Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
Hell.
Benedict was bound for the deepest depths, and he deserved every eternal second of it.
Halfway to sober, the walk to his too small, too expensive townhouse was enough to excise the last of the liquor from his pores—though not nearly enough to dampen the lust thrumming through his veins each time he caught Eliza’s earthy scent lingering on his fingers.
She had been luminous in the moonlight. Lovely and undone for him, and so responsive. Even if he weren’t a villain preparing to ruin her, he’d never deserve her.
Nothing had ever cost him as much as pulling away from her.
Tonight, he’d touched her with no motive other than her pleasure.
It had been glorious to watch her peak in his arms for the first time.
But the memory was tinged with the repugnant understanding that it would never be that way again—pure, adoring, hopeful.
No, the next time Benedict was intimate with her, it would be with ruin in his heart. As the thought settled into his spine, the scotch in his stomach revolted.
He retched against a gate two houses down.
When he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, his palm came away wet—tears he hadn’t noticed.
He didn’t feel better for expelling the contents of his stomach.
Nothing would make him feel better. If the mere thought left him feeling so filthy, vile, then the reality… He would never be clean again.
When he finally started back down the street, it was with a prayer that Bella was already abed. Her presence would only impede his self-castigation.
Disappointment settled in his gut when he saw a candle burning brightly through the window. She was awake.
The temptation to sneak past Bella to his bed to sort out the warring desires of reminiscence and censure was overwhelming. But he knew his sister too well. A locked door wouldn’t deter her if she thought he had intelligence worth knowing.
Instead, he made his way straight to the drink cart beside the mantel and overpoured a glass of scotch, refusing to face his sister on petty principle. He brought the drink to his lips and swallowed it in one gulp.
The glass clinked as he set it down. The knot in his throat—not loosened by the scotch—threatened to choke him.
“Oh, good Lord, you’ve fallen for her.” Bella’s horrified proclamation echoed in his ears.
“I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” he directed to the drink tray while he refilled the glass. He accidentally sloshed some onto his breeches where Eliza’s honey remained. He ignored the devastated pang in his chest. He was a lecher of the highest order.
“Top me off? It seems I will need it.”
Benedict snagged the bottle of gin Bella preferred and took it to her, preparing to face her judgmental gaze. She propped her elbow on the arm of the settee, glass held aloft in her raised hand. He splashed a finger into the glass before returning the bottle to the cart.
Finally, he could delay no longer and eased into the chair across from her. The spring poked his back, but he forced himself to remain still.
Bella was partly undone for the evening, her hair in a braid but still in her skirts, with her bodice only half buttoned.
“Whatever you’ve done tonight can be fixed. But for the love of all that is holy, please tell me you haven’t actually fallen for the chit.” Bella’s voice remained a lyrical alto, even as she spewed hateful things. Benedict chafed at the insult to Eliza, masking his irritation with a casual sip.
“Benedict…”
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Bell,” he said, avoiding her gaze.
Benedict had never been so unraveled. Between West’s impassioned warning, the ecstasy of Eliza’s touch, the lingering nausea of his own self-hatred, and now Bella’s imminent fury—he was wrung out.
Wrung out and craving the comfort of Eliza’s arms with a ferocity he hadn’t thought possible.
How easy would it be to pretend none of this existed? To run back to Eliza’s breathtaking gardens and pleasure her until sunrise. To be the sort of man who could love her as she deserved?
Bella interrupted his fanciful musings. “I need you to assure me that you haven’t done the stupidest possible thing you could’ve done.”
The denial was instinctive, bubbling up in his throat, but his mouth refused to form the words.
“One job, Benedict. Do not fall for the pretty face. I even chose the less fortunate sister, and for precisely this reason.”
He caught the inside of his cheek between his molars, gnawing at the flesh until he tasted blood.
“This is it. There’s no turning back. It’s not as though you can abandon one and seduce the other—not now. Besides, you’d probably be writing sonnets for that one in another two days.”
“I know that. You don’t have to remind me what’s at stake.” He tipped back the last of his scotch, savoring the burn in his raw cheek. Why had he ever stopped drinking?
“It’s not as though I can ruin her on your behalf. I don’t possess the necessary genitalia.”
“Thank you, Bella, for that crass reminder. I’d quite forgotten.”
His dismissal must have struck a chord, because she snapped.
“Twenty-eight years—longer than I’ve been alive.
For twenty-eight years we’ve clawed our way back up from hell, waiting for precisely this moment.
Now you’re going to fuck it up. And for what?
A pair of doe eyes staring at you like you hung the stars? ”
“Enough! I know what is at stake. I know what I need to do. I should remind you, Eliza is not responsible for our misfortunes! She is an innocent bystander—and the one who will pay the price.”
“She’s been more than happy to enjoy the fruits of our ruin though, hasn’t she?” Bella hissed.
“You think every shilling Father lost wasn’t initially gained by the ruin of someone or other? Don’t be naive, Bella—it doesn’t suit. If the boot were on the other leg, you’d be sipping chocolate with every meal. We’re the same—just less lucky.”
“The same? Your Eliza is the daughter of a cheat! We’re the children of the wronged man!
We’re nothing at all the same. I need you to assure me.
