Chapter Eight
“Where will we walk?” Helena asked when the silence between them had stretched too long. She tried to keep a bright tone.
Baldwin continued to lead her through the winding halls. “Charlotte and Ewan have the prettiest garden in the back,” he said. “With a fountain that I’ve heard the Regent himself tried to finagle away when Ewan first inherited his title. He kept it because Charlotte once said she liked it. That was a long time before they married.”
Helena smiled as he led her out the front door and around a path to the garden. In the moonlight, everything seemed soft and almost dreamlike, from the perfectly groomed hedges to the pretty stone benches and the lanterns that hadn’t been lit since there had been no anticipation that guests would sneak away outside.
“You really have known him a long time.”
He nodded. “Yes, we have. Matthew’s family was very close to ours, and Ewan was his cousin and ultimately a ward to Matthew’s family. We used to spend all number of summers together.”
“And that is how you founded your duke club?” she asked, thinking of Charity’s statement earlier in the night.
He glanced at her. “Heard of that, have you?”
She laughed. “It is a fact that sticks out in one’s mind.”
He sighed, but it was one of pleasure rather than sadness. “It is true, our little circle of friends are all dukes. Or all will be—Kit…er, the Earl of Idlewood has not yet inherited. I believe you may have met him at my tea last week.”
She nodded. “I do remember him and his father. Very kind.”
“They are.” Baldwin’s frown drew deeper, then he seemed to shake his melancholy away. “But it wasn’t the three of us who formed it. That would be James, Simon and Graham. They just dragged us all along.”
“You’re all so close,” Helena said with a shake of her head as she thought of the men. The ones she’d seen together were almost like brothers. “I envy that.”
Baldwin expression tightened, but before she could ask him about it, he brought her through one last turn in the hedge maze and she caught her breath. There, in the middle of the garden, was a gorgeous marble fountain of a half-clothed Greek lady pouring water from a pitcher.
Helena stepped away from Baldwin and toward the bubbling beauty before her. “Oh, it’s lovely. Her face is so…so enchanting.”
“Yes.” His voice came softly. “It is.”
Heat flooded her cheeks, and she didn’t dare turn back for fear she might find him looking at her, not the statue. And if she did, fearing what she might do next. Out here, in the quiet dark, in the soft moonlight, anything seemed possible.
“You miss your friends at home,” he said, a statement, not a question.
She continued to look at the statue, though her pleasure in it faded a fraction. “Why do you say that?”
“Because you said you envied my close friendships. So I assumed you must be longing for your own.” He stepped up next to her and stared up at the fountain lady’s perfectly carved face. Still, she felt his tension. His…waiting.
She swallowed. “I did have a circle of friends in Boston,” she said, and her eyes stung with sudden tears. “But we—we grew apart in recent years.”
She could still recall her best friend giving her the cut direct after her fall. It was a moment she would never forget.
He faced her, his expression suddenly curious. “I suppose that happens,” he said softly. “As our lives change.”
He was too close now. Too close and too warm in the cool late spring air. She found herself leaning toward him, her body doing what it pleased rather than what was prudent. She caught herself and stepped away.
To her surprise, he followed, closing the distance she had created. Her throat felt like it was tightening and her world began to spin as she stared up into his handsome face. His unattainable and oh-so-very handsome face.
“Baldwin,” she squeezed out.
He muttered something beneath his breath and then he reached out, catching her arm and drawing her up against him. His chest was rock solid and her body molded to it like it had been made to do so. She could have pulled away, probably should have, but instead she reached up to grip his forearms, anchoring herself in whatever way she could.
His mouth lowered, torturously slowly, and then she felt his warm breath stir on her lips. She gasped, and it was in that moment that he claimed her mouth. What started as a gentle kiss rapidly spun out of control. His arms came around her, pulling her even closer, and his tongue stroked inside her mouth.
Her world stopped. Ceased to exist. It was replaced only by sensation. Of his hard body against her soft one, of the taste of him, of the smell of his skin. He drove his tongue inside of her with finesse and the perfect combination of dominating demand and gentle coaxing.
She couldn’t help but relax. It had been ages since she was kissed, and never like this. Never so…thoroughly. She opened and met his tongue with her own. He made a harsh noise deep in his throat and his hips bumped hers.
She arched against him, lifting to wrap her arms around his neck as she fought for purchase, fought to control, fought to get closer somehow.
But just as suddenly as he had taken her in his arms, he pulled away. He steadied her, then paced off several steps, running his hands through his hair. She watched him, bereft and confused and a tiny bit grateful for his discretion when she’d had none.
“I’m bloody sorry, Helena,” he said at last, turning to face her.
Everything seemed almost magical in the moonlight and her heart stuttered with a longing she had never felt before. One that made her braver than she was. She clenched her hands before her, worrying them as she whispered, “Are you? I suppose it would be very wanton of me to tell you I am not.”
His eyes went wide and dilated, desire slashing across his angled face. “No, it would be honest.” He bent his head. “Honesty is a valuable commodity. One I am sadly lacking.”
She stared at him, confused and intrigued. “I cannot imagine that you are not honorable or honest.”
He barked out a humorless laugh before he turned away. “No one can imagine it. That is how I’ve gotten away with everything for so damned long. And here I am, standing in my sister’s garden, practically seducing you in front of the lady fountain and you have no idea of who I am.”
Helena could not deny how she was brought in by his pain. By his struggle that was so obvious in every tense muscle in his body. She moved toward him, stepping around so that he couldn’t avoid looking at her. She reached out, hesitant, and took one of his clenched hands in her own.
