Chapter Fourteen #2
“You don’t have to be strong every moment,” he said quietly. “Not with me.”
“If I’m not strong, then what am I?” The words caught in her throat. Her deepest fear, rising to the surface despite her best efforts to keep it buried.
Edmund went still.
For a long moment, he simply looked at her, really looked, the way he had that first day at the assembly, the way he had when he called her remarkable. As though he was seeing something she could not see herself.
“You are my wife,” he said finally. His voice was soft but absolute, leaving no room for argument. “You are the most capable woman I have ever known. You are sharp and brilliant and impossible and kind.” He took a breath. “And anyone who wishes to hurt you will have to come through me first.”
Helena’s eyes filled.
She had not cried in years, had taught herself to swallow tears, to convert grief into action, to be strong because someone had to be strong and there was no one else. But Edmund’s words cracked something open inside her. The gentleness of them. The absolute, unwavering certainty.
Anyone who wishes to hurt you will have to come through me first.
She blinked rapidly, forcing the tears back. She would not cry. Not here. Not now.
Edmund reached for her hand.
His fingers closed around hers, warm and steady, exactly as they had been on their wedding day. But this was different. This was deliberate. This was him choosing to touch her, to bridge the distance she had maintained, to offer comfort she had not asked for but desperately needed.
He lifted her hand and held it between both of his.
The world narrowed to the point of contact. His palms, slightly rough, cradling her fingers. The warmth of his skin seeping into hers. The careful way he held her, as though she were something precious. Something fragile.
His thumb traced a slow circle on her wrist.
Helena stopped breathing.
It was the smallest gesture, a single point of movement against her pulse point, but it sent electricity coursing through her entire body.
Her skin tingled where he touched her. Her heart hammered against her ribs.
Every nerve ending she possessed had focused itself on that one point of contact, on the gentle pressure of his thumb tracing circles against her racing pulse.
They stood there in the moonlight, holding hands on a terrace while a ballroom full of people waited inside. It was the most intimate they had ever been. More intimate than the almost-kisses, more intimate than the charged silences, more intimate than anything Helena had allowed herself to imagine.
For this moment, for these precious seconds, she let herself feel it. Let herself want. Let herself pretend that she was brave enough to reach for what he was offering.
A sound from inside, a burst of laughter, a crash of music, broke the spell.
Helena pulled her hand back.
Edmund let her go. His expression was carefully neutral, but she could see the effort it cost him. Could see the longing he was trying to hide.
“We should return,” she said. Her voice came out steadier than she felt. “People will notice our absence.”
“Let them notice.”
“Edmund.”
“I meant what I said.” His voice was quiet but fierce. “Every word. I will not stand by while anyone hurts you. Not Clarissa. Not Reginald. Not anyone.”
Helena looked at him, really looked, and saw the truth of it in his face. He meant it. He would fight for her. Not because their matrimony required it, not because Reginald’s legal challenge demanded it, but because he wanted to.
Because she had captured his affections.
She had known it since the parlour. Had carried the knowledge for weeks, turning it over in her mind like a stone she could not set down. But seeing it now, seeing his devotion written in the set of his jaw and the fire in his eyes, made it real in a way it had not been before.
“Thank you,” she said softly. It was not enough. It would never be enough. But it was all she could give him right that moment.
Edmund nodded once. He offered his arm again, and she took it, and together they returned to the ballroom.
He watched her dance with someone else.
She was composed again. Perfect again. The mask firmly back in place, her smile polished, her movements graceful. Anyone watching would see the Duchess of Westmere at the height of her powers, confident, elegant, and untouchable.
Edmund saw the truth underneath.
He saw the slight tension in her shoulders that betrayed exhaustion. Saw the careful way she held herself, as though she were made of glass and might shatter at any moment. Saw the shadow that flickered across her face when she thought no one was watching.
She let me hold her hand, he thought. For thirty seconds, she let me hold her hand.
He could still feel the ghost of her pulse beneath his thumb. The warmth of her skin. The electric shock that had passed through him when she did not pull away.
Thirty seconds. That was all he had been given. Thirty seconds of her hand in his, her wrist beneath his thumb, her eyes meeting his in the moonlight.
He would level this entire ballroom for thirty more.
The realisation should have frightened him. The intensity of it, the all-consuming nature of his wanting. He had never felt this way about anyone, had never understood how affection could make men do desperate things, irrational things, things that defied logic and reason and self-preservation.
He understood now.
He would do anything for her. Would face any enemy, endure any hardship, and sacrifice any comfort if it meant keeping her safe. He would burn his own world to the ground if that was what she needed.
And she had no idea.
Or perhaps she did. Perhaps she had seen it in his face tonight, when he had taken her hand and traced circles on her wrist and told her that anyone who wished to hurt her would have to come through him first. Perhaps that was why she had pulled away, why she had retreated back to her walls, her composure, and the careful distance she maintained between them.
She was afraid. He had seen it in her eyes, in the question she had asked: If I’m not strong, what am I?
She did not know that she was more than her strength.
Did not know that he valued her softness as much as her steel, valued the way she laughed when she was surprised, adored the way she hummed when she thought no one was listening.
He cherished the way her face transformed when she spoke about books or her sister or anything that truly mattered to her.
She thought strength was all she had to offer. She did not realise she had already given him so much more.
The dance ended. Helena’s partner, some viscount whose name Edmund had not bothered to remember, bowed and escorted her to the edge of the floor. She looked across the room and found Edmund’s gaze, and for a moment, something passed between them.
Not words. Not promises. Just… acknowledgment. Recognition. The silent communication of two people who had stood on a terrace and held hands and had not spoken of what it meant.
Edmund crossed the room to her side.
“Another dance, Duchess?” He kept his voice light, offering her an escape if she wanted one.
Helena looked at him. Her mask was still in place, but beneath it, he could see something softer. Something warm.
“I believe I would like that, Your Grace,” she said.
He led her onto the floor. The music began, a waltz, slow and sweeping. He placed his hand on her waist, felt her hand settle on his shoulder, and tried not to think about how right it felt to hold her.
They danced.
And for the length of that waltz, for those precious few minutes, the walls between them did not matter. The fears did not matter. The terms they had agreed to, the distance they maintained, the careful choreography of their matrimony, none of it mattered.
There was only the music, and the movement, and Helena in his arms.
It was not enough.
But it was something.