Chapter Ten
The Kensington ball was always one of the top crushes of the season, and it was the sole reason that Henry held up yet another marble pillar in yet another crowded ballroom.
He tugged at his expertly tied—and tight as a garrote—cravat and took a long draught of his whiskey. He would give anything to be at Hartstone in quiet and privacy, running his course and his demons into the ground, instead of here, surrounded by people he hardly knew and making small conversation about nothing of consequence. But receiving a thousand and one invitations was part and parcel of an earl announcing a betrothal agreement during the height of the season. And he owed it to Rose to do it right.
Henry watched as she danced with Stephen Kensington, Earl of Thorndale, their host and his longtime friend. Rose was exquisite, there was no denying it. Her peach-tinted complexion set off her blond hair and blue eyes to perfection, and her slender form was full and curved in all the right places. She had a reserved sort of grace that came across as both admirable and unattainable. While Henry could appreciate her beauty as he would a fine piece of art, there was something missing.
Of their own volition, his eyes flicked to the laughing sprite dancing in the arms of Lord Remi, and his fingers clenched involuntarily around his snifter. He’d have expected the sight of Irina to become easier the more they saw of each other, but the invisible fist punch to the gut was always the same: swift and brutal.
Irina and Remi made a striking couple, his fairness complementing her dark beauty. Clearly, they had dressed to suit, she in a vibrant emerald green gown and he in a matching-hued waistcoat. Henry couldn’t curb the scowl that rose to his face. From what he had heard and seen, they had been taking London by storm the past three weeks. The two of them had become the light of the season and ton favorites, their popular presence coveted at every ball and every social event.
As a result, it was no surprise that the betting book at White’s had also gained notoriety with gentlemen placing wagers for winners as they would a horse race. It made Henry sick to his stomach, but it had taken on a frenzied life of its own. Every possible thing was accorded a price—a smile, a dance, a laugh. He could no more stop it than he could an approaching storm. It would have to run its course. Something else would take their collective fancy. Eventually.
Henry could not fault them for their fascination with the princess. Irina lived with such vivacity and passion, and her beauty was only enhanced by her animation…the joie de vivre she possessed. Even while dancing, her hands did not stop moving, her eyes sparkling. It was the same abandon with which she did everything else. Kissing, for example. Henry scowled into his drink.
“Is the whiskey not up to your standard, Langlevit?” a man on the other side of the pillar drawled. “I fear Thorn may take offense at your glower.”
The Duke of Bradburne smirked, and Henry cursed how easily the object of his thoughts affected him. “Thorn is busy enough with my fiancée, and the whiskey is above measure, Hawk.” Though Lord Bradburne had inherited a dukedom and his father’s title, he was still known to his friends by a shortened name derived from one of his lesser titles, the Marquess of Hawksfield.
“Congratulations, by the way,” Hawk said, lifting his own glass. “We have not seen each other since your announcement. My wife has taken it upon herself to retire to Worthington Abbey every other fortnight to check on Lady Northridge. Our daughters seem to favor the country more to town, as well.”
Henry lifted his glass, accepting the toast. It was on the tip of his tongue to make a remark about Irina being as solicitous with Lana, but he wisely kept his mouth shut. Hawk was not an unintelligent man. “How are your children?” he asked instead, opting for the safer turn in conversation.
“Much like my duchess—the girls are intent on putting as many gray hairs on my head as possible.” The duke smiled. “Though they are not nearly as mischievous as their little brother. How is Lady Langlevit? I heard she wasn’t feeling well as of late.”
Henry had known the whispers would quickly blanket London, but he still felt an edge of discomfort hearing it from his friend’s lips.
“My mother is as well as can be expected, thank you for asking. She needs peace and quiet, and most of all, rest,” Henry replied, a pang in his chest at the thought of her.
Ever since she’d seemed to stumble at the dinner she’d hosted early in the season, Henry had noticed more instances of her fatigue and loss of balance. He’d called for their family physician, who had delivered a mixed diagnosis: Lady Langlevit was indeed declining, however she was still strong of spirit, and Dr. Hargrove had stressed that her will would carry her for quite some time. Henry certainly hoped so.
