure it would ever stop.

"Sean." Tyrell took the branch from him. "She won't do it again."

Sean felt an odd moistness on his face and realized he was starting to cry. Horrified, he turned away from everyone.

Elle hurried to stand there. She took his hand, her mouth pursing. "I won't do it again. Why are you so sad, Sean?"

HE WAS STIFF WITH TENSION now. He did not want to recall any more of the past. Once, he and Elle had shared a special bond, and he would have done anything to protect her. They no longer had that bond, and she had Sinclair to protect her now.

Sean sat down on the edge of the canopied bed, the soft mattress giving way to his body instantly. He had lost his best friend a long time ago, and there was simply no going backward. Old memories did not help, they only deepened the confusion. When he looked at her now, he didn't know what to think or do. He saw Eleanor, but then he saw Elle. He was in the present, but the past beckoned. Nothing made sense anymore.

Especially not his being in her bedroom and her having made such a damnable offer.

He had to stay in the present, he decided. It was too dangerous otherwise. Elle was gone. She'd been gone for years. He had no friends. And what he needed to remember was that he was a traitor and a fugitive and she was a stranger named Eleanor.

But he still needed to say goodbye.

HAVING PLEADED a headache she genuinely suffered, Eleanor had left Peter with the men and the ladies by themselves. Supper had been interminable; all evening she had been acutely aware that Cliff and Rex had not been able to find Sean in the woods. He had disappeared and she knew he had left, as he had said he would.

It was incredible. He was gone. Just like that, as if he had never come home, a nightmare come true. There wouldn't even be a farewell.

"Eleanor, dear," the countess said, approaching from behind her.

Instantly Eleanor stiffened. It was a moment before she could breathe and turn to face her mother as she stood there on the stairs.

The countess, Mary de Warenne, was a very beautiful woman. Technically, of course, she was not Eleanor's mother, but the mother of Sean and Devlin. But Eleanor's mother had died giving birth to her. Until she was two years old, she had been raised by a nurse and her father. Mary was the only mother Eleanor had ever known and she loved her deeply. In fact, she had often secretly wished that she could be more like the countess, who was graceful, gracious and generous to no end.

Eleanor tried to smile at her.

Mary paused before her. "My dear, I can see that you are terribly distressed. Would you like to speak about it?"

"I can't."

Mary's blue eyes were searching. "All brides worry and fret before their weddings, but I am afraid that this is something more. I only wish to help."

Tears filled Eleanor's eyes. She knew that the countess had wept for Sean privately and that she had believed her son was dead. And even though her mother had given up hope almost two years ago, Eleanor did not want to raise a painful subject for her. She did not have to.

"Darling, is this about Sean?"

Eleanor nodded. "I miss him so terribly it is a pain in my chest."

"We all miss him." Mary seemed anguished then. "I thought that you had gone on with your life. I thought you genuinely cared for Peter and perhaps were even falling in love with him. Your father and I have been so pleased and so relieved that you and he seem to get on so brilliantly."

"I thought so, too," Eleanor said. "I was wrong. There is only one man I can love, and that is Sean."

The countess blanched and put her arm around her daughter. "We should sit. There is something I must tell you."

Eleanor shook her head, pulling away. "I need to go to my rooms. I am very tired. Tomorrow will be a long day." She no longer had the strength to fight her fated marriage. She could not care less what happened tomorrow.

"Eleanor! I know what it is to be fond of a man, to marry well-and to love someone else, my dear."

Eleanor had heard the love story of Edward and Mary many times, but not from either her mother or her father. She had heard it from the local lords and ladies; she had heard it from her old nurse and from the now-deceased family physician. "It's true? You didn't love your first husband?" she whispered.

Mary smiled. "I loved Gerald because it was my duty to do so. He was a good man, the father of my two sons. And in spite of his philandering, I knew that he loved me in his way and would do so until he died."

"But?" Eleanor cried.

"I loved Gerald because it was my duty, dear. When Edward rescued me and my sons from the British, after Gerald's murder, I found the kind of love and passion I had never even dared to dream of." She hesitated. "I met your father about five years after Gerald and I married, when we had just become his tenants. Although I refused to ever admit to myself that something was there between us, I knew the very moment that Edward walked into our hall that he was different, and not just a king among men. I think we exchanged a dozen entire sentences in those five years. He was polite and correct. But Eleanor, when he finally took me in his arms for the very first time, I knew that I had never understood love-or passion-until then."

Their stories were so similar, and yet not similar at all. "What are you trying to tell me?"

Mary touched her face. "I want you to have what I have, darling."

She trembled. "I will never have what you have. I have always loved Sean. He doesn't love me. Excuse me. I am exhausted, I have to go upstairs."

"Eleanor! Please! I am so worried about you!"

But Eleanor was running up the stairs. At her door she paused, the pain in her temples acute. Now, finally, she would have the time and the privacy to grieve for losing Sean all over again. How many times would her heart break over the same man?

Eleanor stepped into her bedroom, closing the door. Then she saw the table where she'd had his beautiful meal laid out. She had forgotten to tell her maid to cancel it. She stared at the covered platters, and her heart stopped, then leaped wildly.

The dinner plate was used. Some leftovers were on it. Incredulous, she turned to the wine bottle-it was almost empty.

He stepped out from behind the heavy gold velvet draperies by the windows. Instantly his gaze met hers.

He had stayed.

He didn't love her the way she loved him, but she didn't care. She had missed him for four years and she missed him now. She had never been happier to see anyone. She ran to him, throwing her arms around him. She hugged him tightly, acutely aware of his hard chest beneath her soft breasts, his broad shoulders beneath her hands. That terrible feeling of being lost and alone, of being abandoned, of being cold, vanished.

