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“There was no you and me. No. Forget that. There was a me. But it turns out there wasn’t really a you.”

“Declan. You have to believe me. I wanted to tell you…”

“I’m just a humble little orphan,” he said, his tone a nasty, high-pitched parody of hers.

“I never said that! You asked about my family. I said my parents were dead. And that was the truth.”

“Your parents.” He grasped her shoulders. “Interesting that you never mentioned that daddy and mommy were the king and queen of Qaram.”

“Declan.” She twisted a little under his hands. “You’re hurting me.”

He probably was. He could feel his fingers digging into her flesh. So what? A little physical pain was nothing compared to what he’d felt all these weeks.

“And telling me you were Canadian. I suppose that was the truth too.”

A flush rose in her cheeks. “You asked about my accent.”

“Right. And you figured, hey, Canada’s only, what, six, seven thousand miles from Qaram? That’s close enough.”

Tears glittered in her eyes. Did she think that would influence him? Because it wouldn’t. Not anymore.

“I didn’t want to lie to you!”

“Then why did you?”

“I couldn’t—I couldn’t tell you the truth. Not at the beginning, when we first met. And then, after we’d been together for a while—”

“We were never together,” he said coldly. “You saw to that.”

He could tell by the little furrow that appeared between her eyebrows that she didn’t understand what he meant. The she got it, and the color in her face deepened.

“You meant…” Her voice trembled. “You meant everything to me.”

“Yeah. I bet.”

“You did! You were my best friend.”

“Your best friend?” She gasped as he hoisted her to her toes. He was close to being out of control and he knew it, but Christ, he’d had his fill of her lies, of her pretense to be some sweetly innocent young thing. She owed him the truth and it was about time she understood that he wasn’t going to settle for anything less. “Is that what I was when you spent hours lying in my arms? When I kissed you and you moaned and opened your mouth to me? When I held you through those long nights when you wept and wouldn’t tell me why?”

“It was wrong. I should have told you. I know that now, but you were—I just said, you were my best friend and—and—”

“Fuck being your best friend,” he growled, and he bent his head and kissed her.

Not gently. Not tenderly. Not even with compassion for what she’d endured the last few hours and days. He kissed her with pent-up fury at her for what she’d done to him, at himself for not having seen through her from the start…

And then he tasted salt on her lips and he knew she was crying, and he groaned, cupped her face with his hands and kissed her as he’d dreamed of kissing her all the endless weeks they’d been apart.

Her response was immediate, and everything he could have wanted.

She leaned into him, moaned, and gave herself up to his kiss.

It was the way she’d always responded to him, as if he were the only man she would ever want. It all came back, the memories, the joy and then the pain, the anguish of losing her, and he gathered her in his arms and she put her hands on his chest, slid them to his shoulders…

The horse whinnied.

Dec froze.

He drew Annie’s hands down.