Baldwin’s stomach heaved as he stared first at Shephard, then at Helena, whose face was pale as she staggered beneath the weight of her uncle’s cruel manipulation. That was the worst part in all this. Baldwin had promised to protect her. Now, no matter what he did, he couldn’t.
“Marry Charity,” he said, the words no more palatable coming from his own lips than they had been coming from Shephard’s.
His gaze slipped to Charity, and he was surprised to see her expression as shocked as he felt. Certainly she was not crowing about this turn of events, though he wasn’t certain he trusted that she wasn’t a party in her father’s twisted scheme.
“You bastard,” Helena whispered, her voice trembling.
Shephard spun on her, one finger extended in accusation. “You watch yourself, girl. I’ve kindly offered to pay your passage back home, but I can rescind that and just have you put on the street. You wouldn’t much like how a lady survives when she has no relatives to pity her. And if you interfere with me too much, I may just take back the extravagant offer I’m about to make your love and destroy him for the fun of it. You don’t want to carry the guilt of that, do you?”
She flinched and turned toward him. “Baldwin,” she whispered.
He recoiled at her expression and her tone. She was about to tell him that this offer was one he should consider. “No!” he snapped. “I won’t marry her, Helena.”
“No?” Shephard chuckled, continuing to insert himself between them. “Well, I need a title. I want it. I want to throw it in the faces of all those who have questioned me over the years due to my allegiances during the first war. I want the doors it will open, doors others have found closed thanks to renewed tensions between our two countries. Yours is the best of the lot, the highest of the eligible gentlemen.”
“The rank of it means nothing,” Baldwin insisted. “Great God, you can see it means nothing.”
“It means a great deal on paper. It means a great deal to tell those you contract with that your daughter is less than thirty deaths away from being queen.”
Baldwin stared at him, shocked by the depths of this man’s ambition. “Twenty-seven places from the throne might as well be twenty-seven hundred.”
Shephard shrugged. “Either way, I will have it. And I’ve told you, it’s a generous demand, really. You will have a great treasure in trade.”
“Your daughter?” Baldwin said.
“No!” Shephard glanced at Charity and sniffed. “She’s fine enough, though a disappointment, as a boy would have brought far more to my life.”
Charity turned her head, and Baldwin almost felt sorry for her. It seemed Helena wasn’t this man’s only target.
“No, I’m not trying to make a romantic argument about how happy you could be with Charity,” Shepard snorted. “I’m talking about the debts that will just go away. I’m talking about the fifty thousand pounds that will magically appear in your coffers. In my judgment, that will take a great deal of pressure off of you. And it will free you up to invest…or gamble, as I’ve heard you were once happy to do.”
Baldwin tensed. The man had done his research very well, it seemed. And he was now stabbing him with it and taking pleasure in finding every soft spot.
“In short, I will save you,” Shephard continued. “Or destroy you. It’s your choice. So what’s your pleasure?”
Helena could hardly breathe as she looked from her uncle’s cold and horrible countenance and back to Baldwin’s. She saw the pain there. The devastation as he realized that all he had planned for could not come to be. One way or another, there was no future as they’d hoped for. Either he would give up her, or give up everything else in his universe.
She couldn’t let him make that sacrifice.
“Baldwin,” she said, moving on him. When she caught his hand, he jumped, almost like he’d forgotten she was there. When he looked at her, the pain doubled. “You must consider what he’s suggesting.”
His face twisted in horror even more. “No!”
“I know,” she said, touching his face and trying desperately not to cry at the idea that it might be the very last time she would do that. “I know. But you must. He is not bluffing. He’ll ruin you and he’ll never feel an ounce of remorse about it.” She turned to her uncle. “Give us a moment.”
Uncle Peter smirked and then shrugged. “Certainly. I can be generous in that. But time is ticking, Helena. Come along, Charity.”
For a moment, her cousin just stood there, staring at Helena and Baldwin. Then she shook her head and followed her father from the room, leaving them alone again.
The moment they were, Baldwin turned to her. “I can see what you want to say to me. How you want to tell me I should sacrifice you. I will not do it, Helena. I can’t do it.”
She caught his hands. “My love, listen to me. We never intended for a future together. That was…” Her voice broke and she sucked in a breath. “That was a fantasy.”
“It was reality,” he insisted. “I asked you to be my wife. You told me you would. We were ready to tell the world and move forward. And have you considered that when we made love today, we could have created a child? Our child.”
Her hand stole to her belly as that concept slashed through her. Baldwin’s baby, growing inside of her even now.
“If we had known what he held over you,” she whispered, “we wouldn’t have done any of those things.”
He ran a hand over his face and let out an angry sound of frustration. As he did so, the door to the parlor opened and the room was suddenly filled as Charlotte and Ewan, the Duchess of Sheffield, Simon, Meg, James, Emma, Graham, Adelaide and Matthew all entered, filling the parlor almost to capacity. Helena turned away, wiping at the tears that were starting to fall.
“We were told that Shephard and his daughter left and thought we might have something to celebrate,” the Duchess of Sheffield said as she moved farther into the room. “But from your faces, it seems that is not true.”
Helena reached for Baldwin’s hand. He held it so tightly. Like if he refused to let it go, he would not have to let her go. She knew better.
“Some of you know the truth,” he said softly. “Others…well, I’ll explain later. All you need know is that Peter Shephard holds certain debts of mine that I am unable to pay. He is demanding I marry Charity or he will ruin me.”
The room was silent for a moment as looks of shock crossed the faces of all who were there. Then Ewan stepped forward and began to sign.
“I know what you’re saying without Charlotte even having to translate,” Baldwin said with a heavy sigh. “He refuses to accept any kind of payment from an outside source. The marriage is the only way he’ll clear the debts and keep his knowledge of my situation a secret.”
Helena swallowed hard. “I’ve told Baldwin that I believe he should accept the offer. I’ve told him that saving himself and his family should be his priority.”
Emma stepped forward, her dark eyes filled with tears. “Oh, Helena. Oh, I’m so sorry.”