Grantwell filled the resulting silence with conversation, but she was not attending and could not tell what he’d said.
The restaurant tables were mostly filled with the colourful uniforms of the Allied army, mostly red coats, but also some blue and black. Even two men all in dark green.
‘What uniform is the green one?’ she asked.
‘95th Rifles,’ Rhys answered curtly. The camaraderie they’d briefly shared a moment ago had disappeared again.
‘Rifle companies are attached to other regiments,’ Grantwell explained. ‘They carry Baker rifles and are used mainly as sharpshooters, picking off snipers and such.’
‘So the green helps them blend in,’ she said.
‘Yes!’ Grantwell was obviously impressed.
Helene even thought she saw the same emotion flicker in Rhys’s eyes, but perhaps that was only because she wished it. He would be surprised how much she knew about the army and the war. It had been the only way she could feel connected to him.
Grantwell expanded on his discussion of the Rifles. Helene thought she detected some weariness in the young captain. What a strain to carry the conversational weight in the company of two people who left more unspoken than spoken.
They had finished their coffee, the last serving of the meal, when two men in red coats with the same gold ribbons and cuffs as Rhys and Grantwell approached. ‘Grantwell! Landon!’
One clapped Grantwell on his shoulder. ‘Are you done with the meal? Come with us! We are off to La Cloche. The night is still young.’ He noticed Helene then and bowed. ‘Beg pardon, miss. I did not see you there.’
Grantwell made introductions. The men bid Helene goodnight and said they would be on their way. Grantwell gazed at their retreating figures, looking as if he were watching the last coach leaving for London.
‘Did you want to go with them?’ Rhys asked.
‘Another time, perhaps,’ Grantwell said, clearly disappointed.
‘Go on, then,’ Rhys said. ‘I’ll see Helene back to the hotel.’
Helene blinked in surprise. Was Rhys choosing her company? She quickly added, ‘You have devoted most of your day to me, Captain. Please go with your friends, if you wish.’
‘What about paying for the meal?’ Grantwell asked.
‘We’ll settle it later,’ Rhys said.
Grantwell looked convinced. ‘Very well, then.’ He stood. ‘I greatly enjoyed your company, Lady Helene. I hope we meet again.’
She liked this man. ‘As do I, Captain.’
He glanced at both Helene and Rhys. ‘Goodnight, then.’
Helene’s heart pounded. She and Rhys were alone.
CHAPTER NINE
It was a cool and clear night as Rhys walked side by side with Helene, as fine a night as he might have wished—if he and Helene were still betrothed. The streets were filled with other couples and plenty of soldiers, but the atmosphere was gay, not at all as if an enemy might soon be on their doorstep.
Helene, of course, looked lovely in the light of the street lamps, even though her dress and bonnet were more practical than opulently adorned. She adjusted her shawl.
‘Are you warm enough?’ he asked.
‘Oh, yes,’ she responded, a bit breathless. ‘I enjoy the brisk air.’
Rhys kicked himself for being unable to resist his desire to be alone with her, for being lulled into believing he could do so without reliving the pain of the past.
He felt her muscles tense where his arm brushed hers. She straightened. ‘I am glad of this evening, Rhys. I am glad we are able to spend this time as friends.’
His guard went up. He had no intention of discussing their relationship—or lack of one. He ought to ignore her comment.
Instead he said, ‘Friends? Is that what we are?’ He could never think of her as a mere friend.
She blinked. ‘I mean, can we not put the past behind us? It was so long ago and we were so young then.’
This time it was his muscles that tensed. When he was with her the past came rushing back and the bad memories overshadowed the good ones. There was no putting the past behind him. At best he could bury it and push it down again if it burst through. He would not discuss this.
She faltered but went on. ‘I—I can see how suited to the army you are. It has turned out to be a good thing for you, has it not?’
Rhys kept his voice even. ‘All’s well that ends well?’
She released a long breath. ‘Perhaps.’
‘Ease your conscience then, Helene, if it troubles you. You did right to send your father to me that day.’ Rhys’s bitterness broke through his resolve not to speak of this. ‘I am well-suited for the army. I am a good officer. I have every expectation of advancing in rank, although I suspect that was not your father’s intention when he paid for my commission. I suspect he hoped I would become fodder for cannon.’
‘No!’ She stopped in the middle of the pavement. ‘You are wrong.’
They’d reached the cathedral. The distress in her face was such a contrast to her delight upon seeing the structure for the first time, he almost felt sorry for her.
‘My father wanted to help you!’ she insisted. ‘He didn’t want you to die!’
He led her closer to the cathedral and out of the way of other people more happily walking by. It seemed a conversation about the past was impossible to avoid.
‘Then why the army, Helene?’ Her father’s face came back to Rhys, precisely how he’d looked that day. ‘He wanted me gone. He offered me the one way I might be gone for ever. After all, a mere vicar’s son was not good enough to marry his daughter. He told me so. He told me you agreed that I had nothing to offer you. You sent him to deliver your message to me. I should leave the village and never see you again.’
‘No!’ Her voice rose. ‘I never said that—I didn’t mean that. Nothing so harsh. My father cared about you. He only wished to do well by you!’
