Beauty Like the Night

by Liz Carlyle

  Helene was confused. Cam had said that his sister married young, and indeed, Catherine was but a few years older than Bentley, if memory served. “I believe I do not perfectly understand, Bentley. Did they run away? To Scotland perhaps? And what did your father say of the match?”

  Bentley shook his head. “No, they were wed at St. Michael’s. Father said little—and cared even less. And why should he? But Cam held the purse strings, and Cat had a devil of a time persuading him.”

  “When were they wed?” asked Helene, ignoring his snide question.

  “Don’t remember,” muttered Bentley. “Some five years past, I daresay.”

  Helene did some quick computations in her head. “Well, good heavens, Bentley! Catherine could not have been more than seventeen! I understand Cam’s concern.”

  Bentley shrugged, his expression cold. “You need say no more! I should have known you would take his side.”

  “I am taking no one’s side, Bentley,” she softly insisted.

  “I hate him,” spat Bentley, suddenly sounding like the boy he was instead of the man he looked to be. “And I do not care to speak of it further. If you wish to tell Saint Camden I tried to make love to you, Helene, then by all means do so. Indeed, he will be glad for some excuse to have me out on my head, for he has already threatened to do just that.”

  “Bentley, I hardly think I require your brother to guard my virtue.” The young man was almost irrationally angry with his brother, and Helene sensed that something deeply distressing lay behind it. Perhaps Bentley would eventually confide in her. “Come now,” she said softly, holding out her hand. “Let’s cry friends, shall we?”

  A long moment passed between them, until slowly, Bentley reached out and grasped her fingers in his very large hand. “Yes, all right,” he said in a surprisingly soft voice. “Friends.”

  As she clutched Bentley’s hand, Helene stared thoughtfully out into the garden. The shadows had lengthened now, and across the lawns, Helene could see Ariane walking toward the door, her ball tucked neatly under one arm. Helene dropped Bentley’s hand to wave at her, and suddenly, Ariane looked up, smiling broadly when she saw Helene standing at the window. It was a sweet, wonderful smile, full of hope and promise.

  “Do you know, I find it has grown cold in this room, Bentley,” said Helene pensively as Ariane pulled open the door. “Why do we not stir up the fire in the parlor, all three of us, then you and I shall have that game of backgammon after all.”

  9

  Oh, Hesperus! Wake the wish and melt the heart!

  The night wind soughed and ebbed through the trees surrounding Chalcote. Weary from a day spent in the fields, Cam had collapsed into bed and fallen at once into a black well of oblivion. Now, however, the wind kept teasing him back from that restful sleep and into a dreamlike haze.

  But he had not meant to sleep. Had he? No. He remembered now. He’d meant to simply drowse atop his coverlet while he waited for his father’s house party to fall silent.

  In the muffled darkness, he lay motionless, one hand lightly caressing the red velvet box beneath his pillow. It was Helene’s birthday. He knew it, just as he knew that Marie Middleton had forgotten it. Why it mattered to Helene was beyond his grasp, but girls were just different. Helene had tried to pretend it didn’t matter when the day had ended without so much as a new hair ribbon from her mother. But he had seen the tears. And he had hurt for her.

  Cam brushed the box again. Warm red velvet, like Helene’s mouth. He felt his belly clench with fear and anticipation. It was wrong, perhaps, to kiss and to touch and to stroke one another as they did. Especially when they were supposed to be just friends. But for the longest time, she had been so much more to him. Save for his brother and sister, Hellie was his whole life.

  She wanted more than friendship, too. Helene wanted him in that way. And she no longer hid her desire by mischievously teasing and tormenting him. For his part, despite all the trouble she was forever dragging him into, Cam loved no one so well as Helene. Soon, somehow, they would be wed.

  Oh, his father was beginning to grumble a bit about his friendship with “Marie’s wild chit,” as he disdainfully called Helene. And there had been some half-hearted threats of Oxford in the spring. But Cam knew it would all come to naught, for by the year’s first quarter day, Papa wouldn’t have a feather to fly with. Hunting season had already bled him very nearly dry, what with three new horses in the stables and half of society’s scapegraces soaking up Chalcote’s wine for days on end.

