My brother, it has been with the greatest secrecy that I have been living this past year, and I am sure that you will forgive the privacy that has removed even yourself from my intimacy and insight, but it was a necessary precaution.
“Paendly,” he said quietly, “is Giselle your smuggler?”
For a moment, he was really sure that his friend was going to confirm his suspicions: after all, it made sense, did it not? How she had managed to survive, how she had been able to keep a close eye on him as he had escaped France?
“No,” James said finally with a wry smile. “At least, I do not think so. All in good time, my friend.”
The irritation rose up once more in Pierre’s throat, hotter than the brandy. “I think it is a little unfair, mon ami, that you will not tell me all that I want to know about her! After all, who has more of a right to ask than I?”
They stared at each other, one irritated, the other considering. After a full minute, James spoke again.
“I cannot tell what I do not know,” he said slowly. “I receive the letters, just like you. However, I have reasonable sources who tell me that she is still in France, leading others to safety. She is not in much danger, she is careful. But she is certainly not safe, and I believe will soon want to leave France herself, for safer shores.”
Pierre swallowed, and found his heart racing. So, she was in France: all that time that he was there, he could only have been a few miles away from her, and he had no idea!
“I had always thought,” Pierre said finally, with a dry smile, “that the two of you would marry, someday.”
By the sudden raising of James’ eyebrows, the thought had never occurred to him. “Me? Giselle…and me?”
Pierre shrugged. “You always got on so well as children. She is beautiful, you are rich. Matches are made for less.”
He watched his friend for any sign of hope, of interest, but saw none.
“I do not think so, d'Épiluçon,” said James heavily, looking away from him for the first time and gazing into the fire. “I think it will take a great deal to tempt me away from bachelorhood. Now, that woman of yours, the one that I found you with – what happened between you?”
Pierre coloured, and though he tried to ignore the stare of his companion, could not pretend that he did not know to whom he was referring.
“She was no servant, it was her home that you found me in,” he said quietly, trying not to catch James’ eye. “She…she cared for me, when I was injured. That is all.”
But his could not stop his brows furrowing as he considered her, and his voice caught as he finished speaking of her. It was painful to be so far from her.
James had not stopped staring at him. “That is all?”
Pierre gave a hoarse laugh, and shrugged in his best Gallic way. “What else could there be?”
For a moment, the two friends stared at each other.
Then James swore silently under his breath. “Your reticence tells all. “Why man, why did you leave her in that hovel if you felt so dearly about her? You should have brought her with you, to Paendly.”
Pierre shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and glared down at his brandy glass. “It is not that simple. She has a father to care for, and I…I have a sister to find.”
“A sister to find – Giselle is quite capable of looking after herself,” James retorted sharply.
But Pierre shook his head; more to convince himself, he felt, than anything else. “Miss Metcalfe and I, we are from different…des classes. She has her own concerns, and I have mine. Giselle needs to be my priority, I cannot get distracted by – ”
“Love?” James interjected, with a raised eyebrow.
Pierre rolled his eyes. “You always were the more dramatic one of the three of us.”
His friend laughed. “Perhaps, but you will own that I tell the truth when I say that Giselle seems to know how to look after herself, when you consider that she has been in France, unknown to you, for over a year and without incident.”
Pierre twisted his brandy glass in his hands and tried not to recall Helena’s hurt face as he told her that he could not be with her.
“You only usually get one chance at romantic happiness,” said James quietly, all the mirth gone from his tones. “Do not be a fool, d'Épiluçon. If you have found it – ”
“It is not that simple, tu comprends?” Pierre muttered dully, his heart thumping wildly. “Do I wish that I could be with Helena; perhaps. But what sort of a man would I be – would she want to be with a man who could so easily cast aside his only sister, alone in France without protection? Who would want to be such a man, who could callously cast aside his own flesh and blood for the lust of his heart?”
There was a pause, and a log cracked in the grate.
Eventually, James spoke quietly. “I do not think that your feelings towards Miss Metcalfe are all lust, are they? If you are honest with yourself, something in her has touched your heart. You cannot even speak of her without looking pained, and happy, and confused all at the same time. Am I right?”
Suddenly, Pierre found that he did not trust his own voice to speak. He nodded, and glanced up at James with a rueful smile.
James sighed, and shook his head. “You do manage to tangle yourself in knots, d'Épiluçon. First you try to get out of France without any thought, steal a boat, if I am any judge, near drown yourself getting to our shores, find yourself rescued by a very pretty miss, have her fall in love with you and you her: and here you are, in my library, sipping brandy with her not ten miles away.”
Pierre swallowed. “You think that she is truly in love with me? Not just interested in the wealth, the title?”
His friend paused, and then said, “She did not take the money, did she? I have never seen more reproachful eyes than on that lady when you stepped out of her home.”
