Chapter 7
“Ido not like this, Aggie.”
Evander’s heart spasmed as he heard the worry in Helena’s voice. The four of them were standing outside the servants’ quarters door, which was situated in the basement of the inn.
“I will be fine, Miss,” Aggie assured her, giving her a kind smile. “Harley will look out for me in there, won’t you, Harley?”
She asked, looking toward the driver.
The older man with kind brown eyes smiled and nodded.
“Of course I will. Worry not, Miss Robinson. Aggie and I will be just fine.”
Even though they both tried to assure Helena that the arrangement was all right, Helena still looked worried for her maid. That was the type of woman Helena was. Kind, caring. Even to those of lower rank.
“You could take the room with Miss Robinson, Aggie,” Evander offered, nodding toward Helena. “And I could stay down here with Harley.”
Aggie and Harley both laughed at that, only serving to sour his mood.
When Helena had fallen into his arms in the carriage, he had nearly gone mad.
He had not been able to resist wrapping his arms around her, needing to feel what it was like to hold her, if only once.
But just that little hint of physical touch had only served to worsen his torture, and now he was in more agony than he had been before.
“A duke in the servants’ quarters? The innkeeper would have an apoplexy!” Aggie laughed. “I shall be perfectly safe down here, I promise.”
Evander’s gaze shifted to Helena, and he immediately regretted it. Her worried expression only intensified the desire to wrap his arms around her and comfort her.
“She will be safe and sound,” Harley added. “Now, please, you two go upstairs and get warmed up. There is a chill in the air, and with all due respect, Your Grace, you need to get dried off right quick before you catch your death.”
With the flames of desire coursing through his veins, Evander severely doubted it. Even now, despite being drenched to the bone, he felt no chill in the air, even as Helena, Harley, and Aggie stood there shivering.
“Come along, Miss Robinson,” Evander gruffly ordered once Aggie and Harley disappeared into the full and bustling servants’ quarters. “You are trembling. Let us get you upstairs.”
“You were not serious about staying on the receiving floor, were you?” Helena asked him as they made their way up the stairs.
“Well, I do not jest much, but even I know that would not make for a laugh, given the circumstances,” Evander muttered, rubbing the metal key over and over in his hand; he was using it to ground himself, or at least try to.
“You should not do that,” Helena said as they climbed the stairs. “You are soaked to the bone! You need to disrobe and dry off at the very least!”
Evander let out a bark of a laugh as they finally reached the top floor.
“Yes, I am sure Jeremy would love to know that I shared a room with his betrothed and that I was undressed in front of her,” he retorted sarcastically. “The scandal would be of wild proportions.”
Helena tsked her tongue and scowled as he found the door he was looking for and opened it with the key.
A blast of warm, dry air hit him solidly in his face, and despite his mind screaming at him to get away from Helena, he stood there relishing the feeling.
Someone had already lit the fireplace and the oil lamps, giving the clean room a comforting glow.
There was a large bed directly in front of them, but the room was big enough to hold a small dining table and a chaise lounge by the fireplace as well.
His gaze snagged on the flames, and for one awful second, he was not in the room at all.
He was back in the dark, the smell of burning rope thick in his nose, his own screaming ringing in his ears.
His jaw clenched hard enough to ache, and he forced his eyes elsewhere, forced air back into his lungs until the room settled around him once more.
“Look at that,” Helena said, moving past him and into the room, oblivious to what had just passed through him.
“There is a folding changing wall. You can set it up between the chaise lounge and the bed. You could have your privacy while your clothes dry. This does not have to be as unseemly as you make it sound.”
“No,” Evander adamantly stated, stepping further into the room to put the key on the bedside table. “I told you, I will be fine downstairs. There is a fireplace down there as well.”
Evander barely heard her. He forced himself into the chair nearest the fire anyway, refusing to let it push him out of the room, and from there, he watched her argue while letting the rest of it wash over him.