While she had fully intended to remain in London, his mother had returned to Hartstone soon after his engagement ball.
“We wish her a quick recovery,” Hawk said. “Please give her our regards.”
“Thank you, I will.”
Henry studied the man who had always been more of an observer than an active participant of the ton until his duchess had stepped into his life. Until recently, he and the duke had never been more than acquaintances, though he’d once considered making an offer to Hawk’s half sister, Eloise, to fulfill the terms of his inheritance. She’d been caught and killed in the crossfire of the notorious Masked Marauder who had terrorized London five years before. Disfigured by burns to her face from a childhood fire, Henry had felt sorry for her, having been on the receiving end of a fire himself. A marriage to Eloise would have been a kindness, he knew, but beyond that, it would have been a means to an end.
“Lady Bradburne looks well,” Henry said, watching as the duchess danced beside Rose in a rousing Scotch reel that had them both breathlessly laughing. He couldn’t help noticing that Irina was now dancing with Lord Northridge, and inexplicably, the gathering tension left his limbs in a slow trickle. “I take it family life agrees with you despite the threat of gray hairs.”
“It does,” Hawk agreed. “As you will find, as well. Lady Carmichael is lovely.”
Henry nodded brusquely. “We’ve known each other a long time.”
He knew he should say more. Compliment her in some way. Something that pointed to why he and Rose would be happy together. But he could land upon nothing.
“Speaking of brides,” Hawk filled in when Henry remained silent, “it looks like your old ward will have no shortage of suitors, either. Though I do hope she chooses one better than my whelp of a brother-in-law making a fool of himself in that set.”
Once upon a time, the rivalry between Lord Northridge and the duke had been no secret, but now Hawk was only joking. Lady Bradburne’s brother, Lord Northridge, was an excellent father and husband, and Henry knew that Hawk trusted North implicitly. Henry also knew from speaking with Lana that she was deliriously happy. “Princess Irina has certainly blossomed into a beauty,” Hawk continued.
Henry felt his scowl return. He was well aware of how beautiful she had become. “She is on the verge of making a spectacle of herself.”
“I take it you’ve heard about the wagers?” Hawk asked. “I’ve no taste for such bets myself, but the princess has become quite the prize.”
Henry’s lips thinned. “Quite so.”
Hawk’s gaze centered on where Irina was dancing with his brother-in-law. “She appears to be enjoying the attention. North reports that ever since she accepted the offer to stay with Lady Dinsmore, the invitations have been appearing at Bishop House en masse. Apparently, she declines more than she accepts, and yet she is still out almost every night.”
Irina could not have stayed at Devon Place alone, without a chaperone, and so when Lady Langlevit had returned to Essex for rest, Lady Bradburne’s mother had happily stepped in and offered to host the princess. Henry respected Lord and Lady Dinsmore, but he was not at all pleased with the rest of the situation.
“She should be in Essex with her sister instead of cavorting about here with that cousin of hers,” Henry snapped, unable to help himself.
“Cousin?”
“Lord Remi. By marriage, twice removed.” So not really a cousin at all, he added sourly in his own head. “That peacock assured me earlier this spring that he had Irina’s best interests at heart. Now, however, it seems he has no care for her reputation. And it appears neither does she.”
“Perhaps Princess Irina only wants for a strong husband to take her in hand.”
“Oh, is that what you did, Your Grace?” a laughing voice said as the duchess approached, her eyes glinting with humor. “Took me in hand?”
The duke gazed down at his wife. “Firmly, as it were.”
“I’ll remember that,” Lady Bradburne teased and turned to Henry. “You are not dancing, Lord Langlevit?”
Henry tapped his leg where a bullet had torn through years before on the Peninsula. “I fear my body can only handle a few dances a time, Your Grace, and I would not want to deprive anyone of a more capable partner.”
“I am so sorry,” she said, an immediate look of regret on her face.