‘Do well by me? Cared about me?’ He laughed again. ‘When he so helpfully met with me to tell me I must leave, my father was present, too, looking panic-stricken. It was clear my father’s position as vicar was also at stake. That seemed pretty harsh to me.’
That day the Earl of Yarford forced Rhys to leave behind everything dear to him. His home. His family. Helene. Rhys fought hard over the years to make the army compensate for that loss and he was proud to have largely succeeded.
Her eyes narrowed in pain. ‘My father forced you to go into the army? He threatened your father?’ She shook her head. ‘No. I cannot believe it.’
He raised his brows. ‘Then you think I am lying?’
* * *
Helene leaned her back against the cool stone of the cathedral as the past came rushing back.
Her father had not been a warm man. In fact, he’d never much bothered with Helene until he discovered she planned to elope with Rhys. After Rhys left, her father did press her to make a suitable marriage, but she’d thought he’d merely wanted to see her happy. He had become disgusted with her when she failed to accept any other proposals of marriage, but he’d turned his attention towards David and pretty much ignored her again.
Was it possible her father could have been so cruel to Rhys? To say such things to him and to threaten his father’s position?
Why would Rhys say so, if it were not true? Rhys never had lied to her before. He’d also never contacted her after the conversation with her father, as she’d felt sure he would. Suddenly it all made a sickening sort of sense. Rhys hadn’t contacted her, because he’d believed she never wanted to see him again. She almost crumbled to her knees. Rhys was telling the truth about what her father said to him. What could she do now to make things right between them? She wanted desperately for Rhys to believe she’d not known her father would be so cruel to him.
She lowered her head, searching for the words to make him unde
rstand how her father had twisted her good intentions.
‘My father did convince me to break our engagement,’ she admitted. ‘I did not want to listen to him but eventually he convinced me. He said you had no means of supporting me—or children, when it came to that. He said that you would be forced to live only on my dowry or depend upon my father for support—’
Rhys broke in. ‘He told me there would be no dowry if we married.’
Her father had threatened to withhold her dowry? That was another blow.
But she had no choice but to go on. To explain. ‘My father said a young man of your character would despise being kept by his wife or supported by her father. I knew you. I knew that would kill your spirit.’ She remembered how her father’s words had crushed her own spirit and how hard it had been to do what she thought was best for Rhys. She raised her eyes to him. ‘I could not do that to you.’
His eyes flashed. ‘Did it not occur to you that paying for my commission was precisely that? Supporting me? Making me dependent? Only he gave me no other alternative. Ruin my father or leave.’
She took in a breath. Yes. She could see that now, but back then she’d been convinced marriage to her would ruin him. She’d been left with no other choice.
The ache inside her grew unbearable.
His voice deepened. ‘What little faith you had in me, Helene.’
She met his eye again and spoke the truth. Please let him believe it. ‘I sent my father to tell you something entirely different than what you heard. I sent him to give you a future, not to be cruel to you.’
‘But you sent him all the same,’ Rhys countered.
He was twisting her words. Yes, she knew now it was a mistake for her father to speak to him, but her father had fooled her. She was desperate for Rhys to understand.
Her gaze held. ‘Can you not see, though, that we were wrong to plan an elopement, Rhys? No matter how we loved each other. We were not prepared. You could not have supported me.’
‘I would have found a way.’
‘How?’ She persisted. ‘Would you have gone into the Church? Studied law or medicine? Entered into banking or civil service? How could you have done any of those things without being supported by my father or dependent upon his help?’
Rhys’s face took on its hard edges again. ‘We will never know, will we? I had no opportunity to try.’ He stepped closer to her. ‘If you believed all your father said to you, why send him? Why did you not come to me? We could have made a different plan. Not marry until I could support you.’
She felt tears sting her eyes. This was what she could not forgive herself. At the time, she’d thought she’d have a chance to see Rhys again, to talk about the future, but she’d allowed her father to convince her he must speak to Rhys first. By the time she went in search of Rhys, he’d already gone.
Rhys pinned her against the stone of the cathedral, caging her between his arms. ‘Never mind, Helene. There is no going back. I have found my place in the army. Return to Yarford. Find some marquess to marry.’ His face was inches from hers, close enough for her to feel his warm breath against her lips, close enough for his masculine scent to envelop her and cause her senses to flare into awareness.
He took a breath and pushed away from her as he released it. ‘We should return to the hotel.’
She wrapped her shawl more tightly around her shoulders. They walked in a tense silence.
Helene’s senses still flared with need. He’d been about to kiss her, she was almost sure. And she’d wanted his kiss as acutely as a starving child wants a scrap of bread. His physical closeness drove every other thought from her mind and her mind had been spinning.
There was no way to undo the damage her father had done. Or the mistakes she had made. The past was lost to them. How hopeless it was.
How strange to feel hopeless when all hope had been gone for so long. Rhys’s life had moved on, even if hers had not. She’d merely filled her days.
They crossed the street in front of the cathedral where the carriage had nearly run her over and where he’d held her in his arms after rescuing her.
