Chapter Eleven #2
More’s the pity.
In a sort of haze, Irene allowed Wilfred to take her things from the footman and help her into her pelisse.
This time, when he slowly lifted the heavy, woolen garment up to her shoulders, his fingertips brushing the nape of her neck, his breath on her ear, a molten pool ached between her thighs and Irene had to prevent herself from turning around and throwing herself into his arms. When he tucked her hand into his arm and led her outside the Dalton townhouse and into the waiting carriage, Irene held back from clasping on to his hand and weaving her fingers between his own.
And when Wilfred stepped around the carriage and entered by the other door, she tried not to show her delight when he sat beside her, and not opposite her.
The carriage was small and her hips were pressed against his, and it had happened a thousand times before and she had never felt like this.
Irene blinked, almost not noticing the obvious until she pointedly tore her eyes away from their touching thighs. Her brother was not seated across from them. No one was. “Where’s Michael?”
A knock on the carriage window caused her to jump. Michael’s face appeared through the window, his voice muffled as he spoke to the pair through the glass. “I have somewhere I’d rather be than attending my sick sister at home. I’ll walk. You can thank me later!”
And then he was gone.
“Th-Thank him?” Irene wondered aloud.
Wilfred did not comment, nor did he go after her brother and insist he accompany them. The gossips were surely satisfied now by their display of propriety at the door. Instead, Wilfred simply tapped the roof of the carriage, took one look at her, and placed an arm around her. “You’ll warm up soon.”
Irene sagged into his embrace, her eyelashes fluttering shut and her heart twisting with simultaneous delight and grief.
How could I not have known? How could she have spent hour after hour with this man and not realized she was in love with him?
That these sensations, this bliss she felt when she was with him, this knowledge that he was the absolute best part of her, had been there all along and she had just misread it all?
Her own heart was a closed book to her, it seemed, for she had possessed the pages but never perused the paragraphs.
And now…now he was lost to her.
“I am sorry you are not feeling well,” Wilfred said quietly as the carriage rattled along the Bath streets. “I should have taken you home during the fish course.”
Irene smiled weakly. “We could not have just walked out of the Dalton dinner.”
“We could, and I would have made sure we did, if I had any sense,” he said softly, glancing at her, his nose mere inches from hers. “Dragging your brother along to pretend to play chaperone and all. There is very little I would not do for you, Irene.”
Irene swallowed. I should not be thinking of kissing Wilfred. She should not have been calculating just how far she would have to lean before her lips touched his own. She should not have been conscious of his arm around her, the safety and the heat he offered.
After all, he was not thinking of such things.
“You…” he said softly. “There is something different about you.”
Irene stiffened. “No, there isn’t.”
“And how, precisely, can you deny it when you do not even know what I think is different?” her best friend teased.
How, indeed? “I am perfectly well,” Irene mumbled, knowing full well it was not true but refusing to even countenance the thought of revealing the full depths of her misery.
It was a misery of her own making. She should have known she loved him—loved him as a man, not just as a brother. Then perhaps—
But no. Irene knew she was not brave enough to profess her undying love to a gentleman without knowing what response she would receive. The very idea of saying such a thing to Wilfred… Although of course she knew now his affections were engaged elsewhere.
She had lost him.
“You look well. I mean, you look as beautiful as you always do,” said Wilfred lightly.
The boiling heat between her thighs twisted. “I do?”
“Yes. You are a very beautiful woman, Irene,” said the man with whom she was completely in love. “You always have been, ever since we were children.”
Irene tried to smile. It was a compliment of a brother, nothing more. She had to face facts: the gentleman she adored had no interest in her. Not in that way, at any rate. Not when he wasn’t confused because his head was full of drink.
“But there is something…something off about you. Something different,” Wilfred continued. “Something has changed between us. Since my ball.”
It was a good thing the dark evening hid the details of her face, for Irene was certain she was a brilliant lobster red. Her cheeks certainly felt as though they were burning, heat pouring off them so rapidly that she was soon no longer in need of her pelisse.
“Nothing has changed,” Irene said, regret seeping into her voice.
If only something had changed. If only, when she had given him the opportunity to change the dynamic between them, he had taken that chance.
As it was…
The carriage jolted suddenly and they were both jerked to the left. This pressed her up against the side of the carriage, but in turn it pressed Wilfred up against her.
“Whoops,” said Wilfred quietly. “Forgive me.”
And yet he did not move. His free hand was pressed against the side of the carriage, encircling her, pinning her to the corner and leaving her with nothing to do but breathe him in.
Irene swallowed. She looked up into Wilfred’s eyes and knew she would never be brave enough to lean forward and take the kiss that she felt within her soul belonged to her.
He was panting slightly harder now. Perhaps the knock from the carriage had been more dramatic than she had realized?
But no, he was leaning, and Irene could not understand why he was doing this, why he was crowding her, but then he would not know her thoughts were crowded by his mere presence, her desire for him new but already intense, overwhelming her senses, overpowering her thoughts—
Wilfred moved away. “Sorry about that.”
Irene tried to smile. “No… No apology necessary.”