“Don’t be, it was a long time ago,” Henry reassured her. “I much prefer the slower dances to the faster ones anyway. Gives a man a chance to get to know a lady.”
“A novel idea.” Hawk’s lips curved into a knowing grin, and he bowed to his wife, lifting her hand to his lips. “Your Grace, shall we get to know each other a little? I believe I hear the start of a waltz.”
Lady Bradburne hesitated, frowning slightly. “Lord Langlevit, do you mind?”
Henry was on the verge of sending them on their way with a laugh, when a huffing Lord Northridge approached them with Irina in tow. “Langlevit can take a turn with my young sister-in-law,” North said, his face red from exertion. “She has worn me out and is in dire need of a better partner for the next set.”
Henry’s breath caught as her bright eyes met his and slid away, as if he merited nothing more than a glance. “I am sure Her Highness has more than enough partners to choose from.”
Lady Bradburne laughed. “Come now, my lord, don’t ignore a damsel left in distress by my brother’s lack of skill on the ballroom floor.”
“Not lack of skill, dear sister,” North said, leaning weakly against the column. “Lack of breath. Scotch reels are my nemesis.” His eyes narrowed on her. “I’m amazed you are still standing, given your lungs.”
Lady Bradburne’s childhood breathing affliction did not make itself known as much as it had in the past, but Henry often saw both North and Hawk watching her closely, especially when she danced.
“It’s called pacing,” the duchess said dryly, glowering at him before smiling sweetly in her husband’s and Henry’s direction. “I see your Lady Carmichael already has a partner. Shall we, my lords?”
Irina’s chin jutted, something indescribable flashing across her transparent face. “I do not wish to put his lordship out, and I see Lord Remi over by—”
Henry took her by the elbow and steered her to the ballroom floor, clipping the words from her lips as the strains of the waltz began. “No, this dance is mine.”
He’d be damned if he was going to allow her to dance a fourth time with that man.
Irina’s eyes widened at his gravelly tone, but she allowed him to escort her without protest. Sliding one hand around the ruched emerald material at her slim waist, Henry drew her close. He felt Irina’s intake of breath through the layer of silk. His palm warmed to her skin, and as the faint waft of lavender drifted into his nostrils, all the other dancers around them fell away. Henry noted once more how tall she was and how perfectly they fit together for a dance like the waltz. She had fit into him equally well in Essex on his waterfall cliff. The recollection made the muscles low in his abdomen tense.
“How are you?” he said.
Her violet eyes met his with a searching look. “Well, my lord. Yourself?”
“Well, thank you.” He cleared his throat. “You look like you’ve been enjoying the dancing.”
Irina chuckled, drawing his attention to the slender column of her throat. He instantly pictured himself pressing his lips there. “I’ve worn through two pairs of slippers,” she replied.
“Are you not tired?”
“Dancing is my means of release,” she said simply.
She did not have to explain. Henry knew exactly what she meant. He flattened the palm of his hand, brushing his thumb against the smooth material and skimming the sides of her ribs as they took the first turns.
Dimly, he focused on the steps, surprised that for once his leg did not pain him. Dancing with Irina was much like everything else—an unexpected revelation, and for once, he found himself enjoying it. They moved as if they were one, in perfect accord, though she was not laughing or smiling as she had been with her other dance partners. His gaze dropped to her mouth and climbed to her eyes. They had not left his, and the limpid look in them nearly made him sink to his knees.
“Are your accommodations suitable at Bishop House?”
A blank look flicked across her eyes before she answered. “More than suitable.”
“Lady Langlevit misses you.” He’d missed her, too, he realized with a start. Devon Place had seemed brighter somehow, more alive while she was in it. Much like any other place graced with her presence.
“As I miss her,” Irina said. “Have you heard from her? How is she feeling?”
“Better lately, but still in need of rest.” Henry cracked a smile. “She never was too fond of listening to orders from doctors. I’ve hired a private nurse to remain with her for the time being.”
“I shall visit when I am next in Essex,” she murmured.
“She would like that very much.”
