Chapter Twenty-Three

M ark had taken his cousin to Astley's Amphitheatre and then to Gunter's for ices the day before, after being bowled over by Helen in the lending library. He was looking forward to an afternoon playing cards at White's. Pelford had put his name up for membership earlier that week and he had been universally accepted. The young Duke had also introduced him to several of his friends, who seemed happy to include Mark in their circle. These men would never take the place of the Highlanders who died at Waterloo, but they had offered him friendship. A new start.

As he walked to the door, his mother stood in front of it, blocking his way. She seemed to have a sixth sense as to when he was trying to escape.

‘Where are you going?'

Mark felt like a child of seven, rather than a man of seven and twenty. ‘I am going to my club.'

His mother shook her head. ‘You cannot. I have already promised Niamh that you will take her driving in the park.'

He grinded his teeth. ‘Mama, I will take my cousin driving today. But in future, I will not allow you to make plans for me. I am a grown man.'

‘Then act like one. Propose to your cousin. Provide an heir for the earldom. Then we can go back home and leave these rotten sassenachs . We're Scottish. We don't belong among them.'

‘But I do, Mama. Despite you and Father making me feel as if I don't belong anywhere. Papa wanted me to be English. You wanted me to be Scottish. And I am both. I enjoy London and Edinburgh. I am excited to go home at the end of the Season to Castle Inverness and get to know my land and my tenants better.'

‘You will need a wife.'

The idea of marriage no longer terrified him. ‘It will not be my cousin.'

His mother folded her arms and gave him a cold glare. ‘You've become too fine for a bonnie, Scottish lass?'

‘She's barely more than a child.'

‘Niamh has many childbearing years in her. It would bring our family closer together.'

‘I don't want a broodmare. When I marry, I want a wife to spend the rest of my life with. A companion and equal.'

His mother slapped him across the cheek. She'd never struck him before and he was surprised how much it stung. ‘Will you and your English lady wife toss me out of the house once you're married? Because I am old and common and Scottish? Will you push me aside like your father did, after he spent all my dowry?'

Rubbing his cheek, he shook his head. ‘I have no English lady wife and even if I did, I would never ask you to leave. You are my mother and I love you. But I am a grown man and you need to treat me as such.'

Her hands clung together as if she were in fervent prayer. ‘I'm afraid of losing you entirely, like I lost Jamie. My boy Marky did not come back from the wars. It was as though you were a stranger with my son's handsome face. I could barely look at you. You'd changed so much. I didn't know who you were any more. You weren't my boy.'

Mark set his hands gently on her shoulders. ‘A man came back in his place, Mama. Scarred and broken, but still strong.'

She placed her hands on top of his. Tears began to run freely down her cheeks. ‘I ken I don't belong in this world. Your world.'

‘Maybe you could, if you gave it another chance. Aunt Fiona danced with the Prince Regent, for goodness sake. You mingled with duchesses. Did any of them treat you with disrespect? Did any of them snub you like Father's family does?'

His mother shook her head. ‘I barely said a word. I dinnae want to disgrace you.'

‘Papa was the disgrace. How he separated all of us was a disgrace. But he is gone now. We don't have to live like he wanted us to. I am not ashamed of you. I will never be ashamed of you. And I hope some day that you will no longer be ashamed that I have only one leg.'

She nodded, tears still streaming down her cheeks.

Niamh came skipping down the hall. ‘What's the matter, Aunt Merida?'

His mother wiped at her eyes with her hands. Mark pulled out his handkerchief and gave it to her.

She sniffed into it. ‘Mark is ready to drive you to the park.'

Niamh jumped up and down. ‘I am so excited! Shall I fetch my bonnet?'

Mark forced himself to smile. ‘Yes.'

His cousin bounced back down the hall.

His mother called after her, ‘Don't forget a spencer and parasol! The English sun is a wee devil.'

‘And the Scottish sun is different than the English one?'

She patted the same cheek that she had slapped. ‘Of course, it is...and I love you, Son. Truly. I always have and I dinnae care about your leg, you eejit. I care about you.'

Mark laughed. Trust his crabbit mother to make idiot a term of endearment.

He helped Niamh into his new phaeton. She was looking very pretty and pleased with herself in a new yellow spencer with a matching chipped bonnet. ‘Do you think we'll see many people out at the park?'

She meant suitors.

Mark smiled. ‘Yes. This time of the day is called the promenade and we will see a great many bucks of the first stare.'

Giggling, Niamh blushed. ‘It is not that I don't like you, Cousin Mark. It's just that—'

He was a scarred, one-legged man in love with another woman. ‘We are cousins, Niamh. Please allow me to introduce you to some of my new English friends.'

‘And do they have titles?'