  But perhaps he was little better than his father’s friends? Cam eased his fingers around the velvet box, clutched it tight, and thought of things no gentleman ever should. Beneath his nightshirt, his cock sprang to life, hard, pulsing, and needful. He could not resist the urge to slide his hand beneath the coverlet to touch himself. But that was no longer enough.

  Ahh, Helene! He felt the rush of hot blood beneath his skin and knew a wild, urgent ache pulling at him. He needed Helene so desperately, and for many reasons. Yet no one understood. They thought him too young to know his own mind. But he wasn’t. No, despite the fact that he was a little shy—dull and dour, he’d once heard his father say—Cam was as sure of his love for Helene as he was sure of his own abilities.

  Yes, dull and dour he might be, but this year, the home farm had turned a profit, which was twice the amount of last year’s, and Cam knew that the sweat of his brow and his head for numbers had made the difference. Still, his father laughed, scorning him for his refusal to participate in Chalcote’s frivolities.

  Last night, Randolph had thrust a buxom widow in Cam’s direction, with a suggestion so lewd that Cam had been embarrassed for her. She, however, had merely taken umbrage at Cam’s disinterest. Randolph had turned his back on them. “No son of mine,” he had muttered in a tone loud enough for a half-dozen guests to hear.

  Tonight, the dinner party two floors below was growing ever more boisterous. It seemed likely that the rugs had been rolled back for an impromptu dance, for the drunken revelry now rang through the hall. No need for silence then. He would risk it. Noiselessly, Cam slid from his bed and into the corridor.

  As expected, no light shone beneath Helene’s door. He gave the secret knock, and slipped inside. In a thin shaft of moonlight, he saw Helene toss back her bedcovers and spin to a sitting position on the mattress. Silently, he crossed the room to her, bent one knee to the bed, and settled beside her.

  “Happy birthday,” he whispered, leaning close, and pressing the small box into her hand.

  Helene stared at him for a moment, then flicked open the velvet lid. A sigh of pleasure escaped her as she lifted the ornate chain and stared at the large emerald nestled in its filigree setting. In the dim light, he saw her snag her lower lip and give her head an almost imperceptible shake. “Cam, mais non! You cannot give me this,” she whispered in her soft, lilting voice. “But oh! How lovely it is.”

  “It is yours,” he replied, absently running a finger down the curve of her jaw. “Mother left it to me, and it is mine to give as I choose.” He took the pendant from her hand. “Turn around, Hellie.”

  His fingers shook as he lifted Helene’s thick braid to one side, then fastened the chain around her neck. As she turned toward him, she loosened the tie of her nightdress and stared down at her chest. In the darkness, he could barely see the necklace against her skin. It did not matter. He knew all too well what her skin looked like.

  “What do you think, Cam?” she asked with a feminine laugh. “If I wore this with a silk ball gown, how would I look?” In the dark, she looked up at him, her eyes wide, her full mouth half curved into that mischievous grin he both loved and feared.

  He swallowed hard, then leaned forward to gently kiss her. “Someday, Hellie, I will give you silk, too. Emerald silk, to match this stone. I want you always to dress in rich, dark colors, for they suit you.”

  Helene came up onto her knees and flung her arms around his shoulders. “Merci, Cam,” she whispered, pressing l
ittle kisses over his face. “It is the finest gift ever!”

  He let his hands slide up her back as his mouth found hers again. He felt Helene’s breasts urge against him as they fell back into the tangle of bedding, no longer laughing as had once been their habit. Somewhere along the way, they had stopped giggling beneath the bedcovers, and things had become very, very serious thereafter. He kissed her again, with his lips and his tongue.

  Willingly, Helene opened her mouth on a soft, breathless sigh, and took him inside. The kiss went on and on, blissfully sweet in its intensity. They were well past the point of any awkwardness, if ever there had been any between them. Cam really couldn’t recall any. He remembered only that he wanted her; had wanted her forever, it seemed. He pulled himself on top of her, dragging her nightgown up between her legs with the weight of his knee.

  “Helene,” he finally managed to say, barely lifting his mouth from hers, “perhaps we ought to stop.”

