«You knew all this and you went after Matt anyway?»

Caleb frowned down at Willow. «Of course. If I turned my back and walked away, who else would see that no more innocent girls were seduced and abandoned to die birthing Reno’s bastards?»

«Matt would never do such a thing!»

«I know. Now. And I won’t do it, either. We’re getting married, Willow.»

«You didn’t seduce me!» she said through clenched teeth.

«Horseshit,» Caleb said roughly. Then he touched Willow’s cheek in silent apology. «Honey, no man ever crept up on a girl’s blind side as carefully as I did on yours. Your combination of innocence and passion made me ache until I thought I would go crazy. I was determined to have you, but I was even more determined to make you ask for me. My pride couldn’t take the thought of anyone saying that I had taken you against your will.»

«So that’s why you told me to push you away,» Willow said in a faint voice, understanding too late.

«That’snotwhy,» Caleb said in a low voice. «I had just learned you were the sister of the man I had vowed to kill. I knew if I took you, you would hate yourself as much as you hated me when you faced me over Reno’s dead body. I didn’t want that, but I wanted you so much I couldn’t force myself to turn away.»

Willow’s eyes widened in shock as she understood what Caleb had tried to spare her…but even his formidable self-control hadn’t prevented him from taking her.

«That’s when I told you to push me away,» Caleb whispered, «when I knew you were Reno’s sister. The thought of you hating me ripped me apart, but I didn’t know what I could do to stop it. I couldn’t live with myself if I let Reno go on and seduce other girls. Yet I wanted you so much I couldn’t let you go. No matter what choice I made, I lost.»

Understanding wrenched Willow as she remembered facing the choice of marrying a man who didn’t love her or watching the man she loved die beneath her brother’s gun. Neither choice had been bearable, so she had simply walked away, leaving both choices behind. Caleb hadn’t had even that unhappy escape. Duty or desire or death had made a complete, seamless trap. No room to plead or hide. No way to be free. No way to change what would happen. No way to live with what would happen.

Willow didn’t know what she would have done if there had been no escape for her. She made a low sound, caught in the painful understanding that Caleb had paid a high price for the passion she had created in him.

Long fingers touched Willow’s cheek again, then withdrew because Caleb feared her reaction.

«I took you because I couldn’t stop myself,» Caleb admitted, his voice husky. «I held nothing back from you. I couldn’t. I’ve never been with a woman like that, passion and peace and laughter all mixed together. You taught me how much I had beenmissing. AndI knew every instant of every hour I was with you that I was going to lose you as soon as I found Reno.»

Caleb fought against the emotion closing his throat and burning his eyes like naked flame. He took a slow breath, trying to ease the brutal tension in his body. It was futile. The tension had never been wholly banished since he had known that Willow was Reno’s sister.

«Then you called yourself my whore,» he whispered, «as though what we had was nothing more than two strangers rutting in the dark. Yet to me what we had was…beautiful.»

Willow felt the tension in Caleb’s fingers, a fine trembling that rippled from him to her, telling her of the turmoil beneath his controlled surface.

«So I gave you what you wanted,» Caleb said. «I left you to sleep alone, a woman not a whore. And when I woke up, I found out that even though I hadn’t killed your brother, you still hated me so much you would rather ride into certain death than marry me.»

«That’s not true!» Willow said, sitting up. There was an instant of lancing pain that made her wince, but it passed quickly, submerged in the urgency of making Caleb understand. «I wasn’t planning on dying. I just didn’t want to spend my life living with a man who thought all that existed between a man and a woman was a simple trade — she scratches his itch and he gives her marriage or a handful of silver, depending on what kind of woman she is. That way of thinking makes all women the same kind. Whores.»

As Caleb sat up, he struggled for the self-control he had always taken for granted before he met Willow Moran. Very gently, he turned her face against his neck, embracing her without hurting her.

«I never thought of you that way,» Caleb said after a moment, his voice hoarse. «When you gave yourself to me…» His voice faded, then returned, even more ragged than it had been before. «It was the most beautiful gift I’ve ever been given. I had nothing to give you in return but the ugly choices that were tearing me apart. My only hope of changing those choices was to give you a pleasure so great that you wouldn’t be able to hate me, no matter what happened after I found your brother.»

Caleb forced himself to breathe deeply, evenly. It didn’t work. The raw pain he felt was slipping out of control.

«When I discovered Reno hadn’t seduced my sister, I thought God had heard my prayers. I was free of the trap. But you hated me anyway.» Caleb drew a tight breath as his voice broke. He closed his eyes and fought to finish saying what had to be said before he lost the ability to speak at all. «You could be carrying my baby right now. I can’t let you go off alone and pretend to be a widow. We’re getting married. We owe it to the baby we might have created. Accept it, Willow. Don’t fight me anymore. You’ll only hurt yourself.»

«Duty,» Willow said, trying and failing to keep the bitterness from her voice. «Damn duty,» she whispered despairingly. «A whole lifetime of cold duty. I didn’t want that. That’s why I rode out. I wanted so much more from my marriage than duty.»

A small shudder went through Caleb, control slipping away, his voice roughening even more. «I’m sorry, Willow. I wanted so much more, too. I wanted to sleep with you in my arms and wake up to your smile. I wanted to see love in your eyes when you looked at me. I wanted to build a house for you and give you babies. I wanted a passion so deep that I’d sink into your soul the same way you had sunk into mine. I wanted…everything.»

«So did I,» she whispered.

«We could still have it,» Caleb said against her hair. «Can’t you forgive me and learn to love me again? I need that, Willow. I love you so much I can’t even breathe.»

She flinched and wanted to scream at having to listen to duty masquerading as love, but she hadn’t the strength to scream. She hadn’t even the strength to sit upright without leaning against the man who had always been stronger than she was, harder, needing nothing but himself and his God and duty.

«Don’t.» Willow sighed wearily. «You don’t have to tell me sweet, loving lies to get me into your bed. I’m not an innocent girl anymore. I’m a —»

«No more, Willow,» Caleb interrupted in a low voice. «I won’t have you call yourself a whore again. I know you hate me. I know I never should have seduced you, but I can’t go back and change what happened. All I can do is live with it and try not to hurt you anymore.»

«Duty,» she summarized.

«Damn duty,» Caleb said, shaking. «I love you.»

Willow felt a single drop on her cheek and shuddered. She had thought herself beyond tears. Even as she lifted her hand to wipe away the evidence of her despair, she realized that it wasn’t her tear that burned against her skin.

Hesitantly, afraid to believe, she touched her trembling hand to Caleb’s cheek. His tears scalded her, burning through her hurt and confusion to the truth beneath. A sense of duty could force a man to avenge his sister at the risk of his own life. Duty could force him to risk his life to rescue Willow. Duty could force him to marry the girl he had seduced.