“It isn’t what you think,” Eli protested. “I wasn’t fighting with MacPherson over you. He insulted Hannah on the first day of the races, and I asked him to leave the ball so she wouldn’t have to see him. It wasn’t supposed to be more than that, only he—” Eli broke off here, gesturing heavenward with one hand. “He grabbed me from behind as I was about to leave, and I pushed him against the wall. I didn’t mean for it to happen. He caught me by surprise, and I apologized afterward. It was hardly a fight.”
Was that why Hannah hadn’t wanted to go back to Ascot on Wednesday? The revelation took some of the wind out of her sails. Mr. MacPherson didn’t deserve much sympathy, if he’d bullied a debutant.
“Why did Miss Berry thinkIwas the cause then?”
Eli’s gaze slunk away from hers. “I might have mentioned you briefly at the end.”
“Do tell.”
“I…advised him to stay away from you as well as Hannah.” At Jane’s look, he held up his hands in surrender. “I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have done it. It just slipped out.”
“It just slipped out?” she repeated. “You had no right to decide whom I talk to.”
“He wanted more than just talk from you,” Eli muttered darkly.
“And what if he did? It’s still not your place to interfere. We’re not—” She stopped herself without completing the thought, but it was too late.
Eli was watching her carefully. His features looked suddenly sharp, and his eyes had lost their usual warmth. “Go on. We’re not what?” Although he hadn’t raised his voice, there was an edge to his tone. “Speak to me plainly, as I asked you to from the outset.”
She didn’t want to. But it was too late to go back now.
“You and I haven’t…promised each other anything.” She’d been careful of that.
“We haven’t promised each other anything,” he repeated. A humorless laugh escaped his lips.
“Well, we haven’t.” It had been four days. An eyeblink in the span of her life. Surely neither of them thought it would last.
“What am I supposed to say to that?” His voice was still even, but Jane could tell that Eli was well and truly angry. The muscle in his jaw was working furiously, and he paced the green. “Am I supposed to make you an offer, Jane? Because I would if I thought it would solve everything, but I know it won’t change how you feel.”
Jane’s mouth tried to form words, but no sound came out.
“It’s obvious you still haven’t forgiven me,” Eli continued, “and I’m meant to just resign myself to it because there’s nothing else to do. You won’t hear me out. You won’t let it go. I can’t decide if you actually care for me or if this is just the most exquisite punishment you could devise.”
“I’m not punishing you,” Jane managed. Her mind had screeched to a halt at what he’d said about an offer, and she was still struggling to catch up. Had he really meant it? “OfcourseI care for you.”
“Do you?” he returned. “It doesn’t always feel that way. As soon as I get too close, you push me away again.”
She couldn’t handle this right now. She was still reeling at the loss of her club, fumbling for the grace to add the loss of Eli to the wound, even if she’d known it must happen eventually. What alternative was there?
“It isn’t fair to make me feel guilty for needing some time to sort out how I feel about all this. It’s been…confusing.” The word seemed woefully inadequate.
“That’s not what I’m trying to do.” Eli sighed. “If you need time, that’s one thing. But I don’t know how long we have together, and I don’t want to go back to sea knowing that you’re still holding agrudge over something I did five years ago. Otherwise, youarepunishing me, whether you mean to or not.”
“You’ve been gone from my life since you joined the navy,” she reminded him. “You’ve only been back two weeks. I can’t just resume our connection as though none of that ever happened.”
He acted as though it were as simple as snapping one’s fingers. As if, merely by coming back to England, he’d erased all her pain.
“I didn’t ask to be shipwrecked or captured,” Eli protested. “But I’m here now, and we have a chance to be together. Isn’t that what matters?”
“No!” Jane cried. The words were coming out too fast now; they shocked her as much as they shocked Eli. “What matters is that I thought you weredead. I thought you’d drowned somewhere far from home so that they couldn’t even find your body to give you a proper funeral, and I’d never get to talk to you again. And I couldn’t even tell anyone how much it hurt me, because you were someone else’s fiancé.”
She drew a shaking breath, raw as if the grief were still fresh. Eli stared at her with regret in his dark eyes, looking as lost as she felt. He lifted a hand toward her, but she took a step back.
“And if I start to care about you again now”—Jane fought to keep her voice steady—“you’re going to leave me in a few weeks to fight in Lord Melbourne’s ridiculous war and get yourself killed over some opium profits, only it will be real this time.That’swhat matters, Eli.”
“Jane, I—” Eli’s voice broke, and he drew a long breath before he continued. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know I put you through all that. I didn’t think—” He ran a hand over his brow, his hair falling out of place. “I didn’t realize that you cared so deeply.”
Jane didn’t say anything to that. What could she say? It was humiliating to admit how deeply she’d cared, when he’d chosen Cecily.
