"Where's Carmarthen?" Lifting his head, he looked around. "I assume he escorted you here?"
"He's waiting by the wall. He knows I came here to speak with you."
Martin looked into her eager, trusting face, into cornflower blue eyes that held none of the defiance he'd expected to see. Every instinct he possessed was screaming that whatever it was she wished to say to him, he would be better off not hearing. Yet, if he didn't, he'd always wonder…
Just the sight of her had been enough to make him forget all the rational, logical arguments for staying away from her.
"Very well." Lips compressing, he took her arm. "This way."
He steered her past the fireplace to a pair of French doors curtained with lace. Reaching between the curtains, he set one door swinging wide. Without hesitation, Amanda slipped through and out; he followed, closing the door, leaving them isolated on a narrow balcony overlooking the garden.
Totally private, yet not private enough to cause a scandal.
"What did you wish to discuss?"
She glanced at him; he could almost see her girding her loins as she faced him. "You told me of your past. You made it clear it-or rather its consequences-stand between us. I've quietly investigated how people view what happened, how the ton views you now." Her eyes searched his. "There are many who do not and never have accepted your guilt as a given."
He let his brows rise fractionally; he'd never really considered what the ton at large thought. The ton had never, of itself, been important to him. "How…" How what? Heartening? Hardly that. Interesting? The last thing he wished was to encourage her. He shrugged. "It matters little."
Her head rose. "On the contrary-it matters a great deal."
Her tone, the determined light in her eyes, the defiant tilt of her chin, alerted him to her direction. If he were resurrected in the ton's eyes…
The vision she was seeing, the impossible dream she was determined to pursue, broke across his mind. Acceptance, his true position… her. All that and so much more, all he'd blocked from his mind for the past ten years-
Wrenching his mind away, cutting off the thoughts, drowning the vision, took an effort that left his gut knotted, his lungs tight. "No."
She frowned, opened her lips-
"It won't work." He had to stop her from raising the spectre, stop it from gaining further flesh. "It's not that I haven't considered clearing my name." All too frequently during the past week. "But it happened ten years ago, and even at the time there was not a whisper of proof to support my tale-no one able to bear me witness."
Her frown deepened. After a moment, she said, "You do see, don't you, what could be… all that you could have?"
He held her gaze, succinctly replied, "Yes." He saw all too well. Knew how much he longed to seize, to possess. Knew that in this case, trying and failing would be infinitely worse than not trying at all.
If he-they-attempted to clear his name and failed…
That was one scenario he didn't ever want to face. To raise the spectre of having a life he'd accepted as denied him long ago, only to see that hope dashed irretrievably. To know she would be tainted by the association; impossible for her interest to go unremarked.
And, despite all, one point had never, over all the years, escaped him-if he hadn't murdered old Buxton, who had?
Since his return to London, he'd grown even more equivocal about learning the answer to that question. Yet uncovering and publishing that answer might well be what it took to clear his name.
Dragging in a breath, he forced his gaze from her, looked out over the garden and tried to drag his senses in, tried to erect some barrier between himself and the woman he was with-usually an easy task.
He'd never managed it with her. And the balcony was so damned small. "There's no point pursuing it. There's nothing I, or even we, can do." He added, his tone harsh, "I didn't tell you the tale to gain your support-I told you so you'd understand why I have no future in the ton." He paused, then added, "The past is dead and buried."
Silence, then she spoke softly, "Buried, perhaps-but not dead."
He didn't glance her way, didn't want to see her face, her eyes.
After a moment, she went on, her tone hardening, "I find it difficult to believe that you're deliberately turning your back on your life-on what your life would be if your name was cleared."
Would be, he noted, not could; she had a single-mindedness he found disarming.
When he didn't respond, she exploded. "Why?" The word rang with frustration. "I know you well enough to know you have a reason."
He had a plethora of reasons, none of which she needed to know. He could readily imagine her opinion, her demolition of his concern for her. He forced himself to look into her brilliant eves, saw emotion glittering in the blue, and knew in that instant that he had to make her believe she'd misjudged him, that all she'd learned of him over the past weeks she'd misread.