Baldwin’s stomach turned at such duplicity. But then, he was hardly better. All that he was doing was false, meant to keep his family afloat.
Charity was oblivious to his feelings and continued, “When he said he was bringing us here for a Season, I was hesitant, but I suppose I’m glad now. It got Helena and me out of boring old Boston!”
Baldwin glanced down at her. He had not wanted to dance with her, but now he saw a unique opportunity in doing so. He could ask her questions and find out more about Helena.
“It must be helpful to have a companion in your travels,” he suggested carefully.
“I suppose,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “Although Helena was not much of a companion on the trip. She spent most of the crossing casting up her accounts on the prow of the boat.”
Baldwin stifled a smile at that tidbit. Though he didn’t like to hear of her suffering, he could file that information away about her. No boats.
“And do you two share the same…interests?” he said, still treading very carefully.
“Hardly,” Charity laughed. “Helena is a bookworm. You should see her devour them, one after another. She’d read the instructions on a tonic bottle and be enthralled. I prefer excitement. My papa owns a racehorse and he’s taken me dozens of times. I’ve even won some coin at it.”
She said the last with a little wink and his stomach turned. One more reason to avoid Charity as a bride. The last thing his family needed was another gambler. He’d had quite enough excitement in his day—he didn’t need her dragging him out and insisting she spend their money on horses.
“Some have the luck,” he said as he turned her around the floor once more. When would this song end? It felt like it had been going on forever. “Did you and Miss Monroe grow up together?”
Charity’s eyes narrowed. “You are very interested in my cousin.”
Baldwin drew back. Damn, he’d pushed too far. Now he had to back himself down without rousing more of her suspicion. “Not at all,” he lied. “I’m interested in you, of course, as we are dancing. I only inquired after your childhood.”
She didn’t look convinced, but launched into a recitation of her days in Boston as a girl. She never once mentioned Helena, and Baldwin found himself drifting into his own thoughts, counting the steps and the beats to the dance as he waited for it to just end.
And at last, it did. He smiled in relief at Charity as he guided her from the floor and toward her father. “Thank you again for the dance, Miss Shephard.”
She eyed him closely as he brought her to her father. “And to you, Your Grace. Perhaps when next we speak, we can talk of more interesting things than my cousin.”
He pinched his lips at her pointed tone, nodded to her father and left her side. It was like he was being freed from prison, and he drew a long breath. Now he had fulfilled his duty, at least for tonight. He’d danced with the prospects, appeased his mother and made a few mental notes here and there about them.
So he was free to do as he pleased. He glanced around the room and found Helena standing along the wall. She was alone, with a wistful expression that could not be denied, watching the couples who had retaken the floor as they waited for the next song to begin. She wanted to dance. And he wanted desperately to dance with her.
In that moment, he knew he would. She would be his reward for enduring the evening so far. What could be the harm?
He took a step toward her, but before he could cross the room, Walker rushed up to his side. “Your Grace?”
He turned toward his butler with a groan. “Yes, Walker, what is it?”
“I’m sorry to disturb in the midst of the party, but you have a message.”
“Can it not wait?”
Walker shook his head. “I don’t think so, sir. It is from Mr. Deacon.”
Baldwin froze. Deacon was the man he’d hired to investigate the missing debts owed by the estate. “When did it arrive?”
“Just now, Your Grace,” Walker said. “And since you’d told me before that any correspondence from the man was—”
“Urgent, yes,” he said. “It is. I assume you deposited the message in my study?”
Walker nodded and Baldwin sighed as he cast one more glance over his shoulder toward Helena. She was still alone, but now she was looking at him from across the room. He shivered under her focused stare and longed to cross to her, to gather her up and forget the troubles that weighed so heavily upon him.
But it seemed his moment with her was not to be. At least not now. Not there.
Chapter Eleven
Helena watched Baldwin leave the ballroom, and her heart sank. His expression. Oh, it was awful. Like a man being led to the gallows. It wasn’t as if he’d looked pleased during the rest of the night. She’d seen the tension on his face as he interacted with his guests, but this was something different.
Something dreadful.
She longed to go to him, to offer him the friendship they had both vowed was all they could share. She was a fool.
“Helena.”
She turned and smiled as Adelaide, Duchess of Northfield, slid up beside her and gave her a little squeeze.
“Adelaide, oh, you look beautiful!”
And she did. The duchess was the epitome of sophistication in a gold-and-silver gown with intricate braiding and a flowing skirt that swirled when she turned. Unlike the other ladies in the room, whose hair was pulled high to accentuate cheekbones and necks, her companion’s blonde locks were done looser and framed her pretty face to perfection.
“Thank you,” Adelaide said with a little blush. “It is still odd for me to come out into Society with such…fanfare.”
Helena wrinkled her brow. “You didn’t before?”
“Oh no,” Adelaide laughed. “I stood along the wall for many years. It is Graham who convinces me to be…” The duchess looked across the room to where Graham was standing, laughing heartily with Simon. “…more.”
Helena shifted, for there was no denying the love this woman felt for her husband. Actually, that was the common thread that seemed to tangle in all the members of the duke club who had married. They all loved deeply, passionately, truly.
It was truly something to behold.
“I have a hard time imagining you as a wallflower,” Helena said with a laugh. “You are so confident and lovely.”
“Love helps with that,” Adelaide said, tearing her gaze away from the husband. “And practice. The more I dance and, as Graham calls it, exhibit, the easier it gets.”
Helena shook her head. “I used to like to dance. Not exhibit, but dancing was one of my favorite pastimes before—”
She cut herself off. Had she truly been on the cusp of telling this lady, this stranger, about her past? A faux pas of the highest order. Her uncle would be enraged, despite the fact that he always liked to imply she was a scandal in the flesh. But to tell the particulars was something different. Not to mention if she did, the story would spread through their tight little circle, and then what would happen?