The rest of the dance drifted into silence. Odd that their conversation would be stilted and awkward, but not their silence. It was unlike anything Henry had ever encountered. He struggled to categorize it into words, but it was as if the space between their bodies began humming in tune, and while they danced, their pulses seemed to align. Henry could feel the strong beat of hers beneath his hand, pushing against his skin up into his veins.
Irina’s eyes widened as if she could feel the force of it, too. The connection that bloomed between them was more powerful than any words, and it was with regret that he released her as the last bars of music faded.
“Thank you for the dance, my lord.”
“It was my pleasure.”
Henry watched as Irina was whisked away for the next set and preceded to hold up his usual pillar once more. The others had not yet returned, and for the moment, he was content to relive the last quarter of an hour at his leisure. The following set began, and partners shifted once more. He nodded to Rose who was accompanying Lady Bradburne to the retiring room. He was glad that she was enjoying herself, despite her protests that she much preferred country living to the fast pace of London. It would be a good match, then, he thought as he noticed something out of the corner of his eye.
Irina. She had just darted behind a large potted plant and slipped from the ballroom, unaccompanied by her usual entourage. Henry frowned and followed. With the number of bets placed on her, she would not find herself alone for long. The balcony was set kitty-corner to the larger outdoor terrace, he noticed, and accessible only by the narrow doors she’d just exited. To his surprise she stood there, both hands on the stone railing and her head turned to the moonlit sky. Her face was pale and drawn. The vibrancy she’d shown in the ballroom had been replaced by a heavy expression. Tension weighted down her shoulders as she rolled them and pinched the bridge of her nose with her fingers. Suddenly, he wanted nothing more than to draw her into his arms and soothe whatever ache was plaguing her away.
Henry plucked two glasses of whiskey off a nearby footman’s tray and closed the paned French doors behind him. “Escaping?” he asked, making her jump and whirl around.
“Oh, it’s you.”
“Who did you expect it to be?”
She shook her head and shrugged, not even attempting to put up a mask. “I don’t know. Max, perhaps.”
“Here,” he said, handing her the snifter. Hesitating for the briefest of moments, she took it and sipped. “It’s not as good as mine, but will do the trick,” he told her, watching as some color returned to her cheeks after another sip. “Better?”
“Yes, thank you.” Irina turned toward him, but kept her distance. “Now that we are in private and not on a crowded ballroom floor, may I once again offer my congratulations on your engagement? Your fiancée seems truly lovely.” She eyed him, drawing the snifter to her lips as if considering her words. “She’s obviously much better suited for the role of countess than Lady La Valse or a courtesan from some obscure gaming hell.”
Henry drew a harsh breath, feeling the weight of his words from the waterfall hanging between them. He could never take them back. “Irina, I am not sorry for what I said, but I am sorry for hurting you. You must see that I want only what’s best for you.”
“Stop! You are no longer my warden, and as such you no longer have any right to impose what you think is best for me,” she replied, her bitter tone searing him with unexpected power. “Besides, your idea of what is in my best interests is the very opposite of my own.”
“Does yours include making a fool of yourself with Lord Remi?”
“At least I’m not a coward,” she shot back, her eyes flashing fire as she approached him. “And leave Max out of it.”
“What do you mean by that?”
Irina’s eyes narrowed to slits. “He’s honest about who he is. You hide behind so many walls that no one even knows who you are, least of all yourself.”
“You are calling me a coward,” he said softly, the blow striking deep between his ribs. She’d reached into his chest and stilled his heart with those words.
She walked past him, toward the doors where she paused, her hand resting on the handle. “I am finally seeing you as you are. Perhaps it is time you did, as well. Thank you for the drink, Lord Langlevit.”
He stood unmoving on the balcony as she left. She thought him a coward. It was a word that had floated around his mind for many years but had never, ever, come close to being attached to his name. In the army, cowards ran. They abandoned their men and sought safety for themselves. They broke under the hands of their enemy torturers. Henry was not a coward. He had not run. He had not broken, even when the pain had been blinding, his death all but certain.