He told himself he would leave after she finished what she had to say, but all he could think about was crossing the room in three steps.
He could take her face in his hands and finally find out what that mouth tasted like.
She stood close enough that he could see the pulse beating in her neck, and he wanted her so badly that his hands shook as they rested on his knees.
So he kept them there, and he did not move.
She would never want this from him, and he knew it. One good look at what lay beneath the cravat and the gloves, and she would scream in disgust. He had no illusions left on that score.
Did our letters mean anything to her? Does she even remember them?
He had loved her before he ever became a beast. And he wondered whether she had spared a single thought for the man who wrote to her, or whether she had folded him away and forgotten him the moment a better prospect walked through her door.
Scowling, Helena picked up the key and raced toward the door. Before he could register what she was doing, she locked it and slipped the key into her sleeve, giving him a triumphant look as she planted her hands on her hips.
Evander gaped, torn between shock and rage that she had ruined his plan so fast.
“Have you lost your mind? Give that back!” he ordered, raising a pointed finger at her.
“Dry off and I will,” she replied haughtily, shrugging a delicate shoulder.
When he glowered at her, Helena only glowered right back, raising a cheeky, challenging brow as if she were daring him to do something. Evander ground his teeth, his jaw ticking in irritation as he did his best to make her fold under his gaze.
“Glaring at me so hard is only going to give you a headache,” she stated coolly, taking a step toward him.
“This is all very improper. Jeremy would not—” he began to say.
“Jeremy would never forgive me if I allowed one of his oldest friends to catch his death in an act of unnecessary chivalry,” she cut him off.
The haughty expression on her face slowly shifted into one of almost remorse as she bowed her head.
“Furthermore, I would not…”
Evander’s rage cooled as a look of guilt came over her downcast face, and he could not help but reach out and slip his gloved fingers under her chin, coaxing her silently to look back up at him.
“You would not what?” he asked softly, caressing the buttery smooth skin of her chin with his thumb. Even that small touch felt so incredible that he could not hold himself back from caressing her a second time as she stood there, silently, with blushing cheeks and wide, beautiful eyes.
“Would not what?” he repeated.
Helena’s tongue darted out between her plump lips, and he nearly groaned, wanting so desperately to lean in and capture it with a kiss.
“I know we do not seem to prefer one another’s company,” she whispered. “Even so, I would not want to be responsible for your pain or discomfort. You have been through enough.”
Evander’s hand slipped away from her chin, and he took a step back. She knew. Of course, she knew; everyone whispered about it behind his back.
“I do not need your pity,” he stated, walking away from her and toward the fireplace. He stood close enough that the heat scorched his skin, and let it, as if the burn were a penance he owed for wanting her the way he did. “As you can see, I am quite fine.”
“It is not pity,” she countered, capturing his gloved hand. He turned to look at her and nearly fell to his knees as he met her pleading eyes.
“What is it then?” he rasped.
Helena blushed as she stroked the back of his black leather glove with her fingertips. Even through the fabric, her gentle touch shot sparks of pleasure into his flesh.
“It is compassion,” she answered quietly, gently tugging the leather glove away from his hand. “Empathy. I only wish to help you.”
Evander let out a humorless laugh as he began to loosen his suddenly too-tight cravat with his free hand. His mind, clouded by Helena’s soft touch and gentle voice, made him forget what his cravat and high collar were concealing.
“Such words sound kind enough, but from my experience, they are only different forms of pity,” he remarked, tossing the cravat away from him.
“Then you simply have not been patient enough to feel the difference,” Helena murmured, tracing her fingertips over the veins on the back of his bare hand.
He could not help but let his lashes flutter shut as he felt her touch. She was so soft, so tender in her touch. It made that beast inside him cease its roaring, and in seconds it was lying down, purring like a cat getting its belly scratched.
“Such strange veins,” she murmured, tracing them lightly. “Why do I not have them?”
Through the fog of pleasure, Evander searched for the energy to answer.