When they reached the other side, he stopped again. ‘I have one question.’
‘What is it?’ What more could possibly be said?
‘Why did you confess to your father that we were planning to elope?’
He thought she’d told her father? ‘I did not tell him!’ she protested. ‘He discovered it. He learned you’d hired a carriage and guessed the reason.’
‘And when he guessed, you admitted it.’ He crossed his arms over his chest.
Yes, she had admitted it! ‘Rhys! He tricked me. I was only eighteen!’
He said nothing more.
It was another shard from that time that had shattered her. She felt like a broken vase without any glue to fix her.
Well, she’d have to pick up the pieces like she’d done five years before and, painful as it was, she would manage to put herself together again.
* * *
Rhys left Helene at the front door of the hotel, not trusting himself to walk her to her room, not after he’d almost kissed her. From where had that impulse risen? It would have been more sensible for him to have walked away from her. Not that he could abandon her on a Brussels street at night.
He returned to those streets, walking as quickly as if being pursued.
He’d never intended to talk to her about the past. Why had he taken her bait? What good had it done? It altered nothing. Even if her father had been honest with her about what he’d intended to say to Rhys, the chance for them to carve out a life together had long disappeared, if it ever existed at all. The army was where Rhys belonged now. The army fulfilled him. Gave him great pride. He wanted no other life. He’d thwarted Helene’s father. The army had not killed him. It had enabled him to thrive.
Rhys found himself on the Rue d’Anderlecht near La Cloche, where Grant had been headed with Treadway and Strutton. Knowing those two, they would not stay long in one place, but Rhys could use a drink. Not beer. A real drink.
He entered the place, crowded with other soldiers, smelling of sweat and hops. Through the din he heard his name. ‘Rhys! Over here.’
Grant was seated at a table alone. Well, not quite alone. There was a gaudily dressed Belgian woman Grant unceremoniously pushed off his lap.
Rhys raised his brows as he reached the table. ‘Am I intruding?’
Grant waved an impatient hand. ‘Not at all. She’ll recover. Plenty of men to choose from.’ He directed Rhys to sit. The woman shrugged and walked away.
Rhys looked around before lowering himself into the chair. ‘Where are Treadway and Strutton?’
Grant took a sip of a large stein of beer. ‘They’ve departed. With female company.’
‘Whisky,’ Rhys called to the tavern maid. ‘Bring the bottle.’
Grant’s eyes widened and he raised two fingers to the tavern maid. ‘Two glasses.’ He leaned his elbows on the table, giving Rhys a direct look. ‘So. What happened?’
‘What do you mean what happened?’ Rhys settled in his chair.
‘What happened that you are asking for whisky?’ Grant persisted.
The tavern maid placed a whisky bottle and two glasses on the table. Rhys handed her some coins and poured a glassful.
He drank half the glass at once but still did not speak.
Grant poured a glassful for himself. He lowered his voice. ‘Should I not have left you two alone at the restaurant?’
Rhys regarded his friend, who he knew would not press him further. ‘Maybe some day I will tell you the whole, but not tonight.’
‘I comprehend completely.’ Grant, experienced in being betrayed, lifted his glass. ‘Well, who knows? Maybe a French cannonball will hit us both in a few days’ time. Then none of this will mean anything at all.’
* * *
Helene woke early the next day, thinking of Rhys, as she had on and off throughout the night. That she’d slept at all was a surprise. He’d aroused a yearning in her, one that she thought she’d succeeded in burying. At the same time, he’d thrust her away.
She felt unsettled, too, about her father. How could he have lied to her and been so cruel to Rhys? She was surprised Rhys had not cut her completely at that first sight of her in that tavern. How he must have despised her all these years.
What was she to do now? Weeping into her pillow would do no good. She must merely put one foot in front of the other and do whatever needed doing in the moment.
She pulled the bell rope for a maid to attend her. She poured water from the pitcher into the basin on the bureau and washed herself. By the time the maid arrived she had fixed her hair and dressed herself as far as she could without assistance. The girl helped her with her stays and tightened the laces on her dress.
‘Merci,’ Helene said, putting a coin in the maid’s hand.
The girl beamed. ‘Merci beaucoup, mademoiselle.’
Helene made her way to David’s room. He would not be out this early. He could at least have breakfast with her. She’d try to have a civil conversation with him. Her heart jumped at the idea that Rhys might appear in the dining room, as he had that first morning. She gave herself a mental shake. It would be better not to see him.
She knocked on David’s door. ‘David? David? Wake up. It is Helene.’ There was no answer. She knocked again and called louder. ‘David!’
Finally, she heard the shuffling of feet. She stepped back, expecting him to open the door.
Instead David’s voice came from the other side of the closed door. ‘Go away, Helene.’
She bent close to the door’s crack. ‘Please get dressed and have breakfast with me.’
‘Give me one good reason why I should.’ David’s voice was muffled by the door.
‘I need to talk to you,’ she implored. ‘It is important.’
‘I am not going back to England!’ he cried. ‘You waste your breath trying to convince me. Nothing will keep me from the Duchess of Richmond’s ball and nothing will keep me away from the battle!’
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