Chapter 28
I’m such a fool, asking her to come to my bedroom, Reeves chastised himself as they walked along. I should have asked her to sit with me somewhere else.
But wouldn’t that have been equally foolish?
After all, the things he wanted to give her were right here, just a few steps away from where they currently stood.
There seemed to be no point in sending her down to the sitting room to wait for him.
It was a bit more proper, perhaps, but the two of them had blurred the lines of propriety more than once, and anyway, she would be gone tomorrow.
It wasn’t as if she was going to be around him anymore.
Perhaps that’s why she’s leaving. Maybe she’s tired of the way I conduct myself around her. Maybe I offended her when I insisted on examining her injured ankle, or when I put my arms around her at the lake.
He couldn’t bring himself to regret those things, though.
Those were moments that would stay with him long after she’d gone.
It was part of the reason he knew he wouldn’t be able to bring himself to write to her, though she’d asked for it.
It would have been far too sad, thinking about everything they had shared—even if most of those things had only taken place in his imagination.
Would she let me embrace her one final time?
Should I allow myself that, or would it be better to turn away here and now, to start breaking free of her while I feel able to do it?
He didn’t know. He had never had the opportunity to choose how he said farewell to a person before. Rosalie’s death had been too unexpected for that. And then, too, there was the fact that Rosalie… well, she simply hadn’t meant as much to him as Bridget did.
They reached his room, and he opened the door, hesitating in the hall. He wouldn’t force her across the threshold. “Would you like to come inside?”
Courage or foolishness drove her to step into the dimly lit room. As soon as she was in, Reeves felt his heart rate increase.
The last woman who had set foot in his bedchamber had been Rosalie. That had happened exactly one time—the night they had conceived Emma. It had taken only one attempt. She’d kept to her own chambers before and after that event.
And now, here was Bridget, and her presence was like a flame in a room that had been dark for too long. It kept him from seeing anything else clearly.
He swallowed. “I just wanted to give you some things before you left,” he said. “For the orphanage.”
“Oh?”
He went to the shelf beside his bed and picked up the bag he had set there.
“This is for the children,” he said. “I’ve spent a lot of evenings thinking about the nights Emma spent in that orphanage.
It horrifies me. I know the place is safe and as pleasant as it can be, and yet the thought of my daughter there…
most of those children don’t have a father coming to collect them. ”
“That’s very true,” Bridget said softly. “It’s generous of you to think about that.”
“It’s important to me to do something for the place that did so much for Emma.” He handed her the bag.
She looked inside. “Books?”
“Some of the old children’s books that Emma has outgrown,” he explained.
“She has a few favorites that we’ll be holding onto, like the one we were reading from tonight.
But we’re finished with these, and they should go to a new home—to children who are going to enjoy them instead of leaving them on the shelf. ”
She beamed at him. “This is so generous, Reeves, truly. We never have enough books for the children. If you could see the way they read the same thing over and over, just because they have nothing else, it would break your heart. And that’s just the ones who can read at all.
Many have never learned, and though I try to teach them, without enough books to practice on, that can be very difficult.
This is going to help more than I think you realize. ”
“I’m glad,” Reeves said, a flush of pride rising within him. He hadn’t known whether his gift would be useful or not. That she would accept it graciously, he hadn’t doubted, but what did Reeves know of the needs of an orphanage?
He hadn’t always been noble, but he had never been without a home and a family that cared for him.
If he had wanted books as a child, he got them.
Things like this had never been in short supply.
So, he was glad to have discovered something the children at the orphanage genuinely needed, glad that his attempt to help them would be successful.
“I’ll send more books, too,” he told Bridget. “I’ll buy some and have them sent along.”
She was quiet for a moment. “You can do that, but you can’t write to me?”
He tensed.
“Never mind,” she said quickly. “I don’t know what made me say that. I shouldn’t have. Please put it out of mind.”
He couldn’t, though. It wasn’t so easy to forget her words.
Besides, she was right. He wasn’t going to write to her, not because doing so was a chore, but because he was weak.
He didn’t think he could manage the emotions of sending a letter to Bridget, telling her what was going on in a life she had chosen to leave behind.
Sending books was different because it only required him to think of the orphans.
He could manage it without having to think about her.
At least, he hoped he could.
Bridget slung the bag of books over her shoulder.
He saw the way it weighed her down, putting her off balance.
