He had never thought to be stripped bare again.
Her lips had parted in surprise, and he could almost feel the warmth of her breath, the very essence of her life, pulling him closer.
“I would not take you for granted either,” she murmured, and reached out a hand to brush, so lightly, over his fingers.
Another touch, just as she’d given him when they first met and when she showed him how to write. Each time, he showed her a weakness, and she still reached out to him. That was a miracle in itself, and the sensation of her touch, forbidden and strange and sweet, woke his skin. Heat arrowed through his body: wistful desire, blessed hope.
Yes, hope. He had hope that he could rebuild his life. Though he knew he could not do it on his own. He needed Caroline for that.
It was hard to remember his carefully calculated reasons, sitting here in front of the fire.
Perhaps Frances sensed his sudden confusion; maybe he’d tensed. She pulled her hand from his, looked back at the fire again, and said in her damnably calm voice, “Doggedness.” Her tip-tilted eyes crinkled in a smile, and he knew she wasn’t annoyed. “That’s my answer to your dignity. Doggedness is probably the best quality I have, though also the worst.”
The change of subject was a relief; they’d been growing a bit too fraught. They couldn’t begin grabbing each other’s hands at every opportunity or people would talk, and that wouldn’t do either of them any good. A companion was in a precarious position in society; it wouldn’t take much to send her tumbling.
A quick tumble, that made him remember. Frances’s words about soldiers the first time they had met. It had been so long since Henry’d had a tumble, he could hardly remember the sensation. Understandable, then, how much it was on his mind; how tense his body felt, how aware of Frances’s closeness, of her every touch.
But this wasn’t the time or the place or the person for such thoughts.
“Come now, it can’t be both best and worst.” His voice came out clipped as he tried to quit thinking tumble, tumbled, tumbling. He waved a hand for a servant. “What do you care for, Frances? Tea or sherry?”
She thought for a moment. “Tea would be a wiser choice than sherry. You are always trying to get me intoxicated so you can learn secrets from me, aren’t you? One would think you’d been a spy.”
Henry snorted and asked for a tea service to be brought over, then turned back to Frances. “If I’d been a spy, I’d have much subtler methods. But I’ve never been very subtle. Not even before the war.”
“Maybe that’s your best and worst quality, then.” She smiled a quick thanks at the footman who set a tea tray down on a low table between their chairs. “Sugar for you, Henry?”
Henry considered. He’d gotten out of the habit of drinking tea sweetened—or indeed, regularly at all—during his tent-centered life in the army. “Yes,” he decided. “Two spoonfuls, please.” He had a taste for something new.
He watched her pour out the tea, her movements efficient and graceful as though they had been practiced thousands of times. And probably they had. She’d once said she was the daughter of a baronet, had she not? He wondered how she’d tumbled into the role of a companion.
Damn it. Tumbled again. His whole body felt tight and eager.
Frances held out a cup and saucer to him, and he tugged his mind back to the tea tray. The cup rattled faintly in its frail willow-patterned saucer, and he extended his hand, then paused. How to take it with one hand? If he held the saucer, he wouldn’t be able to lift the cup.
After cutting his eyes sideways to ensure that the tune of “Mr. Beveridge’s Maggot” was still issuing from the pianoforte, that Caroline and Emily were still practicing their steps with the glee of debutantes, he shook his head at Frances. “Just the cup, please.”
“Oh, of course.” She rolled her eyes at her own mistake. “Sorry about that.” She twirled the teacup so he could grip its tiny handle, then laid the unneeded saucer on the tray again.
He took a too-sweet sip, then returned to the thread of their conversation. “So. You think subtlety isn’t always necessary?”
Frances stirred milk into her own teacup as she considered. “Not for men, no. Subtlety’s probably more important for women. We’re permitted only the flimsy weapons of speech rather than anything really satisfying. Sometimes I think it would be much easier just to shoot out our troubles instead of keeping a smile pasted on all the time.”
Henry let out a low bark and wiggled his fingers against the porcelain cup, trying to keep its hot contents from burning him. “Shooting isn’t always the fun it may seem.”
Another gulp drained his tiny teacup to the dregs. It was syrupy at the bottom, with sugar grains not yet dissolved.
Well, he could use some help to sweeten his speech, because he had something difficult to say to Frances. He was getting too distracted by his alliance with her when it was secondary to his true strategy.
“Frances.” He leaned forward and set his teacup down on the tray. “Look, I’ve got to tell you something.”
Her cup clattered in her saucer. “Then tell me.”
They had just excused the male sex from the need to be subtle, yet Henry didn’t want to be too blunt. “It’s about Caroline. I—well, I’d prefer to court her on my own from this point.”
He stared at his teacup, lonely and saucer-less on the silver-plated tea tray, as though its dregs held all the mysteries of the universe. He didn’t want to watch her face change at his words; whether it was disappointed or relieved, it would be better not to know.
“You don’t care to have my help anymore?” The question sounded light enough, simply seeking information. He looked up, and her face was a sweet mask.
He sidestepped the question. “I’ve been honored by your help. But I think it would be fairest to all of us if I proceeded alone.”
“You want to be fair? How so?”
“None of the other suitors have ever received assistance from you,” he said lamely.
“I see,” she said with that careful smile on her face again. “You don’t want to give yourself an unfair advantage in winning Caroline.”
“That’s not what I meant. I’m well aware that Caro isn’t in the slightest danger of being swept off her feet by me or any other suitor.”
He turned in his chair to regard Caro. She and Emily now stood by the pianoforte, laughing as they shuffled through the sheet music, making a snowstorm of paper around Bart. In truth, Caro looked just as happy plunking sour notes on the pianoforte as she had playing cards, dancing at a ball, entertaining suitors. Her mood was constant sunshine—never a cloud, never a storm.
This was why the ton loved her and admired her and sought her company. But did Henry have any idea what lay below that sunny surface?
Yes, he did. He had the letters.
He looked back to Frances, whose odd smile had begun to unbend. “What do you mean, then?” she asked.
“Just that… well, it’s my puffed-up dignity.” It rather magnified the indignity by having to speak of it, so he leaned forward, spoke lower. “I’d rather see whether I can court her successfully on my own.”
She picked up her teacup again, wrapping both hands around it as though pulling warmth from the tiny vessel. “So, just to be perfectly clear, you don’t want me to intercede at all.”
“Right,” Henry said, relieved when she nodded. “And I’ll tell the same to my sister-in-law.”