He grasped her hands and removed them, his gaze instantly locking with hers. "You told them."

She understood. "They somehow guessed. I had to tell them you were here. They only want to help."

He shook his head. "I asked you...I begged you to keep silent. I explained...."

"They were forceful and adamant! Cliff thinks to sail you far from here, tonight."

He stared at her, his silver eyes hot and bright.

And when he did not reply, when he simply looked at her the way a man looks at a woman he wants to take to bed, she recalled her proposition-and the fact that this was their last night together. Desire slammed its huge fist into her.

He had returned to take her to bed.

She carefully lifted her gaze to look at him. He continued to stare, unmoving, but his breathing seemed labored, too. She wet her lips. "Sean."

His jaw flexed. "I didn't come here...for that."

Her eyes widened. She wasn't certain that she believed him. "Then why? Why are you here-in my bedroom?"

He half shrugged, turning aside so she couldn't see his eyes.

"Why did you return at all?" she asked, for she desperately needed an answer she could understand-and live with forever. "If you didn't come to take me with you and you didn't come to see the family, why did you come?"

"I don't know!" he cried. And he seemed distressed, too. "I heard about...the wedding." He gestured oddly now.

A huge and awkward silence fell. There was so much tension in the room, it was hard to breathe. "But you didn't come back to stop the wedding," she finally said.

Briefly their gazes locked. "No."

That was not the answer she wanted. "I have missed you so much. I am going to miss you when you leave. Sean, didn't you miss me?"

His face was tight. "In the beginning it was hard."

It was impossible to understand him now, when once she could almost read his mind. "What do you mean?"

"It doesn't matter! Not now!" He confronted her angrily.

She shuddered, afraid of what that might mean.

Before she could speak, he said, "Your dress is green."

Her heart leaped but her body became heavy and still. "Yes."

"Unwed ladies wear...white."

She had chosen her gown with care for the farewell Rex had promised and when she had learned that Sean was gone, she hadn't thought about changing it. Her dress was darker and deeper than a pastel green and it was a part of her trousseau. She had been supposed to wear it after her wedding, as it was more appropriate for a married woman than one unwed, both because of the color and the design. It was the most alluring gown she owned. Both the countess and Tyrell's wife, Lizzie, who had supervised her trousseau, had been very surprised to see her wearing it.

She had worn it to impress Sean. She had worn it to make him look at her the way he had in the woods-the way he was doing now-with bold, burning eyes. He had said he would not accept her offer, but then why was he looking at her this way? "A young unmarried lady is allowed to wear pastels."

"That is not a pastel," he said firmly.

He was leaving her behind. Why couldn't he understand that one night together was better than nothing? Why couldn't he understand that even if he didn't love her, she had enough love for them both? She was desperate to be in his arms, to make time cease, just for a while. She was desperate to feel his love, even if it was a pretense on his part.

"I don't like it," he suddenly said.

His words were hurtful. "It's a beautiful dress."

He shrugged, folding his arms over his hard chest. "I don't know anything...about fashion."

She bit her lip. She knew she shouldn't sink so low as to play him, but she did. "Peter likes this dress. He was staring and it was obvious. He asked me to stroll in the gardens after we finished dining, but I refused." That last statement was a bold lie.

His color deepened. "Don't."

"Don't what? Don't point out that another man finds me very desirable, when you say you do not?" She was breathing rapidly now. "And when your claims are so clearly lies?"

He jerked in surprise. "I said...I didn't come here tonight...for you."

"Then why did you come?" she cried.

"You belong...to someone else!" He was red.

She froze. "No." She shook her head. "No." She had given her heart and her soul to Sean years ago. She belonged to one man and that was him.

He seemed to be fighting to speak. "Did you... break off...with him?"

She tensed.

"I didn't...think so. Good!" He stalked away, stiffly pacing the confines of her bedroom.

She knew he was angry and upset, but she did not back off. "Sean, my offer stands."

He stumbled, then whirled. "No!"

She dared to approach him. "Sean, we have always been honest and open with one another."

His eyes were wide, wary. "That was Elle."

She sensed him stiffening in resistance and struggled to find the right words. "I know you don't love me, not the way I want you to. But Elle has grown up-I think we are agreed on that." She smiled but tension consumed her.

"Last night...you were with Sinclair...moaning."

She gasped. "Let me finish, please!"

"Why?" His furious gaze moved over her face and then dropped to her decolletage. "Tomorrow...you'll be in bed...with Sinclair!" He stared unwaveringly at her.

"I don't love Peter. I don't want to marry him. But why do you care? Why are you angry? And don't tell me you're not! Sean, this might be the last time we ever see each other-ever."

He faced her grimly, hands fisted on his hips. "I am not...angry. I want to talk about Sinclair!"

"No!" she cried, trembling. "I want to talk about tonight-I want to talk about making love with you-right now!"

He cried out. He was angry but he was also horrified and she knew it.

She whispered desperately, "I'm not asking for your love."

"You should...marry Sinclair!" His eyes flashed. "The union is good. Damn it. Titles, land, wealth... But you can't speak...this way! Do you understand?"

She hugged herself. "Why? Because you are so tempted that you might lose control? I meant it when I said I am not afraid of you! Make love to me, Sean. Just this one time, so I can remember it forever."

He stared at her as if paralyzed.

She stared back, and the grandfather clock in the far corner of the room could be heard ticking. A hundred seconds passed. She finally raised her hand in a plea. He flinched but was still. She inhaled and cupped his rough cheek.

His body trembled but he did not move away and as their eyes locked, she saw the battle he was waging. Then she saw his long thick lashes drift closed. She gasped and he moaned.