  “Non, non!” she softly cried, arching against him as she dragged her fingers down through his hair. “Please, Cam! I love you. I will love you till I die. It is the very same for you, n’est-ce pas?”

  “Ah, Helene, you know it is,” he answered, his lips moving lightly across her forehead. “And someday I will have a right to ... to be with you like this. But not yet. Not now.”

  “ ‘Tis nonsense,” she whispered, her breathing already fast and shallow. Impatiently, Helene jerked upward on his nightshirt. “I shall wait for you forever if I must, but why do we wait? And for what? Who knows or cares what we do?”

  And suddenly, Cam decided that he agreed with her. Indeed, in his heart, he suspected that he’d wanted her to react just so. Perhaps he had come to Helene’s bedchamber not only to comfort her, but to make love to her—just as he’d wanted to do since the first time he’d seen her. For a long time, he’d been ashamed of his desire for Helene. But now he understood it, and it no longer felt wrong.

  In the pale light, he imagined that her eyes twinkled mischievously. And in the next moment, she slid her hand beneath his nightshirt, wrapping her long, capable fingers around his swollen shaft, and Cam could not suppress a moan of sweet pain.

  “Can I touch you, Cam?” she asked, her voice unusually thick. “Can I please you with my ... well, you know—as that woman pleases her lover in your papa’s book of naughty drawings?” Playfully, she came up off the mattress and nipped at his ear with her sharp, white teeth.

  Cam felt his face suffuse with color. He knew exactly which book—and which drawing—she meant. And it was naughty. And rather more excitement than he could bear at the moment. A little awkwardly, he jerked to his knees and dragged off his nightshirt. Though they had seen each other in various states of dishabille many times over the years, he heard Helene gasp at his naked, blatantly aroused state. Suddenly, all playfulness vanished. Cam let his hand skim over the soft skin of her knee to catch at the hem of her gown.

  “Take this off, Helene,” he heard himself rasp, almost choking on the words, and the urgency which propelled them. He let his fingers slide beneath the white linen and into the familiar warmth between her legs, caressing her until her breathing grew faster still.

  Cam was well aware what they were about to do. Of what they had come so close to doing a half-dozen times over the last year. But Hellie was seventeen now, an age by which many girls were wed. And at eighteen, Cam knew his own mind. He would gladly wed her at once if necessary. He almost hoped it would be necessary, for it would simplify a great many things.

  “Take it off, Hellie,” he repeated, and Helene snaked up her nightclothes to reveal her sweetly flared hips, and breasts that looked like small, perfect peaches in the moonlight. Although he had touched them on more than one occasion, this was overwhelmingly different. Helene’s nipples were hard and dark against her skin, her belly white and smooth, her coltish legs sleek with muscle.

  Cam let his eyes drift up and down her length, still intimately caressing her, his heart strangely filled with a serene sense of joy that exceeded even his unslaked lust. It was time, and he was glad. He was tired of resisting. He loved her. Truly, deeply loved her.

  The knock, when it came, was abrupt.

  They had not a moment in which to hide themselves, nor to conceal what they were doing. Marie Middleton sailed into the room in a cloud of sour wine and stale perfume, a beribboned package clutched loosely in her left hand. She was roaring drunk.

  But not nearly drunk enough. After one quick glance, Helene’s mother dropped the gift and bolted across the room, her strong backhand catching Cam squarely across the face.

  Yet, the knocking on the door continued, even as Cam rolled sickly toward one side of the bed, attempting to cover their nakedness. The knock became louder, farther away, yet more insistent. It hammered at his consciousness. What the devil ...? Why keep pounding on the door? It was too late. Too late.

  But as Cam sank deeper into the sick and certain sensation of impending doom, the vision of Marie Middleton and his aching flood of memories began to fade into daylight.

  The pounding came again. “Lord Treyhern?”

  Cam rolled over and cursed into his pillow.

  “My lord?” said Crane softly. “Please get up! I believe you’ve overslept again.”

  By the following afternoon, Helene had gained a proper perspective on her encounter with Bentley, and on her visit from Mr. Lowe as well. She had little to fear from either quarter, she had decided, and perhaps some measure of friendship to be gained.

