She nodded, although she was surprised. She’d thought she’d kept her secret better than that. “Remember back in late January? We had an argument. I left in the middle of the night not really knowing where I was going.”
“I remember all of our fights. This one, though, I believe, you threw your engagement ring at me as you left.”
She felt her face flame at the memory. If only she could go back... If only... She swallowed the lump in her throat. Her mouth had gone dust dry. Searching for the right words, she said, “I took a shortcut across the state, thinking I might go to Missoula or Great Falls. I didn’t really know.”
His dark eyes narrowed as he frowned. “You just took off because you were angry. As I recall, you got caught in a winter storm, went off the road and couldn’t get home for several days.”
Livie nodded and touched her temple where she had only a faint scar, a reminder of what had happened that night, as if she needed one. Her other scars ran much deeper.
“Where I went off the road was miles from the nearest town. There was no cell phone coverage. If a driver hadn’t come along when he did...”
“What are you trying to tell me, Olivia?” Cooper asked, his voice dangerously low. His handsome suntanned face had gone pale. As pale and shaken as she felt.
“The driver who helped me...took me to his cabin that wasn’t far from where I went in the ditch.”
His voice dropped to a near-whisper. “You spent the night there?”
She knew she had to get this out as quickly as possible or she wouldn’t be able to. For months she’d tried hard to forget. “He called to have my car towed so I’d have it the next morning. He seemed nice...”
Cooper was on his feet, his expression stricken. “What happened?”
She’d told herself not to break down, but her hormones were out of whack and she was so scared she was going to lose Cooper, the only man she’d ever truly loved, that she couldn’t hold back the tears any longer.
“I woke up in his bed. I have no memory of—”
Cooper shook his head as he took a step back. “You slept with him.”
“It wasn’t like that. You have to understand. I didn’t want any of this to happen. If I hadn’t been on that road...”
He raised a brow. “Are you blaming me for this?”
She swallowed. “We’ve both made mistakes.”
He stared at her, his gorgeous face a mask of anger. “Is that what this was? Payback?”
“No, it wasn’t like that.”
“Some man saves you in a blizzard and you end up in his bed—how do you explain that, Livie?”
“That’s just it. I can’t.” She wiped angrily at her tears. She could see herself sitting in the man’s cabin, sunken into a deep leather chair in front of the fire, feel the heat of the crackling blaze he’d built, taste the wine on her lips. Red. The glass in her hand glowing like rubies as the music lulled her.
“It must have been the wine.”
“The wine?”
“It was just one glass.” She remembered him refilling her glass. “Maybe two. I was cold, the fire, the wine, I hadn’t eaten...and I’d hit my head when I went into the ditch.”
Cooper shook his head angrily. “And you don’t know how you ended up in his bed.” He let out a curse as he turned away from her and rubbed angrily at the back of his neck.
The man had seduced her, just not the way Cooper thought. She’d trusted him, believing he’d saved her when all along he must have been planning to do exactly what he’d done. “I think he might have put something in my wine.”
“Are you saying he drugged you?” His jaw muscle jumped as he spun back around to look at her. “What else did he do?” Seeing her expression, he let out a curse. “So you called the sheriff, right?” When she said nothing, he let out a bark of a laugh and said, “Wouldn’t a woman who’d been drugged and possibly raped have called the sheriff on the bastard?”
“I don’t know if he drugged me or if the wine just hit me and I passed out.” She shook her head and began to cry again. “I was too embarrassed to do anything but get out of there.”
She’d blamed herself for being lured into thinking she was safe with the man. The next morning, she’d found that he’d had her car towed. It was out front, just as he’d promised. She’d quickly grabbed her things and left. Her plan had been to never look back. To never tell anyone, especially Cooper.
She would have taken the secret to her grave.
“You must have at least confronted the man the next morning,” he said, studying her with an angry, disappointed intensity that made her squirm.
She hated to admit waking up to find herself not only naked in the man’s bed, but discovering him long gone. “He’d already left.”
“Left? Without a word? Slam-bam, not even a thank-you-ma’am?”
She said nothing. What could she say? She couldn’t explain how comfortable she’d felt in the man’s company the night before. How protected. She’d relaxed, let her guard down, drank too much wine on an empty stomach. But how she’d ended up in his bed...she didn’t know. The drugged part sounded far-fetched, she had to admit. Maybe she just wanted to believe that over the alternative. She could tell Cooper certainly had his doubts about her story.
Cooper was still rubbing his neck, his face filled with anguish. She couldn’t bear the pain she was causing him. Suddenly, he froze, his gaze slowly lifting to hers. “Why are you telling me this now? Assure me it is only because you don’t want to go into the marriage with a lie between us.”
She swallowed again, choking back sobs as she tried to pull herself together. When she met his dark eyes, she cringed at the way he was looking at her. “He’s blackmailing me.”
“Blackmailing you?” Cooper let out a curse, then a bitter laugh. “Of course he is. How could I forget for even an instant that you are Buckmaster Hamilton’s daughter?” He raked strong fingers through his dark hair. “So if this man wasn’t blackmailing you, you would never have told me about this, would you have?”
“I didn’t tell you because I wanted to spare you,” she cried. “That’s why I didn’t tell you about the first blackmail demand.”
His voice turned deadly. “First blackmail demand? Are you telling me you paid this man?” He started to turn toward the door as if he had to get out of this room or he wasn’t sure what he would do.
“You can’t leave.” She reached for him, needing to touch him, to feel the connection between them.
“Give me one good reason to stay here right now.”
“There’s more.”
He turned, but took a step back out of her reach. “More?” His laugh was harsh. “You get a blackmail note and you don’t come to me, the man you say you’re going to marry? Of course not. You went to Daddy. You got the money from him, didn’t you? Why would you go to the man you say you’re going to spend the rest of your life with when you were in trouble?”
“I didn’t go to Daddy. I used some of my own money.”
“How much?” Cooper asked from between clenched teeth.
“Ten thousand.”
“You paid the man who you say possibly drugged and raped you ten thousand dollars rather than come to me with the truth?” Cooper stared at her as if he didn’t know her. “And now he wants more, right? What a