Chapter Twelve
The next evening, Halsey did collect Inès early, but his sister Fee was also with him. She explained in the coach that she had told her brother she wished to see the play and that she had an invitation to leave them both and visit the box of a friend of hers.
“I will not remain with you beyond the first act, Ev,” she repeated in the carriage, then winked at Inès. “I will return home courtesy of my friend. Never fear.”
“Am I correct,” Evan asked her as his town coach pulled up to the theater entrance, “that Lucille Porter told you her brother is home from his regiment in India?”
Fee stared down her brother. “He once was a very irritating boy of twelve. I shall be very cool to him. So, India can change a man.”
“Not always, my dear Fee, for the better.”
Fee was not dissuaded. “Have you ever met him?”
“No. Should I?”
The footman swung open the door.
Fee gave a little shake of her head. “I understand he is very handsome. He has five thousand a year and a house in Bath. So, yes. I think you must meet him, Ev.”
“Looks, a house, and money are not—”
“I know.” She waved a hand. “Irrelevant. I will take a long look at him tonight and will report on all his warts.”
“Just what I hoped for!” he told her, laughing.
The exchange left Inès admiring the easy relationship between brother and sister. A thing to be savored. One to be treasured. And remembered.
She hugged Halsey’s arm as he led her down from the carriage and up into the theater.
This was the first time Inès had attended a play in London, and it offered a contrast to the few she’d attended as a child in the royal towns of Blois and Amboise. She took her seat and wished she could recall more of her experience.
Still, this was exciting. Their box was to the right of the stage and toward the back of the theatre.
The view of the actors was excellent. If she had trouble hearing the actors, she didn’t mind.
She was not a fan of Shakespeare. Too dreary for her.
Macbeth was certainly more morose than most of the Bard’s plays.
She was more intrigued by the fact that her escort was more interested in her than the action on stage.
“You are bored to tears,” he whispered in her ear, leaning close. Fee had long since departed to her friend’s box.
Inès turned and happily found her mouth close to his lips. “I truly do not like your Tudor playwright.”
“Whom do you prefer?” His eyes were dark purple but twinkling in the subdued light from the stage.
“Molière.”
“Of course. I should have known.” He reached for her hand and tugged at the fingers of her gloves. She questioned his intentions with a sharp look, but he gave her a molten smile that told her far too much of his desire for her. “No one can see our hands, darling.”
“It ends soon,” she said, her heart pounding as he circled his thumb in her palm, then threaded his fingers with hers.
“I do regret that. You and I need more time.”
Her breathing made her chest heave. He noticed, his gaze dropping to her throat but no further.
The décolleté of her gown was lower than her usual style.
She’d worn a new one designed last week for her and delivered only this morning.
The tissue was dark-violet chiffon and far more scandalously cut than she usually wore, but she wanted him entranced.
Wicked of her, it was. But she had not been able to stop herself.
She could play at desire, too. “How much time?”
“How long would you like it to be?” With his eyes, he made love to her mouth.
She could not breathe. “Do you think I entertain men all the time? That I know this…this ritual you and I play? I do not.” She snatched away her hand and moved to one corner. “I want to go home. Now, s’il vous pla?t.”
“I apologize. I offended you when I am merely trying to test the waters. To see if—”
“To see if I want you? You…you have kissed me before! Why question if I care, when every word you say sets me afire?”
He looked duly chastised. “Does it? I am sorry, my darling. I did not mean to confuse you. I meant…yes, I meant to tempt you to see if you cared for me enough to allow me…”
“Allow you what?” she dared him with fury. “The ultimate?”
“No.”
“What, then?”
“I would not take from you anything you do not freely wish to give. And I would not ask you merely for an hour or a night.”
“No, I would not agree.” She would not ever give herself away for a temporary prize. Besides, she was still angry, frustrated like a young girl, deprived of his sweetness.
“Good. I would have you for more than that.”
What was he saying?
“I like all of you,” he declared. “I approve of all I see.”
She tore her gaze from his look of raw desire. She wished he never delved deeper. He must not see the whole of her. Yet he would. One day when she could do nothing but change it.
For the remainder of the play, he did not touch her. And in his carriage, he did not sit beside her, but opposite.
At her door, he did act the gentleman and properly kissed her hand. But he gave no adieu or word of seeing her tomorrow or the next day.
She raced up the stairs to her rooms, aching to have him for all the rapturous tomorrows she would never claim with him.
#
Two days later, his mother held an afternoon reception, and the party of ten adjourned to the back parlor to play cards. Halsey sat down with two others and Inès. Less than an hour later, the two guests begged off. His mother followed.
Halsey sat grinning at the lady he adored. “I’m awfully glad I wagered no money on that game.”
“I am delighted you heeded my warning.”
“How did you win so quickly?”
She waved a hand. “I count cards.”
“You have a mind for complexities.”
She tipped her head back and forth. “For impossibilities.”
His expression died. “What is impossible for you?”
To love you. To love you well and respectfully. “I hope for happiness. I try to work toward it.”
“Might another help you discover that?”
“My mother told me no. A person must make their own.”
He pinned her with a hard gaze. “Mine told me having a partner you respect helps.”
She tipped her head in thought and smiled. “Perhaps that is so. I do not know.”
“You have never been tempted to love?”
Not until now. “No.”
“Allow me to explore that with you.”
She must not want him, need him, or love him. “I should not.”
“You want to? So say it.”
She swallowed hard on the response she should give him.
“No? Very well,” he said with only triumph in his voice. “For now, I accept that you permit me near. I cannot bear to know the reasons why you should not want me.”
She lifted her shoulders. “Is that wise?”
“Instinct often reveals more than wisdom.”
“You know this to be true?”
“Ah, yes. In the work I do, instinct is a good teacher to cultivate.”
Exactly what she should fear with him. Yet she put her trust in his high regard of her. Foolish. But true.
#
The next day, she and Halsey went riding in Hyde Park. Halsey had hired the stable hand to ride with them because Fee had begged off. His sister was instead at home receiving the young army captain, Lord Porter, home from India, whom she had met last night.
Halsey was on a gelding he boarded in a stable nearby. For Inès, he hired a mare he knew to be calm.
“You need not have asked for one so genteel,” she informed him when they walked their mounts through the gates of Hyde Park. She would show him how independent she was by nature.
“No? Why is that?”
She gave him a triumphant laugh and drove her heels into the mare’s sides, and off they went!
Minutes later, after racing her down, he took her home. In his carriage, he sat on the opposite side from her. Again.
She noted too that he did not attempt to put his hands on her in any intimate way. Her disappointment outdid her need of him. She ground her teeth.
“Giving up on kissing me, are you?” she teased him as his carriage idled in front of the Ashleys’ townhouse. Yes, she was once more angry…and hungry for his every endearment.
“Biding my time.”
She arched one brow, miffed with him. “You are waiting for me to give you a sign that we are done?”
He looked her over, toes to hat and back down to eyes once more. “Done? You mean playing this game of hide-and-seek?”
She sucked in air. “Why would you think that?”
“Because, ma chérie, I see when you look at me; I feel when you stand near me; I know when you breathe that you want me. Mere words cannot dissuade me, my darling. Do stop fighting this attraction. The sooner you do, the sooner we will get on.”