Chapter Twenty-Four
“James MacGregor is here,” Georgina said, stepping into the bedroom as Eleanor tamed a last wayward tendril of hair.
Eleanor paused, and Georgina stared at her with sympathy. She hadn’t told Georgina exactly what had happened yet, but she assumed her sister had guessed, given Eleanor’s sudden, stoic arrival.
After the other society members had left, Eleanor had sat in the lecture hall for a very long time, too numb to move, too numb to think. But she knew she couldn’t sit there forever. Eventually, she’d forced herself to her feet and begun the weary journey home.
“Should I have Jeffries tell him you’re not here?”
“No, I will—” Her throat caught and she had to clear it. “I will see him.”
She was looking forward to seeing him. If she told James what had happened with the Natural History Society, if she told him how hurt she was, even when she wanted to dismiss them all as fools, she thought he would understand. He knew what it was to both hate something and admire it, to want it, beyond all good sense.
She needed him, in that moment, more than she had ever needed anyone before. Needed the strength of his presence and the warmth of his teasing.
James was waiting in the drawing room, leaning with one arm on the marble mantel, staring into the fire as though mesmerized. His head shot up when he heard the floorboards creak under her feet.
“You look horrid,” she said.
He did. His hair was mussed, his eyes were red and a little wild. And her heart—her foolish, foolish heart—leaped with yearning. He was here. And he looked dreadful. And she wanted to stare at him forever.
“Cecil,” he said warmly. “What a greeting.”
She pushed down all of her tumultuous emotions and stayed hovering by the doorway. She strove for calm and collected, not heartbroken and wanting and desperate.
He sighed. “I know I look horrid. The duke has made things…difficult.”
“What has he done?”
“Have you heard of Thomas Clark?”
She shook her head.
“They call him the best prizefighter in England. He opened a boxing saloon, not three doors down from mine. He’s taken all of my business. The duke sent him. He wants to drag me back down.”
“That’s dreadful,” she said.
“Quite. But the Duke of Sheffield is a dreadful man, I already knew that. I’m going to have to sell my horses—they cost too much to keep up without an income. Tell me, Eleanor, would you let a man court you if he didn’t keep a nice carriage?”
She thought there were probably more important things to consider in a courtship. “If I cared for him, yes.”
James looked unconvinced.
“What will you do?”
He stared at a point on the wall before he spoke. “I’ve worked too hard for this to simply let him win. I know what he wants—he’s hoping I’ll fight Thomas Clark.”
“Is he hoping you’ll lose?”
He laughed wryly. “He’d rather I lose, I’m sure, but that’s not his end goal. That’s not how he works. He wants to remind me of what I am. He wants to remind everyone else in the process.”
“Is it so bad?” she asked.
“It’s violent. Brutish. There’s nothing very noble about men pummeling each other bloody with their bare hands while rich swells place bets on them.”
That wasn’t what she’d meant, at all. She rephrased the question. “Would it be so bad for people to see who you are?”
He stared at her as though he barely even understood what she was asking. And for the first time since he’d arrived, she felt a prickle of unease.
She smoothed down the front of her dress and decided on a different approach. “I’ve never seen a fight.”
“Women don’t attend.”
“I know. I would like to, though.”
“Why?”
“Because…it’s…it’s something you love, isn’t it? I would like to see you doing something you love.” She realized, too late, how ridiculously besotted that made her sound.
“You can train yourself not to miss things. I’ve done it before and I suspect I’ll do it again.” He caught her gaze and a silence followed that soon turned fraught. “Eleanor.”
The way he said her name immediately grabbed her attention. It sounded…final. Her pulse quickened. She felt like she was on the edge of a great precipice.
“Lady Sarah won’t marry me if I’m still prizefighting.”
Everything inside of her turned to ice. All thoughts of telling him about the Natural History Society fled. All thoughts of finding comfort in him fled. All thoughts fled.
“You…” Her tongue was thick in her mouth as she tried to find the words. “You still wish to marry her?”
Still? A world of meaning was contained in that one tiny syllable. After everything between them? After everything she’d hoped for? Her heart wrenched in her chest.
“If things were different…if I was different…” He broke off, shrugging helplessly, his expression rueful. He made a small, irritated noise. “I’m not. This is…this is all there is for me…this is everything. You understand, don’t you?”
He sounded a little desperate now, as though he needed her to understand.
And this was the worst part. She wanted to hate him. She wanted to be able to turn away and not feel like her heart was shattering into a million pieces. But she knew the soul-deep ache of wanting to belong. She knew how hard it was to let go of. They were not so very different, underneath the skin.
What she didn’t understand was how he couldn’t see that he might belong somewhere else instead.
“I wish…” Her voice shook, and she ruthlessly smoothed it. She would not fall apart in front of him. She would not cry. “I wish you realized that your everything could be more.”
He didn’t realize. She could tell from the smooth confusion etched over his face. Oh, James. She felt sorry for him in that instant—he’d been fighting his entire life, for survival, for money, for respect. He couldn’t understand that something could be given without anything being asked in return. He didn’t realize that respect and admiration didn’t have to be earned the hard way to be true.
“Eleanor,” he repeated, frustrated.
He’d told her before, it wasn’t about happiness. Whatever they could be to each other, whatever they already were…he didn’t want it. Not enough, anyway. She was a stepping-stone for him, not the destination. And arguing with him would only shred her heart even more.
So she did the only thing she could do to salvage some small part of herself—she opened her hands and she let him go.
“I understand,” she said.
He nodded, but he didn’t look pleased. He just looked…resigned.
When he leaned forward and brushed his lips against hers, softly, softly, more caress than kiss, she knew it was good-bye. She wanted to savor the kiss, wanted to etch it into her memory, but she had to close her eyelids against the sudden, sharp prick of tears. His mouth was on hers, and all she could focus on was willing herself not to cry, willing her lips not to tremble, willing her lungs to draw breath.
It was different from their first kiss. It was as gentle and brief as falling rose petals. And just as bittersweet.
When he was gone, she pressed her fingers to her mouth to feel the fast-fading warmth. She breathed in, short and tremulous, and swallowed against the pressure in her throat. To no avail. Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes.
She stared at the empty doorway for a long time, trying to reconcile herself to his absence. It shouldn’t be this hard. She’d known, since the beginning, what he wanted. He’d never made any secret of it, and Robert was right—he’d never told her he’d changed his mind.
But still—her hope had been real. And this hollow pain, it was real, too, and sharp.
She sank down against the wall, curling up her knees to hug them, and that was how Georgina found her a few moments later.
“Eleanor?”
“I think I’m broken,” she whispered, rubbing furiously at her tears. They wouldn’t stop. They simply wouldn’t stop. “What sort of mechanism is crying, anyway? What purpose does it serve? It’s a waste of water.”
Humans were so stupid and so messy.
And even knowing that, even knowing how stupid and messy and wasteful humans were, when Georgina sank down next to her and wrapped an arm around her, Eleanor couldn’t stop herself from crying harder.