It was disheartening, indeed, to see just how little effect she had on him. As Wilfred crossed his legs and looked from her to the window, Irene could see that the moment they had just shared had meant far more to her than it did to him.
Which is to be expected, she told herself firmly as she in turn looked away and out of her window. He did not love her. Not like that. He loved Miss Fletcher, and a fumbling confession and one kiss on a sofa after the man had drunk a touch too much of her father’s spirits was no real sign of love.
Would he propose matrimony to Miss Fletcher? Would she accept him? Would Irene be forced to sit in a church and hear Wilfred, her Wilfred, vow to love another woman for the rest of his life?
“Here we are,” came Wilfred’s gentle voice.
Irene started as the carriage drew to a halt. “‘Here’?”
“Your house. You really are not very well,” her best friend said with a wry smile as he descended from the carriage. When he reappeared again and opened her door, he held out a hand. “I’ve got you.”
It was all she could do not to fall into his arms and weep. No, he didn’t have her, and she so desperately wanted him to, it was ridiculous.
Was this what love was? A complete overpowering of all rational thought? A desperate need to be close to that person, even if you knew they could never admire you, love you, desire you in the same way? A total loss of one’s head?
Chance would be a fine thing…
“Reeny?”
Irene blinked. Wilfred was still standing there with his hand out, ready to help her out of the carriage. Ready to help her through anything.
Until he married another, of course.
“Yes, right,” she said quietly, taking his hand and trying to ignore the quake of heat that cascaded up her fingertips at the meager touch.
The night was young. They had left the Daltons’ relatively early, for there were still many people meandering about the streets. Wilfred pulled her protectively to his side as he walked her up to her front door.
Or at least, Irene hoped he pulled her to his side protectively. She was sure there was another reason, perhaps one not nearly so romantic, but she would prefer to ignore that option for now.
They stopped before her door and Wilfred turned to face her. “Here you are.”
“Yes. And here you are,” Irene said without thinking.
He grinned. “I hope you feel better soon, Reeny.”
He started to walk away before she could think of anything rational to say, and that was why when she opened her mouth, only the irrational emerged. “Wilfred—wait.”
And he halted, turning immediately, obediently to return to her side. Well, to stand opposite her. Very close, now that Irene came to think about it.
“Yes?” he said softly. “What is it, Reeny?”
Irene looked up into those clear, blue eyes and wondered how she could ever have looked into them and not fallen in love with him. He was so…
So good. So kind. So handsome. So charming. There were a thousand and one traits of Wilfred Matthew Kirk Chesterham Zouch and she had known them for years and she had not fallen in love with him?
Or perhaps she always had been in love and she had just never known. It was a cruel trick of fate, to withhold this self-knowledge from her until it was fully useless.
Movement. Warmth. Scalding tingles up her arm.
Irene looked down. Wilfred had taken her hand in his. Even through their gloves, she felt it.
“You know, you don’t correct me when I call you ‘Reeny’ anymore,” he said softly. “Why?”
Swallowing hard, Irene allowed the truth to slip from her lips. “I don’t know. I hadn’t noticed.”
“It’s strange. You know someone for forever, then they grow up and become something the same and yet so different,” Wilfred said, his voice low.
Irene shifted on her feet—to hear him better, she told herself firmly.
“I’ve taken you back here, back home, perhaps a thousand times.
It’s the same home. You and I, we are the same. And yet…”
His voice trailed away.
Irene tried to inhale, but it was rather difficult when the air was being dragged from her lungs as her pulse pounded. “And yet…things are different.”
How she possessed the bravery to speak those words, she did not know. What she did know was that she wanted to hold him, press her forehead against his own, breathe in his air, know they would never be parted.
Wilfred’s expression changed, ever so slightly. “Yes. Things are different.”
This was her moment. Irene knew she may never get a better one. This was the opening to reveal that in fact what Lady Romeril had said was her heart’s one desire. That she wanted to be his wife, his lover, his best friend for the rest of her days and it would be her honor to grow to deserve him.
Fear fluttered along her pulse. Rejection was not something anyone craved, but Irene could not think of a worse rejection than that of her best friend.
So she had to say—
“Well, in you go,” Wilfred said bracingly, stepping back and rapping on the door. “I suppose your footman will still be—ah, there you are, Dempster.”
The burly man was blinking curiously. “Miss Irene? We did not expect you back for quite some time.”
Irene managed a smile, but it probably looked like a grimace. So, she was being dismissed. Perhaps Wilfred had guessed what she had been about to say. He clearly did not wish to hear it.
“Good evening, Wilfred,” she said as cheerfully as she could manage. “Thank you for seeing me home. It’s quite all right, Dempster. I can manage the steps on my own.”
Without a backward glance, for she knew it would only tear her apart, Irene strode inside and slammed the door behind her.
Her family’s sole footman stared in evident marvel. “What was that all about?”
“I can’t talk now, Dempster,” Irene said miserably, leaning her back against the front door and slowly allowing herself to slide until she was seated on the floor. “I don’t think I want to talk ever again.”