‘Some of them,' he assured her as he gently led his new team of chestnuts through the many streets to Hyde Park. Mark was very easy with the reins. He had to let his horses' mouths fully heal. He'd learned from his own recovery that if you tried to go back to normal too quickly, you would inevitably do more harm than good to your body. And despite living with chronic pain, he was a hale and hardy man. He might be changed, but he would be a better husband than his father ever was.

Mark pulled up his carriage near several acquaintances and introduced them to his cousin. But it was Niamh who first spotted Helen and waved merrily to her. She was dressed in a crimson pelisse with military-style buttons and braiding. Her matching bonnet and feather were similar to a soldier's hat. The bright hue complimented her natural colouring. Helen was walking with her sister, the Duchess of Glastonbury, and a group of friends including the young Lord Dutton. Manoeuvring the horses, Mark brought his phaeton over to the party.

Once he was to a stop, Niamh jumped out of the phaeton and practically into the arms of Lord Dutton. Turning her head, she gave him her excuses. ‘I hope you don't mind me walking for a little bit, Cousin Mark.'

‘Not at all.'

‘If you should like, Miss Campbell,' the Duchess of Glastonbury said with a friendly smile, ‘I can chaperon you and see you safely home. There is nothing quite like exercise.'

Niamh was all smiles to be escorted by a duchess. She readily agreed, leaving Mark alone in the phaeton. His eyes fell to Helen, whose cheeks were now a bright shade of red that rivalled her pelisse. Maybe his love for her was not hopeless. She had not been indifferent to him at the lending library. Quite the reverse. And he would be a fool if he let her go to the curate so easily. He was a soldier and he would fight for what he wanted. And this was a battle he could not bear to lose, but his attacks had to be subtle.

‘Lady Helen,' he said. ‘You look a little tired. May I give you a lift home?'

A smile slowly built on her lips and his pulse quickened. He longed to kiss her mouth again. She didn't hesitate, but held out her hand for him to help her up into the carriage. ‘Please, my lord. I should be most appreciative.'

It was not a strain upon him at all to pull her up beside him. Helen, in typical Helen fashion, sat right beside him, the side of her entire body meeting with his. Mark was certain that his own face would be the same cherry red if he stayed there much longer. He touched his hat to the Duchess of Glastonbury and urged his horses forward. He felt Helen linking her arm with his, eager to be close to him. She was too innocent and untried to understand that it was attraction between them and not friendship. Or that it was friendship that had turned into an intense attraction.

‘I told my mother that I was not going to court, Niamh,' Mark said, measuring his words carefully. ‘There is a difference between loving someone, like a cousin or a close friend, and being in love with someone. You can have warm feelings and care for another person, but being in love includes those warm feelings and a physical desire to become one with them.'

Mark didn't think that Helen was in love with her curate. If she had been, she would not seek out his company, nor would she long to touch him. He tried not to remember her wild kisses in the carriage. Or think about how much he'd like to become one with her.

He glanced down as she bit her lower lip, making it red and desirable. He wished to suck on it.

Shaking her head, Helen said, ‘I've never thought of it that way. How one loves a family member is different than how one loves a mate.'

‘The English language unfortunately uses the same word for all kinds of love, but Latin has four different ones. Storge , which is a bond of empathy between people. The love between friends is called philia . Agape is the love of God. And lastly, eros refers to romantic love.'

Mark tipped his hat to an acquaintance and Helen sat beside him, unusually quiet. He hoped that she would realise that his words were not idle conversation, nor something he wished to share with her, but that he was trying to explain his own heart and possibly hers. Friendship was not a bad foundation for marriage, but it could not take the place of desire.

She cleared her throat. ‘Do you think it is possible to love someone in multiple ways? To feel empathy, friendship and romantic love?'

‘Yes, I do. I think the most wonderful and enduring love between two people would have all three,' he said, gazing into her light blue eyes. ‘I hope to know such a love in my lifetime.'

Dropping her eyes to her lap, Helen added quietly, ‘I think we all do. Anything less would be disappointing—no, devastating .'

The same word he had used to describe his feelings for her. Mark longed to speak more plainly, but he thought that Helen might be as skittish as his new pair of horses. He could only gently lead her towards a new idea or she would rebel against him. Glancing down at her face, he saw that she was in deep contemplation.

He watched her wave to several acquaintances as they nearly completed their circuit of the park. A man on horseback rode up beside Helen. He had fair hair, a crooked nose and was dressed to the nines. The man couldn't have been much older than himself and smiled at Helen in a familiar way that irritated Mark to no end. His countenance wasn't precisely handsome, but there was something appealing about his easy manners.

‘Helen, my snake charmer, what have you done with your keeper?'

Mark gritted his teeth. The man called her by her given name.

She let out a gurgle of laughter. ‘You mean my minder, Sunny. I should have known you didn't wish to speak to me, but to find Mantheria.' She pointed to a group on the other side of the park and Mark could see his cousin Niamh's bright red hair. ‘My sister's over there.'