“They are from training,” he muttered, his lashes fluttering as the tips of her nails traveled over the back of his hand and down the length of his fingers.
He lifted his lashes lazily, taking in the gleaming gold of Helena’s hair as her head remained bowed over his hand.
When he had plucked the flower petal from those silky strands earlier, he had at once hated that he had been wearing gloves.
He wanted to feel that gold with his own fingertips, rub them, and see if some of its brilliance would pass into him.
“Training?” she asked, the soft lilt of her question like a caress over his ears. He made no move to stop her as she reached for his other hand and pulled that glove off as well, showing that one the same gentle attention as she did the other. “What sort of training?”
“Boxing,” he murmured, feeling his rigid body grow heavy with desire. “It helps.”
“With what?” Helena asked, those gentle tracing fingertips of hers lulling him deeper into peace.
“Th-the body,” he struggled to say. “Keeps it in form. Helps the mind, too. Keeps it from going places it should not.”
“Hmm,” Helena hummed as she continued her exploration. “I had no idea. I had thought boxing was such a brutish sport.”
He let out a soft chuckle.
“It certainly is,” he rasped, then his head fell back as she applied the smallest pressure to the heel of his palm. He could not help the groan that escaped his lips.
Her movements stopped at once.
“Did I hurt you?” she asked, her worry clear in her voice.
“No,” he all but groaned. “No, it feels…”
He was struggling to find the appropriate word when he felt Helena’s hands travel up to his wrists and pull back the fabric of his long sleeves.
Her gasp had him jolting out of his reverie in a way that was almost violent, and he snatched his hand away as he hurriedly covered the scars she had just exposed.
“Are those from boxing, too?” she asked, taking a step toward him.
“No,” he snarled, taking several steps back from her.
She looked up at him, her gaze finding the ring of scars around his throat that matched the ones on his wrists, and as understanding dawned in her green eyes, so did pity.
“That was… Those are…” she trailed off, shaking her head. “What did they do to you?”
“I am fine,” he snapped, snatching his gloves and cravat from the floor. “And out of patience with people’s pity.”
“Your Grace!” Helena’s brow furrowed as she moved to reach for his arm, but he again sprang back.
“Do not!” he snarled, going for the door.
He tried to turn the handle, but when it did not budge, he let out a growl of rage and banged his fist against the door.
“Give me the key,” he commanded, holding out his hand.
“Wait, Your Grace, listen to me.”
Evander could not stay in this room for another moment to hear what she had to say. He snatched her arm and yanked the sleeve up, ignoring the way his fingertips burned from the touch as they snaked up her naked flesh.
Helena shook her head and grabbed his arm, even as the look of pity in her eyes shifted to fear.
“No, you need to stay. You need to finish getting dry. You need to—”
“Do not touch me.” He pulled free and had the door open a moment later.
He raced down the stairs, taking two at a time until he finally made it to the ground floor, and made no move to stop even as people gasped and turned to look at him as he walked through the busy common room and toward the door.
He kept walking, past the stables and the last of the lamplight, until the road went dark under his boots, and then he ran.
The rain came down hard and cold, and he was glad of it.
He ran until his chest ached and his boots filled with water, but he could still feel her fingers on the back of his hand.
He could still hear that small sound she had made when she touched him, as though he were worth touching.
He swore into the darkness and kept moving.
He wanted her. There was no use pretending otherwise, soaked to the skin and aching with it. His desire had not cooled for all his running, and it shamed him as much as it burned.
It should have been me.
But it was Jeremy who would have her.
Evander stopped in the middle of the road and tipped his face up to the rain, fury, arousal, and pain all coursing through him.
What did Jeremy have that he did not? A face that did not frighten children.
A neck he could leave bare. He had never been taken, never been burned, never been made into a beast. Jeremy could stand up in a chapel, take her hand in front of God and everyone, and never once think to hide.
He had the perfect face and the perfect life, and now he would have her, too.
The woman he had seen first and should have been his.