  The rector had sent a kind note after breakfast, confirming his intent to call again the following day. Attached to it had been a little book on the history of the famous wool churches of the Cotswolds.

  Helene had hardly seen Cam that afternoon. Despite her fortitude in dealing with Bentley, by dinner time, Helene’s courage had failed. Dealing with Cam himself was another thing altogether. Surrendering to apprehension, Helene had sent word that she found herself beset by a headache and unable to join the Rutledges for dinner.

  At the time, it had seemed the wisest course of action, and her head indeed had been pounding. Even now, it continued to plague her, but there was no avoiding the indomitable Earl of Treyhern this afternoon. Against her better judgment, Helene directed Martha to dress Ariane in her warmest carriage dress. Then she took the girl down to the hall to meet her father at precisely half past noon, feeling as if she went to her own doom instead.

  As she’d expected, Cam was entirely serious about their drive. His curricle and a pair of feisty black geldings already awaited their arrival at the foot of the steps. During the half-hour’s journey, she and Cam forced a desultory but amiable conversation for Ariane’s benefit, and soon they arrived at a particularly scenic spot on the edge of Chalcote’s estate.

  As children, she and Cam had often slipped away to this bend in the River Coln, to fritter away an afternoon. For a distance of several yards, the shallow river deepened and slowed, and as Helene stared down at the glistening water, she could not help but wonder if Cam remembered. Some maudlin part of her wanted to believe that he did, and that perhaps those memories were as sweet to him as they were to her.

  After they had climbed from the curricle, Cam walked up the hill to spread a heavy blanket beneath a gnarled apple tree. Ariane danced off to play by the water’s edge, and the awkward conversation which Helene and Cam had thus far maintained came to an abrupt halt as they settled onto the blanket.

  Cam stretched his rangy length across one edge, then leaned back onto his elbows to let his eyes drift across the river below. “Well, Helene,” he said, casually crossing his long, booted legs at the ankles. “Here we are.”

  “Indeed.” Helene managed to keep her voice cool. “Here we are.”

  Across the narrow expanse of grass, Ariane was engrossed in flinging leaves into the whirling current, and she was quite obviously happy.

  “Well, here we are,” Cam repeated, a little less enthusiastically as Helene carefully smoothed her skirts.
>
  “So you have said, my lord,” she murmured.

  Abruptly, Cam jerked fully upright, took off his hat, and sent it sailing onto the far corner of the blanket. “Oh, very well then, Helene! You do not mean to make this easy for me, do you?” he said harshly, raking his hair back away from his face. He turned to look at her, his lips drawn into a tight, narrow line. Then, unexpectedly, his expression shifted, softening a little. He looked swiftly away to stare down at the water.

  “And indeed, you should not,” Cam finally muttered, as if addressing himself rather than her. “No, you should not. I ... I am sorry, Helene. I treated you abominably two evenings ago, and God knows I regret it. I give you my word as a gentleman that it shan’t happen again.”

  Helene stared across the length of the blanket at Cam. The afternoon sun cast his chiseled face into a near silhouette, his profile sinfully handsome. A sudden breeze stirred the softness of his hair, teasing at his stubborn cowlick. In the brilliant light of day, Cam’s dark locks glinted with the occasional strand of purest silver, that time—or perhaps worry—had left him. She resisted a strong impulse to lift her hand to touch it.

  Instead, Helene willed herself to relax. In the bare branches overhead, a pair of wrens scolded and skittered, fluffing their feathers against the breeze. In the distance, the subtle sound of water murmured. All around them, the sharp autumn air was lightly laced with the fragrance of fallen apples, now fermenting amid the meadow grass. Across the river, a trio of cows lowed at one another as they trod a deep path along the river’s bend toward an old stone byre in the distance.

  On the whole, it was a landscape just as idyllic, and just as quintessentially English, as a hundred other such scenes she had enjoyed with Cam in their misspent youth. Helene was a little taken aback by the rush of emotion such a picture evoked—a picture that she had once attempted to forget. Yes, she had often forced herself to view her memories of rural Gloucestershire through the jaded eye of a Continental. She had told herself that pastoral serenity was nothing short of dull. What she could not have, she had attempted to disdain.