Can you still do this?” She tossed whatever book she had been reading aside with a thump before she straightened and made her way to the drink cart. “Father—”
“I said I know! I know what is at stake! I’ll do it. Only I don’t see the need to revel in it.”
“You’ll revel in it plenty once you have her in your bed,” she spat.
“Stop talking about her. Hell, stop thinking about her.”
Bella took a dainty, ladylike sip, a sharp contrast to the venom of her words.
“If you believe I’ll be able to do that, you’re the naive one.
You need to ruin her, Ben. And soon. Wayland has far too much reach— Alice wrote.
He’s sent a dunner all the way to Blackwood.
Thank God Father was cup-shot and out of the way when he arrived.
But Wayland isn’t a fool. He will figure out the connection. Then you’ll never see her again.”
She was right. West didn’t know, didn’t understand. Growing up, he’d had nothing to begin with. He didn’t know what it was to lose it all.
But if she was right, why was a war raging inside his chest?
Every inch of him revolted at the thought of never seeing Eliza again, never running his fingers through her wild curls, never tasting those full lips, never setting eyes on those pebbled nipples that had teased his chest. His stomach threatened to rebel.
But his head… It snatched onto the hope Bella had inadvertently provided.
Wayland would keep Eliza safe. She would be sad for a little while, but then someone would see what those other fools hadn’t.
Probably that damned Bellemere. Eliza would wed.
He would give her a beautiful garden, and she would give him beautiful children.
She would have a better man—a man who wouldn’t destroy her.
And Benedict would forget her—eventually.
Surely there was enough liquor and enough willing bodies in the whole of Cornwall to excise Eliza Wayland from the piece of his heart she had ruthlessly claimed.
He might have to cut that part off, but Eliza was a generous soul; she’d surely have picked a convenient corner he would hardly miss.
“You can do this. You were made for this, Benedict,” Bella clawed him away from the tempting hope forming. Was she right? Was that all he was made for? He existed for the sole purpose of dousing the light that was Eliza Wayland?
Or was West right? Was he meant for more than this?
“Promise me, Benedict.”
“Right.” He swallowed the metallic tang that pooled along his tongue. “I will.”
Bella surged forward, refusing to allow him more time to think. “What have you planned for tomorrow— Well, later today?”
Benedict released a sigh and turned his gaze back on Bella as she settled back on the ratty settee. “Nothing. I’ve a fight, remember? Need to afford this hovel somehow.”
“I suppose it cannot hurt for her to miss you for one day. Are you confident that Wayland will not learn of your fight?”
“Not at all. But unless you wish to earn next week’s rent on your back, I’ve no other ideas.
” Benedict regretted the comment as soon as he’d said it, but Bella had pushed him too far tonight.
She was full of problems and empty of solutions—as always.
But usually the problems didn’t make his heart clench and his cock twitch.
“Don’t be absurd. I’d never allow a man above me. He’d earn the honor of paying me on his knees where he belongs.”
Benedict’s snort took him by surprise. Lately, it was difficult to remember why he cared for Bella the way he did—until she said something crude and he remembered the brash, sharp-tongued rebel she could be.
She continued, “Perhaps I can visit our other project while you’re otherwise occupied.” His appreciation was followed by a sharp reminder that she was a pain in his arse.
“Leave her. I mean it.”
“Why? Will I foil your well-considered plan to fall cock-first in love with her?”
Benedict rather thought he’d fallen for Eliza’s mind first, but that probably wasn’t the central point of Bella’s comment.
“I said leave her, Bella.”
She rolled her eyes but didn’t offer a counter remark. Instead, she rose and found his side. At first he thought she would leave him without comment, but she surprised him, stopping at his side with one hand on his shoulder.
“If you fail… Father—vengeance—it’s all he lives for now.”
“I know.”
“He’ll burn it all down on his way to hell. Everything we’ve worked for. He may not hurt you physically any longer, but there are other ways to destroy someone.”
“Goodnight, Bella,” he said pointedly. She squeezed his shoulder before sauntering off, placing her empty glass on the mantel as she passed.
Sometimes Benedict hated how well his sister could read him. She had sensed the inkling notion that had taken hold during their conversation—let Wayland discover the connection. He would end it, and Eliza would be safe. And Bella knew precisely how to slam the door on that line of thinking.
Benedict understood his father’s capabilities. If Benedict failed, Ambrose Sinclair would burn the world. And it wouldn’t only be Benedict he destroyed.
It had all seemed so simple. But Benedict hadn’t foreseen Eliza.
He hadn’t expected her sharp wit and gentle heart, nor her kissable lips, tender caresses, and wild hair.
If he went through with this—when—it wouldn’t only destroy Eliza socially, it would gut her.
His own chest ached at the thought of her dark eyes filled with sorrow.
Christ, she had been glorious. Sweet smelling and responsive and so eager to please. And he would shatter it.
Perhaps it was in his blood. His father ruined everything he touched. Benedict had never met his grandfather, but he’d done an abysmal job in raising his son.
Benedict swallowed the scotch, grateful it no longer burned. With luck, tomorrow’s fight would finish what he couldn’t. And then he wouldn’t be the one to break her.