Pierre bit his lip. She had wanted to marry him, and what had he done? Bolted, like a frightened hare.
“I want to do the right thing,” he said quietly. “But I am not sure what it is.”
James leaned over, picked up the brandy, and poured another large helping into his companion’s glass.
“Well,” he said finally, “it all comes down to one question. What decision could you not live with?”
“No, Father, I will do it,” Helena called up the stairs, shaking her head with a smile. “You lie down.”
A mumbled groan drifted down from her father’s room, where he was recovering from a headache, he said. Helena smiled. She knew full well he had just returned from the Anchor Inn where he had gone for lunch, and it would take a few hours of sleeping before he was ready to face the world again.
But the crab nets needed checking, nonetheless, particularly if they wanted to eat that evening. She pulled on the shawl that had been rested on top of her mending pile, drew it closer around her shoulders, and walked out onto the beach.
It was warmer than she had expected. A breeze from the land brushed over her, tugging at her hair and making her smile. It was difficult not to glorify in the wonder of nature at times like this: the sun starting to consider setting in a few hours, the warmth of the day still present, and nothing but the ocean before her.
And a boat. Her heart and spirits sunk as she saw Pierre’s boat, still tilted on its side, still just as empty. It was enough to remove the smile from her face completely, and Helena swallowed as she continued to walk towards the shallows, where she and her father hid their crab traps.
The first was empty, and the second had nothing but a small hermit crab, not worth the eating for the effort. Helena sighed as she placed it back in the water. What would they do for food that evening, if the last crab net was empty?
But as she approached the third crab net, something glittered inside, and moved. Was it a beautiful shell, or a crab that caught the light?
She pulled it up out of the water, and gasped as she saw what had sparkled so brightly.
It was a large diamond ring.
Her jaw had remai
ned dropped and her heart was thumping fast as she grasped it out of the sand and seaweed. It was absolutely stunning: a gold band, with three large square diamonds in a row. She had never seen anything like it.
“It is exquisite,” she murmured under her breath.
“Oui, c’est ca.”
If Helena had thought she was surprised at discovering the ring, it was nothing to hearing that voice: that familiar voice that she thought she would never hear again.
“Pierre?” She turned, hardly able to believe her hopes, but there he was, on bended knee.
She must have gasped again, for she found her breath lost, and Pierre smiled at her.
“What, you were not expecting me?”
Helena could not help but laugh, and tears had sprung to her eyes. “Pierre, I – ”
“Non, s’il vous plait, do not say a word,” Pierre interrupted lovingly, staring up at her as he remained on his knees. “It is difficult enough for me to concentrate on speaking English when my heart is so full – and it is very important for me to get this right.”
He swallowed, and it was then that Helena noticed signs of nervousness in his eyes. Could this be – surely, with a ring…
“Helene,” he said quietly, his smile broadening. “Light of my life when I did not even know I was living in darkness, how could I even consider going through my life without you to guide me, and I to love you? I would happily lose everything I owned in this Revolution we are having, if it meant being with you.”
Helena knew that she was not supposed to speak, and she barely knew what she would say, even if she had the opportunity! To hear such words of love, so caressingly spoken, it was beyond the barely admitted dreams of her heart.
“But…but you left,” she managed, trying to keep her voice calm. “You left, you just walked out. I thought I was never going to see you again.”
She watched pain cross his voice.
“I know,” he said sadly. “And I will never forgive myself for doubting you – for questioning my heart when it was so clear that you felt deeply for me. I have always been pursued for my wealth, and you seemed to confirm all of my hated suspicious – and then Paendly arriving like that, I had no time to think. Can you ever forgive me?”
Helena stared at him, but her tongue felt tied, as though all her words had disappeared.
“I hope that you will…I know that you will not mind,” said Pierre hesitantly, “that I have nothing to offer you; no riches, no large houses like your sister’s duke. But I do have my heart, dearest Helena: and it is utterly yours.”
She did not need to speak: there was enough of an answer in her actions, and they were swift. Taking a step forward, she pulled him to his feet, and met his trembling heart with a passionate kiss.
How long they stood there, she could not tell. Whether anyone espied them on the beach, standing as they were against the sun, she did not care. All that consumed her mind was the heat of his lips on hers, the ravishing way his tongue encaptured hers, the strength of his hands around her waist, and she happily lost herself in all the pleasant sensations that his body gave her.
When at last they broke apart, Helena found the diamond ring on her finger, and managed, “I will always be by your side, no matter where you get shipwrecked!”
Pierre chuckled, and clutched at her even tighter. “Do you think that I would ever let you go – Madame d'Épiluçon?”
A jolt of joy rushed through her to hear that name, and to know that it would soon be her own!
She kissed him again, glorifying in the power that she evidently had over him.