The man called ‘Sunny' laughed and tipped his hat to her. ‘You are as sharp-tongued as ever, my dear snake. May I ask how you escaped?'

‘Mark saved me,' Helen said with another laugh. ‘But do let me introduce you. Mark, this is Sunny. Sunny, Mark.'

A bright smile formed underneath the man's crooked nose. ‘Trust Helen to keep it simple, sir. I am called Sunny by my friends, but my title is Lord Sunderfield. And you are?'

This man was the Duke of Sunderfield. The largest catch in the matrimonial mart and he was on intimate terms with Helen and her family.

Mark touched his hat, bowing his head. ‘Lord Inverness.'

‘Good to meet you, Inverness,' Sunny said. ‘I see you picked up Lord Brunswick's horses and that they are in much better hands.'

‘Will you do me a favour, Sunny?' Helen asked from Mark's side.

‘Possibly. I am not green enough to say yes until you tell me what it is that you want me to do.'

Apparently, Sunderfield knew Helen very well. This did not endear him to Mark. Or the fact that he made her laugh.

Helen giggled again. ‘You will like this favour, I promise. Please keep Mantheria occupied for as long as possible.'

‘And are you minding her well?'

She shook her head. ‘Not at all.'

‘I do love your bluntness,' Sunny said with a smile. ‘I suppose that I could assist you for a little while. Good day, Snake, Inverness.'

They watched him ride away and Helen leaned her head on his arm. ‘Sunny is in love with Mantheria. The eros kind, but she cannot marry him because she is already married to Alexander, the Duke of Glastonbury. They are formally separated, but they share a son together and I think their relationship now is the storge kind. But you are right. Friendship and empathy are not enough. For either of them. Alexander lives with Cressida, Lady Dutton. And Mantheria has Sunny, but she doesn't live with him. She can't because she is still married to Glastonbury. What a sad and terrible coil to be in. To be married to one person, but in love with another.'

He lowered his voice and spoke from his own heart. It would be terrible for him to see Helen married to her curate. The final nail in his coffin. ‘I can think of nothing sadder.'

She leaned her head against his coat. ‘Sunny was quite right. They are lovely chestnuts.'

‘They are sweet goers, but one of their mouths has sores in it, so I have to be gentle with them,' he explained.

‘You're gentle with everyone.'

Mark wished that were true. But he had been a captain in the army. He had fought and killed other men. He had watched them die before his very eyes. ‘I used to be a soldier, Helen.'

She nodded again, rubbing her face against his shoulder, causing his whole body temperature to increase. ‘Yes. You were a captain and you flirted with Frederica. But I will forgive you, because my sister coquetted with every man between sixteen and sixty, until she fell hard for Samuel.'

He had danced with her sister and enjoyed a light flirtation with her before the Battle of Waterloo. It had been the sort of dalliance he liked best as a second son, one where he knew that there were no matrimonial expectations. She'd already been engaged to Pelford at the time, but making her fiancé dance to quite a merry tune of her own making.

But there was no need for Helen to feel jealousy. He'd been a different man then. A second son who teased that he was a fortune-hunter. There had been no expectations of him inheriting the earldom or the responsibilities that came with it. Such serious concerns were for his brother James. He'd been a silly boy, playing at war and discovering it wasn't at all what he had expected.

Taking a breath, he tried to make her understand. ‘War is more than balls and fancy uniforms, Helen. I am no gentle man. I am a killer. And I watched every one of my friends die.'

She was silent by his side as they drove further away from her sister, but still in view of the other carriages in the park. ‘It is the nature of all animals to protect themselves. To fight and even kill others that would harm them or the people that they love. Defending your country does not make you a murderer. It makes you a fierce protector.'

He shook his head. ‘I don't feel that way. At least, not any more. Pelford tried to take me to Manton's and I couldn't bear the sound of the bullets. When I close my eyes, I see the faces of my dead friends. Their bodies on the battlefield. It is not a sight you would want to see. And sometimes I wake up screaming at night, dreaming that I am back in Waterloo.'

Helen rubbed his arm that she was holding. ‘It does sound terrible, but if you do not show others what a battle truly looks like, then how can they know to avoid them in future? You are good with a pencil. Illustrate it for me. Show the world the devastation of war. The cost of their freedom that you paid. You and your men, who lost their lives to defend us from the French. The price you are still paying from your suffering.'

Stiffening in his seat, Mark didn't know if he could draw such darkness. He had never tried to before. He wasn't sure that he could do his friends' bravery justice. He didn't know how such knowledge would affect how she felt for him and now that he'd decided to live, it had to be with her. ‘It will change how you see me.'

‘Maybe it will change how you see yourself,' Helen whispered, leaning her head against his shoulder again in the place that seemed made just for her.

Mark resisted the urge to lay his head on top of hers. Could he show her the innermost pieces of his soul? The brokenness? Could her delicate hands fix that part of him, too?