Finally Kate lifted her head. “Just don’t tell me to stop loving him,” she said, choking out the words. “I couldn’t stop breathing, I couldn’t stop loving—” She lost her voice in a sob.
“I’m not,” Henry said. She pushed Kate gently backward, so she was lying down. “I am going to tell you to stop crying, though. You’re making yourself ill.” She got up and went to the washbasin, bringing back a cool, damp cloth. “Put this over your eyes.”
So Kate lay there under the wet cloth, feeling the sting of her swollen eyes, and the way her chest still hurt from the violence of her sobs, and the comfort of Henry’s fingers twined in hers.
“I won’t tell you to stop loving him,” Henry finally said, “because I know it’s not possible.”
“My father . . .”
“I cried for a week when I heard he died. I cried on his wedding night; I cried when your mother died, because I knew he would be hurt by it.” There was a moment’s pause. “I never cry,” Henry added.
Kate gave a watery chuckle. “I don’t either. Ever .”
Henry’s fingers tightened. “I’m so sorry, Kate. I’m just so sorry. All I can tell you is that life can be joyful, even if one of the people you love isn’t beside you. Because there will be others. I know it doesn’t feel that way, but it’s true. You’ll marry—”
“That’s the worst of it,” Kate burst out. “How am I going to marry anyone now? Now that I know—I know . . .” She fell silent, unable to put into words what it was like to nestle in Gabriel’s arms, to laugh with him, to relax against him, to make love to him. “I couldn’t,” she said flatly. His scent was imprinted in her skin, and the way he shook when she touched him, the way his face grew wild and needy.
“I know,” Henry said. “I know.” She got up. “I’m going to change your cloth. Your eyes look like raisins soaked in brandy.”
“Charming,” Kate said, her laugh cracking.
“Love is messy,” Henry said, pulling off the cloth and putting another cold one in its place. It was a little too wet, and a drop of chill water rolled down Kate’s cheek. Even as Kate was reaching to wipe it off, Henry patted her dry. “Messy, messy, messy.”
“I hate it,” Kate said, with conviction.
“Well, I don’t. Because it’s better to live like a flame, Kate, to know a man and love him, even if he can’t be yours, than never to love at all.”
“There will be no one else for me.” She said it out of the quiet conviction that it was true.
“Do you think I believed your father was perfect?”
Kate gave a strangled half giggle. “I doubt it.”
“He wasn’t,” Henry stated.
Kate nearly took off her cloth to see Henry’s face, but at that moment she heard her godmother get up and walk across the room. “He was not perfect,” Henry repeated. “He was a fool who believed that money was more important than love, that the two of us would never be happy together because he couldn’t provide for me as he felt he should.”
“Stupid ass,” Kate muttered.
“Maybe,” Henry said. “I do like being well-fed.” There was laughter in her voice. The cloth disappeared from Kate’s eyes and Henry peered down at her. “Much better,” she said with satisfaction. “I’ll get one more.”
Kate heard her walk away again. And then, over the splashing of water, she asked: “What does she look like, Henry?”
“The little Russian, you mean?”
“Gabriel’s bride,” Kate said. “What is she like?”
Henry lifted off the cloth and put a fresh one in its place. “She’s not you. She will never be you.”
“Yes, but—”
“It’s not important,” Henry stated. “Your mother was your mother. She loved your father, and I was glad of that. But I didn’t think about the two of them together, because it wouldn’t be helpful.”
“I suppose not,” Kate said.
“You can make yourself stop thinking of him,” Henry commanded.
Kate tried to imagine a world without Gabriel.
“Starting tonight.” Henry pulled off the cloth again. Kate opened her eyes. “Very good,” Henry said, as if she were checking the progress of a baking loaf. “You’ll be just fine in an hour or two.”
“I don’t think I want to go to the ball tonight,” Kate whispered. “I’m just not strong enough. He took us—Victoria and me—he took us into the garden behind the chapel, and his voice . . . it was as if he hardly knew me.”
“Don’t you dare start crying again,” Henry interrupted.
Kate gulped.
“You are going to that ball tonight. You are going to look more beautiful than you have ever looked in your life—because I am going to dress you. You are going to give that prince one last chance to be a man.”
“To be a man,” Kate said. “He is a man.” An image flashed into her mind of Gabriel standing before her naked, his chest heaving, his eyes hungry.
“Your father couldn’t imagine life any way other than he’d been taught. He’d been told since birth that because he was a younger son, he had to marry a rich woman. Your prince has been told that he has to marry the woman his brother chooses to send him.”
“He has the castle to support,” Kate protested.
“I’ll give him that,” Henry said. “He has far more responsibilities than your father did, and they’re real ones. His uncle is a loon, and it’s not as if those elderly princesses could start tatting lace to bring in money.”
“He has no choice,” Kate said, sighing.
“There’s always a choice. And tonight we’re going to make that choice brilliantly, absolutely clear to him.”
Kate sat up. She felt washed clean, as if all those tears had rinsed away some of the grief. “He won’t break his promise to marry Tatiana.”
“Then you’ll know for certain that he’s a fool,” Henry said. “I have to admit that my understanding of your father’s character was a great help in moments when I missed him. If Gabriel doesn’t have the backbone to take you, Kate, then he doesn’t deserve you.”
“I wish you could just tell him that,” Kate said, getting to her feet. “It would make it all so simple.”
Henry smiled wryly. “It is simple. You’ll be at the ball, and so will Tatiana. And there it is: his life before him. He can choose.”
“Did you have a night like this?” Kate asked, drifting over to the dressing table. Her eyes were not terrible, all things considered, though she looked awfully white.
“Your father’s betrothal ball.”
Kate turned around. “The very same occasion?”
“The very same. I wore yellow ribbed silk, trimmed with flounces and silk tassels. My skirts were so large I could hardly fit through a door. I wore a wig that night, and three patches. I painted my lips, which was far more scandalous in those days than it is now.”
“You must have been beautiful,” Kate said. Even now, Henry was absolutely luscious.