“Perhaps,” murmured Pierre as he nuzzled her neck, “we should…check the boat for leaks.”
Helena raised an eyebrow. She knew exactly what he meant by that.
“Perhaps we should,” she whispered. “I would not mind taking a close look at – ”
“Helena?”
A man’s cry forced them apart, Helena’s cheeks aflame and Pierre nervously tucking his hands behind his back. She laughed drily.
“Helena,” the voice repeated as the man got closer, and she smiled to see her Father deftly moving across the stones to reach them. “Are you not going to introduce me to my new son?”
11
It was but three hours later, but three hours was all it took. The introductions were made, the future father and son had embraced, and explanations were given. Where lovers are involved, of course, explanations can be brief or detailed, but as long as they end correctly, everyone is happy.
And of course, he was. Pierre tightened his grip on the hand of the woman he loved, body and soul, and she laughed as he stumbled once more on a stone.
“I am starting to think that you are only holding onto my hand because you are afeared of falling!” She giggled. “You must learn to walk on stones, Pierre.”
They were walking along the beach as the sun set: any chance to be alone together, despite his new father-in-law’s kindness.
“These stones, they move too much,” Pierre said nonchalantly. “It is easier for me to cling to you, ma cherie, and I think I will do that for the rest of my days.”
He saw the joy that his words gave her in the brightening of her eye and the pink of her cheek, and it stirred something in him that he had never experienced before meeting Helena: a sort of protectiveness that was intermingled with fierce longing, and a desperation to keep her safe.
And to take off every single piece of clothing that she had on.
Pierre swallowed. Perhaps he should be ignoring that particular instinct.
She stopped, and rather than attempt to go on without her steadying arm, Pierre stopped alongside her. They looked out at the sunshine together, and Pierre sighed.
“You know,” he whispered, “I am looking forward to spending the rest of my life watching the sun go down with you.”
Helena laughed, and it made his heart sing to hear her so happy. “We only have forty-two more sunsets until we can watch one as husband and wife.”
“Husband and wife.” Pierre tried out the phrase on his own tongue. “I quite like that idea. I suppose there is no chance that it could be twenty-two more sunsets – or two?”
She laughed again, turning to face him as the glowing embers of the sun made her earrings sparkle. “Eager, are we?”
Pierre clasped her to him, and kissed her. He had intended it to be a light, brushing kiss, but any opportunity to lose himself in her was one to be taken, and it was a full minute before he released her.
“Very eager,” he said in a jagged voice. “Perhaps we should inspect the boat – we never did earlier, you know.”
He saw the passion, the desire in her eyes, and he tried not to lose all control over his body.
“You know that we cannot,” she whispered, “even if – despite my own wishes. My Father is expecting us back at any moment.”
Pierre groaned, but released her from his grasp, keeping a hold on her hand as they turned and started to walk back the way they had come along the beach.
They had not walked another ten yards when Helena pointed at something out in the ocean. “What is that?”
Pierre glanced over, but could see nothing. “What?”
“That,” repeated Helena, “there, just below the horizon.”
No matter how hard he strained, he could see nothing, and said so. “There is nothing there that I can see.”
Helena had stopped walking now and was squinting out to sea. “It looks…it looks like a woman.”
“In the ocean?” Pierre said hastily, now looking himself and shading his eyes in an attempt to see more clearly.
Helena tilted her head, and then shook it. “It must just be a trick of the light; it does that sometimes, when the sun is setting. It is simply not possible to have a woman out there.”
They continued walking when a thought came into Pierre’s head, and he laughed. Helena smiled enquiringly, and he shook his head.
“I was just thinking,” he said with a smile, “that
I must be careful. If it was a man in the water, I must hope that he is not shipwrecked – or my dear Helena may fall in love with him!”
They laughed together, and Pierre was almost relieved to hear her giggles. Though he had jested, it was a relief to see just how ridiculous she found that idea.
“Come here,” she said softly.
Pierre gave himself up to her tantalising kiss, and almost groaned audibly when it ended.
“Now you listen to me, Pierre d'Épiluçon,” Helena said quietly, resting her forehead on his own as he looked down at her. Their hands were intertwined, and he could feel the rise and fall of her breasts as she breathed heavily. “All you need to know is this: my shipwrecked suitor is standing right before me, and in forty-two days, I will be his wife.”
Wondering who is in the water? Discover her Ravishing Regencies story in Marooned with a Marquis – read on for the first chapter…
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To Sophie and Dave – two of my favourite people.
And always, Joshua.
Acknowledgments
This was the series that I never thought I could publish, so first thanks must go to my amazing Kickstarter supporters! Thank you for your faith in me, and I hope you love this book as much as I do!
Thank you to my wonderful editor, Julia Underwood, who has given me unparalleled advice – any mistakes left are completely my own!
Ravishing Regencies- The Complete Series Page 26