“What is it?” she whispered. “Can’t you tell me?”
He seemed to ponder that a moment, then he nodded. “If I’m going to accost you in the garden and then pull away, I suppose you deserve to know why.” He hesitated, and she watched all the color drain from his cheeks. Then he pulled his hand from hers and said, “What you must understand, Helena, is that I have nothing.”
Baldwin felt the words coming from his mouth, words that had remained unspoken for so many years. And yet he couldn’t stop them. He looked at this woman, this lovely woman who fascinated him, and he wanted to tell her the truth. He needed her to understand why what they’d just done, that stunning kiss, was impossible.
Perhaps he needed to remind himself, as well.
He watched for her reaction, but her expression remained passive, open, accepting rather than judging, and it spurred him on. Not that he could have stopped. Saying it out loud had opened floodgates he’d been bracing against for years.
“No one knows,” he continued, moving to sit down hard on the bench across from the fountain. “Not even my mother understands the full extent of the damage to our position, though she is aware of some of it.”
Helena took a place beside him. “How did it happen?”
He winced. “There is a story.”
“You needn’t tell me if you don’t want to,” she said. She reached over and covered his hand with hers. “I’m a stranger, after all.”
“After that kiss, I’d say you’re more than that,” he mused, watching her pale fingers tangle with his. “Here it is, the bottom line of it: my father loved us, I know that is true, but he was selfish. He gambled and he lost. I used to watch him do it with this pit in my stomach. But he was always assuring, always implying that we had more than enough for his foolish decisions not to matter. And when he died—”
He cut himself off with a shake of his head. She nodded slowly. “You discovered the truth.”
“Yes,” he whispered. “I was already mourning the father I loved, weighed down by grief and responsibility, and then I started finding the ledgers.”
“Ledgers?” she repeated.
“Dozens of them, all designed to hide one lie or another, one debt or another.” He almost choked on the words. “For six months, as I went through the contents of his office, every single day brought some new nightmare. The creditors were calling and I was in a chess match with a dead man. Every move took me closer to my doom.”
“It must have been devastating,” she said.
He nodded. “Utterly. But I…I made it worse, Helena. I did.”
“How?” Her brow wrinkled.
“One of the men my father owed money to, he approached me with a bargain. More gambling to clear the debt. I was against it. By then any stomach I had for the idea was long turned. But I felt I had no choice, so I did so—and I won. That small debt was cleared. It was exhilarating.”
He stopped talking and bent his head as shame flooded him. He couldn’t say the next, he never had. Not to his mother, not to anyone.
Helena brushed a lock of hair from his forehead. “You gambled more,” she said softly, filling in the things he could not bring himself to say. “You tried to fix the damage using the same tools your father had to make it. And I assume it failed.”
He nodded without looking at her. “Yes. Though I did clear a few debts, I also incurred more. I stopped after a few months, but the damage was done. By him. By me.”
Her breath went out in a shuddering sound that mimicked the one inside his head at all times. “It must be terrible for you.”
He dared to look up at last and found her staring back at him. She was care and empathy and support personified. But he wasn’t finished yet.
“I’m telling you this, not for your sympathy,” he said slowly. “But because I must. I am not the kind of man who goes around kissing young ladies in a garden. I would normally not be so reckless, but the moment I saw you on the terrace at the ball, I was drawn to you. When I look at you I want…well, I simply want. But there are still outstanding debts I cannot even find and a future that can be fixed in only one way. So I…I can’t pursue what I want. I must do what I need to do, no matter how much I don’t want to.”
Her eyes widened slightly, and she nodded. “You must marry for money.”
He wanted to howl when she said it. He wanted to turn away from the disgust that would shortly flow over her face. Only it didn’t. Her expression remained calm and unreadable.
“Yes,” he choked out.
“You have so much weight on your shoulders,” she whispered, reaching up to stroke her hand over one of them.
“Much of which I put there myself,” he said. “I did this.”
“Not alone,” she reminded him, her grip tightening on his arm. He stared at her, and for a moment just a tiny fraction of the weight that he carried lessened. He could breathe again.
But it couldn’t last. “Either way, the result is the same.”
She was very still, and then she slowly slid her hand away. His body mourned the loss. “I understand. I must confess to you that I don’t like it.”
“No?” he whispered.
She smiled, a sad and small expression that hit him in the stomach. “If my reaction to the kiss didn’t spell it out to you, let me be clear. I want, too, Baldwin. I’ve been shocked by how deeply I felt connected to you, even after that first night. But I’ve known my position for a long time. I never assumed it would or even could be elevated. That wasn’t my purpose in coming here. So it seems we must just be…friends.”
Pain ripped through him at that kind offer. One he didn’t deserve but meant so very much to him. “I would be honored to be your friend, Helena Monroe.”
She stood and he followed her to her feet. She slid her hand through his elbow and smiled up at him. He could see the lie in that expression. The pain behind it. It mirrored his own, but what was there to do? Life was not fair.
He knew that very well.
“Then we shall be friends,” she said, and motioned to the house. “It will be enough.”
He nodded as he began to guide her back to the house and the party within. But with every step, he felt the weight of her fingers around his bicep. The warmth of her body beside him. He felt the relief that confession had given to him. Not just confession to anyone, but to this woman who had inspired his trust so easily.
And he knew being her friend was not enough. Could never be enough. But it was the only option.