“I am not a coward,” he whispered to himself on the balcony.
The doors opened, and a couple drew short when they saw him, standing alone. Henry nodded to them and slipped past, re-entering the ballroom.
Irina was nowhere in sight, but he’d had enough of the evening. He could not stomach another dance or another inane conversation about his marriage plans with anyone. Locating Rose where she stood conversing with the Duke and Duchess of Bradburne and the Earl and Countess of Thorndale, he signaled the butler to retrieve their cloaks and call for their coach while they said their good-byes.
In the carriage, he remained preoccupied until Rose gently touched his shoulder. “Something troubles you?”
Henry pushed a smile to his lips. “I am tired, that is all.”
“It is more than that,” she said. “We’ve known each other forever, Henry, and you could never lie to me. It is about the princess, isn’t it?”
Hellfire. He just wanted the evening to end.
“No.”
Rose squeezed his arm. “Your mouth says no, but your eyes say something else. I saw the two of you dancing. You were staring at each other as if there was no one else in the entire room.”
“I—”
She raised a hand. “No, let me finish. I am not angry, Henry. Far from it.” She smiled, and he knew she was being honest. “It was the same way I used to stare at John when we danced, as if no one else mattered in the world but us.”
“You’re imagining things, Rose,” Henry said, a surge of pain stabbing through him. “You saw two people who can’t even begin to share something as rare as you did with John.” His voice broke. “He deserves to still be here with you.”
“He is,” she said, patting her chest. “In here. In my heart.”
“I should have been the one to die that day, not him. He was a good man.”
“So are you,” Rose said fervently. “And you deserve to be happy. You deserve to have the chance to find someone who loves you, even if, like John, it’s only for a little while.”
Henry dropped his head into the cradle of his hands, his eyes gritty. “She loves a man who no longer exists. A hero on a pedestal. I’m not that man.”
“Why not?” Rose countered.
“Because he’s gone,” he whispered. “Gone to a place no one can ever find him.”
Coward.
A coward who has run.
She leaned in to hear his barely audible words. “Why, Henry?”
“Love is a weakness, Rose. I learned that well when they had me,” he said, surprised he was speaking of it with her, and yet, unable to stop. Maybe it was because of Irina’s earlier words. A justification, perhaps, even though he knew no absolution would come from it.
“I never told you or John, but my captors brought in a young girl, a servant from the tavern where I’d been staying. They tortured her…right in front of me. They believed I’d break, that I’d give up the names of my allies, and so they broke her fingers. Her hands. Her knees. They bruised her face and split her lip. They…”
Henry’s stomach turned, the familiar sweat of panic and powerlessness threatening to suffocate him.
“Oh, Henry,” Rose whispered.
“Do not feel pity for me,” he bit out. “I did not know her. She was just a girl. I did not even know her name, and that is the only reason I did not break. If I had known her, if I’d known her name…if I had cared—” He swallowed hard. “I would have broken. I would have given them whatever information they wanted.”
He closed his eyes, still able to hear her screams echoing down the long corridor to his prison cell.
“They stripped away any capacity for love I might have had that day, though perhaps I never had it in me to begin with. Perhaps there was ever only brutality.”
Henry stared at his palms, clenching and unclenching his fingers, his mind going dark with the memories that haunted him. Even Rose didn’t know what he was capable of…what he was still capable of when his nightmares took him back to dark, harrowing places. No, it was safer for everyone for him to be alone.
Rose stayed quiet. Appalled, perhaps. What did it matter?
“You are kind, Rose, but I am ruined in more ways than one,” he murmured, touching his leg, the old wound stiff and aching. Along his back, the old burn scars, reopened by the lashes of a whip in France during his imprisonment, itched as if alive.
“Some say that about me because I am a widow,” she responded.
He was glad she hadn’t tried to argue with him again. “Then perhaps,” he said with a weak, forced grin, “the two of us make sense together.”
Companionship. Convenience. Safety. That is what this marriage would be. She nodded, but said nothing more.
It would have to be enough.