“Let me take that for you,” he said, holding out a hand.
That was what a gentleman would do—and it was also what someone who cared for her would do.
It was what he ought to do, even though she was leaving.
Bridget shook her head. “I have it.”
“Let me,” he insisted, reaching for the bag again. “It’s heavy. I’ll give it to my footmen to put in the carriage for you.”
“You can’t keep doing things for me, Reeves,” she said quietly. “I can take care of myself.”
She was right. He wasn’t going to be the person caring for her, much as he would like to have been.
It didn’t make sense to reach out and do these things for her—not anymore.
She would take care of herself from now on, and this was the first moment for Reeves to step back and let that happen.
As much as he wanted to show her what she had come to mean to him with continued chivalry, the separation between the two of them needed to begin.
“There’s one more thing I want to give you before you go,” he said.
“Something else for the children?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “Something for you.”
He had gone back and forth about whether he would actually give her the gift he had chosen.
It was the kind of gift a man gives to a woman he’s courting, and he knew that.
It wasn’t a gift for someone who had helped you look after your child for a while.
There was even a chance she would reject it because of that, and he knew that he would be humiliated if she did.
Perhaps it was better not to even take the chance.
But he wanted her to have it. The idea of keeping it, or of giving it back to the shop, was worse than humiliation.
He couldn’t write her letters. He couldn’t keep in contact. But this was a way of ensuring that she would take a piece of him away with her, and that she would never forget about him entirely.
At least, that was what he hoped.
He turned back to her and held out the small, thin box. “I thought about giving this to you this morning, for the ball,” he said. “But I decided to keep it for a farewell gift.”
She opened the box and let out a gasp. “Reeves…”
It was a necklace of silver, a simple chain that she would be able to tuck under a dress and keep out of sight. “I wanted something you could wear at the orphanage,” he explained. “Something that wouldn’t be too gaudy for your life there.”
“Still, it must have cost a fortune…”
It had been expensive, but certainly no more than she was worth. He lifted it carefully from the box. “May I?”
In response, she turned her back to him.
He fastened the clasp carefully, almost reverently, his fingers brushing against the bare skin of her neck. He lingered there for a moment, wishing that moment could be longer. Wishing that he could make something more of this last moment the two of them would ever be together.
And then caution abandoned him.
This truly was his last chance with her. She would be gone forever after today. He would never see her again, would never have another opportunity like this one.
He turned her in his arms.
Her eyes were wide. Her breathing was ragged and shallow, and as his gaze dropped to her lips, he saw that they were slightly parted. Her face was flushed with desire, and he felt sure that she was thinking the same thing he was.
He bent to her and pressed his lips to hers.
Immediately, the kiss went from exploratory to passionate as the taste of her drove him into a frenzy.
He wrapped his arms around her and crushed her body into his, needing more of her.
Needing this to be more. If he kissed her hard enough, deeply enough, maybe he could keep her beside him. Maybe that would make her stay.
Maybe…
What am I doing?
He broke away from her and held her back at arm’s length. Her lips were swollen from his kiss, and that sight was so alluring that he very nearly dove back in, but he managed to restrain himself.
This isn’t right. She might marry one day. She might leave the orphanage and find a husband—someone who can love her the way she deserves to be loved. Someone who isn’t a terrible brute like me, grabbing women and kissing them in his chambers. She doesn’t want this. Not with me. And she shouldn’t.
“You ought to go,” he said, hearing the gruffness in his voice, unable to control it. “You’ll need your rest if you’re going to be leaving in the morning.”
“Oh…” she sounded startled, maybe even sad. He ignored that. She wanted to go—she had said as much. If she were having second thoughts because of that kiss, that was all the more reason to put distance between the two of them.
“I’ll make sure a carriage is ready in the morning,” he told her. “One of my footmen will escort you back, so you’ll be sure of being safe on the road.”
He saw tears come into her eyes and wondered whether she had expected him to take her back. But she must have realized he couldn’t possibly leave Emma even if he wanted to. It simply wasn’t an option.
He turned away from her, unable to bear watching her tears. “Get some rest,” he told her. “Someone will come to wake you early in the morning so that you’ll be able to make the whole trip in one day. You don’t want to have to stop on the road.”
“All right,” she said softly, and despite the tears, her voice was even. “Thank you, Reeves. I appreciate your help in this.”
And then she was gone.